Is Tanking Boring?

[Kalise]

all the other things tanks have to deal with such as positioning, enmity, mitigation, and general raid awareness.

That implies that these are things that Tanks actually need to do...

Enmity is pretty much a non-factor, it's just a case of mash your highest damage rotation in DPS stance and have everyone else de-taunt.

Mitigation is just "Use X button when boss uses Y ability at the predetermined time"

Positioning, is relevant occasionally, but there are a number of times when the boss just positions itself.

With mechanics, often actually having Tanks deal with fewer mechanics, since people who design bosses tend to make it so that DPS and Healers get targeted by crap that forces them to do stuff, while Tanks are often just sat there whacking away at the boss with maybe a cone attack to sidestep here and there.

It's a far cry from some of the great iterations of tanks from MMO's. Where things happened such as consistent high damage throughout a fight, meaning that a tank would have to continually space out their defensive CD's well to mitigate damage (Often weaving them between healer CD's) but ensuring that for the Tankbuster skills they had a potent enough CD available. Where threat was an actual thing that Tanks were in control of, where they'd try and optimize how much they used their major threat generators vs their DPS skills (Because while maximizing DPS was still important, it didn't happen to coincide with dealing adequate threat). Where tanks were constantly having to move bosses and adds in a fight and so the best Tanks could excel by moving as little as possible to deal with mechanics and minimize DPS loss from casters having to move.

As it stands now, Tanking in FFXIV is essentially just like playing a DPS, only you've swapped your DPS cooldowns for defensive ones. A lot of the time it's just sit there, follow the boss and maximize your DPS rotations. Maybe you boost your threat on pull with tank stance and an enmity combo before just going full DPS to mitigate high frontload classes. But otherwise, it's mostly just DPS stance, DPS combo, maximize usage of DPS cooldowns.

[Katie_Kitty]

words

Just because it's not difficult to maintain hate doesn't mean it's not something the tank has to keep an eye on. Believe it or not, enemies aren't just naturally attracted to the tank by default like people such as yourself would have us believe. Getting and keeping aggro requires intentional action on the part of the tank, so yes it is something the tank has to do. You're also completely downplaying the importance of mitigation, positioning, and general awareness for tanks. If a tank just parks her butt down in one spot and that spot is no longer safe for anyone to be, guess what happens? Yep, anyone who needs to attack from melee range stays right in the danger zone and takes the hit. So yes those are absolutely things that a good tank needs to take into consideration. DPS need to consider them as well, but they are ultimately only responsible for themselves, nobody else. Which goes right along with my point that tanks are a role of responsibility and DPS are just all about chilling and hanging out and pressing buttons.

Do DPS sometimes get targeted by stuff that doesn't target tanks? Sure, but there are also mechanics for tanks that don't target DPS. Overall, those mechanics are in the minority, and that means tanks don't get to just stand around and do nothing because most things DPS have to deal with tanks have to deal with as well.