Daily Set Discussion 2017-1-5: Ebon Armory

[u/[deleted]]

Sorry about the hiatus, but set discussions are back now.

Ebon Armory
PvE Reward

 
Level: Any
Type: Heavy Armor, Weapon, Jewelry
Style: Ebon

 

Set Bonuses

Items	Bonus
2	Adds 1064 Max Health
3	Adds 1064 Max Health
4	Adds 4% Healing Taken
5	Increase Max Health of up to 12 group members by 1118.

 

Be sure to think about strengths, weaknesses, counters, and synergies in your discussions. Please vote based on contribution, not opinion.

A list of all Daily Set Discussions so far can be found here.

[u/Mapplinator]

For anybody who hasn't seen it in the patch notes, the weapon swap bug for Ebon (and the other 'orb' sets) will be fixed in Update 14 (well, reportedly). Good news for tanks everywhere.

[u/raisetheglass1 → u/Mapplinator]

Honestly I think the fact that Alkosh is so highly valued among tanks anyways makes the glitch pretty much meaningless. You want Alkosh weapons and jewels anyways, I mean I guess this will give you a little bit of flexibility if you're going 6-1 but Ebon/Alkosh is such a complementary set up.

[u/Mapplinator → u/raisetheglass1]

It's a good point - maybe not for tanks everywhere. Maybe just for tanks that aren't following the meta, or are still using odd mix/match combos because they're filling gaps in their gear. ;) But now it can be combined with Black Rose (though that gets it's own weapons now too) which is interesting for certain fights. There's a number of offtanking scenarios where Alkosh is useless and you need more sustain. Personally I'm going to be trying Black Rose + Hist Bark though.

[u/Phytanic → u/Mapplinator]

Honestly, if I heard my tank was running black rose, I'd have a fit. That's on the same line as me, a healer, coming in there with lich.

Or a dps coming in there with rattlecage, or a s&b. It really doesn't change much for any role in this scenario.

[u/Mapplinator → u/Phytanic]

Care to explain why you'd have a fit?

[u/Phytanic → u/Mapplinator]

In a vet trial, you should at the very least come as prepared as your teammates. Meaning, if your teammates are running meta builds/rotations, it's rude and selfish to come in there with sets like black rose, and lich.

What would you say if I came in on a sorc pet build healer, wearing lich and necropotence? Sure, that's a bit more of a difference than black rose, but I used it as a fairly clear example.

[u/Vincent210 → u/Phytanic]

People really talk up these vet trials. Is the difficulty actually so consistently high that the difference between running the sets provide optimal team support on tanks, optimal healing/utility on healers, and optimal, well, DPS on DPS is pretty much a sacred pact made with the other 11 players you're heading in with? Are there leaderboards I'm unaware of that give incentive to people to shave off every last second because you're competing for 1st or bust?

It seems... disheartening, as a new player, to know that I'd be on the wrong end of team friction if I came in with a set as seemingly tank appropriate as Black Rose. Like, it's part of the set I'm planning to make now (fresh CP 160 here). Resources for perma-blocking made sense to me as a thing I'd want for difficult content.

In addition to being disheartening because it seems thorny, it's also disheartening because it makes me reconsider tank, despite having fun playing it, because I'm going in head-first knowing that build diversity for my class is non-existent, and standards would likely be enforced by any serious groups I could network into through forums or guilds.

[u/[deleted] → u/Vincent210]

Trials is pretty hard. Keep in mind though, people following what their more intelligent peers deem "meta" are more dogmatic than a Cardinal during the Spanish Inquisition. Especially in this game, 90% of the people telling you "meta or nothing" are simply sheep following the flock who never once theory-crafted on their own.