Marking Targets

I have been playing a dps recently and noticed not a single tank marks targets in the 30 or so dungeons I've done and when I'm tanking and mark everyone for the most part ignores them so I'm curious do any of you mark targets still? I know it used to be a big deal but is it still?


And a totally unrelated note but not deserving of its own post as a PLD I can do just my zodiac braves quest for the sword and not shield right?

I rarely see it anymore. Generally as a dps if we aren't aoeing everything down Ill watch my aggro meter and switch targets as I start to gain enmity on a mob.

I admit I stopped marking a while back. I have noticed however, the better DPS (and I suppose healer if you going to do some damage too) will start on the target I Provoke / pulled, or ranged toss pulled first. And then they usually then down the next "dangerous" one in the pack (usually the one dropping AOE or something). All without marking. Unless it is a lower level dungeon where especially someone is new I will still mark, or if I am waiting on a patroller I will mark that so people may know why I am just standing there.

- They made tank enmity a total joke so it takes a DPS being a jerk and going unreasonably hard on a single target while a tank ignores it to pull hate.

- While you can upgrade the PLD Sword before the Shield or vice versa in the ATMA>Animus stage, the answer is generally, no. You cannot complete a relic quest for just your Sword, before moving to the next step both must have undergone the transformation to the previous.

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Originally Posted by Ehayte

- They made tank enmity a total joke so it takes a DPS being a jerk and going unreasonably hard on a single target while a tank ignores it to pull hate.

- While you can upgrade the PLD Sword before the Shield or vice versa in the ATMA>Animus stage, the answer is generally, no. You cannot complete a relic quest for just your Sword, before moving to the next step both must have undergone the transformation to the previous.

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He said he played pld, which everyone knows how awful aggro is for a pld in low-levels. War, starring aggro is strong, pld, not so much. We don't even get a proper tank stance until 40, by which time dps have already gotten hard hitting skills. So, no extra aggro multipliers, doing stupid low damage, and dps hitting harder than ever, low level for pld is not a joke. Post-50, unless it's a large pull I don't need a tank stance as either pld or war.

And onto the real topic, marking overall is useless, if you want to do, I don't say anything and go after the lowest number. I never marked, just because I know, most of the time, dps don't care. I've marked before, and a bard decided to attack the only unmarked mob, I even started attacking it once I saw the health dropping. The beard promptly switched targets. Oh, and nins, don't even get me started. It seems like every non wants to tank at least one mob per pull. They don't even care. It's ridiculous.

Easy, as a healer, as soon as I cast a cure/ regen on the tank, it displays a list of the enemies the tank had an effect on (provocation, flash, whatsoever), so it becomes immediatly clear as crystal which enemy has its life decreasing faster than the other.
For any dps, it will display the list too, as soon as the player casts an aoe.

Anyway, just relying on enmity as a dps, is really blind. If every dps focus on a different enemy, it will always make the fights harder on the healer. Say, each dps can put an enemy down in a minute by solo-ing it. Tanks will get hit by the 2 mobs during a minute. If you focus the same enemy as the other dps, you can safely assume it will take 30 seconds to kill it. And another 30 to kill the second enemy, which, in other words, means that the tank (and possibly even the dps), get hit by half during the second part of the fight.
For most healers, it won't change a thing. For new players or slightly undergeared healers, it certainly does matter.

In leveling dungeons especially, as a healer main, I like seeing a tank actively mark. I'll sleep the last mob in the pack if there's limited aoe presence, and it does help focus damage when generating enough enmity to hold everything may be an issue. If someone gets whacked in the face by attacking an unmarked mob, it's pretty clear who's at fault. If there's a legitimate reason to kill a mob first, communicate why it's a good idea to kill that mob first, so that players learn from the encounter. For example, I typically point out mobs that heal others, like barbers in Pharos, or moths in lost city. Even putting a 1 on whatever you're attacking, then switching the 1 to your next mob is often sufficient to keep damage focused so that it's not a problem. In many cases once you've reached level 50 however, aoe damage is often significant enough to ignore single targeting, making marks less useful.

As a 43 PLD, I mark one target to focus first and help me build a little enmity then don't care and will rotate enmity abilities and while cycling through mobs see if I need to give more love to a certain mob.

if the dps have a brain, they start on whatever the tanks target is, or on some special mob that needs to die first, like the humans that transform into dragons in stone vigil hard and snow cloak

Marking is only necessary in low DPS groups where focus firing is the only way to get things killed (provided you don't lose patience and quit due to how long it's taking), or if you're just starting out and want to minimise your damage received. I used to mark all the time, but it's pointless in higher level content, which is where your character will eventually spend most of his time. The name of the game is chain pulling, and once you get good at that, everything else will feel too slow.

Incidentally, Paladins only have problems tanking brayflox normal and Quarn normal. They can easily handle Sastasha through Haukke, and Stone Vigil and up is a joke.

I mark, but only 1 + 2. I mark 1, tomahawk, OP OP OP, rotate and mark 2 and combo. If the 3rd is not slept I gain some on them or just rotate through. As MOBS die I remark in larger trash packs. Have not had any higher end experience though, so it may change.

The hard part is consensus on sleeping. With WAR, OP does wake them, I do have flash, but often it is not too much of an issue as groups can kill off trash without the sleep.

Can people stop with paladin doesn't generate enough threat on lower level dungeons. If this was true why have i never had any problems. If your paladin is losing threat its because, 1 there not using flash multiple times on pulls with more then 1 mob, flash really is under rated, its affected by attack power so combo it with fight of flight, mobs stick to you like glue when you do this.

In low level dungeons marking helps DPS know what target to attack first. Things go a bit faster probably. Unlike tanks and healers, DPS don't see all mobs on the enmity list until they have attacked them. Some players may be high level doing roulettes but sometimes there is a newer one. So it helps DPS to learn to concentrate on the same mob, or know who has to die first.

When the difficulty of the place is not low for the group, it helps. Except in huge pulls with lots of mobs (with AoE attacks mostly) mobs die quicker if there are marks.

Usually a 1 on the first mob you can change when it dies is enough, but marking 3 is also nice. If everybody knows very well the place it may not be needed at all.

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Originally Posted by Carvaka

The hard part is consensus on sleeping.

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If you are having difficulties, sleep may help, but if mobs die quick and with no problems (which is most times), it is not needed.

As a tank, I mark when I need it. This is when I need it:

- There is an enemy I want to die first. Maybe he does AoE, maybe he poisons, maybe I just don't like his face. If I want him dead, I'll mark him.

- I'm losing hate. If I'm having hate issues, I will mark in order to show DPS who to attack so that the group is focused and I don't lose hate anymore. If I'm not losing hate on anything... this isn't required, the group can attack whoever they like.

- If I'm in Sastasha, Tam-Tam or Copperbell (normal modes) and there's a bunch of non-synched players in the group... then I will mark to help out new players if they're getting overwhelmed with their first dungeon runs.

There are other reasons to mark targets, but (to me) these are not the tank's responsibility:

- Stress on the healer. If mobs are not dying fast enough, and the healer is having troubles with MP or would just like a breather to attack more or something like that... then the healer can mark the mobs to focus the DPS so that the healer's issues are cleared up.

- DPS do not know who to attack. If the tank isn't stressed... and the healer isn't stressed, but the DPS are unclear on what to do, then the DPS can mark things to focus their own attacks.

I think the tank guessing at other class's issues and marking for reasons other than tank-reasons is... inefficient. It can also lead to marking things when it's not required, which clutters the screen with unnecessary junk.

TL/DR:
If there's no problems, I don't see a reason to mark.
If there's a problem... then the character having the problem should mark in order to clear it up.

Marking targets 1-49 I've always understood. Even if people ignore them, I think it's fine for a tank to mark on the chance that they do. Especially early on when aggro is hard to come by and AOE isn't really a thing.

Sleeping is also understandable before AOE is involved, but if you have 2x THM/BLM and a WAR tank, sleeping is very counterproductive.

Both, at 50, are unnecessary. Rarely will you run into something that needs to be marked, and rarer still something that needs to be slept. It's just not a thing at 50. You need to have aggro on EVERYTHING. As Cold_Raven pointed out, though, there are situations where you should mark, specifically if something in a pack needs to die asap. But yeah, it's a niche thing unlike early on in leveling.

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Originally Posted by shape

Can people stop with paladin doesn't generate enough threat on lower level dungeons. If this was true why have i never had any problems. If your paladin is losing threat its because, 1 there not using flash multiple times on pulls with more then 1 mob, flash really is under rated, its affected by attack power so combo it with fight of flight, mobs stick to you like glue when you do this.

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Thank you for saying this. I had no issues leveling and if anything Shield Oath made Paladin's lazy.

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Originally Posted by Wintersandman

Thank you for saying this. I had no issues leveling and if anything Shield Oath made Paladin's lazy.

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When people talk about PLD having trouble with emnity generation during lower levels, they are referring to the small window between lvl 30 and lvl 40. Most DPS classes are geeting big portions of their rotations during this time, but Paladin does not get shield oath until lvl 40. Depending on both the tanks personal skill and the DPS/Healer skill levels, some Paladins experience difficulty holding hate against 3 enemies (or more) at a time. This was especially true before the emnity buff to flash a few patches back. Since that buff, it has become a lot less of an issue. Once PLD gets shield oath at 40, it all becomes EZ mode again.

I stopped making when I stopped loosing threat. Of you are a newer/inexperienced or undergeared tank, mark away. Best case, people follow and you maintain threat. Worst case dps ignore it and rip hate in which case you can just call them dumb because you spelled it out for them (have defense against "you suck" harrassment).

Once you get ahead of the general populace in gear and stuff you just never loose hate again.

I remember when marking targets helped. A little, sometimes. That was back in about 2.0 or 2.1 when I had an i55 weapon on tank compared to DPS i70, i80ish. But since then, you get good on tank and it's pretty much impossible to lose hate.

Exceptions would be 1) the tank screws up, like an Overpower hits 5 targets and misses a 6th. 2) the DPS screws up, like using single target attacks and heavy offensive cooldowns while tank is doing area attacks. Or 3) better gear on DPS.

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Originally Posted by shape

Can people stop with paladin doesn't generate enough threat on lower level dungeons. If this was true why have i never had any problems. If your paladin is losing threat its because, 1 there not using flash multiple times on pulls with more then 1 mob, flash really is under rated, its affected by attack power so combo it with fight of flight, mobs stick to you like glue when you do this.

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I guess I could have been a bit clearer on my statement. While I still say pld has awful aggro generation, doesn't mean we can't keep anything. I didn't have problems, but I also realized why we had a large mana pool and a way to fill it fast early on. What I had meant was that we can't do a 2 or 3 flash and do single target hate for most party make-ups. The moment you start throwing out dots or aoe, you have to flash a lot. A war, on the other hand, can throw out 3 OP pre-defiance and single target without worry.

why turn this thread into a pld cant hold hate thread... this thread has nothing to do with holding hate at all.

op asked if we should mark or not... not that we need another one of these threads either mind, but I will answer none the less.

marking is for when something really has to die, nothing more as far as I'm concerned.

learn to tank without it and it makes your job easier, you shouldn't be focusing on only one enemy in front of you as tank its your responsibility to be thinking about them all and what is the best way to achieve that and still be good for the next pull. with that said if that is marking for you that's great but since you cant rely on anyone following those marks best be prepared.


however as dps if I think the tank is struggling on a pull i might mark for them, usually only if their new mind. but this is pretty rare as I believe that the best way to get better at tanking is to go in and just grab everything and let the dps do whatever they want and learn to control the flow in those circumstances.

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Originally Posted by monochromicorn

I guess I could have been a bit clearer on my statement. While I still say pld has awful aggro generation, doesn't mean we can't keep anything. I didn't have problems, but I also realized why we had a large mana pool and a way to fill it fast early on. What I had meant was that we can't do a 2 or 3 flash and do single target hate for most party make-ups. The moment you start throwing out dots or aoe, you have to flash a lot. A war, on the other hand, can throw out 3 OP pre-defiance and single target without worry.

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Pretty much this. I played all day today capping poetics and finishing my books, and I've really gotten sick of how often I have to use flash then the riot blade combo. It'll probably get a lot easier when I've got better gear, but in the meanwhile, I'm chugging mana pots like a drunkard to keep up with good dps,

I've only had to worry about marking things in sub-level 50 content anymore. At 50, DPS generally seem to follow the list brought up earlier.
Shield Lobbed target first -> Biggest / aoe dropping target next -> another aoe dropper? -> stragglers
Assuming they're doing single target damage.
I HAVE had to worry about marking things when in-progress ques shove me into no-tank no-healer runs because things dying in a pretty specific order help the party progress while the other role fills back up. This became especially common as of Zodiac dungeon runs.

This being my first MMO altogether, I wasn't at all used to the tanking mindset, even if I knew the base concept of tank-healer-damager-(support). Plus I did a bit of forum reading once I realized my class was a tank :p So I knew what my purpose in the group was. But the first dungeons I did, as well as when doing any dungeon the first time, I didn't mind saying it was my first time there, and if any of the more experienced players could help out it'd be awesome. I think first Sastasha run I did together with my flatmate, the other DPS took the lead and 'pointed the way' where I should go, plus marked important enemies.

A bit later on, when I was comfortable enough even my first time in a place to run ahead, I'd still ask (if I saw level-synched people or just generally people who appeared to know the dungeon) if there were any enemies that should be killed first and if so which ones and/or 'could you mark them for me? =D'

Nowadays, I only mark targets if I have newcomers or if there are enemies that should be killed first that I know people tend to ignore. Otherwise, I do my AoE aggro things, and then hit on the mob that takes the most damage :p Or tab between them or continue AoE aggro if I have AoE-happy DPS. It's usually easier for me to switch to the mob the dps are focused on than to stick to my mob and then rant at dps for not switching target ^^; (But then again, I have more the mindset that I'm there to support the group by protecting them, not to lead them and force them to play My Way. I'm also usually one of the first to volunteer for OT duties in 8-24-ppl stuff, and actually grab adds instead of poking the boss in the side :p Gotta protect the squishies, no?)

it is faster w/o mark, imo. You don't need to be "perfect" in tank & spank in normal dungeon. Aoe aggro all mobs and keep em at bay and let the dps do w/e they want as long as the mobs die. In worst scenario tanker will loss aggro on 1 mob and it die 5 sec after <--- I don't see it as a big deal, however I'v had healer complain about this.

Its a good habit to have.

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Originally Posted by Tex_Mex

When people talk about PLD having trouble with emnity generation during lower levels, they are referring to the small window between lvl 30 and lvl 40. Most DPS classes are geeting big portions of their rotations during this time, but Paladin does not get shield oath until lvl 40. Depending on both the tanks personal skill and the DPS/Healer skill levels, some Paladins experience difficulty holding hate against 3 enemies (or more) at a time. This was especially true before the emnity buff to flash a few patches back. Since that buff, it has become a lot less of an issue. Once PLD gets shield oath at 40, it all becomes EZ mode again.

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Paladin was never hard. Honestly Marauder has more issues between 26 and 30 than Paladins do ever. We get RoH at 26 which is our 3 step enmity generator. This helps until we hit 40. Flash is useful yes but too many paladins make it the end all. Also speed pulls at 30-40 just don't make sense.

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Originally Posted by monochromicorn

We don't even get a proper tank stance until 40, by which time dps have already gotten hard hitting skills.

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I really hope SE changes Sword and Shield Oath places when expansion comes to help new lowbie PLD's while also adding enmity removal to SwO to make OT:ing more enjoyable(unless they give us proper OT combo), its still boggles me why PLD gets DPS stance before tanking stance.

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Originally Posted by Synestra

while also adding enmity removal to SwO to make OT:ing more enjoyable

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This would remove MTing in SwO completely and it wouldn't actually change anything, you should basically be spamming RoH after a courtesy Fracture + RB anyway.

Why is SwO enmity a problem for you??

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Originally Posted by Wintersandman

Paladin was never hard. Honestly Marauder has more issues between 26 and 30 than Paladins do ever. We get RoH at 26 which is our 3 step enmity generator. This helps until we hit 40. Flash is useful yes but too many paladins make it the end all. Also speed pulls at 30-40 just don't make sense.

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Maybe really crappy marauders. Whenever I try to level my white mage job, I find myself spending an inordinate amount of time teaching Maras how overpower works. "Hey, so there's this ability you have called overpower: If you you use it on groups that are--stop using tomahawk as part of your dps rotation--if you use it on on groups that are packed together--why do you keep using tomahawk so much, he's right in front of you--if you use it when mobs are close together, you get their hate; It's better than spamming tomahawk and making me hate you."

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Originally Posted by Galgarion

Maybe really crappy marauders.

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There are horrible tanks from every class. I had to work and couldn't doze for a second in Toto or Manor.