Enmity in "lower level" content

Tanking is a frustrating thing at the moment. In newer content, I can keep bosses glued to me absolutely no problem.

To properly single tank the taurus and demon, active hate must be kept on both targets. The way I choose to do this is that my current target gets Flashes (because my flash can be as low as 10 seconds), and the other target gets Provokes. Sometimes, I'll also use the Provoke for the main target.

Even splitting enmity like this, neither target takes their attention off me. I am a well-geared tank. I TP in a lot of enmity gear (secondary to capping defensive stats) and have a fantastic swap for Provoke and all my other abilities. I have a great haste/enmity set for Flash and Reprisal.

I know how to use sentinel, divine emblem, warcry (and rampart if it's not strategically needed). I have a strong cureswap, piled with enmity. In higher content, I can typically save sentinel for when I need it as a damage-reduction cooldown. In lower content, I pop it very early in the fight and right-away if it's mobs that have natural party-hate like Incursion, Vagary. Ambuscade also has party hate, but I just don't need to sentinel as a hate tool in there.

That said, I find myself going to HTBFs sometimes where enmity is a whole lot harder to hold. This is partly because most of this stuff has lower evasion, lower defense meaning the DDs hit harder. This is mainly because of the design of the enmity system.

The lower level the target is, the more enmity is generated by damage, while enmity from job abilities and healing remains the same. That's why DDs pull off tanks in older content so easily. This also makes enmity-cap, which is still a thing, more easily attainable for the DD and once at enmity cap--there's very little that can be done by jobs other than BLM, DRG, and THF.

The thing is, just because they outgear the content doesn't always mean they're able to tank the content.

The theory is that Square Enix considered that if enmity wasn't higher for DDs in older content, like Delve, then DDs wouldn't be able to tank in content where a tank really wasn't needed but that's pretty broad.

There's a lot of content that we outgear where a tank still is needed or is desirable, like many HTBFs.

If that theory is the truth, then how about changing it so that elemental damage and healing did reduced enmity in older content and put melee back on a flat value regardless of how old the content is.

One theory concerning high-tier battlefields is that the harder difficulties don't actually increase the level of the monster, just the stats of the monster. This is effectively similar to how we're still 99, but our gear raises our level. Essentially, our ilvl is calculated in the enmity formula but the monster's "inflated level (set by chosen difficulty)" is not.

It's crazy that damage that would never pull a Reisenjima boss off of me will pull HTBF Ultima off of me (Ultima is the breath one. Omega, I understand, because he has hate resets)

The present design has everyone else enjoying the fruits of their gear progression and tanks working harder and still failing in older content. Since enmity now affects how much hate is lost from taking damage, simply switching to Sulevia's (which has no enmity on it) is not necessarily an option either.

Even with my Burtgang AM3, I'm not going to TP nearly as fast as the blu/dnc/thf/sam/etc. That also means building up tp to 300% which can take a PLD quite a while.

I'll be honest, it's frustrating and embarrassing. People that don't know what's going on think the tank is "fail" and like to spout things like "I thought you were the tank." It takes joy out of the game temporarily to experience this. I'm actually geared enough that I can, if I give it my all, usually hold an easier NM for most or all of it's health in easier content but I get a lot of tells about other PLDs.

I've thought about posting this thread for a while but it's embarrassing to call a spotlight on yourself. It was only once I saw other tanks--that I respect--acknowledging this that I decided to bring it up on the official forums.

TL;DR: Hello, my name is Omnys and I sometimes have enmity problems in older content.

I'm a bit disappointed this has gotten no feedback from the community.

On the flipside of this, I took my BLU to help another PLD with farming Tenzen tonight.

My BLU is not amazingly geared but the PLD, at least in his most visible set, is better geared than my PLD. Full souv+1, Burtgang 119 AG. I don't know what kind of enmity swaps he does for abilities like provoke or Flash but I do know that he appeared to be playing correctly. After the first run, once he realized that I could pull hate off him, He'd open just as I would--

Flash, Sentinel, Provoke, Warcry, Rampart, ... Flash, Provoke and I would still sometimes get hate off him. Now I wasn't holding back, but this was more of a test from a different viewpoint of the thoughts in my OP.

Hate resets are a fine mechanic. I have no complaint about that, but aside from resets, hate should be reliable. I don't expect to be able to a fresh 119 to hold off an Reisenjima geared person, but I do expect a mythic tank to be able to hold off of mythic DD. I especially expect a mythic tank to be able to hold off of a NQ DD, such as my BLU. So what, I was TPing faster than him, that's the difference between our job types. I'm supposed to TP faster than him and do more damage than he is, otherwise there's no point in me being there.

And that's not even to begin to imply that a tank geared equal to a DD (mythic v mythic) should do the same amount of damage. Tanks are tanks for a reason, and DD are DD for a reason.

In many areas, enmity is fine, areas where the mobs are higher level. I tank many UNMs just fine, regardless of fury/frailty* etc (which is doing everything for melee damage and nothing for me).

* And that's not to mention the fact that if I just bring SCHs and BLMs, the hate issues are non-existent unless the fight has a hate reset (Omega HTBF) or peculiar hate mechanics (Puppet in Peril)

In content like HTBFs, which I can hit in many of my tanking setups ("hard", "trivial", "accuracy", etc) which means that I'm producing more enmity by putting out more damage and taking less damage (especially when I use my "hard" set--because there's lot of enmity+ on that gear), enmity issues arise.

Like I said, I get the point that in this paradigm, melee can tank older content. The WHM and casters are safe and that's really smart, but it's frustrating to go to the few old things that still need a tank, like many HTBFs*, as a tank. It is frustrating to watch this "older content" reach a point where the monster either turns for voke/flash for a second, or altogether ignores it.

I will note that WAR or DRK could probably switch to a -dt set and tank many of these things. But most don't. Their response to getting smacked in the face is to smack the other guy back in the face.

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Originally Posted by OmnysValefor

Their response to getting smacked in the face is to smack the other guy back in the face.

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Not trying to take away from your original intention but this part made me laugh. Sounds about right.


Overall, I think the enmity cap will always be a tricky thing to manage as there might not be an easy way to adjust it without calling out a specific job, ability, or trait.

For argument's sake, lets say Provoke temporarily increases the enmity cap, but what if you don't sub Warrior for some instance or another?

That said, I'm not sure how everyone feels about Scholars anymore, but they do have those spells to help with enmity gain. Best I could give ya on this subject.

As I recall, Animus-Augeo is in the Crusade line of spells (though much earlier) and doesn't stack with it. I assume that it doesn't stack with Ninja's version either.

Animus-Minuo still exists, but -10 enmity isn't a lot, especially for worthwhile DD, and rests on the group bringing an SCH. This is something we do for a lot of hard content, but enmity isn't typically an issue on hard content (edit: not because of SCH enmity spells, lol)--especially against casters. Casters, for some reason, produce much less enmity than melee.

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In most cases, when the group is enmity capping, it's because the strategy is wrong.

Enmity is working well in a lot of areas actually, high content-level areas.

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Another suggestion would be to make Yonin and Innin available from /nin sub and possibly increase their potency. With Yonin on, jobs generate full enmity from damage. With yonin off or innin on, they generate reduced damage.

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Lastly, that line you quoted was intended to be funny.

I agree so much. I am constantly running into this issue with my dancer. I even made a post about it in the Job Balancing thread. The two areas where Melee DD is in desperate need of help is primarily Enmity and also innate frontline survivability (as in we shouldn't need to rely on swapping into tank gear in the midst of DDing just to survive AoEs).

The gear on my Dancer isn't the absolute best, but it's not bad either. Unbuffed I have about 1100 acc / 1200 att, and I also have lots of stp, multi hit, crit, and skillchain bonus. I hit very hard and fast, and if I have Haste II, I can solo 3-step double darkness all day. If I have capped haste and Geo buffs, then in a sandbox environment (a.k.a. Apex Eruca Genocide), I can regularly do about 2000 dps, plus another 2200 dps in skillchain damage.. Yes, I out-dps myself.. Dancer is fun.

The problem though is that because of the higher damage output, I generate a LOT of enmity. So to keep from pulling hate, I literally have to stop closing skillchains (which is what Dancers are are built for), and pace my weapon skills effectively lowering my damage output by half just so that I can live... So my Dancer is caught between being too strong for most content lower than CL 130, and too little accuracy/survivability for CL 135+. It is very frustrating. The current enmity mechanics literally prevent me from going 100% on anything that can kill me.

Mean while, Black mages magic bursting off of Scholar skillchains can do the same damage over time as my dancer, but are virtually untouched by enmity and can avoid most AoE/Spike damage altogether, thereby dramatically diminishing the role for both Melee DD and Healers in one fell swoop...


So if SE is serious about bringing Melee DD back out of obscurity, they need to give us our main party niche back: Skillchaining. I think this needs two things to happen:

1) Either remove Imminence entirely, or nerf it to minor situational use only (perhaps more of a soloing JA).. Make it so that Magic bursting a traditional skillchain is far more attractive than magic bursting Imminence SCs.

2) Adjust enmity drastically. I would love to see Melee DD enmity to be brought down closer to offensive magic levels for ALL content, not just the highest level content. Even meeting halfway would be an improvement. Melee is already more likely to be smacked in the face (which obviously makes sense), The enmity difference between melee and magic DD is just far too vast. An NM should be mildly upset at anyone who is trying to stab them or throw fireballs at them, but they should be absolutely livid if someone tries to flash them.

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Originally Posted by Shyles

So if SE is serious about bringing Melee DD back out of obscurity, they need to give us our main party niche back: Skillchaining. I think this needs two things to happen:

1) Either remove Imminence entirely, or nerf it to minor situational use only (perhaps more of a soloing JA).. Make it so that Magic bursting a traditional skillchain is far more attractive than magic bursting Imminence SCs.

2) Adjust enmity drastically. I would love to see Melee DD enmity to be brought down closer to offensive magic levels for ALL content, not just the highest level content. Even meeting halfway would be an improvement. Melee is already more likely to be smacked in the face (which obviously makes sense), The enmity difference between melee and magic DD is just far too vast. An NM should be mildly upset at anyone who is trying to stab them or throw fireballs at them, but they should be absolutely livid if someone tries to flash them.

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Don't forget that melee are losing enmity when they take damage too so we def. generate way to much compared to mages. I don't think this would do much, they will probably just bring a bst or two. Much safer then bringing melee that can be killed incredibly quickly.

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Originally Posted by Helldemon

Don't forget that melee are losing enmity when they take damage too so we def. generate way to much compared to mages. I don't think this would do much, they will probably just bring a bst or two. Much safer then bringing melee that can be killed incredibly quickly.

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That is the startling part of it.

For all the damage they're doing, they're shedding a lot for each strike they take and each AOE that hits them. Frequently, the same thing that brings them to yellow or red hp doesn't get past my phalanx or cureskin (like Mow in this month's ambuscade). And yet, for all the damage they're shedding, the BLMs who are doing very potent damage, are not out-hating them.

I told a good blu friend of mine today, while we were farming Oryx. "See how this isn't even looking at you? If we were doing the same damage, and taking the same damage at say Tenzen, I wouldn't be able to keep it completely off of you and it's not that his blu does more damage on VD Tenzen, it's the design of the system.

Also, most people probably haven't given feedback because they are to focused on fixing the melee situation and don't want to distract the dev's? Lol. Kind of the reason I made no comment at first, they need a huge fix first before anything really imo. I thought I remember reading that the extra damage from MB doesn't get hate, or maybe less hate, so that could be a big part of it.

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Originally Posted by Helldemon

Also, most people probably haven't given feedback because they are to focused on fixing the melee situation and don't want to distract the dev's? Lol. Kind of the reason I made no comment at first, they need a huge fix first before anything really imo. I thought I remember reading that the extra damage from MB doesn't get hate, or maybe less hate, so that could be a big part of it.

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They don't specify how it works, but there is a(apparently huuuge) enmity reduction on magic bursts. And of course, no one has tested the potency, that I'm aware of.

Forgive me for asking (I'm a casual, and I'm still fairly behind in content), but what is this "lower level" content you speak of? I've read your post a couple times and I don't really see mention of low level content... unless I have a different idea of "lower level content" from you (I'm thinking of like... lv90- content, like Dynamis, and CoP/AU/WoTG endgame things, and the first two Abyssea expansions). What are "the taurus and demon" you are mentioning, specifically?

My main reason for asking is that although I do have a tank job, at those levels I find trusts just fine to work as tanks, so keeping enmity doesn't really seem a concern to me. Even my friends of non-tank jobs can tank that tier of content without getting maimed. My friend who is a 99 THF tanks most of the things we've done in dynamis and assaults.

So, what content are you aiming for exactly that makes keeping enmity so essential?

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Originally Posted by Kjara

Forgive me for asking (I'm a casual, and I'm still fairly behind in content), but what is this "lower level" content you speak of?

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Yeah, I regret the title a little bit, but I was referring to things that have lower level than 119, including content that inflates the monster's stats without actually affecting their level (like High Tier Battlefields).

Your thf friend tanking actual old stuff is fine and sensible. It doesn't make sense to bring a tank when a tank is not needed. A PLD that can't get hit (because his evasion is too high for some older NM) is pretty useless--mch of our TP comes shield blocks).

If a friend needs something old dead, say an abyssea NM and actually needs help, I'll go on blu or something and dd-tank as much as the mob wants to hit me.

I'm talking about a level of content where enmity is fractured to the point that it's not working (like old content) but still dangerous enough that you need the tank to be able to reliably tank.

Edit: And there's a ton of more-relevant things that many jobs can tank, which I don't mind. There are also things that need a dedicated tank and enmity is fracturing. Or just cases where you bring a dedicated tank and he has to struggle because of deliberate design.

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Originally Posted by Kjara

What is this "lower level" content you speak of? ... what content are you aiming for exactly that makes keeping enmity so essential?

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Depending on your gear and damage output, the point at which your enmity generation becomes virtually uncontrollable varies. It is because of how they adjusted enmity a few years ago. To summarize it, There is a level scaling factor involved with how much cumulative enmity you generate. So the higher the enemy's level is in comparison to yours, the less cumulative enmity you generate with each point of damage. And the smaller the level gap is, the less enmity reduction you get from the scaling. So if you close a 35k darkness skillchain on a ilvl 130 monster, you probably wouldn't get aggro. However if you close a 35k skillchain on an ilvl 119 monster, then you might turn it toward you because you generate more enmity at that content level.

So I think what the OP means by low level is really "low content level or CL". At my Dancer's current gear quality, "low level" content for me is about ilvl 123 and below, since that's the point where it's almost impractical for a tank to be in the same party as me because I will probably take hate within two or three WSes. For others, it can be as high as ilvl 130ish. So the catch is that even though a melee player would generate less hate on higher content level, the AoE damage also gets higher, and they are prone to dying. In lower content level, they would generate much more enmity, take hate, and they are prone to dying.

It's a bit of a conundrum, and it's a problem that offensive magic jobs like scholars and black mages seem to be uniquely exempt from..

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Originally Posted by Shyles

It's a bit of a conundrum, and it's a problem that offensive magic jobs like scholars and black mages seem to be uniquely exempt from..

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Not just them. Anyone using magical ws will create much less enmity than any mage outside of mbing and even then who knows since mb enmity reduction will never be tested lol.

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Originally Posted by OmnysValefor

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Originally Posted by Shyles

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Thanks both for explaining :)

Now that I understand I can definitely see the issue. I hope they get onto fixing it soon. I've always been perplexed at why they just couldn't give tank-specific jobs an higher enmity cap. Most of other games with role systems do.

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Originally Posted by Kjara

Now that I understand I can definitely see the issue. I hope they get onto fixing it soon. I've always been perplexed at why they just couldn't give tank-specific jobs an higher enmity cap. Most of other games with role systems do.

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I don't think tanks should have a higher enmity cap.

First, I don't know how hard it would be to programmatically change it.

Second, if it's too much higher, it's too easy to keep hate, but if it's not enough higher, the problems still exist because Volatile Enmity decays over time and Cumulative decays with damage taken.

Since enmity does work in high content, the proof is there that they can make the current system work.

Another factor is that anything that can be tanked by say, an average warrior can be tanked by a trust, with few exceptions.. and in those cases, find a real tank.