Why does THF have enmity stealing JA, and PLD does not?

[Oakrest]

Why does THF have enmity stealing JA (Collab/Accomp), and PLD does not? Thieves steal items, not hate - stealing hate on THF just sounds ridiculous.

Having the ability to sneak-ily move hate onto other players (i.e. Trick Attack) makes sense for thief - sly, tactical, and misleading - however, stealing hate from another player from the simple use of a JA is just strange, it always has been. I realize this isn't a new JA, it's just something I've been meaning to post for a while.

A PLD might say, "hey there Monster, stop picking on my WHM friend and try some one your own size!" and provoke the monster to his attention - but would a THF? I'd say no... it just doesn't fit the picture. The THF might throw a rock and distract the monster temporarily as he ran off into the forest - but I don't think this "valiant" ability for a thief to 'steal' enmity, and sacrafice himself to save the whm makes any sense at all. A THF should be more selfish than that (at least by character description).

Using Google Translator on this JP thread from a community rep shows the following,"

When using cover, I want you to move enmity from the player who received cover to the PLD

As the ability of a similar effect, the "deceptive attack" is already available to Thief (Collab/Accomp). Thief is where you want to transfer it to the fighting.

So SE's response to a long list of questions about giving the PLD enmity control, was basically to say - if you want to hold hate, that's the job for THF. Wow... just wow.

This is just very wrong and very frustrating. Is there no creative director at FFXI ? Is there no hope for lore and logic anymore? Please SE, please respond to this...

[Daniel_Hatcher]

The same reason a DD that really can't tank/mitigate damage that well has Provoke. SE are growing something illegal and smoking it.

That said, I suppose the arguement is: You're supposed to take hate from the DD/mage with the current hate and move it to a job that should have very little (THF). Not saying it's right, but still.

[Chilzen]

Actually, THF has always been designed as a job that utilizes hate control in party situations, that's likely why they gave it Collaborator / Accomplice abilities. Before those abilities their purpose was to firmly plant hate on the tank through the use of SATA, as well as give THF a chance to shine with some impressive damage without fear of repercussion from the mob due to high spike damage.

The response they gave seems almost spot on to one that I could have sworn was given on the English side by a rep as well, which basically means SE is deadset on having us use party dynamics from the old days in a game that hasn't grown with the level cap as far as group synergy and mechanics work. Basically anything that requires you to have a PLD nowadays won't have it where players are going to setup a party with THF + PLD in the same group for the purpose of THF yanking hate off other members every so often and popping Bully + SATA behind the PLD every 3 minutes, because with the low hate cap, a fraction of that time to set it up like they want us to and anyone that's going to get hate on the mob will be busy playing pingpong with everyone else with a low delay and high haste.

Another issue with the current game is that either due to level differences due to the increases the past couple of years, or the general zerg nature of the game nowadays, hate control abilities are rather worthless in many situations. It might help your healer in an "OHSHIIIII!" moment, but use it on any DD and within a WS or just a few attack rounds and they'll recap again. Only job that really benefits from having a THF yank hate off them is a BLM that either tears through a mob due to all the INT + MAB slapped on their gear, or 10 minutes recast is still down on Enmity Douse, which is a whole other rant that probably doesn't matter on the PLD forums, and I suspect the new line of merits will address that with timer reductions.

[Babekeke]

The same reason a DD that really can't tank/mitigate damage that well has Provoke. SE are growing something illegal and smoking it.

That said, I suppose the arguement is: You're supposed to take hate from the DD/mage with the current hate and move it to a job that should have very little (THF). Not saying it's right, but still.

A well-geared THF has a lot of hate. PLD is about the only job that I can trick exenterator onto, and then not pull hate immediately when I sneak evisceration (well, in abyssea.). I'd love to be able to tell you how well THF deals damage in Voidwatch... but even since Bully procs, I've never been asked to go THF ><

[Oakrest]

There's big problems with enmity right now - not just for pld. And I'm not really talking about thf or pld in general in this thread. I just specifically find it weird that the thief role has the ability to 'steal' enmity as if it were a tangible item (which thieves are generally better at stealing).

I'm not suggesting here that giving Collab/Accomp to PLD will fix it's enmity situation - it won't. Collab/accomp only really seem effective as a quick Provoke-like function when a DD like a BLM temporarily exceeds the cumulative enmity. PLD needs a more permanent solution. All I'm saying is, it's strange reasoning and lore for thf to have been given these JA, when so many other jobs would make sense to have an enmity steal ability (even if Collab/Accomp aren't the right solutions, SE is putting enmity consideration into the wrong jobs by giving it to THF). THF has treasure hunter, flee, situational DD, and massive evasion - enmity control should not be on its list (granted, Trick Attack makes sense).

[Babekeke]

The main reason I can think of as to why THF got these abilityies, is because THF has always been great at evading attacks, yet we were never able to get to the top of the hate list, unless we had Mandau.
We even get a great 2 hour for saving the party a bit of time for people to get out of AOE range, Mages to recover a couple of ticks of MP, debuffs to wear or whatever, but before these JAs, we had to wait for the rest of the party/alliance to wipe before we were top of the hate list, and Perfect Dodge became useful for solo only.

Without vast changes to the enmity system, what PLD could use is not so much an ability that steals enmity from other players, but an ability that cuts the accumulated enmity of players in AOE range by half, allowing PLD to remain at enmity cap while other DDs rebuild hate. Let them use this ability every 60 secs, and PLD should be tanking for most of the fight.

[Llana_Virren]

I'm suprised no one mentioned this:

There's an ability called "Trick Attack" which moves the enmity of the next attack to the player in front of the THF (under some other circumstances, but nevertheless). By "stealing" enmity the THF can then transfer it to another player via Trick Attack.

What you should be asking, is why are there any enmity-controlling abilities when the calculations are borked into uselessness?

[Aarahs]

Unless I'm incorrect, trick attack doesn't transfer all thf enmity, only the enmity from that single attack. I think it's a bit silly and the hate system should get an overhaul since lvl99 cap, but there it is.

[Oakrest]

what PLD could use is not so much an ability that steals enmity from other players,

Did you read my posts? I did mention, "I'm not suggesting here that giving Collab/Accomp to PLD will fix it's enmity situation - it won't. Collab/accomp only really seem effective as a quick Provoke-like function when a DD like a BLM temporarily exceeds the cumulative enmity. PLD needs a more permanent solution... ". Collab/Accomp might only help a thf save another player in a pinch, and even then it's not reliable. But again, that's not the point - the point is that this is energy spent in all the wrong places, and in all the wrong way.

I go on to mention more in that section too. This thread is about trying to understand what THF has any enimity controll JA at all (at least that 'steals' enmity) - the point is, SE isn't putting intelligent thought into this.

What you should be asking, is why are there any enmity-controlling abilities when the calculations are borked into uselessness?

I kind of am in a way, I'm just trying to bring awareness to the enmity discussion using some really specific examples where they have clearly fallen short on thinking it through.

[Flyinghippress]

In all fairness THF does make a very good tank inside Abyssea and in some cases outside of it as well. Granted that isn't its definition... but hey, what can you do? I just look at it as more ways to play a job. PLD unfortunately got the short end of the stick. A tank with little means of maintaining enmity on its own.

They gave provoke to WAR likely so that low level groups could have a tank since PLD is an advanced job. What they didn't think of was getting PLD an ability to do the same. They should really think about adding one or at least augmenting the existing abilities.