Community Opinions on Tanking

[Kalise]

For better or worse, it's pretty normal across any MMO that doesn't involve a constant struggle for survival in its highest difficulty fights once fully memorized... which is most of them. So I can't honestly say it gives me a strange feeling, at all, though I do wish we could see more value for and from indirect contribution.

Ehh... It's not always the case.

Since, there have been times in MMO's when the top tier tanks were the ones that were most self sufficient, which meant that the healers could spend more time DPSing, or they could replace a healer altogether with another DPS, replace the off-tank with another DPS (Because said self sufficient Tank could cheese through boss mechanics #JustDKThings) or otherwise adjust to push out more DPS than if they just took the Tank(s) that would provide the most personal damage.

Though this was alongside more options for healers, such as builds that would work via dealing damage to things acting like a 0.5 healer 0.5 DPS. Or other mechanics such as WoW's Shadowpriest giving an aura that gave lifesteal to everyone so basically everyone had a mini-Bloodbath active at all times. I suppose the FFXIV comparison would be running a RDM over a healer to primarily damage but also spot heal with Vercure and help out against deaths with Verraise. (If not also including any changes to classes, such as if Mantra was turned into a mini-Bloodbath effect for the team)

Heck, I remember some boss encounters in WoW where you just didn't need a healer at all because a Death Knight could cheese the bosses mechanics so hard that damage wasn't taken due to various things like AMS removing the stacking debuffs as well as percent health healing with a exponentially increasing health pool.

So i dont agree with @Kalise at all here for example. 99 % of the time the problem is always the tanks can do too much, not the opposite. Like its not 1999 anymore where tanks literarly just auto attack and get punched, in any mmo

Whenever it's the case of Tanks doing too much, it is always, without fail, due to how much damage they push out.

Since, in order to try and make DD players want to play tank, they give Tanks massive damage.

Which leads directly to the issue of "Why bring a DD class when a Tank does the same damage but doesn't die?"

This is literally the issue that's being faced by Devs here too, they're pushing Tanks into this place where they don't have to care about anything other than stacking damage and pushing DPS combos and then they're surprised when Tanks are doing "Too much damage"

That is why it is necessary to divorce Tanks from this one-dimensional ideal wherein all they care about is stacking DPS stats and pushing Fell Cleave.

Be it by making mitigation stats useful, making Enmity/Mitigation combos a thing that are worth using, by creating more boss mechanics that need tanks to do something, by changing how bosses deal damage so it's not so heavily invested into specifically timed tankbusters, or a plethora of other things.

Tanks get into trouble for "Doing too much", when, ironically, they have little to do. When they don't care about maximizing Enmity, when they don't care about maximizing mitigation, when they don't care about positioning bosses or reacting to various mechanics, when they don't care about using any support skills to help or protect allies. When literally, the single thing they have to care about, is "Do More Damage"

Which is where the comment around Tanks becoming useless punching bags. If you take away everything but their damage, then people complain that Tanks are "Doing too much" even when they have only damage, so you take that away... What are Tanks left with?

[Kaitoo]

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While this a problem i dont think this is created with tanks in mind. The reason for whey they give tanks "moar dmg" is obviously they want more people, especially dps, play tanks, yes.

However, it's not like the other roles in the game are hyper complex. Quite the opposite, they repeatedly say they want the skill ceiling for all jobs lowered, doesn't matter tanks, healers or dps. Hence why they are bundling together things and simplifying it every expansion. So it's not like something that is extra hamfisted about tanks, its the whole game.

The reason why it is a special case with tanks is active mitigation. So in earlier mmo design there was bare to none active mitigation. Tanks had shields/the highest armor rating, so they took less dmg by simply existing. I.A. "tanks are just punching bags", something that was exactly intended in the holy trinity system. With active mitigation, in theory, you make the tank gameplay less boring while still have the same holy trinity principle. Problem is active mitigation requires farr more skill then just standing around. You cant have proper active mitigation in a game when you are not willing to accept a large gap showing between players who can press the button at the right time or not.

That's why i mentioned the core game principle instead of a lengthy tank analysis because the issue is not really tank design. The core issue is the overall game design. And the band aid fix with more dmg is gonna spin out of control as it always does.

I dont see more interesting tank gameplay being added without certain parts of the community flipping their shit, because this would mean a reversal on their stance of a high skill floor and low skill ceiling, something which alot of players like cause they cant underperform

[Connor]

I can only really speak as a healer and with limited experience as a tank, but I always felt like there was something missing from these two roles.

They don’t feel like separate roles with separate responsibilities in the party; they feel like blue DPS with more defense and green DPS that occasionally uses a healing oGCD.

Sometimes I consider tanking, but then I realize I’d be doing the exact same as I would as a healer (spamming DPS abilities and using an oGCD every few minutes so nobody dies), just in front of the enemy instead of behind it. And then i realize as a healer I’d be doing the exact as I would as a DPS, but with some healing oGCD’s thrown in (Of course, healing could never get in the way of healers dealing damage,).

Sadly though I find it extremely likely the developers will ever make a concerted effort to solidify the idea of ‘different roles do different things’. I’d honestly be less surprised if they announced they were renaming the roles to ‘defensive DPS’ for tanks and ‘support dps’ for healers.

I expect for the new expansion the healers and tank’s will likely get a slew of new damage dealing abilities, probably ones with some sort of combos or interactions with each other to make DPS’ing as a healer/tank even more desirable

[Katie_Kitty]

People keep bringing this up and I will never agree with it. Tanks in FFXIV do not play like "DPS with defensive cooldowns." If they did, then you would see many many more people playing tank classes. No, people don't play tank classes, and the reason why is because they don't want the responsibility of mitigation and enmity and leadership. You're expecting me to believe that the same playerbase that is so bad at the game that they can't even play DPS roles right doesn't want to play a "DPS with defensive cooldowns"? No. The fact is that most DPS-only players in this game are utter garbage and you can see that in action every day just by running dungeons or normal trials as a Paladin and figuring out, "oh hey I'm doing more damage than most or all of the damage-dealers as a paladin which is not even a good class for doing damage." People suck at this game and if tanking was just a "DPS with defensive cooldowns" then more people would play it.

Putting that aside, I also don't agree with the mentality that tanks should just be meatshields for the party. First off, as I said above, we can't even rely on the DPS to consistently out-DPS the tanks or healers in this game so why would we want to gimp tank damage? That would just make everything worse for everyone and everything would take twice as long to finish. Plus it would suck all the fun right out of tanking. I don't want to just be a meatshield. I want to be able to dish it out just like I take it. There's nothing wrong with that at all.

If you want to make tanking more complicated, then give tanks more complicated DPS rotations.

[Kalise]

Tanks in FFXIV do not play like "DPS with defensive cooldowns." If they did, then you would see many many more people playing tank classes.

Err... No.

You see, people like Developers assume that the reason that DPS players don't play Tanks is because Tanks don't do Sick DEEPS. But this is not the case. There's a number of factors that make people not want to play Tanks.

First and foremost, is the design of the classes and their rotations. DPS classes invariable have more interesting and cool rotations. I mean, compare how flashy and cool SAM is as well as how much more engaging and complex it is to play one. Then compare it to any of the Tanks, where pretty much the most interesting part is when a WAR presses Inner Release and gets to then just mash the Fell Cleave button for the duration.

This is not only the case in this game, but in every other game where Devs try and make Tanks appealing by giving them a ton of damage. Heck, there have been numerous periods in WoW where Tanks not only competed with DPS classes in damage but also EXCEEDED them (Especially in AoE situations), in fact there was also a time when Tanks (Predominantly Protection Warriors) were also the best class in PvP too (Lel Vengeance working on players allowing tanks to one shot people who tried to kill them...)

In any of these points, was there a sudden surge in DPS mains swapping over to playing Tank? No. All that happened is they started complaining about the fact that Tanks were doing more damage than them and would do so with really boring rotations (Spamming Heart Strike and Death Strike as a Death Knight... Wow, so engaging and fun...)

DPS players play DPS classes because: 1) They like the looks or the lore of that particular DPS class 2) They like how the class plays, how its rotation plays out and how it FEELS to hit things with the skills (Like, it's way more satisfying to land a Deathflare or Midare Setsugekka with its build up into a massively flashy animation, than it is to land a Fell Cleave)

Since, many players don't actually give a damn about DPS. They won't care about maximizing the DPS they can do, they won't use parsers or look up optimal rotations and stats. But yet they'll still play DPS classes but not Tanks.

I mean, if DPS was literally the main factor in why people play classes, then why would there be more Healers than Tanks. With Healers having LESS DPS than tanks and an even more boring rotation (Stone/Malefic/Broil Spam for days). Well, they get to have some more interaction, especially in more casual settings where they don't get overgeared so quickly to the point of basically not having to heal with GCD's.

Sometimes, people don't like playing tanks/healers in games because if things go wrong, they get blamed. But, given the number of absolutely awful DPS, I don't think that's the case in this game. As I don't see a lot of complaints being voiced about people, usually people just try and help teach others (Hooray for not massively toxic communities!)

Probably helps that honestly, as long as your healer isn't a total derp, you can pretty much get through any casual content... It might take like 4 whole eternities if your DPS suck, but you'll eventually get it done...

[Katie_Kitty]

First and foremost, is the design of the classes and their rotations. DPS classes invariable have more interesting and cool rotations.

You expect me to believe that the playerbase that can't even out-DPS a paladin in faceroll content is skipping tanking classes because it's not complicated or interesting enough for them? That's laughable. No, it has nothing to do with the rotation and everything to do with the responsibility. Most people in this game don't even know how to spam their AoE buttons.

No. All that happened is they started complaining about the fact that Tanks were doing more damage than them and would do so with really boring rotations

Yes, I realize that "waahh they have boring rotations" is a common excuse for DPS-only players to use when asked why they refuse to play tanks, but - again - That's not the real reason why most people don't play tanks. Again, I'm not talking about the orange-parsing top 1% DPS players I am talking about the average player in the game which is utter trash at the game in every respect. Those people are not refusing to play tank because their rotations aren't complicated enough.

Since, many players don't actually give a damn about DPS. They won't care about maximizing the DPS they can do, they won't use parsers or look up optimal rotations and stats. But yet they'll still play DPS classes but not Tanks.

If anything, it only supports my own argument that most people play DPS because of the lack of responsibility and the ease with which they can get away with doing virtually nothing in particular and the way nobody ever holds them accountable for their failings except in the highest end content.

I mean, if DPS was literally the main factor in why people play classes, then why would there be more Healers than Tanks.

Sometimes, people don't like playing tanks/healers in games because if things go wrong, they get blamed. But, given the number of absolutely awful DPS, I don't think that's the case in this game.

Are you trying to make my case for me?

"blue DPS" or "DPS with defensive cooldowns" doesn't mean they do great DPS. It means they focus a lot on DPS and that other considerations such as enmity and mitigation take a backseat to just doing damage. if the issue was not the responsibility that comes along with tanking, then why would people who suck at playing DPS classes (90% of DPS players in the game) not switch to a "blue DPS" class with a simpler damage rotation? Logically they would. But they don't, and the reason why is because they are scared off by the idea of responsibility and being held accountable for maintaining a minimum standard of performance.

[Canadane]

Are you trying to make my case for me?

Looks like you're both arguing for the same thing to me.

[Lyth]

Every job does damage. This has been the case in every Final Fantasy game, even if it amounts to just hitting something with your cane between heals.

The reason why tank and healer damage output ends up coming under scrutiny is because damage output is the central part of how dps jobs differentiate themselves. The idea being, if your dps and tanks are doing the same damage, then you just replace all your dps with tanks and call it a day. But I think that there's another area which can and should be the key differentiating factor: raid buff synergy. You don't need to have a massive numbers difference between dps and the other two roles. You just need dps to be the ones to set up the big damage windows that everyone benefits from. If that's an exclusive feature of dps, then they remain a mandatory part of the team regardless of relative dps values, because you don't clear without a properly timed buff window.

That's also a big reason why raidwide buffs just don't belong on tanks and healers. The introduction of Balance was one of the worst design decisions that was made in this game. Likewise, 100% uptime buffs like Slashing should never have been a part of the game, but putting it on a tank (and the highest damage tank, no less) only made it worse. That's not even going into the actual balance issues raid-wide damage buffs create in these roles.

Enmity is not a particularly scintillating part of tanking. The only reason why it exists is because there's a difference in dps output between tanks and other jobs. Most actual enmity mechanics revolve around either securing aggro on a newly spawned mob, or around an enmity reset. This sort of thing is fine. But forcing tanks to spend a fight "maximising their aggro" is pretty silly. It's like maximising your dps, except with fake numbers so that dps players don't feel intimidated by the tank's dps output. No thank you.

[Kalise]

You expect me to believe that the playerbase that can't even out-DPS a paladin in faceroll content is skipping tanking classes because it's not complicated or interesting enough for them? That's laughable. No, it has nothing to do with the rotation and everything to do with the responsibility. Most people in this game don't even know how to spam their AoE buttons.

Note that I said interesting and cool, not complicated.

SMN has a pretty simple rotation. Apply DoTs > Ruin Spam > Fester > Dreadwyrm > Ruin Spam. However, it does it in a cool way, where you get to fire off cool Deathflares and summon your own mini-Bahamut. It's also somewhat engaging because you have procs to use, you have 3 different states that change your rotation slightly (Normal state where you're just dumping your Aetherflow, Dreadwyrm where you're just trying to dump Ruins and Bahamut where you're trying to spam Enkindle)

As opposed to a Tank where you just 1>2>3 ad infinitum. Doesn't even matter WHICH of the 3 Tanks you're playing. Just 1>2>3 over and over. Maybe spam an AoE a couple of times when you're pulling packs to secure threat initially. But otherwise, 1>2>3. Unchanging even if you swap stance. None of these 3 button combos are particularly flashy either. At best, you have Decimate which is pretty cool. But that's a niche ability when you consider how much ST the game is (Even in casual content because of so many roadblocks limiting mass pulls...)

I am talking about the average player in the game which is utter trash at the game in every respect. Those people are not refusing to play tank because their rotations aren't complicated enough.

Though, it's hard to say with any certainty WHAT these people's reasoning actually is for not playing tanks. Also, really? You think the average player is complete garbage at the game? Honestly, I find the complete trash players a minority. Heck, even sprouts tend to be okay, like they're not the best, but they're not particularly awful.

If anything, it only supports my own argument that most people play DPS because of the lack of responsibility and the ease with which they can get away with doing virtually nothing in particular and the way nobody ever holds them accountable for their failings except in the highest end content.

On the flip side, because of how little a Tank actually has to do, because they have so little outside DPS and they can rely entirely on the healer to make them live, Tanks also have little responsibility. As I mention, as long as your healer isn't trash you can complete any casual content. Pretty much the Healer has the most responsibility in casual content because Tanks can't survive without them and without a Tank it's possible to just shield a DPS through a lot of the games damage. In addition, it's a common trope that whenever something goes wrong, it's always the healers fault, they're always the first to get blamed. Yet, Healers are more popular than Tanks.

Are you trying to make my case for me?

No, I'm covering the many different reasons why people don't play Tanks. It is and never has been because they didn't do enough damage.

I mean, by your own admission, "The average player is utter trash at the game" and "Can't even outdamage a Paladin in casual content" - This suggests that the DPS level of a Tank has literally no bearing on someone's decision to play one of the 9 unique DPS classes over one of the 3 mostly interchangable Tanks.

Yes, part of the reason is the assumption of responsibility, but it's not the entirety nor even the majority of the reasoning. DPS classes just have more variety, they're more diversely created with vastly different gameplay and mechanics. Compared to Tanks and Healers whom have pretty much the same base kits. Tanks with their 1>2>3 combo. Healers with their small heal, big heal, instant heal and ST nuke. With very minor differences between the 3 classes within either role for these basic things that you rely upon for the majority of the game.

So, it's not particularly shocking that DPS classes draw more people to them. I mean, we'll see I guess, if the Gunblade class is real and is in fact a Tank, I expect the tank population to increase when Squall fanboys start maining the class because it'll be new and cool. Especially so if it has a ton of flashy animations.

if the issue was not the responsibility that comes along with tanking, then why would people who suck at playing DPS classes (90% of DPS players in the game) not switch to a "blue DPS" class with a simpler damage rotation? Logically they would.

I think that you're implying that people who suck at DPS are actually aware that they suck at DPS.

Far more often than not, the kind of people who are too stupid to be able to play a DPS class to a respectable level are too stupid to realize that they suck. If they party with someone else who ends up trouncing them, they'll just assume that the person in question is just way, way better geared and/or using some kind of exploit or "Overpowered" class.

[Shurrikhan]

I don't necessarily want to gut mitigation abilites from the dps stance I just want a majority of the "powerful" mitigation tools to be more readily available within the stance and for a requirement to use them due to raid damage. One thing that I disliked about 4.0 WAR was inner release was locked behind dps stance. Similar to current DRK and blood weapon. I think that all skills should be available in both stances. Just create a dps tool that uses the "tanking" recources when dpsing. Thanks for the input!

Not sure how I missed this post earlier. While I don't think it's a perfect solution, especially so long as the timings by which one can spend resources without loss to DPS aren't flexible enough to sync to periods of least damage/healing taken and we'd still need to see average damage taken increased, it's an interesting thought. Builder-spender, with building being more efficient in the currently "wasteful" stance in order to bring that stance's value up without removing the dynamics or differences between the two stances... Straightforward but tasty food for thought.