Hate
Hate (also called threat or aggro) is the system instance monsters use to decide who to attack. Every monster that tracks hate keeps its own table with an entry per nearby player; the player with the highest accumulated hate becomes its target. Hate is the mechanic behind the Battle Roles system and is active inside instances only — monsters in the open world use the classic behavior.
How hate is generated
Every hostile or helpful action adds hate to the acting player's entry, scaled by their battle role:
- Damage: each point of damage dealt to the monster adds hate, multiplied by your role modifier (Tank 3.5×, Support 1.5×, Healer 1.25×, DPS 0.5×).
- Healing: healing teammates adds hate to every nearby monster that is tracking you or the player you healed — even ones you never touched. Healing generates 1.5× more base hate than equivalent damage, and only effective healing counts: overhealing a full-health target generates nothing.
- Presence: simply standing near a monster registers you on its table with a small baseline. The Tank's baseline is the highest of the four roles, which is why an untouched boss walks toward the Tank first.
Accumulated hate never fades on its own. It only drops through the specific events listed below.
Status
While a monster tracks you, a status icon shows how dangerous your hate level currently is, relative to the threat leader:
| Status | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Disengaged | You are on the table but far below the leader. Safe. |
| Perceived | Your hate has grown to a noticeable fraction of the leader's (roughly a third). Nothing to worry about yet. |
| Recognized | You are approaching the leader's hate (roughly two thirds). Ease off or use a hate-reducing skill. |
| Aggroed | The monster is targeting you. If you are not the Tank, something went wrong. |
Switching targets
A monster does not bounce between players over small differences. To take its attention off the current target, a challenger must exceed the target's hate by a clear margin — matching it is never enough. After each switch the monster also commits to its new target for a few seconds before considering another change, so aggro cannot ping-pong.
The one exception is the Tank's Enrage taunt, which instantly jumps the Tank's hate above the current leader and forces the monster to turn immediately.
Losing hate
- Death: dying wipes your entry from every monster's table.
- Leaving: changing maps or logging out removes you from the tables of the map you left.
- Vanish (DPS skill): instantly removes half of your accumulated hate on every enemy.
- Fade (Healer skill): halves your hate generation for its duration (it does not reduce what you already built).
- Kiting: a monster that cannot reach or see its target sheds a large part of that player's hate and re-targets someone who is actually present. Likewise, an Aggroed Tank who stays out of the monster's reach or line of sight for more than a few seconds loses their accumulated lead. Tanking means standing your ground.
The aggro overlay
Inside an instance you can watch the hate table live with the command:
@aggro start @aggro stop
The overlay shows the monster's name and HP, its current target, and every tracked player with their hate value, percentage relative to the leader, status and role. It refreshes about once per second.
See also
- Battle Roles — the four roles, their hate modifiers and role skills.
- Instance System — where hate-tracking monsters appear.