Gunbreaker gameplay hope and expectations

[shao32]

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I think you get lost in some point, first of all we are claiming WAR is strong, all what they have is equally or better that the other 2 and have no weakness whatsoever, it's not OP in terms of numbers nobody say that, but how strong and mandatory WAR is and we don't want to see another 2 years of WAR ruling the tank role when another tanks are complete ignored like how ignored was PLD in HW and DRK in SB.

Ffxi have nothing to do here, WAR has been the most powerfull tank of the game 6 years in a row, we can't complain about that? We have to look down and accept WAR having preference over the rest at the same time if we complaing we called WAR haters? Nobody here want WAR burn down, we want to SE take some of the stuff WAR rules to leave place to the other tanks and all of then have something to shine, balance is not all about numbers but how they tools interact with the raid too.

[Kalise]

WAR has been the most powerfull tank of the game 6 years in a row, we can't complain about that? We have to look down and accept WAR having preference over the rest at the same time if we complaing we called WAR haters? Nobody here want WAR burn down, we want to SE take some of the stuff WAR rules to leave place to the other tanks and all of then have something to shine, balance is not all about numbers but how they tools interact with the raid too.

Sure, you can complain about WAR being the preferred tank for so long.

But you have to realize that not every aspect of that preference is down to WAR being too strong at certain tasks and some of the blame lies in other tanks being too weak at certain tasks.

Like in terms of snap threat, PLD is the only tank that realistically has an issue here. Both WAR and DRK can snap threat just fine (DRK having an advantage because of having oGCD Enmity skills to utilize while WAR has none)

In terms of mobility, PLD is the only tank that lacks a mobility tool. Both WAR and DRK have skills. Only DRK's is powerful enough and doesn't use any relevant resources so it ends up being part of its DPS rotation making it less usable for mobility.

In terms of DPS, Tanks are pretty even. Though, both DRK and PLD have the capacity to outperform WAR.

In terms of CD's, WAR has a higher number of CD's yes, but both DRK and PLD have actual mitigation on tank stances which is effectively like having a 0 CD Rampart (Though, at the cost of requiring a GCD to activate and for PLD another GCD to spend going back into DPS stance).

WAR has Holmgang which is currently superior to Living Dead/Hallowed Ground, yes. Maybe this is actually an area that WAR should be nerfed in, so as to have a longer CD from 3 minutes to 4-5 minutes (Bearing in mind, it should have some advantage over LD/HG because WAR cannot just hop into Tank stance for free Rampart in addition to popping another strong CD and/or a health buffer in the form of TBN to easily mitigate another TB while Holm is on CD. A weakness of WAR is that they rely so heavily on Holm to deal with Tankbusters as they don't get free DR from tank stance, they don't have easy health buffer from TBN, they can't Shirk the OT and Rampart/Sentinel + Intervention them, they don't have 40% DR CD etc)

So, yes, WAR has been dominant for a while. In some cases, pretty significantly so.

Yes, you can complain about that and ask for other tanks to share the limelight (Though, part of it will always be player perception, unless WAR gets gutted and is unable to Tank, there will be a lot of people who will still favour WAR)

But do note, that WAR's "Dominance" isn't entirely due to their kit being too strong, or having too many areas that it's good at. But also in part because other Tanks have kits that are unreasonably weak (There's no reason why PLD shouldn't be able to push out snap enmity for example), or have flaws in their kits design (DRK's mobility skill being part of its DPS rotation for example).

Yes, some parts of WAR are strong, namely Holmgang's CD. Some parts seem excessive, such as Shake It Off as an AoE shield (Though, this is literally their only OT utility and even then, it's largely unnecessary... Meanwhile both PLD and DRK have things that can allow the MT to more easily soak TB's without Holmgang... In addition to always being able to Provoke and use their OWN tools to soak them...). But WAR isn't so ridiculously broken or universally strong as many people try and claim when they ask for bunches of nerfs to basically everything about it.

Like, so many people come and say "Pick ONE thing for WAR to shine at" as if PLD/DRK don't both have multiple areas where they're strong, even with their arbitrary limitations in certain aspects (I.e. PLD's snap threat and DRK's mobility being part of its DPS rotation).

For example, PLD has unparalleled team utility, to the point where it can itself nullify TB's on the MT on a lower CD than Holm, no other tank comes CLOSE to matching Cover/Intervention/Passage of Arms/Divine Veil (Though, it's a little bit weak). In addition to having reasonable DPS (Tied to 2 different burst phases for better sustained DPS). In addition to also having great self mitigation with Hallowed Ground and Sentinel, alongside essentially "Free" Rampart from Shield Oath. Oh, and if you want to complain about self healing... PLD can Requiescat > Clemency spam (Which costs less than IR > Inner Beast spam because Req is a shorter CD as well as then still having FoF as a damage burst)

DRK has crazy self sustain thanks to TBN being usable in DPS stance (The "Meta" stance to be in most of the time) for constant shields. They also have good DPS that can be adapted for both burst and sustained output. They have arguably the best snap threat in the game. They also have crazy good AoE damage (Not currently relevant in raids due to encounter designs).

This is things they "Shine" at, not accounting for extra things they perform well.

So again, I'm not saying that WAR's don't have anything that could do with nerfs. Just it's not like they need everything bar 1 aspect of them to be completely dismantled like many anti-WAR players seem to believe.

The final note being that, WAR's aren't so universally strong that there's no room for Gunbreaker. There's plenty of room for Gunbreaker just like there's plenty of room for PLD/DRK. People just need to pull their heads out of their rears and actually look past "Holmgang is OP!" or "Look at all their healing on [Skill that is completely irrelevant because it's tied to Tank Stance which no-one in the current meta wants to use]" and actually look at what non-WAR's bring.

[Phoenicia]

I think you get lost in some point, first of all we are claiming WAR is strong, all what they have is equally or better that the other 2 and have no weakness whatsoever, it's not OP in terms of numbers nobody say that, but how strong and mandatory WAR is and we don't want to see another 2 years of WAR ruling the tank role when another tanks are complete ignored like how ignored was PLD in HW and DRK in SB.

Ffxi have nothing to do here, WAR has been the most powerfull tank of the game 6 years in a row, we can't complain about that? We have to look down and accept WAR having preference over the rest at the same time if we complaing we called WAR haters? Nobody here want WAR burn down, we want to SE take some of the stuff WAR rules to leave place to the other tanks and all of then have something to shine, balance is not all about numbers but how they tools interact with the raid too.

No, I am not lost. And yes, it does. I mean in the very same paragraph you said "WAR has been the most powerfull tank of the game 6 years in a row". So you want to punish it by nerfing its guts to the ground, instead of be happy that they are balanced which proves my point. It sounds exactly the same as "PLD has been the ONLY good tank in FFXI for 15 years in a row" so I want them to not even exist in FFXIV as punishment for it being good for so long instead of my <insert favorite job here>. It is the same because it is completely and utterly illogical.

In Stormblood and since patch 4.2, tanks have been in a VERY good balanced state. It could have been better (Give the PLD snap threat would be a good one). And going to the tank forums and plague it with "WAR is OP plz nurf" posts is not helping ANYTHING. I mean this is a GUNBREAKER threat for crying out loud. We should be discussing Gunbreaker game-play and what might make it fun.

In respect of that, I mentioned something NOT fun in WAR design and hope it doesn't "plague" GNB, and somehow all hell broke loose with how OP WAR is?

So yes, anti-WAR posts here come off as WAR hate.

EDIT:

We're all forgetting the most important question. What kind of mount will they get? I hope its a big gun.

No, they will ride a literal tank. Or maybe some HMMWV. lol

[Kalise]

We're all forgetting the most important question. What kind of mount will they get? I hope its a big gun.

Inb4 it's Warbear because it's too OP that Warriors have a bear mount and it needs to be taken away from them so that other Tanks get a chance to have a bear mount

On a more serious note:

Currently we have Bear (Warrior), Lion (Paladin) and Panther (Dork Knight)

So... At a guess, we'll get another Animal. One that isn't associated with any tribe (So nothing that we get from Beastribes) or part of one of the expansions EX Trials (So no Horse/Birb/Wolf)

If we go by Beastkin only... There's potential for Bandersnatch, Boar, Chimera and Mylodon.

To say nothing of them adding in any new Beastkin with ShB. Or deciding to go with something else entirely instead of a Beastkin.

[Phoenicia]

To say nothing of them adding in any new Beastkin with ShB. Or deciding to go with something else entirely instead of a Beastkin.

I still want a gun mounted humvee for my gunbreaker.

Buut, if it's something from the animal kingdom (beasts specifically), felines are already out of the question. I also feel bad that Lions are already taken because of Squall's association with Greiver and Lionheart (his best weapon had that name too).

I KNOW! Give it a Hippopotamus! j/k.

Rhino might be cool. Do we have access to rhino mounts currently? If not, this is a real-life tank-class animal that is pretty armored and dangerous. Despite its poor eye-sight!

But... I want my humvee!

[shao32]

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im glad you recognize WAR have stuff that needs to be nerfed like holmgang and shake it off, but i complety disagree, is not a problem that WAR being to strong and the others to weak, not at all, is a problem that WAR has been overbuffed every patch since release bcs WAR mains can't be happy without being the most stronger tank.

on 4.0 WAR was perfectly balanced with the other 2 excep by his dps being a bit low, they have tank swap limitations like the other 2 not being a big dealt since they are still lower compare to DRK and PLD limitations, they only utility was the slashing, holmgang and his entirely defensive kit is the same as right now and they dps rotation was more complex, what happen? they given a the strongest aoe shield mid expansion givin him a powerful utility midexpansion from nowhere something that they din't need broken complety the tank balance, they tank stances limitations removed they have to be especial of course, but PLD and DRK asking for have the same complety ignored or argued we will being to powerful when are actually WAR he most powerfull tank in tank stance, unchained back to being usable so we back again to WAR main pulling when the pull betwen all tanks was similar are more equal and in the end the faceroll rework on his berserk window when DRK suffers severe problems of mitigation and other stuff without being adresed.

right now despite od this "good balance" as phoenicia claims we have DRK is still the most unplayed tank in the game for a far margin and the comon view of the job is despite being able to pull similar numbers they compositions don't offer the same as a WAR-PLD composition, all of this bcs if is not PLD is WAR doing everything better that DRK all of this bcs they overbuffed and rework WAR midexpansion when was DRK the one that need that, DRK have a spot before that, we only really need some potency tweaks to be on par to PLD and the balance would be much much better

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it's obviously you have diferent point of view of what balance should be done, im not a person that see buff everything to 1 job standars a good thing at all since i saw that creating powercreep problems all the time, the WAR buffs this expansion where unjustified and the clear favoritism around the job insulting.

and as you can see if i think WAR capabilitys are unfairly superior to the other 2 i can't be happy with the "very good balance" we have after WAR cheesing some fights before 4.2 during 2 entire raid tiers.

you understand what you want again, i don't want to WAR being nerfed to the ground at all, i consider WAR 4.0 a perfect status and much more balanced that now and i was not broken or uncapable to do anything, have limitations but his defensive kit was inctact, his dps rotation was solid, his utility was on par and his stances was again ok compared to the other 2, if wanting a proper balance betwen dps, defense, utility and capabilitys betwen all tanks is called WAR hate bcs is as usual the edge then so be it call what you want i don't care anymore, but keep in mind it's insulting bcs we asking for balance and all of then being equal and thats pretty far of what means being a hater.

[Grimoire-M]

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It's less that WAR mains complain for buffs and more that they want their main niche preserved, that of being the best tank for DPS, which was not the case in 4.0. PLD was ahead of them in that respect on top of having more utility. Their 'complex rotation' was really just the stance swap penalty (which shouldn't have been a thing to begin with, as it took away from both mitigation resources and damage) and the IR window halving beast gauge costs instead of nullifying them. Yet it also had a longer duration, and higher potential thanks to syncing with every other Berserk, which still had a raw damage bonus (This was fine as it actually made managing gauge interesting and balanced out the higher potential from Berserk at the time). The main reason that's the case is because the role action changes took more from DRK and PLD than WAR. The secondary reason? People don't rely on tank stance to mitigate damage anymore. WAR's Tank stance is supposed to be the worst one to begin with and that isn't even an issue for them right now given both of the other tanks can use abilities on the WAR to avoid needing to use Inner Beast.

The unfortunate consequence of wanting to maintain that niche as the best raw DPS tank is they wound up being the best overall tank due to poor raid design and lack of forethought on SE's part regarding buffs. The problem with what SE did is they went too far in 4.1 and gave WAR everything they lacked, without toning back what they already had over the other two tanks. Shake It Off was a dumb rework. The IR/Berserk changes are a toss up but I see the merit in the direct crit change. The 'free Fell Cleave Spam'? Not so much. I dislike the Role Actions more than anything though. WAR got way more out of it despite losing Bloodbath. That's the part that needs adjustment.

DRK's problems stem from their complexity (mostly boils down to fight to fight variance) and their reliance on sustained dps compared to the other two tanks. Dark Mind makes them the best or worst tank when it comes to mitigation too. They don't have a real burst window as much as a collection of oGCDs that barely constitute something similar. If more weight was put into their oGCDs that problem can be shored up, but really I think they need a spike damage window, probably once every two minutes, alongside that in Shadowbringers. Otherwise they're just going to fall behind even more. They're the best tank when it comes to AoE right now too and that didn't really get a chance to shine due to the focus on one-boss fights. Though given people are calling for a flash upgrade too I wouldn't be surprised to see that niche taken away. Hopefully SE lets you use more blood abilities at the very least.

I'd consider Stormblood a complete failure in regards to tank balance and mechanical theming. They all require more work next expansion and with Gunbreaker coming in as well that leaves less time to devote to the other three. I hope that means SE is focusing more on them just in case, but we'll see. I hope SE at least makes tank stance matter for whoever's tanking the boss. That would fix most of WAR's issues given how healer balance is currently.

[Kalise]

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To be fair, for Warriors, it's more than just wanting a niche of "Best DPS Tank" (Which has the side effect of currently also meaning "Best Tank" by the nature of defence not being a concern really) but also the fact that outside of potentially Damage and Holmgang what do they bring to a party?

WAR has practically no utility to perform in an OT role. At best they have Shake It Off, but for all the arguments of how OP it is due to being just better than Divine Veil... How often is it actually impactful when you've got Healers spreading Critlo or dropping Helios/Succor to apply much better shields to the party? Especially when you have to consume buffs and it's often still just worse Reprisal (10% less damage from the boss using the AoE vs 8% (+4% per buff removed) max health shield...)

But everyone would cry foul if WAR got any kind of actual utility to make them not hot garbage in an OT role. So what are they left with? As it stands, they're left with being the premier MT's due to Holmgang and ease of dealing damage (Press IR when buffs are up then mash Fell Cleave = Most of your work is done...)

Like, "Oh they have mobility" "They have Slashing debuff (Though NIN is almost as ubiquitous as WAR and also provides that)" "They have mitigation CD's" "They have snap threat" where most of these are kind of just things that Tanks as a whole should have (Snap threat, mitigation CD's. Mobility maybe, at the very least, knockback mitigation)

Then it comes down to, if you can play well enough on DRK or PLD to push out similar damage to a WAR (Which is possible) what reason is there to ever take a WAR to a party over having DRK + PLD? Other than you can more easily ignore TB's with 2m shorter CD on Holm than Living Dead (But then again, PLD can mitigate TB's with 90s CD Rampart > Intervention for 50% damage reduction onto the MT... Which is half the CD of Holm)

[Grimoire-M]

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Regarding most of your utility comments:
- Mobility and Slashing makes more sense on DRK and WAR. PLD doesn't need mobility as much as they need range on Requiescat to enable them to use that phase to get their own sort of advantage, sometimes in ways where a single dash wouldn't be useful, such as Panto 2 in O11S or for a number of things in O6S should you choose to capitalize on it. That's unique to them and I would not advocate for mobility on them for that reason.

- Having some baseline level of personal mitigation is one thing, but when it comes to immunities, WAR is still king. It aligns with healer cooldowns near perfectly (WHM - Benediction. SCH - Excog + Lustrate. 45s Aetherflow lines up well. AST - Essential Dignity doesn't line up but will get full value. Star will.) And Inner Beast into Storm's Path can handle a lot of tankbusters without any healer or offtank input at all while still being better than TBN/Shelltron in effect (though the cost it has is notable without Unchained up). That would feel fair if their tank stance mattered, since it actually is the worst stance to have as a main tank. They're the worst tank at sustaining aggro and require healer input or personal cooldowns in order to take advantage of their tank stance but Shirk & Shadewalker both can bypass the former problem and the latter does not matter currently. And that's more of a raid design issue more than it is a tank issue. At the moment their tank stance winds up being used for Inner Beast sometimes and Unchained openers otherwise. That's it.

- Intervention grants 10% reduction plus half of the boost their own Sentinel/Rampart provides to the target, so in the example you talk about it winds up being equivalent to two Ramparts across two tanks. That's still good, but it winds up being closer to TBN most of the time. Both of these spells are good, but TBN seems weird to me thematically. It's the least DRK-like ability by a mile, but I could understand it if it was self only, like Inner Beast is.

- The thing with Shake it Off is it lets you dump cooldowns you aren't using (or in some cases, were already using) into it, without any extra input to activate those enhanced shields. Veil requires a healer cast or Clemency to activate by contrast. If it saves healer GCDs at no cost people are going to use it, and that's why Shake's better than Veil specifically. And both still have an advantage over most healer shields in that both can stack alongside them and eachother, if you choose to take advantage of it. Which people do, because SE has been leaning more on back to back Raid AoE instead of tank damage to push on healers, and it turns out that having resources to dump into those windows winds up being better in the long run compared to TBN or Intervention as a result.

That all said. WAR does have a few things it should be bringing to the table that SE hasn't given it yet. The biggest one? A Raid DPS buff. A rallying cry skill fits them perfectly. Even more than PLD. I'm still baffled they haven't gotten it yet, but maybe with the Piercing changes SE will go and add it in to compensate for whatever they do with Slashing.

The other thing WAR should do is sustain itself more. Bloodbath could return in the form of a personal cooldown but I'd like to see it added to their tank stance too. This is to bring them more in line with the other tanks, assuming that SE does actually pressure tanks with more boss damage. DRK can do this sure but WAR should have the best option by far. They're the one going berserk. Lifesteal fits that archetype far better as it feels more on theme with the adrenaline rush going on while also somewhat compensating for not having passive mitigation. Both of these address WAR issues in a WAR-like fashion, which allows SE to pair away stuff like Shake it Off and Slashing to compensate.

[Kalise]

-Snip-

As far as mobility goes, it mostly comes down to how people perceive it's ability to negate knockback effects. As such, giving tanks parity with either mobility OR knockback mitigation would suffice. As it stands currently, both WAR and DRK have mobility while PLD has an isolated knockback immunity skill, so it works out well (Aside from maybe the CD of Tempered Will being 180s which seems rather long for such a niche skill)

Then as far as mitigation and aggro goes, WAR's are the bottom of the totem pole in terms of mitigation, so if Tank Stances were a thing, it would be relevant that other Tanks have more tools for mitigation, while WAR would continue to rely on either outside support (I.e. PLD for Intervention/Cover) or immunities to deal with TB's reliably. Then for aggro management, they're actually pretty close to being the best constant aggro generation. Given that their Enmity combo is merely 10 Beast Gauge away from being their best DPS combo. Butcher's Block combo is higher potency than Storm's Path, but Storm's Path gives 20 Beast Gauge instead of the 10 that Butcher's Block/Storm's Eye gives.

Literally drop the bonus Beast Gauge from SP or bump up the generation of BB and they'd be spamming their Enmity combo all day and thus be kings of sustained enmity.

On the topic of TBN, I feel it's able to be put on allies in order to give some level of OT presence. Given that MT's still mostly use DPS stance and DPS combo's, the only thing that really differentiates the 2 roles is when the OT can provide support to the MT in some way. Especially when DPS between tanks are so similar that the decision for OT comes down to who provides the most utility (Which invariable ends up with PLD > All). Hopefully with their 5.0 designs where they mentioned about possibly making all 4 tanks able to perform well in both roles they'll look to address this in more thematic ways (I.e. It would make more sense for DRK to debuff damage with Reprisal to aid the MT)

As far as WAR's not getting some obvious utility skills like Raid DPS buffs, likely it comes down to how everyone and their cat has been yelling about how OP WAR is and how they have too much stuff for like 6 years. Not to mention, that a Raid DPS buff would just further push WAR into the meta which pretty much defined by "What composition does the most DPS".

To be honest, I'd love to get Bloodbath back. I'd happily trade Raw Intuition for Bloodbath again. I could even see Shake It Off being replaced by something akin to an AoE Bloodbath that works on magical damage too (Focusing more on their "Tough out the damage and come back swinging" design as opposed to slapping an AoE shield onto their kit). To be honest, I'd also love to see Mercy Stroke and Fracture come back. Possibly in the form of Beast Gauge spenders, so that BG isn't just about "Spam Fell Cleave" (Or if Tank Stance becomes relevant "Spam Inner Beast") - Especially if Inner Release was re-done to not be infinite BG skill usage and was something more interesting (Especially if it also incorporated making Crit and Direct Hit stats relevant in some way given that it already provides their effects at 100% chance for the duration)...