Why having a dedicated MT and dedicated OT is a TERRIBLE idea

[Phoenicia]

I speak primarily of pre expansions Aion. Ain't no Aetherteck in muh game.

Even pre-expansion, Aion had 1 absolute tank class in the Templar, everyone else is a stand in in the same order I mentioned and you can just remove the engineer. It was still a PvP game through and through and even Sorcerers and Clerics (caster and healer respectively) could tank 90% of the content by either kiting and abusing defensive magic (sorc) or socketting a block set (cleric). Neither does that address the fact that gladiator (and any non-templar stand-in tank) still fit the role of DPS that actually does DPS when a templar is present.

Again, those games didn't have the 2 problems we do have here in FFXIV, raid composition carries less than half the jobs available and all jobs have extremely rigid roles they fill.

[Kalise]

Ask me for a god damn essay, why don't you?

Well, if you're argument hinges on it, yes.

I've put forward many reasons why "Homogenized" tank roles allowing for equal baseline kits to balance around Tanks having similar capabilities in MT/OT isn't necessarily the detriment that people are claiming it is where "Every Tank is a clone"

I've then used anecdotal evidence of other games that have done "Homogenized" tank capabilities where Tanks were still unique in how they played and what they brought to a party. With encounters that were quite varied and unique.

Meanwhile your the one who brought up the argument of:

I've played plenty of MMOs that featured the split between Main and Off Tank, and those games had much more varied encounters than FF14 did. Your encounter design is naturally limited by the tools your players can bring.

So anecdotal evidence that it is a 'terrible idea' is easily countered by anecdotal evidence that "it isn't".

To which I say... Well... Prove it.

Prove your stance that MT/OT split lead to more varied encounters.

Prove that your anecdotal evidence about MT/OT splits not being a terrible idea exists.

Show why these games where fun BECAUSE of these splits like you're suggesting, just like you're trying to suggest that Tanks being balanced around a baseline capacity would be not fun.

Since, I'd argue the fun comes from playing a class you enjoy in well designed and interesting encounters. Where the idea that your class is not considered because it was designed for a "Subrole" and is thus incapable of joining a static (Either because the meta doesn't include that subrole (I.e. MT+MT or OT+OT) or because that subrole is already covered in the static... Or worse, your class is just overshadowed by the better class within the subrole)

Wherein having all tanks with similar capacities allows for designs and balance to where it matters little about which tanks you bring to a raid, allowing more freedom for Tank players to pick their favourite job to do the content with instead of being forced to go play WAR/PLD all the time.

[Kaedan]

I can say it, because they already do it and all the tanks can still MT all content. And there is no indication they will be changing it.

What's the purpose of designing the pairs? 1) To make it easier to balance 4 tanks and 2) to give players a more transparent communication of the devs intentions. PLD is very obviously designed to be OT. WAR is very obviously designed for MTing. And DRK is meant to be between the two (Yoshida and company even said as much directly at HW launch and later when SB released during LL and interviews).

And yet all of them can MT all content. It's just that certain tanks have tools in their skill sets that make them more SUITED for MT or OT.

[shao32]

We already have all tanks with similar capacities in raw numbers at least and every encounters leaves always 1 tank doing nothing, the other encounters where 2 tanks are busy are just the ones where each tank is tanking 1 boss or 1 boss and a bunch of adds, nothing interesting mechanically.
Then we have the encounters where both tanks share tank Buster's but in resume that's only require both tanks being in the same place and use they respective mitigation, you can't have much more on top of that except you start to make tanks sinergy and interact witch each other more often.

The MT/OT system allows the combat team address and identify problems between tanks more easily, a tank it's overshadow by other? Well it will be more easy to see why and implement ajustments based in his counterpart only, one subrole it's taking over the other? Well it will be more easy see why and bring buffs and nerfs as they need.
At contrary to bring same capabilitys to all tanks balance become much more tricky, what happen when 1 tank it's overshadow? It will be worse bcs it's not by 1 or 2 tanks but all of them, then you have to bring balanced based on all of then at the same time and not take down another tank in the process, if you put it to the same level of the most strongest tank then 1 or meany 2 will take the place of the other tank.

Devs team manpower it's limited and they will have more jobs to manage this expansion, and if this system allow them to bring us more quality in the balance process so be it, at the same time it's unlikely they would take it to a extreme of making certain subrole less effective since they first priority it's always make every job and every raid composition viable to take down everything.

[Kabooa]

Wherein having all tanks with similar capacities allows for designs and balance to where it matters little about which tanks you bring to a raid, allowing more freedom for Tank players to pick their favourite job to do the content with instead of being forced to go play WAR/PLD all the time.

Yet, your claim is that it opens up more design space for encounters, but your cited example doesn't follow this. If all the tanks are more or less even, such as right now, but we still have limited encounter design with that, why could nudging it just a bit more in the even direction change that? If TBN and Inner Beast scaled like Shelltron, would that suddenly change encounter design?

No.

If Holmgang, Living Dead, and Hallowed Ground all had the same cooldown, would that change encounter design?

No.

Did reducing Shadow Wall down to 120s to match vengeance change encounter design? No.

The tanks, after 4.2, are already so close on objective performance that we are -already- at your theoretical "All tanks are equally capable", but there's hardly this limitless expansion of encounter potential.

Probably because the aforementioned part about encounters being limited by player tools. It doesn't matter if every player has every tool if your toolbox is a toothbrush container. That's the other advantage of clear advantages and deficits in not just potency of tools but the tools themselves. More tools = more gameplay options. More unique tools = more things you can individually play around.

I couldn't, during Kalecgos in Sunwell, save my raid and have a shining moment of heroism through a clever use of Divine Intervention as a Paladin, if I -wasn't allowed to have that- because the -other- Hybrids didn't. Nope, we would have stood there and waited to die.

I couldn't clear up literally an entire side of the room during the Stone Guard if I wasn't allowed to have Divine Shield. Using that really good tool, effectively forcing myself to play better by not having it readily available, eased up a ton of pressure on the raid as a whole.

Both of these encounters are completely doable -without- those tools, and indeed, are properly done without them. Hell, it wasn't two weeks after I did the DI trick in Sunwell that it got patched out.

Should every one else have gotten those same tools?

No.

Because they could do things -I- couldn't as well. The primary gameplay advantage of Kit Deficits is that it allows for those clever moments, that you're really able to excel in. And then you combine them to create weird scenarios that the developers probably didn't intend, but could be utilized effectively for a short time - Like in old school BC where Taunt + Blessing of Protection meant you had an invincible tank for 5 seconds.

The catchphrase "Clever Use of Game mechanics" was such a meme back then, because it represented players approaching encounters like a puzzle, finding out what they could use where. It was honestly fascinating hearing how other raids took on the same boss, because it could be -radically- different.

The most radical difference in this latest tier is "DPS in, DPS out, Line". Yet our jobs are so finely tuned and balanced against one another, we should have this endless potential of encounter design, right?

Right.

[Aurelius2625]

That said... I know this wish won't occur. It's just not how SE seems to see the game. Much as I like SE's results in FFXIV, it really feels like the lead devs are all DPS-mains that don't 'get it' with tanking... so they just make tanking viable and then turn around and focus on the DPS or Support abilities of the tanks as if they were just a specialized version of a melee-DPS.

This hits it right on the head. I'm almost positive that there are people who main DPS jobs on the dev team, and hardly play tank, and mostly just "think" about what it should be like. That's how you get 3.x PLD, 2.x WAR, and 4.x DRK. I suppose the same could be offered for DPS and their quirks, but for tanks it seems like some of the things aren't just potency discrepencies and the like, it seems as though there are serious flaws that SHOULD have been caught, but because they probably don't even play the tanks, it's not even thought of.

[whiskeybravo]

But I can give you two very, very good examples of how the present mindset of "let all tanks be able to handle every situation" leads to major tank balance problems: they're called "Heavensward" and "Stormblood".

Disingenuous statement at best.

There is the concept of "let all tanks be able to handle every situation" and there is the action taken to achieve that in reality. Just because they failed to achieve the reality does not mean the concept of balance also fails. These are not mutually exclusive. You can say you want to achieve balance, but if you don't that doesn't mean balance can't or doesn't exist - it just means you failed to take the correct actions to achieve it.

So yes, there is an opportunity to "fix" the system and try to achieve balance - but if it fails - are you going to blame MT/OT structure for it's failure? Or are you going to blame dev team for failing to take the correct actions to achieve balance within this new structure?

Razors cut both ways.

[Kalise]

Yet, your claim is that it opens up more design space for encounters, but your cited example doesn't follow this. If all the tanks are more or less even, such as right now, but we still have limited encounter design with that, why could nudging it just a bit more in the even direction change that?

Because maybe, they can spend less time trying to balance Tanks and spend more time actually designing encounters.

They can utilize the fact that they can give all tanks equal access to things (Like how we have Role Action Low Blow and Interject) to create new mechanics that Tanks can use.

If they gave all Tanks a "Cover" type skill, they could implement mechanics that focus around Tanks using this skill - Without it then just leading to a "This fight requires PLD" with the extreme being "This fight requires 2x PLD"

If Holmgang, Living Dead, and Hallowed Ground all had the same cooldown, would that change encounter design?

Theoretically it could.

Since without Homlgang dealing with a TB every 3 minutes it increases the number of TB's that have to be soaked without an immunity skill.

If you then also increase TB frequency you can then have a situation where Tanks need to have more creative ways of mitigating damage for them. Such as potentially making use of skills like ToB/TBN on the other Tank/Intevention/Passage of Arms/Cover/SiO etc.

The tanks, after 4.2, are already so close on objective performance that we are -already- at your theoretical "All tanks are equally capable", but there's hardly this limitless expansion of encounter potential.

This is hardly due to the situation with tank balance or a MT/OT division and more to do with the fact that SE just doesn't actually bother making interesting Tank mechanics to deal with.

I guarantee you that even if they did do MT/OT division that nothing would change in encounter design. Since they've had potential to mix things up, they could make us actually use some of the skills we have (Such as Awareness/Reprisal/Low Blow/Interject) but have chosen to not do that.

Arguably because it seems like they only design things from a DPS perspective - Hence to out of touch responses they make towards Healer and Tank issues.

Probably because the aforementioned part about encounters being limited by player tools. It doesn't matter if every player has every tool if your toolbox is a toothbrush container.

This isn't even a pertinent point.

Since, it's not like in a world where Tanks have equality between their kits, that they can't still receive new tools.

If anything, it opens up space for new tools if you then can get rid of certain "Fluff" skills that don't help perform the actual Tank role. Rather than trying to crowbar in a bunch of "Unique" utilities on top of existing kits.

That's the other advantage of clear advantages and deficits in not just potency of tools but the tools themselves. More tools = more gameplay options. More unique tools = more things you can individually play around.

More things for SE to never actually design encounters around so you'd 99% of the time just take them off your action bar.

Hell, it wasn't two weeks after I did the DI trick in Sunwell that it got patched out.

And then you combine them to create weird scenarios that the developers probably didn't intend, but could be utilized effectively for a short time - Like in old school BC where Taunt + Blessing of Protection meant you had an invincible tank for 5 seconds.

So you want MT/OT divide so you can...

... Find exploits in the game design?

Really?

That's your reasoning?

Finding thing that not only did the Developers not foresee, but then quickly fix to prevent happening?

If anything this is a literal reason against this change.

[Kabooa]

If anything this is a literal reason against this change.

I hope you realize the irony in that your rebuttal here can easily be used against giving tanks all the same tools.

We -shouldn't- have all tanks with a cover skill, because then it's not a clever way to deal with a mechanic, it's the -only- way to deal with a mechanic. Boo, boring. Cover isn't required now, as evident by Warrior and Dark Knight being a viable tank pairing, but the presence -of- cover allows you to do different things.

Requirement vs Good use of Class disparity.

Theoretically, wildly different Tank Invulnerability cooldown timers / the lack of comparable Cooldowns lead to different encounter design.

If tanks had all the same tools, SE would just continue to make non-interesting tank mechanics. Speculation is fun, isn't it?

If SE never bothers to include uses for tools, why does every tank need every tool then? They aren't going to get used and will be taken off the bar.

Finding "unintended uses" of certain skills. Saying it's seeking an exploit is kind of unfair. It was well within the rules of the game, but not within the design scope of the encounter - Which is why they patched it out. They felt it trivialized Kalecgos's encounter. You know.

Kind of like Tank Limit Breaks this tier. We try a thing and sometimes it works.

[Kalise]

I hope you realize the irony in that your rebuttal here can easily be used against giving tanks all the same tools.

We -shouldn't- have all tanks with a cover skill, because then it's not a clever way to deal with a mechanic, it's the -only- way to deal with a mechanic. Boo, boring. Cover isn't required now, as evident by Warrior and Dark Knight being a viable tank pairing, but the presence -of- cover allows you to do different things.

But this isn't irony. This isn't finding something that the DEVELOPERS DO NOT INTEND TO HAVE IN THE GAME.

This isn't literally cheesing the encounter in a way that the developers don't want.

This is performing to the mechanics that have been designed for you to deal with. Just like how we have to use CD's to soak TB's, just like healers have to heal through TB's and RB's, just like DPS have to move out of the god damn fire.

Requirement vs Good use of Class disparity.

This really hinges on just how mandatory usage of these skills would be.

Like, yes, maybe you can cover someone to mitigate a mechanic that is aimed at them. But if it doesn't kill them (Or it does and you just raise them) then it's considered "Good use" instead of a requirement.

Theoretically, wildly different Tank Invulnerability cooldown timers / the lack of comparable Cooldowns lead to different encounter design.

Well, it certainly has shown hasn't it.

What with all the interesting encounters we have thanks to the difference between Holm/LD/HG



Theoretically, it can lead to different encounter design, but it likely won't because then it literally just exists to screw over whatever job the mechanics aren't designed around.

For example, if there was a TB that lasted 10 seconds of massive damage every 7 minutes and another TB that happened very frequently... That would be a different design. But one that caters specifically to WAR+PLD and screws over DRK who's different invuln skill doesn't work towards either design.

If tanks had all the same tools, SE would just continue to make non-interesting tank mechanics. Speculation is fun, isn't it?

Except no?

You're still thinking that same tools = No new tools can be added.

If they add new tools (To all tanks) then they can actually design around them as it won't arbitrarily exclude tanks that don't have those tools.

If SE never bothers to include uses for tools, why does every tank need every tool then? They aren't going to get used and will be taken off the bar.

Because if every tank has the tools, they CAN include uses for them.

They CAN include things that we need to silence or stun or ignore crits from. Since, irregardless of what set up of tanks we have, they all have access to these things.

Just because they don't doesn't mean they can't.

Finding "unintended uses" of certain skills. Saying it's seeking an exploit is kind of unfair. It was well within the rules of the game, but not within the design scope of the encounter - Which is why they patched it out. They felt it trivialized Kalecgos's encounter. You know.

Kind of like Tank Limit Breaks this tier. We try a thing and sometimes it works.

If they literally patch it out, it's an exploit.

They say, "No we don't want this interaction in the game, we're removing it" that's literally an exploit.

It's not comparable to Tank LB's, since we use it to mitigate damage, that's literally what it's designed to do as that's all it does. The fact we turn it into a DPS increase because of the reduced damage allows us more uptime on the boss doesn't make it an exploit and makes it good skill usage.

Creating an invincible tank in BC WAS considered an exploit as it wasn't supposed to be a thing where enemies would target an invulnerable player. Having Voidlords tank certain bosses because pets having innate 90% damage reduction from AoE's (To make them not die in normal usage) WAS an exploit because it wasn't supposed to be a thing where the best tank was a Warlock's pet.

Doing something like proccing Critlo off a Warrior in defensive stance so has an innate boost to incoming healing to create a big shield is not an exploit because it's not breaking any of the rules or creating a situation that is otherwise impossible to happen (You can get bigger critlo's by having better stats, by using Convalescence/Mantra/Nature's Minne/Largesse etc.)