Larger low-medium health difference?

[The Boz.2038]

The game divides the professions into three "classes" of health. Let's call them Low, Medium, and High. 
At level 80, with no additional Vitality from gear and traits, they have 11645, 15922, and 19212 health, respectively.
Note that the difference betweem the Low health and Medium health classes (4277) is larger than the difference between the Medium health and High health classes (3290). In addition to this nearly one thousand health of extra difference, the relative difference is even more stark: a Medium health class has 36,7% more health than a Low health class, while a High health class has only 20,7% more health than a Medium (and a whopping 65% more health than the Low).

Now, I like the idea of there being a difference in health between the major professions, but... does that seem odd to anyone else? To have the have-nots so much worse than the haves and have-lots, in both absolute and relative terms? It seems even ANet is aware of this, given how eager they are to give us new Vitality gear, and a PvE-only Vitality boost (of a whopping +235!)...
I remember there were conversations about this shortly after the game's launch, and the reasons stated/deduced back then were "the low health classes have more tools to evade and block attacks, but are more vulnerable to conditions" and "in longer fights, sustain will outdo the bulk health difference easily", but nothing about that explains the increased relative difference. Furthermore, the evolving game design of e-specs and power creep of damage and utility has made these arguments even more moot, I think. And additionally, the low health classes' heals are also kept a tiny bit weaker, because someone somewhere thought that the percentage of health they could gain with a single cast was relevant or something...
Can anyone think of a good reason why it's like this? Is there something that would fundamentally break if the health values were a tiny bit shaken and crunched up around a, say, 16000 +/-3000 value? Or just adding a simple 1000 health bump-up to the low health classes?
Bonus question: would anyone else like to see their health end in a 0?

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

Yes, please buff Necro and Warrior base values more, this discrepancy is astounding.

[The Boz.2038]

7 minutes ago, Lan Deathrider.5910 said:

Yes, please buff Necro and Warrior base values more, this discrepancy is astounding.

Sorry, but...

o.O

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

In all seriousness though I think the deltas should be the same, but the easier thing would be to lower the base HP of the medium health professions rather than raise the HP of the lower tier. The lower tier has tools to avoid damage entirely whereas the upper tier has fewer such tools. You could argue that the medium tier has the best of both worlds though.

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

Just now, The Boz.2038 said:

Sorry, but...

o.O

That post was sarcasm, I gave you a separate more serious response.

[The Boz.2038]

If lowering med/hi HP is a better idea, why does ANet think giving us more HP is the way to go?

(for the record, I disagree with you, because there are *tons* of "conventional" attacks on random PvE mobs that will absolutely one-shot an elementalist and make a warrior just raise an eyebrow)

Edited February 21, 2022 by The Boz.2038

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

8 minutes ago, The Boz.2038 said:

If lowering med/hi HP is a better idea, why does ANet think giving us more HP is the way to go?

(for the record, I disagree with you, because there are *tons* of "conventional" attacks on random PvE mobs that will absolutely one-shot an elementalist and make a warrior just raise an eyebrow)

Sure, if the ele went full glass and forgot their sustain skills/dodge. There are PvE mobs that will one shot a warrior just as fast.

 

Anet definitely went overboard on the extra defense stats from espec lines it seems in EoD. Looking at Harbinger specifically. But we'll see next week.

 

Back on point in though, just because there is a disparity does not mean that the answer is to raise the HP of the lowest tier, not should they considering the tools they've provided to offset those lower HP values.

Its just as valid to raise the HP of the upper tier so that there is no difference in the deltas, or to lower the HP of the middle tier for the same reason.

[The Boz.2038]

It is not as valid, if a third of the roster is getting one-shot by a pretty significant portion of the HoT and PoF veterans and above. Sure, warrior can theoretically be one-shot, but much fewer mobs have the capacity to do that. Much, much fewer.

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

9 minutes ago, The Boz.2038 said:

It is not as valid, if a third of the roster is getting one-shot by a pretty significant portion of the HoT and PoF veterans and above. Sure, warrior can theoretically be one-shot, but much fewer mobs have the capacity to do that. Much, much fewer.

That third of the roster was also given things like aegis and blind  to not take damage in the first place. Kind of the same argument over ppl QQing about being one shot in WvW by a glass cannon while running glass stats. I also do believe that those three classes also, either on core or via an elite spec can grab vitality boosting traits. Kind of makes it a moot point then does it not?

[The Boz.2038]

Everybody can grab vitality boosting traits. Not a moot point at all.

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

20 minutes ago, The Boz.2038 said:

Everybody can grab vitality boosting traits. Not a moot point at all.

So why don't you do that then?

[The Boz.2038]

What a lacking reply...

 

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

2 minutes ago, The Boz.2038 said:

What a lacking reply...

 

The moment you acknowledged the ability to take more vitality...

[The Boz.2038]

Low health classes start off with a deficiency of health. Investing in health means they don't invest in other stuff. Other than current guardian, all other low health classes are not compensated for this investment to get back up to "barely par".

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

1 minute ago, The Boz.2038 said:

Low health classes start off with a deficiency of health. Investing in health means they don't invest in other stuff. Other than current guardian, all other low health classes are not compensated for this investment to get back up to "barely par".

What they do have are things like blind, ports, evades, invulns, and stealth which are why they have lower HP. You want to increase their HP, fine, but then those classes would have to give up some of their active mitigation in return.

[The Boz.2038]

1 hour ago, Lan Deathrider.5910 said:

What they do have are things like blind, ports, evades, invulns, and stealth which are why they have lower HP. You want to increase their HP, fine, but then those classes would have to give up some of their active mitigation in return.

And they have exactly that -1000 HP of those, right? Is that your honest belief?

[draxynnic.3719]

There is a degree to which the lower health professions are offset by having more sustain. They're more susceptible to spikes, but in situations where the threat is more one of being worn down by pressure instead of being spiked down, they last longer... potentially lasting indefinitely where a higher-health profession will be worn down.

However, I think there are two problems with the current approach:

First, damage values coming from PCs have been normalised so that elementalists don't dominate DPS roles in raids. Used to be that an elementalist could afford to take somewhat more defensive stats because it would simply be offsetting higher base damage values, but that hasn't been so for a long time. If they take enough vitality to make up the difference in survivability, then they're going to be slower at everything. Might as well suggest that high-health professions balance their lower sustain by bringing more healing power.

Second, the prevalence of attacks that can 100-0 a low health profession in PvE have greatly increased. Currently, that's somewhat hidden in the higher-end modes by the high availability of aegis and barrier, but firebrand and scourge being nerfed will likely reduce that, and there are plenty of attacks in the higher-end fractals which for lower-health professions, are basically "dodge or aegis or die", and there are increasing numbers of them in the open world as well. Thief and guardian do have a lot of blocks, evades, and so on, but they often only need to make one mistake to be on the floor, while higher-health professions still usually have access to one when they really need it if they don't waste them (warrior in particular: they may not match guardians and thieves for blocks and evades, but they still have quite a few) and can afford a mistake or two. When it comes to elementalist... elementalist justifies its low health pool through its ability to heal rather than prevent damage, it really doesn't have significantly more damage prevention than warrior has. 

Third, the inverse relationship between health and sustain was largely set based on the core professions. A spellbreaker, for instance, can mitigate quite a bit better than a core warrior just through Full Counter, and I think warrior self-healing is also quite a bit stronger than it was on release. Scourge barriers also significantly increase the sustain of necromancer if they choose to build that way. Now, you can also say that elite specialisations increase the sustain and mitigation of low-health professions as well, but it's likely that the relative differences are not the same as they were when the base health values were decided on.

I think it is fair to say that the degree to which having a lower health pool is a handicap in PvE has increased compared to where it was when those totals were set, and it might well increase further due to announced balance changes. So it probably is reasonable to review the base health values.

[Mell.4873]

The only valid thing I see if the fractal modifier that lowers the health by a percentage is to punishing on low health classes. I small bumb on low health classes would be fine by me, it would not directly buff necro with it also being a light armor class but instead buff Elementalist and Thief. The problem will be guardian but a small health increase won't make it op since most of there defence comes from aegis. 

Edited February 22, 2022 by Mell.4873

[Gotejjeken.1267]

I'd rather shuffle the health pools--there is no reason Necro should be a 'high health' class. 

Should just tie health to armor weight (heavies have more, lights less, medium in middle) and then adjust defensive abilities accordingly.  So, a light armor class should have a high skill ceiling but ultimately be harder to play than a heavy armor one (higher skill floor as well).  

Kind of used to work like that, run into a warrior or guardian then could be a noob that could do massive damage if you weren't paying attention; run into a mesmer or elementalist and you hoped they were a noob, or you were just dead.  

Edited February 22, 2022 by Gotejjeken.1267

[Jski.6180]

I am all for lowering hp on high hp classes and bring up hp on low hp classes. The fact that it dose vary as much as it dose is an issues of anet not letting ppl build there class the way they want.

[The Boz.2038]

5 hours ago, Mell.4873 said:

The only valid thing I see if the fractal modifier that lowers the health by a percentage is to punishing on low health classes. I small bumb on low health classes would be fine by me, it would not directly buff necro with it also being a light armor class but instead buff Elementalist and Mesmer. The problem will be guardian but a small health increase won't make it op since most of there defence comes from aegis. 

Low health != low armor. This is specifically aimed at low health classes, and would not affect a necromancer.
Low health is elementalist (light armor), thief (medium armor) and guardian (heavy armor).

Also, for context, the differences between Defense values on armors at level 80, ascended quality is 967, 1118, 1271, which is a 15,6 and 13,7% difference.

[draxynnic.3719]

3 minutes ago, The Boz.2038 said:

Low health != low armor. This is specifically aimed at low health classes, and would not affect a necromancer.
Low health is elementalist (light armor), thief (medium armor) and guardian (heavy armor).

Also, for context, the differences between Defense values on armors at level 80, ascended quality is 967, 1118, 1271, which is a 15,6 and 13,7% difference.

I think when you do the maths of the underlying mechanics, the actual difference between the damage taken by a high armour profession and the damage taken by a low armour profession, all else being equal, is even less.

I think I calculated at one point that the difference between heavy and light armour was around 10% extra damage taken by the light armour profession.

Edited February 22, 2022 by draxynnic.3719

[The Boz.2038]

Yes, base Toughness does slash those Defense numbers pretty much in half.

[Ragnar.4257]

13 hours ago, Lan Deathrider.5910 said:

What they do have are things like blind, ports, evades, invulns, and stealth which are why they have lower HP. You want to increase their HP, fine, but then those classes would have to give up some of their active mitigation in return.

Because, of course, these are things that medium/high HP classes have zero access to 🤔

[phokus.8934]

They dun goofed by not standardizing everything and then balance abilities and traits.  Class weights and different health pools is such an archaic design.  But it certainly won't be changed so this is a moot point.