Ways to improve and diverse shields

Grim Dawn Ideas and Feedback
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Shields and their current standing

Hello all and welcome to this topic where i shortly discuss ideas about shields and how they are currently limited (imo) awfully combat and roleplay wise while also trying to give ideas on how to fix and balance out things.

Shield limitation
The basic function of a shield is usually viewed as a fighter’s offhand and a tool used by S&B builds. It completely dominates the offhand slot when used, not giving any room there and usually when taking the shield you need to focus on more direct meleeish combat. Roleplay wise the shield always being in the other hand and always being tied with mostly classes like soldier or necromancer limits the aesthetics while also lowering any sort of roleplay potential outside of the norm.

Ideas for improvement
Firstly one big thing that could instantly increase variety, usage, usefulness and aesthetics of the overall build is that the shield wouldn’t be limited to offhand slot. This would give way to tanky mages for example who could use a shield on primary hand with a sort of bashing melee movement while having a mage’s offhand in use or a wand or just switch sides of a pistol/sword/hammer with the shield (if you character happened to be left handed or something).
Ability to dual wield shields.
Now this might seem op tank wise at first and in a way it has it’s perks but a good way to balance this out would be to make the build use the block recovery and chance of the strongest shield and not both together. It would indeed apply the extra blocking power and other stats while decreasing immensily the characters offense but giving teams quite interesting tanks.

Ideas for new stuff
One idea that i’ve been playing out in my head is actually how to give some minor shield perks to for example two handed builds. So far two handed builds are offense oriented and that is the idea of them but some builds could use variety and tankyness. So my suggestion is to make a new set of gauntlets/gloves. Shield gauntlets which have a buckler built into them, a small shield somewhat strapped to the wrist part which provides some defensive (or offensive if similar to final stop) values.

Well, here is the start of my post. Thank you for reading it through and please share your thoughts about the matter. Have the shields become stagnated, gimmicky and in some cases downright useless? Tell your thoughts and ideas. Have a blessed day/night!

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It’s not happening

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The devs considered to add dual wielding shields, but scrapped the idea when it turned out it requires too many tech changes. I assume they will not enable us to equip off-hand items in the main hand for the same reason.

4

If it’s any solace the new expansion will add a mastery that is focused on shields.
It has at least 1 skill that uses the shield to attack and multiple WPS that use the shield as a extra damage source.

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We will however be getting a shield throwing skill with the new Oathkeeper mastery coming in the Forgotten Gods expansion.

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Honestly I think the idea of dual wielding shields is stupid and I don’t know why it is ever suggested. To be complaining about lack of role playing aesthetics and then suggest two shields which has almost never been done.

almost never :stuck_out_tongue:

Something I think would work is to give caster offhands some of the functionality that shields have much like Diablo 2 necromancers shruken heads.

7

Because people usually like crazy off-the-wall things/ideas and being able to do such things in the games they play, games often being fertile ground for unrealistic fantastical ideas. DW shields is actually in a number of games.

While I would agree that from a more realistic perspective it doesn’t make a whole lot of sense outside of ceremonial uses like shown in your linked picture and there isn’t much in the way of actual historical use of it in combat that doesn’t mean it can’t be used in games and from a role-playing standpoint if a person were so inclined and the game offered the freedom to do as you liked.

But, if I were in a real-life situation where I had to dw shields I would most certainly go with this style of shield (aka Cap’n 'Murica-style)…

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…to better bash yer squishy brains right out of yer skull with.

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Kinda newb question here, but can’t you use a Shield on a character without the Soldier or Necro mastery? Something with Devotions for defensive set-up, and make up for it with Skills and gear choice?

Edit : actually, there are such builds in the Compendium, not many, but still…for example : http://www.grimdawn.com/forums/showthread.php?t=63586
Maybe part of the problem is perception of the doability of such builds, and the expectations held for high-end builds (lots of Compendium builds aim to be Gladiator farmer, and I totally get this, but maybe a build that can reasonably farm Nemesis could be viewed as “good enough”?)

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In my honest opinion, the shield issues don’t lie in the shield idea, but in the stats. I’ve been using shields for many characters, once I even purely focused on shield, and managed to get a constant 7k physical damage reduction (4k for all other damage types). It was not like 100% uptime on the damage reduction, but nemesis monsters could hit me only few times before they died.

What is the biggest issue in shields in my opinion? The uptime. Shields should cap at 50 - 80% recovery time and the lowest base shield recovery should be 1 second, never less than 1 base recovery.

  • Shields basically give too much survivability and it’s only because of Soldier, where you can get a massive shield bonus, 15% shield recovery and block chance on level 10/10 Shield Training and 45% recovery with Overguard (12/12).

Applying that huge nerf, and nerfing Overguard would most likely leave a better option to wield shields outside of Soldier mastery.

  • But what about the shields? I mean, you nerf the efficiency and they will stop being useful.

Shields could gain better stats. As for now, we have many good shields, but all good shields are outperformed by actually viable shields, like Siegebreaker or any set shield, you could throw Untouchable to that, too.
Other masteries, like Demolitionist, could support shields too. There’s Oathbreaker coming into the sack, which will again restrict shields even more for Soldier, as that mastery supports shields too. When FG hits, we can have shield overflow on Soldier and Oathbreaker builds, no one will even think about wielding a shield on an elementalist, for example, therefore shields need a huge efficiency nerf and a big general buff. Buffs should contain + max resists, high armors, physical resists, skill bonuses, skill modifiers for non-soldier and non-oathbreaker skills that will increase shield base values, like block chance or recovery. An offensive shield should not be an additional melee weapon that provides a random, minimal defense bonus and high amounts of damage - why not dual wield two melee weapons then? Skybreach Bulwark is one of those, there’s no reason for that shield to exist. It merely provides offensive stats, with a lie of defense. What do I mean by “lie of defense”? The shield just pretends to be a shield, while in reality it’s just a melee weapon that somehow got physical resists and block ratings.
Another example, Turion’s Reprisal is a good idea of saying “Arcanists can wield shields too!”, but also a failed idea. You’d think about picking it on a retaliation Battlemage, but that will most likely not happen as Arcanists have enough defense to withstand some major damage, at times. Imagine getting rid of the skill modifiers it has right now and changing them to 20% block recovery and chance for Arcane Will. You’d already think about a nice Agrivix retaliation build, using Demolitionist and Arcanist.

There’d be very much to talk about shields. Shields are way too much Soldier restricted and offense-based to be even considered useful outside soldier. Shield should have the idea of defense, not supporting damage, as most shields do. Even the almighty Siegebreaker everyone prioritizes is a damage-based shield with a TOUCH of defense. Like literally, what is the point of shields anyway? You focus on blocking, you’re almost immortal, you don’t focus on the shield, you feel like you have two weapons but the off-hand weapon is a level 50 one and you can do better with another offensive weapon, a sword for example.

Every one second you have a 35% chance of mitigating 1740 damage. That’s not even a good build at this point, if you picked an offensive weapon, and dual wielded instead, this build would be only a touch squishier, but would have a ton of additional damage.

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These are some really good ideas, I second this. I think this is especially true now that we have second mastery that uses shields but lacks skills as overguard and shield mastery(all of the oathkeeper’s skill are revealed and non of them improve your recovery time or block chance).
You should be able to make a x + oathkeeper(or any class really) that uses shields well for defensive purposes and not having it restricted to Warlord or other soldier builds.

Edit: That not to say that the soldier should not gain an advantage in using shields. But compared to other class features such as dual wielding melee/ranged or 2H wielding a shield well is far more restricted.

11

Dunno about that, going dual wield takes the relic spot outside of Nightblade and other specific options. But I get your point about Shields being some kind of melee off-hands, with a couple defensive stats instead of Mana regen…Maybe they do need to buff the baseline defensive stats of Shields, like more base Block.

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I dunno… I kinda like the idea of putting offhands in main hand when shield-wielding…

But I also like the idea of feet-wielding guns like Bayonetta. Devs?

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This would result to even more OP bullshit with Soldier. The easier it’ll be to cap block chance at 100, the easier it would be to increase block damage, the more OP shield soldier will be.
The more effort you’ll need to put to reach the goal, the better the shield will be for other classes. What would be the point of wielding a shield as a non-soldier if shield block chance increased to 50, and block rate to .5? This just screams “soldier”. Sure, it definitely would help other classes too, but there’s a but (not a butt), soldier will have the most advantage of that. That’s the mere reason why shield base stats need a nerf and shield usage overall needs a buff - why would you even need an offensive shield anyway? A shield is meant to block damage, negate damage, so giving shields stats like damage absorption, high armor or physical resist, other resists would be the best, but base stats need a nerf in order to make them more usable for other classes, and get some skill modifiers that increase blocking in non-soldier masteries. If an offensive shield should exist, because there always might be a reason for that, the shield must provide a nice boost to defense, not just blocking and that’s it. Titan Quest does it pretty damn good, although not perfectly, it does a way fucking better job than GD. You pick a shield, and you’re like “Damn, I got a shield, now I can tank way more damage, but I deal kinda less of it too, but X cannot kill me as easily anymore and it gave me a huge advantage”, in GD it’s like “if I equip that shield, and I get lucky, I’ll kill X” and in the end you fully rebuild your character to make it stronger because shields suck (outside of soldier).

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Maybe some underperforming skills in other masteries could affect shield. I am thinking of temper in Demolition as an example. Or would that just make soldier more tank when it combines with other mastery that has a shield benefit skill?

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It’s probably too late now, but I feel they possibly should have had some of the shield block % and recovery reduction not stackable. To prevent 100%/100% and set a maximum threshold. Imho non-stackable is probably easier to manipulate than every single skill, devotion, and item %.

With the FG shield stuff, I suspect we may see these numbers even easier to attain with Soldier/OK or perhaps new gear. Just a suspicion, though.

Perhaps this can be done with masteries, though. Such as adding non-stackable % to a Demo skill and so on. For example.

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All shields should receive another 10% block chance and gain a new 5-10% damage absorption. Any shield that becomes too OP can have its offensive stats nerfed. Or even perhaps -% damage modified could be a thing too.

A few exceptions could be some “offensive designed shields” that don’t gain the damage absorb but have decent offensive stats for a shield.

This would make shields approachable to non soldiers/oathkeepers.

17

Uh, any shield improvement suggestions expectedly boil down to dual…shielding.
(Enriching the language, you know.)

For me personally, this idea always seemed absurd. It’s just way too detached from reality and mechanically makes little to no sense. Can’t imagine dual wielding shields by any stretch of imagination, that absurd.

BTW why not dual wielding crossbows, pole arms, etc.? Why always the shields? Why, why, why?

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Dual shielding? Come on… seriously?

More defense on shields? It’s already possible to make builds that are unkillable. Really unkillable, not almost unkilllable like binders or demolitionists during Blast Shield. Not if all the monsters in the game attacked them all at once. Therefore, unless block chance and recovery gets a cap (at 80-90%) it’s unrealistic to ask for more defense on shields which would only empower the ultimate tanks by allowing them to get more offense.

If block chance and recovery do get a cap, then by all means, more defensive buffs to shield are most welcome and it would make shields more viable for non-soldier builds.

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  1. Wait until shattered realm.
  2. My suggestion implied nerfing things that buff shields, but also buff shields themselves so they’re more universally good instead of feeling restricted to Soldier, Oathkeeper etc.
  3. The issue I have with block by itself is that while it’s fantastic when it goes off, it does nothing when it doesn’t. Meaning at some point burst damage will catch up with you if you don’t cap it. Whereas %damage absorption would take you further.

I want to open up shields to broader use. I don’t care if they make you highly tanky so long as they don’t make you unkillable and also come with slower kill times. This could be adjusted after my suggested change. Shields should feel like an option for any class that wants to live more comfortably with lower kill speeds. Period.

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Just an idea that came in mind to further diversify the whole shield situation.

What if we made a new two handed weapon type staffs, quarterstaffs etc and make them function like normal two handed weapons in game but with the big difference of having the damage stats lowered and granting these weapons the shielding chance, very toned down version from an actual shield but giving some shielding chance to those two handed barbarians who rush into combat like nobody cares or for mages that need to look stylish while also needing a way to defend themselves.