Best SB Tank?

[Aladire]

The biggest change to me that will make PLD so much better is if they put the Oaths to where it does not trigger GCDs.

Since PLDs can now block magic in SB, you have to pick based on the mechanics and your play style.

WAR: Has more dps due to a better dps stance and attacks

PLD: Better defense (for party) as they are more align as being actual tanks. Can make for a little hard to maximize as some abilities require positioning such as the new wing move and the wall they can put up from time to time

DRK: Requires more control over resources, but can be a decent balance between dps and def. If done right with a 1 attack buff, can put out some nice damage and debuff

The biggest problem is that with Stormblood, we do not know all the changes. It could be that with the plan to close the gap between casual and hardcore players, that everything that is in HW will become invalid and have to learn how each tank works with the raid and party composition.

[sarehptar]

Personally, I main DRK and will continue to main DRK. I like the lore of this class, the story, and the NPCs, and I feel like it's a good balance--I can swap between main tank or off tank, not commonly assigned one side like WAR (OT) or PLD (MT) end up a lot of times. DRK has some of the best looking weapons in the game. Although also some of the ugliest; Guillotine of the Tyrant, I'm looking at you. People talk so much about MP management in this class that you'd think the only thing you do is watch your MP bar but the class has good tools for handling MP so that's really not the case.

That said, WAR is stupidly good.. In terms of being able to tank, mitigate, keep itself alive, and dish out huge damage, WAR feels like it's king to me currently. But I heard it is getting adjusted, so it might be about to get hit with the nerf bat, who knows.

PLD's new moves certainly look interesting, but unless they've made drastic changes, I'll still level this one last of the three. PLD feels too much like 1-2-3-1-2-3 to me to really enjoy.

[whiteblade89]

My pick will always be DRK for my go-to tank. I love the greatsword look and it really benefits from massive pulls. A lot of people say it has a higher skill cap, and I've always been iffy on whether I agree or not. It comes down understanding your toolkit, which is redundant because that's the key to being good at any job you play. They have solid physical and magical mitigation (less physical than PLD but more magical) and their tools for mitigation are pretty unique (DA+DP into DA+DD and you might as well be in the Matrix).
Haven't played PLD since 2.0 because I deleted that character and never levelled my current PLD past 22. But the love that it's getting might influence me to buy a jump potion it to try it out. (Yes I said it. I would use a jump potion to avoid levelling a boring class, just my opinion).
WAR just never resonated with me. Don't like the axe and I don't like being responsible for the slashing debuff as a tank (lame excuse, I know).
Bottom line: choose what you think is cool and fun. Despite the conversation of PLD being the weakest tank, if it's fun for you and you enjoy it, have at it. Sword and board with the best of em, my friend.

[bswpayton]

Personally, I main DRK and will continue to main DRK. I like the lore of this class, the story, and the NPCs, and I feel like it's a good balance--I can swap between main tank or off tank, not commonly assigned one side like WAR (OT) or PLD (MT) end up a lot of times. DRK has some of the best looking weapons in the game. [s]Although also some of the

Alot of warriors self healing seems to be gone so I think thats a nerf

[sarehptar]

Alot of warriors self healing seems to be gone so I think thats a nerf

Yeah, like I mentioned I know they are adjusting WAR hard. Although it seems very odd to me that they would adjust the self-heals, which is one of the primary reasons WAR makes a good main tank too... I thought the whole point was to eliminate the meta of WAR always being off tank...

Then again, no one has ever accused FFXIV of having good balance between jobs, so. /shrug

[Mirateski]

I can swap between main tank or off tank, not commonly assigned one side like WAR (OT) or PLD (MT) end up a lot of times.

given a drk/pld combo I'd actually make the drk mt, because they get more out of it than pld at the moment. No that anyone ever uses that combo.

On topic, I played PLD through the HW story and I will almost definitely be playing PLD through the SB story unless something changes significantly. (Although I find the wings skill to be quite bizarre - who wants to stand behind the paladin, in cleave range? o-o) I'll be doing this mostly for character reasons, because although I don't RP I have a fairly detailed story for my main mapped out in my head, and right now he plays paladin. To be honest, I'm just psyched for a damaging aoe on the gcd.

[rxnin]

If you plan to main a tank in SB go for Paladin, they received lots of changes to become viable in parties. War is also a great tank, but they may have possibly received a nerf in terms of Fell Cleaves due to the new resource system. But again, these are all speculations and we won't know for sure until release. In the mean time, play the tank you enjoy/like the most.

[Lambdafish]

PLD's new moves certainly look interesting, but unless they've made drastic changes, I'll still level this one last of the three. PLD feels too much like 1-2-3-1-2-3 to me to really enjoy.

PLDs main problem was its lack of a personal mechanic to manage, WAR has wrath stacks, DRK has darkside/dark arts MP management, PLD has nothing. Now we have the Oath gauge, which should add a lot more depth to the job if done right.

[Stormfur]

I have all three tanks at 60. Here's my opinion, if it helps.

Keep in mind, these things will probably change a bit at SB release.

Warrior is the king of off-tanking because of the raw damage it outputs. It sacrifices a lot of defense for this though. Whereas paladin has a handful of defensive cooldowns, Warrior has next to none.It tries to make up for this by having a huge HP pool. If you want your character to look like a raging beast and just cleave all the things and leave a path of bodies in your wake, go Warrior.

Paladin is great for defense-oriented tanks. If you're concerned about your team more than yourself, and you want to make their jobs easier (especially healers), paladin could be the class for you. Hallowed ground is easily the best "oh shit! button" ability of the three tanks. Paladin used to be best at mitigating physical damage attacks but in SB they're going to shore up its magic defense too (this was previously Dark Knight territory). If you want to be a stalwart defender of all that is good and holy in this world, go Paladin.

Dark Knight's "gimmick" used to be magic defense, but SB is throwing this into the air. To me, DRK is more of a jack of all trades, master of none. It has the ability to regain some HP/MP through its attacks. Living Dead, DRK's "oh shit! button" is one of the weirdest contrivances I've ever seen. It essentially doubles as a healer panic button because they have to heal you for a certain amount or else you die. You have to manage your MP carefully on this class. You don't have as much HP as WAR or as many defensive cooldowns as PLD but you do have other abilities that try to make up for this.

Of all the classes, I'm going to focus on DRK for Stormblood. I like my tank to be somewhat balanced and not skewed too much one way or the other. Also I loved the aesthetic and grittiness and loved, loved, loved the questline.

[SpookyGhost]

Whereas paladin has a handful of defensive cooldowns, Warrior has next to none.

Vengeance. Raw Intuition. Thrill of Battle. If you're using Defiance then you have access to the most versatile defensive CD in the game, Inner Beast. Dunno how this meme of "WAR has next to no defensive CDs" still exists.