Made two thanes during this i50 phase.

1 troll, spec: 50 SC / 42 shield / 39 hammer / 6 parry

1 Norse, spec 50 SC / 50 shield / 25 hammer / 14 parry (MoB IV )

Both in the free gear, troll was up to 334 str with self buffs...only 100 weaponskill difference between the two toons.

Liked the norse spec better tbh, could be a decent solo farmer. Reality of PvP situation? prolly would not be able to lay a finger on them

Interesting that here on Uthgard 2.0 that weapon spec does not appear to matter as much?

Afaik str. has only a small effect in numbers at WF, so it ´s possible working as intended. I just dunno if 100 WF difference has a big effect in the to hit formula/defence penetration that might be a big point picking a troll instead of Norse.

But the Norse has better dex/qui so quicker casts and better block/parry, I would recommend a troll as a pure offtank for hybrid/shield tanks I would go for norse, as a thane dwarf might be good choice too for the coolness and roleplay aspects

Also I would prefer the first specc of yours, 42 shield is enough for the slam and your blockrate is still nice, also not sure about the 50 SC, thenaes with cast focus had their potential but I think it was later on with trials of Atlantis and later, with 1.65 I for myself would probably prefer more points in weapon, but dunno.

Thanks for the reply.

Stormcalling is the Thane's signature line, 50 spec is surely the way to go?

I did a few tests between the two thanes and the troll defo hits harder, no doubt about it.

Not sure how the two would perform in a PvP situation tbh. 25 hammer would perhaps be a tad low to try and land some hits (well, 25+11 items plus RR).

Need some decent parry vs dual wielders tho, plus cookie cutter is soooo boring

50 SC doesn't do that much for you. The damage boost on spells is extremely minimal and the yellow str/con isn't that much worse since it's a spec buff (nominal value *1,25 = actual value) and gets kind of close to the cap anyways. I'm not saying 50 SC not worth it, just keep in mind that 48 or 50 SC isn't notably different at all. I personally would put my points elsehwhere, but either is fine.

That being said, I'd never go below 29 hammer on a thane (or any other hammer-using character, that is). Conquer is your best style hands down and the main reason you should go hammer in the first place. If you want to run a (very) defensive solo spec, I'd recommend 48 SC, 42 Shield, 29 Hammer, 30 Parry. Defensive group spec could be something like 48 SC, 50 Shield, 32 Hammer. I was so far advised to not go below 39 Hammer spec for damage/WS, but I feel like this doesn't apply on Uthgard 2.0 as much as it would otherwise. I have run extensive tests and found that weapon spec doesn't nearly matter as I thought it would. If you want to be on the safe side, though, 48 SC, 42 Shield, 39 Hammer (lower accordingly as you progress in RR), 15+ parry is a very decent allround spec.

Regarding race, I'd go Norse for both grouping and soloing. Thanes are not designed to be melee damage dealers IMO, I'd never seriously compromise my defenses and abilities to cast in favour of more weapon damage - both solo and grouped.

Garlak wrote:50 SC doesn't do that much for you. The damage boost on spells is extremely minimal and the yellow str/con isn't that much worse since it's a spec buff (nominal value *1,25 = actual value) and gets kind of close to the cap anyways. I'm not saying 50 SC not worth it, just keep in mind that 48 or 50 SC isn't notably different at all. I personally would put my points elsehwhere, but either is fine.

That being said, I'd never go below 29 hammer on a thane (or any other hammer-using character, that is). Conquer is your best style hands down and the main reason you should go hammer in the first place. If you want to run a (very) defensive solo spec, I'd recommend 48 SC, 42 Shield, 29 Hammer, 30 Parry. Defensive group spec could be something like 48 SC, 50 Shield, 32 Hammer. I was so far advised to not go below 39 Hammer spec for damage/WS, but I feel like this doesn't apply on Uthgard 2.0 as much as it would otherwise. I have run extensive tests and found that weapon spec doesn't nearly matter as much as it does elsewhere. If you want to be on the safe side, though, 48 SC, 42 Shield, 39 Hammer (lower accordingly as you progress in RR), 15+ parry is a very decent allround spec.

Thanks for the well thought out response, some interesting stuff in there.

Conquer has no 'To Hit' bonus, I appreciate it is a very important RvR tool with the snare component but does it miss quite a lot in RvR? Personally I always thought the two in the chain off block stun and Frost Hammer were the good ones (along with Provoke using a tiny amount of endo )

Will experiment with the specs you have mentioned, thanks.

Personally I always thought the two in the chain off block stun and Frost Hammer were the good ones (along with Provoke using a tiny amount of endo )

These are very useful styles, too, I was speaking more from a group perspective here, where peeling in the backline is what you'll do most on a defensive thane. If you strictly want to solo, you might be able to get by without conquer, but even then, IMO a 60% snare that lasts for like 23 seconds is too good to pass up. For example, when you're fighting a tank and manage to stun him, just get in a few free styles of your choice, then hit conquer and get distance to nuke. Melee snares ignore resistances, so even if your opponent has determination 5, which isn't that likely on a soloer, he'll be snared for a decent amount of time, allowing you to get the distance needed to nuke him down. You can even do that by running through your opponent without hitting a stun first, but it requires a bit more timing to pull off.

Conquer has no 'To Hit' bonus, I appreciate it is a very important RvR tool with the snare component but does it miss quite a lot in RvR?

I never had particular problems hitting conquer in RvR. Take this with a grain of salt, but IIRC, to hit bonus only affects "whiffing", not defense penetration vs block, evade, parry. Even if it does, conquer is a back positional style, eleminating block and parry, leaving you with advanced evade - which is more often than not (unless facing a savage or BM with a lot of dodger) fairly insignificant.

Thanks for the tips, certainly made me think about the different specs available.

As far as templating goes, I take it thanes will be a nightmare to do this patch?

5 stats / all resists / 3 skills +11

Or is it simply not possible due to lack of available high utility items and sacrifices need to be made somewhere?

Just wanting to piggy back on this...

Trying to decide if 39 or 44 Hammer is worth it (the style)? If I use a 2 hander and I'm over 50 doesn't it get a little better still? I think I read that somewhere. This would also mean I would go either 50 SC or 48 SC, so the buffs aren't really needed? I plan on running solo sometimes if that helps.

Wulver wrote:Just wanting to piggy back on this...

Trying to decide if 39 or 44 Hammer is worth it (the style)? If I use a 2 hander and I'm over 50 doesn't it get a little better still? I think I read that somewhere. This would also mean I would go either 50 SC or 48 SC, so the buffs aren't really needed? I plan on running solo sometimes if that helps.

if you stop before 50 SC your lose the 75 str/con buff, the previous is 63 str/con

Unless you plan to not get Slam, you can't go 48 SC / 44 Hammer.

I was looking at specs, how come no one goes sword? it being more dps and with every group being forced to run a shammy or 2.

AND

Is 29 in weapon style too few points to be viable?

29 hurts your DPS a lot, 39 allows you to get 50 composite, and that's good.

As for why people go hammer, there are mostly two reasons. First, the anytime's low endu cost, which is very good while leveling or when solo'ing (don't forget your spells cost endurance too). Second, the back snare is amazing (long duration) in pretty much any RvR situation. Third (I know, I said two), getting a slow effect is relatively easy in 1vs1 (after block), and that's nice.

With sword on the other hand, well you would need to go 50 because not getting a decent positional would reduce your overall damage by a large amount (less in solo, but still), and 50 would mean not getting slam (which isn't necessarily a bad thing in my opinion). The anytime apparently costs a lot of endurance and so can be difficult to use on a Thane (you can use the anytime chain as a substitution but the first hit is really weak). There's also no reliable quick way of getting a decent snare effect (2nd hit of the side chain, or 2nd hit of the anytime chain but low duration), which is a very powerful effect in RvR. Finally, placing a slow effect in a 1vs1 requires a stun.

Don't get me wrong, Sword isn't bad, but Sword is pretty much all about Ragnarok. Go 50 or go Hammer (or Axe, but I don't know much about it).

Actually, I would love to use something else than Hammer, but I just can't find any reason.

So I've been thinking about a Slam-less Thane for a few days.

The only reason to raise Shield that high is to get Slam, which can easily be substituted by positional stuns (this is coming from someone who played Valewalker for years). As for Guard and block chance, the difference between 42 Shield and 35 (Paralyze) is around 3%. Sure, we make a slightly less effective Guard bot, but let's see what we gain in return. Stopping at Paralyze would notably allow for 50 SC / 44 Weapon / 12 Parry.

While 44 Weapon doesn't give any particularly interesting style, they are still usable (unless you go Sword). It obviously also increases Weaponskill and 2H damage bonus. It's hard to guess how much it brings in term of damage and defense penetration, but for a 210 skill points investment I'm guessing it shouldn't be too bad.

50 SC gives the last buff (it reaches the cap, for comparison a Shaman needs its last buff and MotA III to do the same), which represents an increase of 15 points in strength and constitution (around 50 HP I believe) compared to the previous one, for 99 skill points.

With both, I believe we can expect a noticeable melee damage difference (however the spell damage difference definitely won't be). How much exactly? That's what I want to know. I know what we lose for not reaching Slam (around 3% block chance, and that's pretty much it as I don't value Slam much), but I don't know exactly what we gain (50 HP and a certain amount of damage).

Any thought?

I tried many thing with sced thane during beta and 5l ra i prefer troll but maybe cause i'm more a melee thane than based on sc (i play war as main). Fact is i'm ok with the guy that explain 42 is not a must have with shield. I prefer positional and play 50 weapon 50 sc(or 46 .........) rest shield (as troll i let what left in parry). If you play norse dex/qui parry could be a difference but honnestly i don't see the point . Just my view on thane i played with mob 3 mopain 3 mop (parry 2 or 3 don't remember). Don't forget ra thane in 1.65 are very poor . Selfbuff is very good as a thane but you can't specialise in determination that's why my main is 50 war but with purge if you solo in df it could be cool

I like,

44 Stormcalling (highest instant DDs)
44 Hammer (Sledgehammer rear followup dmg)
42 Shield (Slam)
13 Parry

Troll so that you get highest melee damage.