Paladin in Arena of Honor

[MageFFA]

I always felt that for rhinos to be a viable class in PvP, twink and endgame, they would need to be defensively superior than their opponents while having their offensive capabilities be used for team fights. I was fooling around with my 71 rhino, historically rhinos were one of the worst classes there, and i tried different forms of builds vs the updated IB bear. Here is what i got.

Bears without a doubt is the best class in 71 ever since Iron Blood was buffed. They curb stomp mages and birds alike, rarely do they lose health. With rhino if i tried to invest into my offensive build i would end up just the same as every other class, but if i went into a defensive build i start to win majority of my fights against the bear. This is achieved by invest max points into all armor buffs, Guardian and Stone, 9 into restore, 9 into H/s Debuffs, Rhino Might and Summon, 9 into Vital Force for debuffs, and the trump card Brutal Force. Brutal Force will give me a edge against the bear by giving me sheer H/s and Dodge. While in a fight the bear barely has the ability to keep up once i start using all my skills in conjunction. The fight plays out with me constantly debuffing his H/s and Hit while I'm slowly chipping damage on his health.

Since rhino is a paladin class it focuses mostly on team support. This here is the summary of what a Paladin does,"Most of these powers relate to providing benefits to those around the Paladin. These include healing and curing of disease, morale in combat and turning of undead." As you can see not all of the abilities pallies can do translate to PL but the important onces are Healing and curing of diseases, Curing of diseases mean removing negative debuffs for your party, and Morale in combat, providing any forms of buffs whether damage and armor. With that being noted let's talk about how we can redo the class.

These following skills do not need to be changed because they are good where they are now. Charge, Restore, Meditation, Guardian, Holy Tempest, and Revive. Those skills are balanced perfectly in my opinion. That leaves Rhino Might, Redemption, Brute Force, Summon, Vital Force, and stone. Let's work from there.

Rhino might is a CC that debuffs the enemies H/s. As you level it up it has a chance to stun. I would personally prefer if the Debuff on H/s was increased to be slightly higher. At level 6 it only debuffs -8 H/s and at level 10 it only debuffs -22. A better number would be L.6=-12 and level 10=-30.

Redemption could be done better. People keep complaining that it des x2 Damage, and while i disagree i am up for change. Remove the damage multiplier and replace it with a stun. The stun should be only activated on combo. Redemption should also have a chance to debuff armor. 30 should be the max that can be debuffed at level 10. Cinco can do the rest from there.

Brute Force is a skill i hated until recently. It offers up such interesting gameplay and opportunities towards new forms of tank builds. I would increase the total amount of H/s that is given at every level for the skill. Along with buffing the total H/s i would also increase how much total armor is given to my teammates. 25 should be set to max. Rhinos should NOT benefit from party buff on Brute Force.

Summon is a great skill but i think the devs missed a shot with it. Increasing the total H/s reduction would be excellent but also introducing a Mana debuff would be neat also. Mages are easily the worst matchup that a rhino can have. Even if you manage to crack their HP you'd be left with having to now deal with their MP thanks to Mana Shield. If Summon could debuff M/s it would end the cycle of rhinos being pushed over by mages thanks to their M/s and bears thanks to their H/s.

Vital Force is the best party buff in game. It just so happens to be placed on a class that barely can do much with it. Incrasing the total damage the buff gives while only leaving a fraction of it as a individual buff would be excellent and weed off all complaints. Hit and Crit stats don't meed to be chanced.

Stone just needs more armor. Even when paired with guardian it's still not a significant thing buff compared to other classes. Buffing the total armor given is the best option. Another option would be giving Stone a HP instead of increasing armor. Consider the fact that rhinos possess the lowest total HP stats of ALL classes it would be logical to decrease the gap between rhinos and bears. The more the health a class has the more demanding the heals would be. H/s carries restore after all. This would be a double edged sword if done correctly.

This is my personal opinion on whats best for rhino.

[Vapourised]

I always felt that for rhinos to be a viable class in PvP, twink and endgame, they would need to be defensively superior than their opponents while having their offensive capabilities be used for team fights. I was fooling around with my 71 rhino, historically rhinos were one of the worst classes there, and i tried different forms of builds vs the updated IB bear. Here is what i got.

Bears without a doubt is the best class in 71 ever since Iron Blood was buffed. They curb stomp mages and birds alike, rarely do they lose health. With rhino if i tried to invest into my offensive build i would end up just the same as every other class, but if i went into a defensive build i start to win majority of my fights against the bear. This is achieved by invest max points into all armor buffs, Guardian and Stone, 9 into restore, 9 into H/s Debuffs, Rhino Might and Summon, 9 into Vital Force for debuffs, and the trump card Brutal Force. Brutal Force will give me a edge against the bear by giving me sheer H/s and Dodge. While in a fight the bear barely has the ability to keep up once i start using all my skills in conjunction. The fight plays out with me constantly debuffing his H/s and Hit while I'm slowly chipping damage on his health.

Since rhino is a paladin class it focuses mostly on team support. This here is the summary of what a Paladin does,"Most of these powers relate to providing benefits to those around the Paladin. These include healing and curing of disease, morale in combat and turning of undead." As you can see not all of the abilities pallies can do translate to PL but the important onces are Healing and curing of diseases, Curing of diseases mean removing negative debuffs for your party, and Morale in combat, providing any forms of buffs whether damage and armor. With that being noted let's talk about how we can redo the class.

These following skills do not need to be changed because they are good where they are now. Charge, Restore, Meditation, Guardian, Holy Tempest, and Revive. Those skills are balanced perfectly in my opinion. That leaves Rhino Might, Redemption, Brute Force, Summon, Vital Force, and stone. Let's work from there.

Rhino might is a CC that debuffs the enemies H/s. As you level it up it has a chance to stun. I would personally prefer if the Debuff on H/s was increased to be slightly higher. At level 6 it only debuffs -8 H/s and at level 10 it only debuffs -22. A better number would be L.6=-12 and level 10=-30.

Redemption could be done better. People keep complaining that it des x2 Damage, and while i disagree i am up for change. Remove the damage multiplier and replace it with a stun. The stun should be only activated on combo. Redemption should also have a chance to debuff armor. 30 should be the max that can be debuffed at level 10. Cinco can do the rest from there.

Brute Force is a skill i hated until recently. It offers up such interesting gameplay and opportunities towards new forms of tank builds. I would increase the total amount of H/s that is given at every level for the skill. Along with buffing the total H/s i would also increase how much total armor is given to my teammates. 25 should be set to max. Rhinos should NOT benefit from party buff on Brute Force.

Summon is a great skill but i think the devs missed a shot with it. Increasing the total H/s reduction would be excellent but also introducing a Mana debuff would be neat also. Mages are easily the worst matchup that a rhino can have. Even if you manage to crack their HP you'd be left with having to now deal with their MP thanks to Mana Shield. If Summon could debuff M/s it would end the cycle of rhinos being pushed over by mages thanks to their M/s and bears thanks to their H/s.

Vital Force is the best party buff in game. It just so happens to be placed on a class that barely can do much with it. Incrasing the total damage the buff gives while only leaving a fraction of it as a individual buff would be excellent and weed off all complaints. Hit and Crit stats don't meed to be chanced.

Stone just needs more armor. Even when paired with guardian it's still not a significant thing buff compared to other classes. Buffing the total armor given is the best option. Another option would be giving Stone a HP instead of increasing armor. Consider the fact that rhinos possess the lowest total HP stats of ALL classes it would be logical to decrease the gap between rhinos and bears. The more the health a class has the more demanding the heals would be. H/s carries restore after all. This would be a double edged sword if done correctly.

This is my personal opinion on whats best for rhino.

That's interesting that is. So rhino essentially only has one counter at 71 which is mages. Does tank rhino fare well vs birds and foxes also? I'm under the impression that it still does since rhino can just kite and stun fox while being immune to their armour shred debuff.
Time to find me a beastly set and lvl my rhino. I've always wanted a good lvl for my rhino and 56 wasn't it.

I did fight ur 71 rhino but I wasn't using beastly but a dex set so didnt get the health bonus from str set. I hope you drew ur conclusions from fighting a 71 beastly bear and not on our fights lel.

[MageFFA]

That's interesting that is. So rhino essentially only has one counter at 71 which is mages. Does tank rhino fare well vs birds and foxes also? I'm under the impression that it still does since rhino can just kite and stun fox while being immune to their armour shred debuff.
Time to find me a beastly set and lvl my rhino. I've always wanted a good lvl for my rhino and 56 wasn't it.

At 71 rhinos will out tank birds enough to win by default. Rhinos are and has always been a direct counter to birds. Hit buff makes it so blind doesn't do as much either. Foxes is a tricky matchup. The fox main objective is to end the fight early and not let it go the distance. The tempo of the fight will be set the minute the rhino starts using summon and rhino might. Now you're on a time limit. Just losing 18 H/s alone is significant. Timing shred is upmost important. This plays exactly like how bear rhino is but the difference is that the bear is strong enough to force the rhino back to save it's own life. If it goes the distance it's still anyones game, though the rhino will win the majority.

Mage v rhino is just a automatic stomp. If they don't kill you initially on combo then once they M/s call it quits. Redemption doesn't give HP back when comboed on MS.

[Vapourised]

At 71 rhinos will out tank birds enough to win by default. Rhinos are and has always been a direct counter to birds. Hit buff makes it so blind doesn't do as much either. Foxes is a tricky matchup. The fox main objective is to end the fight early and not let it go the distance. The tempo of the fight will be set the minute the rhino starts using summon and rhino might. Now you're on a time limit. Just losing 18 H/s alone is significant. Timing shred is upmost important. This plays exactly like how bear rhino is but the difference is that the bear is strong enough to force the rhino back to save it's own life. If it goes the distance it's still anyones game, though the rhino will win the majority.

Mage v rhino is just a automatic stomp. If they don't kill you initially on combo then once they M/s call it quits. Redemption doesn't give HP back when comboed on MS.

Yeah about foxes. They seem to be pretty easy to beat as rhino at 56. I always keep foxes far away and even if they get close, they have to to usually use a number of skills to wear down the rhino but they're pushed back the moment they catch up. Tempest counters fox pretty well imo with the knockback and stun. Had a few FFAs with Nae's fox so that's how I came to this conclusion. Both of us were using mace sets.

Maybe it's different at 71 im not sure.

[MageFFA]

Also Paladin is a class that doesn't need damage buffs to win against non-healing classes. If the level is balanced and is Regeneration dominant then they can control the fight to their advantage unless the regen is far more than what the rhino can debuff.

[Vapourised]

Also correct me if I'm wrong but once a mage uses ms, you can't health sap with redemption let alone drain. If you use those skills on a shielded mage, it just does damage to their mana pool without any regeneration.

This is one of the big issues for rhino when fighting a mage since rhino depends on getting their hp back. The same is true when a mage casts drain on a shielded mage (I think?).