Tanks, Trolls or bad?

First up, have no idea if this is the right place to post this or not, but I have a question regarding the behaviour of Tanks. Now I want to say first up that most tanks I have run with are reasonably good at it, with some being better reasonably. However I have come across a few who are sub-par.
Now I am not ranting or anything, I just want to know what the best way to react or act around the sub-par tanks are, especially when they wont listen to any advice or requests that are made by either the Healers or DPS. How do you tell if a Tank is deliberately trolling, or just not that good? What do you say to them afterwards?

Well you have the ex-melee dps who went Dark Knight. They have zero idea how to tank, get crushed cause they don't rotate cool downs, and lose aggro all the time. You also have the Warriors who only run in Deliverance cause they want to do big Fel Cleaves and believe they are solid enough that they don't need tank stance, but healers suffer cause they are still the squishiest tank.

I don't think you are getting trolled you are just getting tanks who want to DPS.

Perhaps your right with regards to that. My FC leader is a Tank who is dps mad, so I am well acquainted with that concept, but the instance which sparked this whole thought off for me was today when I was doing a DR high run of Snowcloak. The tank was a fully Law geared including weapon, Warrior. He didn't use defiance which mean that myself (Summoner) and the Ninja were constantly ripping aggro from him within the first few seconds of a pull. He ignored all the mechanics of the dungeon and didn't respond to anything any of the party said. It got a bit annoying when I was having to run over to him every minute to get him to grab bosses off of me -_-

Sounds like he was just a bad Warrior.. even without Defiance on he should be able to hold aggro with a Zerk/IR rotation at the beginning of the fight. Tanks can do more damage, but it really has nothing to do with their skill, it's about the healer. If you have a good healer you can slack on being a tank and focus more on killing because they will keep you alive.

The best part is the healer always gets zero recognition for this and everyone thinks the tank is amazing.

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Originally Posted by Ashquar

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just a bad warrior.

had a dark knight who forgot to use grit at a start of a snowcloak run.

proceeded to teach them how 2 dark knight, and they took my advice thankfully.

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Originally Posted by Ipkonfig

Well you have the ex-melee dps who went Dark Knight. They have zero idea how to tank, get crushed cause they don't rotate cool downs, and lose aggro all the time.

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This. Last night. My expert roulette. Neverreap. Had to leave it was so bad.

Yea alot of DPS went DRK when expansion came out and sadly most of them suck at tanking. And for those tank that forget to turn on tanking stance, it might be due to level sync when you enter a low level dungeons. When you level sync your tanking stance gets deactivated and most people forget to turn them back on, so its ok to remind them.

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Originally Posted by ZodiacSoldier

Yea alot of DPS went DRK when expansion came out and sadly most of them suck at tanking. And for those tank that forget to turn on tanking stance, it might be due to level sync when you enter a low level dungeons. When you level sync your tanking stance gets deactivated and most people forget to turn them back on, so its ok to remind them.

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Yep, I forget to put up Shield Oath a lot of time when I enter lvl 50 dunjon (there was no sync here before >__<)

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Originally Posted by ZodiacSoldier

Yea alot of DPS went DRK when expansion came out and sadly most of them suck at tanking. And for those tank that forget to turn on tanking stance, it might be due to level sync when you enter a low level dungeons. When you level sync your tanking stance gets deactivated and most people forget to turn them back on, so its ok to remind them.

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Yep, been guilty of this a time or two.

there's 3 kinds of tanks OP.
Great tank = knows their role, outside of occasional hiccups (everyone has em), they give you a relatively smooth run.
Good tank = rusty and/or new, but Open to learning. Adapts fast...you can always tell as the pulls progressively get better and better. These usually evolve to great tanks.
Bad tank = Doesn't care, never holds aggro, isn't willing to learn. We've all seen em, they're the reason you are so happy when you get a good one :)

I had a really interesting run the other day. running as DPS in a low level Roulette. got a PLD who I swear was either challenged, or young, or not human (perhaps someone left their cat on the keyboard? not sure...). He would actually use flash as a ranged pull...would hit only one mob period...would pause for 30-45 seconds in the middle of a fight, never even bothered hold aggro. a few times he even left the mob group, ran off to grab dungeon items (in this case it was the firesand for copperbell), and he went to open the door and move on...while we still had 2-3 mobs left!

I was on my Lancer, and about halfway through i gave up on him, and would mark a mob. he would proceed to target that mob and hit it till dead. i tanked most the instance with a great healer. I almost thought it may have been a bot, but a few times it actually spoke when it went afk (need water....bio....) I was less frustrated and more amazed...I didn't think someone could actually be that bad unless they tried!.

Hey wait a minute...I just hit 51 on my dk and war and you're telling me they AREN'T dps???

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Originally Posted by Slappah

Hey wait a minute...I just hit 51 on my dk and war and you're yelling me they AREN'T dps???

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Only if we do a premade and I am tanking for you.

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Originally Posted by Ipkonfig

Well you have the ex-melee dps who went Dark Knight. They have zero idea how to tank, get crushed cause they don't rotate cool downs, and lose aggro all the time. You also have the Warriors who only run in Deliverance cause they want to do big Fel Cleaves and believe they are solid enough that they don't need tank stance, but healers suffer cause they are still the squishiest tank.

I don't think you are getting trolled you are just getting tanks who want to DPS.

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this is all true. I was trying to lvl my monk by spamming sohm al and we get this war tank in 130 gear which isn't the issue. I'm with a brd and he decides to pull the entire first mobs to the flower, no big, I know how to aoe as monk. The tank however dies in about 20 seconds. Now while I'm slowly killing and tanking one mob at a time and the bard is kiting the others, we are doing a pretty good job of surviving while killing the trash. The healer manages to swiftcast raise the tank. He just stands there while me and the brd finish off the last of the trash. Now the suddenly starts calling out the healer for being a noob and not being able to heal then drops out.

Now we are left standing there and I can't help but notice that the tank was the noob as he had Deliverance ON the entire time since we started the dungeon. I didn't say anything because if you are a warrior and you can't even notice something as simple as having Defiance on or even that you have lower hp then you have no business playing as the job, let alone being a tank.

Tell them the truth but don't be rude. I've been told to git gud several times by people who have every class on 50 and above. Some are nice, the others were just dicks. Please don't be the latter. I appreciate criticisms and well-written ones better. If they don't listen, don't say a word.

I queued up and did the first pull of a dungeon wearing glamor pieces once for an outfit I was debating glamoring to.

Though it was mixed in with my actual gear, wasn't too big a deal. It was pretty fun.

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Originally Posted by Ditto

I queued up and did the first pull of a dungeon wearing glamor pieces once for an outfit I was debating glamoring to.

Though it was mixed in with my actual gear, wasn't too big a deal. It was pretty fun.

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... now im trying to imagine healing something like that... it doesn't sound fun to me...

At lower levels, if a tank is wearing crappier gear than what he could have gotten with the class quests, it's trolling. Especially because you get a new weapon every class quest you complete.

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Originally Posted by Ashquar

Perhaps your right with regards to that. My FC leader is a Tank who is dps mad, so I am well acquainted with that concept, but the instance which sparked this whole thought off for me was today when I was doing a DR high run of Snowcloak. The tank was a fully Law geared including weapon, Warrior. He didn't use defiance which mean that myself (Summoner) and the Ninja were constantly ripping aggro from him within the first few seconds of a pull. He ignored all the mechanics of the dungeon and didn't respond to anything any of the party said. It got a bit annoying when I was having to run over to him every minute to get him to grab bosses off of me -_-

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Folks, don't let your friends drink and tank.
Hundreds of lalas die, every year, because of a drunken tank. "Sorry" will not bring your friend back to life, only the exasperated healer will.

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Originally Posted by Temjiu

there's 3 kinds of tanks OP.
Good tank = rusty and/or new, but Open to learning. Adapts fast...you can always tell as the pulls progressively get better and better. These usually evolve to great tanks.

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That's more or less how I found learning to Tank in this game to be, this being my first MMO proper with a real pull,tank, aggro system. Initially I wasn't particularly good. Most of what I've learned about tanking in XIV has come from friendly suggestions mid dungeon that I could apply directly into subsequent encounters and from there in the next dungeon I go to.

I see no reason not to take advice from other players in Dungeons, or from what you learn through failing an instance. E.G - Learning not to stand under meteors with Healers under them in my first attempt at the The Chrysalis freeing me up to get to the next meteor.