RDM tanking(post your comments and thoughts on it here)

[saevel]

The single issue with RDM "tanking" was it took awhile to build up hate. PLD's and even NIN's had spells / abilities with a high VE value. And while CE and VE are equally valuable, VE wears so fast as to be impossible to maintain, but you tend to get more of it at once. RDM sucks as a sole tank, but absolutely shines when your dual tanking. PLD/NIN + RDM/NIN was the crazy good combo, the PLD would sentinel and blast their hate through the roof, then the RDM would slowly build it and eventually overtake the PLD. Typically took 5min for this to happen, by myself the mob would be chasing the WHM's or the BLM's before I had a chance to build super hate.

So while RDM tanking as awesome, it did have it's limits.

[SpankWustler]

The single issue with RDM "tanking" was it took awhile to build up haste. PLD's and even NIN's had spells / abilities with a high VE value. And while CE and VE are equally valuable, VE wears so fast as to be impossible to maintain, but you tend to get more of it at once. RDM sucks as a sole tank, but absolutely shines when your dual tanking. PLD/NIN + RDM/NIN was the crazy good combo, the PLD would sentinel and blast their hate through the roof, then the RDM would slowly build it and eventually overtake the PLD. Typically took 5min for this to happen, by myself the mob would be chasing the WHM's or the BLM's before I had a chance to build super hate.

So while RDM tanking as awesome, it did have it's limits.

All of this, and additionally, Red Mage tanking went downhill even faster than Paladin tanking once engaging the monster entered the equation. I don't understand why something honestly situational was considered overpowered by the development team.

Tanking seems to be an aspect of the game which the development team takes a large, albeit bizarrely expressed, interest in. If a spell's enmity generation is taken advantage of by people on large, that spell is changed as soon as they can figure out how to untangle their own spaghetti code and change it.

I don't know if I should be hopeful or fearful that they would ever pay so much attention to all elements of FFXI.

[Mageoholic]

The single issue with RDM "tanking" was it took awhile to build up hate.

False. RDM capped hate faster then both PLD and NIN. At the time RDM was the single best tank in the game. This is why it was nerfed because it was being used on everything. 3 minutes and you were capped on CE and VE, and nothing was taking it off. If you wanted DD to be able to start right away you had a THF SATA you and then go sit in his corner out of the ally to watch.