A wild tank appears!

Greetings.

I am very interested in playing a Tank role. I have started on Marauder, as I understand this is a good way to ease into the role. Which other classes should I be focusing on? Are there classes I should avoid? (since I'm a Marauder already, is it pointless for me to learn Gladiator abilities?)

Gear is confusing for me. The disciple of war armor that is offered to me through questing usually boosts my Strength stats. Should I be focusing on Vitality? Should I have the goal of focusing on both?

Crafting items looks both time-consuming and overwhelming. Can I play though the game while avoiding crafting altogether, or will I gimp myself out of end game gear if I do this?

For note, I am currently still on a free-trial account so there are some restrictions for me. I plan on going full access once my trial is up, but in the short term I'd really appreciate some advice so I can make the most of my time here.

Thank you for your assistance!

-Smitten Mittens

First off, be CONFIDENT. Swift and decisive pulls. Or your party will pull. Unless noted otherwise, your party members should always be ready to engage after the pull, therefore you need not issue a "Ready Check" at every boss. Only pull what your team can handle and at the same time not waste their capabilities I.e. single mob pulls with a WHM, SMN and BLM at your disposal. Keep all mobs engaged at ALL TIMES and facing YOU, their back turned towards your party. Should you move to avoid AOEs, reestablish your position quickly. Watch for stragglers and know where your healer is at all times. Some Jobs/classes need to be stationary to maximize their DPS, help em by maneuvering the mobs around em, not the other way arkind. Secondly, level a gladiator for its Flash and Provoke skills (mandatory). Lastly, head to toe, wear tank gear for its defense and secondary stats. For accessories, wear vitality if you have trouble staying alive, strength if you have trouble keeping aggro. Have fun.

Ok, first off: Some gladiator abilities are VERY useful for marauder. Don't be afraid to play with them.

Both are important, but something to note is that ALL left-side armor pieces have vitality on them regardless of class. And you use strength, just like pugilist and lancer. However, there IS a distinction between gear made for them, and gear made for tanks. Tank gear will have both physical and magical defense of an equal value that is significantly higher than other gear of the same item level. Most of the time this gear is restricted to only GLA, PLD, MRD, WAR, and DRK, though there are a few "tank oriented" pieces that are scalemail and allow LNC and DRG to use them, but they're far and few between, with most scale mail not having the defense of your heavy plate.

Crafting is not needed for endgame, though it's not TOO complicated once you learn the basics. Personally I like the freedom to make and repair my own stuff.

Hi there fellow tank,

as others stated before be confident and don't let others give you a pace you don't want.

About you skill question:
-You will need to level gladiator to 15 to unlock warrior at level 30; as a minimum you want to bring gladiator though to 22 for Provoke <- this is what I totally recommend
-Awareness skill you get at level 34 Gladiator (Paladin) it prevents crit hits (very usefull in combination with Raw Intuition WAR 54 skill and for certain encounters)
-Warrior is the most DPS focused tank of the 3 possible tank classes, so the other crossskills are from pugilist (monk) to increase damage or selfheal (level 43 monk to get all skills)

About you STR or VIT question:
Your maingear from head to feet should always priorize VIT over STR (Description will say WAR, MRD, PLD, GLD, DRK); your weapon should be according to your skill level never be more than 5-8 ilvl under the current dungeon level. For accessories and you status point allocation there is a never-ending discussion in duty finder and everywhere... you will need to find you own way you feel comfy. I personally started on full VIT and now swapped to a rather STR build and even tank endgame on it... but as said find your own way.

About crafting:
You can totally avoid it. I am a casual crafter focussing mostly on the needs of my FC; why I leveled them. You can if you want level crafters and craft your own gear but imho not needed; just run current dungeons a few times and you should get gear from quests to have level appropriate gear available. Also in the zones is always a vendor with level gear.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Urthdigger

Personally I like the freedom to make and repair my own stuff.

---

This is a big plus though about haveing crafters leveled :D

Hope I could help you, enjoy your game :)

Thank you so much for the quick replies!

So it sounds like I will have to level Gladiator as a path to the really cool stuff. Once I cap at 20 Marauder, I'll start on this as well. Seems like the required dungeon / end game skills I need are almost all post level 30, so I have a ways to go.

About Tanking gear:
Is there a distinction in game showing this beyond class requirements, or will I have to rely on reading the stats? I'm sure in either case I won't have trouble finding the distinction once I get used to it...

And in regards to healing: Will a higher VIT stat make it easier or tougher on my healer? I'm not sure if the healing skills in the game are based on a % of total health or are more related to flat healing stats from the source. It seems like the latter, but if it's % based I could see the need for more STR instead of VIT in tougher content. Maybe this is just a matter of shaving seconds during runs? The last thing I want to be is a drain on the people keeping me alive!

In regards to crafting, I assume Armorsmith is a no brainer for the role I'm investing in. Which gathering discipline will I benefit from? Will the armor I make be level equivalent right away or will I be required to grind through a few crafting levels first?

The gear description usually says either of "All Classes" (then you need check stats you want VIT/STR); "Disciplines of Magic" (You cannot equip as tank or any physical DPS); "Disciplines or War" (you can equip as any physical DPS and tank but they are STR/DEX based so worse than tank gear) or "DRK/WAR/MRD/PLD/GLD" (this is your tank gear). Later on there is class specific gear that will be "WAR/MRD" or "WAR" only.
You see those in the gear description a bit under the Physical and Magical defence stats. If its shown green you can eqip due to level/class; red means you have wrong class for that gear; Yellow measn right class but not needed level.
Also during dungeon runs your left side gear that actually is meant for you you can "Need" from chests this option isnt given for not-your-class/mainstat-gear there you only can "Greed".

VIT makes it easier to NOT heal. I had longtime VIT so I could longer survive without heals (wherein STR scales for 2 selfheals to make those stronger on the other hand). Heals are base on flat amounts not % (those skills been removed with expansion). In normal dungeon runs STR vs VIT really is on about seconds if you are in endgame content and have the according gear you will notice the difference significantly as thats a difference of 5-10 minutes in dungeons and for "real" raidcontent aka current Alex Savage the STR build is needed as the enrage times are short and every bit DPS is needed.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by roachsrealm

About Tanking gear:
Is there a distinction in game showing this beyond class requirements, or will I have to rely on reading the stats? I'm sure in either case I won't have trouble finding the distinction once I get used to it...

---

The most obvious difference on the left side armor pieces is that tank gear has the highest Defense (both physical and magical). Just going by that stat will get you the pieces that have the right other stats as well. It's also, as mentioned previously, limited to only being worn by tanks (or in a very few cases, tanks and lancers/dragoons) so will list the individual classes/jobs in the area that says who can equip it.

There is one other thing to be careful of when comparing equipment, though. Sometimes a chest piece will cover both chest and head so you can't wear a helm with it, or legs will cover both legs and feet so you can't wear boots with it. Because these pieces cover multiple gear slots, they'll appear to have higher stats, but for a true comparison you have to add the stats of both pieces they would be replacing to decide if it's truly higher or not. (The +/- numbers on the tooltips when looking at another piece of gear don't do this for you. If you look at a combined chest piece that has 1 more defense than your current chest piece but would cost you 2 defense by not being able to wear your helm, it will show the green +1 in the tooltip as though it were an upgrade when it's really a downgrade.)

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by roachsrealm

And in regards to healing: Will a higher VIT stat make it easier or tougher on my healer? I'm not sure if the healing skills in the game are based on a % of total health or are more related to flat healing stats from the source. It seems like the latter, but if it's % based I could see the need for more STR instead of VIT in tougher content. Maybe this is just a matter of shaving seconds during runs? The last thing I want to be is a drain on the people keeping me alive!

---

VIT gives you more total hit points, and thus gives your healer a bit of a buffer so they have more time in which to heal whatever damage you just took. STR gives you more damage, which can make things go faster, though that aspect is really more up to the damage dealers in your party. The other, more tank-related, advantage of doing more damage is that you can maintain aggro on the mobs better. If you fail to maintain aggro and the mobs start attacking other members of the party, that's harder on your healer than a somewhat lower VIT score yourself is.

As mentioned above, your armour is going to be whatever gives you the best Defense. You'll also get a lot of both VIT and STR from it, but there's rarely choices to be made between VIT and STR there. Where you'll be making that VIT vs. STR choice is in your jewelry and in how you allocate the bonus points you get as you level up.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by roachsrealm

In regards to crafting, I assume Armorsmith is a no brainer for the role I'm investing in. Which gathering discipline will I benefit from? Will the armor I make be level equivalent right away or will I be required to grind through a few crafting levels first?

---

Miner gathers the ore that Armorsmith makes into metal and then armour. If you want to do well with crafting, you may need to work on multiple crafting classes, however. This is partially because they use cross-class skills from each other and partially to provide materials to each other. (Armourer, for instance, may need some leather as well, which you'll have to buy from other players unless you level Leatherworker alongside it. That in turn, may need some cloth from Weaver, and so on.) Most people who get seriously into crafting end up leveling all of them, which is why it turns into such a huge time commitment.

As to the levels you can make stuff, the recipe level for making most gear is near to the level at which you'd wear it. If you're level 20 MRD by the time you begin crafting, then you've got about 20 levels of catching up to do before you can make better MRD gear.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Werhusky

The gear description usually says either of "All Classes" (then you need check stats you want VIT/STR); "Disciplines of Magic" (You cannot equip as tank or any physical DPS); "Disciplines or War" (you can equip as any physical DPS and tank but they are STR/DEX based so worse than tank gear) or "DRK/WAR/MRD/PLD/GLD" (this is your tank gear).

---

the main difference is not VIT/STR vs STR/DEX. DPS gear has VIT too. the main difference is the Defense and MDefense stat. even if the gear has VIT/STR it's probably not tank gear.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Tint

the main difference is not VIT/STR vs STR/DEX. DPS gear has VIT too. the main difference is the Defense and MDefense stat. even if the gear has VIT/STR it's probably not tank gear.

---

I know I said based and worse lol

Thanks again for the replies! I just hit 19 on my Marauder and my gear is all tanky so far. It's fun. Started leveling Gladiator and Pugilist to get some synergy going. (my god they attack fast, marauder is so slow I had no idea!)

It sounds like for the end-game I should plan on Warrior specific left-side and probably 2 sets of trinkets. Looking forward to the journey.