Please Buff Tenacity So Tanks Actually Want To Use Tank Stance

[shao32]

warriors have it more easy to tank outside of tank stance, with shorts colddowns and a self heal combo cant really compared on how DRK suffers outside of grit on this fight.

[Mycow8me]

But...dps is something that *everyone* is always worrying about. It's how the game works, you get the boss to 0 hp, you win. The faster you do that, the better. In shinryu's case, you can skip a significant amount of mechanics with good raid dps, thus ensuring less mechanics for people to potentially mess up and die to, thus lowering group dps even more. It's a net gain. But the catch is that you don't learn how to do that until you try. If you spend all your time in tank stance and get used to that extra passive mitigation/hp, then *of course* you're probably gonna die when you try to take it off, because you don't know when you need to use extra mitigation to help your healers out. Have no fear.

Yeah, skip soar or disband. Sorry man, you make good points its not that I disagree its just there's no reason to argue over semantics at this point cause we have fundamentally different thought processes or have not had the same experiences with raid groups.

[whiskeybravo]

Buffing tenacity does nothing to encourage more tank stance. The only way you're going to accomplish that is a design change, be it either the content or the jobs themselves. I used to be on the tank stance bandwagon too (for different reasons), but a eventually jumped off because it really just doesn't matter. Put the stance on if you need it, or use dps stance if you don't. It's really that simple. Since SB launch I've literally had 1 person - 1 person (it was another tank no less) - tell me "You're too cool for tank stance?" which happened in a v4n run where I tanked in deliverance the whole time w/ no swaps. That's it, 2 tanks @ 70, literally the only time anyone has said something negative. Most people aren't even paying attention to call you out on it one way or the other.

Oh here's another, I was on SAM so I didn't think much about it, but since it's fresh - was running the new dungeon the other night, war tank pulled the last couple of packs wall-to-wall, ended up dying because he switched to deliverance halfway through. The healer asks "Why did you switch to deliverance with that large of a pull?" tank says "because aoe damage". And that was it. We re-did the pull and he stayed in defiance and we proceeded to clear the dungeon. Nothing else was said, no hard feelings, I even gave him the commendation cuz why not.

I get there are occasionally hardcore types who call people out for using a "crutch" tank stance, but outside of those rare situations most people aren't even paying attention to what stance you're in to begin with unless it leads to a wipe.

[BluexBird]

The only complaint I currently have with Tenacity is the fact that Direct Hit is still vastly superior to Tenacity. People say that the overall different between DH vs. Tenacity builds isn't that big, but that's only a statistical average. It doesn't change the fact that if you end up being lucky, you are potentially able to deal A LOT more damage by melding Direct Hit and use crafted accessories, than if you meld Tenacity. Not to mention there is a buff that increases Direct Hit chance. Given the fact that the base DH chance without any melds for tanks is ZERO (which is DUMB), this makes DH the clear winner when it comes to melds. Whether this will change as we get access to more Tenacity in the future, remains to be seen.

And it's not just the fact that Direct Hit is better than Tenacity that I'm mad at - it's the fact that Direct Hit is SO GOOD as a stat, yet they screw us over by not only not giving us gear with no DH, but barely any STR on our accessories. Meaning there's no reason not to use the higher-level accessories dropped from raids.

[Aana]

The way the OP is worded just sounds like a convoluted way to increase damage in tank stance by gearing the 'tank stat'. If you want more damage in tank stance, there are much simpler ways to do that. Reduce tank stance penalty. Give access to offensive actions while in tank stance. Bake in tank stance to the job itself and make the 'stance' just multiply enmity or 100 other things simpler than having a single sub stat get a minor boost while in defensive stance.

But that point aside, unless tank stance is equal to offense stance, it will be intentionally avoided. But if you make them the 'same' power, then you remove a large amount of nuance from tanking. Tank stance is just a conscious choice. Do I want to trade safety for damage. Why remove the choice or push for a 'right' choice.

Why does 'Good tanking' need to mean "I know how to stance dance". Why cant it just be "I'm good and coordinate with my healers to NOT need tank stance to raise the raids overall DPS." (like its been this entire game) I really don't understand the constant requests to make tanking in tank stance more appealing. If you can keep enmity and survive, then youre tanking. What in the world does it matter what stance your in at all if youre doing that.

On Tenacity. Its already great. Parry was crap. This stat is good. It adds reasonable, measurable amounts of tankiness and damage. Great. Does it add as much damage as a 'damage' stat? nope. It does more than damage theres no need for it to add as much damage as DH otherwise it would be even less interesting. "Stack this 1 stat foever!". That's no fun. That's boring. Tank stats are the most balanced as they have ever been. Theres not really a terribly 'wrong' way to gear, but there are preferences. Real choices for the 1st time in this game.

[MauvaisOeil]

The way the OP is worded just sounds like a convoluted way to increase damage in tank stance by gearing the 'tank stat'. If you want more damage in tank stance, there are much simpler ways to do that. Reduce tank stance penalty. Give access to offensive actions while in tank stance. Bake in tank stance to the job itself and make the 'stance' just multiply enmity or 100 other things simpler than having a single sub stat get a minor boost while in defensive stance.

But that point aside, unless tank stance is equal to offense stance, it will be intentionally avoided. But if you make them the 'same' power, then you remove a large amount of nuance from tanking. Tank stance is just a conscious choice. Do I want to trade safety for damage. Why remove the choice or push for a 'right' choice.

Why does 'Good tanking' need to mean "I know how to stance dance". Why cant it just be "I'm good and coordinate with my healers to NOT need tank stance to raise the raids overall DPS." (like its been this entire game) I really don't understand the constant requests to make tanking in tank stance more appealing. If you can keep enmity and survive, then youre tanking. What in the world does it matter what stance your in at all if youre doing that.

On Tenacity. Its already great. Parry was crap. This stat is good. It adds reasonable, measurable amounts of tankiness and damage. Great. Does it add as much damage as a 'damage' stat? nope. It does more than damage theres no need for it to add as much damage as DH otherwise it would be even less interesting. "Stack this 1 stat foever!". That's no fun. That's boring. Tank stats are the most balanced as they have ever been. Theres not really a terribly 'wrong' way to gear, but there are preferences. Real choices for the 1st time in this game.

Well, that's pretty strange to call for "boring choices" while yourself calling DPS stances and DH "best choices".

Why keepin illusions of choices ? Possibilities that aren't, optimization non existant ?

There's no such difference as stacking tenacity because it's the best-to-go, or stacking DH because it's the best-to-go. In both cases you only get the choice to make a bad decision.

[Aana]

Well, that's pretty strange to call for "boring choices" while yourself calling DPS stances and DH "best choices".

Why keepin illusions of choices ? Possibilities that aren't, optimization non existant ?

There's no such difference as stacking tenacity because it's the best-to-go, or stacking DH because it's the best-to-go. In both cases you only get the choice to make a bad decision.

on stats, there is choice now. -1.5% damage for ~7% mitigation. That's a choice. A tradeoff. The old 'tank stat' was more like -7% damage for 1%mitigation. Theres a clear cut winner in the old scenario. And the only 'no choice' now is DH which has no bearing on our gear. Its only melds. The gear you choose to meld DH too is the choice and leads to the above. As I said, we have the MOST choices weve ever had as tanks. Not perfection (DH is such an obvious winner for melds its not really a choice, but the gear itself is pretty open right now).

And what I mean by 'boring' choices on watering down/removing tank stance is that it forces 1. If we did the same damage in tank stance as out, theres no tradeoff. Its just a toughness button as complex as deciding to use a CD on a tank buster. Hmm should I reduce damage or not to for zero cost....hard choice. Not only does watering down stance variance become less interesting, it will either lower the skill floor, or lower the skill ceiling. If (extreme example) you delete all tank stances, tanking just gets harder for newbies and has little effect on the 'best'. Newby tanks will get run over by damage and enmity issues. If you do the opposite (delete offensive stances), newbies see no change, but the 'best' players get their wings clipped as their damage goes down and their survivability (which was already high) is just unnecessarily high and EZ mode now. The skill ceiling drops down. Right now stances are an expression of skill/group coordination. Buffing up tank stances to 'encourage more tank stance' just because only hurts this dynamic. Who is it really helping? Right now stances are training wheels to keep the tank population healthy (tanks are underplayed as it is) and offer skill expression later down the road when you become good enough. Why mess with either of those aspects just for the thematic 'feel' of being tankier?

Buffing up tank stances with the goal of 'making people use tank stance more' is kinda a silly goal. Why do tanks need to use more tank stance? Why is that even a goal? What good does it provide to the players/community? People tank with and without stance now. Why is that broken in need of fixing?

[MauvaisOeil]

Sure, tenacity is "quite" a choice, but since the encounter design is not focused on the ability to reduce damage taken, but the sole ability to avoid dying in one spectacular damage burst, it's outshined and cannot truly compete with additionnal dps.

The same way tank stances offering 20% dmg reduction for 30% damage done cannot compete. However the cause are quite different but both remain options, and poor options, due to the way the game was designed.

Tanking in DPS stance is not a "risk" at all, because you can survive with solely cooldowns, and because you gain much more DPS than you loose survavibility. You're never quite on an edge to play turtleneck completely, even if you had to dance, TB are what, 60s ahead ? far enough to drop into DPS for most of your GCD.

A tank stance reducing damage taken by 20% and damage done by a SOLE 10% (meaning, the bias of your dps in dps stance and tank stance would only be 10%) WOULD be a meaningfull choice. Not a win-win situation like it is nowadays. Not to say with more and more abilities tied outside of tanking (BW, fel cleave, decimate, IR), the gameplay in tanking stance turns out more and more boring. In fact it's more and more... lvl 50 gameplay :x.

[Falgern]

warriors have it more easy to tank outside of tank stance, with shorts colddowns and a self heal combo cant really compared on how DRK suffers outside of grit on this fight.

Which fight are you talking about? Shinryu EX? The only difference between tanking on warrior and dark knight in shinryu is that picking up the adds is not feeling good as it takes MP so you end up losing damage on the actual boss

Tank stance isn’t really the problem.
It’s our dps stance that’s too strong.
Tank stance is high cost low reward, dps stance is low cost high reward.

I'd be very supportive to nerfing our dps stance in both enmity and survivability.
Make it like blood 4 blood with increased damage taken, reduce our hp pool to dps class level, reduce healing received, any that would make it a meaningful decision to go into dps stance.

A -50% enmity modifier would be enough to make tanks use tank stance if they so wanted. But it seems to be the current goal to just keep tanking the way it is with how many abilities tanks get for their DPS stances

[Acidblood]

Personally, and at this point, I think SE needs to just flat out drop the idea of 'tank stance'... it works OK on WAR because they have skills built around being in a certain stance (and they can switch oGCD), but on PLD especially the stances are next to pointless in terms of gameplay.

For example; would it really make any difference to PLD gameplay (apart from making it less clunky) if they removed the stances (and gauge), adjusted the enmity of the standard combo (which is now otherwise useless), and made blocking more active as their primary means of mitigation while tanking? Similarly, for DRK, they could remove Grit and make DRK more of a counter tank, able to parry more actively, counter to lower incoming damage (to themselves or the party), and use Dark Arts in far more interesting (read: less spam, more impact) ways.

As for Tenacity, the only change they should make (apart from maybe some scaling tweaks) is to give Tenacity a significant effect over Enmity*; i.e. more Tenacity = more Enmity = less time spamming Enmity builders = more time doing more damage, and all without the chunkiness of stances. *And adjust Enmity appropriately so that you can't just do a single Enmity combo and then forget about it.