Yet another Red Mage post, but hear me out, please.

[Duelle]

Right, it's so much better now that people expect tanks to do part of the DPS job and blame them for when the party fails a DPS check...

Which can easily be blamed on several factors, including fight design, the fact that WAR unintentionally raised the bar for expected tank DPS and SE's attempt to create difference between the tanks by using the DPS discrepancies as an excuse instead of saying "yeah we screwed up".

[Reynhart]

Which can easily be blamed on several factors, including fight design, the fact that WAR unintentionally raised the bar for expected tank DPS and SE's attempt to create difference between the tanks by using the DPS discrepancies as an excuse instead of saying "yeah we screwed up".

The thing is, we don't really care about tank DPS. What matters is the raid DPS. Bringing a NIN might end in lower personal DPS when compared to MNK or DRG but its utility makes up for it if you consider the party as a whole. DRK and PLD could contribute as much as WAR in party DPS without relying on personal DPS. For example, an OT PLD could help the MT take less damage without relying on its tank stance (If Rampart or Sentinel worked with Cover), thus increasing the MT DPS without having a high personal DPS.

Besides, you don't want people to expect you to back heal as a tank ? Fine, just don't play PLD. And if I don't want people to expect good DPS from me as a tank, I won't play WAR.
This way, you would have a tank job for each type of player, bringing more uniqueness between them. And no more BS like "I'll kick you if you use Clemency because it lowers your DPS"...

[Khalithar]

The only thing DRK has that is purely magical mitigation is Dark Mind.

I've always felt the main advantage of Dark Mind wasn't the 20%/30% mitigation, rather it was the fact that it's cooldown is only one minute.

Edit:

Which can easily be blamed on several factors, including fight design, the fact that WAR unintentionally raised the bar for expected tank DPS and SE's attempt to create difference between the tanks by using the DPS discrepancies as an excuse instead of saying "yeah we screwed up".

I have to agree with this. I mean this last patch they buffed Sword Oath of all things, 25 potency may not seem like much but what amounts to a 75 potency DoT really adds up on longer fights, especially if you take the decent up time on FoF in to account. I worry this is going to lead to an arms race with tanks demanding more and more dps. I feel the tanks are a bit of a mess now that I think about it, we have tanks getting boosted DPS and focusing on DPS stats (crit/det) and the one tank stat (parry) is largely worthless because of all the magical damage and inconsistency of it on times where it could be useful.

[Reynhart]

I mean this last patch they buffed Sword Oath of all things, 25 potency may not seem like much but what amounts to a 75 potency DoT really adds up on longer fights, especially if you take the decent up time on FoF in to account.

Except that it's not really 75 potency. In fact, they mostly changed SwO calculation to the same for auto-attacks. So, SwO is 75 potency for a base de lay of 3.00. Since our weapons have a 2.24 delay, SwO potency is 2.24*75/3 = 56.

For me the problem right now is that they seem to have no idea how to balance tanks except by increasing personal DPS.

[ErdrickLoto]

I do really want Red Mage to be a tank. Pretty much entirely because I want a magic tank, yes.

I'd think that being a tank would make Red Mage's "hybrid" nature be more notable. DPSes already have arcanist/summoner (even though they focus more on damage spells), and all healers are basically hybrids anyway.

[ADVSS]

well i mean yeah after 3 or 4 defensive cooldowns, 2 stances, needing gladiator as a cross class, annnd needing an enmity combo, an enmity ranged attack, and an instant cast aoe for enmity, i guess it could get like. how many skills are left again? 13? it could still work though for sure.

Even more entertaining i thought the idea of making a tank branch from arcanist would be impossible, then i realized that a literal translation of acn > magic sword thingy like alisaile is probably possible
summon 1 and 2 could be the tank stances, emerald sword and topaz sword, with each having pet bar actions that would fill in the cooldowns that a tank from up to 30 would be missing, one being dps stance one being tank stance. ofc levels 30-50 would have to cement in more tank abiltries whilst 50-70 would do the whole pld gets more combos, and such and some fluff. Really creepy idea if you ask me,
2 heres your egi glamour, we couldnt figure out how to do redmage so we just made it so your summon is a sword.

[ErikMynhier]

I would love a tank as a RDM but I think the way the game is set, if we get it it would be some odd mechanic INT mage that os basically a debuffing frontline fighter. Most likely to make it "new" by making the buffs/debuffs based on MND making it the first non-healer with a real use for Cleric Stance.

[ADVSS]

I would love a tank as a RDM but I think the way the game is set, if we get it it would be some odd mechanic INT mage that os basically a debuffing frontline fighter. Most likely to make it "new" by making the buffs/debuffs based on MND making it the first non-healer with a real use for Cleric Stance.

yeah its probably the easiest way to do red mage without completely breaking it, no doubt. only issue is well besides potd the other cnj utilities arent really needed much in a normal party set up, but aero is pretty nice being an instant cast dot, itd work for a melee caster to say the least. on a side note, if it were to cc cnj i think it could just be int based and use cs as a reversal. Not sure how a smn or blm physick would do with CS but im assuming it would be maybe double the potency, maybe less. Nothing spectacular but at least somewhat useful

[Synestra]

My main concern, though, is how the addition of a new tank would impact the existing tank balance. At the moment, PLD is designed to have an advantage in physical mitigation, DRK in magical mitigation, and WAR has the highest baseline dps. If you make RDM into a magic tank, then how would you differentiate it from DRK?

Tank and healer roles seem to be the most difficult to balance. From what we've been told, the expansion promises to address significant balance issues between the existing tanks, as well as offer a much needed overhaul to the way that our gear stats work (parry in particular). I don't think that it's a good idea to throw in a completely new tank job into the mix, introducing fresh balance issues, at the same time.

This is the reason why i personally dont see them adding a new tank in 4.0 and honestly does this game even have a need for new tank job atm?

[Synestra]

I've always felt the main advantage of Dark Mind wasn't the 20%/30% mitigation, rather it was the fact that it's cooldown is only one minute.

Short cooldowns are the thing that makes warriors so good and fun to play, longest CD it has is hes "ultimate" holmgang rest are from medium to short. SE really needs to pay attention on CD effects when they are adding recast timers on them, for example how can you justify Shadow Wall's 180s recast while Venegance is same DMG reduction offering a 50 pot counter attack + wrath/abandon stack while also having a 60s shorter recast.

We need more cooldowns like Dark Mind, Equilibrium, Shelltron as it would be alot more fun to migitate damage trought whole fight instead just TB's.