Isn't it strange how Ninjas are tanks?

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Originally Posted by Cursed

no. no. no.
While SAM was exceptional at tanking, it wasn't the "de facto" tank at 75.
SAMs wouldn't last 30 seconds vs PW or AV.
There are also several other mobs that SAMs have no chance at tanking.
try going and tanking some VNMs and Synergy mobs with SAM and let me know how long you last without 3-4 whms spaming cureV on you.

And when SAM did tank, it often relied on a co-tank. No SAM was solo tanking Tiamat, Khimaira, Cerberus, Saramaya.
They were often accompanied by another sam, or a thief, or a war/sam..

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Fairly certain I solo tanked Khim, Cerb, Saramaya, Tyger, Ultima, etc on SAM without any real issues. Can solo tank Tia too, but there's no point to doing that because of back to back hate resets.

Edit: Like Sparthos said, MDT/PDT sets, barfire set for Tia+Cerb, and about 6-8 other competent players made these NMs easy and much faster to kill than using a PLD. This allowed you to camp multiple HNMs/kill at once, or kill the one you have faster to get to the next.

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Originally Posted by Rearden

Fairly certain I solo tanked Khim, Cerb, Saramaya, Tyger, Ultima, etc on SAM without any real issues. Can solo tank Tia too, but there's no point to doing that because of back to back hate resets.

Edit: Like Sparthos said, MDT/PDT sets, barfire set for Tia+Cerb, and about 6-8 other competent players made these NMs easy and much faster to kill than using a PLD. This allowed you to camp multiple HNMs/kill at once, or kill the one you have faster to get to the next.

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what do you define as solo tanking?
you're the only melee on the mob?

and the roars are precisely the reason why any other melee besides drk or /drk would suck at solo tanking wyrms with hate resets that can fly.

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Originally Posted by Arcon

I think he meant from a role-playing perspective, not from an efficiency perspective. And he's right, Ninjas are very weird tanks, they're even weird as melee, they're support to work covertly and stealthy, not provoking monsters and whatnot.

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Pretty much this.

Yes, just me on the mob, someone runs a THF mule out for TH at the end, Avatars/BLMs BRDs, RDM, WHM.

No one is going ot read this wall, but here it is anyways.

Solo tanking is unwise no matter how you do it. Which was the strength of using DD tanks. If hate got wierd, you still had only one person to concentrate cures on and two doing damage. Sam specifically had a lot of tools that aided in damage mitigation, as well as acquiring hate.

When you're a DD tank, you know that the monster is going to be on you and it's going to stay there. You know that no matter how hard you cure, that DD tank is only a weaponskill or a hit away from taking it back. All the While, you are a contributing force in killing the monster.

When you had a Paladin tank, you know your DD's were holding back, because as stated above, you know you're one hit or a weaponskill away from taking hate... That uncertainty made Paladins a liability. And I know, the obvious answer I alway hear to that is "Well you just had bad Paladins", and that's just fact, but the unfortunate thing is, it's not the specific Paladins, all paladins were just bad at holding hate. They had no tools, other than telling the party to slow damage. Now before your blood boils, please note that I'm speaking in the past tense, Paladins do pretty decently in voidwatch currently.

Ninja's currently are "Tanks out of Habit" it seems. Like, there's some of the old school folks that just can't let it go. It's annoying to me, mainly because SE's made it a point to give nearly every single monster in the game rediculous AoE moves now, to the point where even regular attacks make shadows, subbed or mained, absolutely useless. Ninja as a tank still works, but unless you're using a Kanagi and all but ignoring your shadows, you're a borderline liability now too.

With certain job combos, the only time I see DD tanks fail is when they sub ninja.
Take Monk for example. I had groups so hellbent on using ninja sub, not knowing that it was impeding the abilities that woudl mitigate the damage I take. Logic says: 'Well if you have shadows, you mitigate damage', and while true it goes against the tanking style of monk. With full counter gear, merits, atmas, etc etc etc, you could probably (technically) "evade" more than a thief, but WHILE evading, you're doing damage. You're pretty much guaranteed 5% evasion no matter what, and with counterstance up with atmas, and gear, you can counter probably close to 75%-80% of the hits. Those are hits where instead of taking damage, you instead deal damage. So you pop Aggressor, and Berserk, and Counterstance, since your defense is already nothing, and the less you evade, the more you counter, and voila! that 80% "Evasion" is translated directly into damage. Same dynamic works basically for Retaliation as well, give or take.

Mentioned earlier, "defense" of the job is practically useless... Sam was a good tank because instead of Defense, you have PDT and MDT gear. How much does a monster hit you for? if it's 600, I could easily shave 40% off that with PDT. But how much defense would I need to do what PDT does? On Monk, with counterstance and berserk up, I think my defense is like 18, maybe less. With those off, it's probably over 300. But the difference in damage i take is at best 10-20% more per hit, but I'm countering 50% more of them (doing damage in the process). So which would you choose? Longer fight where I take 10-20% less damage per hit? or a fight where 50% of the hits I take are blocked completely and turn to damage to the monster, thus shortening the overall fight time?

To the "Role-Playing" aspect brought up later between Ninja and Samurai...

You want to draw real life comparisons between the two arts as to which would tank better? Idk, how about we find the nearest dragon in real life and see who fairs better shall we? There was no "tanking" in real life for either art... Ninja assassinate, where Samurai Duel. Of the two they both play thier roles out in game arguably accurate. Ninjas deceive the monster, and debilitate it; where Samurai take it head on and overwhelm it with technique and skill.

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blah blah blah....You want to draw real life comparisons between the two arts as to which would tank better? Idk, how about we find the nearest dragon in real life and see who fairs better shall we? There was no "tanking" in real life for either art... Ninja assassinate, where Samurai Duel. Of the two they both play thier roles out in game arguably accurate. Ninjas deceive the monster, and debilitate it; where Samurai take it head on and overwhelm it with technique and skill.

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Oh you
8675309

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Originally Posted by Frost

You want to draw real life comparisons between the two arts as to which would tank better?

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Samurai are all about their honor and being able to take hits and never give up, so I have no idea what you're talking about. Also, doing whatever it takes to please their master/sensei which means going through a lot of more pain than one would think.

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Idk, how about we find the nearest dragon in real life and see who fairs better shall we?

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Comparing this as literal to a Dragon is absurd. And a lot of what ninjas come from are fiction as well which is already popular enough for anyone to realize that they aren't about taking hits. So if we want to get into fiction, than I don't see the issue with Dragoon.

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There was no "tanking" in real life for either art... Ninja assassinate, where Samurai Duel. Of the two they both play thier roles out in game arguably accurate. Ninjas deceive the monster, and debilitate it; where Samurai take it head on and overwhelm it with technique and skill.

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It makes less sense for a class which is based off real ninja or fiction ninja which have always been based on absolute lightest equipment and speed to being a shield is pretty weird.

Regardless of whatever we're discussing with Samurai, the main topic here is Ninja being a tank.

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Originally Posted by Vortex

The primary reason PLD failed at tanking is because while they have hate enimity generating abitlies they lacked damage, you NEED damage in order to keep hate on anything, and they simply failed in that department.

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This has always troubled me with the way SE handles tanking compared to other MMORPGs.
They should just give some passive job trait to PLD (and maybe to NINs under the effect of Yonin?) that gives them a different enmity generation ratio.
There is a formula in the game that estabilishes how "damage done" converts to "enmity". They should just reduce this conversion rate for ALL jobs cept PLD and maybe something else. This would make reaching the enmity cap harder (which is kinda easy with the damage players deal nowadays... the cap was created with level 75 in mind) and tanking more meaningful.
A tank should be able to tank because of his "tanking abilities" and his enmity, not because of the damage he deals (or not only for that).
Yet that's exactely what's been happening for the majority of NMs in FFXI.
Tanks can't generate enough enmity, DDs are much better with that. Many DDs have some interesting defensive abilities... and so DDs became tanks.
Everybody always accepted that as if it was something "normal", but to me it's always been pretty retarded and the result of some huge planning mistake at the source of it all.


Anyway, talking about pre-abyssea and even now with Voidwatch, PLD makes a difference on a lot of mobs that would be otherwise kinda hard to tank on NIN, SAM, MNK, WAR etc.

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Originally Posted by Tagrineth

SE has disagreed with you about SAM on numerous occasions.

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Yeah, their Artifact and Relic armor wasn't designed for tanking at all. It's not like it had any Enmity+ on it. No defensive combat skills like parry+ or evasion+ on it. It definitely didn't have "Occasionally boosts TP when damaged" on a piece. It's not even as if they have a defensive ability that can block physical attacks. They certainly don't have an A- defensive combat skill either. And a damage boosting ability that requires you to be facing the mob like a tank would to activate? Don't be silly.

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Originally Posted by Juri_Licious

I mean if you take a look at an actual Ninja they are quite the opposite and focus on the bodies weak points.

It'd make a lot more sense if Samurai was a tank class. I mean they are suited in armor.

Just thought it was rather odd.

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Woah, did somebody necro this thread from 2004 or something?