Really want a magic tank

[Malkria]

The issue with ranged tanks in this game is the mass importance of positionals and keeping the boss in a certain place. Unless you want the job to be full of binds and about locking the boss in place (which would either be broken or pointless in practice), a ranged tank would either be in melee range 99% of the time, or would cause chaos for any job that needs to hit positionals

Granted I haven't done a lot of tanking, and frankly that is why I am asking for a magic/ranged tank. I don't like melee and I doubt that I'm alone in that if there was such an option I would be more into tanking, and I imagine others as well. So all that said, maybe let's try to think of a way to make this work?

First off, if the pet had basic controls and a decent sized aggro pull it could bring in the mobs just fine. From what I have observed in dungeons this could lead you to using the tank to pull mobs then tell it to move to a certain spot much like a fairy or other summon we have currently. Next would be in dealing with positional mechanics. To be honest...there would be no way to conventionally manage this without a LOT of micro managment. So instead maybe have a mechanic based around shields that the mage bolsters with it's own damage. Without it, the mage has to sacrifice some of their own life to either restore the shields or repair/heal the pet. This also would get around the healer needing to heal both mage and pet, simply have the mage be the only one to heal the pet.

By linking the life of mage and pet you could have a reasonable way to be ranged while tanking, bolstered by having the pet simply attack what the mage attacks much like normal pets do currently. Now yes this would in effect make the pet 'easy mode' for a lot of mechanics, but at the same time the tank has to keep track of the fight, teammates, themselves, mechanics, and their pet's status. So I feel it would balance out.

Also, while I can't say for certain, a pet based tank would sound far more difficult.

Well yes and based on what I wrote above it should be. As for aggro there is already abilities to shift aggro around from person to person via the NIN, so having a tank pet just soak up all the aggo the caster produces isn't outside of what can conceivably be put in the game. Furthermore having an aspect of the tank that can't be helped by teammates is also already in the game, unless the Dark Knight actually can get help from AST or BRD jobs with their mana regen?

Granted this would either be considered an easy mode job because the pet can ignore/soak a portion of the mechanics that other tanks can't, or it would be considered the hardest tank due to having to keep track of yourself AND your pet as you tank. Maybe that is a good thing, after all the point is to have a tank that is NOT like the others with a different flavor and weapon. In fact with a high physical defense, magic defense, and high dps style tanks...without going ranged there honestly aren't a whole lot more options to go with.

[Rayo]

Granted I haven't done a lot of tanking, and frankly that is why I am asking for a magic/ranged tank. I don't like melee and I doubt that I'm alone in that if there was such an option I would be more into tanking, and I imagine others as well. So all that said, maybe let's try to think of a way to make this work?

I can see what you mean by your concept and it could work in any other game, heck I've mained a Ranged tank in another game, but it worked their because the game was a sci-fi setting with plenty of Ranged, gun toting enemies. On top of that, I'm a huge supporter of a Caster/ranged tank, with the ideas of Morning star (Long mace) wielding Blue mage, Blunderbuss and artillery fire Cannoneer (FF5), I'm not even opposed to a summoned tank, but one solely based around that idea causes problems called impractical and unbalanced because gameplay.

What you propose is that you want to either play a pure utility non-healer support that tells another tank to get hit or play as two tanks at the same time. Why not just be the tank and cut the middle man. Not to mention the balance issues. You play an all around safer tank, so you have to be balanced in theory as a "less risk, less reward" or "more work, same result" job. you either have a super effective pet but you have to dedicate yourself to constantly keeping it active and drawing enmity to it, or have a pet that can just as easily die in combat as any other tank, and you'll have to pick up the pace. on top of the fact that you have to be punished if the pet dies, either you can't tank at all and what normally happens when the tank dies happens or you become the tank with little to no tools beyond the basics. not to mention the vast majority of bosses in the game are built around the idea of having a tank at point blank range, as most bosses carry 3 categories of attacks, anti tank (small circle, tank busters, cleaves, enmity focused attacks, run away aoes, line of sight mechancis), anti-melee(small circle AOEs, 360 cleaves, Run away AOE, line of sight mechancis) and anti-ranged ( Super large cone aoes, half room aoe's, stack markers, Pull ins, donut AOE's, random targeting, rush down attacks line of sight). Major threats to melee and tanks overlap, but not ranged threats, you'll have to actually watch out for more things if you were to be a ranged Pet master tank.

[Malkria]

I can see what you mean by your concept and it could work in any other game, heck I've mained a Ranged tank in another game, but it worked their because the game was a sci-fi setting with plenty of Ranged, gun toting enemies. On top of that, I'm a huge supporter of a Caster/ranged tank, with the ideas of Morning star (Long mace) wielding Blue mage, Blunderbuss and artillery fire Cannoneer (FF5), I'm not even opposed to a summoned tank, but one solely based around that idea causes problems called impractical and unbalanced because gameplay.

What you propose is that you want to either play a pure utility non-healer support that tells another tank to get hit or play as two tanks at the same time. Why not just be the tank and cut the middle man. Not to mention the balance issues. You play an all around safer tank, so you have to be balanced in theory as a "less risk, less reward" or "more work, same result" job. you either have a super effective pet but you have to dedicate yourself to constantly keeping it active and drawing enmity to it, or have a pet that can just as easily die in combat as any other tank, and you'll have to pick up the pace. on top of the fact that you have to be punished if the pet dies, either you can't tank at all and what normally happens when the tank dies happens or you become the tank with little to no tools beyond the basics. not to mention the vast majority of bosses in the game are built around the idea of having a tank at point blank range, as most bosses carry 3 categories of attacks, anti tank (small circle, tank busters, cleaves, enmity focused attacks, run away aoes, line of sight mechancis), anti-melee(small circle AOEs, 360 cleaves, Run away AOE, line of sight mechancis) and anti-ranged ( Super large cone aoes, half room aoe's, stack markers, Pull ins, donut AOE's, random targeting, rush down attacks line of sight). Major threats to melee and tanks overlap, but not ranged threats, you'll have to actually watch out for more things if you were to be a ranged Pet master tank.

I personally see it as both a job you have to work at hard and as a kind of unique hybrid. In fact if you ever have played a "cloromancer" or a leech-type healer you might understand what I am trying to say next better. Basically the caster's DPS directly heals the tank and probably would be more on the direct then DoT side. Thus occasionally the caster would need to directly reinforce the pet, but this wouldn't be cast from MP it would come from the health of the caster. In fact various buffs could be done at cost of HP. Thus the caster is still the primary focus of the healers, not the pet itself which they won't be able to heal. Finally if the pet goes down, the caster could expend an ability to instantly bring it back up at maybe half to 75% of their health if available. This would give this job a LOT more forgiveness for dying while tanking, but at the same time could still be not enough to prevent the mob from going after the caster and then the party.

Now as for mechanics I would again point to another job in the BLM that I just god done arguing with the community about how some of the mechanics you will 'take the hit on' so you can keep your DPS up. If we already have a job where the player can eat mechanics as a DPS, having a tank pet do the same isn't unfathomable. In fact knowing which mechanics your pet can take and which it can't could be it's own unique style.

Again, if you have a SMN or even just the arcanist you can take it's tank pet and try it in a few dungeons. It's not a hard concept to test to see for youself how viable or not it actually is.

[Rayo]

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Yes, I've tried a SMN tank summon to tank a dungeon, it did not end well, it was tedious frustrating and boring and People had to regulate their own DPS to not over take the egis.

Also what you created is a Job more safe than PLD, but actively forces Healers to babysit you, you say that you should be ok taking a hit while as fragile as a Caster, but you actively sacrifice health to use your skills. You also don't really go over how you can help the party stay alive or optimally DPS, just how the Caster can keep their pet alive. aAlso the problem with the pet coming back is that Enmity doesn't work that easy, its built up. You can't simply just get back all you lost enmity that easily, and Provoke/Ultimatum works differently as it essentially puts you at the top of the list, not generates it. Lastly its broken that you can instantly bring back an important Part of the party combat ready at the press of a button, even if you sacrifice health, as no other job can do that without using up the emergency button or LB3.

I want you to know, I'm not against a petmaster Tank, I've come up with some ideas in different games, but what you propose brings up the SAM/BLM conundrum, "if its so overpowered whats the point of bringing anything else." What you want is something super easy, super effective, super fun, and super unbalanced.

What I would propose is different, when the pet acts as a tank the damage it takes is dealt to your health, you get a trait early on to make it so that the pet will cast Tank role actions on your target instead of you so it can use provoke, ultimatum, and shirk. Your abilities focus on buffing both you and your pet at the same time. With stronger abilities requiring the use of a Job resource (like PLDs oath, WAR's Beast, or DRK's Blackblood). Also some abilities are solely for your pet to use, including its own enmity generation. To simplify Pet maneuverability, you have a recall button, which causes the pet to drop its actions to follow you (excluding actions you tell it to perform) and pressing the button again to tell the pet to stay at its position (allowing you to effectively maneuver the pet like a good old fashion tank, but also tell it to stay so you can move out). Lastly in case the pet dies, you deplete your resource, but can take on a stance that makes you an inferior tank (all previous skills change to one for solely you) so you can make resources to re summon your pet.