Shattered Kingdoms

So I walk in a PvP battle with my mercenary to tank for a group, but this happens:



Now I'm stuck in neutral stance for three rounds, which means I'm going to take more damage and be less effective for the group. All four stances, however, are completely useless, as it is far too easy to set someone in the prone status via bash, trip, and a few other ways. Sure, as a swashbuckler you can waste time using kip up and setting back to whatever stance you lost, but that doesn't stop someone from knocking you out of your stance the very next round and robbing you of whatever bonuses you had. If I have to rate them from least useful to most useful I'd put them as such, defensive -> hedgehog -> wolverine -> aggressive.

Defensive is the worst possible stance to take because when you are knocked prone (you will definitely be knocked prone), you lose all possible advantages of the stance. Hedgehog is slightly behind it, but they're both worthless stances. The tanking game has been dead ever since this change to stances was implemented. Wolverine is only slightly better. And that is because as a swashbuckler you're forced to be front row to have any effect as dps. That means you're always exposed to being knocked prone. If you can get the jump on your enemy then great, you get extra attacks per round against that person, and can possibly outdamage them.

Aggressive, however, has the most advantages as a non-swashbuckler you can utilize weapons with reach, and range to deal damage from behind PCs, and NPCs. It's typically been said that if you're aggressive in the front row that you deserve to die, but now the philosophy is simply to get the jump on your opponent and deal as much damage as possible.

Tanking is dead, and the game has moved to being as aggressive as possible.

Hammer or bust.

Really though, the stances are useless unless you're Hammer because the only one you can ever actually use is aggressive from the second row.

It's so easy to get knocked prone, and so easy to die in the span of one prone that the stances become pointless.

If there is anything that didn't need a buff, it was bash/trip.

I don't understand the point of making bash and trip reset all stances. Those two skills are already powerful enough. I'm fine with them resetting the two crazy stances that swashbucklers get (given the fact that swashies get kip-up and are meant to be active), but why the other two standard stances? That's dumb.

This was said ad nauseam when the prone-stance-wipe change happened by anyone who knew what they were talking about. It's still true.

Tanking is dead. RIP.

bash
bash
bash
bash
bash
bash
bash

Seems like there is lag now when trying to bash/trip a prone target. No longer can one continually spam bash and win.

They still didn't need a buff, especially not at the sake of stances being made completely unreliably for frontliners.

Only newblets rely on the spam bash strategy.

Why not make a merk and maybe barb passive skill where they have a chance to maintain their stance when bashed or tripped.

I guess I am in the minority, but I like that knocking someone prone changes their stance. Yeah, it is annoying when playing a warrior class, but it is the only way to remove the bonuses that your target gets from their stance. I think it is a neat idea.

Well yeah, it's real neat to be able to remove someone's strengths by doing something you were going to do anyway.

It's also stupid. People shouldn't be punished even more than they already are by sitting on the front lines.