Shield Wall: A Dual-Paladin Static

[Lyth]

I'm not convinced that you can balance mitigation against dps, though. Every tank needs access to mitigation, self-sustain, utility, dps, and enmity generation abilities. If there is a significant enough discrepancy between the tanks in any area, you're setting yourself up for balance problems. DPS isn't the most important parameter either; if you give one tank a significant enough mitigation advantage, it can just as easily become unbalanced.

Mitigation and dps are not tank "identities". I think part of the problem is that we've tried to distil PLD down to "best at (physical) mitigation" instead of themes like "protects allies with a shield" or "casts holy magic and bleeds opponents dry with dots". It doesn't matter whether you shield your allies, buff their health, or debuff the boss. It doesn't matter if you cast curative magic on yourself, shrug off accumulated damage, or steal life force from your enemies. Different aesthetics can result in similar functionality, as long as they're balanced within the same category.

I've heard the argument about healer dps and mitigation before, but how do you design for that? Does your defensive tank become a liability when paired with a healer with weaker dps? Do you switch tanks when you get a more aggressive healer? There are a lot of different possibilities to account for. You can't really predict how % mitigation translates into healer dps increases, even when it does make a difference.

I think if you want balance, you have to do it independently across each category. If you're aiming to simultaneously balance all three tanks, that is. I feel that a lot of MMO devs eventually give up on this sort of balance and opt for flavour of the month "balance", which, while easier, doesn't make for a very good play experience.

[aleph_null]

When I was talking about mitigation vs personal dps it was from the pov of optimizing and speedkilling, not from the developing. Of course ideally we don't want such thing to even happen. All tanks should provide similar overall raid dps and enough mitigation to tank every content in the game. It's just that as players we can't really change what we have, so we just pick the best of the options and while min-maxing dps, everything from personal to raid mitigation and utilities are weighed based on how much extra dps they could afford us.

[Reynhart]

All tanks should provide similar overall raid dps and enough mitigation to tank every content in the game.

That's why, for me, tanks should be separated on how they perform as OT, and not MT. The first concern of the MT is to survive, so, you give every tank the (approximative) same MT personal mitigation and damage output. And thus, dungeons are never a problem nor are fights designed to be single-tanked.

But in 8-man content, suddently, the OT changes the game. Suddently, the gameplay could vary with the DPS stance (Or the lack of tank stance), and there, you can be creative on how you balance them.
Give PLD significantly less damage than DRK and WAR, but give him covering buffs so that the MT need its tank stance less and can do more DPS to compensate...
Or make DRK do less damage than WAR, but put vulnerability debuffs here and there so that all other jobs do slightly more during raids..
And give WAR the highest personal DPS of all tanks as an OT but less damage increasing utility...

[Jim_Berry]

I main PLD, while only leveling NIN so I can step foot in Gordias since no one wanted me. I only now fear that I will have to compete for a spot in groups due to the many PLDs we will see.

*EDIT*
With the coming of Stormblood and PLD vs WAR/DRK, my wish is as follows:

When someone examines you while you're on a job, there should be an indicator that shows how many hours you have actively participated in content as that job, so it's not a "Jump Potion" thing where someone all of a sudden become a PLD main due to changes.

I know some people might go into, say, Sastasha undersized and go afk to get free log time, but the time should track how often you are engaged with an enemy and are attacking/being attacked (pulling all the adds and standing there will not count).

[Jim_Berry]

That's why, for me, tanks should be separated on how they perform as OT, and not MT. The first concern of the MT is to survive, so, you give every tank the (approximative) same MT personal mitigation and damage output. And thus, dungeons are never a problem nor are fights designed to be single-tanked.

But in 8-man content, suddently, the OT changes the game. Suddently, the gameplay could vary with the DPS stance (Or the lack of tank stance), and there, you can be creative on how you balance them.
Give PLD significantly less damage than DRK and WAR, but give him covering buffs so that the MT need its tank stance less and can do more DPS to compensate...
Or make DRK do less damage than WAR, but put vulnerability debuffs here and there so that all other jobs do slightly more during raids..
And give WAR the highest personal DPS of all tanks as an OT but less damage increasing utility...

In FFXI, the tank, PLD, spend the most time as a meat shield compared to NIN and WAR tanks. We need that back.

[Maku]

In FFXI, the tank, PLD, spend the most time as a meat shield compared to NIN and WAR tanks. We need that back.

This wouldn't work in the realm of FFXIV though due to jobs having set roles.
NIN was never meant to be a tank at all in XI but the community made it one. My BRD was never supposed to be able to tank but once we found that Mazukra gave made enmity and BRD could equip the most -% damage gear around I did it for the fun of it and rocked.
However, roles are defined in FF14 and the community already hated the idea of WAR being always turned to as the OT due to DPS output and debuffs it could do. It is just a different style with forced roles.

[Mnemosynia]

That's why, for me, tanks should be separated on how they perform as OT, and not MT. The first concern of the MT is to survive, so, you give every tank the (approximative) same MT personal mitigation and damage output. And thus, dungeons are never a problem nor are fights designed to be single-tanked.

I disagree if everyone has the same parameters why play class A or class B? This is what destroys games main life isnt fair games shouldn't be either nothing is really fair people are supposed to have the niche. If you have no niche i'd rather just play a shooter.

But even shooters have niches lol so yeah im sure you get my point,

[Reynhart]

But even shooters have niches lol so yeah im sure you get my point,

I get yours...but surely you didn't get mine. Tank will have their niche, when performing as OT.
You can have the OT that deals damage, the OT that protect other, the OT that put debuffs, etc...MT is too rigid as a purpose to really make tanks work differently.

[Brannigan]

In FFXI, the tank, PLD, spend the most time as a meat shield compared to NIN and WAR tanks. We need that back.

FFXIV isn't FFXI. There's a lot of things in FFXI I wish that XIV would copy, but class balance and mechanics aren't on that list.