I’m doing this a bit out of order, mainly as I haven’t had time to go through all the Minstrel changes but I will be coming back to Minstrels soon enough.  However, I will not be touching on the Loremaster changes mentioned in this post as I just don’t have enough knowledge about the class to discuss it intelligently.

Captains were discussed in the same thread as the Loremasters and I was very interested what they’d do to the class as I think the last revamp of Captains was awesome for the class and really made a huge difference in my enjoyment of the class.  The main things discussed are usability changes, trait changes, and new skills added after level 66.

While some may look at the usability changes as being small, they’re actually pretty big and have been sticking points for many a Captain.  Buffs from “In Defense of Middle-Earth (IDoME)” and our Banner of War will now increase with level!  I’m guessing they will stay at the current values (+50) at level 65, but scale relative to that value depending on your level.  This is probably one of the most requested changes for the class, and I’m happy to see it finally make it in.  Cooldowns for “Time of Need” and “Shield of the Dunedain” have both been reduced to five minutes to reflect the same concept we’ve seen with all other classes.  War-cry now provides a 15% attack speed buff from the start as opposed to needing a trait to get to that level.  And the note about our Heals sounds more like a bug fix then anything else.

As for the traits, nothing too big here with the most changes coming to the Leader of Men line which expands this role to include more options for agro management.  Both a set bonus for cooldown reduction on our threat shout and a new trait to allow that shout to affect up to 3 targets.  I’m not so sure Captains needed an AoE taunt but this does allow a little more flexibility in off-tanking roles.  It will probably also help in the 3-man content as well.  Hands of Healing gets a buff to the Relentless Optimism trait from 10% heal bonus up to a 50% bonus.  And finally Lead the Charge sees the insertion of the Adherent of Elendil trait and the removal of the Focused Strikes trait.  This change makes a lot of sense as the Elendil trait fits better in this line and the Focused Strikes trait was pretty worthless.

Some very interesting items in the new skills section with a major change to the Shield Brother system and some nice improved versions of skills.

  • Sure Strike will see a new version dropping the active Battle-shout cooldown by 2 seconds.  This really makes you want to put this skill in your rotation to increase everything Captains do, whether it is DPS or healing from more potential chances to get off Rallying Cry.
  • Grave Wound now no longer removes the DoT from Cutting Attack but will also apply a new one.  Nothing too huge here, but a nice added damage boost.
  • Cutting Attack gets the best boost as Captains will get a long requested Slow with a 25% speed reduction for 20 seconds!  This will be huge in PvMP!

As for Shield Brother, there will now be 3 different options for how these skills work:

  • Song-Brother
    • Inspire becomes a power over time heal
    • Strength of Will reduces power cost for healing by 10%
    • To Arms becomes a 25% outgoing healing buff lasting 10 seconds
  • Blade Brother
    • Inspire becomes a power over time heal
    • Strength of Will reduces threat from damage by 10%
    • To Arms becomes a 25% outgoing damage buff lasting 25 seconds
  • Shield Brother remains the same as it was with one exception
    • To Arms becomes a 15% incoming damage reduction buff lasting 10 seconds

Essentially this allows you to pick the kind of class you want to benefit using your “Brother” skills and provide bonuses appropriately.  Song Brother boosts your healers,  Blade Brother for DPS classes, and Shield Brother is best on your tanks.  Pretty cool idea as some times you may have a lower level character in those roles that needs boosting, or a particular fight that’s more challenging for certain roles.

From the looks, I’m really liking these changes as the class didn’t need too much but they addressed some of the main issues and cleaned up some of the traits.  I’m most excited about the addition of the new Brother skills as they add another nice level of complexity to the class and will make them even stronger in group situations.

As always, these are still in the works and may change but they’re on the right track from my point of view.

 

Related posts:

  1. Captain Updates with Isengard Today Raskolnikov posted the second iteration of the Captain class and there are some big...
  2. Rise of Isengard Captain Developer Diary Wow, Turbine’s kicking out all sorts of news today – which I was hoping...
  3. Upcoming Proposed Warden Changes I posted earlier about this, and I’ve had a chance now to go through the...
  4. Captain Healing Present and Future With the big changes coming down the pipes for Captains I decided to do a...
  5. Proposed Isengard Minstrel Changes I know I’m quite a bit behind on these, but luckily for me Orion today...