Tank Balance Megathread.
The purpose of this thread is for documenting real, objective discrepancies between the 3 tanks. It is not for theorycrafting, demanding nerfs/buffs without a decent, objective argument, etc. And above all its to attempt to compile this information and reduce the number of individual BUFF THIS NERF THAT threads.
The idea here is to compile everything we know about the tanks and both quantify and qualify the differences between them with 6 months of Savage progression behind us and 3.1 having been launched, well on our way to 3.2 were major tank adjustments are expected.
Excuse any extra-in depth analysis for DRK as it is my main, however I have all tanks at 60. Please feel free, PLD and WAR mains, to supplement any additional information that will add perspective.
I'll be making side-by-side comparisons to illustrated specific similarities/discrepancies as I go rather than covering each tank in one huge block. At the end after all the facts I can muster have been documented (with help from you guys, if I'm wrong about anything, which is not unlikely), I'll mention some ideas for adjustments to all the tanks, keeping everything as minor/minimal as possible, keeping the tanks' playstyles intact, but making it so that no tank is at a severe disadvantage in a single major department without a meaningful benefit to make up for it.
I want to encourage everyone to contribute to factual documentation in this thread, and help make it objectively clear what the tank imbalance actually IS, and how it could be fixed in a way that would not damage any one tank's playstyle or nerf them in any considerable fashion, and keep not just tanks balanced, but other jobs as well with respect to any changes we might see.
Changes in 3.0:
PLD - level 50 toolkit lacks 2/3 of a full combo rotation. These combos were added/completed in 3.0.
WAR - level 50 toolkit lacks a proper OT stance with which to use the main mechanic of the job (stacks). This stance and abilities with which to utilize it were added in 3.0.
DRK - new job. Level 1-50 toolkit is complete by the standards of 2.x, thus level 50-60 skills were largerly personal utility and QoL additions (gap closer, placed AoE, etc).
Stances- (all of these grant the same eHP boost).
PLD:
Shield/Sword Oath: Both cost a sizeable chunk of MP and a GCD. SwO adds extra 50 potency auto-attacks. These add up and PLD's SwO DPS is actually very good. Enough so that the DPS discrepancy between maximum SwO DPS and maximum ShO DPS is about 32% (iirc, correct me with exact number if needed). PLD has no cross-stance passive dps buff (Maim, Darkside). Shield Swipe procs provide a mild DPS and enmity gain while tanking as of patch 3.1, closing the gap by a small amount between ShO and SwO DPS. Both are on the GCD, incurring a DPS loss for every switch.
WAR:
Defiance/Deliverance: Defiance provides a 20% boost to healing received from spells only. Healing abilities such as Lustrate and Tetragrammaton are not effected. Larger DPS loss however WAR comes with a passive buff that is kept up through a normal rotation in Maim. Stances are oGCD with their only gate being an extremely short 10s cooldown. WAR's arguably best defensive cooldown however (IB) is gated by their tank stance. WAR does have to constantly make choices between defense and offense while the other tanks can (arguably) do both at the same time albeit to a lesser extent at times. IB is gated by tank stance, and two of their other most powerful mitigation CDs are often used to build stacks. This is rarely an issue in practice however. DPS stance offers a small 5% boost in damage dealt and converts parry rate increases from stacks to crit rate. Potencies of WAR combos tend to be smaller, this boost negates this for the most part while OTing. DPS discrepancy between maximum Del DPS and maximum Def DPS is roughly 28% (again, iirc, please correct if this is wrong). Regardless, WAR is unique in that its stances are off the GCD with very short recasts and thus can be woven in and out of seamlessly in the midst of a rotation, which has been a source of heavy controversy. Most people that play WAR either casually or otherwise can attest to how satisfying this is and want it on the other tanks as well.
DRK:
Grit/Blood Weapon: While Bloodweapon is not a stance, it largely functions as their DPS stance as it cannot be used simultaneously with Grit and provides a concrete DPS gain when out of it. Darkside functions similarly to Maim, although weaker, the DPS loss from Grit is smaller. DRK also has specific DPS gains present while MTing in the form of parry-based procs, however these are available whether in Grit or out of it. In fact, most of DRK's toolkit is independent of Grit. DPS discrepancy between maximum non-Grit and DPS and maximum Grit DPS is roughly 23% (once again, iirc. Please verify.) Grit's activation and deactivation are both on the GCD, but only its activation actually triggers the GCD. Because DRK has a lot of oGCD DPS, most stance dancing will see DRKs squeezing as many oGCD DPS abilities into the GCDs leading up to when they are going to reactivate Grit, and then weaving in defensive CDs before and after Grit's activation to avoid having to use them in between combos.
Mechanics-
PLD: ? Blocking ? Off-healing ? (PLD lacks a central mechanic around which the playstyle of the job revolves. This has been a complaint, but can easily be seen as a design choice. WHM can be seen as a healer equivalent, lacking a major unifying mechanic such as pet management for SCH and cards for AST).
EDIT:
Originally Posted by
Donjo
I would like to submit that the Paladin's "Primary Gameplay Mechanic" is their unique possession(among the tanks, at least) of both Reactive Utility and Utility that specifically targets party members instead of enemies. Basically, their shtick is that they're the best at actively protecting the Party and getting it back on its feet when things are starting to go sour. This, of course, ignores the perceived effectiveness of this Utility, which you have covered further down in your post. Regardless, when we ask "what does a Paladin manage that the other Tanks don't?", their spread of party based utility rings the bell.
WAR: Stacks
DRK: Mana
I will not be making an in-depth comparison between WAR and DRK as far as how well-equiped each job may or may not be on the resource management of their stacks/mana respectively, as it seems to be unanimous that they are completely capable of doing so without any innate hinderance outside of player error. The main difference is that WAR is about acquiring and spending defined blocks (stacks) of their mechanic, whereas DRK is about maintaining, and is more vague as its resources are constantly and wildly replenishing/depleting by varying values from moment to moment.
Combos-
PLD:
RoH - 150+200+260 hate + debuff
GB - 150+230+220(540) dps + dot
RA - 150+200+340 dps + hate
WAR:
BB - 150+200+280 hate + dps
SE - 150+190+270 dps + debuff + buff
SP - 150+190+260 debuff + buff
DRK:
PS - 150+220+300 hate
SE - 150+250+260(400) dps + self heal
DE - 150+250+280 dps + debuff + mana
Lets talk balance-
I'm not going to state the obvious here, only discuss what actually makes a difference in interactions between the tanks (ie DRK has higher potencies because not many offensive CDs, WAR has lower potencies because lots of offensive CDs, etc).
What we see is that PLD has to use its hate combo for both enmity and its only bit of combo-based raid utility. Everything else is pure DPS with the exception of the small hate boost afforded from Savage Blade being the gate to RA. This puts them in an awkward and annoying spot as it divorces DPS from every other part of their job.
WAR has an interesting thing going on as well. BB is part of their dps rotation as well as hate meaning they use it while OTing. This isn't bad per se, but it creates an awkward dynamic between their MT in which it CAN become a bit dodgey for said MT to tank outside of tank stance, especially if the MT is not another WAR as neither other tank wants to use their hate combo if they can help it. The SE combo is a no-brainer part of the rotation, however SP, while having the potential for 100% uptime, almost never actually gets it, due to the noticeable DPS loss. While the hate combo is potent and the highest DPS all the utility lies in the other combos, creating something of an ideal balance.
DRK has the most potent hate combo out of all the tanks and generally wants to use it as little as possible. We see that the highest DPS rotation is a large MP drain but also a self heal in tank stance, while their resource management rotation, Delirium. DRK has a general feel of "Get a shit-ton of hate quickly, then focus on fun stuff." Alternating between the two remaining combos offers sustain, high DPS, and debuffing utility.
So while WAR's rotation could be classified as a bit "selfish" in certain scenarios, both it and DRK have a combo rotation that is well married to itself and the jobs' utilities/mechanics. While PLD has a combo tree that puts DPS in direct conflict to its utility and aggro management, while the DPS rotations offer no extra beneficial effects other than the MP regen from Riot Blade.
Other Weaponskills-
In terms of DPS, WAR has a huge advantage here, bringing hundreds and thousands of potency per minute in these extra weaponskills.
PLD:
Shield Bash: An on-GCD stun. Has been handy in the past; makes PLD the only non-caster to be able to chain-stun. Use is situational however and only occasionally finds functionality in raids or even primals.
WAR:
Fracture: A DoT, albeit an expensive and not terribly potent one. However, for WAR it is a proven DPS gain to keep it up.
Fell Cleave/Inner Beast:
Steel Cyclone/Decimate:
These are unique among weaponskills in that not only are they extremely potent single-target and AoE abilities but also they do not interrupt your combos.
For WAR to have its most powerful abilties on the GCD, free (stacks, not TP), and not interrupting their combos is a huge benefit. Almost no other job in the game has this. This also contributes to a high degree of built-in TP sustain. Fell Cleave (500) and Decimate (AoE 280) in particular offer incredible burst.
The general theme of WAR is in fact burst DPS. Inner Beast and Steel Cyclone also ignore Defiance.
There have been arguments made, some even by respected WAR mains in the community (Xeno, Layla), that having these incredible powerful abilities cost only stacks and a GCD (not really a cost as that saves TP) and above all else, to not interrupt combos, is overpowered. I'll leave that to the comments section.
Originally Posted by
Isius
DRK:
Scourge: a 500 potency/30s DoT. Cheaper and more potent than Fracture. This is not a huge dealbreaker one way or another, but it does render DRK the most efficient tank for multi-dotting. On multiple targets multi-dotting with Scourge is essentially the equivalent of spamming Fell Cleave.
Damaging Abilities/oGCD Attacks-
As is the case with all oGCDs, these are always a DPS gain.
PLD: SB - 120
WAR: IB - 300, SC - 200AoE/FC - 500, Dec - 280AoE
DRK: Scrg - 100(500)
PLD:
Spirits Within: 300 potency, decreases as HP decreases. A very strange skill. Viable for OTing however. Always kept on cooldown but rarely sees its full effectiveness while MTing.
Circle of Scorn: 250 potency in an AoE over 15s. PLD's only damaging AoE, thankfully off GCD and with a very short recast. Also part of enmity management.
Shield Swipe: Only usable while tanking (Block-proc) but with a very short recast time.
WAR:
Brutal Swing: Off-GCD stun with very short recast. WAR's only unique oGCD damaging ability.
DRK:
A large majority of DRK's DPS comes from its plethora of off-GCD damage.
Low Blow: A clone of Brutal Swing with a slightly longer cooldown. Parrying can reset the recast timer in a similar fashion to BRD's crits with Bloodletter.
Dark Passenger: A line AoE for a small-to-moderate MP cost. Offers a blind in dungeons with Dark Arts, in addition to increased potency. Very short animation lock.
Plunge: A gap closer. Has a long animation lock.
Reprisal: Procs on parry, deals damage and debuffs target similar to WAR's SP. Stacks with SP. Does not offer the maximum potential uptime of SP but in practice is kept up about as much due to WAR preferring to use higher DPS combos, and Reprisal not being combo locked/on-GCD.
Salted Earth: 525 potency in an AoE over 21s. Between this and Scourge DRK has a lot of DoT damage happening.
Carve and Spit: This ability rewards expert MP management with Dark Arts with a 450 potency oGCD, and catches the player when they call with a burst of MP at the sacrifice of DPS.
PLD: SW - 300, CoS - 100(250)AoE, SS - 150
WAR: BS - 100
DRK: LB - 100, DP - 150/250AoE, Plng - 200, Rprsl - 210, SE - 525DoT, C&S - 100/450
Shared: Mercy Stroke: Better on WAR due to shorter recast.
Ranged:
PLD:
Shield Lob
WAR:
Tomahawk
Overpower: This counts in that it is technically ranged, albeit not far. Is more used for its AoE aspect.
DRK:
Unmend - this is the only notable one in that it uses a different resource than its combos (MP vs. TP) and deals 30 potency more of damage than the other two, and also has a proc effect for Unleashed. The additional potency is a central theme with DRK which is "get enmity taken care of quickly so you can do more important stuff..."
Abyssal Drain: AoE Unmend, essentially. Covered more below.
Dark Passenger: Also technically ranged like Overpower, but moreso used for its AoE component.
Salted Earth: Again, more used for AoE, but can be placed in anticipation of repositioning or on a stationary target as you are approaching it.
Plunge: Used in point-blank rotation as well, more used for its gap-closer component.
AoE: (Unless otherwise specified, all AoEs generate additional enmity).
PLD:
Circle of Scorn - This is PLD's only AoE damaging ability, and is on a 25s recast. PLD's AoE DPS or lack thereof has been a hot topic. The main benefit of this ability is that it is one of the only Tank AoEs that is off-GCD. 250 Potency including DoT.
WAR:
Overpower - 120 Potency conal AoE, on the GCD, spammable. Aside from the TP cost, this is a very good and powerful ability, and its spammable nature synergizes well with WARs offensive cooldowns. This is further supplemented with self-healing cooldowns as well.
Steel Cyclone - 200 potency PBAoE, ignores Defiance damage penalty. Uses stacks and not TP, thus is a TP gain. On the GCD.
Decimate - 280 poteny PBAoE. Uses stacks, does not generate additional aggro. Essentially this is the AoE counterpart to Fell Cleave, and allows for a very large AoE burst as well. On the GCD.
DRK:
Unleashed - 100 potency PBAoE. Uses MP instead of TP and is considered a spell in terms of damage type, although it feeds from the DRK's STR stat as do all of its other "magic" abilities. A free one may be proced by Unmend casts, and is typically used in AoE situations to maintenance aggro on multiple targets as it does not interrupt combos. On the GCD.
Abyssal Drain - 120 potency ranged AoE. Costs noticeably more than Unleashed but deals more damage proportionately, with the same overall enmity value. Offers DRKs a QoL tool enabling them to pull multiple targets at ranged. Notably it has the same range as Unmend and the same radius as Unleashed. Restores HP with Dark Arts, giving a large self-heal in an large-scale AoE encounter. On the GCD.
Dark Passenger - 150 potency line AoE mentioned earlier. Another of the few off-GCD AoEs. Generates no additional enmity.
Salted Earth - 525 potency per 21s every 45s, placed, persisting AoE. Offers DRK additional high oGCD AoE DoT, and can be placed to damage the DRK's target as well as other targets, even those it is not actively tanking.
Offensive Cooldowns/Buffs
PLD:
Fight or Flight (FoF) - +30% for 30/90s. Overall +10%. This is PLD's lone offensive buff. It is independent of stance, however it struggles to fulfill the role of the other tanks' passive buffs (Maim, Darkside) and offensive cooldowns (Berserk, Internal Release, Blood Weapon, DRK's oGCDs) combined in a single ability, and ultimately fails.
This cooldown is readily sufficient in SwO, but in ShO it does not stack up. PLD's lack of a persisting buff such as Maim or Darkside is a large missing aspect of their toolkit.
WAR:
Infuriate - Not wholly an offensive cooldown, but instantly grants +10% crit rate in Deliverance and the resources with which to use extremly high potency abilities, all of which are a DPS gain from its basic combo-based weaponskills.
Unchained - Removes the -25% damage penalty of Defiance. Self explanatory, massive offensive cooldown for MTing. Allows Defiance to function as a defensive cooldown while DPSing but maintaining a large chunk of the DPS available in Deliverance. In keeping with the theme of WAR of large burst DPS, this allows that burstiness to be present even in Defiance.
Berserk - +50% attack power for 20s/90s, 0% (pacification) for 6s afterward. +50% x 20/90 = 11.11, 6/90 = .067, 1-.067=.93, 11.11x.93= roughly 10%, same as
FoF but for attack power instead of damage dealt, verify math if needed. Due to stat modified, this cooldown scales with gear, becoming more powerful as the
WAR gears up. In spite of overall not contributing any more DPS in theory than FoF, it is a much larger increase for a smaller period, further contributing to WAR's very high burst. Independent of stance.
Internal Release - +10% crit for 15s. A cross class skill, but WAR is the only tank to get it.
Maim - +20% damage dealt, potential 100% uptime, and designed to be maintained through a proper combo rotation. Makes tank stance damage noticeably more
potent than PLD, and further boosts OT DPS as well.
Clearly, WAR is designed for burst. When all of these buffs are on cooldown, WAR's DPS is good, but nothing to write home about, if we assume that all tanks in a DPS comparison are partnered with a WAR or NIN for the slashing debuff.
DRK:
Blood Price: Not a direct DPS cooldown, but it provides MP (roughly 5% of max per blow taken regardless of damage inflicted, even if that value is 0, as long as it was not dodged.), which does directly influence DPS.
Blood Weapon: Technically an OT "cooldown". +10% attack speed (GCD recast and auto attack speed), -20% TP cost, and fixed MP return equal to roughly 3% of
max MP per hit including all physical abilities/weaponskills and auto attacks. Returns roughly 3K MP in its duration (15s). 15/40 uptime = 3.75 attack speed increase overall, additional DPS through the added MP and thus additional Dark Arts Usage difficult to quantify, please provide math if you have it (assuming
1-2 extra DA Souleaters for each Blood Weapon cast).
Dark Arts: Not necessarily an offensive cooldown, but offers added potency (100-350 extra potency depending on the skill modified) per cast. Last 10s with a 5s recast. In a typical rotation, Dark Arts is usable about once every 20 seconds assuming a rotation that alternates between Delirium and Dark Arts
Souleater and Dark Arts Carve and Spit on CD, without danger of MP flooring. A conservative rotation will get 3 DA Souleaters and 1 DA C&S per minute adding up to 770 (140*3 + 350) potency per minute added from the cooldown itself. Real math may state otherwise, please verify...
Darkside: Similar to Maim. Proportionate to tank stance penalty (Maim is +20% Defiance is -25%, Darkside is +15% Grit is -20%) but does not "negate" it, due to being present regardless of stance. +15% damage dealt, infinite duration mana providing.
As stated previously much of DRK's DPS comes from oGCDs (2500-3000 potency per minute, roughly) and DoT damage (about 1525 potency per minute). Many of these have short (longest is 60s) recast times, so DRK's are a good bit less bursty, but have high sustained average DPS.
DPS Summary (slashing debuff assumed on all tanks).
PLD:
MT ShO - -20%, FoF, SS procs.
MT SwO - SwO autos, FoF, SS procs.
OT - SwO autos, FoF.
-Large drop-off in DPS from MT to OT with associated stance, small DPS increase from tanking. This means that PLD, similar to DRK as I will outline below, does achieve, albeit by a much smaller margin, its peak potential DPS by tanking outside of tank stance. Rotation/Priority base: PLD is rotational, however it wants to use its pure DPS combos as often as possible. The issue here is that maintaining hate and maximum raid mitigation requires the use of their weakest combo.
WAR:
MT Def - -25%, +25% Unchained (gated by Def), Maim, Berserk, IR.
MT Del - +5% Del, +2-10% crit (stacks), added 80-200 potency in IB-to-FC/SC-to-Dec, Berserk, Maim, IR.
OT - +5% Del, +2-10% crit (stacks), added 80-200 potency in IB-to-FC/SC-to-Dec, Berserk, Maim, IR.
-Much smaller gap between MT and OT. WAR however gains no concrete DPS from actually tanking something, as Unchained only provides a negation to Defiance and not a boost that can be used out of it. Because of this, WAR's entire DPS toolkit favors not only OTing but also Deliverance. (There is no DPS difference between OTing, and MTing in Deliverance. The sole exception to this is the minor increase through Vengeance counterattacks. If someone could provide a % increase math for this that'd be great).
-Rotation/Priority base: WAR is also largely rotational, with some priority being given to Fracture and Stack expenditure as well. Stack management is seemlessly integrated into the rotation, and both its aggro combo and DPS management provide raid DPS increases and WAR's highest DPS. The only flaw in WAR's rotation design is that the use of its main raid-mitigation utility is discouraged in a DPS rotation. Either utility combo maintains Maim automatically.
Stack expenditure does not interrupt combos but it can cause debuffs to fall.
DRK:
MT Grit - -20%, Darkside, all oGCDs, Blood Price, Low Blow and Reprisal procs.
MT Gritless - Darkside, all oGCDs, Blood Price, Blood Weapon, Low Blow and Reprisal procs.
OT - Darkside, all oGCDs minus Reprisal, Blood Weapon.
-Very small gap between MT Grit and OT DPS, as there are sizeable DPS boosts native to both (Blood Price, LB/Rep procs, and Blood Weapon, respectively).
DRK's toolkit overall lends itself to MTing for DPS. However, the DPS difference between OTing and MTing without Grit, is much larger than the other tanks, and DRK's Gritless MT DPS is considerably higher than its plain OT DPS (outmatching OT WARs by many accounts). Blood Weapon is the only part of DRK's DPS toolkit that requires it to be out of tank stance, but there is additional DPS that is tied to getting hit by something, regardless of stance. This can be considered awkward as while a DRK can achieve extremely high DPS while MTing, it must work hard to do so and so must its party.
-Rotation/Priority base: DRK is can be considered rotational but has a much greater emphasis on priority and resource management, and the "set rotation" can vary depending on the state of the DRK's mana. In Grit, a rotation may periodically have to use an extra Delirium combo outside of the typical Delirium-DA SE-repeat rotation. MTing Gritless has more freedom and the combined MP returns of BP and BW can allow for greatly increased DA SE usage at the expense of allowing Delirium to fall. The same can be said of OTing, however it is ideal for sustain to stick to a back-and-forth rotation of these combos, while keeping Scourge up. It basically amounts to alternating Delirium with DA SE, with increased or decreased DA SE usage depending on mitigation needs and incoming MP. The aggro combo is not tied to resource management or utility and thus can be ignored at no cost to the DRK after hate has been established. Maximum DPS is effectively tied to both utility and resource management.
EDIT: The issue with PLD DPS rotationally can best be summarized as a problem arising from their DPS rotation suffering from both DRK and WAR priorities combined. WAR wants to avoid its mitigation combo, DRK wants to avoid its aggro combo. On PLD, they're the same combo (RoH).
Wall of text/explanation incoming:
What this means is that currently, in a raid composition from a DPS perspective, DRK is the ideal MT, and PLD is the ideal OT, assuming they are in your party. WAR is equally suited to both MTing and OTing depending on who the other tank is, but in a vacuum prefers the OT slot as it does not have any largely considerable DPS increase from tanking something, regardless of stance. I.E. ideal tank roles for each composition for DPS are: DRK MT/PLD OT, DRK MT/WAR OT, WAR MT/PLD OT. It is never DPS efficient to make a DRK OT or a PLD MT. This is a large balance issue. In a PLD/WAR comp, the WAR loses far less DPS than the
PLD from MTing, while the DPS difference between the OT WAR's DPS and the OT PLD's DPS is not as vast.
What can we glean from this so far? OT DPS is very neck-and-neck, however WAR is in the lead with PLD trailing behind DRK. DRK is very sustained, oGCD/DoT-based, WAR is very bursty. PLD is somewhere in between. MT DPS sees DRK in the lead by a large margin, WAR offering good DPS as well, with PLD very far behind. In terms of efficiency, PLD struggles to manage aggro/utility and DPS at the same time, but generally does not suffer from this while OTing, although it doesn't want to keep RoH up unless absolutely necessary. WAR manages its own mechanics seamlessly well and suffers very few pitfalls in the rotation, granting enhanced raid DPS or raid mitigation (but typically not both simultaneously) and great personal DPS/aggro management. DRK can suffer from mechanic management but in the hands of a skilled player this is usually a non-issue, whereas aggro management is something that is dealt with at the very beginning of an encounter and then ideally never visited again, moving on to utility and resource management, both of which are married to his maximum DPS potential.
WAR and DRK have some rotational pitfalls and choices to make. However, these choices are largely equal (aggro/dps and raid dps? or aggro/dps and raid mitigation? for WAR, and raid mitigation/mana management and high dps? or somewhat less raid mitigation/mana management and even higher dps? for DRK), and do not present the kind of lose-lose situation that PLD suffers with not 1 but 2 major aspects of the job being tied to the combo that it does not want to use. (RoH providing raid mitigation and aggro).
What we have is two jobs that have very effective combo rotations for their own purposes, with choices to be made that are situational and not at a huge detriment to DPS (in the case of WAR, if SP is needed, the sacrifice is usually worth it), and who achieve pinnacles of tank DPS in one respective role (MT for DRK, OT for WAR). Then we have another tank, PLD, that must make some seriously painful choices in its combo rotation, in which is maximum DPS is tied to only that -its maximum dps -and offers nothing else to the raid or aggro management, and at the same time, is behind the other two tanks in both MT and OT DPS, for no discernable reason of design. We also have the tanks that make contributions to raid DPS most efficiently (WAR brings Storm's Eye, and one could argue that DRK with Scourge and Salted Earth can contribute more meaningfully to DPS on targets that it is not actively tanking with heightened ease compared to the other two) as the two tanks that are the highest on personal DPS as well, bringing a plethora of offensive cooldowns in the form of buffs and/or directly damaging oGCD abilities. PLD has the lowest personal DPS, the lowest raid DPS, the largest DPS sacrifice for its highest-uptime form of raid utility, and exceeds neither of the other tanks in OT or MT roles, offensively.
PLD also suffers from very few ranged DPS options, and equally few AoE DPS options. WAR is able to decimate (pun not intended) targets with its AoEs that pair with its many offensive cooldowns, and DRK has a veritable swiss-army-knife's-worth of ranged and AoE options for any situation.
That completes the DPS portion of this. How's it looking so far? Pretty bad for PLD, yeah? We see fundamental flaws in PLD's offensive design compared to the other two tanks, flaws that are not simply weaknesses that you must mechanically work around through proper play as part of the intended design, like the sacrifice of defensive CDs for stacks on WAR or the high MP costs of DRK. Its just flat-out MISSING stuff.
Resource Management (TP, MP, Stacks, etc.)
PLD:
PLD lost its single form of TP resource management when Shield Swipe was moved off GCD, and even this in 3.0 had become a DPS loss. Now its a DPS gain but a TP loss. Hmm.
PLD can generate enmity without TP through Flash, which costs MP, and doubles as mitigation through the blind outside of raids. However, it deals no damage. Hmm... If chain stunning is needed, Shield Bash is also a massive TP drain.
MP - PLD's Riot Blade and Sheltron recover MP in a fairly consistent fashion. This resource is spent on only two things in its native toolkit: Flash and Clemency. It also fuels Stoneskin, a cross-class skill. We'll talk about the controversy if giving a melee job cast times later. However, PLD has fairly proportionate recovery techniques to the costs of what few abilities use the resource in question, and mana management is not really considered a mechanic of the job in any concrete fashion.
WAR:
TP - WAR could have been said to have TP problems in AoE scenarios prior to 3.0, but even then, between stack expenditure and Berserk downtime, its TP floor took a decent while to hit while in Defiance, but was poor in out of it.
3.0 - Now WAR has Deliverance, which means that the stack expenditure and Berserk downtime are contributing to the general slow-down of its TP usage regardless of the role that it is fulfilling within the party. Even without any other TP recovery, it takes a WAR a very long time to TP floor with constant expenditure of stacks and full Berserk uptime, without the Pacification being cleansed.
Equilibrium - Any WAR that has sat in front of a striking dummy and tried to TP floor, using stacks as soon as they were expendable, keeping Fracture on the dummy, and using Berserk on cooldown can tell you that it is an arduous, time-consuming task. Equilibrium makes that task literally unachievable. WAR is now the only job in the game that pretty much cannot TP floor unless spamming Overpower, and even that can be done considerably longer than before. Its not just the only tank that can't TP floor - its the only JOB that can't TP floor. This raises some eyebrows. To say this is part of WAR's excellent design implies that every other job in the game that can TP floor is of poor design. This isn't a "omg nerf war" thing, respected WAR mains in the community have stated that this is a bit overpowered. On the note of TP sustain, the expenditure of stacks instead of TP for Wrath/Abandon-based weaponskills like IB and FC without even breaking a combo has also been a note of some controversy and has again, been acknowledged by people with no desire to see WAR end up with the short end of the balance stick. Even without Equilibrium entirely, it would take WAR much longer to TP floor than DRK and especially PLD, regardless of stance/role.
WAR does not utilize MP, save for cross classing Flash in early-game leveling.
Stacks... WAR's stacks come naturally through a normal rotation and thus the resource replenishes and refills naturally, and 30s or more of downtime is required to lose these stacks, which is generally not present.
DRK:
TP - At the outset of any encounter, be it a single-target boss pull or a large AoE pull, DRK expends its MP far more than its TP for most of its ranged pulling, AoE, and enmity management, and its TP is reserved for its combos alone. This does give DRK a very slight edge in certain scenarios.
Blood Weapon - With a 10% Attack Speed increase combined with a 20% TP usage decrease, Blood Weapon is a TP gain of about 60-70TP per minute. Slight, but it
noticeably slows TP consumption and while it is up, your TP regenerates faster than you can deplete it.
Notably, unless tanking outside of Grit, DRK has no means of TP recovery/consumption slowing while MTing. While it does not have any TP vampire attacks with all of its weaponskills costing 70 TP or less, and its DoT skill being a cheap 60 TP, this is still an issue.
MP - Mana management is DRK's main mechanic and as such it is a relatively stream-lined affair. If a proper rotation is maintained MP flooring is relatively difficult, however skills such as C&S and defensive CDs that need DA can pepper the rotation with spike-MP consumption that has to be predicted and accounted for. However, between Blood Price, Blood Weapon, Syphon Strike, and the occasional un-DAed C&S in AoE situations and Sole Survivor, DRK is essentially the BLM of tanks and can maintain its MP indefinitely. People have cited MP issues relating to costs of abilities in proportion to a lvl 60 DRK's total MP pool, however these issues can be worked around/predicted and are largely the result of player error.
What can we glean from this?
PLD and DRK both use TP and MP, albeit to a much lesser extent with the latter on PLD. WAR uses only TP, but essentially has an infinite amount and it is extremely difficult, if not impossible, to run out on a single-target boss fight. DRK and PLD do not have this luxury, and while it is true that there are enough mechanical interruptions in 90% of the fights in the game right now that are relevant and current for this not to be an issue, it is still worrisome.
However, the main issue that we see in terms of overall game balance is that every DPS job that uses TP has a substantial means to recover it, without having INFINITE TP. WAR has infinite TP while PLD and DRK run out faster than most DPS jobs, which have access to Invigorate from DRG or some other resource. Here we see WAR being clearly ahead of not only DRK and PLD but just about every other job in the game that uses TP, with not really any real justification, mechanical or otherwise. Hmm...
Utility: I will cover personal utility here as well as raid utility. This means I will include abilities that only benefit the job itself provided they are not defensive CDs or self-heals.
PLD:
Rage of Halone - 100% uptime -10% strength down at the expense of DPS. Theoretical 100% uptime, but now that it is, as of 3.0, tied to PLD's weakest combo, it is typically only applied when absolutely necessary, or for the enhanced enmity. Questionable utility as-is, as raid-wide damage is almost always magical, with only a handful of examples to the contrary.
Tempered Will - Self-cleanse of bind and heavy effects, prevents knockbacks maximizing personal DPS uptime and simplifying certain mechanics.
Stoneskin - Cross-class from CNJ(WHM). Effective utility for personal and spot raid mitigation, however the cast time causes a large DPS loss and is prone to interruption.
Cover - Can save lives when the situation allows for its use. Only covers physical damage. Someone please provide info on whether defensive CDs from the PLD or the covered party member or both influence the net damage transferred to the PLD, can't recall at the moment. Is off-GCD and thus provides no DPS loss if the player acts quickly.
Clemency - See Stoneskin. Provides effective spot healing, and self healing, but is prone to interrupts. Many state that it is feasible to time correctly to maximize its effectiveness, however it is still a large DPS loss, even moreso while OTing which is the only scenario in which interruption is not a threat. Can have an effective cure potency of 1800 if cast on a party member.
Divine Veil - Grants a shield totalling a percentage of the PLD's HP to all party members in range. The requirement of a heal to proc the shield, as well as its limited range and lengthy recast time are the big issues. Is very effective when stacked with SCH and AST shields (which it does, incidentally, stack
with) to further mitigate heavy raid-wide nukes. Again, like many of PLD's numerous utility abilities, it is very situational and requires many circumstances to be met in order to be effective.
Shield Bash - On-GCD stun, the only physical chain-stun in the game. Situational, but has proven extremely effective in the past. Is a massive TP drain.
Spirits Within - Off-GCD Silence. Part of the DPS rotation, is a DPS loss to save, but again, has proven to be situationally useful. One of the few Silences in the game, and the only one given to a tank.
WAR:
Storm's Eye - 100% uptime -10% slashing resistance at no expense of DPS, enmity, or resource management. Benefits the WAR themselves as well as DRK, PLD, and NIN. A skilled WAR always keeps this up even with the delay inherent in Fracture uptime and spending GCDs on stacks, and thus it is an expected and guaranteed utility.
Storm's Path - 100% uptime -10% damage dealt at the expense of personal (BB) OR raid (SE) DPS. Has a theoretical 100% uptime, but in practice is typically only applied when absolutely necessary for a tank buster or raid-wide nuke.
Brutal Swing - Off-GCD stun with a short cooldown. Similar to stuns shared by numerous other melee jobs.
Holmgang - Targeted bind and knockback prevention, although infrequently used for this purpose.
DRK:
Delirium - 100% uptime -10% intelligence down at no expense of DPS, enmity, or resource management. Does not stack with the MNK ability Dragon Kick. Delirium is a dedicated part of DRK's DPS and resource management and thus is always applied, and is still used regardless of if a MNK is present.
Reprisal - A maximum of 66.6666...% uptime -10% damage dealt at no expense. Duration and recast give it a built-in minimum of 10s downtime. Off the GCD and
not combo-locked. Requires a parry to proc, which synergizes with Dark Dance, a parry-rate boosting cooldown. It has been suggested that in the 20s that this cooldown lasts that it is statistically impossible to not get a Reprisal proc, and it follows that in the 40 seconds of downtime remaining on the recast that it is also improbable to not get a second, assuming there is active and consistent incoming physical damage. May be applied twice per minute (i.e. once at 15s, again at 45s, or at 9s, and again at 39s). In practice, has closer to 50% uptime rather than the statistical maximum of 66%. Stacks with Storm's Path.
Salted Earth - I'm including this based on the fact that it can be placed away from your target and thus benefit the rest of your raid in bringing down another target or add. It qualifies as DPS utility in my eyes, but feel free to argue the contrary.
Low Blow - Off-GCD stun. Slightly longer recast (25s), but parry procs can reset the recast timer. In practice it is difficult to chain-stun something with this, although certainly possible. Can only be considered a stun and not necessarily a chain-stun, any procs are readily utilized for added DPS.
Plunge - Considering this as gap-closers can technically prevent knockbacks, and thus negate positioning problems and the resultant loss of DPS in such cases. Maximizing tank uptime on a target also minimizes enmity worries for the rest of the party.
All told, all the tanks have varied and arguably complete utility toolkits. All of them have some sort of stun or interrupt, knockback prevention, and raid mitigation buffs, while DRK and WAR have specific DPS boosters/additives and PLD has party defensive buffs. WAR's Path is famous for its usefulness, and DRK's Delirium+Reprisal kit, both of which stack with Path, arguably offer equivalent mitigation combined. DRK's various QoL tools and unique abilities can be used beneficial ways for themselves and the party, and WAR's slashing debuff is a borderline necessity. The issue here is the same as with DPS. PLD falls behind WAR and DRK considerably in that its utilities are extremely situational and/or gated be cooldowns/heavy resource drain/cast times, and the single utility that isn't, Rage of Halone, is arguably only marginally useful to anyone but the MT, and keeping it up is a tremendous DPS drain.
Enmity (e):
PLD:
ShO x2e, 80% DPS
Shield Lob - 120p x 3e = 360e
Flash - 600e
Fast Blade/Savage Blade/RoH - 150 + (200p x 3e = 600e) + (260p x 5e = 1300e) = 1900e
Fast Blade/Savage Blade/RA - 150 + (200p x 3e = 600e) + 340 = 1090e
Circle of Scorn - 100p x 3e + 150DoT = 450e
WAR:
Def x2e, 75% DPS
Tomahawk - 120p x 3e = 360e
Heavy Swing/Skull Sunder/BB - 150 + (200p x 3.5e = 700e) + (280p x 5.5e = 1540e) = 2390e
Overpower - 120p x 5e = 600e
Steel Cyclone - 200p x 3e = 600e + 25% = 750e (?) Verify if it works like this...
DRK:
Grit x2.3e, 80% DPS
Unmend - 150p x 3e = 450e
Hard Slash/Spin Slash/PS - 150 + (220p x 3e = 660e) + (300p x 5.5e = 1650e) = 2460e
-DA PS - 150 + (220p x 3e = 660e) + (300p x 6.5e = 1650e) = 2760e
Unleash - 100p x 6e = 600e
Abyssal Drain - 120p x 5e = 600e
And then it was written that every PLD on the planet said WTF. Lowest DPS and lowest enmity modifiers. Back when it was just WAR/PLD, it was different. PLD only ever used its hate combo, and WAR's DPS loss from Def was higher, so it had Maim and higher modifiers to make up for those potencies (and overall wound up getting more hate in the end, but not by a huge margin. Now we have DRK, who outDPSes both of them in the MT slot (where you care about enmity), and yes,
its optimal DPS ignores its enmity generators, but the amount of hate they were given is borderline overkill. A DA PS is generally the first and last nail in enmity's coffin for an entire 10-13min encounter, unless Grit is off for the entire time and you have a solo-healing WHM, then you might have to hit it again. But still. We're seeing a theme here aren't we?
Defense/Mitigation -
I will do my best to do side-by-side comparisons of what I believe to be equivalent abilities, but many people will have their own ideas of what is equivalent to what, etc. So excuse that in advance.
Rampart/Shadowskin - moderate mitigation moderate uptime
-20s durations, 90s recasts, 20% damage taken reduction. High, moderate duration phys+mag mitigation with moderate recast. WAR has no equivalent.
Sentinel/Vengeance/Shadow Wall - high mitigation low uptime
-40% for 10/180s, 30% for 10/180s, and 30% for 15/120s + counterattacks. WAR wins hard here. All mitigate phys+mag. These are the big mitigation CDs and WAR has almost double the uptime on its version while also getting a DPS increase from it.
Inner Beast/Reprisal - mechanic-reliant, active mitigation w/ high uptime/frequent usage
-20% for self for 6s every 5 stacks (typically every 8 GCDs or 15-20s), -10% for entire raid for 20s every 30, proc providing. Phys+mag. PLD has no equivalent.
Rage of Halone/Storm's Path/Delirium - combo-based debuffs
-10% phys for raid, -10% phys+mag for raid, -10% mag for raid. Path wins, although Delirium will see higher uptime for priority reasons. RoH loses in potency and in motivation to maintain uptime.
Bulwark/Raw Intuition/Dark Dance - phys only/block+parry+evasion
-15% block rate for 15/180s, 100% parry rate for 20/90s, 30% parry rate for 20/60s. RI carries a flank/rear penalty that must be covered with Awareness, DD has high uptime and an added evasion bonus, although this is only useful in dungeons or old boss fights. RI is often used for stacks, and DD is often used for Reprisal procs for added guaranteed raid-wide mitigation and personal DPS. PLD's block has higher mitigation per proc, but has very poor uptime and overwrites potential parries due to the way damage is rolled. Each ability has flaws and benefits. All are phys only.
Sheltron/Thrill of Battle/Dark Mind- unique CDs
-Unique CDs for each job. PLD is phys defense, WAR is HP, DRK is mag defense. They're all very good CDs. ToB technically covers all damage while Sheltron and
DM offer direct mitigation to one damage type or the other at a high percentage for a short duration. The appear to have balanced durations and recasts, with ToB having the longest recast but same uptime as DM, and with Sheltron being similar but only counting for a single attack requiring perfect timing. WAR mains give math on ToBs eHP boost and theoretical mitigation? WAR seems to arguably win here.
Clemency+Stoneskin/Equilibrium+Second Wind/Souleater+Sole Survivor - self heals.
-Clemency and Stoneskin are both spells and therefore awkward on a melee, tank job. They have the benefit of being the only abilities that any tank can
directly cast on a party member to support them, but this comes at a big DPS opportunity cost. They can be used for mitigation, but the other tools PLD has generally render them useless, as most don't want to stop and cast for mitigation as opposed to weaving mitigation between GCDs. WAR destroys here. Off-GCD self-heal, boostable with cooldowns, available every minute, instant cast. Second Wind is weaker but further supplements it, and can easily have high returns when boosted. DRK is in a different boat, having almost no burst healing but instead active, constant, regen-esque self-healing, with a 400 potency (the equivalent of Second Wind) heal every 3-7 GCDs (depending on Scourge application and if Blood Weapon is active allowing for consecutive DA SE usage. It is also limited to being Grit-only, however Equilibrium is likewise Defiance only (for healing). Sole Survivor provides a powerful percentage based heal but it
rarely provides actual healing when healing is needed (similar problem to Mercy Stroke) and is far more valued for the equivalent percentage based mana restore.
Traited Convalescence+Awareness/Traited Bloodbath+Foresight - traited cooldowns
-PLD has a powerful 30% Convalescence, and an Awareness that lasts 10s longer (25s) giving it far more chance to see actual returns from it. WAR's Bloodbath
has double the duration, and Foresight has a shorter recast. DRK can crossclass all of these abilities but has none of these advantages or equivalent traits that give it an edge.
Cross-class Tank Cooldown usage:
PLD:
-If tanking in SwO, Bloodbath can see some very high returns.
-Foresight pairs well with Sheltron and Bulwark.
WAR:
-Convalescence has incredible synergy with ToB.
-Awareness has equally terrific synergy with RI.
DRK:
-Bloodbath+Blood Weapon and DRK's many oGCDs, and self-healing from DA SE, can be very effective when tanking in or out of Grit.
-Foresight offers some much needed extra physical cushion and pairs well with most of DRK's native CDs.
-Convalescence can save your WHM a Bene when using LD. Adds cushion to DRK's higher uptime but weaker CDs such as DD.
-Awareness again pairs very well with DD and greatly increases the effectiveness of the CD by negating crits that will bypass Parry.
Oh Shi-- Buttons:
PLD:
Hallowed Ground - Unequivocally the best. Requires zero healer intervention, completely mitigates all mitigateable damage, and lasts 10 seconds. Its only
downside is its 7min cooldown.
WAR:
Holmgang - Binds the player and the target. On that note, requires a target. Will not drop below 1HP for 6s. IMO, the best thing about this CD is its 180s
recast which is insanely short for something that prevents death. Also prevents knockbacks. WAR is very well equipped to heal itself back up from here by a considerable amount, so does not necessarily require an extreme amout of healer intervention, but it can.
DRK:
Living Dead - Has an activation window before the actual buff kicks in. The window and the buff are both 10 seconds but can be ended early. The Living dead buff ends when HP drops to 1 and the Walking dead buff ends when a value of heals are received totalling your max HP. Absolutely requires healer intervention. 5 minute recast, longer than Holmgang but shorter than Hallowed Ground. The benefit of this ability is its high potential optime per use, up to almost 20s in extreme cases.
Each Job has a department where they lack an equivalent (WAR lacks a Shadowskin/Rampart equivalent, PLD lacks an IB/Reprisal equivalent, and DRK lacks any traits to boost the cross-classable abilities). However, what's the 1 job that clearly shines in several different areas? WAR.
Stats:
In a Parry scaling testing thread on the forums (will find link later) that was made shortly after 3.0 launched, there seemed to be evidence to suggest that parry scaling is different between the three tanks, albeit by VERY marginal amounts. The general sense of the thread seemed to suggest that DRK's parry scaling was somewhat higher than the other two tanks, I can only presume (if this is true) that it is to make up for the fact that PLD has a shield, and WAR's Wrath stacks now offer a 2-10% parry bonus. This is a neglible difference if it is actually present, I'm mentioning it for completion's sake.
Up until this point, I've been very piece-meal and have broken everything down into sections based on the different aspects, overall, of tanking in this game. Now I'll be giving a TL
R of each job. I will NOT be including any "false-cons" including disadvantages that only arise in the hands of a poor player (stack mismanagement/blowing defensive CDs for stacks when it is inappropriate to do so on WAR, or letting DRK MP floor/blinding/evasion boosting on DRK when Blood Price is up, crap like that.)
1: PLD
Pros:
1. High-powered defensive cooldowns
2. Very effective on-demand physical mitigation
3. Hallowed Ground
4. Block mitigates more per proc than parry; SLIGHTLY better passive mitigation.
5. Can actively, directly support other members of its party through direct targeted heals and mitigation.
6. When the occasion arises, Cover is an extremely powerful ability.
7. Only tank with a silence and a chain-stun.
8. Divine Veil stacks with healer shields providing very effective extra mitigation from Gigaflare-style raid-wide nukes.
9. Sword Oath provides the largest boost to base DPS out of all the tanks' OT toolkits, at 13-15% (Verify).
10. Mitigates physical raid damage.
Cons:
1. Most of its defensive cooldowns have extremely long recast times; Bulwark and Hallowed ground in particular.
2. Has only two cooldowns that will effectively mitigate magic damage.
3. Block overwrites parry in damage rolls, causing the job to see reduced returns from parry instead of the two procs occuring additively.
4. Utilities directed at other members of the party are awkward to use on a melee job and prone to interruption without precise timing, making them situational at best, and a DPS loss 100% of the time.
5. Divine Veil and Cover are devalued or disallowed altogether by many mechanics or lack thereof in endgame encounters.
6. Lowest MT and OT DPS.
7. As of 3.0, has a conflicting toolkit in which it benefits from both MTing (SS procs, ability to block in general) and OTing (much higher relative DPS, freedom to cast).
8. In spite of having a shield, its synergy with the other two tanks means it will never be in the MT slot in a group that wants to maximize DPS.
9. Combo rotation divorces DPS from both enmity and utility.
10. Very poor enmity generation compared to the other two tanks. Tanking out of ShO is cumbersome when it comes to enmity.
11. Stances are costly not just for MP but for the GCD that they cost, but the disruption to the combo rotation.
12. AoE DPS is nigh nonexistant.
13. As of 3.1, it has literally no form of TP management short of stopping to cast something.
14. Has a limited/incomplete kit as far as offensive cooldowns go, both in the form of damaging abilities and buffs.
2: WAR
Pros:
1. Highest OT DPS, hands down.
2. Highest burst out of all the tanks. Many high potency offensive buffs and Fell Cleave lend themselves to this talent.
3. The only tank that offers a DPS benefit to the raid, including the other two tanks. A group without a WAR needs a NIN (one using an inefficient rotation to boot) to get the most DPS out of its tanks.
4. Storm's Path mitigates all raid damage by 10% and is gated only by a combo.
5. Its death-prevention cooldown has the shortest recast time of all the tanks and can be up 2-4 times in a given encounter.
6. Solid MT DPS and terrific threat generation.
7. Inner Beast, while short in duration, is readily accessible and mitigates big hits when they happen, when it matters.
8. Good physical mitigation and decent magical mitigation.
9. Ability to manipulate its max HP means it can reach a bare minimum threshold to survive tankbusters with minimal percentage-based mitigation.
10. Tank stances are off GCD, allowing it to seemlessly weave between them.
11. Tremendous AoE burst DPS.
12. Combo rotation keeps its DPS, enmity, and raid dps synergized.
13. A small one, but Defiance's healing buff, as well as any Convalescence uptime, can benefit the entire raid when used in conjunction with deployment tactics.
14. While none of its cooldowns have recasts shorter than 90s, none of them are longer than 120s.
15. Has only a single non-combo-based weaponskill (Fracture) that will interrupt its combos.
16. Practically infinite TP.
17. Unequivocally the best tank for self-healing. WAR survives in the absence of a healer for considerably longer assuming it is played defensively in that scenario.
18. The abilities gated by its MT/OT stances are easily accessible from one or the other due to stance dancing and the transferrence of stacks.
Cons: (There are 7 listed here, but honestly only like 1 or 2 of them are substantial, true disadvantages...)
1. Use of enmity combo in DPS rotation does not synergize with the other two tanks should they desire to drop their tank stance, as neither of them wants to use their enmity combo unless absolutely necessary.
2. Storm's Path is a DPS loss and in practice, it is usually only on a target when absolutely vital.
3. Has no direct DPS benefit from tanking something; OT DPS and MT w/o tank stance DPS are essentially equal.
4. Piggybacking off the above, it loses its most frequently used mitigation tool and its most potent self-heal when tanking outside of tank stance, which is a much bigger defensive sacrifice than the other two tanks make (this is largely moot however as it can stance-dance so seamlessly).
5. In between Fell Cleave/Berserk bursts, its DPS is more average.
6. Holmgang's duration can be dangerously short, and binds you in place.
7. Arguably, its tank stance requires healer intervention to achieve its theoretical eHP potential. (I'm trying really hard to think of cons, okay!?)
3: DRK
Pros:
1. Highest MT DPS, regardless of stance.
2. Good OT DPS.
3. DPS is steadily high, with no huge bursts or troughs, synergizing well with WAR.
4. Has arguably the most complete AoE DPS toolkit, having a line AoE, PBAoE, a ranged AoE, and a placed AoE DoT. AoE DPS is very high although not as bursty as WAR.
5. High DoT DPS.
6. Most of the job's native defensive cooldowns have recasts of 60-90s.
7. oGCD damaging abilities are potent and have 20-60s recasts.
8. Self-healing, while not particularly powerful, its constant and sustained.
9. Highest default threat generation of all the tanks; other jobs relatively safe from pulling hate and rarely need to hold back to avoid stealing enmity.
10. Provides effective raid mitigation in Delirium+Reprisal, the application of which is tied to its maximum DPS; always a DPS gain to keep them up as much as possible, and the added magic mitigation tends to more effective as raid-wide damage is ubiquitously magical.
11. Salted Earth and Scourge allow DRK to more easily contribute DPS to targets it is not actively tanking.
12. Plunge situationally aids in positioning-related mechanics.
13. Extremely high magic mitigation.
14. When parry is unavoidable on gear, DRK tends to benefit the most from it in terms of DPS, mitigation, and raid mitigation (Reprisal, Low Blow).
15. TP consumption is slowed when OTing/MTing outside of Grit, and disabling Grit comes at minimal cost.
16. Ranged/AoE abilities do not consume TP; MP can be maintained indefinitely.
17. Living Dead can provide an extended period of healer DPS, if planned accordingly.
Cons:
1. Due to having substantial DPS benefits both to OTing and getting hit, MTing outside of Grit is encouraged for considerably higher maximum DPS. DRK's entire toolkit lends itself to MTing and doing it dangerously.
2. The same benefits to getting hit are absent from OTing, meaning an OT DRK is not able to milk the job for its maximum potential.
3. Its burst is brief and small, in spite of its overall sustain being higher.
4. In a fight without adds or large-scale AoE phases, does nothing to contribute to raid DPS.
5. Reprisal can be unreliable unless you are using Dark Dance to force it.
6. While Dark Dance+Reprisal and the cross class skill Foresight can go some ways toward mitigating this it only has these + 2 other cooldowns for physical damage. Not as bad as PLD for magic, but still not good.
7. Enabling Grit is on/triggers the GCD.
8. Shadow Wall is weaker for no defineable reason (If I had to guess, I'd say Reprisal is meant to make up for it).
9. Living Dead requires heavy healer intervention and/or resource consumption.
10. Weak TP sustain especially while MTing in Grit.
Alright.
So what does all this mean?
Well, for one thing, it means tanks are not balanced.
Lets have a cursory look at the other jobs:
Healers:
WHM - crazy healing output but low raid utility, the de-facto solo-healer, Bene and Holy are insane. Great DPS.
SCH - great mitigation/spot healing, de-facto off-healer, slightly lower healing output, great raid utility, incredible sustained DPS.
AST - good healing output and mitigation but weaker on the DPS side, but AWESOME raid utility on all fronts (DPS, mitigation, resource management, etc.)
See the balance there? Each has their niche as far as healing, and as DPS decends, raid utility ascends.
I'm not going to go into DPS jobs as they are well.. DPS jobs, and there is a readily defineable inverse curve in raid utility-to DPS with all of them.
Tanks:
PLD - lowest overall DPS, great mitigation, lowest in-practice utility
WAR - highest OT DPS, great mitigation and self-healing, excellent utility, infinite resources.
DRK - highest MT DPS, great migigation, excellent utility
Some of you remember me as the author of that infamous WAR nerfing thread. I've gained some perspective since then, and even in that thread I confessed that
my changes were largely shooting-off-at-the-mouth.
The general consensus amongst most endgame players is that WAR should not be nerfed but that the other tanks should be brought up to its level. The issue
with this, especially in regards to PLD, is the sheer number and magnitude of those changes would result in a complete rebuilding of the job. Here is where I
agree and disagree with this:
-PLD's raid-contribution to DPS should absolutely be brought in line with WAR. However, many have said that for this to come in the form of personal DPS does not make sense in the context of the jobs design or theme.
-PLD's overall ability to self-heal or in its specific case, offer healing utility to the party, needs some tweaking.
-PLD's enmity needs a complete re-working from the ground up. Since 3.0, it no longer makes any sense for them to have the lowest enmity modifiers.
-PLD does need some form of TP management. No idea how this would be implemented mid-expansion.
-WAR does not need infinite TP.
-WAR does not need the degree of survivability that it currently has in the absence of healers.
-WAR's Wrath/Abandon-based weaponskills not interrupting combos and being able to be used anywhere in the rotation with almost no penalty feels excessive.
***These are changes/issues that have been acknowledged by many well-known end-game WAR mains including Xeno and Layla. Implementing changes such as these would not change the fact that they have excellent mitigation, extremely high OT DPS, and terrific utility.
-DRK needs some additional form of TP management aside from Blood Weapon, especially for times when it must stay in Grit.
-DRK could use another minor form of self-healing.
-Not necessary, but cooldowns such as Shadowskin and Shadow Wall feel like they should have Dark Arts effects.
Here is a hypothetical example kit of changes. These are meant to be as minimal as possible, using tools the jobs already have and not implementing any pie-in-the-sky new abilities.
PLD: Adjustments to enmity, cast times, combo priority, TP management, and party utilities.
1. Shield Oath enmity modifier changed to 2.5x to make up for their lower personal damage output.
-Currently Defiance and Grit are 2.3x AND their respective tanks have higher personal DPS. Bringing Shield Oath up from 2x to 2.5x will mitigate this.
2. Rage of Halone enmity modifier changed to 5.5x (same as BB and unbuffed PS).
-Same idea as above; there's no reason it should be 5x.
3. Clemency (and Stoneskin) cast times remain, but are uninterruptible at the cost of binding you in place similar to Holmgang.
-Its clear that SE designed this ability, which has no gate other than its MP cost and can heal both you and a party member simultaneously, to have a cast time to make up for that. In keeping with that theme, this will allow you to avoid interruptions that you would otherwise certainly have while tanking, but still force you to use it intelligently.
4. Sheltron restores 50 TP upon block in addition to MP.
-Additional TP management provided while MTing.
5. TP costs of all combo-enders reduced to 50 TP.
-Overall TP management.
6. Divine Veil recast shortened to 120s.
-This ability's recast time is unanimously considered to be too long for what it does.
7. Rage of Halone now provides Slashing debuff instead.
-Much needed raid DPS increase.
8. In Sword Oath, if Clemency is cast on a party member, it restores 100 TP instead of the heal.
-Additional TP management provided while OTing.
9. Shield Swipe now has a conal AoE. Pacification only applied to current target.
-Mitigates poor AoE DPS issue.
10. Goring Blade Duration extended to 30s
11. Sheltron recast increased to 50s, but can block magic damage. Regular blocking including that under the effect of Bulwark still only blocks physical damage.
12. Cover range extended to 25y (same as Provoke).
-Slight personal DPS increase to make up for maintaining the RoH Slashing Debuff.
***These adjustments grant PLD raid DPS increases, AoE DPS fixes, TP sustain, and adjustments to its otherwise very situational utilities, while also giving them proper enmity balance against the other two tanks. Their personal single-target DPS was not touched outside of benefitting from their own Slashing Debuff.
WAR: Adjustments to self-healing, TP, and Wrath expenditure.
1. Equilibrium recast increased to 80s. In Deliverance, provides a 400 potency self-heal and 100 TP.
-Makes WAR's self healing slightly less overpowered considering the power of ToB, IB, and Second Wind, while keeping its overall potency and instant cast. Extends the self-heal aspect to OTing as well, and lowers the TP sustain down to more reasonable levels considering the lack of a TP cost on all Wrath/Abandon abilities and the TP regen during Pacification.
2. Using Inner Beast/Steel Cyclone or Fell Cleave/Decimate will interrupt combos. Infuriate recast reduced to 50s.
-Requires WAR to use these abilities more intelligently over the course of the fight as opposed to being able to use them willy-nilly in the middle of a combo. Infuriate recast reduced to make sure this does not damage their burst potential.
3. Storm's Eye now gives Halone debuff. Potency increased to 280.
-See PLD. This means WAR still has the highest OT DPS and great MT DPS, but no longer ALSO provides the best raid DPS increase. Will not change rotation as
Storm's Eye is still more potent than Storm's Path, but will make the DPS loss less punishing if Path must be chosen instead.
***No one WANTS to nerf WAR, I understand. However these changes barely touch its DPS or mitigation at all, keep its self-healing high (and actually extend that self-healing to Deliverance), and maintain its various methods of TP restoration and sustain with slight adjustments to bring it more in line with the TP sustain of other melee jobs, including not just tanks, but DPS as well. Even Xeno has mentioned a few of these adjustments as possible future changes on MogTalk.
DRK: Changes to cooldowns to provide slightly more physical mitigation options, more choices to make with Dark Arts, some minor TP boosts, and an extra piece of raid utility.
1. Dark Arts will provide a 10s recast time reduction to both Shadow Wall and Shadowskin.
-Provides additional Dark Arts effect choices between defensive cooldowns, and allows DRK slightly more frequent options in fights with physical tank-busters.
2. Sole Survivor provides a 20% TP restore.
-Overall TP sustain buff.
3. Using Dark Arts on Sole Survivor enables it to be cast on a party member, and shortens its next recast to 90s. If they survive for the next 15s, they are healed for 10% of their maximum HP, TP, and MP.
-Some extra party utility and additional Dark Arts usage.
4. Whenever Dark Arts is applied to Power Slash or Souleater, their TP cost is halved. In Grit, Souleater restores 20 TP in addition to the self-heal. Self heal out of Grit added at 50% of damage dealt, self heal in Grit increased to 150%.
-Provides slight additional overall and MT TP sustain, while bringing Self-healing more in line with the potential of WAR and PLD.
5. Dark Arts Dark Dance now provides a 20% Parry strength increase as well as evasion. (i.e. it will have a use on bosses where you cannot dodge).
-Gives Dark Arts Dark Dance a use in raids.
***This all looks like a lot but its actually not much. It actually increases the skill cap of DRK by forcing Dark Arts usage to be more intelligent as you now have more choices. There's a bit of extra party utility, more TP sustain while MTing and in general, some slight boosts to self-healing since DRK has no huge Clemency/Equilibrium equivalent, and some slight adjustments to its potential for physical mitigation. DPS was not touched.
ALL:
Awareness duration fixed at 25s untraited, trait reduces recast to 90s.
-Awareness' 15s duration while cross-classed is too short. Should be longer. D:
None of the tank/dps stances interrupt combos.
-Def/Del never did, but at the very least, Grit/Swo/ShO should not. Their MP costs and being on the GCD remain.
If anyone has suggestions for other/different changes feel free to provide them. This is within a single-expansion context, so no new abilities, just adjustments to existing ones.
With these adjustments, all the tanks now how have TP management tools, all the tanks have viable or at the very least useful self-healing options, all the tanks have viable raid utility, DRK brings high MT and sustained DPS, WAR brings high OT and burst DPS, PLD brings raid DPS buff, and all tanks can meaningfully debuff the enemy. In addition, all the tanks still maintain their own unique playstyle.
Lets revisit that Pros/Cons section now, with these adjustments in mind. Adjusted Pros with "+++" and Adjusted Cons with "------------"
1: PLD
Pros:
1. High-powered defensive cooldowns
2. Very effective on-demand physical mitigation
3. Hallowed Ground
4. Block mitigates more per proc than parry; SLIGHTLY better passive mitigation.
5. Can actively, directly support other members of its party through direct targeted heals and mitigation+++without interruption and with decent uptime.
6. When the occasion arises, Cover is an extremely powerful ability.
7. Only tank with a silence and a chain-stun.
8. Divine Veil stacks with healer shields providing very effective extra mitigation from Gigaflare-style raid-wide nukes.
9. Sword Oath provides the largest boost to base DPS out of all the tanks' OT toolkits, at 13-15% (Verify).
10. Mitigates physical raid damage+++Now given to WAR.
11. Provides Slashing Debuff.+++
12. Good TP sustain while MTing and OTing through Sheltron and Clemency respectively.
Cons:
1. Most of its defensive cooldowns have extremely long recast times; Bulwark and Hallowed ground in particular.
2. ------------Now has 3 cooldowns that will effectively mitigate magic damage.
3. Block overwrites parry in damage rolls, causing the job to see reduced returns from parry instead of the two procs occuring additively.
4. ------------Divine Veil can now be used much more often, Clemency is a TP gain while OTing and cannot be interrupted.
5. ------------See #4, also Cover can now be used much more reliably and easily
6. ------------MT and OT DPS remains the same, but provides raid DPS increases now through the slashing debuff.
7. ------------See #4, 5, and 6.
8. ------------Can now perform adequately in both positions.
9. ------------Now uses RoH for slashing debuff and focuses DPS in the other rotations.
10. -----------Shield Oath and RoH enmity boosts mean PLD now has sufficient enmity generation to make up for low personal DPS.
11. -----------Stances still on GCD with MP cost, but can be used in between combos.
12. -----------Shield Swipe now provides additional AoE DPS while tanking.
13. -----------Lowered TP costs and Sheltron+Clemency now provide good and sufficient TP sustain.
14. -----------Now is the only tank that offers a raid DPS increase.
------------Voila, PLD is good now.
2: WAR
Pros:
1. Highest OT DPS, hands down.
2. Highest burst out of all the tanks. Many high potency offensive buffs and Fell Cleave lend themselves to this talent.
3. +++Mitigates physical damage for the rest of the raid at all times.
4. Storm's Path mitigates all raid damage by 10% and is gated only by a combo.
5. Its death-prevention cooldown has the shortest recast time of all the tanks and can be up 2-4 times in a given encounter.
6. Solid MT DPS and terrific threat generation.
7. Inner Beast, while short in duration, is readily accessible and mitigates big hits when they happen, when it matters.
8. Good physical mitigation and decent magical mitigation.
9. Ability to manipulate its max HP means it can reach a bare minimum threshold to survive tankbusters with minimal percentage-based mitigation.
10. Tank stances are off GCD, allowing it to seemlessly weave between them.
11. Tremendous AoE burst DPS.
12. Combo rotation keeps its DPS, enmity, and raid mitigation+++ synergized.
13. A small one, but Defiance's healing buff, as well as any Convalescence uptime, can benefit the entire raid when used in conjunction with deployment tactics.
14. While none of its cooldowns have recasts shorter than 90s, none of them are longer than 120s.
15. Has only a single non-combo-based weaponskill (Fracture) that will interrupt its combos.
16. +++Great TP sustain through Equilibrium and stack expenditure in place of TP.
17. +++Multiple self-healing tools in MT and OT roles.
18. The abilities gated by its MT/OT stances are easily accessible from one or the other due to stance dancing and the transferrence of stacks.
Cons: (There are 7 listed here, but honestly only like 1 or 2 of them are substantial, true disadvantages...)
1. Use of enmity combo in DPS rotation does not synergize with the other two tanks should they desire to drop their tank stance, as neither of them wants to use their enmity combo unless absolutely necessary.
2. Storm's Path is a DPS loss and in practice, it is usually only on a target when absolutely vital.
3. Has no direct DPS benefit from tanking something; OT DPS and MT w/o tank stance DPS are essentially equal.
4. ------------Inner Beast still native to tank stance, but Equilibrium now restores some HP in Deliverance as well.
5. In between Fell Cleave/Berserk bursts, its DPS is more average.
6. Holmgang's duration can be dangerously short, and binds you in place.
7. Arguably, its tank stance requires healer intervention to achieve its theoretical eHP potential. (I'm trying really hard to think of cons, okay!?)
---------Lets be real, most of these barely qualify as cons.
3: DRK
Pros:
1. Highest MT DPS, regardless of stance.
2. Good OT DPS.
3. DPS is steadily high, with no huge bursts or troughs, synergizing well with WAR.
4. Has arguably the most complete AoE DPS toolkit, having a line AoE, PBAoE, a ranged AoE, and a placed AoE DoT. AoE DPS is very high although not as bursty as WAR.
5. High DoT DPS.
6. Most of the job's native defensive cooldowns have recasts of 60-90s.
7. oGCD damaging abilities are potent and have 20-60s recasts.
8. Self-healing+++ is not as bursty as PLD or WAR, but is constant and sustained.
9. Highest default threat generation of all the tanks; other jobs relatively safe from pulling hate and rarely need to hold back to avoid stealing enmity.
10. Provides effective raid mitigation in Delirium+Reprisal, the application of which is tied to its maximum DPS; always a DPS gain to keep them up as much as possible, and the added magic mitigation tends to more effective as raid-wide damage is ubiquitously magical.
11. Salted Earth and Scourge allow DRK to more easily contribute DPS to targets it is not actively tanking.
12. Plunge situationally aids in positioning-related mechanics.
13. Extremely high magic mitigation and good physical mitigation
14. When parry is unavoidable on gear, DRK tends to benefit the most from it in terms of DPS, mitigation, and raid mitigation (Reprisal, Low Blow).
15. TP consumption is slowed when OTing/MTing by +++Blood Weapon and DA Souleater usage respectively, and Sole Survivor provides a situational restore as well.
16. Ranged/AoE abilities do not consume TP; MP can be maintained indefinitely.
17. Living Dead can provide an extended period of healer DPS, if planned accordingly.
18. +++Can provide a small HP/MP/TP restore to party members.
Cons:
1. Due to having substantial DPS benefits both to OTing and getting hit, MTing outside of Grit is encouraged for considerably higher maximum DPS. DRK's
entire toolkit lends itself to MTing and doing it dangerously.
2. The same benefits to getting hit are absent from OTing, meaning an OT DRK is not able to milk the job for its maximum potential.
3. Its burst is brief and small, in spite of its overall sustain being higher.
4. In a fight without adds or large-scale AoE phases, does nothing to contribute to raid DPS.
5. Reprisal can be unreliable unless you are using Dark Dance to force it.
6. ------------Dark Dance+Reprisal can provide good physical burst mitigation, and Shadowskin Shadow Wall can be made more readily available with DA.
7. ------------Enabling Grit is on/triggers the GCD but does not interrupt combos.
8. ------------See #6.
9. Living Dead requires heavy healer intervention and/or resource consumption.
10. -----------Now has frequent sustained TP restoration.
------------Like WAR, a lot of these really aren't big cons, but the few that were have been addressed.
Remember this?:
PLD - lowest overall DPS, great mitigation, lowest in-practice utility
WAR - highest OT DPS, great mitigation and self-healing, excellent utility, infinite resources.
DRK - highest MT DPS, great migigation, excellent utility
Now its this:
PLD - highest raid DPS, great mitigation, good self-healing, excellent utility and resource sustain.
WAR - highest OT DPS, great mitigation, good self-healing, excellent utility and resource sustain.
DRK - highest MT DPS, great mitigation, good self-healing, excellent utility and resource sustain.
Help me edit, modify, correct and/or add any necessary information in this OP to help the community get a better and more factual picture of where the tanking imbalances are, what they are, and how they can be effectively and realistically fixed while keeping each tank a powerful and viable option in any content with their own unique playstyle.
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