Still not MSQ though. Ergo I am correct. Also dealing with the blasphemies was not a major plot point of the MSQ, they were one for the role quests though
I think you might be over thinking that. You can ding 90 without doing Lv80+ content, probably without doing Lv70+ content. It's rare for EW duties to appear in roulette, so rare that I've only ran most of them once or a few times total. It's usually HW and SB content that rolls with the occasional ShB and maybe an EW from time to time... if not lowbie dungeons. If you're doing your dailies and a few side activities that give you EXP then you'll have a tank and healer at 90 in a reasonable time.
Also, higher level content is more about mechanics, so provided you know the mechanics well enough you would probably be fine. You can also roll trials, then you have a co-tank and a co-healer which takes the heat off a lot. When I'm on shield healers I can feel like a loose wheel when I'm paired with a regen healer in normal content. You just throw up your shields and DPS, mitigate raidwides and sometimes step it up if things go wrong.
If you play White Mage you have powerful regen stacks and heavy duty emergency heals. I'm not the best player in the world, far from it, and I've been able to correct some big mistakes of my own while healing tanks who don't know what a mitigation is. While you won't be clearing high end content on it without being good, it's very forgiving in normal content provided you're not dying to mechanics yourself.
If you tank on Warrior, similar story. You have solid mits and you have a lot of self healing tools, which, like WHM does give you a lot of leeway for mistakes.
So what's stopping you from doing these methods of gaining exp?Even the first two on a level 80+ job will get you roughly 7 mil exp per day, doing Pixie, Arkasodara, and EW daily hunts. That's just under 12 days to get a job from 80 to 90, in a very casual manner.
- Tribal quests
- Daily hunt marks
- Frontline roulette (you get exp on the job you queue up as, while being able to swap jobs in the frontline itself)
- MSQ roulette (unless you already consider this to be "high level content")
- Alliance raid roulette (you'll get Crystal Tower raids most of the time anyway)
- Duty Support/Trust dungeon runs
Heck you can just do fates until you get the challenge log for the week, do Wondrous Tails on your main and hand in as the Tank/Heal you don't want to play (gives half a level per week on it's own!), Deep Dungeons for 60-70 where it doesn't matter if you're actually tanking or healing, because they are designed to be clearable even if the system gives you a party of 4 DPS, Bozja for 70-80 where you just do fates but in the trenches (and you can ignore the critical engagements if you want)
alongside all the stuff others have mentioned. plenty of ways to level a class without having the responsibility of 'keep aggro' or 'keep allies alive'
My advice would be to not be afraid to Tank and Heal.
Honestly, Tanking casual content (Dungeons) is the easiest thing in the game. Make it even easier by picking Warrior, you don't even need a Healer to keep you alive after level 76. But Gunbreaker would be the obvious "quick to level" choice, and is probably the most like a DPS job already, so not exactly a bad choice.
I honestly worry more about playing DPS than Tank, because you die much quicker as a DPS. You can get away with fucking up so much as a tank.
Even Healing isn't all that bad, although it takes a bit of getting used to, and I still sometimes get "oh shit" moments. Sage again, highest starting level and is the "most like a DPS", with the most braindead "passive" healing option in Kardia. Definitely more of a challenge than Tanking, but still not that difficult.
Take this MSQ obstacle as a driver to tackle these challenges. You'll appreciate it in the long run.
Besides, by far the easiest EXP is Alliance Roulette, which 90% of the time lands on Crystal Tower. In an Alliance Raid, you have two tanks to take over from you, and as an 8 man party you have a co-healer to pick up the slack.
I like to level all the jobs, but I agree with you. This is on par with having to level subclasses to unlock the job you wanted in the old days. I am a thaumaturge/black mage main, I shouldn't have ever had to level up archer to continue playing thaumaturge/black mage. Previously these sorts of plot elements would be important to warrant inclusion into the MSQ, but they segregate them off into side content, even though it is pretty pertinent to the main content. This particular side content making you have to level up other jobs that you may not have any actual interest in playing. That story content should be job characters storylines, but not be so entwined with the primary story's threat. Imagine if you weren't even allowed to check out Bozja or Hildibrand's story content unless you had one of each job role at that level. Why? Just why? At least in that content's case it is quite separate and tangential from the main story, and yet STILL why?
I for one also thought all the raids and alliance raids were important enough plot points to warrant being entwined into the MSQ and not forever pushed aside into background on the backburner in the hopes that you one day go back to it and address it (Alexander is gonna put the whole timeline at risk, no pressure though, just handle it whenever), especially since that stuff all just inevitably comes back later because surely you did it (even though many somehow still surely didn't), but that is perhaps a separate matter entirely.
I had the same issue, so here's how I leveled healer/tank:
1. Queue as a tank/healer to the daily Frontlines from roulette, you can change your class during the instance but it'll still count towards the class you queue'd as. It's a mode most don't take super seriously, so just follow the group and try to do objectives. Whether you win or lose is irrelevant, as you'll get at least half a level each time, almost one whole level if you win.
2. Do your weekly wondrous tails. Getting 9 stickers will always reward you half a level.
3. Do daily beast tribes. They actually grant you tons of exp, especially from level 70+ onward with pixies and arkasodra.
4. Do daily hunt targets. Similar to the hunt tribes, when you get to level 70+, Shadowbringer and Endwalker daily hunt targets gain you some really nice exp.
5. Queue for the main story scenario roulette. These are easy to both tank and heal for those with healing and tank anxiety. Good exp rewards.
6. Queue for alliance raid roulette. This is another relaxed atmosphere to learn tanking and healing. If you suck, nobody is really going to notice since there are 5 other healers/2 other tanks present.
7. I used to do a lot of FATEs Thavnair when leveling from 80 to 90. The exp was good.
8. Do your hunt logs if leveling jobs from level one.
9. Leveling summoner also levels your scholar. While scholar isn't the easiest or most intuitive healer to start out with, you can get it leveled without ever touching it by leveling summoner.
10. Gunbreaker begins with level 60, so that's a lot of leveling done already. It's not too hard to play either, and has a lot of mitigation options.
With these options you'll be level 90 in no time.
EDIT: Should've read page 2 before making this post lmao.
People are too afraid of tank and healer jobs. One thing I found out was that those jobs are actually easier to play than DPS. Either to compensate for the anxiety of having a very responsible job or to make it easier to focus on the fight as a whole.
Healers have the babiest rotation ever. Put dot, attack, attack, attack, attack... put dot when it ends, go back to attacking. Heal when needed. In most content, you only really ever need to worry about the tank's health or when the boss does an AoE. Heck, on this expansion, all of their AoE heals got their range buffed so hard that you can hit people all the way to Narnia. And the regen doesn't even provoke the monsters anymore. Want more? Instant queue on most of the roulettes. You level up FAST.
Tanks are easy too, as long as they remember to use the mitigation skills. Rotation is simple, they are hard to kill, they usually have some AoE mitigation tool to use... Some can even heal the party members in a pinch, and I'm not even talking about just Paladin. No positionals, just hold the aggro of everyone. The devs added a lot of useful markers so tanks can even tell when they have to defend from a tankbuster without having to know which skill it's called. A lot of annoyances got ironed out, like Dark Knight's ultimate skill that before would make them easier to die and now they can use to self heal instead. Warrior can even AoE heal the party now! Fast queues too.
So, if you're afraid of tank and healer jobs, I say to go for it anyways. You may be surprised.
I, for example, just quit doing DPS jobs altogether. I just tank/heal now. :P