Gladiator FAQ and discussion thread

[Requiel]

Gladiator FAQ and Discussion

OUTDATEDPLEASE VISIT HERE FOR MORE INFO

What is gladiator Resolve/stance?
Gladiator's Resolve is a level 100 talent only available to protection warriors, the talent modifies both Battle and Defensive Stance. Battle stance is turned into Gladiator Stance which increases all physical damage done by 20% and replaces Shield Block with Shield Charge, This stance allows the warrior to forgo its taking ability and become a DPS spec. Defensive stance is buffed with an additional 5% mitigation, for a total of 30%.

YOU CAN NOT SWITCH STANCES IN COMBAT ONCE YOU HAVE GLADIATOR’S RESOLVE

How does shield charge work?
Shield charge works exactly like shield block. It has 2 charges both a 15 second CD and only one charge can be cooling down at a time (one charge waits for the other charge before starting its cd). one charge gives you 6 seconds of the buff and like shield block, two charges can be used at once for a 12 second buff.

Is X final?
Everything in beta is likely to change at some point.

Will it be competitive dps? Yes
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Please stop tweeting Celestalon, if you need 14 times to confirm it, I’ll eat a shoe.

Is gladiators AoE competitive?
Currently gladiators AoE is very strong due to Deep Wounds, not a bursty as the other two spec’s AoE. It keeps up with Ravager which is considered to be a tad OP currently. Gladiator has a strong cleave abilities such as Revenge, Thunder Clap and Heroic Strike (Glyph of Cleave), currently glad is one of the better spec with 3 target cleave, but like everything is up for change.


Will I be able to tank?
Short answer: not while in gladiator stance, but you can still tank in defensive stance. (Source)


Long answer: while in gladiator stance you lose the passive ability Unwavering Sentinel which (Source)

• Increases your armor (a good stat in WoD)
• Increases your stamina
• Makes you crit immune (required for tanking)
• Increases your expertise ( 3% extra chance not be parried)

You also lose

• Ability to switch into defensive stance (25% damage reduction)
• Ability to generate resolve (WoD vengeance)
• Shield block (primary active mitigation)
• Threat generation (defensive stance)

Since it doesn’t have these things it’s safe to assume it will be treated like a DPS when it comes to assigned buffs and debuffs e.g. Flag carrier debuff, spoils buff, etc.

What are our Defensives/utility?

Gladiators have access to these person CDs:

• Shield Wall – 40% 12 seconds
• Last Stand – 30% max health 20 seconds
• Demoralizing Shout – 20% damage reduction 10 seconds
• No raid wide CDs
• Shield Barrier (Reduces damage output by a lot)

Arms and fury have

• Die by the Sword – 30% damage reduction 100% parry for 8 seconds
• Defensive Stance – 25% damage reduction, unlimited duration and no cd.
• Rallying Cry – 15% max health to everyone and 20% life leech if glyphed

Gladiator has more stackable CDs, but arms and fury has a 25% reduction with no CD and unlimited Duration. Unless you’re soaking one large hit, arms and fury will take slightly less damage in a raid if used properly.

Wheres recklessness?
Glad doesn’t have its own baseline CD unlike arms and fury which have recklessness; gladiator will be tuned around the fact that it has one less CD. This doesn’t necessarily mean it’s going to have a problem with bursting down targets, Glad has access to the tier 90 talents, can pool rage and shield charge charges to burst down a target. It will be slightly less than arms and fury but this is one of its slight weaknesses

Burst comparisons PreTuning

45 second burst:


30 Second burst:



15 Second burst:



What Stats will gladiator use?
Bonus armor is Gladiators number one stat for Gladiator; Bonus armor is a secondary stat that gives the warrior 1 Attack power which is equivalent to 1 point of Strength (5% less due to stats buff). Bonus armor is obtained from; cloaks, rings, necks and some trinkets it is also available in temp buff form from Food and potions (flasks aren’t properly implemented like the other ones are so they are most likely gone).

Since Bonus armor is the weighted so much higher than the other secondary stats, playing Gladiator without bonus armor will not be optimal. The difference between using Bonus armor on all pieces (that it’s available on) VS using other secondary stats is roughly between 3-5% damage.




Bonus armor should not show up on shields and should be given to primary tanks first. (source)


All the other stats are meant to be close but consider there hasn’t been any fine tuning so they cannot be ranked yet, but here’s a list of what they do:

Crit: Base damage increase (1% to 1% damage), increases rage generation and addition damage via enrage.

Mastery: increase AP by 8+X%, X is equal to 1 mastery (not mastery rating) which is 110 rating in WoD or 600 in MoP.

Haste: increase attack speed and reduces the GCD and the cooldown of Thunder clap and Shield slam (via headlong rush), Both the GCD and CD is calculated by using this formula:

Reduced cd = (1/(1+Haste))*CD
Haste being in decimal form i.e. 19% = 0.19

Haste reduction is linear for both the GCD and the CD reduction meaning that there will always be 3 GCDs between each shield slam (with no Procs). This effect for the GCD stops at 50% haste (1 second GCD) but continues to lower the CD of spells.

Multi-strike: like crit it’s a flat increase your damage done and Procs Blood craze (Currently works for glad, but not sure if it is intended)

Versatility: Flat increase to damage/healing (x%) and damage reduction(x/2%).

Talent Breakdowns

T45


T60


T90



What problems does gladiator currently have?

• Due to gladiator only having one 1h weapon damage based talents will almost always be inferior to AP based abilities (less choice). This effect was reduced when they bumped up the % which AP contributes to weapon damage.
• Mastery isn’t great considering it’s our attunement.
• currently has resolve (should be tied to d stance like vengeance)

Isn’t this like bear-catting?
It’s similar to bear-catting in the fact a tank spec can go to dps, but unlike bear catting you cannot switch stance/forms in combat to dps when you’re not currently tanking, which made bear-catting OP.

Can I shadow meld and switch stance?
Shadow meld does not take you out of combat in and instance, so you can’t switch stances by shadow melding.

Does HLR conflict with SS reset?
No, this was a screw up on my part. SnB contributes the same % reduction on SS CD at any haste level.

Will this affect prot tuning and vice versa?
Not likely, tanks are tuned to be 75-80% of a dps spec in terms of damage. Which means if glad is OP it’s likely that prot is as well. Tuning can be done specifically via shield charge and the bonus damage on the stance itself.

Pruned passives:

• Sword and board is now baked into Devastate
• Ultimatum is baked into Shield slam
• Blood and thunder is now baked into Thunder clap

Are there any haste caps?
there are two haste caps, one at 25% haste and another at 50% haste. these caps allow for an extra gcds inside the shield charge buff, both are insignificant and would never be worth going for.

Do we have Set bonuses?
The intention is to have set bonuses affect both Gladiator and Prot warriors, these would act like the feral set bonuses (between bc and cata), which affected a common ability or did different thing based on which stance (form) you were in. (source)


Additional info:
http://sentrytotem.com/classes/warri...rise-gladiator
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CdtULPg1q3s
http://gladiatorsresolve.blogspot.com
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5LjIPLTU0PU

[Mirishka]

Excellent info, thanks.

[Keensteel]

Gladiator stance is a fucking joke. The class and game don't need for it to exist. If a Prot warrior wants to DPS then the mother fucker should go Arms or Fury and change his spec just like any other class in the game.

How about fixing Arms and Fury...!

[Valech]

Gladiator stance is a fucking joke. The class and game don't need for it to exist. If a Prot warrior wants to DPS then the mother fucker should go Arms or Fury and change his spec just like any other class in the game.

How about fixing Arms and Fury...!

I find this awesome and a step into the direction of fourth speccs. Also, It frees up a specc for me to finally PvP in Arms.

[Zirhark]

Gladiator stance is a fucking joke. The class and game don't need for it to exist. If a Prot warrior wants to DPS then the mother fucker should go Arms or Fury and change his spec just like any other class in the game.

How about fixing Arms and Fury...!

To oppose your opinion, I love the fact they are fulfilling the fantasy role of a sword and shield dmg class.

[Keensteel]

To oppose your opinion, I love the fact they are fulfilling the fantasy role of a sword and shield dmg class.

and they could have just as easily integrated shield play into Arms and/or Fury as well (Arms seems to be the natural choice).

We are discussing 2 different things anyway. Shield play integration and giving Prot warriors a DPS spec are 2 very different things... Prot warriors should change spec if they want to deal damage specifically, just like every other fucking class in the game...

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I find this awesome and a step into the direction of fourth speccs. Also, It frees up a specc for me to finally PvP in Arms.

fourth spec...

How about giving us 3 functional, interesting specs to start with?

[Archimtiros]

and they could have just as easily integrated shield play into Arms and/or Fury as well (Arms seems to be the natural choice).

We are discussing 2 different things anyway. Shield play integration and giving Prot warriors a DPS spec are 2 very different things... Prot warriors should change spec if they want to deal damage specifically, just like every other fucking class in the game...

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fourth spec...

How about giving us 3 functional, interesting specs to start with?

They are completely separate issues. Arms needs fixing, Fury needs Heroic Strike back, but neither of those have any impact on the development of Glad Stance.

[Keensteel]

Development requires time and resources. Welcome to the real world, Archie. #realjobsintherealworld

[Jeroun]

at this point if fury or arms dont change glad might be the only stance worth dpsing which makes me sad. Although i love the idea.

[Archimtiros]

Development requires time and resources. Welcome to the real world, Archie. #realjobsintherealworld

Dude, don't even start. First off, Glad took very little work to get started and even less work conceptually. Literally all you do is replace one button in the rotation to give a buff and turn off a bunch of defensive abilities. I know it takes some design time, but most of that is spent iterating damage balance.

That aside, Glad has been "done" since it was first unveiled (for alpha, not blizzcon), we haven't seen so much as a minor change to it or protection in general. Fury and Arms are constantly getting tweaked, changed, looked at; so obviously design time is being spent there.

The question isn't the amount of time being spent, but if we are happy with the design route they are taking.

[Earthbound]

Yo, Keen, you really think the people who spent a lazy afternoon making Glad Stance happen took valuable dev time away from Arms or Fury?

You're delusional, bro.

#hashtagsomethingherebecausei'mcoolapparently

[Keensteel]

Yo, Keen, you really think the people who spent a lazy afternoon making Glad Stance happen took valuable dev time away from Arms or Fury?

You're delusional, bro.

#hashtagsomethingherebecausei'mcoolapparently

Your post doesn't even make sense. It's contradictory. Or, is your argument that Gladiator Stance was developed in an afternoon, in which case I would say this to you, "I would rather be delusional than stupid."

In regards to Archie's post, dude, how can you even pen those comments? Do you work for Blizzard and have insider knowledge? Your post is all opinion and most of the content is pure speculation.

[Archimtiros]

Do you work for Blizzard and have insider knowledge? Your post is all opinion and most of the content is pure speculation.

No and yes.


How is you claiming that Glad development somehow took away from the development of other specs anything but pure speculation? My point, Gladiator hasn't been touched since the first Alpha notes went out. Fury and Arms received multiple changes after that happened and are still in a state of flux while Gladiator is actually very solid. That is clear and obvious that they aren't too busy dealing with Gladiator to work on Arms/Fury. Anyone could reason that out.

[Earthbound]

Your post doesn't even make sense. It's contradictory. Or, is your argument that Gladiator Stance was developed in an afternoon, in which case I would say this to you, "I would rather be delusional than stupid."

In regards to Archie's post, dude, how can you even pen those comments? Do you work for Blizzard and have insider knowledge? Your post is all opinion and most of the content is pure speculation.

You REALLY think it took them more than a day or two to come up with:

Gladiator Stance: Increases all Physical DMG by 20% and allows you to Shield Charge

???

[Neronis]

I'm really excited for this because of how unreliable the devs are with Arms/Fury changes atm. Plus it looks like fun with Shield Charge. Seems like a more reliable Fury, to be honest. I wish I got a beta invite so I could see it. I like the idea of it being tuned higher because it has no Reck. PLUS I GET TO USE ALL THESE COOL SHIELD AND 1H TRANSMOG STUFF! I'm totally on board.

[Requiel]

I'm really excited for this because of how unreliable the devs are with Arms/Fury changes atm. Plus it looks like fun with Shield Charge. Seems like a more reliable Fury, to be honest. I wish I got a beta invite so I could see it. I like the idea of it being tuned higher because it has no Reck. PLUS I GET TO USE ALL THESE COOL SHIELD AND 1H TRANSMOG STUFF! I'm totally on board.

Plus you get to use heroic strike


too soon?

[Flaks]

You REALLY think it took them more than a day or two to come up with:

Gladiator Stance: Increases all Physical DMG by 20% and allows you to Shield Charge

???

With having to balance it against 2 other specs that are currently facing wild changes in gameplay mechanics as well as eventually damage tuning, yes, it's most likely taking a fuckton of time out of fixing two already existing specs.

[Requiel]

With having to balance it against 2 other specs that are currently facing wild changes in gameplay mechanics as well as eventually damage tuning, yes, it's most likely taking a fuckton of time out of fixing two already existing specs.

Considering that it shares all of prots damaging abilities, all of that "fuckton" of tuning would need to be done anyway for protection.

[Earthbound]

With having to balance it against 2 other specs that are currently facing wild changes in gameplay mechanics as well as eventually damage tuning, yes, it's most likely taking a fuckton of time out of fixing two already existing specs.

No. Not even...no.

They are spending NO time on Glad Stance because it's simple. Tell me, how many changes / iterations of GStance play have you seen in the notes?

[Keensteel]

No. Not even...no.

They are spending NO time on Glad Stance because it's simple. Tell me, how many changes / iterations of GStance play have you seen in the notes?

That's because it is new to the game, dumbass. No one is vested in Glad stance at this point. It has no final iteration yet so people are just going to test what they have been given and take it however Blizz gives it to them. Testing Gladiator Stance has been so limited up to this point. Arms and Fury have people vested in their play. And Fury, in particular, is considered a solid spec by many in the community.

What Flaks posted may or may not be true. That was never my argument in the first place. My argument was, get what you have in place right first, before bringing anything new into the mix.

I still feel like there is a chance that Gladiator stance will be nixed altogether before the end of Beta or it's mechanics will be rolled into Arms in some form or fashion. Shield play integration is what should be the driving force to Gladiator stance, or some form thereof, not giving Prot warriors the ability to do competitive damage in a 4th, unneeded spec. Yes, those are my opinions.