Four Ways to Die - why the Tank Meta feels "off".

+1 OP; I feel like Square wants to continue pushing things like Vitality and Parry out of desire to be somewhat traditional but they've pushed damage as the meta and it just means role homogenization.
Everyone is a DPS - this role continues to bleed into Tanking & Healing you're going to find people will want them to make these Jobs more rewarding and seamless to play;

Look at Paladin complaints - low/inconsistent damage, not TP management, clunky tank swapping, no offensive cooldowns. Why? Because our toolkit isn't cultivated towards the current state-of-play.

As for "ways to die" - content doesn't necessarily need to drop your HP to 0 either;

Bosses could make you memorize a 50-step emote train that resets the encounter if anyone messes up their emotes.

Bosses could be more Tower-defense such as Vishap where you fail if you don't protect the objective.

Bosses could be anything Square wants - Players are just used to living in a very limited "content box" - so currently they've gone back to the safety of round-arena boss formula and pushed a rather basic "high DPS" with timed busters encounter design.

Just here to point out that the concept of a brick wall tank never truly existed in Final Fantasy XI. It was tried and failed miserably early on the in games life cycle. Kiting took over. And eventually Utsusemi tanking became a thing. And then DPS tanking became a thing because they held hate better and were barely frailer than their tank counterparts.

So yeah, any "brick wall" from XI has no idea what they're talking about.

Has anyone else noticed that people that do subscribe to the DPS side of tanking, and embrace it, do not simply disagree with the brick wall mentality, but are openly and deliberately hostile towards it? I constantly wonder why this is and what it achieves.

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Originally Posted by Syzygian

Has anyone else noticed that people that do subscribe to the DPS side of tanking, and embrace it, do not simply disagree with the brick wall mentality, but are openly and deliberately hostile towards it? I constantly wonder why this is and what it achieves.

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I see the exact opposite more often in game.

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Originally Posted by Tilgung

I see the exact opposite more often in game.

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Really? Give examples, I'm curious.

I have several cases of where I've almost ragequit my FC after die hard VIT tanks have made it a mission to shoot me down every time I've tried explaining STR tanking to people who were curious about trying it. Or on a off day of tanking it was never "You're doing bad," or "You suck" but "Oh STR tank, explains it".

The STR advocates are usually boisterous and love doing what they do because they love the meta, where as the VIT tanks are usually spiteful because they've been told their prefered method of tanking is wrong. Its honestly been getting to the point that I pray SE would just make VIT our damage stat so this crap can come to and end.

If nothing else if I have to see one more case of "Would you tell a healer to go all INT then?" I swear I'm going to get kicked from that party/LS/FC

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Originally Posted by Tilgung

Just here to point out that the concept of a brick wall tank never truly existed in Final Fantasy XI. It was tried and failed miserably early on the in games life cycle. Kiting took over. And eventually Utsusemi tanking became a thing. And then DPS tanking became a thing because they held hate better and were barely frailer than their tank counterparts.

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That was because XI's developers didn't know how to create defensive stats that scaled appropriately nor did they design the intended tanks (WAR and PLD) with the needed mechanics to make it happen.

The chief complain was that defense as a stat was worthless, VIT reduced physical incoming damage but neither tank had anything to then help them hold aggro. Gear swaps alleviated things a bit, until people discovered a DPS in -damage taken gear could mitigate as much as a tank and hold aggro better. Then there's Utsusemi tanking. It was a true balance clusterfuck.

I think it tends to be the fact a large number of Balmung players are RPers, even amongst the midcore raiders. The mere suggestion of converting some of that fending to slaying is apparently a very offensive concept to numerous tanks I've encountered. My best guess is: if they're going to role play a tank, they need to play a tank in classical sense in every facet of the game.

Unfortunately, the meta is the meta. And anyone attempting midcore or hardcore raiding needs to adhere to it to be successful. And it's these tanks in particular I try to offer advice to. And a surprising number of them are violently against it.

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Originally Posted by Duelle

That was because XI\\'s developers didn\\'t know how to create defensive stats that scaled appropriately nor did they design the intended tanks (WAR and PLD) with the needed mechanics to make it happen.

The chief complain was that defense as a stat was worthless, VIT reduced physical incoming damage but neither tank had anything to then help them hold aggro. Gear swaps alleviated things a bit, until people discovered a DPS in -damage taken gear could mitigate as much as a tank and hold aggro better. Then there\\'s Utsusemi tanking. It was a true balance clusterfuck.

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I'm very much aware of the reasons. And it doesn't refute my point: Any tank claiming to be an old fashioned brick wall in XI has no idea what they're talking about. It never existed.

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Originally Posted by Tilgung

I think it tends to be the fact a large number of Balmung players are RPers, even amongst the midcore raiders. The mere suggestion of converting some of that fending to slaying is apparently a very offensive concept to numerous tanks I've encountered. My best guess is: if they're going to role play a tank, they need to play a tank in classical sense in every facet of the game.

Unfortunately, the meta is the meta. And anyone attempting midcore or hardcore raiding needs to adhere to it to be successful. And it's these tanks in particular I try to offer advice to. And a surprising number of them are violently against it.

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I see. I'm definitely in the camp of tanks who adheres to the meta but doesn't really like it. But a tank is above all, adaptable, and everyone should keep that in mind I feel.

Its hard for people to believe, but I have met healers that are extremely capable and good at taking advantage of every nanoparticle of mitigation/HP that a tank has. I've even raided with a couple... I've seen them more than match and even supersede the DPS deficit from their tanks not being in full STR gear, just by looking at their fflogs. Most healers I feel are, like the rest of us, adapting, and I wonder how many of them just don't know what to do with a tank that trying hard to boost their DPS. I know my current healers are not nearly so comfortable going ham, and every raid night in A3S when I put on a couple of slaying pieces instead of melds, I almost feel a pang of guilt. =/ Just the way it is though, I suppose.

TBH, this worries me as I do not want to be a squishy tank. But, IMO, it may be better to just redo the stances and create new status effects.
For EX:

1. New effect "distraction" increases damage output by 20% to the flank and rear positions, and adds 15+% more enmity gain for other party members. The damage increase should be applied in a way that prevents an increase in enmity from the damage bonus. And, maybe make it so that the enmity bonus rises over time to make the player try to use skills with the "attention" status occasionally, but also make it so that the enmity bonus never exceeds 35-45%.
2. New effect "attention" grants 1% enmity gain per bonus points placed into vitality up to 30% for 7-30 seconds, or just remove the enmity buff off of the party.
3. Adjust sword oath to add vit/? to strength and determination, but subtracts 10%+ strength (food and equipment bonuses would be included) and enmity. And, the 20% damage increase still applies, BTW.
4. Shield oath will apply distraction passively and apply attention to certain skills (RoH, Shield lob, shield swipe, circle of thorns, the riot blade combo, flash, or spirits within for examples).

Basically, just make it so that vitality is important for the stances to work properly, or something like that.

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Originally Posted by Syzygian

I see. I'm definitely in the camp of tanks who adheres to the meta but doesn't really like it. But a good player is above all, adaptable, and everyone should keep that in mind I feel.

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Fixt that for you bud.

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Originally Posted by Syzygian

Its hard for people to believe, but I have met healers that are extremely capable and good at taking advantage of every nanoparticle of mitigation/HP that a tank has. I've even raided with a couple... I've seen them more than match and even supersede the DPS deficit from their tanks not being in full STR gear, just by looking at their fflogs. Most healers I feel are, like the rest of us, adapting, and I wonder how many of them just don't know what to do with a tank that trying hard to boost their DPS. I know my current healers are not nearly so comfortable going ham, and every raid night in A3S when I put on a couple of slaying pieces instead of melds, I almost feel a pang of guilt. =/ Just the way it is though, I suppose.

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Talented healers have always tried to min-max their DPS in conjunction with their healing - especially in recent years where mana cockblocks have become less of a thing. All the meta is doing is teaching mediocre healers to move outside their comfort zone with in down time.

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Originally Posted by Sapphidia

The Downward Filter into Casual Content.

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this is imo the worst that comes with the current meta. PPl get mocked for wearing vit accessoires while leveling. or even worse: yesterday I had a tank in full lv35 tank set for cutter's cry. I put up regen and i was able to do some damage as healer. after the first pull he switched into lv38 scalemail set. obviously he took far more damage afterwards, while not even doing more damage himself. and this wasn't even the first time to encounter such behaviour.

anyway good write-up

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Originally Posted by Starkbeaumont

this is imo the worst that comes with the current meta. PPl get mocked for wearing vit accessoires while leveling. or even worse: yesterday I had a tank in full lv35 tank set for cutter's cry. I put up regen and i was able to do some damage as healer. after the first pull he switched into lv38 scalemail set. obviously he took far more damage afterwards, while not even doing more damage himself. and this wasn't even the first time to encounter such behaviour.

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Uh... The level 38 Horn Scale Mail set should be a straight upgrade to the level 35 Heavy Steel set unless he equipped the wrong head (i.e. Vintage Celata instead of a Mythril Elmo). The Iron/Horn/Tortoiseshell Scale Mail sets are all full def/mdef tank sets.

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Originally Posted by Ultimatecalibur

Uh... The level 38 Horn Scale Mail set should be a straight upgrade to the level 35 Heavy Steel set unless he equipped the wrong head (i.e. Vintage Celata instead of a Mythril Elmo). The Iron/Horn/Tortoiseshell Scale Mail sets are all full def/mdef tank sets.

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weird, now that you mention it. but he took way more dmg... like a lot

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Originally Posted by Starkbeaumont

this is imo the worst that comes with the current meta. PPl get mocked for wearing vit accessoires while leveling. or even worse: yesterday I had a tank in full lv35 tank set for cutter's cry. I put up regen and i was able to do some damage as healer. after the first pull he switched into lv38 scalemail set. obviously he took far more damage afterwards, while not even doing more damage himself. and this wasn't even the first time to encounter such behaviour.

anyway good write-up

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Man I gotta say; this must be an NA thing. I've had zero arguments (probably because I can't speak to 80% of them :P) about my gear and/or stance in the JP DF.

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Originally Posted by Rhaja

If nothing else if I have to see one more case of "Would you tell a healer to go all INT then?" I swear I'm going to get kicked from that party/LS/FC

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To be fair, if Cleric Stance were removed and INT became a thing, I'd be more inclined to embrace it than to deny it. Just me, though.

Even though both the VIT camp and the STR camp have diehards in their camps: just rename 'Fending' to 'Provoking', remove the VIT and turn it into STR. Watch tears flow. Of both joy and sadness.

Funny thing is, both tank mentalities work for me at different times. There are some fights where I'm glad to be dishing out massive damage as a WAR/DRK and other fights where I would rather be an unbreakable wall as a PLD. I would be perfectly fine with a meta that allowed a choice between them, but right now there isn't much choice.

The current end game content requires high DPS and fending gear just isn't as useful in adding "tankiness" as it should be, removing that choice. I'm still hopeful that SE is working on it though, I can't imagine they would leave tanks as the single anomaly when it comes to gearing and their role in the party.

Except it really isn't an anomaly. There's already precedence in at least one previous MMO where gearing to absolute tankiness wasn't the best option. And considering it was this games predecessor, I'm not surprised it wormed itself in here. Intentionally or not.

We've got concrete defensive cooldown rotations and decently planned out healing rotations. The fact of the matter is, we've got near exact amounts of HP necessary to perform as well as needed and going over it is technically a waste of stat points.

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Originally Posted by Tilgung

We've got concrete defensive cooldown rotations and decently planned out healing rotations. The fact of the matter is, we've got near exact amounts of HP necessary to perform as well as needed and going over it is technically a waste of stat points.

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The problem is less that these exist (as they're bound to), but moreso that the HP threshold for Savage content is easily met... without even using VIT accessories at low ilvl... or tank stance... or even crafted accessories sometimes. It's honestly a bit ridiculous what you can get away with as a tank in 3.0, more than previous raid content even. Maybe it's tuned so loosely because it's the first raid of the expansion? I hope that's the case at least.

There was a very interesting response to this post on Reddit (that cannot be linked here for obvious reasons, but you can find by looking at the cross-post of this thread) where somebody had numbers from T9 Savage and A4 Savage that showed tank damage had only increased like 10-20%. Second Coil, not final coil. (Well, there's no Final Coil Savage anyway.)

Now that's outright scary.

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Originally Posted by eagledorf

There was a very interesting response to this post on Reddit (that cannot be linked here for obvious reasons, but you can find by looking at the cross-post of this thread) where somebody had numbers from T9 Savage and A4 Savage that showed tank damage had only increased like 10-20%

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Yeah, you can notice this simply by checking how much the bosses auto you for. It's reaaaally strange that the damage didn't scale higher with our HP going up so drastically. I mean it is the first raid, maybe they just wanted to ease people into it, but 3k-4k autos are super tiny. Med2 + Fairy heals takes care of those with ease. It was always that way, to be fair, but it's even less of a problem now with all the new healer abilities, Equilibrium/self healing scaling in general, and the stat scaling. Hopefully the next raid rectifies this, but I guess only time will tell...

Not even just autos though. The tank busters as well!

BTW, the average auto in A4 was 1.9-2.2k, not 3k. You can check out some fflogs to get an idea.

Obviously this is including shields and buffs, but still that means the healing demand on tanks has virtually vanished.

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Originally Posted by eagledorf

BTW, the average auto in A4 was 1.9-2.2k, not 3k. You can check out some fflogs to get an idea.

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Well I was more talking about Alex Savage in general, I think autos on the tanks in A4S at least make some sense because of the Nisi mechanic (if people actually did it).

The trend is for all the damage to be on the party these days. Nisi is one example, but it holds true for other mechanics like the lasers as well.

In fact, in that guy's parse the highest damaging abilities were AoE damage on the party. Party-wide mechanics exceeded the tank buster by as much as a third. Of course that includes the fact that the tank buster usually has a cooldown for it, but it gives you an idea how badly things have shifted.

The problem is...what's the point of the tank if the party takes all the damage? You can't reduce the healing load by popping Sentinel if everybody takes damage except for yourself.

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Originally Posted by Tilgung

We've got concrete defensive cooldown rotations and decently planned out healing rotations. The fact of the matter is, we've got near exact amounts of HP necessary to perform as well as needed and going over it is technically a waste of stat points.

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The problem is there's no point to using fending pieces at all tanks who are doing Alex Savage look at fending off pieces and go meh. There's also no active mitigation, parry is crap, there's no dodging, you can block as a pld but there's no way to get +block from gear or block str other than shields (idk how it scales either). I only go slaying because that's the meta I don't like it but what can I do, i'm slowly not playing my tank as much except for raids and that's about it. It's just not as exciting dying because of strict DPS checks because we didn't get that extra bit of dps, i'd rather SE focus on actual defensive stats on items. But that would mean they have to fix mitigation, skills, redesign stats on items it's a lot of work I just feel like a DPS that has a big sword that gets hit hard every 60 seconds or so, because even with full slaying the extra hp and worthless parry in fending gear is disregarded.

It's just bizarre to me that i'm a tank but I have to be on par with other dps? I'm an old school MMO player I used to be a protection paladin on WoW, Lancer in TERA, the only other game where you're a DPS tank is Aion being a Templar/Gladiator. Prot paladins had amazing AoE and blocked everything being a real great tank, lancers stopped EVERYTHING big stomp? Massive shield block. Enemy charging? Send em back flying. Aions tanking was "okay" because there were some elements of being tanky the game wasn't yelling at you to be a better dps just a better tank. It honestly makes me sad that when I run an expert and I do more dps than say a Bard, Dragoon whatever and i'm sitting there in my tank stance being yelled at for wearing str accs when if I go fending i'll still get laughed at. I just feel that tanks are in a very awkward situation that the community is torn in 2 or even more possible ways and I just hope that there's something for say an old school meat shield or a strong battle hardened tank that does dmg actively.

Sorry for the rant this is my favorite thread in here I hope it gets some love and that people can give more feedback I love reading everything in here it's all very interesting to me.

I'm one of the 'brick' tanks. If I wanted to do a bunch of damage, I'd roll a DPS. Or rather, I did. I play DRG and it's really fun, but when I'm done with Dragoon, I don't want to just go play a different, slightly more durable dragoon. I respect that the game needs tanks, and this was the easiest way to get people to play it, but... boy, it really was at the expense of those of us who wanted to be the unkillable stalwart sentinels. It wouldn't even bother me that much if the community wasn't so pushy. I'm getting dogged left and right about wanting to play a tank with a lot of health, it's like... this is the Duty Finder, I don't know how good this healer's gonna be. Why make both our lives hell? We're not taking eternity or losing, so why the pushback? It's all really disconcerting.

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Originally Posted by Sapphidia

What IS the current Tank Meta?

As anyone with some 3.0 raiding experience will tell you, the current tank meta is very much focused on DPS. Contrary to how a lot of veteran MMO players might expect to have to build and play as a tank, the way top end raiding works is such that if played properly a tank can contribute a large amount of DPS to the raidgroup's overall total. The catch? In order to do so, they have to sacrifice quite a large amount of "tankiness".

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I can't think of a current MMO where this isn't the established 'meta'. WoW scaled back on it kind of hard recently, but at one point tanks were the top dps because of Vengeance, but DPS stacking still exist in Mastery even now.

I get that nostalgia is really strong for a lot of MMO veterans (I've been playing MMOs since 2000 with EQ), but when we're reaching back years and multiple expansions in other MMOs to find comparisons maybe the conversation has gone a bit astray.

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Originally Posted by Kumori_Kumo

I'm getting dogged left and right about wanting to play a tank with a lot of health, it's like... this is the Duty Finder, I don't know how good this healer's gonna be. Why make both our lives hell? We're not taking eternity or losing, so why the pushback? It's all really disconcerting.

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Eh, DF healers really aren't as bad as people let on. Out of 10 DF runs I'll get maybe 2-3 healers that are truly bad in the realest sense.

DPS from tanks/healers has the been the part meta even before HW. In a lot of the job/class quests they pretty much spell it out for you that you'll be doing more than just heal/tank. Most modern MMOs on the market have tank/healer DPS part of the meta. This really isn't something new. Its just a lot of the more casual players and people that aren't familiar with more modern MMOs are finally catching up to what the top 20-30% are doing. It's all trickling down.

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Originally Posted by Instrumentality

I can't think of a current MMO where this isn't the established 'meta'.

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Honestly, at the moment, neither can I. Even some MMOs I used to play years ago (FFXI) brick wall tanks weren't really a thing, or were quickly abandoned when something was found that could better replace it.

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Originally Posted by Instrumentality

I can't think of a current MMO where this isn't the established 'meta'.

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Think of a game (not necessarily video games either) that has a competitive scene that doesn't. I'm at a loss, except for stuff like Tic-Tac-Toe (which may have one, beats me). It's a natural consequence of a drive to perform better than your peers.

I don't think any game that has the potential to be taken seriously can avoid developing a meta. It can function of more microscopic levels; but it tends to be there.

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Originally Posted by Instrumentality

I can't think of a current MMO where this isn't the established 'meta'. WoW scaled back on it kind of hard recently, but at one point tanks were the top dps because of Vengeance, but DPS stacking still exist in Mastery even now.

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I've seen this type of comment a lot on both of my threads, and whilst there's truth in it, it's missed the point. The issue isnt that tanks are having to push their dps as hard as possible. That -will- always be part of tanks. You accept it'll be less than a DPS class but all tanks in all MMOs have always been able to contribute to the dps to the best of their abilities.

The issue in FFXIV is just HOW MUCH YOU SACRIFICE in order to push your dps, and how this requirement not only reduces that "feel" of tankiness but pretty much prevents you from gaining any real satisfaction that the gear you gain from progression rewards is helping this.

In WoW, prot warriors didn't suddenly drop to Battle stance and wear leather armor in order to max their damage. Virtually all WoW tanks now gain damage from their tank stats. A tank with huge amounts of gear trying to do the most damage they can will be wearing almost identical gear to a tank who's trying to be as survivable as possible, and their rotations wont be that different either. They might just swap out a trinket or something.

That's the point here. Tank DPS has always been important, and there's emphasis on it in all MMOs. But here, the balance is skewed hugely far in favor of DPS. Tanks are expected to tank in their DPS stance as much as humanly possible. Any gains in gear that make them tankier are immediately sacrificed into a direct dps conversion (get a new chest? Drop a vit acc for str so your HP stays the same. Already wearing full slaying? Probably means you can tank more in Sword Oath). The way the game mechanics are set up, coupled with the fact that tanks can waltz into alex savage and perform perfectly well in base level "undergeared" stuff just means there is ZERO incentive to gear up as a tank, even if it's incidental.

Tanks never really get to feel the benefit of getting tougher and tougher here - the satisfaction the game gives them for playing their class well and getting upgrades comes from higher DPS, not in seeing past tankbusters barely move their health bar when it used to nearly kill them.

There are arguments that "extra dps is always important" and "tankiness is a binary state - you either survive or dont". This is short sighted. Survivability of a tank is a two person job - healer and tank working together. The Meta in FFXIV is for the tank to push as much responsibility for this onto their healer as possible. They specifically try to go into an encounter wearing as little designated tank gear as possible and tanking in dps stance as much as possible as long as the healer can cope. That's fine and all, but getting tankier DOES help your healer out. It may be a binary thing of "if the tank survives you dont need any more tankiness" but is this really any different to "if you have enough DPS to beat the enrage, you dont need any more dps". It adds security and safety to the encounter. It makes it easier, the same as higher dps makes it easier.

The reason why people are eschewing tank stats isnt because "dps is always better" or "tankiness isnt important". Both of those are purely subjective. The issue is the balance - tanks can survive Alex Savage fights in 190 gear with slaying accs in dps stance, but a lot of undergeared raidgroups couldnt hit the DPS checks. The DPS check remains the harder part of the encounter and the tank survivability is easier. Yes, taking a 25,000 health tank with 50% parry chance who always tanks in Shield Oath -would- be far far easier to heal than a sword oath 15k health one... but the increase in healing ease doesnt translate to any significant increase in the chance to complete the encounter.

I counter with this: let's make a few hypothetical changes to A1S. The Hyper compressed Plasma now hits for 10,000 more damage than it does now. Royal Fount now hits for closer to 8,000 on a tank in tank stance and is no longer scripted - it can come at random points throughout the fight, including very close to the tank buster (and can be blocked/parried). Auto attacks are increased by 50%. The total health of the oppressor is reduced by 5%.

In this situation, with 5% less health the enrage timer is still tough but tanks woudl be fine just pushing as much dps as they could in tank stance. Every other person in the raidgroup would play the same with the same mechanics, but tanks would always be at risk of dying if healers werent lookign after them. The fact that royal fount could come at any point, the harder autos, all would mean that tanks would need to use some cooldowns more reactively, and would benefit hugely from tank stats - not that Parry is good, but if parry had a bigger return then it would -help-. A big health pool would -help- as it would reduce the chance of tanks being randomly burst by unfortunately timed royal founts.

Maybe the numbers are off but you get what I mean - the issue with tanks being so focused on DPS isnt that dps shouldnt be important... it's that incoming tank damage is so fundamentally MINOR in this current patch (even compared to 2.0 raiding - T9 and T13 felt MUCH harder on the tanks than anything in alex savage from a damage-income perspective) that tanks can just ignore any reason to make themselves tougher. And THAT is what feels off.

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Originally Posted by Sapphidia

Yeah I think the main point of my post was simply : This is how the meta is. This is -why- the meta is. This is why the meta feels fun to a lot of warriors and other players who favor aggressive dps, but understand there's a lot of players who are unhappy about this and don't enjoy it.

I don't think the meta is likely to change, and I think the mechanics of the game in general are likely to make it too hard to drastically alter the entire way tanks go about mitigating stuff. That said, some small quality of life changes, some gearing changes, and a bigger focus on high incoming tank damage in hard encounters would go quite some way to making it not feel quite so hugely swayed into the "dps>all" camp.

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Nice post. The current trend to what has occurred in the current tanking meta, is because this is how SE designed it to be. You can clearly see that more effort and thought was put into WAR and DRK designs. They have made one tank a staple and the others a either or, depending on the encounter. SE need to realize that the community is going to push hard even though the content is not designed around that ilevel, they will do math around DMG output to DMG input to Job requirements and most effectiveness in the current raid. This system will in turn work it's way into the more casual base and new tanks starting out, who don't really know the job yet.

I know so many players that have switched jobs that they have been playing since 2.0, because that was required. I don't think SE will do any rework of the current tank's at this stage, I don't think raid encounters will change in terms of mechanical type. i.e set time for certain abilities that never change static encounters.

Unfortunately the way things are is here to stay, and I suspect that only in the next expansion will maybe see some drastic changes, if more care and thought is put into the individual jobs, and not just how they fit into the story. It might become better, only time will tell at this moment.

To be honest this is one of the main reasons I don't enjoy this game as much anymore. When I tank I'm an old school tank. When I heal I'm an old school healer. Sure I'll dps if I want to but ONLY if I want to. I don't want to feel forced to do it like the current meta. Same with tank. I don't want to be forced to be a tanky dps. That isn't a tank to me. If I wanted to dps I would play blm more or my smn. I've actually started looking at other MMOs that I've played before for that reason.

Sapphida, you have basically just written one of the dozen or so essay threads I have planned to write for me (which is to say, I agree with your assessment). I absolutely fall into the "immovable wall" paradigm myself. I participate in the tanking game, but I'll absolutely agree that gear over iLvl 180 hasn't really made me feel any more powerful a tank than I was before, with the exception of now being able to hold threat off that 210 DRG that doesn't think "hold back" is a viable option in a boss fight.

It doesn't help matters that gear actually has very little impact on survivability right now. For tanks, the overwhelming majority of our mitigation in a fight comes from out cooldowns; and most of our cooldowns are flat reductions to the amount of damage taken, rather than impacted by our character's stats. This makes gearing up my PLD feel incredibly unrewarding, because it doesn't really have an impact on my ability to survive. Indeed, the tankiest feeling I get from my gearing progression has been that enmity thing, where the only way a DPS will pull off me anymore is if I muck something up during the pull.

And I'll also admit that yeah, it doesn't exactly feel great to have my extra HP basically be an accessory. I hold enmity, but surviving is almost no challenge once I've got enough HP for the "tankbusters." And that doesn't feel very good at all.

I will chime in, though, that in my experience as PLD, the most rewarding times for me (outside of seeing my HP barely be hit when the boss is firin' her lazor), are when I'm doing things that only my class can do. Throwing out that Clemency heal to rescue the DPS that the healers couldn't get to in time; keeping Stoneskin up for many of the fights to eat white damage and take a chunk out of tankbusters; completely negating the knockback damage from the second boss in Fractal Continuum with Tempered Will; throwing a 1.6k shield on my party for the jump in A1; using Cover on the only healer who survived and popping Hallowed Ground so they can use their lb3 and save the raid - these are all things that only PLD can do, and when they work, they actually feel great (the downside is that they are a little clumsy to use right now, and are, like the cooldowns, mostly not dependent on gear). An added bonus here is that they also all fit with the "immovable wall" fantasy of "no, you will not hurt my friends."

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Originally Posted by Sapphidia

The issue in FFXIV is just HOW MUCH YOU SACRIFICE in order to push your dps, and how this requirement not only reduces that "feel" of tankiness but pretty much prevents you from gaining any real satisfaction that the gear you gain from progression rewards is helping this.

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I need to stop you here, because this is not true. Death Knights in WoW for quite a while in the current expansion had the option of sacrificing a tremendous amount of 'tankability' for very notable DPS increases which, unsurprisingly, was pretty much the only choice to make. This also happens in how you build Rift tank specs, and in how you build 'tanks' in Tera or tanks in SWTOR for what mods/enhancements/etc you place in your armor.


This is what I mean. I simply don't accept that your premise is true that tanks are somehow unused to this concept or that it's stretched obscenely here, and the assertion otherwise feels more like a myth/nostalgia to me than it does to any thing that actually exist in the tanking world of today. Tanks have for multiple expansions across multiple different MMOs had the choice of sacrificing durability for DPS, FFXIV isn't even the most extreme example of it that comes to mind (which would be warrior tanks in Tera).

One of the heavy problems about the meta isn't just that it doesn't fit with the classic tank themes but that it has generally succeeded where it was supposed to. That is to lure people into the tank position. There are alot of people who play tank, and are very good at it, that would not traditionally play a tank role in a game like this. They want to have the freedom that tank gives in this game where they can have both survivability and damage potential. It's kinda a catch 22 now for everyone. I know I would certainly be disappointing in a complete rework of tank stats in the game. I enjoy pushing my DPS. However, I can also get where alot of people are put off by the type of gameplay that tank offers in this game.

I wouldn't mind a tune up of damage, or even a way for more bosses to throw vulnerability down onto a tank. This would still need a rework of the whole accessory system though. We need a more thorough way to mitigate through accessories outside of just HP. If it forced me to stay in tank stance more then that switch over to DPS stance in between busters to throw out that 3x FC would feel even sweeter.

I definitely don't want to lose the freedom of tank stance swaps, but I also wouldn't mind seeing fights that would call for more survivability means. Parry also needs to be completely recalculated so that it's meaningful mitigation.

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Originally Posted by Sapphidia

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Apart from what Instrumentality has said; the point we're pushing is that it's a lose-lose situation.

Solve the DPS meta so that the balance is shifted in favour of 'wall-tanks' (kind of like First Coil, though that may have more to do with WAR just being poop in more than one way) and 'DPS-tanks' will be here in your stead writing 4600 word (maybe not so eloquently) essays on how we can shift the meta back into their favour. You can only shift the meta, you can't kill the concept (which is the underlying problem) entirely.

This dance is done to death in every MMO. That is the constant jockeying to make the game in their image (which is understandable). The only real solution is homogenization of performance, which has the natural consequence of diluting the 'fantasy' inherent to each unique class. Fantasies are after all based on a unique distinction.

Excellent read Saph! This has made me trying to find you in the game for the past few days just to praise you directly. I completely agree with the post and its point of view. Personally, I am some sort of a "Traditional" type of tank, although I too have embraced the meta and am currently mastering stance-dancing as well as tanking with your HP pool just-enough to survive the tankbusters. Contradict to some of the players posting answers in this threat though, I believe Square Enix can totally and easily fix this problem without revamping the whole game. Instead of making our "Active" part of tanking just popping cooldowns, why not making more of the "Inner Beast" type of skills where you can actually enhance your own mitigation for a short amount of time just by actively timing the skill? Disable, Sheltron as well as Dart Arts + X cooldowns came close to it, but we need more of those "Active tankiness management skills" in my opinion.

That, or just abandon the accuracy stat altogether so that healers can DPS as well as tank. Some healers are indeed taking advantage of tanks' mitigation to deal DPS, but seeing all these "Miss" messages popping up isn't fun or incentive.

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Originally Posted by AbandonedPaladin

Instead of making our "Active" part of tanking just popping cooldowns, why not making more of the "Inner Beast" type of skills where you can actually enhance your own mitigation for a short amount of time just by actively timing the skill?

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So, basically...you want SE to implement WoW-style "active mitigation". As someone who played through half of Warlords of Draenor (the expansion that really relied on active mitigation), that's not as fun as you think. You still use the same rotations, same dCDs, etc. The only difference is, if you mess up your rotation, rather than screwing dmg (done or taken) by a small % for a few sec, you died. Granted, it's not like the rotation was hard (it was super easy); but you did the same thing all the time. It was all homogenized and boring.

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Originally Posted by Ralvenom

Granted, it's not like the rotation was hard (it was super easy); but you did the same thing all the time. It was all homogenized and boring.

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I stopped enjoying WoW's tanking when they started the general shift toward active mitigation in Cataclysm (though they also got rid of Frost tanking for Death Knights, which soured me even further).

I'm not necessarily opposed to more active stuff here (I loved the Utsusemi tanking in FFXI in part because of the active, risk/reward style), but for active mitigation to really feel active, it needs to be less rotational and more reactionary. FFXI's NIN required you to pay attention to your shadows, and you could play really aggressively, forgoing Parry and Evasion but needing to refresh shadows more often, or more defensively, prolonging the life of your shadows, but above all, Utsusemi was never rotational.