Tanking habits

[HakuroDK]

As a tank myself, all of this tank hate kinda hurts. I do my honest best to make sure the party goes at a suitable pace, but everyone's idea of a suitable pace is different. Some folks prefer to go at a slower pace and others prefer to go much faster. I have been yelled at by DPS and healers alike for NOT mass-pulling. I have been yelled at by a holy-spamming WHM for not having good survivability. I've been yelled at by enough people for trying to adopt to a playstyle that is not theirs that I've had just about enough of the tank hate.

Do you know? If you roll a tank, your DF times will be cut down 10-fold? If you roll a tank, YOU can control how fast the party goes? It's downright insulting and hypocritical to crap all over tanks when those crapping over tanks aren't even willing to play that role.

You want to know my habits? If I see two DPS jobs that specialize in single-target damage (MNK, DRG, SMN, etc.), I think to myself "There is no way AoEs are happening here" and I slow the party down. If I see two DPS jobs that specialize in multi-target damage (BLM, BRD, etc.), I think to myself "They should be able to handle it" and I test the waters with a single pull first. If they can handle it, I double-pull. If they can handle it, I continue to go at that pace. If they can't, I scale back.

I don't mark targets for two reasons. First and foremost, a DPS should be focusing fire on the add with the lowest HP. If that isn't clear, attack what the tank is attacking. Second, any tank worth their salt can manage enmity on several adds at once. I don't have time to be marking adds when I get saddled with trigger-happy DPS who are more than happy to pull before I'm ready, which makes my job five times more difficult than it already is because I have to then yank enmity from that DPS, yank enmity from every other add attacking other players besides myself due to proximity, pull enmity off a running healer because they hit Medica II after the pull but before I got enmity generated properly... seriously. When I tank in some parties, I feel like a babysitter.

If I see a healer having a difficult time healing me for ANY reason, I don't give that healer gruff. Instead, I pop damage reduction cooldown abilities that I would normally save for a boss and play defensively.

Whenever I enter a dungeon, I am always polite, greeting the rest of the party and corroborating with any fellow tanks over who should be main tank and who should be off-tank. After that, if necessary, we talk strategy before the pull to ensure everyone is on the same page.

Whenever a dungeon ends, I give a commendation to whomever did the best job in the dungeon, congratulate everyone in the party for a good run, wait for the loot rolls to end, use the /goodbye emote, and leave. If there were any particularly amazing players, I may even friend them.

I get that you're talking about tanks that are not me, but to be perfectly frank, you're generalizing every tank with your frustrations and criticisms while you yourself are not a tank. And that is incredibly rude.