The 4th Tank.

[Phoenicia]

Snip.

I wasn't dismissing any of your ideas. I was just pointing out things we need to consider with our ideas.

I love evasion tanks. Hell I played Warrior in Tera because I thought it would be a viable evasion tank but then realized it was a meat tank that was only supposed to dodge 1-shotters. Later it was given a block-like mechanic in its Cross Parry skill.

Speaking of Tera, warrior wore leather, but in its tank stance, it raised its Endurance to a level that made its total defense higher than the plate wearing classes. Basically on a hit, warrior took less damage than the main tank class, lancer. Though most would die from the telegraphed attacks in that game. Basically tanking in that game required you to block or fully dodge telegraphed attacks or you die, regardless of your defense or HP... Unless you vastly outgear content. Anyways, let's not derail. lol

A non-plate wearing class that has a tank stance to raise their defense can solve this whole "need plate tank" issue. Even a caster than converts INT to not only damage, but defense/HP also.

I also agree with you that the tanking meta is getting bland. I'm very disappointed that Alexander Savage is more about DPS checks and less on mechanics than FCoB was. I would love to see more variety to tanking than just press I-won't-die-now button before a boss does a rawr-I-kill-tank move.

[ckc22]

In terms of sam I'd either like it to be a counter-attack based tank class or if it's a dps I think giving it a 'skillchain' angle like in XI could be cool - instead of hard rotations 1->2->3 have the weaponskills act more like ninjutsu where different combinations proc different 'skillchains'.

[Souleater13]

Samurai could have more control over TP. Would be a dps.

1>2>3 combo skills would be low to medium potency and would generate TP as well.
Then there would "finisher" skills cost lots of TP, hundreds at various levels but have high potency's and effects to them.

I think of FF11 samurai's with their TP control and FF6 and Cyan with his sword tech meter.


A couple of DOT skills that would be "bleeds"

[Giantbane]

As has already been mentioned a number of times, Yoshi already said he thinks SAM should be DPS. Given that, I really think the chances for SAM as tank are pretty low.

Something hammer based would be cool. And another tank that shares the shield with PLD would be interesting. I could see Templar as a good option (1H Lance + Shield).

Maybe even BLU as a tank. As the BLU is all about getting hit by monster abilities to learn them, it makes the most sense to me if it were a tank here. Granted, it wouldn't be the same where you permanently learn 40 or 50 skills and choose between them. Instead, a BLU here could absorb specific skills to get limited use charges to use within the next 30s or so. For instance, if hit by titan's table flip, it would give them one charge of that ability, and they could turn around and use it right back (a scaled down version, obviously).

[Khalithar]

I could see Templar as a good option (1H Lance + Shield)

I do like the idea of another tank class with the shield, but I think it should be a weapon we haven't seen before like a one handed mace or a flail maybe. But I think the whole knightly protector thing is pretty much covered with paladin, I don't really think we need two of them. In my mind I keep going over what would be a good theme for a new tanking class, the game currently has three tanks, three melee dps, three healers, and four ranged dps.

If we assume that Samurai is meant to be the fourth melee dps class (I still like my idea of putting it on the leather armor and keeping the eastern style themed armor for mnk/nin/sam) then what does that leave us for tanking? We have a berserker in the warrior, we have a knightly protector in the paladin, we have the darkness wielding knight in drk.

So after really tossing thoughts around I came to two possible conclusions as to what made the most sense to me:

1. If SE sticks with their continued insistence on tanks only wearing the heavy plate armor, the only thing that I can think of is a heavily armored frontline soldier carrying a shield and possibly a mace. Not the light wielding knightly protector or a berserker, but a professional soldier/mercenary sort that is sent to fight on the front lines. I was inspired for it by everquest 2, everquest 2 has the berserker style tank, the paladin tank, and the shadow knight tank, then there was the class that's meant to be the opposite of the berserker while being a tank, that class is called Guardian: http://eq2.wikia.com/wiki/Category:Guardian No magic, no special powers or rage to harness, just a badass highly trained heavily armored soldier.

2. The other thought I had was a magic wielding tank that creates defensive shields and buffs to survive, the only caster I can think of that did that was the Red Mage armed with a rapier and no offhand.

[Shurrikhan]

Snip

Had lost the reply I was going to make for this and gave up for the time being, but as you mentioned wanting some feedback in discussion on a Dancer(esque) job, here goes:

I absolutely want to see a skill-based evasion tank, where the evasion is more than just a 1.0 Featherfoot / 2.0 Perfect Balance or the standard defensive series of cooldowns. I've been working on a Dancer idea, but it's still super rough and yet also overly complex:

It's very much multi-role, primarily a support-ish melee dps but can heal (inferiorly, but paired with increased support buffing) and tank if need be. It can use it's 'melee' moves (steps) even without a target or being in range, and will commonly do so for the purposes of support or prepping 'combos' (or as close as Dancer gets to combos) during movement. It builds up different elements (which gives it strong and versatile passive benefits and can be unleashed for magic damage or burst support) and creates or maintains dances through its abilities (broader, dynamic support while also modifying and being modified by ability order). I personally made their weapon choice basically any chain-weapon, typically kamas, short-handled blades, or bladed fans. The choice of weapon type within might effect an ability each of magic and physical attacks. Would use leather or preferably a new form of physical cloth armor. Without its abilities, Dancer would be cut like tissue; with its abilities, it's a handful to kill, though it still doesn't synergize quite as well with standard healing as a standard tank would, usually preferring something of a 'new meta' composition.

I'd like to see non-traditional tanks, but I do think, in more ways than just their ability sets, they should perform non-traditionally. I also feel like, if they're going to be an evasion- or especially a blink-tank, they need some way to maintain enemy positioning, hopefully simultaneously enabling the non-traditional tank to perform their own positionals without spinning the tanked enemy. So far what I've mostly stumbled onto is the idea of simply creating either (1) (my preferred) a sort of blur, making our position seem a variable amount of time behind our real position, or (2) puppeting a sort of shade/clone, whatever, giving orders through our regular ability sets and WASD (no pet bar) either in place of or alongside our own (real body) controls. It's a lot to cover a relatively small purpose, but I do think it would be worth it if it could pair into trait-like passives that would aesthetically fit with a job like Dancer (or Ninja, for that matter).

Edit: as for SAM, I really hope it will be a bit about as tanky as DRG by default, but also have some ways in which its rotations and their benefits can be moved from dps in focus to survivability (say, going for parry rather than +crit via certain combo orders, as a painfully simple example) that could make it a pretty sufficient short-term tank. Just, no damage reduction cooldowns greater than Keen Flurry or Featherfoot... It should be a tank by choice, not because it had real (dps) abilities taken away from it and no reason not to use the defensives given in their place.

[Zophar]

As has already been mentioned a number of times, Yoshi already said he thinks SAM should be DPS. Given that, I really think the chances for SAM as tank are pretty low.

I'm still not willing to dismiss the possibility of SAM as a tank though. It was also said that SAM was under consideration as the new tank for HW, but they decided to go with DRK instead. Plus, I mean, SAM just feels like it would fit really well as a tank, and there aren't a lot of other jobs out there that really do.

[Tila]

I think many people would be unhappy if SAM was made a tank tbh. If anything it would be a DPS that shares DRG gear.

[Duelle]

While I'm all for non-plate wearing tanks, historically, Samurai wore heavy armor (plate).

Lamellar isn't really the same as plate. For one it restricted the user less and depending on the material was arguably lighter.

Beastmaster or Puppermaster tanking with their pets would be interesting but I fear it would be as clunky as Titan-egi tanking even if they had better aggro.

The way I'd implement Beastmaster is having a proximity buff between master and pet that splits damage. The master would do the tanking, the pet would be a sort of back-up/second HP bar of sorts/extra DPS/source of defensive cooldowns. Kinda building on the concept behind Lineage II's Dark Avenger (tank that had a pet, though that pet was only there for extra DPS).

RDM tanked in a fun way with all its defensive spells and enfeebles that made some mobs just stand there doing nothing.

Not really. RDM tanking involved spamming enfeebles not for their effects, but for their enmity. A RDM could generate crazy amounts of enmity using the correct spells, enough that it could hit the aggro caps and be the tank. It was several years too late, but SE ended up nerfing enmity from enfeebles to kill off RDM tanking.

[VargasVermillion]

I have a feeling SAM will be a dps this time around, not only did yoshi say he would rather it be a dps but they probably want to use the opportunity to have a sword wielding dps since that's a popular request.