Tanks are fine (show your support so they don't change them)

[Axxion]

So I just learned STR accessories are BiS for tanks again. Hmmm... we've gone back in time!

We went forward and back as you can say

[KrenianKandos]

Having hit my level 70 PLD, and currently working once more on my DRK, I like to put in my two gil here.

With Paladin, I can definitely see the power creep happen and my dps being just enough to keep threat against 'good' DDs. The biggest thing that I noticed is that my damage has not necessarily gone up that much. I find myself just staying in Shield Oath, solely because I don't 'trust' random PUGs. It's simple: Even if I opt to put up a target, 9/10 times I've seen DDs completely ignore it and hit whatever they want.

That's another problem with the current situation: Everyone is still new in the expansion with their skills and there's a lot more herp derp happening right now than it was previously.

I found as I gear up, I'm feeling a bit more comfortable to a) do big pulls and b) flip into sword oath if I have people who 'understand' what to target. But I definitely can feel DPS being close to me in threat.

One of the suggestions I've seen work for me, honestly, is simply staying in Sword Oath longer than usual. Back in the previous expansion, after two RoH and a GB rotation, I would switch to Sword Oath and not worry about bosses at all. Now? I'll go at least 4-5, and maybe two GB rotations before I feel 'remotely' comfortable switching. Stance Dancing 'is' still doable, but a lot of tanks need to get into the mentality that you need to stay in Shield Oath a while longer now. But also, DDs need to start listening and targeting the right mobs:

1) If it's a small pull, and the tank targets an enemy: please please PLEASE don't go off and attack another mob. Then cry out in frustration when the mob is slapping you in the face. Oftentimes, we add DoTs and Flashes and a couple of mid rotation attacks to keep them on us. And if we're doing small pulls, it means we're undergeared or just on the line for those instances and as such, we won't have a weapon/damage to keep up with your explosion of another target

2) If it's a big pull: We normally do AoE attacks and because of that, we are not focusing on our high emnity attacks: Please use your AoEs and not melt single targets. It's fine to do a rotation or two if you get strength up attacks (Like Sam's first rotation to do 10% damage for x seconds) but really, after the buffs, go to AoE or don't wonder why you suddenly rip it off.


Honestly, guys and girls? It's still very early in the expansion. We are still gearing up. The best weapon comes out of an EX. The Best armor is gear you can easily get and is maybe 5 ilvls higher than all the runs you're doing in effectiveness. (I would say 10 but even then, I'm seeing some funny things happening in the runs I've done during my experts where I have to wonder if the gear is honestly meant to be used for those or not.) As such, our threat won't be there, and it takes both Tanks and DDs to think in a run and realize "Hey, this is all new. We should coordinate together and make things smooth instead of blowing stuff up."

It's on the tanks to look at the problems that come in and try to fix their methods in order to keep threat if a) aoe can't be kept and b) single target is lost all the time

It's on the DD to look at the problems that come in and try to fix their methods in order to not pull off threat if a) You suddenly rip off a tank's threat in an AoE situation and b) You rip off threat single target.

Maybe you're opening with a main attack after a previous pull and it doesn't allow a rotation to go through for a tank. Maybe you're focusing too much on single targets when it's an AoE pull. But on that argument, maybe the tank is switching too quickly out of Shield Oath or maybe the tank isn't doing enough of his AoE rotation to establish hate.


I don't get the complaining so far, when we're a little over one week in an expansion. We're still all gearing up. We're still all learning our classes. Breathe, people. And let's work 'together' until we are all at a point where we can effectively say: Here's the problems.

I'm now ILVL 307. I'm feeling more confident in my tanking skills and that DDs, unless they decide to really go up and ignore everything, won't rip the threat off of me and I can add DPS, even if we've gotten our damage removed. It will come to a point that maybe at 310, I'll have issues from 310. But I rather take a moment and 'analyze' that situation when i get there and it's common place.

More often than not, I can do my job just fine and give in DPS when I can.

[DrCynapsis]

Also, I never told a healer that they needed to DPS. I just sat quietly in frustration doing my job.

I rarely badger them when I see Healers play pure healing only. I use it as an excuse to push a more aggressive play style and see if they keep up. If they pipe up I usually respond with a rant about party synergy.

[Mirch]

I do like DRK, less than before tho because pre 4.0 it was "faster"...also rip Scourge best skill ever made for drk, after Salted Earth

[Gimorian401]

If tanks were fine, they'd suffer queues because of their raging popularity.

I agree and disagree with this. They changed tanks and how they work (please SE put it back to VIT being the only damage calculation for tanks) but many players just dont like tanking. Its a play style mostly. Tanks in MMOs have never been popular. WAR in HW was OP and was able to keep up with some of the DPS in Deliverance. We didnt see an over abundance of WAR cause of it.

[NosamKin]

I've gotten DRK to lvl 67 - and I'm having a great time and more FUN. More fun than SB. in fact i've only been focusing on DRK. (My SMN, MCH & WAR are sitting right where they were when 4.0 came out.) Maybe I'm not the best tank ever, maybe i'm pretty good, but my FC doesn't complain and neither have the other parties I've been with. Could improvements be made ? of course... but I agree with "tanks are fine".

[Kosmos992k]

I think the tanks are OK as is with two things that could be improved upon.

The two issues I see are that tanks function best after the 64-66 level skills/traits are obtained, because their skillsets are designed in such a way that only with the skills from levels 66-70 does everything begin to fall into place. So in pre-60 content especially, the tanks can feel clunky because they just don't work as well as they used to.

Second thing is Tenacity. Square Enix, you added a role statistic and then made it's impact almost negligible. What were you thinking? Why would anyone stack their role stat if it has next to no appreciable impact? Fix that. The whole STR/VIT damage scaling thing would be moot if Tenacity had a decent impact; especially as significant impact with Tenacity also boosts healing and damage resistance.

Significantly better impact from Tenacity would grease the wheels of the clunky design in pre-60 content since it lifts tanks in 3 key areas and makes a virtue of stacking something besides STR.

[Kosmos992k]

I agree and disagree with this. They changed tanks and how they work (please SE put it back to VIT being the only damage calculation for tanks) but many players just dont like tanking. Its a play style mostly. Tanks in MMOs have never been popular. WAR in HW was OP and was able to keep up with some of the DPS in Deliverance. We didnt see an over abundance of WAR cause of it.

I agree with this, tanks are expected to know every dungeon, boss and trial, and failure on their part is highly visible. People invariably treat the Tank as the one who carries the can in a party when it comes to things not going well. The high expectations of tanks and the level of responsibility laid at their feet are the reasons fewer players want to tank than play damage dealer.

[FallenWings]

WAR in HW was OP and was able to keep up with some of the DPS in Deliverance. We didnt see an over abundance of WAR cause of it.

I see this too much and it's frankly getting really annoying when people stretch out WARs DPS.

Good WARs kept up with Bad DPS.

A DPS at their peak or even moderate output is still in the realm of 20-40% more DPS than WAR and tanks overall. People always look at WARs parse after they throw out their huge burst and assume they'll stay at that range for the rest of the fight.

With us reverting back to pre 3.2 main stat weights, tanks as a whole are looking to be under 50% if even attempting to optimize and under 30% when "Tank" stancing(All in VIT accessories that is).

[Marianno]

Not a tank expert but I think SE is trying to force everyone to learn to manage their own aggro. I do agree that something needs to be done about the enmity issues especially in the 70lvl dungeons. I play AST a lot in 70lvl dungeons and it is a pain for me because I have to heal dps just as much as tanks. I thinks ALL dps need to use the ENMITY SKILLS given to them (melee especially/ranged). It becomes annpying when I have to continuously ask dps at the beginning of each dungeon to use them please. Then people get mad when they pull hate and recieve no heals. Bottom line is, if your not the tank, I am not healing you. Aggro is not just a tank thing, but everyone. Tanks do need to do damage to do their jobs effectively, but EVERYONE is responsible for watching their aggro. If you see you will pull aggro as a dps, give the tank a little wiggle-room to establish aggro. I think part of the aggro issues is that there are dps who refuse to use enmity skills to help the tank manage aggro.