Rooted: Why does this debuff exist?

Title topic. That's all. Is it thematic? Is Rooted superior to all other forms of mez protection to the point it needs this debuff? Must you take Teleport or have a Pocket Kin to not want to smash your head into a wall? Must it de-toggle Combat Jumping and Hover? ( Unless it doesn't anymore. Been a long time. )

What is the true reason that Rooted cripples your movement capabilities? is 100% unslotted regen that overpowered?

I want to know what is so game-breaking about Rooted that you need to move at a pace so slow that even the Tortoise would feel sorry for you.

Because Stone Armor is an archaic and poorly designed set.

Well of course you'd think so, Silas! You bash it all the time in your guides!

Shame, too. I kind of like the crystal armor shtick... too bad Stone Armor is such a terrible set with out Granite Form.

I bash it all the time because its a terribly designed set which I'd otherwise like to like. Granite/Rooted is also the epitome of everything wrong with Tankers, IMO.

I want Stone Armor to get the treatment that /Psy got for Doms. Break down the tier9 into a normal power, make the rest of the set not utter balls.

That makes a lot of sense, when put that way. Do you think any of the Tanker sets are well designed, then?

I happen to think Dark Armor is amazing, but I can't seem to find that 'sweet spot' in any build I put together that makes me want to GOOOOO for it! That, and being so rarely seen, I like being 'exotic'~!

Almost all of them, actually. Invuln and WP especially, with the exception of RttC having such a crap taunt component. Elec and DA are both pretty solid, Fire and SD are pretty good because they can be squishier than the other sets without IOs but bring more offensive capabilities.

Ice is a little tricky, because its pretty easy to softcap but doesn't have a lot of protection beyond that other than Hoarfrost. Sure, you can get more s/l resists with Tough but that's not the set itself.

In the past I would have argued that Unyielding was badly designed, way back when it rooted you. The set had some other more systematic issues, but they've all been resolved more or less. Before Burn had the fear component removed maybe Fire Armor, since it was squishier than the other sets because it had more offense, except that offense was counterproductive to tanking.

Now its pretty much just Stone which is overall poorly designed IMO. To elaborate on the epitome of everything wrong with Tankers bit, by that I mean the paradigm of paying punitive costs in damage-dealing and/or mobility for superfluous survivability.

I see! Well thanks for the info, Silas. Insightful as always~!

No problem

I suppose I could also give explaining it mechanically a shot. Rooted gives you +100% regen. Only Elec and WP have powers that offer comparable regen, RttC which requires 4 foes in melee to reach that level of regen and Energize which requires huge amounts of global recharge to make permanent. That said, RttC can give you far higher levels of regen and Energize also has a hefty heal component.

So Rooted gives you that level of recharge, but you pay for it with reduced mobility. Which I guess the devs figured made sense because you're covered in stone, you're gonna be slow. Which does make sense, it just makes for poor set design IMO.

I can understand.

Doesn't Rooted also include endurance drain resistance and defense debuff resistance? It's the strongest/most comprehensive mez protection toggle in the game, I believe.

I'd argue that Stone Armour when running all its non-Granite armours is :
a) a massive endurance hog, but also
b) possibly the most comprehensively protected set.

You've got decent, but not necessarily 'good' Defence values to S/L/E/N, Very good Psi defence, smallish S/L resist, Good F/C resist, Moderate Toxic resist when Earths Embrace is up and +regen.

Mez protection, you've got Rooted for KB, KU, Repel, Hold, Sleep, Immob, Stun; it also makes you functionally immune to endurance and recovery draining effects. Minerals provides +perception, perception debuff resistance and Mag 30 Confuse protection.

You get 50% defence debuff resist (which I'd argue isn't anywhere near enough for a defence based tanker set, just as with Ice) from Rooted, Rock and Crystal combined.

All you're missing is fear protection to be mostly immune to all mezzes in the game (other than cheat mode Ghost Widow Soul Storm and Sequestering in the BAF)

Now I'll admit, I'm biased, because one of my favourite toons is a Stone/Fire scranker that I deliberately build to avoid Granite like the plague, and since I rebuilt him into a hideously expensive setup a month or so ago, he's been almost impossible to faceplant on without me doing something stupid.

The drawback to Rooted to me is only the mobility aspect, and a couple of run speed IO's in Swift will mitigate a lot of that. Teleport is however the other other power from Stone armour for me. Teleport on a keybind (I Ctrl-Click to go to where I clicked) makes stone so much more mobile it's not even funny.

I think it's a personal taste thing. Yes, in comparison to more recent defence sets, it is lacking in SO grade 'out of the box' survivability. Even in comparison to some of the sets from the early days of the game, it's a little weak to start with. But it can be turned into something pretty special IME (I still can't get over being able to stomp round a map full of Carnies, annoy 4 times the aggro cap of them and then laugh as the come running in to try and stop me, only to be burned to a crisp... After some of the trouble Carnies have caused me over the years, that sort of payback is priceless, and I used to do it before I IO'd him to the gills too )

It is definitely a thematic thing more than a game balance thing. I'd actually like to see some the penalty removed from Rooted. Granite deserves the full set of penalties, Rooted could get away with a lesser set of penalties and still be thematically appropriate.

I always thought Granite/Rooted would have been way better if it limited max running speed, jumping speed and jumping height rather than lower these. Like if, say, you had Swift Hurdle levels of movement available, and never more than that. This would remove that situation where you're either slow as a turtle, or thanks to a single specific buff super fast and pay no price for your survivability.

Having played a stoner for many years I would love the speed penalty (out of the box) just lessoned a tad. And as other posters have suggested the ability to move over a curb would be huge. Getting stuck on the lip of something is very annoying. Jumping should stay impossible because after all you are supposed to be rooted to the ground. At the end of the day though it’s all old hat to me. I think everything is more annoying for casual players or those who don’t want to invest in their character. I move around just fine with the run speed bonuses I have worked into my build.

Maybe the runspeed debuff in rooted is overkill and the runspeed debuff in granite is not even a kill.

Crazy thoughts of the day -

Make all Stone armors stack (minus Granite with Minerals)
Buff the s/l def, e/n def and f/c res armors
Gut Granite when another armor provides that bonus (s/l/e/n def, f/c res)
Remove the movement penalties from Rooted, put them on Granite (in addition to the existing penalties).

So we end up with something decent and mobile, but still have the option of going survival overkill (while maintaining the psy hole in Granite).

Eh. It's quite flavourful, so I say leave it be. I can build around it with a +run speed build anyway - I hardly ever use Teleport these days.

If you buff the s/l and e/n armours it'd be even easier to softcap with IOs, so I don't think that's a good option.

Stacking Rooted's penalty on Granite would be terrible, since you can generally run around in Granite without Rooted and only turn it on occasionally. I'd not like to see an assumption that they're both always on. I'd also hate an assumption that you even turn on Granite a lot as a Stoner....I'm not even using it on 75% of the iTrials I'm running. It's just not needed.

Hm... the name of the power is "Rooted" so you MUST be rooted to the ground! So it is "sorta" thematic.

Anyway, I would like to see the -runspeed on this power to be lessened, and maybe give it the Grounded treatment. I.E. if you're not on the ground you don't get the benefits of the power.

I'd be fine with a debuff to jumping/running if it were *just* a debuff and not a ridiculous and arbitrary ban against turning on sprint and/or flight/leaping/superspeed toggles. You can zip around at superspeed, fly, and jump off the ground though other means while using Rooted/Granite but for some reason cannot activate associated travel powers? It's sheer idiocy.

It's time for the -jump aspect of Granite and Rooted to go. Reducing the -speed debuff would be nice as well. These debuffs just aren't needed anymore, (and frankly were not terribly well thought out to begin with). Yes, Granite is still the single best Tanker armor available, but now with Inventions and Incarnates, you can basically reach the same levels of survivability with none of the drawbacks. What reason will anyone have to continue taking Stone outside of theme, (which can be substituted with a rock Shield)?

I have a stone/stone tank and I think it is funny that i am either in rooted or granite I can still jump with 1 of my attacks IE Tremor but when I move I can not jump at all.