Tanks, please use strength gear.. :(

[TouchandFeel]

@Yorumi

I never said that the 1 and 2 from my list ended up being the greater percentage of focus for an experienced tank in this game, in fact I stated the opposite when I said that it becomes second nature and you don't really need to think about it.

The numbers were given as priority allocations for the responsibilities of a tank, for example if 1 is not being accomplished then a player should not be focusing on doing 3 as 1 is of higher importance.

I tanked in WoW (as well as many other MMO's from EQ1 on) and found it to be easier than in FF14. Agro control was so easy it felt virtually automated.

The main difference that I will agree with you on is that in WoW, tanking did feel more "defensive" where FF14 feels more "offensive". Neither is necessarily better, they are just different and being more offensive as a tank can lead to some players feeling sort of like a dps. This is not inherently a flaw as it can make a role that can easily feel less fun due to being more reactionary be more enjoyable to more players since they can play more aggressively and therefore feel more proactive.

Personally, this dichotomy of playstyle is something that I would love to see explored and expanded upon in this game whereas some tanks feel more defensive (ex: a chunk of PLD damage coming from defensive abilities or defensive abilities / procs leading into/enabling offensive abilities), while others are more offensive where their defenses come from using attacks (ex: the way WAR are).

As for the thread topic, you can see that many tanks disagree with the OP's opinion (as is often times the case with this particular poster and their threads on these forums, they sort of have a reputation).

[Yorumi]

@Yorumi

I never said that the 1 and 2 from my list ended up being the greater percentage of focus for an experienced tank in this game, in fact I stated the opposite when I said that it becomes second nature and you don't really need to think about it.
...
I tanked in WoW (as well as many other MMO's from EQ1 on) and found it to be easier than in FF14. Agro control was so easy it felt virtually automated.

I know you wern't trying to imply they were necessarily the major focus of the class. Really though automated describes agro management in ff14 perfectly. I've just never seen a case where a tank has a proper weapon and a dps was realistically able to threaten a tank's aggro. To me aggro is so automated in this game that it's a little like saying a mnk needs to focus on second wind. Sure a tank needs to maintain aggro but it's so automated that they have to be almost trying to avoid aggro to not hold it.

As far as the comparison to tanks in other games, defensive vs offensive isn't really all of it. The design of hte classes in general is such that here maximizing a tank is mostly brain dead. I mean max dps on pld is just GB > 2x RA. If you need the str down then it's just a rotation through all 3 combos. Combine with the very slow 2.5 sec GCD and you have very low APM classes. Contrast to a tank that needs to maintain tight defensive buffs that don't have a trivial combo to gain the buff, or has buffs randomly falling off(absorb damage, or stacks being consumed). These buffs/debuffs contribute to a tanks survivability and fight mechanics now are major consideration and makes a tank think more about tanking. I'm not saying these other games are super impossible hard, but by comparison ff14 is brain dead.

[Alahra]

Really though automated describes agro management in ff14 perfectly.

I'm guessing you didn't tank in WoW (or if you did, you did so prior to mid-Wrath of the Lich King, when the tanks were designed differently). All tank actions have an enmity modifier of some ridiculous number (5000x or something like that, I don't recall the exact figure)--there were no skills that had special enmity modifiers, so as long as you were doing your rotation, you had threat, pretty much full stop. Resources weren't as much of an issue in AoE situations, either, as tanks could AoE to their heart's content in WoW since things regenerated much more quickly than MP and TP do here.

That's pretty different from FFXIV, where automated doesn't necessarily apply. If you don't use your enmity skills, you won't generally hold hate, and you have to gauge how much you need to use them given your group's damage and healing output at the time. There's nothing automatic about that--you actually have to make decisions regarding aggro control. WoW's system is automated because enmity is automatically applied to everything you do.

[Yorumi]

I'm guessing you didn't tank in WoW (or if you did, you did so prior to mid-Wrath of the Lich King, when the tanks were designed differently). All tank actions have an enmity modifier of some ridiculous number (5000x or something like that, I don't recall the exact figure)

Yeah I'll admit I havn't played current WoW at all. So apparently it is automatic. Much of my more modern tank experience comes from swtor(well did a lot in tera too but that's a radically different game). I don't want to make it sound like it's super hard or anything but dps are actually capable of pulling aggro from a tank. They discuss burst threat rotations how to properly use taunts to get the maximum threat boost, and even some strategies where the tank lets a dps pull with an opening burst and then quickly taunts before going into a max threat rotation. It's not hard or anything but considering they actually have discussions on threat management vs this game where the amount of discussion is based read your skill descriptions it's much more of a consideration there.

[Galgarion]

Yeah I'll admit I havn't played current WoW at all. So apparently it is automatic. Much of my more modern tank experience comes from swtor(well did a lot in tera too but that's a radically different game). I don't want to make it sound like it's super hard or anything but dps are actually capable of pulling aggro from a tank. They discuss burst threat rotations how to properly use taunts to get the maximum threat boost, and even some strategies where the tank lets a dps pull with an opening burst and then quickly taunts before going into a max threat rotation. It's not hard or anything but considering they actually have discussions on threat management vs this game where the amount of discussion is based read your skill descriptions it's much more of a consideration there.

Old Republic's threat generation was pretty easy to game, though. As I recall, the taunts in that game add a multiplier to threat generated, so you're actually encouraged to weave taunts into your tank rotation. Past a certain point, losing threat becomes impossible even if you just stood there auto-attacking.

[Yorumi]

Old Republic's threat generation was pretty easy to game, though. As I recall, the taunts in that game add a multiplier to threat generated, so you're actually encouraged to weave taunts into your tank rotation. Past a certain point, losing threat becomes impossible even if you just stood there auto-attacking.

Like I said not super hard. High end content does have the typical things that require you to use taunts so you can't just spam them for extra threat without consideration for anything. In their version of savage when dps are just going absolutely all out the tanks have to at least give threat some consideration in their rotation whereas here there's not really anything to think about threat wise.