Hammers, Knockdown & PvE

I've recently been playing a lot as a hammer warrior.
What I've noticed is that there aren't a lot of us around in PvE. Axes, dime a dozen; swords, you can't move for the buggers.
But hammers?
Nowhere to be seen.
I'm guessing that one of the main reasons is the necessary drop in defense from having no shield.

I'd like to make a couple of suggestions to make hammers a more attractive PvE option.

Allow hammers to knock down ALL mobs
Now this one's REALLY annoying. In many areas, the biggest advantage of the hammer, knockdown, is completely nullified due to a large percentage of the mobs being immune to knockdown (giants, ettins, dolyaks, wurms, etc.).
The ridiculous thing is, bosses of the same type CAN be knocked down.
So allow hammers to knock down these mobs. Maybe add a condition such as Hammer Mastery or Strength being at a certain level in order to be able to knock these mobs down. Another idea is to give all giant-type mobs a skill such as Balanced Stance or Dolyak Signet. Just don't allow them to have the passive ability to resist knockdown.
Nobody in PvP has an inherent resistance to knockdown, so why should things in PvE?

Knockdown should end stances
The definition of a stance is standing in a certain way.
If you get knocked flat on your ass, you're no longer standing in that certain way.
The trouble with this one is that it could really unbalance a lot of skills, and would definitely affect PvP.
For example, at the moment a warrior's primary way of ending a stance is to use [skill=text]Wild Blow[/skill]. This skill has a major drawback; you lose all adrenaline when using it.
Now if we look at [skill=text]irresistible blow[/skill], if we added the bonus of knockdowns breaking stances, we'd have a skill that performs one of the functions of Wild Blow (indeed, the primary function), but also has the added benefits of knockdown, extra damage and no loss of adrenaline.
But then again, I think that Wild Blow needs re-tooling anyway, as it's a far better skill in the hands of a sin (no drawbacks), and the Paragon gets an equivalent skill that is adrenaline-based and doesn't result in the loss of adrenaline.

Thoughts?

Having mobs that are immune to KD is part of what makes PvE hard (and still isn't that hard)

Having KD's end stances is a very large change in game dynamics and would destroy what balance we have.

It would make sense, but there's so many things that don't make sense due to balance and I like it this way, really.

Earthshaker (elite skill. look it up).

Hammers aren't that great in PvE anyway... Triple Chop or Dragon Slash will always cause more damage. Decent on a hero purely because they time Counter Blow extremely well.

As for stances... i hardly see how Mantra of Frost is attained from 'standing in a certain way', its just a game mechanic. Never understood why people are allowed to use stances when they're flat on there ass though, your suppose to be immobile, other than shouting you can't do anything.

It's a nice thought, and it makes some sense. But it ruins the balance. I think there'd be a backlash because it is indeed a large change in game mechanic. I appluad the effort though.

Yea, because knocking a 500 kilogram pure muscle brute down makes soooo much sense.
Instead of ending a stance why not just make that they cant block while knocked down, that would make more sense then end it.

When 1 is to much, we can add 0.1.

Knockdown could have a % chances to finish stances, in the same way that blindness, along with the 90% chances to fail, add some straying to all proyectiles (spells like flare or light spear included).

For the knockdow to all mobs... well... they are giants... and wurms...
You can't do more to them that hitting their knees, XD
It would have more sense if you could knock them down while they are crippled, entangled or slowed down.

The suggestions make sense for PvE, but it won't work for PvP. Also if you want mass knockdown, EarthShaker is a good elite to look up. Then ending stances.... eeeeeeehhhhh...................................... ...... I think you'll have to deal with wild blow for the time being.

QFT

the pve knockdown.

Also pve will always have simple "cookie cutter" builds no matter what you do because of A) monsters not comprehending AoE well enough and B)PvE players cry bloody murder every time a nerf hits them, even if a PvE nerf is needed, creating permanent overpowered builds.

so /notsigned

/notsigned
esp for removing stances. Thats one of the points of balanced stance, you can not be knocked down.

~the rat~