With the launch of Stormblood

--Removed--

I was thinking that they'll probably try to balance tanks as "OT" type and "MT" type, in which case adding samurai as a second "OT" type to compete with war would make sense, so we'll see raid groups bringing pld/drk + war/sam, but it seems like they are trying to avoid having that subclassification among tanks. It'll be interesting to see how they'll balance the three tanks so that any combination of two tanks is viable for raid progression.

So you want to punish all the players who play DPS, just to prove a point to SE?
What you're suggesting will just split the community up even more than it already is.

That said, I DO agree that it is unfair that there will be no new tank and healer classes in Stormblood. I just don't think this is the way to do it. You are simply punishing other players who will just grow to hate tank-players because of it.

Showing dissatisfaction towards the lack of new tank and healer classes can be shown through feedback. There are many who are on your side on this, and together we can make sure SE knows about our opinions on this.

While I'm a little sad that they made Samurai a DPS instead of a tank, I can remember how messed up dark knight was when everybody was jumping onto that because it was the cool new class, and how many people really didn't know how to play it.

I remember how bad things were when you dropped people off in DR at level 30 with no idea how to do things. Think about how bad that would be for level 50.

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Originally Posted by theincubuslord

You are simply punishing other players who will just grow to hate tank-players because of it.

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The thing is, they already do. Look at the instant smug reaction from DPS when they announced it. Honestly, at this point it legitimately feels like DPS players care even less about us than SE does.

*edit* spelling

I'm sorry, what? I can't tell if you're being sarcastic or not but you're generalizing the entire DPS community due to a choice SE made? what?

I'm sorry but if you dislike the fact that they're only adding DPS classes, perhaps you could give them a go?

Nobody's stopping you. however I certainly would at this point. :)

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Originally Posted by XoanGrahm

The thing is, they already do. Look at the instant smug reaction from DPS when they announced it. Honestly, at this point it legitimately feels like DPS players care even less about us than SE does.

*edit* spelling

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I've never understood the whole "HAHA, look what we got and you DIDN'T!" kinda attitude. Doing dungeons, doing raids, we are doing that as a team! We need tanks and healers as well as DPS, and playing one class-role over another doesn't mean you now automatically are enemies with the other class-role-players. It's utter moronic to split a community up like that. We're ALL FFXIV players, all fans of the game, and we all want to play the game and have some new cool stuff to play with!

So yeah, I do think it is unfair that there will be no new tank and healer classes. But splitting up the community isn't the way to deal with it, no matter which side you are on.

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Originally Posted by XoanGrahm

The thing is, they already do. Look at the instant smug reaction from DPS when they announced it. Honestly, at this point it legitimately feels like DPS players care even less about us than SE does.

*edit* spelling

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You act like there weren't a few smug tanks when DRK, a highly requested class, turned out to be a tank instead of a melee dps. Yes, Melee DPS who hadn't seen a new one since 2.4 and Casters who hadn't seen a new one since 2.0 are excited that they are finally getting a new job that suits their play style. If your argument is that tanks didn't get a new toy when a new one was added in 3.0, maybe you should talk to casters that haven't received one in 4 years.

you know what the dev team has limited resources?, they can't add every expansion 3-4 dps 1 tank and 1 healer

this time they decided 2 dps because the str stat jobs and the int stat jobs had only 2, meanwhile the other jobs had what 3 of each?, in the next expansion they could add 1 tank and 1 healer, or 1 dps and 1 tank or 1 dps and 1 healer, or just add another 2 dps, what you do not like it, they will note it, but is theirs decision to chose what roles will get new jobs, not yours

also, do not expect they will give a new tank/healer job per expansion, is unrealistic

Your proposed protest to let SE know what's up is already happening. It's been happening for at least as long as HW as been out, if not longer. Many tanks admit to only running pre-made DFs. A couple of censuses ago, the role ratio was perfect at 1:1:2 and queues were still waiting on tanks. It hasn't changed SE's development process nor has it changed the player's minds as to what jobs they're going to play.

What's more, adding more tanks and healers while 1/3 of each are left out due to balance issues, all you'll get is another job(s) left out.

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Originally Posted by XoanGrahm

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Have you forgotten that all three tanks will be getting new toys from level 61 to 70 and that, due to the change of cross-class skills to role based skill pools, Paladin and Warrior will be getting replacements for "must have" cross class skills such as Provoke?

What you post sounds like is a passive aggressive rant about not getting a new tank job.

I don't understand all this doom and gloom. If your a main tank player, you will main tank regardless if we get a "new toy" or not right? What happened to just tanking because you like to? A new tanking job will not all of a sudden create a influx of tanks forever, and having all tanks go on "strike" as it were isn't going to do a thing to SE and only hurt us as a community even more.. (not to mention put us tanks in a light we really don't want to be viewed in)

Tanks (and healers to an extent) are in a weird place right now. We have one tank that's pretty much requested in EVERY composition, one that has become a joking meme, and the last that is still trying to find its identity. Adding one more into such a fragmented state isn't going to do anything useful for the sake of having "something new".

We need to wait. Sit back and see how the changes to 4.0 will be recieved by the player base and balance what we have right now.

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Originally Posted by Esp

I don't understand all this doom and gloom. If your a main tank player, you will main tank regardless if we get a "new toy" or not right?

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Perhaps, but I would have liked to try out something new while still a tank. I'm not unsubbing over this, but I'm a little disappointed, is all.

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Originally Posted by aleph_null

I was thinking that they'll probably try to balance tanks as "OT" type and "MT" type, in which case adding samurai as a second "OT" type to compete with war would make sense, so we'll see raid groups bringing pld/drk + war/sam, but it seems like they are trying to avoid having that subclassification among tanks. It'll be interesting to see how they'll balance the three tanks so that any combination of two tanks is viable for raid progression.

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I do prefer that they avoid sub-classifications unless they plan on going whole-hog with the idea that no two jobs provide quite the same functionality or "niche", but that latter idea would require that gearing, and possibly even leveling, were revised heavily to allow for easier job swapping, and even then you'd want to try to keep a sense of bringing the player, not just the class. Moreover, classes would feel a bit... fettered at best, dismembered at worst, if there was still a clear niche victor for each fight, such that one job always ends where the next begins, regardless of the actual range of their toolkits.

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Originally Posted by XoanGrahm

Maybe its time for all tank mains, to just.. not queue up for anything without a full pre-made of friends or FC members. Let the DPS wait in their two hour queue's and show SE that they've made a mistake.

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That said, as a DPS I'll probably be doing my best to try to avoid the need for a tank anytime I and my friends don't have one in actual need for experience to rotate through (e.g. MSQing on tank/heals, and one of four friends each taking a healer or tank through 61-70 then swapping out while the two previous dps do the same). If SE hadn't gone out of their way to destroy their own toolkits and mechanics (removing most forms of CC), DPS could actually forgo tanks entirely for a time. So rather than pointing fingers at "entitled" DPS for having gained two jobs this coming expansion, let's first note that it took dungeon redesigns just to ensure tanks would remain in the loop even mitigation needs weren't so great as to actually require your presence...

Yeah, I'll openly admit I was running on practically 0 sleep when I wrote this, and it could have been worded much better.



So I found a a better way of putting it, for example: If 5.0 rolls around, and we only get two classes again, and they are only a tank and a healer. Wouldn't you be upset as a dps player? I'm not advocating the removal of the two DPS classes we're getting. I actually am happy we're getting them. But the reason given to us by SE sounds like a cop-out more than any actual rational reasoning.

To address another point, I know we wont get tanks and healers in each expac, thinking we would is unrealistic. But this is only the second expansion, and we do have gaps in the tank meta as it is. There is no competition for Warrior at the moment(my main) and that's actually really unfortunate. I would love another high damage tank so a warrior isnt required for every single raid scenario, or hell, just so I have another option to play as, because I enjoy the high damage tank approach.

One final though, to the person that said "Have you forgotten that all three tanks will be getting new toys from level 61 to 70 and that, due to the change of cross-class skills to role based skill pools, Paladin and Warrior will be getting replacements for "must have" cross class skills such as Provoke?" Thats kind of a worthless argument, because by the same token every DPS job is also getting those reworks and new skills from 61-70. Not really a valid point, sorry.

*Edit* character limit

I don't think any type of psudo tank strike will be necessary. DPS queues will skyrocket regardless of if tanks and healers avoid DF. There are already going to be many upset DPS.

My concern is more on how they are going to try and balance tanks and healers. Short of Homogonising the different Jobs or drastically changing the meta I am not sure how they can do it without tuning tanks to fit different subcatagories. With such small raid tiers its hard to balance around 'Physical Mitigation' 'Magic Mitigation' and 'Damage', particularly since damage is dominant at the moment. Depending on the boss mechanics one of the Mitigation style tanks will always lose out and be underpowered Job for a teir.

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Originally Posted by Xau

you know what the dev team has limited resources?, they can't add every expansion 3-4 dps 1 tank and 1 healer

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SB supposedly has triple the budget of HW. Despite that, we're getting no new race and only 2 new jobs.

At what point will people stop making excuses for SE? When the next expansion has quintuple the budget, only gives us 1 new job, and removes a race?

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Originally Posted by Xau

this time they decided 2 dps because the str stat jobs and the int stat jobs had only 2, meanwhile the other jobs had what 3 of each?, in the next expansion they could add 1 tank and 1 healer, or 1 dps and 1 tank or 1 dps and 1 healer, or just add another 2 dps, what you do not like it, they will note it, but is theirs decision to chose what roles will get new jobs, not yours

also, do not expect they will give a new tank/healer job per expansion, is unrealistic

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If we're going to arbitrarily split up jobs by mainstat, wouldn't it make more sense to split them up by their actual role? We currently have 1 OT vs. 3 melee DPS. What do you think makes more sense -- adding another OT so that OTs can finally play another job or adding another 1.5 melee DPS so that DPS players can now drown in even more options?

If there was no healer added, I could understand as someone who also plays healers. The situation with their design and balance is far worse than what tanks have to deal with and quite a bit more complicated to deal with (largely thanks to AST).

But 2 DPS in a single expansion and ONLY 2 DPS?

I'd blame SE but the decision is not SE's alone. SE listens to their paying subscribers and if there wasn't such vocal opposition to making DRK a tank, such persistent pressure to add a sword DPS or make SAM a DPS, and such widespread avoidance of tanking, SE would've surely felt differently about the matter.

As a tank main, I know I won't be touching DF for a very long time after SB releases. And, while you might assume it's out of support for this topic, I'm actually not that petty. I'm sure to be fully booked by friends, FC mates, and LS peeps for content once SB releases. Good luck to the DPS players who don't have that option.

You know, when HW released, I tried out MCH and it was nice having fast queues for it. I wanted to try out SAM and RDM but chances are I'll be too busy bailing my DPS friends out of DF queue purgatory.

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Originally Posted by Brian_

SB supposedly has triple the budget of HW. Despite that, we're getting no new race and only 2 new jobs.

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A new race is just pure cosmetic, it's like making new glamours options. Since we know absolutely nothing about the numbers of dungeons and trials we'll get throughout Stormblood, it's far too early to consider they've wasted their money. I'd rather have a whole new original concept with Eureka, challenging dungeons and beautifully designed raids than a 4th tank thrown in the already messy pool.

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Originally Posted by Brian_

If we're going to arbitrarily split up jobs by mainstat, wouldn't it make more sense to split them up by their actual role? We currently have 1 OT vs. 3 melee DPS. What do you think makes more sense -- adding another OT so that OTs can finally play another job or adding another 1.5 melee DPS so that DPS players can now drown in even more options?

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What makes more sense is to tweaks existing tanks so that all three can be fully used in either position.

Jobs are not the only type of content. Besides, some of the more strident members of this forum are endlessly trying to convince themselves that WAR is the only well-designed tank job in the game. Heaven help us all if SE introduced another "inferior" tank.

There is no OT "role". It's an arbitrary, player-created designation which depends entirely on how your group decides to split up the tanking responsibilities on a given fight.

I'm relieved that RDM and SAM turned out to be dps. Neither would have made for a unique tanking aesthetic over the existing tanks. Casters previously had the least variety in terms of jobs (BLM and SMN). Adding RDM into the mix not only helps with that, but its also a great way to get melee orientated players to try out casters, by bridging the gap between the two playstyles. I'd also be interested in seeing if this opens the doors to new caster synergies, allowing for a caster-heavy raid comp.

I'm happy with the introduction of SAM as melee. I like having the option of being able to jump into a sword-based dps for offspec purposes, and the charge attacks sound reminiscent of Cyan from FFVI. Also, with the addition of a fifth job with slashing, the game designers will have to think twice about letting WAR effectively be the sole provider of the slashing debuff. I'll be interested to see how it synergizes with the existing melee jobs, as well as the tanks.

SAM and RDM start at lvl 50, so I'm not entirely certain how useful existing tank mains at 60 will be to alleviating queue times, outside of the once-a-day roulette. It'll be an problem regardless of whether your secretaries have booked out your Stormblood schedules or not. Well, serves them right. T-they'll see! *shakes fist*

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Originally Posted by Shurrikhan

I do prefer that they avoid sub-classifications unless they plan on going whole-hog with the idea that no two jobs provide quite the same functionality or "niche"

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Originally Posted by Reynhart

What makes more sense is to tweaks existing tanks so that all three can be fully used in either position.

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Personally I don't really mind having subclassification into different kinds of tanks, just like how there are different kinds of dps (melees with resistance down debuffs, ranged with magic/physical dps boost and mp/tp regen, casters with high personal dps and some defensive utilities). I know that ideally any tank can be good at OT and MT, and that any combination of two tanks is good for progression, but that'll be a lot harder to balance when we get more and more new jobs. Right now we have 3 tanks and 3 combinations of tanks, if we have 4 tanks we'd have 6 combinations, if we have 5 tanks we'd have 10 combinations, and so on. I think it's reasonable to have certain combinations being "bad", just like certain combinations of dps are just flat out terrible for progression (2 melees 2 casters for example, will struggle with long fight).

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Originally Posted by Lyth

There is no OT "role". It's an arbitrary, player-created designation which depends entirely on how your group decides to split up the tanking responsibilities on a given fight.

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"MT" and "OT" are just oversimplification of saying which tank benefits more from taking hits, due to skills that proc based on taking hits (block/parry/just taking damage) like shield swipe, reprisal and blood price. You want the tank that benefits more from taking hits to be, well, tanking the boss as much as they can, while their cds allow (with a few tank swaps to allow the other tank to use their cds as well).

Yes it's player created designation, but it's not arbitrary, it completely depends on the skillset of the jobs. It's not arbitrarily decided that war benefits less from taking damage compared to pld/drk. It's decided by their skillsets, which are at the hands of the devs.

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Originally Posted by aleph_null

Personally I don't really mind having subclassification into different kinds of tanks

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Problem is, since every content can be accessed by a random party setup, you can't design content where one tank job can't MT. So, if all tanks can be good MT, all tanks should be good OT too.

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Originally Posted by aleph_null

Right now we have 3 tanks and 3 combinations of tanks, if we have 4 tanks we'd have 6 combinations, if we have 5 tanks we'd have 10 combinations, and so on.

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Well, right now, we have 3 tanks, and 2 clearly superior combinations. Create another OT (Still viable as an MT), and you'll probably end with only 1 superior combination.

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Originally Posted by aleph_null

but that'll be a lot harder to balance when we get more and more new jobs

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Frankly, I really don't look forward to a 4th tank...In fact, I wonder how many tanks other MMO managed to do without clear overlapping or serious balance issue.

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Originally Posted by Lyth

..There is no OT "role". It's an arbitrary, player-created designation which depends entirely on how your group decides to split up the tanking responsibilities on a given fight...[/i]

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Except it is not? If you do any type of end game raids you will realized that the game tries to split the distribution of jobs into the following category

Main(Benefits from taking hits (Shield Swipe, Reprisal, etc.) Tank (PLD,DRK)
Side(Doesn't benefits from taking hits) Tank (WAR)
Main(Throughput) Healer (WHM,AST)
Side(Mitigation) Healer (SCH,AST)
2 Melee DPS (MNK,DRG,NIN)
1 Physical range DPS (BRD,MCH)
1 Caster (BLM, SMN)

Of course this doesn't mean you can't clear the content with every other arrangement, but it would be a complete ignorant statement to declare that the game didn't try to force certain jobs into certain role.

Forgot about T10 Physical and Magical resist adds? How much harder would an average group have it in A10S without Caster or Range LB during progression?

The Limit Break nerf when you take a duplicate of jobs into instance also enforce this theory.

Go ahead and queue for A12S RF and tell me how many time you get a duplicates of healers and tanks and report back.

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Originally Posted by Lyth

...if you're actively raiding, then you'll also know that WARs generally tend to be the designated "MT" at the onset of fights because of unchained...

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Yes, I do know well enough how broken Unchained and WAR in general is.

But riddle me this,

Can you make the same argument for PLD and DRK?

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Originally Posted by mosaicex

Main Tank (PLD,DRK)
Side Tank (WAR)

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Neither the Duty Finder nor the Raid Finder actually enforces a WAR in the party. What it does is not pick the two same tanks.

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Originally Posted by aleph_null

snip

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Not really. MT and OT are designations which refer to which tank is actively tanking at a given point in time. There are plenty of situations in which the group benefits from having the WAR actively tank, depending on other factors such as unchained on pull, cooldown timings, any active debuffs, and so on. There is no clear line. You have to look at it on a case-by-case basis and play to each of your strengths. The devs give you the tools, but it's up to the player to make the maximum use out of them.

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Originally Posted by mosaicex

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The game does divide different jobs into different categories. However, whether the devs intend to create a subdivision within the tanking role remains to be seen. MT/OT designations are extremely fluid, and players are adhering less and less strictly to them. For that matter, if you're actively raiding, then you'll also know that WARs generally tend to be the designated "MT" at the onset of fights because of unchained. MT/OT designations were player-enforced from the outset. The bit about duplicate jobs in RF is irrelevant to this discussion.

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Originally Posted by Lyth

Not really. MT and OT are designations which refer to which tank is actively tanking at a given point in time.

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I don't mean MT as who's actively tanking at the moment, since there are forced tank swaps so it's kinda pointless to classify tanks as such. What I meant was classifying tanks as "MT type" or "OT type" based on their skillsets. Having those two types of tanks doesn't mean the "MT type" has to tank the boss from pull to the end of the fight, since as you've mentioned there are cases where the "OT type" tank can help the group just like doing unchained pull. Warriors being the better choice to pull the boss doesn't make it more of an "MT type" than pld/drk, in the end they just do a few combos before the pld/drk provokes the boss, since that'd benefit the group dps more by having access to shield swipe, reprisal and blood price.

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Originally Posted by Reynhart

Problem is, since every content can be accessed by a random party setup, you can't design content where one tank job can't MT. So, if all tanks can be good MT, all tanks should be good OT too.

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Being an "MT type" tank (at least based on what I meant above) doesn't necessarily mean you can't OT, vice versa. It just means you benefit more by MT-ing. Currently warrior is really good because it's the only tank having access to slashing debuff. Let's imagine if all tanks have slashing debuff (or none of them have), pld/drk combo wouldn't be as bad as it is now. But if you have a drk/war or pld/war combo you'd still want to have the war pull, then the other tank provoke after a few aggro combos, since war still benefits less by taking hits compared to the other two. Balancing tanks such that they can at least do decent job (not optimal) in either position is good enough imo.

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Originally Posted by Reynhart

Well, right now, we have 3 tanks, and 2 clearly superior combinations. Create another OT (Still viable as an MT), and you'll probably end with only 1 superior combination.

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Come on let's be realistic here. Even if we have 3 tanks that are good at both MT and OT positions, we'll still have one mathematically superior combination even if by a really small margin (or at least one superior combination for any given fight), unless you make some of them virtually the same.

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Originally Posted by aleph_null

What I meant was classifying tanks as "MT type" or "OT type" based on their skillsets.

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This is still a problem. The OT skillset needs to allow the tank to be a fully competent MT, but the other is not true. Just look at what PLD loses if it's not actively tanking.
If SAM was designed to be an OT tank, you can be sure that all premade parties would have sought SAM+WAR.

Short of making all three tanks identical, they are never going to be able to balance the tanks across 2 different sub-roles. It doesn't matter how small the gap in performance is, people will find it and they will make it matter.

The gap between PLD and DRK right now is not even that bad. The gap is between PLD / DRK and WAR as an OT.

So, do PLD and DRK need to be competitive OTs? With a new expansion looming? I don't think so. Then again, I am not married to a job like some people are. If I want to MT, I will play PLD or DRK. If I want to OT... I guess I have no choice but to play WAR. If they make PLD and DRK viable OTs, then yea, I'd have more options. Do you know how else I'd have more options? If they just added a new OT.

So yea, sometimes it's not a matter of choice. Sometimes you queue into DF or RF and get a PLD + DRK pairing. And? Are you trying to optimize raid DPS in DF / RF or something? Or blaming your inability to clear on PLD + DRK?

When I choose to play DRG, MNK, or NIN, I am choosing to play one role. Melee DPS. When I choose to play BRD, I am choosing to play one role. Ranged DPS. Are tanks really so special that we get to ask SE that all our jobs should fill two slightly varying roles equally optimally?

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Originally Posted by Reynhart

This is still a problem. The OT skillset needs to allow the tank to be a fully competent MT, but the other is not true. Just look at what PLD loses if it's not actively tanking.
If SAM was designed to be an OT tank, you can be sure that all premade parties would have sought SAM+WAR.

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How about no? You keep on saying this garbage but it's wrong.

PLD is a better MT than WAR. Especially during progression. As long as your new OT job is really competitive with WAR and similarly worse than PLD / DRK as MT, you'd have no issues.

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Originally Posted by aleph_null

Personally I don't really mind having subclassification into different kinds of tanks, just like how there are different kinds of dps (melees with resistance down debuffs, ranged with magic/physical dps boost and mp/tp regen, casters with high personal dps and some defensive utilities).

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Except, only one (and perhaps a small part of two other's) DPS job's additional output is ever really conditionally nullified—Bard, in the event that there are no casters, nor need for Paeon/Ballad (whereas Monk and Summoner even without Int down or instant backup rezes still have near-full and full outputs, respectively). An "MT" or "OT", on the other hand, require a condition to even meet their niche criteria. Without presently tanking, an "MT"'s better adjusted mitigation, enmity generation, per-RNG-mitigation procs, and so forth, are all wasted. Similarly, a specialized "OT" can only really be considered a hybrid, merely costing less dps to carry parts of a tank's toolkit, but with a lesser capacity to make use of them. The difference for them, especially outside of resource regeneration-requiring fights, is far more pivotal than that of, say, a raid-buffing vs. self-centric dps, for which there is no forced waste or overlap (more alike, again, to the difference between a Bard, who's toolkit is niche, and any other DPS's).

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Originally Posted by Brian_

When I choose to play DRG, MNK, or NIN, I am choosing to play one role. Melee DPS. When I choose to play BRD, I am choosing to play one role. Ranged DPS. Are tanks really so special that we get to ask SE that all our jobs should fill two slightly varying roles equally optimally?

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By your absurd logic, WAR, as an "OT" should be as bad a "MT" than MNK is bad at being a "Ranged DPS"...

Pld can really use some offensive boost though.

I think, the main strength of War is not only the dmg-output, but also because he doesn't have to give a f*** if the boss does magical or physical dmg because it's all the same to him.
Make sthe War very flexible. Imo

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Originally Posted by Shurrikhan

Except, only one (and perhaps a small part of two other's) DPS job's additional output is ever really conditionally nullified—Bard, in the event that there are no casters, nor need for Paeon/Ballad (whereas Monk and Summoner even without Int down or instant backup rezes still have near-full and full outputs, respectively). An "MT" or "OT", on the other hand, require a condition to even meet their niche criteria. Without presently tanking, an "MT"'s better adjusted mitigation, enmity generation, per-RNG-mitigation procs, and so forth, are all wasted.

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Just a note, brd's foe requiem is still worth it even in groups without casters, since that boosts the healers' dps (a reason why speedrun groups take drg/nin/mch/brd).

In terms of utilities being nullified, well in easier contents it doesn't really matter since in the first place you can get two of the same jobs in the party. In the harder contents you can make RF require one MT type and one OT type in the queue, just like how RF enforces at least one of each type of dps (melee, caster and physical ranged). For statics/premades we already see most groups having one war and one pld/drk, nothing really changes. I agree that it's less than ideal (compared to every tank being equally good at MT/OT position), but it's a lot easier to balance I'd imagine.

If we look at the state of healers right now, any combination works (whm/sch, whm/ast, sch/ast) since ast can switch between two stances (shield type and regen type), but imagine if they add another new healer. Is the new healer (and every subsequent healer) going to have two stances too, leaving whm and sch as the odd ones? Or are they going to give whm and sch two stances too? I honestly have no idea how they'll go forward from this point.

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Originally Posted by Reynhart

This is still a problem. The OT skillset needs to allow the tank to be a fully competent MT, but the other is not true. Just look at what PLD loses if it's not actively tanking.
If SAM was designed to be an OT tank, you can be sure that all premade parties would have sought SAM+WAR.

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Eh not really, as MT war is kinda inferior compared to pld/drk, for magic busters we only have thrill (which isn't a big mitigation on its own) and vengeance. With high defiance uptime yes war has a really good mitigation, but there's a reason why people don't have wars tanking in defiance for a long time. The only fights where warrior is good in the MT slot is where the tank busters are spread in a way that you can holmgang every alternate tank buster (like a12s), so you can stack thrill + vengeance for the other ones. There aren't many fights where bringing double war is optimal.

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Originally Posted by aleph_null

Eh not really, as MT war is kinda inferior compared to pld/drk, for magic busters we only have thrill (which isn't a big mitigation on its own) and vengeance. With high defiance uptime yes war has a really good mitigation, but there's a reason why people don't have wars tanking in defiance for a long time.

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Ok, let's count what PLD has for magic damage. Rampart...and Sentinel, the first one on a 90s CD and the second one on 180s. And of course, Hallowed Ground.
You don't need "high defiance uptime" to pop Inner Beast either alone (As poweful or Rampart) or on top of Vengeance (More powerful than Sentinel) and/or Thrill for each perfectly scripted tank buster. WAR is also able to refill a lot of HP instantly after a big hit. And if you really, really need the mitigation, you still have Storm's Path...WAR is a better "magical MT" than PLD. And for obsessive-DPS-people who will answer "But, using Inner Beast is a DPS loss compared to Fell Cleave"...well PLD is a DPS loss compared to any other tank.

In fact you can easily match Rampart with Storm's Path+Thrill+healing and Sentinel with Storm's Path+Vengeance, making even Inner Beast less required.

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Originally Posted by aleph_null

The only fights where warrior is good in the MT slot is where the tank busters are spread in a way that you can holmgang every alternate tank buster (like a12s), so you can stack thrill + vengeance for the other ones.

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Warrior is a "good" MT in every fight. Not "the best", but still a better MT compared to PLD than PLD is an OT compared to WAR.

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Originally Posted by aleph_null

There aren't many fights where bringing double war is optimal.

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There's pretty much none, but for very different reasons than their personal prowess. (Not stacking jobs, non-stacking debuffs, etc...)

These type of posts make me feel 4.0 would be good time to level and play a tank.

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Originally Posted by Reynhart

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That's why i said... War doesn't really care what dmg inc type it is.

Magical dmg? Pld is weak
Physical dmg? Not the strength of Drk
While warrior _can_ use inner beast and /lol-macro

War mechanic is maximum flexibility + good dmg, makes him a win for every second tankslot

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Originally Posted by Reynhart

Warrior is a "good" MT in every fight. Not "the best", but still a better MT compared to PLD than PLD is an OT compared to WAR.

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That's the main issue that I also want to see resolved. Even if we place pld/drk as the MT type tank they're still terrible together. To begin with I never liked the idea that war is the one and only tank that has slashing resist debuff, considering all the tanks have slashing type damage. Either give all of them slashing resist debuff or remove it from warrior. Storm's eye isn't the only reason why warrior is a good tank, but it's one of the biggest reasons why pld/drk combination is comparatively terrible.

(On a side note it seems like double war is possibly optimal at faust z lol)

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Originally Posted by aleph_null

Even if we place pld/drk as the MT type tank they're still terrible together.

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That's why I think it would be a good idea to make them perform better as OT, so that PLD/DRK is not clearly inferior.
It would also result in more setup with WAR MT - PLD/DRK OT because some players likes to MT but don't really like PLD andr DRK.

Actually in a pld/war composition it's not too big of a difference between having either of them as MT. In a12s it's probably better to have the war take more tank busters than the pld (holmgang - thrill/venge - swap to pld - holmgang - thrill/venge). Drk is a lot more inclined to the MT type since it has two dps skills based on parry procs and mp regen skill based on taking damage.

Anyway I'm not against what you suggested, having all 3 tanks viable for either slot, I'm just saying that's a lot harder to balance, and a lot more things can (and probably will) go wrong. Since we don't get a new tank in 4.0 I guess that's the road SE is trying to follow, so let's just see how it goes.

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Originally Posted by aleph_null

Anyway I'm not against what you suggested, having all 3 tanks viable for either slot, I'm just saying that's a lot harder to balance, and a lot more things can (and probably will) go wrong. Since we don't get a new tank in 4.0 I guess that's the road SE is trying to follow, so let's just see how it goes.

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Actually balancing 3 compositions now and adding a forth tank and balancing 3 new compositions later is easier than adding a forth tank now and then trying to balance 6 compositions.

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Originally Posted by Ultimatecalibur

Actually balancing 3 compositions now and adding a forth tank and balancing 3 new compositions later is easier than adding a forth tank now and then trying to balance 6 compositions.

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The only way your going to effectively balance all 3 tanks for both MT and OT positions is to effectively homogenise their strengths and weaknesses and effectively make the difference between them cosmetic. I don't think that is what most tanks actually want. A better bet would be to intentionally balance each role towards either MT or OT and make them noticeably worse at the other. The current meta isn't really diverse enough to allow for them to be equally good in each role and still have their own niche.

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Originally Posted by Belhi

The only way your going to effectively balance all 3 tanks for both MT and OT positions is to effectively homogenise their strengths and weaknesses and effectively make the difference between them cosmetic. I don't think that is what most tanks actually want. A better bet would be to intentionally balance each role towards either MT or OT and make them noticeably worse at the other. The current meta isn't really diverse enough to allow for them to be equally good in each role and still have their own niche.

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People who think balance requires homogenization really don't get what true balance nor true homogenization is. True homogenization is incredibly easy to balance (because all actions and all numbers are exactly the same), but balance does not require that all factors be the same only that the end results are close to equal. Homogeization would be all 3 tanks are reskinned Paladins, balance is all three tanks dealing the similar average damage and having similar levels of durability.

As long as Warriors manage "Origin" stacks, Dark Knights manage MP consumption and Paladins have their own individual playstyle, even if the end result is the same, they will not be homogenized. Are Black Mages and Summoners homogeneous even though they deal similar levels of damage? Do you expect Red Mage to be homogeneous with them? I suspect the answers to both questions are no.