How do we feel about tank damage right now?

[Reynhart]

Here's an example of how bad things are. Had some recent runs of E2S. Healers and tanks did job to the best they could, group saw hard enrage at 10:30.

Let me get this straight: All your DPS failed in savage content and your conclusion for hitting enrage is that tanks and healers don't do enough damage ?!

Think of every wipe you all have ever seen

The extreme majority of the wipes I've experienced are not on an enrage, so, have absolutely nothing to do with DPS numbers.

Dps get battle raises, heal buffs, and damage mitigation tools. Healers get damage mitigation tools as well.

You realize that DPS have far less than half the healing and mitigation potential of tanks and healers ? And that healers have less than half the mitigation of tanks ? DPS already share their responsibility with us much more than tanks and healers do.

So, please, keep my DPS low, so that DPS won't blame me when they can't do their only job.

[Quor]

What it comes down to is DPS is king and all else is just support to that.

No, tanking and healing are the twin kings. Dps comes after the tanking and healing have been successfully established. Not to say dps isn't important, but it's not the priority, just a very close second.

Not really fun though wiping over and over and over X100 because of....once again...dps issues.

True. It's frustrating knowing the errors of others are keeping you from clearing. Not much to do for it but hope that they git gud; asking for more tank damage is just trivializing what dps do, and in the process you end up ruining it for the good dps out there. It would be no different than if you gave dps the ability to survive damage like a tank. Sure, it would be nice for those dps who aren't shit to not be held back by a shitty tank, but then you ruin it for all the good tanks out there. At some point in time it's legitimate and encouraged to tell someone "no, the problem is you, you need to get better." The lack of skill on the part of other players isn't a reason to blanket buff a job or role.

Think of every wipe you all have ever seen
How many of those are due to healers and tanks? Now how many of them are due to lack of damage or dps error?

Truth be told, it's probably about equal. Sometimes I die because I tunnel vision and miss a mechanic (Shadoweye + stack + prey in E2S is something that still gets me from time to time when I'm MTing), and sometimes I'm sitting there, watching the tank buster cast while I'm at 40% life with no invuln up (because we planned ahead and used it earlier) while both my healers are Glaring and Broiling. And then sometimes my BLM best friend plays a little fast and loose with Aetherial Manipulation and ends up eating Pure Light or Temp. Current, or my MNK buddy shoulder charges off the edge to his doom, or our BRD's toe touches an aoe and she gets one-shot. I've had occasional parties where it was possible to isolate a single player and be like "yes, this guy is holding us back" and they've more often been a dps, but that's only because I play tank, so the likelihood of 1 of the 4 dps being the problem out of 7 people is higher than it is for the 1 other tank or 2 healers.

I love being able to do my job in dire situations with only 3 players alive, using tools to keep the healer shielded or protected until they try to get the rest of the team revived. Problem is, we already know at that point we dont have a chance of clearing because 5 minutes from now we will all die due to lack of damage. That is my biggest gripe.

And it's a valid gripe. It should be talked about more. SE needs to be made aware that the brain-dead aggro systems and somewhat-sparse non-attack options that tanks have are not enough. Tanks want to do tanky stuff. We want to mitigate, we want to be rewarded for controlling the boss appropriately, and we definitely don't want to be reduced to "tanky dps."

Here's an example of how bad things are. Had some recent runs of E2S. Healers and tanks did job to the best they could, group saw hard enrage at 10:30. Doesnt sound too bad right? Well, each dps died at least one time each and were only a couple levels above minimum. The boss had about 35% hp left. Why not remove most hard enrages and actually give healers and tanks a challenge. We had zero problem surviving all the soft enrages to that point. Dps were all still punching out more damage than the tanks and healers. Problem is you can survive great and heal great all you want, you will NEVER clear a fight at item level if all 4 dps die one time.

Yes, FF14 expects more from its dps than the average mmo (specifically WoW, but others as well) has typically expected.

The dps of tanks and healers should equate to the level of 50% damage of dps damage+5% of whatever dps is required to clear fights with hard enrages. So E2S that would be a bump of about 810 for each healer and tank.

Again, for what reason? Because dps players can be shit? There's already a good bit of wiggle room, even at min ilvl. Buffing a job or set of jobs because the players on another set of jobs might be terrible is a bad idea. You can flip the logic and say that dps need more self-sustain and personal mitigation in case they come across a shitty tank or healer and it makes just as little sense.

Dps get battle raises, heal buffs, and damage mitigation tools. Healers get damage mitigation tools as well. No reason tanks and healers cant have a tiny bit of dps carry potential.

AST and SCH fit that bill just fine, and WHM makes up for it with higher raw damage potential and the best healer defensive cooldown in game. You could add some kind of dps raid buff to tanks, but it would have to be equal across all tanks or else you create a drastic imbalance; better to always bring the tank with the dps buff than not. We'd just have a repeat of 3.0 WAR where you always wanted that Storm's Path debuff because -10% damage to everything the boss does was so strong you were stupid not to bring it.

Now, to be clear, I'm not shitting on the idea per se. I've actually advocated for something similar back when we had aggro combos. Kabooa even suggested a modification of it, something like 1% increased damage taken, stacking up to 4 times, but each tank could only apply 2 stacks maximum, with further re-application just refreshing those stacks. So you not only have incentive to use an aggro combo every X seconds, but both tanks have that incentive, making threat management something that's just a tiny bit more interesting than it was at the time. The point being, it was a universal tank buff that would have increased tank combo complexity (since it gave aggro combos an important purpose beyond simply aggro) while also providing a useful boost to the raid.

Most people shat on the idea. These same people also complained about tank homogenization. Stupid is as stupid does I suppose.

As it stands, fights at item level requirement have almost ZERO room for dps error, while a healer or tank dieng in savage content is easily recoverable (oh tank died before tank busters in E2s? Let me just cover+hallowed+tank cds. A healer died? Guess that healer that was mostly dpsing before can just take over healing for a second until a raise goes out)

Outside of that PLD-specific situation, you would have a drastically different result, as a dps or healer would eat the second tank buster and then the whole thing would start to collapse from there. Not that it would be irrecoverable, just that you'd now have a helluva hurdle to jump in order to beat the enrage.

Personally, I don't like the idea of hard enrages, but I understand why SE has them. I like the softer stack-style enrages more, something akin to Nidhogg's Akh Morn's, just getting more and more powerful until eventually the damage curve outpaces the ability of healers to heal and tanks to mitigate. To a degree, it is what it is, and again, I understand why SE does it even if I don't like it myself. Still, worth talking about the benefits of a soft enrage-style approach instead of the purely hard enrage stuff that happens. SE does need some kind of hard enrage qualifier in there though, if only as a means of countering botting. Yes, it sounds far-fetched, but if it was possible to throw 6 healers and 2 tanks at a boss and successfully beat it via attrition, then you'd see an explosion of those "selling X/Y/Z clears!" in party finder, at which point you devalue the effort and work that goes in to clearing those fights the real way.

[ShadowNyx3]

snip

During progression the distribution of wipes is going to make you think that it's mostly a damage problem because those issues come when you've reached the enrage and are trying to scrape by with as much damage you can get to beat the enrage. However, I would say that in general, wipes due to tanking and healing errors occur just as much in the time leading up to the final push while healers and tanks figure out how hard things hit and how much mitigation and healing they need to get by.

I don't really see your gripe as anything different than players who are mechanically consistent getting frustrated with other players who are taking longer to become consistent enough to clear. In your groups you might find that the tanks and the healers are doing a lot of work while the dps are struggling but there are just as many groups where the dps are on point and waiting for the tanks and healers to figure it out. Just as you might be frustrated at performing your role well and keeping things rolling while dps are falling over, dps can be equally as frustrated with a tank that misses cooldowns or a healer who is inconsistent with their healing.

To your point though, the groups who have consistent dps players might find their path to clearing easier because the dps requirements are balanced less on tanks and healers and therefore a solid dps group can make up for healer and tank errors. That is the role of the dps though and is why tanks and healers aren't weighed as heavily; they require an enrage to create a minimum standard to fulfill their role. The only way to spread out the responsibility of damage to all roles is to have tighter and tighter checks. The only places you're ever going to remotely find that now is during week 1 savage prog and ultimates. But if you really want to experience the pinnacle of shared damage responsibility, take a time machine back to Alexander Gordias and watch how much fun people were having with that.

[Bravely_Default]

I suppose from the perspective of somebody that grasps things quicker it seems more of a dps problem. I didnt think groups had too many problems with tanks too often but I'll keep that in mind. I think if they start making more nidex styled fights or lengthen fights like E2S I would not have too much of an issue. I have always liked the mentality of having a chance no matter what, but most fights you can tell by about partway in whether you have a chance or not which is just sad.

[J-Reyno]

But, like I said, optimizing enmity is not technically the same as optimizing damage. And, frankly, this line was only to point out that enmity is barely something tanks have to focus on

I get you, but we weren't discussing optimizing enmity. Even so, I'd say that optimizing enmity does not mean stacking as much enmity as possible, because that would be the same as saying optimizing healing is pumping as much healing as possible, all else be damned.

Optimizing would mean doing as much as is necessary to establish and maintain enmity while also dealing as much damage as possible. So much to the contrary of your statement, optimizing enmity is exactly what tanks focus on, because optimizing damage is exactly that. The only separate action from strictly dealing damage tanks need to do do for optimizing enmity is turning on tank stance.

[Quor]

I suppose from the perspective of somebody that grasps things quicker it seems more of a dps problem. I didnt think groups had too many problems with tanks too often but I'll keep that in mind. I think if they start making more nidex styled fights or lengthen fights like E2S I would not have too much of an issue. I have always liked the mentality of having a chance no matter what, but most fights you can tell by about partway in whether you have a chance or not which is just sad.

We've all been there man. Not to toot our collective horns, but I honestly believe as a tank (and healer as well) a person just becomes used to having more on their plate in a moment-to-moment situation. So it gets frustrating to see people who literally only have one job fail to do that job, and you naturally want to be able to affect the outcome of a fight more than you already are.

[J-Reyno]

If Tank stance was -sane-, something like 1.7x or 2.0x, I'd have agreed wholeheartedly with you. It would then require a tank that is -just as good- as your DPS, and then damage concerns might be valid. It would require far more threat management with your off tank.

I agree that the hand-holding of tank stance is pretty ridiculous. That said, who did it punish to take away what little agency tanks had when it comes to managing enmity and give less damage in return? Because in my opinion it only punishes those tanks who DO perform just as well or better than the dps. SE decided no one likes tanking so felt it would be good to make it super accessible and remove some of what little non-damage engagement the role had in the process.

SE: "Ohhh hey we're going to have to change up tank stance so that you never really have to worry about enmity anymore"

Player: "Ah okay, well I guess I did just use tank stance to establish enmity and turn it off as soon as possible, so it's not a uh... bad thing I guess? Any actual tank-oriented engagement we're getting in return?"

SE: "Nah."

Player: "I see. Well, the enmity is one thing, but what about the defense?"

SE: "It's passive! "

Player: "Oh uh-okay... well I guess I can at least I can focus on doing good damage and feel rewarded for that"

SE: "Yeahhhhh we're also going to have to take some of your damage too"

Player: "...allllright. So what ARE we getting?"

SE: "Here's a couple more damage attacks you can use to feel better!"

Player: "....I'm getting more damage attacks to deal comparatively less damage?"

SE: "What was that? Btw healers are getting more actual heals, and they get to match or even exceed your damage at the same time!"

Player: "..."

SE: "Please look forward to it!"

The only tank that even gets a defensive ability past level 70 is WAR with Nascent Flash. Well, I guess we could count DRK's Dark Missionary if we really want, which is hardly as useful or necessary as healer role's heals. The role is simply not designed in the same way as healers. It's a watered down dps that just tries its best to deal damage only to be matched in damage by a role that has far more to do which doesn't include dealing damage.

So if nothing else it seems many agree that something needs to change, and it boils down to two ideas. The first is that current gameplay is fine but the damage needs to be higher. The second is that the current damage is fine but the gameplay needs to be adjusted to give tanks less damage skills and more non-damage role abilities.

I'm obviously in the first camp and think that it is the best solution, and that even if SE were to decide to change tanks it's still the best solution until that happens. Because there's no way a complete redesign of the role along with and adjustment to all of the game's content is happening anytime soon.

[Reynhart]

I get you, but we weren't discussing optimizing enmity.

We were discussing primary focus. And since tanks have two focus, to keep monster on them and to survive, I simply made sure that enmity was a not non-issue to focus on the surviving part, which, again is almost completely unrelated to how much DPS you do.

[Nedkel]

Here's an example of how bad things are. Had some recent runs of E2S. Healers and tanks did job to the best they could, group saw hard enrage at 10:30. Doesnt sound too bad right? Well, each dps died at least one time each and were only a couple levels above minimum. The boss had about 35% hp left. Why not remove most hard enrages and actually give healers and tanks a challenge. We had zero problem surviving all the soft enrages to that point. Dps were all still punching out more damage than the tanks and healers. Problem is you can survive great and heal great all you want, you will NEVER clear a fight at item level if all 4 dps die one time. The dps of tanks and healers should equate to the level of 50% damage of dps damage+5% of whatever dps is required to clear fights with hard enrages. So E2S that would be a bump of about 810 for each healer and tank. Dps get battle raises, heal buffs, and damage mitigation tools. Healers get damage mitigation tools as well. No reason tanks and healers cant have a tiny bit of dps carry potential. As it stands, fights at item level requirement have almost ZERO room for dps error, while a healer or tank dieng in savage content is easily recoverable (oh tank died before tank busters in E2s? Let me just cover+hallowed+tank cds. A healer died? Guess that healer that was mostly dpsing before can just take over healing for a second until a raise goes out)

It seems like its a time to install a parser again and kick away dps that does +/- only 50% more damage than a tank (instead of 90-100% more) because like that they are at the bottom of the dps chart for their job.
If they are the role to deal damage then i will just kick them away if they wont deliver. This is what developers apparently want us to do, to put stress on dps, so let it be.

[J-Reyno]

We were discussing primary focus. And since tanks have two focus, to keep monster on them and to survive, I simply made sure that enmity was a not non-issue to focus on the surviving part, which, again is almost completely unrelated to how much DPS you do.

We all know that mitigation is another aspect of tanking, but that's not the point being made here. The point of the discussion was that tanks focus on dealing damage as a primary objective of their role. Dealing damage is exactly how they maintain enmity, and so damage is an essential element of tanking. It must be done, and is in fact most of tank gameplay.