Which is the most powerful role?

[SeraviEdalborez]

Thanks for the replies so far.

Please note, that I'm not looking for the most wanted role. I don't really care about queue times either. I'm looking for the most impactful role in a positive way, i.e. "Who can carry other players the hardest?"

That said, what makes Bards so special and useful?

Healer, specifically Scholar. I'm biased but Scholar has great versatility. Lots of MP to work with, has more freedom to throw on DPS than WHM (arguable), and a much better "emergency" heal. More MP over the course of a fight means you have more glue to apply to anything falling apart, such as battle resurrection.

Bards are "just" a very easy to play DPS, dodging doesn't adversely affect their damage (because they can attack while moving unlike casters, and don't need to be in melee range), and they have Ballad to help healers recover from MP-taxing situations (like somebody dying) and Requiem to boost magic damage. It's definitely great to have one, but "best carry" is, in my opinion, unarguably a healer. If all heals die, the fight is over.

[D00meriksen]

@SeraviEdalborez

It seems I wasn't too far off with choosing SCH then. I like that I have a good mana pool, so I can throw out "support" whenever needed, be it mitigation for damage spikes on tanks, additional offense for crucial dps phases or combat resurrection when someone dies.

Basically I'm looking for classes which are not that gcd constrained while doing their regular job, so they have more time to use situational support abilities. I guess "versatility" was the word I was really looking for. Bards seem to be able to do just about that, but pay with lower dps, which is not a big deal if they can make everyone else do more damage with their buffs.

How fare Monks and Warriors? Do they have strong oh-snap buttons to save the day?

[givemeraptors]

@SeraviEdalborez

It seems I wasn't too far off with choosing SCH then. I like that I have a good mana pool, so I can throw out "support" whenever needed, be it mitigation for damage spikes on tanks, additional offense for crucial dps phases or combat resurrection when someone dies.

Basically I'm looking for classes which are not that gcd constrained while doing their regular job, so they have more time to use situational support abilities. I guess "versatility" was the word I was really looking for. Bards seem to be able to do just about that, but pay with lower dps, which is not a big deal if they can make everyone else do more damage with their buffs.

How fare Monks and Warriors? Do they have strong oh-snap buttons to save the day?

Scholars have a lot of abilities to rotate and choose from, and their ability to DPS is far less taxing than WHM holy spam. In that sense they are similar to their SMN counterparts, who have a large ability pool and some powerful cross-class abilities. Virus, E4E, Resurrection, these are top notch abilities that see frequent use in all content.

In general the person with the most ability to pull a party out of a hole...Scholar perhaps since they can more efficiently tank and heal/kite and heal than a WHM. However, I would caution against taking this too seriously as the death of one member, even a DPS, frequently spells a wipe in a lot of endgame content (and even Ultima HM if the other 3 DPS aren't top notch).

[Artemiz]

Due to the nature of this game (and MMO's in general) the most useful job is the one with the best player behind it. Everyone has their responsibilities and the game is set up so that the fight gets really tough if people don't successfully deal with their responsibilities.

The tank and healer are obviously critical though I think good DPS get overlooked, for the most part. Good DPS make life so much easier for everyone from BLM's who know when to use Blizzard and Eye for an Eye to SMN who can Raise leaving the healer to concentrate on the tank. Not only that but he faster the fight is over the easier it is for everyone, as long as hate is stable, and hate is a team effort not just the tanks job.

[Bixby]

How fare Monks and Warriors? Do they have strong oh-snap buttons to save the day?

Every job that isn't a healer (and often healers, too) is generally going to be pressing a GCD button every GCD, with a few oGCD abilities thrown in. If that's what you meant by GCD constrained, there really isn't much variety in that department. Every DPS and tank class has a rotation with their GCD abilities, and you don't step outside of it all that often.

Warriors have next to no utility moves. They have an off-GCD stun. Pretty much everything else in their toolkit is threat, DPS increase, or damage reduction. And most of it is not about suddenly busting out such-and-such skill to turn the tide, it's mostly about using the correct cooldown at the correct time so you don't get wrecked by the big hit you know is coming.

Monks have an off-GCD stun as well (this is hardly unique, btw), an on-GCD AOE silence that can only be used every third GCD (well, it can be used anytime; but it's only a silence if they're in the right form, which happens every 3rd GCD), and one-ilm punch that removes a single buff from the target (which can't actually be used on much of anything at all; either buffs aren't there at all or they're not removable or not important enough to bother).

[Mimilu]

(A good) Main Tank > Healers > Range DPS ≥ One good Melee DPS for LB ≥ The remaining Melee DPS
Second tanks can be thrown anywhere on this, depending on how extensive adds are.

[Alindra]

From my experience in the DF, it seems that if the tank sucks, you probably won't succeed at anything. So they're probably the most important.

[Segraine]

I vote healer. I am biased with scholar being my main class and my dislike for all other roles.

I've been in parties that can clear some lvl 50 dungeons without a tank. Just last night my party 3 manned the first Pharos boss with a first timer in the group before a tank joined. These situations tend to strain the healer the most. But I find the runs more fun than tank groups. I come from Guild Wars 1 where there are no tanks so I am used to chaotic encounters. It is fun when the tank can't hold threat. However, without a healer no one is going anywhere.

I'd like to see content where the tank can't hold threat at all. Control, debuffs, and kiting are perfectly viable options.

[Umero]

Tank is obviously the most powerful role. It has the least waiting time in Duty Finder. From sketch, leveling a tank without any friends help would be way faster than leveling any other job.
So please play tanks more, guys! Help the game out! We need more tanks!

[D00meriksen]

By "not gcd constrained" I meant classes like summoner. Yes, you should be using Ruin if all other priorities are met, but you won't lose much damage from not casting it. At the end of the day support (like Resurrection) should come at a price, but I feel with this class it's rather low. Bards seem to be similar.

Nobody of you said anything about CC like Sleep, yet. Is it not used anymore in end game?