do people hate tanking?

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Originally Posted by Bigcat9715

I used to tank back before 3.0 hit, but decided to stop afterwards due to the fact that tanking requires good gear at all times or they're going to lose aggro alot. Since 3.0 hit i've just been playing DoM jobs, but I'm wondering if I should pick up Drk and give it another shot. Have they made it easier for tanks to hold aggro regardless of gear?

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Yes. Tank stances generate more enmity, and other actions, such as Savage Blade, Skull Sunder, and Spinning Slash all also generate more enmity.

It is said that DRK has become more of an MT since PLD beat it now with DRK's lack of OT utility. I haven't MT'd much as DRK, though, unless it's a solo thing.

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Originally Posted by Jim_Berry

I wish it was easy to just tank and NOT have to focus on trying to push dps numbers. Seems that people like me who just want to tank can't because there's too much bashing due to low numbers.

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for the most part it is pretty easy to tank as long as your gear is good and you understand the basics of aggro/cooldowns. Thats WHY people want you to push out good numbers. Being a basic tank and staying in tank stance hitting your 1,2,3 combo over and over makes you an ok tank. You are a still a damage dealer at the end of the day since you are hitting things. I think a lot of tanks forget that.

You can just as easily hold aggro and be a meat shield WHILE doing great dps. If you can make a run faster why wouldn't you? If I was a tank that only tanked or a healer that only healed i'd be bored of the game really fast only because most content doesn't hit hard enough to warrant more.

I love tanking but bad groups make me not want to tank.

I really feel bad for new GLD/PLDs right now though.

Pre-Shield Oath is even more of a nightmare now. I'm ilvl 208 and have been struggling with aggro against DPS in gear worse than the dungeon drops in Toto Rak as an example during my low level roulettes. Before STR tanking got nerfed, I had no issues with it.

Tanking is a chore and people don't pay per month to do chores.

Proof of this : SE gave tank roulettes special mounts after doing a certain number, also glamour and other things you can only get by tanking, they know tanking isn't fun so if they try and force it maybe it will be fun? nope.

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Originally Posted by Gameplayzero

for the most part it is pretty easy to tank as long as your gear is good and you understand the basics of aggro/cooldowns. Thats WHY people want you to push out good numbers. Being a basic tank and staying in tank stance hitting your 1,2,3 combo over and over makes you an ok tank. You are a still a damage dealer at the end of the day since you are hitting things. I think a lot of tanks forget that.

You can just as easily hold aggro and be a meat shield WHILE doing great dps. If you can make a run faster why wouldn't you? If I was a tank that only tanked or a healer that only healed i'd be bored of the game really fast only because most content doesn't hit hard enough to warrant more.

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My tank is, for the most time, paired with people at almost 10 iLvs higher than me, so I have to Halone like 3 times in a row before throwing on Goring or Royal. That said, I'd rather be labeled as a tank that can't dps than a tank that can't hold hate. Either way, both paths are flagged as "You suck!".

*EDIT*
After my run-ins with my tanking experiences lately, I realized I'm not a legit tank. I can't push 1k like everyone else. So, I'll just continue being a NIN.

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Originally Posted by Adventica6

Tanking is a chore and people don't pay per month to do chores.

Proof of this : SE gave tank roulettes special mounts after doing a certain number, also glamour and other things you can only get by tanking, they know tanking isn't fun so if they try and force it maybe it will be fun? nope.

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And the Live Letter noted more tank mounts coming.

I play a tank everytime in df to avoid bad tanks :D

But then again, you can have bad healers and dpses. They are easy to replace though, if one leave or got kicked, another usually joins within a minute.

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Originally Posted by Jim_Berry

My tank is, for the most time, paired with people at almost 10 iLvs higher than me, so I have to Halone like 3 times in a row before throwing on Goring or Royal. That said, I'd rather be labeled as a tank that can't dps than a tank that can't hold hate. Either way, both paths are flagged as "You suck!".

*EDIT*
After my run-ins with my tanking experiences lately, I realized I'm not a legit tank. I can't push 1k like everyone else. So, I'll just continue being a NIN.

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yeah you should have a handle on holding aggro and being a tank first before trying to do extra. So if you are losing aggro then yeah you are still in the right. Honestly rotations for tanks is pretty simple outside of raids, so you might be doing good enough dps as it is and cutting yourself short. Its just goring blade with loads of royal authority as you've said.

I was scared to tank, and leveled up 2 healers and a dps before I attempted to level a tank. It's surprisingly fun, but it stresses me out to do more than a dungeon or two at a time. Once I get it to 60, I'll probably only play it when a friend/FC needs one and I'm not already busy. My tank of choice is DRK, and while I'm not max, I'm not sure I'll ever be a "dps" tank. Just like I'm not really a "dps" healer. If I feel like I can, I will, but most of the time, I'd rather play it safe (as long as it's not too slow).

Bad dps get noticed far less than bad tanks and healers.

I used to love tanking dungeon runs... that is, until they started making large pull, speed-run tanking not possible, or extremely limited.

I found it way more exciting and involved back then, as well as requiring you to know your limits, when to use this and that, what was good to mass pull and what wasn't, etc etc. You also had to be aware of the party, too, can they handle the pulks, do they want the pulls and so on. Now tanking is just not fun, you pull a small handful of mobs, or if allowed, a medium amount, in the small room you're blocked from progressing further from, sitting there not needing to even focus properly on what you're doing because the small group can't pose any threat to the block that you are, then once them sponges are dealt with that door opens and you can go to the next room to repeat that.

This goes for healing, too, not just tanking.

TL;DR -- Tanking was fun. I don't feel any satisfaction or self-improvement tanking/healing the dungeons after this design philosophy was implemented.

Sometimes I feel some of them shouldn't be using "random" roulette in Duty finder, if they didn't want to be in certain dungeons or don't want random jobs. Most of the times I've seen Tanks or healers vanish or become ??? in the list right off the start when the ring drops. Then that one guy last night who did come back in 8 minutes and then quickly vanished again. It's like he didn't expect to still be in the dungeon.

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Originally Posted by Zorafin

The smallest mistake, and they're subjected to honestly harmful abuse.

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But this should be no problem at all, i mean if your group doesnt like the way you do things you can always say "well feel free to kick me as it doenst matter because i get those juicy insta ques" and suddenly everyone will just stfu. Always abuse the power if you have it :P

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Originally Posted by AstralKaos

TL;DR -- Tanking was fun. I don't feel any satisfaction or self-improvement tanking/healing the dungeons after this design philosophy was implemented.

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the new dungeons don't hit hard regardless. Even if you could pull huge you still would barely heal or have health drops like now if thats what gets you going. What about dps stance on both tanks or healers since you hardly need to heal/tank for those anyways. I feel like one of the bigger complaints should be on the bosses since they hit like a wet noodle and don't require tank stance at all. I mean I understand if you hate the walls because you can't speed run anymore, but idk about your complaint about wanting to improve in a dungeon setting rather than for raiding. I just find that complaint odd.

edit: actually you can still pull fairly big in the new dungeons anyways in specific parts like in old dungeons. In never reap and fractal you were always gated to two/three trash pulls. Its only in the two expert dungeons before this patch that you could pull far more than that to go as far as 3-5 mobs. Lost city you could just destroy the walls before killing the mobs and anti tower (aside from the first part) at times gives you the chance to pull some more. Only issue is that some of the mobs come out late.

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Originally Posted by Jim_Berry

I wish it was easy to just tank and NOT have to focus on trying to push dps numbers. Seems that people like me who just want to tank can't because there's too much bashing due to low numbers.

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Honestly, in dungeons I just don't care. I'll do my pulls, hold aggro and if things don't die fast enough for the group its the DPS's fault.

I will do what I can to push my DPS as far as is safe in raid or a solid farm party, but in the DF? Meh. If DPS won't push, you won't see me doing so either.

Tanking can get pretty stressful, since you're basically the pace setter, the de facto leader, and entail knowing the dungeon/mobs a little more than the others. So I can understand why people wouldn't want to tank. It's not for everyone, but it's pretty fun once you get the hang of it.

no but a lot of DF tanks seem to be really elitist, I met a tank a few days ago who had a macro for kicking someone.

I have the biggest love-hate relationship with tanking. Believe me, I LOVE tanking, I truly do. Every time I reroll, I end up going back to Warrior. Getting to lead the group, know that I can be a leader figure (when applicable), being able to set the pace of a dungeon, I don't mind having to be a step ahead of the other classes, and I enjoy being able to take on that role. The thing I don't love is being absolutely verbally abused if I do something wrong. Not everyone does it, mind you - I've gotten plenty of friendly assistance and compliments while I leveled, and re-leveled Warrior. Some players in this game have been wonderfully kind. But when I'm getting lag spikes in the middle of a dungeon I've never done before (and told the party as such) after a bad day, constantly getting rude remarks and complaints from the healer up until the very moment he leaves, without ever getting reassured that I'm not actually doing that badly...it can really kill your motivation.

The last thing I want to do is dissuade anyone from tanking, because it is so very, very fun when you do it right. But unfortunately, the pressure that's on you when you tank combined with the chance that someone will go off on you for any mistakes you make, since they are so evident as a tank, turn a LOT of people off from the job.

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Originally Posted by Synestra

But this should be no problem at all, i mean if your group doesnt like the way you do things you can always say "well feel free to kick me as it doenst matter because i get those juicy insta ques" and suddenly everyone will just stfu. Always abuse the power if you have it :P

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This is fair enough, but I hate being labeled a jerk for responding in that way - plus there's the fact that the verbal abuse still hurts, even if it isn't truly *worth* anything. I like to think I have a pretty thick skin, but after a while, getting hammered for being a bit dumb and slow to learn gets exhausting.

Tanking is so mind-numbingly boring.

I know there are many reasons why a person might not want to tank, but is tanking for randoms that bad? I always pop in DF for roulette and I don't get anything that "bad". Big pulls, small pulls I rarely see someone getting angry at whatever pace something happens, nor someone saying,"hey its a boss turn off ur tank stance". I won't say I am perfect in tanking everything, cuz sometimes I would notice I screw something up. Most of the time everyone in the party don't say a thing and just goes through the dungeon. Sure sometimes I would get someone in the party try to run ahead to mobs, but hey the aoes are down, others are attacking, we are going to stay here and fight. Its super rare for me to see someone bitch about it. I like tanking in the end though.

well tanking is always scary at first in df if you don't know the healer, the dps are like mass pull plz and healer just remains silent, well the dps dont ask mass pulls its just commonly agreed thats how you do it room to room.

like new healer i do a light pull to start with to test healer then dps abuses you, to many times have I started a mass pull and then wind up dead cause healer either wanted to dps or just was super bad.

and in a mass pull who gets blamed for the wipe if tank dies? the tank cause the healers defence is to just say its not my fault tank dident use cds while healer wasent even trying to heal.

So to sum this up i dont tank unless I know the healer nowadays and bairly df as tank.

To answer blunt : yes there is a lot of pressure on tanks to perform good. I changed my main to be a healer even if it was main tank for over 8 months. And people that are saying that a tank is just a dps with mitigation skills and a healer as well -> do play the higher instances and then provide feedback. It went so bad that I wanted to quit the game-> and no not because I hate tanking or that I suck at it. Before posting your point of view, try the higher instances and then post.
And to be honest -> yes there a lot of jackass tanks (i know a few as well) that really suck at setting the pace and want to run the dungeon even if the healer can not maintain the healing. But the same thing i can say about dps and healers as well. Point is as many have said before : play with people you know and leave the anger out of the game as by providing some rules or info it will make it run smooth.
Oh and yes, as a tank i rather cut my wrist than do df :).

I love tanking, I hate the guilt that comes with tanking.

Knowing that you are spending another few minutes doing something over again because you were where you need to be, or not clear with your instructions, or you got killed wondering about using cooldowns.

Then you get a front row seat to watch it all fall apart from your (in)action.

It honestly makes me want to say nasty terrible things when one of the other roles gets an instruction squeezed through party chat, but doesn't follow through with it for one reason or another. Learning parties feel like a race, and one where you hope you don't screw up first. I tend to be quiet, and accomodating, but the fact that it is mostly strangers in pf and df makes the idea of being the rude one with all the profanity and rage, just for once, tempting. More for myself than any desire to see Rando Deeps improve.

Tanking is scary for most people. They don't want to take lead, screw up, and be yelled at.

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Originally Posted by KoroushSensei

when i am in a dungeon and our tank decides to leave or dc it takes a long time for another one to appear

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I don't hate tanking, it's the easiest role of the 3 (arguably the same as healer or easier). I sometimes do it for fun, but I always bring the rest of the party with me in the que. If I'm queing as healer or dps, I still bring a tank (and healer). This way, I can speedrun everything and not have to run into healers who cannot heal 4 trash mobs in high lvl areas/healers who whines when DPS take a little damage/when a BLM wants to fire 1 spam on a trash mob on the far corner of the trash room while tank and healer and other dps is dealing with 10 other ones/DPS who autoattack, etc.

I don't even find tanks hard to find, I collected a good collection of them in my linkshell and they either came as very good tanks or tanks whom I helped to train :3

I find Tanking to be extremely stressy.

Have I pulled enough, have I popped the right CD's? Are they in a good position...which way do I dodge so everyone can keep their positional bonus?
Can I switch to DPS stance now?

It's such a shame that I like the PLD Eso gear >.<

I've been messing around with tanking recently. Got my PLD to 30s and WAR is 40s. What I can say is I wish there were more AoE abilities for crowd-control. Maybe there will be at higher levels, but if so then I think those should be available at lower levels. Crowd control is something that is needed starting with the first dungeon and if it were up to me each tanking class would have two abilities. "But you can just spam Flash" yeah I get it but what fun is that? With two, one could chain off the other and make tanking groups a little easier and also keep it interesting instead of just spamming the same thing over and over.

I know I'm probably part of the minority with this. I'm also one of the few who actually LIKED paladin tanking in WoW (which, for those not in the know, gets a lot of flak for being the easiest tanking class).

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Originally Posted by Sailysium

While most agree with you, I'd refrain from saying it's harder as opposed to just higher responsibility placed when picking up tanking.

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I have to agree with this quote. As someone that is playing all 3 roles, I can say that Tanking is not harder, its the responsibility that scares players away from this role.

Agreed with most, tanking has a level of stress to it as you need to know pull patterns in addition to rotations... but rotations are easier and pulling isnt difficult at all.

Out of all 3 roles I'm willing to say its harder to be a top tier DPS then anything else. That's my opinion though.

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Originally Posted by Velox

Because of this, there's little satisfaction from the lack of "big numbers" that you see in DPS jobs.

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Yeah you can see evidence of this by the reaction of tanks when their dps was reduced slightly. Arggo generation was increased to compensate, but you can't see those numbers, so everyone was spicey over it.

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Originally Posted by ErikMynhier

Yeah you can see evidence of this by the reaction of tanks when their dps was reduced slightly. Arggo generation was increased to compensate, but you can't see those numbers, so everyone was spicey over it.

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Heh. Imagine they'd give aggro relatively arbitrary but "big" numbers...and showed those instead of damage for tanks :3

You simply can't be bad and a tank, without getting a lot of 'hate' from your party. ;b

People will tend to gravitate towards the job that compliments their personality/skill set the most, DPS is easily the most popular followed by healer then finally tank. So I don't think people hate tanking per say, just less people enjoy it than the other roles. Most of the negative stigma of tanking comes from other party members but I must admit I've found it to be massively over stated, if you're a terrible tank you're probably going to get some hate but for most people it's fine. I run roulettes every day with 3 other randoms and honestly can't think of a single instance where I got grief from other party members and that's after getting all tanks to 60 via leveling exclusively through dungeons.

I do understand why some find the leader role to be quite stressful though, it doesn't bother me in the slightest as I've been tanking for years in other games and I have a leadership role in my actual job so making calls and taking responsibility doesn't bother me at all. To those not used to it though it can be intimidating but the role itself is actually quite easy for those who overcome that hurdle. I agree with the poster above who said being a top tier DPS is usually the hardest role, only beaten by trying to heal a bad group. Healing competent players can be relaxing and enjoyable but I find it turns really difficult really quickly if people won't dodge stuff or do mechanics. In contrast tanking is usually very easy as long as you're alert and aware of everything that's going on.

Of all the roles though tanks need the most confidence and that is the sticking point for newer players, those who persevere though will get to enjoy a job with easily the most perks of any other roles from instant queues to having more say in how instances get run.

For 4 man dungeons, I feel I have a bigger impact on speed and success of the run as a healer. Secondly a bigger impact on efficiency/speed as a dos. Lastly I feel my impact to the run as a tank is least meaningful. Average to below average tanks tend to be ok in 4 mans as at a bare minimum it's just holding aggro.

If you are talking 8 man content, I'll switch up roles to what I see most DF groups failing at and do that role.

This is my reasoning for not running tank a lot in DF (at least 4 mans and VA).

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Originally Posted by Gemina

tl:dr? Heavy is the body that wears the armor

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Are you calling me fat? :mad:

In my opinion, tanking in XI was superior to tanking in XIV. I really miss Ninja tanking. It always made me feel godly when a tank buster was mitigated by one of my shadows.

As far as XIV goes, I think what turns a lot of people off to tanking is being in the unavoidable spotlight. When a tank screws up it is extremely obvious and the general public are very vocal about it.

You just gotta grew a thick skin, not worry too much about people opinions, and do the best you can. I think that's true regardless of what job you play.

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Originally Posted by Zojha

Heh. Imagine they'd give aggro relatively arbitrary but "big" numbers...and showed those instead of damage for tanks :3

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That would actually be fun. A rolling counter for arggo numbers optional for people to view the party's arggo numbers would be downright useful. More so then the shape/color system we have now.

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Originally Posted by Lan_Mantear

Are you calling me fat? :mad:

In my opinion, tanking in XI was superior to tanking in XIV. I really miss Ninja tanking. It always made me feel godly when a tank buster was mitigated by one of my shadows.

As far as XIV goes, I think what turns a lot of people off to tanking is being in the unavoidable spotlight. When a tank screws up it is extremely obvious and the general public are very vocal about it.

You just gotta grew a thick skin, not worry too much about people opinions, and do the best you can. I think that's true regardless of what job you play.

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To this day, I am thankful to Yoshi & Co. for putting the kibosh on that madness on day 1. I still believe the XI devs would never have had to think up those cheap hate reset mechanics if Utsusemi were made unavailable as a support job.

I really don't get all this talk about tank jobs being "boring". To be honest, that sounds like a smokescreen word for "I can't hit for big numbers like Dragoons". I can't think of anything more exciting than facing a big monster one-on-one and keeping its eyes on me (or the other tank). Any damage a tank can offer is great, but SE slipped up by acquiescing to tanks trying to be DPS in 3.0 and making DPS checks that relied too much on tank DPS--something which the devs, to their credit, addressed in 3.2.

Some don't like tanking.

Some don't like the pressure & responsibilities that come with tanking.

Some just have no desire to deal with entitled brats who flip their lid should the tank not be performing at their standards. Oh and Twelve forbid if something should ever go wrong...

I like DPSing as a Warrior, but for some reason I just find tanking very engaging. It's a lot of standing still and hitting the same few buttons. As a melee DPS which I usually play I'm having to run around all over and such. Maybe I should level a Paladin, they have more utility and random buttons to hit to help out in between just doing 1,2,3 combo right?