Is there any tanks that feel like your playing a tank and not a DPS ?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Jandor

You're not alone, I also preferred when it was something to think about. Enmity wasn't exactly hard to manage, but neither is popping cooldowns really, and popping cooldowns has to carry nearly the whole tanking part of the job now.

---

Yeah the fact it was not hard to manage is what has confused me about the the change. Sure, it was frustrating when you wanted to maximize damage and you ran into a couple of players that could not be bothered to use their aggro dumps. Even still it was not a major issue.

Granted if they made tank purely reactionary where more responsibility was placed on their own shoulders for their survival I could get the idea of making aggro easier to manage, or gave them more complex or fleshed out damage rotations. Or maybe made encounters have more tank responsibility.

Honestly idk but I wish tanks had something more added to their role.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by LeonKeyh

snip

---

the clutch plays back in the day came from the fact that both WAR and DRK had a lot more sustain than they do now, as well as being able to dish out more damage because their skills came up faster. they both had the capability to bring themselves back from the dead when fighting a bunch of mobs in dungeons without the help of healers, and despite WAR having good self sustain in single target, DRK had great mitigation via The Blackest Night, and some niche cooldowns that added more damage and sustain, which were removed.

DRK for example could restore 30% HP/mana(or 20% if the enemy survived) every 120 seconds because of Sole Survivor. Salted Earth was a 21 sec aoe ground dot on a 45 sec cooldown (instead of current 15s on a 90s cooldown) that generated a lot of blood, which could be used on quietus, which used to restore mana by default. Abyssal drain was a GCD mana spender, which allowed you to use your mana to lifesteal alongside souleater combos, which used to cure for more dmg because its cure scaled with the damage it did when buffed by dark arts. blood price was a 15 sec buff on a 40 sec cooldown that allowed you to generate both blood and mana when taking damage, which further fueled your survivability. blood weapon used to be 15 secs with a 40 sec cooldown which helped you push more dmg via its skillspeed buff, and also generated even more blood and mana than it does now, which leads to more sustain. there's a lot more i can go into in terms of optimisation for clutch moments, but most of these abilities were either removed, or nerfed hardcore, which i suspect came from the devs wanting to keep tank damage lower than it really has to be.

Nowadays, only PLD has the ability to use its mitigation smartly, along with requiescat, to keep itself topped off with clemency. PLD was the only tank who kept most of his survivability untouched, and even though it comes at the loss of DPS when your healer is alive, when you're the only one left, the DPS loss is nothing next to the sustainability you can generate. I myself have been able to beat many dungeon bosses, and a few trials bosses, with about 25-30% of their health left as a PLD with smart usage of cooldowns and knowing when the boss is gonna burst for big dmg, or knowing when i can dodge and heal myself. its just too bad only PLD can really do that now.

I partly blame the dungeons, Tanks are leaders, guides and no dungeon requires this in 50+. and with scaling being abysmal most fights tank busters barely scratch you and with agro being minimized to so a child could tank, you mostly doing what a DPS does.

Aurum Vale for example has you cautiously guide mobs away from hazards and vents so DPS arent being hurt or attract more mobs and to make sure bad breath doesnt plow your party with narrow corridors and room wide mobs rather than the "preferred" limited linear progression so guidance is key. and wareness too with patrol rather than mobs arrange like bowling pins with no danger. and in instances like the Burn where Aoes are large and frequent so you need to actively be alert or stun vital mobs with the largest aoe. Such hazards are far too rare so 90% of the time outside of savage your just a Dps with rampart

Personally my favorite tank is still Warrior but I tend to not mind simple classes and easy rotations.

Reason being nascent flash is probably my favorite tank skill since it gives you ridiculous survivability no matter how many mobs that you're tanking.

I'm not much of a fan of tanks that buckle under pressure, but that's just my two cents.

Step 1: Play a dps or healer
Step 2: get hit with something you shouldn't get hit with
Step 3: Die and realize how squishy you are
Step 4: Play a tank
step 5: Take the same mechanic, don't die, and realize how ignorant you were, that all tanks are tanky.
Step 6: Come back to this thread and delete it.

ARR and HW were shining examples of old WoW style agro system. To keep the agro focused on you you have to be doing constant damage. That was ok, but it got old after time.

Losing agro off a tank happened all the time, and it may not be the tanks fault. Maybe that NIN had it's relic weapon maxed out, and was just doing way more damage then the tank could push out. BLM and DRG's were notorious for pulling agro from me when I was leveling my PLD back in ARR.

I remember playing as a MNK back in ARR and they could really dish out the damage (since we weren't a broken mess back then) and I kept pulling hate from the a paladin. I told him he needs to use flash twice initially and once every rotation.

And this is why i'll never forget this moment.

"Flash doesn't do any damage...it's useless for a tank". Those were his/her words. I tried explaining to him that I can't help pulling hate from you unless you use flash, and my bloodbath, internal release burst is going to trump him every time. They started using Flash begrudgingly though and it was like a light bulb turn on for him/her. They asked for more tanking tips and I said "Yeah don't move around so much, it's hard to DPS when your making the mobs rotate. Learn when to move back in just before and AOE goes off" They were puzzled by this and I spent the rest of the dungeon losing ma' stacks due to a tank running all over.

This is why reading your tooltips and watching the agro bars is so important when your starting out tanking. Back then it was WAYYY more important than it is now, but ARR and HW your opener and first couple rotations really dictated how you would be DPS for the rest of the fight.

Now holding agro is face roll easy and if you lost agro it's probably because you don't have tank stance on. Watching agro is much more important in savage content and your co-tank has to be on same page at all times as your both running your tank stance. I have to know what part of the battle I will have agro. Some times you out damage your co-tank and pull it back. I see this when my co-tank is a GNB, and that's why it's important to watch the agro bars in high end content.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Sqwall

Watching agro is much more important in savage content and your co-tank has to be on same page at all times as your both running your tank stance. I have to know what part of the battle I will have agro. Some times you out damage your co-tank and pull it back. I see this when my co-tank is a GNB, and that's why it's important to watch the agro bars in high end content.

---

It really isn't, the only thing you need to know is when you need to tank swap and you simply turn off your stance until that point, enmity problem solved. The only exception this expansion are Leviathan and E4S Titan in phase 2 but even that is solved by simply dropping your stance for a minute or so after grabbing 2nd in enmity, the dps can't catch up to tanks in that time and you don't need to think about it again for the rest of the fight...unless your co-tank is so bad that you manage to pull the boss off them after giving them a 1 minute enmity lead and in that case you have a lot more problems than just enmity.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Absurdity

It really isn't, the only thing you need to know is when you need to tank swap and you simply turn off your stance until that point, enmity problem solved. The only exception this expansion are Leviathan and E4S Titan in phase 2 but even that is solved by simply dropping your stance for a minute or so after grabbing 2nd in enmity, the dps can't catch up to tanks in that time and you don't need to think about it again for the rest of the fight...unless your co-tank is so bad that you manage to pull the boss off them after giving them a 1 minute enmity lead and in that case you have a lot more problems than just enmity.

---

Hmm I never had a problem staying in tank stance. I suppose my static wants to keep tank stance up on both tanks for oh crab moments, then it falls to the other tank and adjust. I suppose this can be viewed subjective

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Sqwall

Hmm I never had a problem staying in tank stance. I suppose my static wants to keep tank stance up on both tanks for oh crab moments, then it falls to the other tank and adjust. I suppose this can be viewed subjective

---

It depends on which tank comp you're running and the individual skill level of the players. Warrior generates an absurd amount of aggro quickly, which makes it easier to rip off your co-tank, especially if they're less experienced or undergeared. What I tend to do is drop stance for a little bit then turn it back on.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by ForteNightshade

It depends on which tank comp you're running and the individual skill level of the players. Warrior generates an absurd amount of aggro quickly, which makes it easier to rip off your co-tank, especially if they're less experienced or undergeared. What I tend to do is drop stance for a little bit then turn it back on.

---

Yeah we run PLD (me) Warrior. Which is probably why we never have an issue.

I would really appreciate it if Square Enix would bring the defenders values like block, dodge or parry back into the game.

Currently I feel forced to be a DPS class just like the healers. Actually they could do away with the classic Protection / Damage / Healer line up and give each class utilities to fill each role individually.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Vejj

I would really appreciate it if Square Enix would bring the defenders values like block, dodge or parry back into the game.

---

I don't know how much I want RNG to factor into my mitigation...

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by ItMe

I don't know how much I want RNG to factor into my mitigation...

---

I do and it's not at all, it simply doesn't work in this game. Damage always comes in predictable bursts, adding RNG mitigation into the mix completely throws off cooldown planning for the fight.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Vejj

I would really appreciate it if Square Enix would bring the defenders values like block, dodge or parry back into the game.

---

For those to be viable, fights need to be designed very differently. Proc based mitigation works best with fights that have a constant mostly stable stream of incoming damage where the Law of Large Numbers can take effect. It does not work with the very spike heavy tank buster focused fight design of FFXIV.

Quote:

---

Currently I feel forced to be a DPS class just like the healers. Actually they could do away with the classic Protection / Damage / Healer line up and give each class utilities to fill each role individually.

---

And then you end up with fights that are less mechanically complex and more based around dealing damage as fast as possible. The Trinity role division system actually allows fights to be more complex.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Ultimatecalibur

For those to be viable, fights need to be designed very differently. Proc based mitigation works best with fights that have a constant mostly stable stream of incoming damage where the Law of Large Numbers can take effect. It does not work with the very spike heavy tank buster focused fight design of FFXIV.



And then you end up with fights that are less mechanically complex and more based around dealing damage as fast as possible. The Trinity role division system actually allows fights to be more complex.

---

Or worse, either forces a restrictive meta to be used in order to have the best chance of clearing content, or else required a homogenization of the jobs in such a way that you may as well just destroy any remaining identity. As limiting as the Trinity can sometimes feel, by distinctly separating the roles the way they do, SE doesn't paint themselves into a corner as far as encounter design goes. If they plan for always having 2 tanks, 2 healers and 4 dps, then they know there is a baseline they can operate from as far as encounter design goes.

And to be fair, they've been doing well thus far. Earlier ShB stuff was perhaps a bit on the easy side, but Eden 5-8S and the last 4 EX fights have thrown a lot of mechanically interesting stuff at players.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Venur

Is there any tanks that feel like your playing a tank and not a DPS ?

---

In XIV? Not really.

Just go for whichever 'DPS + some mitigation skills' job has the aesthetic or apm flow that most clicks with you.

If you're looking for the ability to clutch out a fight in a manner besides just dealing faintly more average dps over time, though... PLD will likely be the most obviously and iconically attractive, though WAR can produce about as much support over time at less cost to output.