A lot of people dont like to play Tank -

[Sylvain]

Literally this.

I moved with the same mentality, the problem is,

In WoW tank and heal dps are borderline meaningless for 2 reasons.
1 - You're part of a bigger group so your contribution is smaller for each new dps member
2- You just don't pull that much damage.


In FF, group are smaller, 8 vs 10 doesn't seem like a lot, but assuming 2k dps from tank in def and 4k from each dps (normalised) you get 20kdps. If both healer start dealing damage and do for instance 500 your group dps increases by 5%. Put both your tank in dps stance and raise them to 2500 for instance, you gain another 1k.

By playing with tank in dps stance and healer actively nuking, you gained 2k dps which is 10% raid dps. If you make your party a 10man group, your raid dps without going aggressive would be 28k, adding 2k only increases it by 7%. Then, since in WoW raids had around 16 dps, you can easily see where "a dps tank contribution" goes. Same for healer. 500 dps when your raid dps is 64k is negligible.

If we did little damage it wouldn't matter, but f@ck we actually do a lot of damage.
A very aggressive healer can reach 2k dps (especially WHM). Over the course of a 8min fight that's almost a million damage. All three tank can do very decent dps too if allowed.

That's the first reason.

The second reason is that FF damage is substantially different from WoW and most other mmo.

In FF as you might have noticed, damage tends to be extremely spiky. It's either "avoid or die" for most dps and every single boss has at the very least one tank buster (some much deadlier than others such as OS3). This is coupled with boss have rather weak AA.

In WoW, you actively need to keep the tank alive, you need to assign a healer to the tank basically and I remember how some could litterally die in less than 4 or 5 secs if I wasn't spamming them during cataclysm.

In FF, you can litterally put a HoT and let the fairy do half if not all the tank heal for you (spare tank busters). So if the boss does low AA dmg and aggro isn't an issue, wth do you need tank stance for? 20%is a lot when you struggle keeping the tank alive, but 20% of not-a-lot is still not-a-lot. They'll die in 17sec without heal instead of 14... big deal. The fact that tank cd have a outrageously long duration doesn't help (especially rampart). Then if you add the whole 90% of the raid dmg comes as a burst. Well, it takes me as much time healing 2 low people than the whole raid. both healer do medica once and bam party full.


I would love that tank focus more on mitigation and healer spend more time healing, but that would require some extensive rework of the PvE balance (noticeably a huge nerf of healers aoe potency) and boss AA to be substantially higher. (healer having less than unlimited mana making any mana management a non existent concept. The only way a healer runs oom is by spamming rez. If we could run oom by healing the tank too much, you could be sure that tank stance and piety would get more love.)

[Lannybaby]

I used to main war in ARR, HW, and did a little drk on the side (during HW of course). I still tank to this day, but only to get fast queues in roulettes. The fun factor has been lessened, imo. As several others have mentioned, the thrill just isn't there anymore - wars and drks have an available answer to everything. In fact, the biggest problem with drk is their low damage compared to the other two. They tank very well, and that's what bothers me. If I make a mistake, I expect to be punished for it. Did I burn too much mp during my blood weapon phase and a buster is coming, and I don't have enough for TBN? Rookie mistake, but one syphon strike is all I need to work TBN again. There's nothing to watch out for because it's all been simplified. With dps, and even healers, there's more to do and more to watch out for.

[Moogly]

I don't think nerfing the tanks will make less or more players take on the role.
It's more about how symbolic the role is in the trinity - the tank is expected by default to lead the group.

Being the leader of the group is most of the time a hassle for many players that just want to get into a dungeon, disconnect their brains and just have fun.

[Azerhan]

I don't think nerfing the tanks will make less or more players take on the role.
It's more about how symbolic the role is in the trinity - the tank is expected by default to lead the group.

Being the leader of the group is most of the time a hassle for many players that just want to get into a dungeon, disconnect their brains and just have fun.

Personnally, I find the tank in my roster not like a leader, but more like: "Take the boss and let me do the dps". I've played DPS and Tank in Savage, and I've to say I've found much harder to dps correctly (I mean do the more dps that I can AND doing all mech without make my party wiping) than take the Boss to the correct point and do the role of the tank, and all that includes (CDs, moving, Tank Swap...)
All that thing like Provoke, Shirk... Are making the job of tank too easy. I mean... I don't understand how I can loose aggro with all of that, and more: I've a NIN in my team. And using a CD at the good moment isn't hard, and rota for dps is so easy (and in WAR it's never been so easy than now) that I can't miss since I'm used to play dps.
That why I don't play tank in FF: when you understand the job very well, you find out it is too easy.

[Lannybaby]

Toxic players. The tank has to be aware of every little thing and gets lectured if they fail to do something. As a DRK, I've been called out for staying in grit, which I would do when I'm lagging, or when I'm not familiar with the encounter and decide to play it safe. Conversely, I've been called out for not staying in tank stance enough. Maybe some people won't tank because of all these expectations; I can't even play the way I want to without someone harping on about what I'm not doing. They request big pulls, I do that despite actually hating to do big pulls. When I point this out, I get something similar to "cry me a river" or the good-old vote kick. I don't tell others how to play their class, what buff to turn on, what stance to go to - I let them do what they want barring a few minor requests. I request the healer keeps me alive. Wanna attack? Cool, just don't let me die. DRG refuses to use Nastrond? Questionable, but your choice. Just kill the target. I want to play my way? Big, fat, nope.

Tank leads the group? I doubt it. The tank is like the fall-guy, it's always his fault. Who would want that kind of burden on their shoulders?

[aqskerorokero]

guess i m with those fews......I suk at dps jobs and I go heal only to prove that my previous healers are wrong......

[MistakeNot]

Wow, all these people talking about how tanks are "too stressful" or "hard to play", are making me think there's a huge misconception of what tanking is really about. lol

Tanks are actually the LEAST stressful job to play,

Wrong. The stress does not come frome game mechanics, but from other players. They are what make tanking and healing more stressful than the DPS jobs.

[Faeon]

Wrong. The stress does not come frome game mechanics, but from other players. They are what make tanking and healing more stressful than the DPS jobs.

That is correct yes when you are the tank all eyes are on you, and any mistake how small usually will get you flamed, especially when randoms are around. It is the player base that is why people tend to stay away from the more stressful jobs.

[Llus]

I play a tank by complete accident. FFXIV was the first MMO I stayed with past 1 week. I chose marauder in ARR because mean looking guy with a huge axe! I had no idea about the healer tank and dps roles. I knew I didn't want to be a caster. When I learned what it meant to be a tank and what it took to git gud at even basic tanking I was surprised. I didn't even get defiance until I was level 45, nobody ever told me and I was too stupid to realize that there was more available. Once I did get my tank stance, holy crap! Suddenly everything was SUPER easy! I stayed in tank stance 100% of the time. Then I started to notice that things weren't dying as fast as they used to. Then I found out that I had a 20% damage penalty in tank stance (no I never read my tooltips - just pushed the buttons that lit up). So I started looking for tips to improve damage. I adjusted my stats to STR and that really helped out. Started using overmelded STR accessories, read my tooltips in-depth, watched videos on optimizing. And while I wasn't (and am still not) a top tank, I've come a long way. Beyond optimizing my stats and rotation, I also learned about optimizing CDs for fights. As a defiance only tank I had no idea that tankbusters were even a thing. I'd build my stacks and IB, simply rotated CDs once they fell off and that worked! Every once in a while I would simply die. Then I learned about tankbusters, the scripted nature of every fight and started learning how to optimize my CD usage. Holmgang used to be the "Ohh Shit!" button, then it became the "Hahaha! You suck at killing me!" button.

That experience is probably the best one I could have had. Coming in as a complete noob, knowing nothing and progressing to the point where I want to optimize not only my damage; but the damage my healers and DPS can put out is a ton of fun. For example, knowing that If I HG at X point in a fight, healers can keep blowing up the boss for 5s w/o having to slowcast a heal. Holding the boss at a particular point for 2s longer when having to move it or stagger-step moving means my mele can hit their positionals easier. Pre-positioning for upcoming mechanics, tank swaps etc. All these things mean you're constantly thinking ahead. It's like a game of chess, but you know exactly what your opponent will be doing next and can take advantage of it. Knowing what your DPS could be doing at that point of the fight, knowing what your healers could be doing at that point all make the fights more interesting. After a while though, your reactions to a fight will be just as scripted as the fight itself. I know I'm going to use Vengance on 2nd buster, gang 3rd, rampart+RI #3, move to Y position after X happens so the only thing left to you is optimizing your personal DPS. To dumb down the role to a HULK SMASH BUTTON is dissapointing. This is why I didn't like PLD in ARR, literally 1, 2, 3 all day. There was nothing interesting in being a PLD and you weren't expected to do damage. A lot of that mindset is still in the game where PLDs want to main tank and stay in shield oath. The same with DRK going grit 100% of the time; only now DRK is a 1, DA 2, DA 3 tank. This even permeates WARs staying in defiance until IR is up, then going deliverance and doing their FC spam.

I know SB was supposed to be the expansion that made it easier to play all roles, but to dumb things down by so much that you are now literally facerolling your keyboard to do damage is dissapointing to say the least. WAR is no longer engaging. DRK hasn't been engaging since the release (with HW you had to really micromanage your MP so that your darkside wouldn't fall off). I like the changes they've made to PLD, subtle changes like moving the RA combo off of SB, giving more party and single target utility as well as the new Holy Spirit (HULK SMASH!) gives PLD a much more engaging playstyle.

At this point I don't think SE will be making any more drastic changes to WAR. It seems like the majority of players love the WAR changes. But hopefully, SE will make changes in the next expansion that will bring back a level of difficulty for both WAR and DRK to make them more fun and interesting to play.

[ArcaviusGreyashe]

Tank leads the group? I doubt it. The tank is like the fall-guy, it's always his fault. Who would want that kind of burden on their shoulders?

Been playing tank for 4+ years, and it hasn't felt like a burden since the six first months. Sure, you're a little uneasier than DPSs or healers for your first run, but after that...

I always felt, as a tank, like a leader, but leading isn't "being the boss". It's "be cheerful, motivate your party, make them feel proud of themselves, adjust for your healer and never, never adopt automatisms.

I like being a tank because each pug I join turns out differently. Because the party needs more dps, or the healers are less focused on healing, or you actually have to build a kill for the team by helping them be motivated, inspired.

That's what being a tank leader is, and that's what is fun about the game. Sure, war is now pretty straightforward and easy to play, but that leaves me more time to help and cheer