Savage Alexander and the Paladin Exodus

[CyberForte]

WoW tried the magic tank thing with DKs.

Didn't work well. With five classes that can tank(monk, druid, Paladin, death knight, warrior as soon demon hunter) they can't really get away with "best tank" for long because that's way too big a balance issue.

Kinda why they're all copycats of each other. Druid/monk are dodge tanks. Paladin/warrior are shield block tanks. Death knight is a halfass heal/absorb/parry tank.

I don't really have much to add on this topic in general, but as someone who's played 4/5 tank classes on WoW, I feel the need to step in here and tell you that you have no idea what you're talking about. WoW tanks are not "clones," as you put it--each has a distinct playstyle and each has different strengths, which have in fact suffered similar balance issues. If you need proof of that, ask how many DKs solo tanked Ra-den back when he was current, then compare to the number of paladins or monks. WoW has a lot of problems, which is why I left it to come here, but a lack of variety in tank design is not one of them. Indeed, its tank design is possibly the thing I most sorely miss here so far...

For the record:

Druids have avoidance-based active mitigation with some self-healing on top of it. Also very high passive mitigation.

Monks have some minor avoidance, but their theme is much more reactive self-healing through purifying their stagger, putting up Guard at appropriate times, and using Expel Harm if they get low--they're significantly more active than Druids, and most similar to Death Knights in their design. Also have very strong cds. My personal favorite tank.

Paladin have passive block that accounts for almost nothing, and then active mitigation in the form of Shield of the Righteous which reduces physical damage by a flat percentage. Also has emergency self-healing, and some passive healing. Option to spec for an even more active rotation with Seraphim, or a more passive one with Holy Shield.

Warriors have passive block, but also active mitigation which gives short-duration bursts of 100% block chance, as well as the ability to "critical block" for twice the amount of a normal block. Almost no self-healing, but high passive damage reduction to compensate.

Death Knights are another extremely reactive, active-mitigation based tank. High hp, lower passive mitigation, and self-heals that scale well with damage taken. Self-healing also triggers a physical absorb shield. Some strong anti-magic cooldowns--mainly anti-magic shell--but hardly a "magic tank." My personal second favorite tank.

When I say DK and monk are self-healing--in a raid setting, I would consistently do 40-60% of my own healing on these two, not even counter purified stagger dot on monk. I don't think you can honestly call any of these clones. Does having different design cause imbalances? Yes, definitely, but I think the variety is worth the price of that overall.

As far as FFXIV tank balance goes, I obviously need to wait until 60 to see for sure, but even at the level I'm at, I can already kind of understand where the sentiments I've seen in this thread are coming from. It's a pity, since I find the class to have much more interesting flavor than Warrior, and yet mechanically it seems in every way lacking in that comparison. Have yet to try Dark Knight.

[Duelle]

When I say DK and monk are self-healing--in a raid setting, I would consistently do 40-60% of my own healing on these two, not even counter purified stagger dot on monk. I don't think you can honestly call any of these clones. Does having different design cause imbalances? Yes, definitely, but I think the variety is worth the price of that overall.

As a fellow tank from WoW (prot warrior), you have to remember that people didn't discriminate against any type of tank outside of content just not meshing with the tank in question (ex: bear druids not being able to tank Illidan because they had no block mechanic to mitigate Shear). Even when we had mass paladins and DKs during Wrath people didn't kick warriors or druids to the curb (or, as a parallel to what's happening here, call them useless/weak).

[Shurrikhan]

As a fellow tank from WoW (prot warrior), you have to remember that people didn't discriminate against any type of tank outside of content just not meshing with the tank in question (ex: bear druids not being able to tank Illidan because they had no block mechanic to mitigate Shear). Even when we had mass paladins and DKs during Wrath people didn't kick warriors or druids to the curb (or, as a parallel to what's happening here, call them useless/weak).

A lot of that could just be because it was neither expected nor really possible to gear every tank. Here, eso gear and weapon are the only things separating the tanks' gear. When we get a good PLD here who we'd rather have as a WAR or DRK, we think nothing of telling them to swap, especially when they're only a couple of slots into eso or less. You don't want your Bear tank, well... let's hope he's just as good a player as a healer or dps. (Likely one of those will pan out, but even then, do you have a spot for either of those?) Not only was the community a bit more accepting, but the game also made it gave good players a bit more safety in their class choices. I kind of miss that, though not as much as I love XIV's freedom.
[Blood DK horde, Prot WAR alliance tanking when I raided, though have tanked as every class during Wrath and WoD, just not all in real raiding]

A bit more on topic: I'd have to agree with Cyber that the WoW tanks are at least as varied as XIV's (though I can think of some cases where they were more varied in previous installments, they've actually done a bit better on average against homogenization than dps classes).

On topic: Given how modest the requests from PLD raiders, or would-be raiders are, I don't see why it would be called any more than a hot-fix to cover. I really hope they get at least that much, and the SE can see from there.