Just getting started tanking: Most efficient xclass order?

Hello there everyone!

I've been nothing but a healer, SCH main although I also have WHM, and I'm halfway through patch 2.4, so I'm sort of getting near HW content.

I thought I might try tanking sometime soon-ish. I've been lurking a lot and doing some research and I haven't 100% decided which one to main, but I don't really think that's even an issue right now since all of them need to be leveled to a certain point for cross-class skills anyway. My question is, for someone with none of the tanks unlocked yet, which order is the most efficient? Which cross class skills should I get first to make leveling the other classes easier? Should I play one to a certain level, then switch to another and come back later? If you guys wanted to post your thoughts about a main tank for me, that would also be appreciated. Thanks!

Level GLD to 34 first to get Provoke, Convalescence, and Awareness. Flash is also pretty nice in some cases for WAR, but if you level GLD till you get Awareness, you'll have Flash unlocked anyway. Provoke is mandatory, Convalescence is amazing and Awareness is mostly situationnal but very good on WAR.
Level MRD to 26 second for Bloodbath, Foresight, and Mercy Stroke. Bloodbath's sustain is nice even if you'd think it's barely noticeable, Foresight is garbage but it's still one more defensive CD, and Mercy Stroke is both a DPS gain and a very good self-heal if you get a last-hit with it during a trash pull.
If you plan on playing PLD, CNJ gives Stoneskin, but you already have it levelled from what I understand (which is nice).

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Originally Posted by Freyyy

Level GLD to 34 first
Level MRD to 26 second
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If you plan on playing PLD, CNJ gives Stoneskin, but you already have it levelled from what I understand (which is nice).

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I'm lvl 30, so it's four levels away. Not too bad, I can pick it up in a few days and I was planning on it anyway.

Should I do GLD to 34 all the way first or switch back and forth between them? Provoke is critical, so I should get it to 22 at least, but since Awareness is situational should I jump to MRD for a little bit first?

You can do GLD to 22 first then switch to MRD if you want yeah. Awareness is far from mandatory compared to Provoke.

Cool, sounds great! Any thoughts on a main...your avvie says DRK, do you like it? I haven't heard much about it in terms of playability.

Well, since you have a WHM, I would suggest you go for the GLD/PLD route first. Since you already have the cross skills from CNJ available to him. Granted, these cross skills don't give the best utility, but cure at early levels can help sustain you in solo and stoneskin and protect will help a lot with solo leveling too. The GLD is the basis for all tanks imo. We contain Provoke and Convalescence; two very important tanking skills. Flash is also very helpful as it allows for another way to gain enmity if you run out of TP with MRD. Not quite helpful to a DRK as they use MP anyways (so it doesn't really save you anything). Only reason to use flash with DRK would be if you DON'T want to hurt enemies while gaining aggro (maybe you know your magic user's will sleep some enemies). But that's situational.

Pending what you are looking to do with your tank, I would say GLD/PLD will meet all your needs. However, you'll have to level MRD regardless for the cross skills there (well... to gain the most out of your tank). Foresight is nice as it gives more defense (and for a tank, always a good thing). Bloodbath is pretty nice, but it's not nearly as effective as with the other tanks since you have no means to mass hit enemies (therefore, it's a slow increase to your hp). Usually, it just negates your enemies auto attacks on you. You won't really "gain" hp with it as a PLD. More like you'll stay stagnant in your hp if you're fighting something at the same lvl. Mercy stroke is helpful early and for solo playing. Later in game, it can be helpful... but getting the timing right on the kill shot can be difficult. But it's also an off GCD attack, which is nice too.

I wouldn't suggest going DRK first as it's cross class skills are both GLD and MRD. My personal opinion; go GLD first, then MRD, then DRK. Get GLD to lvl 22 for Provoke. Awareness at lvl 34 won't be needed unless you get a high lvl WAR as it negates the lvl 56 WAR move raw intuition's weakness. After you get to lvl 22 and get provoke, switch to a MRD and lvl to 26. You will gain every cross class skill a MRD can give at this lvl. At this point, the choice is your's. Did you really like playing GLD or MRD better? Or, if you're really curious, you now have all the needed cross class skills to move to a DRK and test it out. From there, it's really all about play style preference. As you are a healer, I feel you'd probably like PLD or DRK more. PLD contains more support type moves (but I will also point out, many are situational and hard to set off perfectly). DRK is a mana user, so it may help you in that you usually pay attention to your mana bar. It still dishes out good dmg too. However, if you are totally looking to change things up, WAR will probably be the avenue you'll wanna take.

I play the 3 tanks.
DRK is a lot of fun but can be pretty hard to learn as a first tanking job. It really comes to personnal preference. PLD is easy to learn and feels reliable and very smooth to play; WAR is slow-paced (not a lot of oGCDs to weave) but feels very aggressive, has a high skill-ceiling and is very rewarding when you master it. DRK is very fast-paced (a lot of oGCDs to weave, Blood Weapon which increases your attack speed) and feels very aggressive like WAR does but I believe that the skill-ceiling is not as high as for WAR (tho still higher than for PLD). DRK is also the only one that's able to jump on the enemies with Plunge (a gap closer ability), which feels absolutely great as a tank.
My fav ones are DRK and WAR. Originally I mained WAR before 3.0, but switched to DRK and love the shit out of the two of them.

Thank you both so much. So, here's what I got:

GLD -> 22 for Provoke. Use Cure, Protect & SS xclass to help soloing
MRD -> 26 for all xclass abilities. Make sure to use flash and provoke from GLD
GLD -> 34 for PLD and Awareness, cause it's needed later
MRD -> 30 for WAR
Unlock DRK at 30
At that point, just experiment and see which one I like best, since I'll have the full xclass toolkit.

Thanks again, this was very helpful!

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Originally Posted by KaitlanKela

Thank you both so much. So, here's what I got:

GLD -> 22 for Provoke. Use Cure, Protect & SS xclass to help soloing
MRD -> 26 for all xclass abilities. Make sure to use flash and provoke from GLD
GLD -> 34 for PLD and Awareness, cause it's needed later
MRD -> 30 for WAR
Unlock DRK at 30
At that point, just experiment and see which one I like best, since I'll have the full xclass toolkit.

Thanks again, this was very helpful!

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Pretty much, but let me also elaborate on a few of those statements as well.
For MRD, DEFINITELY bring Convalescence too! It's a godsend of an ability for tanks and healers.
If you decide to go WAR, then yes, you'll probably want to finish up with GLD to lvl 34. Awareness is really only useful to a WAR at a high level (56 with raw intuition). It's not necessarily a bad move, but it's not so great that people will complain you don't have it otherwise.

If you decide to continue with GLD/PLD as your main tank, then you will want to take out Cure real quick. It's heals become practically useless once you hit lvl 20 I'd say (probably sooner really). As a GLD though, you can still cross class all the others, so I'd suggest using second wind if you have it available. If you wish to just stick with what PLD can cross, you'll want foresight, bloodbath and mercy stroke most likely. Raise isn't very useful unless you really like picking up dead people randomly throughout your travels. You can't use it in battle though. For me, cure is more like a joke cross that I sometimes keep on. I'll look at my FC healer and start spamming out cures and be like, "don't worry, I got this. You DPS". As a heads up. I'm a lvl 60 PLD and my cures do an amazing 250 per cure (I know, impressive).

Yeah don't forget Convalescence, it's one of the best cross-classes in the game at any level.

As others have said, priority should be to get GLA/PLD to 22 for provoke before really starting to tank. It's beyond me why such an essential tanking skill is given to only one tank class (it would be like raise only being given to one healer, but having the others cross class it), but that's the current situation. If you want to go all the way to 34 that's good, but awareness is by no means vital until endgame or you get Raw Intuition at WAR level 56.


From there, it really is down to personal preference in style. I have all three at 60, was PLD main through 2.x (when I was playing as I took several breaks) then did DRK through the Heavensward storyline, before taking PLD to 60, then switching to WAR for raid group synergy. PLD is very easy to get to grips with, has straightforward cooldowns which are a) always available unless used; and b) don't require resource to reach full potential. The animations look cool and it definitely has a good feel to it (in my opinion), but it is generally a little lackluster and falls behind the others in damage (especially AOE) and enmity generation. However, if you don't plan on doing bleeding edge progression, it's fine.

DRK is a fun class to play, with plenty of action, but to me it felt a bit too much like a micromanagement dps class with PLD cooldowns thrown at it. Of all the tanks, I actually found this to be the most difficult having to juggle both MP and TP along with planning ahead with MP to ensure a CD can be buffed by Dark Arts when needed. It's an interesting class, and I think I'd really enjoy it if given the chance to main, but it takes some getting used to.

WAR is my current main and I find it to be the most refined of the tank classes. All of the abilities sync well with one another, and it doesn't feel like there is much in the way of bloat there. I find with both DRK and PLD their abilities are just a bit bland or too clunky. Carve and Spit for instance - either some oGCD damage or some MP restore, but doesn't really feel as satisfying as hitting Fell Cleave, despite having nearly the same potency when buffed (if it actually did three attacks at that potency, then I'd enjoy it!). Divine Veil should be a great boon to the party, but falls a bit flat when you have to jump through hoops to get it setup and ultimately isn't all that much more effective than just hitting Storm's Path before a raidwide AOE. Chances are the healers will overheal everyone anyway, so you might as well get 10% less damage overall for 20s than a short HP shield.

My suggestion would be to get GLA to 22, possibly unlock PLD and get to 34 (although PLD pre 40 is a bit painful as you have no tank stance so lower enmity generation than the other tanks, despite the DPS classes getting some nice DPS moves in the mid-late 30s). From there I'd probably try and have all tanks somewhere around the 30 mark (you'll want Mercy Stroke from 26 MRD in any case) after which you'll have an idea of which you enjoy.

Also, for WAR, remember to take Internal Release from MNK.
You will use it if you decide to main the WAR.

For WAR, i use these cross-class: Provoke, Convalescence, internal Release. These 3 always.
The last 2 usually are Flash and Awarness, but sometimes I switch them with Second Wind and Featherfoot (dont panic! You just need to get the MNK to lvl 12 ^^).


However, if you like tanking, you will level all the 3 class someday :)

This is great! Totally bookmarking this thread for reference.

I honestly don't think I'll be doing cutting edge content, I generally only play like maybe 10-12 hours over the course of a week, so I don't know if I'll ever get there. I'd like to get to the point where I could PvP and not be a burden, that's kinda my long term goal. I haven't given any thought to what class I would play in it, though. That said, it seems like PLD has less raiding utility (right now), but that really shouldn't have any bearing at my level of gameplay.

If I decide to go WAR, I'll make a note to take PGL to 12 for Internal Release.

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Originally Posted by Priwia

Also, for WAR, remember to take Internal Release from MNK.

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Oh yes, this one too ! Can't believe I forgot it lol.

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Originally Posted by KaitlanKela

This is great! Totally bookmarking this thread for reference.

I honestly don't think I'll be doing cutting edge content, I generally only play like maybe 10-12 hours over the course of a week, so I don't know if I'll ever get there. I'd like to get to the point where I could PvP and not be a burden, that's kinda my long term goal. I haven't given any thought to what class I would play in it, though. That said, it seems like PLD has less raiding utility (right now), but that really shouldn't have any bearing at my level of gameplay.

If I decide to go WAR, I'll make a note to take PGL to 12 for Internal Release.

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Um... for PVP the WAR is really fun to play. High burst damage, self healing + all the defensive ability.

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Originally Posted by Freyyy

Oh yes, this one too ! Can't believe I forgot it lol.

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We use it so much that we think is a WAR ability and not a cross-class : P

Guys...I ran my first dungeon as a tank last night. Sastasha as a level 16 gladiator. I just wanted to say that I have found new appreciation for all the tanks out there and how hard you guys work to keep the monsters from eating me when I heal. I promise to never spam overheals again.

As hard as it was, it was really fun and I think it will only get better with practice. I leveled up, so only 5 more levels to provoke. :)

Thanks for the advice everyone!

Glad to hear things are going well! And yea, first time tanking really gives you an appreciation for the difficulty for tanks in early dungeons in general. As you go on and get more moves, it does become easier, but usually, that's also when you begin to do larger mob pulls (and then it becomes hard again lol).

From an opposite perspective though, I recently started to heal a bit. Dungeon's weren't too bad, but I finally hit a trial (Titan). My god. My MP management is horrible. My appreciation for healers have gone up so much (I ran out of MP at around half way into the Titan fight... needless to say, I was panicking).

Well, on Titan there is still one thing you can do if you run out of mana...

http://www.reactiongifs.com/r/bndn.gif

Seriously, though. Titan was (and still is really) scary. I found Ruda and the 2.xx HM trials less stressful.

Based on this I think it is an objectively good thing for tanks to heal and healers to tank, just to get an appreciation and understanding of how we can bast support the other role. Specifically I am learning a lot about what the CDs do so I know when tanks need more heals, or when they're less squishy. For example, convalescence. If I see that icon now I cast ALL the heals until it's over. :)

Coalescence is both a healer and tanks best friend <3

And yea, trying at least 1 class in all each category definitely helps everyone gain a bit more perspective. Even as a DPS, I've learned some things I took for granted while being a tank. But it also makes you more aware of when other's are doing cringe worthy things...

And technically, Paladin forces you to do both healing and tanking :P But you could easily get to lvl 15 without ever really hitting the harder content with a healer ^^'

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Originally Posted by KaitlanKela

GLD -> 22 for Provoke. Use Cure, Protect & SS xclass to help soloing

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Don't bother with cure. It scales for utter crap on Pld. You'll drain your entire MP bar before you see a decent return on that move, if the enemy is even nice enough to not hit you long enough to use it. The only time cure even does remotely well on Pld is if you scale your attributes with Mind, but that's contrary to pretty much every other asset of Tanking, so I wouldn't recommend that either.

Stoneskin, on the other hand, is amazing, but you are going to have to really work on your timing to use it effectively. It is one of the most potent xclass skills a Pld has, but also one of the most difficult to use. I recommend learning how to fit it in early, because Clemency works in much a similar way. You won't use it at all if you don't get the hang of the timing... and then you'd probably come back here to join the chorus of complaining Pld's who say that the cast time is too long to be useful... Which isn't true, really. It's just specifically tuned for Tankbusters and really precise timing.

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Originally Posted by KaitlanKela

MRD -> 26 for all xclass abilities. Make sure to use flash and provoke from GLD
GLD -> 34 for PLD and Awareness, cause it's needed later

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Awareness is amazing for War later (coupled with Raw intuition), but don't underestimate its early use on Pld and Drk. By itself, Awareness is very situational, but on regular CD it works wonders with Bulwark (Pld) and Dark Dance (Drk). Nullifying Crits takes them out of the Crit>Block>Parry>Dodge equation (can't remember if that's the exact order). Removing Crits from the line up increases the efficiency of any move that increases one of the other stats. By using it with either of those moves, you're basically increasing the odds of successful blocks/parry's/dodges. War gets a similar effect at maximum Wrath stacks, but you'd have to stay Infuriated to get the effect. Pre-3.0, that's obviously not ideal. So, post lvl 50, it's better to just use it to Nullify the Crit penalty of Raw Intuition.

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Originally Posted by KaitlanKela

For example, convalescence. If I see that icon now I cast ALL the heals until it's over. :)

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Glad to hear a healer say stuff like this. I can't express how frustrating it is as a Tank to use all of your CD's to maximum efficiency only to have the healer sit on their thumbs and completely ignore them. Convalescence and Divine Veil are by far the two worst ones, followed by Walking Dead. It totally sucks to see healers waste Divine Veil because they weren't paying attention to the icon before the raid wide dmg went out. Not much a Pally can do at that point except say: "welp... I tried."

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Originally Posted by Februs

Crit>Block>Parry>Dodge equation (can't remember if that's the exact order)

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That's it except that dodge comes first and not last.