Gunbreaker gameplay hope and expectations

[Lyth]

...

Job identities aren't set in stone. DRK was initially described as a sort of parry tank. I suppose in fairness, we did have Dark Dance, as well as a number of abilities (Reprisal, Low Blow) which interacted with Parry procs. But you know what? In 4.x, there is not one single mention of the word "Parry" in DRK's job specific actions text. The closest thing that we have to a "Parry" tank presently is WAR, who has that odd bonus to Parry built into Defiance, as well as the only 100% Parry move in the game.

There is no design justification for lifesteal on WAR other than the fact that "we threw on some lifesteal abilities in ARR for the sake of it and never properly re-evaluated the job since." I'm not saying that this game shouldn't have a lifesteal tank. If anything, history has shown that it's an extremely popular and fun concept. But if WAR really, truly is meant to do this, it should give up all the other thematic concepts it is hogging. Why is it also the most mobile tank? Why does it have the best burst? Why does it have the best party-wide barrier shields? Narrow the focus a bit.

Meanwhile, SE seems to struggle immensely with what to do with DRK. Should it be a parry tank? A magic tank? A bubble tank? (Psst... DRK has a 27 year history behind it to draw on and a lot of in-game lore.) This game needs a proper lifesteal tank. That's something I'd like to see DRK properly commit to. We don't need the best burst. We don't need the best sustained dps. We don't need to have the best utility. We just need a core concept that people can get behind. And I think lifesteal is it. It would even make Living Dead's design more palatable: let us heal our way out of it.

With regards to balance: I presume you're asking if the balance has to swing the other way. If you could math out the perfect balance without testing, the answer would be no. The problem is, as we've seen with most of these theorycrafted "studies", is that reality doesn't match up with theorycraft. Even when you're the person designing the game. But I would much rather see the devs err on the side of change, rather than being overly conservative and seeing another two years of mandatory WAR/SCH/BRD/DRG/NIN.

[Kalise]

I'm not saying that this game shouldn't have a lifesteal tank. If anything, history has shown that it's an extremely popular and fun concept. But if WAR really, truly is meant to do this, it should give up all the other thematic concepts it is hogging. Why is it also the most mobile tank? Why does it have the best burst? Why does it have the best party-wide barrier shields?

Why's the style of mitigation a tank has in any way impactful on other aspects of tanking?

Should we gut everything about PLD except blocking so it just sits there dual wielding shields and only ever blocks stuff because it's the "Block Tank"?

That's a completely asinine thought process.

Tanks mitigation type has no relevance to its other functions, other than maybe being a way of theming party utility (I.e. PLD is a "Damage Reduction" tank so would make sense to give out "Damage Reduction" skills to aid others)

Each aspect of a tank - Mitigation, DPS, Enmity, Utility and Party Support - Should be mostly independent of each other. There's no reason why the "Burst DPS Tank" can't be using Lifesteal as mitigation, or damage reduction, blocking, parry, shielding etc. How it deals its damage has no real bearing, outside of the fact that lifesteal in combination with burst damage allows for burst mitigation through high bursts of lifegain (I.e. What would be useful for DRK in order to deal with Living Dead's effect, as well as WAR to be able to deal with their own Holmgang effect)

It all comes down to giving Tanks a unique kit for each fundamental of tanking, to reduce the chance of someone feeling like they have a "Worse Version of X Ability from Y Job" as well as giving each Tank a unique playstyle to separate them.

So long as things make sense across the board, like how it makes little sense for WAR to have an AoE shield for its party utility as opposed to some sort of War Cry damage buff or AoE max health buff skill.

For example, WAR has been for its entire inception, supposedly focused on having more max health, having lifegain (To enhance with its increased healing received effect to offset the high max health) and dealing damage with an emphasis on crits and burst. So, it would make the most sense if its mitigation was more focused around health buffs and lifegain. Its damage focused around getting a bunch of crits (Which also would cause more lifegain through lifesteal mechanics) and having burst phases of guaranteed crits. For party utility, it would make the most sense for it to have skills like Battle Litany for enhancing damage output or AoE Thrill of Battle for defensive boosts.

PLD has been focused around blocking and damage reduction what with being the only tank in the game that has access to block and having the strongest damage reduction CD's (At the cost of higher CD's) and has recently been shifted into this dual damage type and thus dual burst phase damage dealer. So its mechanics are pretty simple, pretty much just keep it as is, block focused, good damage reduction skills, dual damage types with 2 different burst CDs one for each damage type.

DRK is one that needs to gain an identity. Parry is awkward because Parry and Block function the same way, being chance to reduce physical damage by 20%. Though, with TBN's existence it could easily become the shield tank and be the ideal place to have the AoE shield (As opposed to WAR or PLD, who have no inherent thematic reason to have one). It also has some thematic reasons to have life gain too, which can be done with more focus on occasional burst healing such as Sole Survivor and DAAD to differentiate it from a Lifestealing WAR. It's damage should remain focused around MP management, allowing it to adapt between burst or sustained output depending on how you play with it.

The end result should be that, for mitigation, all tanks are about equal. They can all survive content equally well, deal with TB's at a similar efficiency and sustain themselves over long periods of time with various ways to reduce damage and regain health (PLD has Clemency, DRK has its burst healing and WAR has its more sustained healing based on damage). The difference is, each Tank goes about it in a unique way. In this example, WAR stacks max health and regains health instead of reducing damage, they just bloat their HP bar until its big enough to take the entire hit and then self heal back afterwards. PLD just reduces the damage they take, by blocking or otherwise having a tools to reduce incoming damage. DRK gains health buffers like WAR, but through Shielding rather than max health, they try to minimize the damage dealt to their actual health pool by throwing up shields, with what manages to get through, they heal up.

For Enmity, all tanks should be equal. No ifs, ands or buts. It's a fundamental core to tanking. All tanks are able to snap aggro in similar fashions as well as provide sustained enmity.

For Damage, overall DPS should be the same for all tanks. Just with it being spread out differently. In this case WAR focuses on bursts of damage, through critical strikes and its forced DCH CD (This doesn't necessarily mean having IR be like 40% of their total output, IR can be toned down and have some of the damage spread throughout their kit with an emphasis on doing critical damage). PLD splits its damage between 2 different burst phases, one focused on Fight or Flight boosting physical damage and one focused on Requiescat boosting magical damage. DRK focuses on maximizing its effectiveness of Dark Arts and Blood, allowing it to pool resources to burst hard or continually spend them to provide sustained output.

For utility, things should be fairly similar. Mobility, CC and anything that would be used for a "Tank" mechanic (Such as how Esuna is occasionally used as a thing that Healers have to react to that isn't just DPS/Healing), for example, knockback protection. Again, with the potential to differentiate some aspects (For example, PLD could get a ranged skill that gives them a large movement speed boost instead of a charge like WAR/DRK have) but have the overall result being similar (I.e. Don't have the mobility skill be a DPS gain for ANY Tank. Have their CD's and effective ranges be equal)

Then for Party Support, again, they can have similar effectiveness but do so in different ways. For example, WAR can have an offensive and defensive War Cry where they grant crit rate and/or crit damage buff similar to Battle Litany (With a touch of Foe Requiem) and grant % max health increase respectively. PLD could get an offensive and defensive boost in the form of a boost to Physical and Magical damage as an aura and a change to Passage of Arms where it's no longer a channelled skill to provide damage reduction. With DRK getting an offensive and defensive boost in the form of say a mass Dark Arts boost that buffs the potency of the parties skills by a % and an AoE shield respectively.

Each tank then has all the core features it needs, they're all balanced closely with each other and they all have unique identities. With of course, new classes (Such as Gunbreaker) being able to enter the fray with their own take on each fundamental.

[Lyth]

Interesting that you mention blocking. Shields are a core part of PLD's aesthetic. It's part of what gives the job a unique identity. It also gives rise to thematic abilities like Sheltron, Cover, and Passage of Arms. Are the other tanks at a disadvantage because they can't block? Not really. But if you handed out the ability to block to every tank, you'd dilute PLD's identity.

The same is true for lifesteal. It's not mitigation. It does, however, lower your average healing requirements, much like block procs do on PLD. It doesn't need to be on every job. Make an identity out of it.

DRK is essentially already there. Unlock the Souleater heal from Grit. Bloodspiller doesn't need to compete with Fell Cleave. Have it steal some life. Blood Weapon, as it stands, is about siphoning away our opponents' life energy. HP is the only thing we aren't draining. I just want to see them commit hard to a concept, rather than making a partial effort across several.

And yeah, giving WAR Battle Litany while preserving all of their present strengths? That sounds even worse than the Shake it off change. Do not want.

[whiskeybravo]

In 4.x, there is not one single mention of the word "Parry" in DRK's job specific actions text. The closest thing that we have to a "Parry" tank presently is WAR, who has that odd bonus to Parry built into Defiance, as well as the only 100% Parry move in the game.

And you don't think that had anything to do with the communities witch hunt against parry back in 2.X and 3.X? Nevermind the fact that for Raw to really be effective you have to pair with a 2nd cooldown.

How would removing Raw improve DRK or PLD?

There is no design justification for lifesteal on WAR other than the fact that "we threw on some lifesteal abilities in ARR for the sake of it and never properly re-evaluated the job since." I'm not saying that this game shouldn't have a lifesteal tank. If anything, history has shown that it's an extremely popular and fun concept. But if WAR really, truly is meant to do this, it should give up all the other thematic concepts it is hogging. Why is it also the most mobile tank? Why does it have the best burst? Why does it have the best party-wide barrier shields? Narrow the focus a bit.

The most mobile tank is also the only tank that get's rooted in place by his ultimate, also the only one that requires a target while also being in melee range of that target to execute.. Contradictory much? "Best mobility" in and of itself is a hell of stretch anyways, 90% of the time you're tanking you're standing completely freaking still lol

The best bursting tank because it's the only tank with an actual burst cycle. Again, a stretch of words.

I'll concede on the power of Shake it Off, but let's not forgot there were many other suggestions the community floated around that would've "thematically" been more appropriate for WAR. But the way it's being framed is like the WAR community banded together and said "Give us the best party-wide shield in the game or GTFO". The original Shake it Off was crap, and needed to be adjusted.

Meanwhile, SE seems to struggle immensely with what to do with DRK. Should it be a parry tank? A magic tank? A bubble tank? (Psst... DRK has a 27 year history behind it to draw on and a lot of in-game lore.) This game needs a proper lifesteal tank. That's something I'd like to see DRK properly commit to. We don't need the best burst. We don't need the best sustained dps. We don't need to have the best utility. We just need a core concept that people can get behind. And I think lifesteal is it. It would even make Living Dead's design more palatable: let us heal our way out of it.

At least you acknowledge that straight up nerfing WAR does not fix anything that's actually wrong with DRK.

[shao32]

there is no reason why WAR should be the jack of all trades, best on all of then either, it's not like WAR should be worse to others or something like that but most a call of WAR shouln't hold all this niches, parry, self healing, movility raw mitigation, shielding ect ect, and it's incomprehensible that the other tanks have the fault for don't being better and "you shouldn't complaing about my job", DRK have a pass bcs was excesibely gutted this expansion but gets better and can't be competitive to the other 2 bcs WAR get a lot of things this expansion some of then in middle of it ignoring DRK, shadowbringers can't have this problem again, with WAR being over the other 2 again, it should be equal and leave room to the other to have something to shine and don't overwhelm over everything the others have.

[Izsha]

there is no reason why WAR should be the jack of all trades, best on all of then either, it's not like you understand that WAR shoun't be worse to others or something like that but most a call of WAR shouln't hold all this niches, parry, self healing, movility raw mitigation, shielding ect ect, and it's incomprehensible that the other tanks have the fault for don't being better and "you shouldn't complaing about my job", DRK have a pass bcs was excesibely gutted this expansion but gets better and can't be competitive to the other 2 bcs WAR get a lot of things this expansion some of then in middle of it ignoring DRK, shadowbringers can't have this problem again, with WAR being over the other 2 again, it should be equal and leave room to the other to have something to shine and don't overwhelm over everything the others have.

Parry niche? Are you serious? Are we just making up niches to pretend that the world is ended?

zomg! Drk has total lock down on the self shielding niche, the fastest attacking niche, the ground aoe niche, the magic defense niche, highest enmity action niche, ogcd spam niche, the best story quest niche. See all the niches! More niches means better job so drks the best nao.

Sheesh. Having a passive 0-10% parry based on gauge while in a tank stance no one uses doesnt make war a parry tank or have some made up parry niche. Raw in is just a 20% physical mit skill. If raw makes war the party tank then drk has a stupendous magic defense niche with 30% and once a minute. So drk has the magic niche. But war is somehow hoarding all the niches. Oh wait. You just look at every unique skill on war and call it a niche, but entirely ignore every unique skill in pld and drk. Solid.

I can run down the list on drk and pick out every unique capability it has and call it a niche drk is hoarding, but you immediately see how stupid that would be. It's just as easy to see when you do it too.

[shao32]

Parry niche? Are you serious? Are we just making up niches to pretend that the world is ended?

zomg! Drk has total lock down on the self shielding niche, the fastest attacking niche, the ground aoe niche, the magic defense niche, highest enmity action niche, ogcd spam niche, the best story quest niche. See all the niches! More niches means better job so drks the best nao.

Sheesh. Having a passive 0-10% parry based on gauge while in a tank stance no one uses doesnt make war a parry tank or have some made up parry niche. Raw in is just a 20% physical mit skill. If raw makes war the party tank then drk has a stupendous magic defense niche with 30% and once a minute. So drk has the magic niche. But war is somehow hoarding all the niches. Oh wait. You just look at every unique skill on war and call it a niche, but entirely ignore every unique skill in pld and drk. Solid.

I can run down the list on drk and pick out every unique capability it has and call it a niche drk is hoarding, but you immediately see how stupid that would be. It's just as easy to see when you do it too.

DRK use to have parry mechanics, now have zero but WAR keep theirs, DRK use to have the best mobility, now WAR get a overall better tool for that, PLD use to be the only tank with raid shielding, now WAR have the best shield between all tanks, WAR get rampart coming from nowhere but his mitigation kit was untouched, now is the best mitigation tank too, self-healing WAR is still unbeatable, ect ect.

When we look at heavenward every tank was more unique, the imbalance was just a matter of numbers, DRK mobility, reprisal, parry mechanics, int down, the job bring unique stuff to the party, PLD the same despite being low in magic defense bring party shielding cover as do now too, clemency, str ect down.

And now PLD shielding is surpased by WAR shielding, DRK mobility is surpassed by WAR mobility, both tank mitigation are surpassed by WAR mitigation, tank stance are being always surpassed by WAR defiance and I can still going.

[Phoenicia]

I fail to see how Shake it Off is "the best party-wide shield in the game". It really isn't. It is actually closer to being the worst. lol

Shake It Off:
1- Shake it Off shields party with 8/12/16/20% of THEIR OWN HEALTH, not the Warrior's.
2- It eats away CDs for it to be anything above 8% on top of its own CD.
3- At ilv400, DPS average HP is 50k. During prog is MUCH LOWER. Even with VIT melds. At 8%, the barrier blocks ~4k damage.
4- It is oGCD, but does that alone warrant it being the "best shield"?
5- Most Nasty AoE hit for ~40k damage. Healers still have to heal after SiO.

Now let us compare it to Veil:
1- Shields the party with 10% of THE PLD'S HEALTH! Not the party's.
2- Has a 2 minute CD but can be alternated or couple with the stronger party damage reduction ability, of Passage of Arms.
3- At ilv400 (which you shouldn't be), PLD has 80k HP. My PLD wearing the BiS for DPS is at 73055 unbuffed. 78k+ with food and party VIT buff. That's 7.8k shield. The WAR needs to to feed 2 buffs to SiO to block the same amount and has to hop into Defiance to feed it all 4 buffs to finally pass it.
4- Veil itself is oGCD and the barrier won't activate without a heal. But here's the thing, Regen and ANY spell AoE heal activates it. In AoE scenarios healers ALREADY HEAL before AoE. Simply ask the SCH to deploy Adlo off you and with 1 GCD people have Adlo+Veil.
5- Same as SiO. Even a shield of 8K won't save the healers the trouble of healing after AoE.

How is PLD "surpassed by WAR" in shielding? Lol.. Do you even math, bro?

And how is either stronger than Aspected Helios. My almost BiS AST does 5k, shield is multiplied by 1.5, so: 7.5k shield.

Succor My Suzaku book Non-BiS SCH does 4.5, again multiplied by 1.5 for the shield.

Neither of the above 2 moves have a CD.

Now to look at the ACTUAL BEST SHIELD in the game: Deployed Adloquium!

Potency: 300 with 300 shield. On crit it's 450 and the shield is a wooping 900! My static's SCH crits for 24k~25k heals (I'm PLD/DRK, no defiance bonus). The shield is ~50k. Holy molly That's almost a DPS's 100% FULL HEALTH amount of shield.
CD: 2 minutes (same as Veil).

If an AoE hits 0, it's not because the raid had PLD or WAR (or lacked one), it's because a SCH fished a critlo and deployed it.

Tanks' shields aren't even mandatory. Having them is just tanks stepping on healers' toes. You can survive EVERY AoE without them, and having them won't save the healers any healing before or after said AoEs.

Not only are healers fully capable of keeping the party/raid alive through AoEs on their own. BRDs have Troubadour, MCHs have Dismantle. All casters have Addle and all melee have Feint. All tanks have Reprisal. All mentioned abilities are on shorter CDs than SiO and Veil. Over-mitigation is actually a real thing.

So why is everyone getting their panties in a twist so far up their bums about WAR having SiO? I don't get it. Is it a matter of "he has it and I want it"? If so, just grow up.

[Phoenicia]

Sorry for double posting.

When we look at heavenward every tank was more unique, the imbalance was just a matter of numbers, DRK mobility, reprisal, parry mechanics, int down, the job bring unique stuff to the party, PLD the same despite being low in magic defense bring party shielding cover as do now too, clemency, str ect down.

And now PLD shielding is surpassed by WAR shielding, DRK mobility is surpassed by WAR mobility, both tank mitigation are surpassed by WAR mitigation, tank stance are being always surpassed by WAR defiance and I can still going.

HW balance was just Numbers? It was MUCH MUCH more. PLD couldn't block anything worth blocking. All tank busters were magical. It did so little DPS it couldn't push fights quicker and it was somehow the only tank that can't mitigate the x-th mechanic/tank buster that groups have an easier time "skipping" because WAR and DRK's DPS was just higher than PLD. PLD's DPS combo had Savage Blade in it which caused aggro issues when off-tanking. PLD and DRK SUCKED at off-tanking because of TP issues. There were INTEGRAL design issues in HW's tank balance and numbers were just a result of it.

lol Mobility is worth s$!# mate. Let's not pretend it matters. All 3 tanks can manage 98%~99% up-time on all bosses in savage. Check FFLogs. And there are many reasons that is possible. PLD can block knock-backs, has REALLY strong DPS ranged moves (Holy Spirit). DRK can plunge. Healers have Rescue. Let's not pretend that WAR sticks to the boss like glue because of Onslaught. Not to mention bosses barely move and the fight is 100% scripted so you can just pre-position.

"Mobility" matters in games with PvP that isn't an after thought and a net-code that isn't spaghetti. This game is neither. It might also matter with unpredictable fights, which this game doesn't have either.

And please, in HW the tank forums had only 3 topics:

1- STR vs VIT accessories
2- Remove Parry.
3- Buff PLD/Nerf WAR.

Is your WAR jealousy so bad that want parry to be a thing again and take Raw Intuition from it?

How is DRK the "parry tank" when WAR got RI at the same time DRK was added? Nowhere was it stated that DRK was a "Parry tank" anyway. Is it just the interaction of Reprisal? It was only made that way because DRK was meant to "mirror" PLD by having similar but opposite features. Here are a few other examples:

- Physical tank vs Magical tank. (Even though that made no sense with WAR getting RI in HW).
- Shadowskin vs Rampart. Only animation was different.
- Shadow Wall vs Snetinel. Same in CD and duration.
- STR Down vs INT down.
- Combo for enmity and combo that branches from MP regen was also available to both tanks.
.... etc.

PLD had Shield Swipe was to "counter after block". DRK got Reprisal as a "counter after parry". WAR could cross-class for Haymaker from pugilist to "counter after dodge" (OMG EVASION TANK!!!). Parry interaction was just so it has a "counter after RNG mitigation" tool.

So just because you had reprisal and low blows it didn't make you a "parry tank". You don't have a "Parrytron" that forces a parry to ensure the interaction and Dark Dance was bad.

Reprisal was too useful to be locked behind RNG, so SE decided to make a role action. How did losing that 1 parry-reaction ability make WAR step on your toe when WAR got RI at the same time DRK was added to the game?

If anything, DRK was touted as the "magic tank" for its identity because of Dark Mind and Delirium's INT down debuff, and guess what? PLD is the tank that's stepping on its feet now (blocking magic). Not WAR that is still using universal abilities and the ONLY physical-only CD Raw Intuition. WAR can't RI magic.

Speaking of such, why is PLD the tank that got to cross over from 1 damage type to universal (Blocking both physical and magical) while DRK staying magic only with DM and WAR staying physical only with IR? Why is magical vs physical still a thing anyway? Tanks' Fending gear's Defense and Magic Defense has the same value.

In Conclusion: As mentioned before, where tanks stand right now has no bearing on where they will be in Shadowbringers. And even then, WAR is not the BUSTED tank some people here seem to claim. This WAR jealousy needs to end. Let us discuss other tank jobs without WAR being brought in as the tank that does everything better because it doesn't. Kthxbai

[Izsha]

DRK use to have parry mechanics, now have zero but WAR keep theirs, DRK use to have the best mobility, now WAR get a overall better tool for that, PLD use to be the only tank with raid shielding, now WAR have the best shield between all tanks, WAR get rampart coming from nowhere but his mitigation kit was untouched, now is the best mitigation tank too, self-healing WAR is still unbeatable, ect ect.

When we look at heavenward every tank was more unique, the imbalance was just a matter of numbers, DRK mobility, reprisal, parry mechanics, int down, the job bring unique stuff to the party, PLD the same despite being low in magic defense bring party shielding cover as do now too, clemency, str ect down.

And now PLD shielding is surpased by WAR shielding, DRK mobility is surpassed by WAR mobility, both tank mitigation are surpassed by WAR mitigation, tank stance are being always surpassed by WAR defiance and I can still going.

You know why pld shield could be considered a niche? Because its an integrated part of their kit. Shield blocks activate shield swipe for damage/enmity. Shelltron does the same, forces a block, and gives MP to fuel holy magic. Bulwark increases block rate for the above. Shield bash. Passage of arms. They have large portions of their functional kit and aesthetic design revolving around their shield. Drk (HW) similarly had multiple abilities that fed off the parry system. Increased parry rates, abilities that proced based on parry...sounding familiar? War: Has a miniscule, passive parry rate in a stance no one uses. Has 1 CD that doesnt even synergize with that passive because its 100%. In fact it gets in the way of the passive (if it were even being used).

The fact that a tank has a singular action doesnt give it a niche. If that is the definition of niche, then drk gets the magic def niche. The fast attacking niche and the self shielding niche. Funnily enough blood weapon and TBN actually are integral parts of an interconnected kit.

Please continue using double standards to make war sound massively impressive. Im sure it will work if you try again.

Please continue to repeat:
* How warrior crushes every other tank in damage when all 3 tanks are within a cats whisker of each other in actual practice according to both theoretical math and actual in game FFlogs.
* How much warrior benefits from buff stacking while ignoring that every crit buff in the game doesnt help Wars burst window, and other buffs tend to fall on 60/120 timers instead of 90 missing IR entirely half the time.
* Applaud the massive bonus of mobility when you the name of the game is never leave the boss and knockbacks RARELY outpace any tanks option.
* How warrior having a single parry skill with no synergy of any kind deleted the Drk Parry Tank when all people complained about for years was the RNG of parry and how parry builds were useless even on drk and drk shouldnt be based on RNG skills and a terrible stat.
* How Warrior has the best shield when pld has not 1, but 2 party mitigation tools stronger than shake, +cover+intervention.
* Keep reminding me of wars defensive superiority with the lynchpin of your argument being inner beast while every tank worth their salt will never be in defiance and Pld/Drk can freely use on demand mitigation every 15 sec.
* Pluck another single skill comparison like FC/HS/BS out of context of the big picture to prove war OP.

Its the same exaggerated claims with little or very skewed evidence, or in some cases, flatly false claims. We get it. War has been in a healthy or strong position since 2.1 while other tanks have been on a roller coaster ride. That still doesn't justify petty vengeance nerfs in a period that all 3 tanks are the most balanced in the games history.