Are there more tanks playing now?

[Asheilin]

Having come from other mmos, Tanks are meant to be Vit Walls that keep the party from being hit as much as possible. Recently starting a tank before 3.2 because I finely had some time to test them out, I had that mentality in mind. Because thats how I was taught to play a tank. SE has made that into the new focus, and that makes me happy.
As to the PVP issues. Can't say much about that really as I dont pvp in XIV. However previously in mmos as a tank in pvp, they were not these masterful powerhouses. They were the POSs that you couldn't kill and would whittle away at your life while the dps wrecked and the healers healed. If the parties didn't work together it meant for a horrible pvp run.

As a Healer main, having tanks switch to dps stance 85% of the time meant I couldn't spam dps on trash because those I've DF with went "In dps Stance, no CDs you'll have to keep me alive." Ok. I'm a healer; no biggie. But then it started becoming "Who needs CDs?" In any stance. Without the HP to get through a cast or 2 of dps for me because Strength is Life stupidity. I say that because I've been running into more and more tanks since 3.0 that think their job is to dps first, hold Argo second, Save the Fing Healer jumping around their head with 10% life last... who then b**** when healer dies and then party wipes because they are not able to heal themselves enough and the dps drop as well.

So, Vit tanking makes me happy. Either the tank will be stuck in tank stance keeping emnity and allowing me to do my job right, or they'll have to get good at dancing stances with cds. As a tank, I'm looking forward to reaching 60 and not getting b****ed out for being a Vit tank.

[Synestra]

It is interesting that SE didn't consider the PVP implications when doing these balance changes, especially when they introduced a new PVP mode this patch. I don't think PVE changes should be held back because they might affect PVP, but I think that they should've added or changed a PVP specific trait to nullify the difference there.

There is rumours that SE removed that 10% DMG increase trait from tanks, so maybe that is one thing they could use as an tweaking tool in future.

[Blitzace]

Honestly i'm getting quite sick people saying STR tanks were toxic,bad etc etc.

Give me one valid reason what is the difference between full str VS full vit tank?

If the STR tank sucked, and changed to vit, guess what? he still sucked. Only with more HP.
Now keep in mind, its flat HP. no DMG reduction but less DMG. which results in less-selfheals for lets say the warrior, king of all self heals.

If you can't keep the STR tank alive, Him switching to VIT will not do much, Either the tank sucks or you do. Its that simple.
Yes certain tanks were harder to keep alive due to the fact they didn't use cooldowns or had crappy gear. But that still did not hold me back to DPS, so stop using that as an excuse.
And stop pretending like a tank in VIT is 20x easier to heal and keep up cause thats just bs.

[Triston]

Strictly STR-to-VIT makes very little difference with regards to healing, correct.
However, they also meddled with aggro output on tank stance vs no tank stance. In 3.1 tanks were running full STR without tank stance and managing to still keep aggro; in exchange they were taking gobs of damage and the bad ones wouldn't even use their CDs. In 3.2 you WILL have to be in tank stance more often in order to keep threat, and if you try to run without tank stance full VIT you probably will not keep aggro. Even bad tanks will learn that they need to stay in tank stance more often (bad ones will be in it permanently), and as a result they will take strictly less damage than they did in 3.1 just because they have their tank stances up.
A VIT tank isn't easier than a STR tank to keep alive, but in tank stance it is. SE lowered the skill ceiling, which good tanks are understandably upset about, but also lowered the skill floor and bad tanks will no longer be as much of a burden on the healers.

[Taiyoji]

Just wanna say thanks for the tank changes. I've run all the new content and I enjoy being a solid tank again, for the record I am a PLD. Holding hate has been much easier on me, I have found that the meta has shifted less from helping with dps checks, and more toward surviving big hits.

Having said that, I suggest greater increases to the healing potency of equilibrium, and Inner beast. Though I main Pld and will always stand by it... When I was running warrior, I noticed a drop in self healing power. That is the only change I would make.

Also I would say to ppl upset with dps: please know we're facing harder enemies now with outdated gear and reserve judgement till you have your new gear. Again, very happy with changes

[Kaeoni]

Here is what I believe.

A lowering of the skill ceiling is an incredibly stupid move on SE's part. All 3 tanks operated efficiently at high skill levels, and lower skill levels. The only thing Square-Enix managed to do was Piss off all the talented individuals who were able to Mix Dmg in, which, by the way did NOT dwarf a GOOD DPSs output. So lets not fool ourselves here in thinking they were not encroaching on DPS's area of expertise. I don't think it's a good thing to force players as they're currently doing, to operate at only a slightly higher capacity as compared to bad or newer tanks.

Tanks and healers are the only 2 class categories in the game which are effectively losing access to skills as they get into group content, where as DPSs skill-sets expand through positionals and utility.

Is the answer really to dumb down Tanks and Healers? Is it because we're of vital importance and this change is to make us more of a friendly class to play? That's certainly a good excuse, but it's not good enough.

Tanks can operate fine, and did operate fine hiding behind Tank stances 24/7 Regardless of Vit or Str, as do healers who strictly heal. It was the Tanks/Healers fault if they died using Str OR Vit and stance danced incorrectly, not the str/vit/stances themselves. You can't blame Clerics stance for giving you a 20% healing debuff, you're not suppose to heal in it stupid. Why was Str proven so effective as to work at the highest of endgame? Yet you claim it sucked? Clearly Str Tanks are stupid then right? Since they worked so well in highest form of PvE?

Yeah, lets pretend you failed to heal or tank a dungeon and it's because of the Str Tank. How about admit you have room to improve as a player instead of scapegoating.
The only time a Tank ever needed to meet a damage requirement was for the last DPS check In Savage prior to 3.2, One that SE admitted was too god damn high and because of that everyone jumps on the "tanks shouldn't dps boat"

To be frank, Healer and Tank Dmg was never factored into fights (EDIT:this could be misinformed, because I don't have the post or livecast of this, but It was cited on a Limit-Break Radio as a Dev response to a question about Savage and how, calculations are done for fights) yes, that means for Savage as well. Healers and Tanks were just making up for the lower ilevels of the overall group. There is nothing inherently wrong with that. The people complaining wanting Tanks to only tank and Healers only to heal are primarily bad DPS who are being humiliated, and inexperienced tanks/healers who are refusing to learn.

Paladin needed adjustments to make it relevant in Savage sure, but this could have easily been alleviated with potency changes or making innovative changes to existing abilities.

This is how I see it, and you don't have to agree with me, that's fine, I still love you. But I just don't believe in nerfs, there are other ways to go about balancing a game which might be more difficult, but also avoid crap like what's currently happening.

[Reynhart]

Honestly i'm getting quite sick people saying STR tanks were toxic,bad etc etc.

Some of them were because they thought that you were automatically a bad tank for wearing Vit acc...and they were very vocal.

A lowering of the skill ceiling is an incredibly stupid move on SE's part.

Changing damage calculation is not lowering the skill ceiling, it's only shifting it. Tanks will still maximize their damage, but by how they play, not how many million gils the spent on pentamelded accessories. The issue was more a game design problem. If VIT is the main stat of tanks (As state the only accessorie we can need on), why isn't it our focus when gearing ?

And, judging by the few dungeons/raids I've done in 3.2, bosses hit much much harder so that safety net is welcomed for healers in training.

[Ragnorak]

40k hp or not a tank that cant mitigate is a ded tank. Things hit a lot harder now if you think forcing VIT some how gives the healers a buffer for bad tanks (who cant tank let alone mitigate in the first place) ive got bad news for you. Sephy ex tank buster says hello

[Kaeoni]

40k hp or not a tank that cant mitigate is a ded tank. Things hit a lot harder now if you think forcing VIT some how gives the healers a buffer for bad tanks (who cant tank let alone mitigate in the first place) ive got bad news for you. Sephy ex tank buster says hello

I agree with you though The increase in HP is needed now.
If referring to meeeee, I've never been against the Vitality change. Just the dmg nerf that came with it. x.x

Changing damage calculation is not lowering the skill ceiling, it's only shifting it. Tanks will still maximize their damage, but by how they play, not how many million gils the spent on pentamelded accessories. The issue was more a game design problem. If VIT is the main stat of tanks (As state the only accessorie we can need on), why isn't it our focus when gearing ?

From a pure stat perspective I agree with you.

I also agree it might be better for healers in training too!
Even I have lapses in judgement, or am slow to heal for some reason or another.

How i'm seeing it is,
because of how threat was increased in respective tank stances to offset the decrease in damage, taking off Defiance, Grit and Shield Oath is far less appealing.
This means Tanks aren't utilizing part of their skillset anymore due to the increased monster damage which isn't being mitigated by grit/oath or offset with increased healing potency of Defiance. And the difficulty to now hold threat with Damage/baseline threat combos alone.
Is this bad? I dunno.
I don't believe offensive stances should be assumed full time, but I don't believe they ever were especially with DPSs capabilities keeping them in check. a Tanks primary function will always be to hold the attention of the monster and do the best it can to mitigate the dmg incoming. However I don't believe Offensive stances should be as oppressed as I've seen them be either. I hate to see abilities simply not used due to the fact you're going to lose threat, or it's too taxing on a healer for even brief periods of time w/o checking in with them. I guess if the Offensive s.tances are too offensive then, maybe they should be adjusted to be more "tank" like.

I admit I'm not the best Warrior in the world and it plays second fiddle to my Scholar in terms of gear... But I'm not horrid at the class. I say the ceiling has dropped because chances to stance dance have severely decreased which means 1-3 abilities depending on tank class simply aren't seeing as much use as I believe they should. To the point where some might never use them...
My concern with my War is the same as with my Sch, It bothers me that i'm losing more and more access to skills I enjoy and i'm not being compensated with new healing skills or mitigation tools. I like weaving in more abilities, and SE is taking that weaving out. Now it's almost insulting... "How efficiently can spam Phsyick and Adloquium" and it's like, god damn, Even in terms of right now, with me doing dots I'm slightly bored, but now you honestly feel like I should say goodbye to 7 of my spells on Sch? Really? REALLY? I lose less on War but still... Why not just take out Mug, Dream Within a Dream and Duality? Any other class would lose their god damn minds if their toolkit was being suppressed. Why Don't we just take out Goad, Dream within a Dream and Mug for giggles?


It's not some massive change on tanks specifially. I'm not trying to make it out to be that. Just where the hell does it stop? I just enjoyed warrior specifically because I could dance all over the place.
And I enjoy Sch not only because it's a healer but because I could throw down tons of Dots and Broil Lobster.

I feel like without these options... Well... right now I'm getting annoyed with both classes, I'm missing dots left and right on Sch, and I'm switching out of Defiance far less frequently than before...
I'm sure lots of you would be happy to hear I might quit Sch and War because I don't tank and heal like a lot of people think you should and I understand where you're coming from. I should just grin and bare it, Evolve, all that. But... i like the multifaceted nature of healer and tank, something DPS doesn't exactly have, other than maybe Bard but it's utility doesn't seem to get a lot of use these days... And I think that's where a lot of this angstyness annoying..ness is sorta emanating from.
Idk I'm just not happy with it.

I found Sch such a snoozefest until I began doing dmg between heals. I loved Deliverance so much, It was like... I dunno It felt like tanks were going in an interesting place with the HW Expansion. But now It's just a bummer

[DutchRyker]

I play Warrior and Paladin and all I can say is "damn my back fills so much better because I don't have to carry sorry ass dps anymore thanks SE" ..... LOL I'm kidding .... I do see that my dps is less now but I still have np what so ever in holding aggro on mobs but my question is this....If you what a job to play that puts out the top damage then why in the HELL!!! are you playing a tank???