KTM and its usefulness at high end.

Tel · 03/24/07, 8:00 AM

Just a quick one here, on a topic thats concerned me for some time.

Im currently Lead Officer (GM) of a guild thats just downed Gruul (pre-nerf), working on Mag and heading into SSC this reset. We're having some debate at the moment over the usefulness of KTM with regards to raiding vs the amount of player skill it takes away.

Personally, I feel that part of my class is knowing how far I can push the agro boundary with a particular tank, and adjusting accordingly. I think that if i were to use KTM, although I may do a slight amount more DPS, I'd probably not be as good a player as I am atm. Others in the guild share this view. However, recently there have been a few people suggesting that as literally EVERY other guild out there uses KTM, we should give it a go.

Im interested to find out from the guys and girls on here;

1. Do you use KTM? If not, why not?
2. What are your views on it with regards to taking away an element of player skill and encouraging lazy gaming?
3. Has using it made your gameplay noticably easier?

If this is too specific a topic, or has been covered already, feel free to heap it, and point me in the right direction, cheers

Moridin · 03/24/07, 8:15 AM

We've had the exact same discussion in my guild, no final conclusion reached yet, then again, it's only been discussed since around when the first version surfaced at Vaelestraz.

Elerion · 03/24/07, 8:27 AM

vs the amount of player skill it takes away.

Uhm, it doesn't take any skill away. It reduces the need for a certain skill, but it doesn't make you worse in any way. And even the most skilled DPS'er in the world, playing with the same very stable tank for years, will be able to see an improvement with KTM.

1. Yes. We have used it on and off since we started reclearing AQ with rerolls after our 6 month break last summer. Had people install it to stabilize Huhu, then didn't care if people used it until Patch, where we got it back in. We've had people install it again for certain TBC encounters.

2. It doesn't. It may even help build player skill, since you get a better idea of what kind of tps typical tanks put out on typical encounters, giving you a mark to shoot for even when not using KTM.

3. On encounters where aggro order is absolutely essential (low geared Huhu) or you're otherwise in danger of drawing aggro (a ton), it helps you in two ways. Your DPS can push to their potential with greater efficiency, and you avoid aggro pulls, which will cause deaths, threat/dps loss and whipes.

And yes, it's been covered before. KTM is a great tool. It's not essential in any way, but it does help you do more dps and have less accidents.

And to add: I was initially very skeptic towards threatmeters, since I viewed them as inaccurate. If they are inaccurate, they can do more harm than good. Once they were refined and tested enough that they could be considered 99% accurate, I've been of the opinion that they are definitely a good thing.

Quixotic · 03/24/07, 8:27 AM

1. Yes, why intentionally make the game harder?
2. How is it skillful that you don't know if the tank missed a bunch of attacks in a row and therefore has lower than expected aggro? I would even go as far as to say it is more skillful as you can push your dps limit all the way up to the 10% threshold and stay there for max dps.
3. I've raided with KTM since the beginning of BWL, to several bosses down in SSC, and quite frankly, there is no point to not raid without it.

sulliwan · 03/24/07, 8:29 AM

I don't really think trying to be psychic and using your spider sense to notice when the tank gets 4 parried shieldslams in a row qualifies as "player skill".
It's a great tool that displays the information about a certain aspect of the fight in an easy to read manner and allows every dps class to operate at their maximum potential. I don't really see why you wouldn't use it.

Fugazor · 03/24/07, 8:45 AM

Originally Posted by Tel

1. Do you use KTM? If not, why not?

Yes, why not?

Originally Posted by Tel

2. What are your views on it with regards to taking away an element of player skill and encouraging lazy gaming?

Bullshit. This game has little to do with skill anyway. Tell people who think like that to use default UI only since everything else make things easier.

Originally Posted by Tel

3. Has using it made your gameplay noticably easier?

It was so long ago... probably yes and I saw people that started to dps way much better after KTM.

However I might add... KTM can be dangerous for brainless people who will trust that it is 100% accurate which is not true. It still require "skill" to use KTM correctly.

zepi · 03/24/07, 8:50 AM

1. I've personally used KTM every now and then and always ended up deleting it because I've always found it unreliable in the very situation it would be most needed due to boss mechanics. The only time I really felt it was really helpful was at the Ouro, when I used it to determine if someone from the ranged would get the sandblast so that people could run and hide. When I saw a single ranged caster on top of aggro in the meter, I just asked him to move out of range to make sure that SB would not reset his aggro.

2. Having my tank tell me "Shieldslam missed" in ventrilo has always been enough for me. I'll stop for 1-2 second or cast Arcane Missiles, Warlocks apply just dots for a moment and Shadowpriest doesn't press that Mindblast button. I hardly remember having problems with boss aggro ever, and in the only places where it would have mattered, like Firemaw and Broodlord I've found it to be unreliable because a single aggro reducting ability just messes everything up.

3. I've raided both BWL and AQ up to Ouro with and without KTM, and I've not used it for a second in TBC. Just for your information, our first Vael kill was in Jan 05, I know atleast some of our OT's started using it at Vael. I've just tried it few times every now and then, and I'm not using it currently, make your own conclusions.

Currently I'm not using it because I'm pretty sure that it doesn't handle invisibility correctly which really destroys it for a mage in aggro limited encounter (which I'm yet to find in TBC, I've never pulled aggro on gruul and I've been nuking with trinkets from the beginning and we killed him twice pre nerf). I'm sure, that I'll give it a shot once I feel I might need it.

Vhex · 03/24/07, 9:04 AM

Personally, I feel there's more skill involved in knowing how to ride the line then there is in guessing what your agro is.

Additionally, as a healer, KTM allows me to be pissed off when a mage or rogue or hunter pulls agro on a fight. The excuse, "I didn't know I was that close to pulling agro!!" just doesn't fly with KTM. In my book anything that increases personal accontability is a good thing.

Bekah · 03/24/07, 9:08 AM

Originally Posted by Tel

1. Do you use KTM? If not, why not?
2. What are your views on it with regards to taking away an element of player skill and encouraging lazy gaming?
3. Has using it made your gameplay noticably easier?

1) Guild was never religious enough about it to make the whole thing reliable- especially with one of the main MT's not modding up due to crappy PC. Also, at the height of my DPS adventures- Shadow Priests were mana limited not threat limited. Going full out it was pretty much impossible to pull aggro unless all the VE was pure heal. I plan on using it once I get back into raiding though, especially after some near disasters in KZ at 70.

2) Dot timers take away no more of an element of skill- I don't see how this is any different. Yes, a skilled individual can function without them. With them, even a skilled individual can improve timing and precision slightly- and an unskilled player can function leaps ahead of where they would without help. It's a tool, like a crowbar. You can use it to be lazy or to excel, the use of the tool doesn't change the fact that it allows greater ability than without.

3) I certainly hope it does- riding the aggro line with a merri-go-round of tanks and constantly changing gear was like trying to tightrope walk in a hailstorm. Visualizing it objectively is good. This is why it's used fairly often.

dukes · 03/24/07, 9:08 AM

It depends on who it is and what boss fight you're doing. Hydross and pre-nerf gruul are pretty ridiculous fights DPS wise, and everyone needs to be getting every bit of DPS they can. Having a melee DPSer on Gruul get smacked by a hurtful strike because he wasn't using KTM and so didn't realise he was above the offtank is just stupid when you need that dps to kill him before he oneshots the tank.

Generally (in my experience) the people who have agro trouble are Hybrids. All of the hybrid DPS classes have little or no reduction in threat, and have no escape move (invis, soulshatter, vanish). Warlocks also need to maximise their threat before the first soulshatter to make sure they get the most out of it, same with mages for invis really, if they're pushing the threat barrier.

It's also interesting to see the difference between tanks - we have one warrior in guild that can push out a consistant 20% more than any other, and I have no idea how. Tanks knowing that they have a barrier of threat in front of DPS classes is also quite nice - they know that they can spare the time to do another demo shout if one resists, or TC.

--1. Do you use KTM? If not, why not?
Yes.
--2. What are your views on it with regards to taking away an element of player skill and encouraging lazy gaming?
It is a tool for maximising the way you play the game. Many classes can do without it, but it helps to take away an element that otherwise can be quite random, and there's enough of them in the game right now to make it worth doing regardless of if it sacrifices a small amount of player skill imo. It's also allowed people to adjust to the new skills and having BoS horde-side much quicker.
--3. Has using it made your gameplay noticably easier?
It has helped to maximise raid DPS, which has meant easier/better boss kills, if you want to look at it that way. When you have someone who is putting out the best DPS in the raid, but still holding back because they "think" they're pushing the agro limit as they're top on DPS, but don't know it, it's just stupid to not use KTM when it's there to use. It's like saying don't use Grid because it shows people's health in a clear way, maybe everyone should play with friendly nameplates on and purely heal with that instead because it requires more "skill" to heal well?

Boevis · 03/24/07, 9:17 AM

1. Personally yes, as the OT on Gruul it's fairly essential for me to know my limits. As a Bear I can pull aggro early on fairly easilly, and even later a string of 3 ability crits can bump me up almost 5k threat in an instant (mangle, maul, ilotp) and the DPS warriors are doing their job as best as they can. I've got an upper and lower limit on where I can be without potentially causing a wipe. Well, at least that's how it was before the nerf ...

A few healers in my guild don't use KTM, I don't care too much about that, I know they don't need a 12 box on their screen. DPS that don't use it and pull aggro get bitched at until they get it.

2. KTM is an addon that does quick math for you (your damage * threatmod vs tank damage + special threat * threatmod) and displays it. Much like the standard ui displays health bars. I honestly think it makes players less lazy, you see where they are and where the tank is. If there's DPS riding the Tanks ass on threat chance are he's going to try figuring out how to boost his TPS, meanwhile DPS that are far behind (much like on DMs) know they need to push more. At least that's the way I hope people think.

3. Easier? yes, if not for Blizzard's general desire to make players discover formulae I would have expected it to be in the UI when they added all those other silly things.

BeeLz · 03/24/07, 10:10 AM

1) no, never used it and I never will. As a mage I had 4 things to do as a damage dealer. Watch my mana, watch my health, watch my aggro and max my damage. If I use KTM I might aswell let a bot play for me.
2) aggro management is one of the essential and only "skills" a damagedealer needs, taking it away makes the game even easier imo.
3) never used it :p

Coriolis · 03/24/07, 10:50 AM

I flat out don't see what "skill" there is in managing your aggro without KTM. Even if you're constantly starting at your combat log and trying to figure out how many crits you got in a row that still tells you nothing about how many misses the tank had in a row. There is nothing the tank or you can do about this - it's completely random when he happens to have a bad string. The only way to make sure you won't get aggro without KTM is to wait a significant amount of time and always be far below the tank on threat - this is fairly easy for some classes and rather hard for others. If you play a class without real aggro issues then sure it doesn't matter, but if you play a class that can pull aggro very easily you either gimp your dps or run the risk of pulling aggro.

The only "skill" a person who doesn't ever get aggro have is not doing good damage or playing a class for which aggro dumping is trivial.

Back when I was first clearing bwl/MC we didn't have ktm and we waited alot like this (I think on broodlord I spent most of my time wanding as a lock

), and that was OK since frankly nothing in bwl/MC really required mad dps. It's not that way anymore and not using KTM is simply gimping yourself.

Trey · 03/24/07, 10:51 AM

To the people who have never used KTM and never pulled aggro, how do you know you are doing as much as you can? How can you be sure that you aren't pushing your play as far as it can go? There are so many variables in threat (mob abilities, your resists/misses, the tanks resist/misses, talents) how can you possibly keep track of them all on top of having to DPS to max potential while controlling adds, avoiding AoE, and everything else that needs to be done on encounters? Some people make it seem that they have a 6th or 7th sense for threat, when it seems to me that they are more likely putting out less than optimal DPS.

On Aran, I know that if all the spell schools get locked out he is going to come running to me, and everyone who has KTM can see that. On a few encounters we've had to call people out on KTM when they are closing in on pulling aggro, and when they don't listen they usually get splattered. If there is a mod that can improve raid DPS and prevent death, why not use it?

diospadre · 03/24/07, 11:18 AM

As a tank, anyone who doesn't use KTM can go fuck themselves. It's the best tool you can have for raiding, and playing without it is tantamount to clicking on abilities and turning with your keyboard while on the phone.