PLD 4.0

[Brian_]

Only because current boss fight design is based around single hit spike damage every X seconds/minutes rather than constant, growing or even rhythmic damage patterns.

Taking 20% less damage from 1 in every 4 attacks is meaningless when only one attack is important. Parry and Block would be closer to fine if fights were not so reliant on Tank Busters in order to threaten tanks.

So you're suggesting that if we switched to a meta where general tank damage was much higher that people would suddenly prefer inconsistent and spike prone damage intake?

You're wrong and ignorant. We've seen that meta in other MMOs and the test of science and basic reason and logic has resulted in what I said.

Spike damage = bad.
Inconsistent damage intake = bad.

So RNG "blesses" you and you get a string of blocks and parries. Your healers adjust to that degree of damage intake. Then RNG flips on you and you get a string of hits with a couple crits mixed in. Your healers fail to account for the sudden spike in your damage intake and you die. When healing, you cannot adjust your GCD usage based on your tank MAYBE blocking or parrying.

As block and parry currently exist, they're useful in a very specific situation. When tanks are taking a lot of quick and small hits, parry and block are really good. But, that comes back to the idea of consistency. When you take a lot of quick and small hits, parry and block provide a much more consistent decrease in damage intake.

[Ultimatecalibur]

So you're suggesting that if we switched to a meta where general tank damage was much higher that people would suddenly prefer inconsistent and spike prone damage intake?

No, that was not what I was suggesting. I was suggesting that getting away from single hit Spike + mostly ignorable regular damage pattern would make non-spike RNG based proc defenses (i.e. parry/block and not Dodge/Perfect Resist) more viable. If you can't rely on RNG defensive procs to reliably decrease average damage intake they are worth less than effects that do reliably decrease average damage intake.

You're wrong and ignorant. We've seen that meta in other MMOs and the test of science and basic reason and logic has resulted in what I said.

And you are one of the thousands who hear and repeat things without actually understanding what is actually going on.

Spike damage = bad.
Inconsistent damage intake = bad.

Yes, random unpredictable Spikes in damage are bad (which is what makes Evasion tanking non-viable), but "inconsistent damage intake" is not a bad thing. Problems occur because far to often inconsistent damage intake is too varied to be effectively reacted to.

If damage is too consistent it becomes boring to deal with.
If damage is too inconsistent then it either ends up being impossible to deal with or forces players to focus on the worst case scenario which ends up making it boring also.

So RNG "blesses" you and you get a string of blocks and parries. Your healers adjust to that degree of damage intake. Then RNG flips on you and you get a string of hits with a couple crits mixed in. Your healers fail to account for the sudden spike in your damage intake and you die. When healing, you cannot adjust your GCD usage based on your tank MAYBE blocking or parrying.

Depends on how big the damage variance is. Having to react to 150% more damage than expected (getting a x2 damage crit when you were expecting a 80% damage parry/block) is a different monster than reacting to 87.5% more damage than expected (getting a x1.5 crit when expecting an 80% parry/block).

As long as the variance is large enough that it needs to be paid attention to, but still small enough that it can be reacted to Inconsistent Damage is fine and a good thing to have as it keeps Healers focused and interested in the fight.

As block and parry currently exist, they're useful in a very specific situation. When tanks are taking a lot of quick and small hits, parry and block are really good. But, that comes back to the idea of consistency. When you take a lot of quick and small hits, parry and block provide a much more consistent decrease in damage intake.

It is not just quick small hits. The hits can be slower or harder as long as there are enough hits for there to be enough procs to influence the average amount of damage taken a significant amount.

More hits = more chances to proc = closer damage taken is to the average. This is the Law of Large Numbers.

[Brian_]

snip.

The average amount of damage taken is something someone mentions when they don't understand what's going on.

In relation to tank damage intake, the only thing that matters is the interaction it has with healers.

Making yourself harder to heal in order to keep your healers focused and interested in the fight is not what you should be doing as a tank and it certainly doesn't work in this game. Boring is good. You want to make their job boring. Healers in this game always have something to do with their free GCDs.

Healers will plan how to use their GCDs. Like I already said, they cannot plan their GCDs around something that might happen. They plan for the worst of what can happen. Having higher or lower average damage taken does not matter if it doesn't change how a healer heals you. Occasionally mitigating 20-30% of a physical attack's damage does not change how a healer heals you.

You know what no healer has ever said in FFXIV? "Wow, he clearly just blocked that. Now I can just cancel this heal and go back to cleric stance."