How do we feel about tank damage right now?

[Kalise]

If you want to compare FF14 to an MMO, FF14 to WOW would be more appropriate.

Even then, it's not simply a case of tanks being mere meat shields and that's it.

For example, it wasn't until Mists of Pandaria when Druids had Feral and Guardian specs separated. Meaning that before then, they shared the same talent tree. Thus allowing one to pick a role and still be 90% effective in the other role. So, Bear Druids could shift into Cat form when off-tanking and put out DPS level damage.

There also have been several iterations of Vengeance, providing the MT's a massive attack power boost based on damage taken which has put Tanks close to DPS levels of damage (Much to the chagrin of many DPS players who could see themselves being outperformed by a Tank...). In fact, one of the first iterations of Vengeance worked in PvP, which made Tanks one of the best classes for Arena. Especially Protection Warrior who had the highest burst damage of any class in the game and could literally one shot people with Shield Slam with stacked Vengeance.

Looking at other MMO's, it's not always the case of Tanks being meat shields either.

In City of Heroes, Tankers eventually died off in popularity once the AoE limit came in so their easy to attain defences didn't mean much when mass pulling literally the entire dungeon wasn't viable. Instead, people tended to opt for the high damage Brutes or Scrappers instead, if not simply anyone who'd geared enough to get good defences including Masterminds, Stalkers, Arachnos Soldiers or Arachnos Widows (While Peacebringers/Warshades also could get good defences and had forms that increased their tankiness, the existence of Quantum enemies that specifically deal MASSIVE damage to them often made them shy away from the role) if not simply relying on Controllers/Dominators to simply mass CC everything including Arch Villains.

In Anarchy Online, you have 3 main classes for tanking, Enforcer, Keeper and Soldier. With Adventurer having some potential to build for a tank role with a form to supplement it (Though, not often used). But in various periods of time, Enforcers and Soldiers have found themselves at the top of the DPS charts. But that's only notable in specific content, since a lot of stuff was doable with ad-hoc "Tanks". Things like Fixers with their massive evades dodging everything while holding aggro due to keeping several HoTs on everyone in the party. Medics tanking via mass healing and HoTs. Engineers just having their ridiculously high level pet go tank stuff with aggression modifications. Bureaucrats could just charm enemies and make THEM hold aggro. All this without sacrificing on damage potential either.

If looking for a game that supported the idea of tanks as meat shields with little DPS, I'd say Warhammer Online would be the best case. Of the 3 (Technically 6) tank classes, when playing as a tank (With a sword and shield as opposed to using a 2h weapon and smacking things hard) their damage would be rather low, especially compared to the premier damage dealers (Bright Wizard/Sorcerer and Slayer/Choppa... Even more so during that time when Slayers could get a 0.0 attack speed and thus deal literally infinite damage instantly...).

However, as the game was primarily focused on PvP, it meant that the Tanks had instead a lot more focus on staying alive and keeping their allies alive with aggro being less important (Though, still significant when facing Keep Lords). For example, ALL tanks had a channelled skill that would severely reduce damage done to allies behind them, sort of like Passage of Arms but on steroids, making it important for people to actually focus the tanks in PvP. Tanks also had a lot of CC skills so they could stop people from being able to run past them and go murder their squishy allies. Knights of the Blazing Sun and Chosen were the games support classes too, wherein they could provide auras to buff their allies/debuff the enemy respectively (They could rotate them to actually keep 3 aura effects up at once since they persisted for ~12 seconds after being toggled off).

In addition to this, there was keep battles as open world PvP where Tanks gained additional advantages due to the nature of how it worked. On offense, Tanks high survivability meant they could man the battering rams more easily, despite getting shot by ranged defenders, cannons, crossbows or having burning oil dropped on them. On defence, because there was collision, tanks could literally wall off the doorway by standing there, causing the enemy to have to deal with them in order to enter the keep (Until some sneaky buggers zoned in through the back door and murdered all the healers keeping the tanks up)

But again, a lot of this design only worked because it was a PvP centred game. There was nothing like enrage mechanics to contend with. It wasn't considered "OP" to have a plethora of CC that actually worked because it wasn't being designed to be used against bosses that needed to pull off scripted attacks to be threatening. Also, they weren't necessary because you could still do PvP games and take Keeps without them. In fact, you often wouldn't see them, especially given that the lead job designer was a Bright Wizard main so you can imagine what the most OP class in the game was...

[Kabooa]

Even then, it's not simply a case of tanks being mere meat shields and that's it.

Warhammer especially, and particularly WoW's initial vengeance scaling, are examples of bad design. Warhammer literally had obsolete class mirrors that skewed PVP so badly in its early days and some classes were just blatantly inferior at all aspects of their role other than really niche build set ups. Isn't it great being a witch elf, the melee rogue equivalent, except on the other faction you have your Witch Hunter counterpart who does all the same stuff, but the finishers can be done from ranged?

Speaking personally as someone who played the most overpowered class during Pandaria's early days, Prot Paladin, being able to deal the most damage, mitigate the most damage, and heal the most damage as a singular class is the apex of bad design. Sure it's great being able to drag people over the finish line with you, but ultimately it was with an unfair advantage amounting to 20-25% more "man power" in a 10 man raid. Imagine if you could just bring two more players into current 8 mans without them scaling up.

FF14 at it's worst state, or rather, a debatable worst state, as that tends to be based on what you play and when, has never been that outlandish before. Objective Obsolesce wasn't to the point of Warhammer's mirror scenario, nor was the 'Meta' at any point equivalent to having two extra players.

[Makeda]

Even then, it's not simply a case of tanks being mere meat shields and that's it.

Technically there's no reason for tanks to NOT be just meat shields even here...

...

except that players have figured out that if everybody and their fat-cat minion focuses on DPS only, they can beat the enrage timer faster.

I have not played Classic WoW... but I would not be surprised to find some guilds there focusing on DPS for their tanks and healers...

The reason having heals only heal and tanks "only tanks" back in the old days might largely be because the player base wasn't as skilled as it is now...

I think the most dramatic example of player skill suddenly overtaking the developer's combat engine is Guild Wars 2.

- At launch people thought "these dungeons are amazing and require intense coordinated planning, positioning, and a mix of mitigation and healing..."

3 days later it was "everybody make a pure DPS glass cannon, stack on each other, and roll your cat over the keyboard until the boss is dead."

- if you look at the combat engine they had... if they'd put it out in 2004, it would have worked... but they put it out in 2013, and players just looked at it a second time on day 2 and said "naw... we got this..."

And the devs there threw in the towel, not a single permanent dungeon added since launch (they did add some temporary event ones, that got pulled a month later, and even that fast players had gimped them), the entire dungeon team fired, and the raid team that joined a few years later - completely different design to how they approached things... which players again eventually out DPS'd.

We could just ignore all the modern player skill... and "go back to playing this with individually marking each mob in a trash pull, stunning that one and grabbing this one... and focusing on armor and healing..." but it's just too easy to not do that now... but it's not really the game that's changed... it's the playerbase.

[Kalise]

Warhammer literally had obsolete class mirrors that skewed PVP so badly in its early days and some classes were just blatantly inferior at all aspects of their role other than really niche build set ups. Isn't it great being a witch elf, the melee rogue equivalent, except on the other faction you have your Witch Hunter counterpart who does all the same stuff, but the finishers can be done from ranged?

Not all Witch Hunter finishers could be done from ranged. Also, Witch Elves did more damage than Witch Hunters.

Either way, both were rendered obsolete because outside of the level 20-29 bracket where their stealth openers dealt insane damage, they were just blatantly inferior to BW/Sorc and Slayer/Choppa especially since their stealth openers damage didn't scale at all so were literally worthless in level 30+ content.

I was a Witch Hunter main.

As far as obsolete class mirrors, they weren't as bad as you make out. Most mirrors had fair representation on either side. All the healers for example were viable, WP/DoK, Archmage/Shaman, Runepriest/Zealot. Most of the DPS were viable.

Really the only major notes was how trash Marauder was compared to White Lion, simply due to a single skill, Fetch. Which was OP as it let a WL literally teleport any target from inside a keep to right in front of them. While Marauder... Kept getting all its arms nerfed for no reason...

Other mirrors that were lacking was tanks, but that was mostly due to how busted the 3 actually strong tanks were. KotBS/Chosen had so much utility with their auras and Black Orc was basically unkillable. So no-one really played Blackguard, Ironbreaker or Swordmaster.

I have not played Classic WoW... but I would not be surprised to find some guilds there focusing on DPS for their tanks and healers...

Oh, it's not "Some" guilds, it's everyone. Since everyone now uses predetermined optimal specs and BiS gear lists.

So your Tanks are Warriors with Arms spec not Protection. Healers have builds where they're like 60% talented into DPS trees too.

The wealth of knowledge people have access to these days has dramatically shifted the way that game functions. For example, the best class for PvP and DPS in PvE is Frost Mage, which at the time was considered unviable for everything until WotLK when they got a ton of buffs.

[Xtrasweettea]

[snip to save pages]

Yeah... the point of my post was pointing out that trying to compare FF14 tanks to FF11 won't work without having to go too much into detail...

I suggested WoW due the amount of similarities between FF14 and WoW.

I wasn't suggesting tanks were just meat shields... I have no idea where you got this...

[Kalise]

I wasn't suggesting tanks were just meat shields... I have no idea where you got this...

I wasn't implying that you were.

Ivellior was the one that was talking about how Tanks don't do damage and that games with the Holy Trinity with Tank/Healer/DPS have it so that Tanks don't deal damage.

Hence when we compare to games such as WoW, Anarchy Online, City of Heroes, Rift etc. Tanks can and did do appreciable damage. They were not just meat shields designed to mitgate damage and hold aggro only, but to beat up the enemies too.

Games that are MMO's with the Holy Trinity can disprove their argument, even if they dismiss the nature of the Final Fantasy series wherein tanky characters have often been some of the highest damage ones (Especially given that you generally put Cover and Counter onto the tankiest characters, making them deal tons of damage as they counter nearly every attack the enemies do)

[MerlinCross]

Also I find it funny that we might have the "Holy Trinity" but most talks are about wanting to deal more damage or how boring it is to deal effective damage. If this oh so Holy Trinity is supposed to be followed, why do we CARE about Tank and Healer Damage?

Oh right, Fights are designed around stupid tight enrages that need the damage to punch through. Okay fine but why do we need the Trinity if Damage is that important?

I just find this to be a circular discussion.

[Kalise]

Also I find it funny that we might have the "Holy Trinity" but most talks are about wanting to deal more damage or how boring it is to deal effective damage. If this oh so Holy Trinity is supposed to be followed, why do we CARE about Tank and Healer Damage?

Because there's not enough mechanics and tools to create engaging and rewarding gameplay via "Tanking" and "Healing".

The only thing that there is to do in encounters is punch the boss. The only difference of gear and skill is punching the boss more gooder. There's no room for optimizing mitigation or enmity control for Tanks, or healing efficiency for Healers (Which often will pave the way for adding in more damage, since that's the only thing that makes encounters go faster. Not just about beating enrages, but having an appreciable effect when you get better/stronger) only damage.

Okay fine but why do we need the Trinity if Damage is that important?

This is exactly an issue with the current design, which I mentioned earlier:

Either that, or if they continue to make Tanking and Healing requirements so minimal, just go the whole hog and delete the Tank and Healer roles and just give everyone Rampart, Assize, Swiftcast and Raise and tune every job as a DPS who can pop a CD when the boss does a thing.

With how little engagement there is with the actual support roles, just having everyone get the skills necessary to pop when bosses do their scripted skills has little difference to the current "Trinity" system.

[aodhan_ofinnegain]

Oh right, Fights are designed around stupid tight enrages that need the damage to punch through. Okay fine but why do we need the Trinity if Damage is that important?

So what, you suggest they remove enrage timers? then where's the challenge in that, it makes things pointless. If you can't do it, you then either, accept that you can't clear, or git gud and or get better gear until you can beat it. Clears shouldn't be just handed to every player that walks into the instance on a silver platter, there is no fun in that, people already complaining there nothing to do for tanks and healers, removing enrage timers will only further destroy any semblence of difficulty left in the game. Personally I wish they would add enrage timers back to casual content again and stop pandering to the casual scrubs that don't bother their arse to learn how to play their job let alone read tooltips.

Removing the trinity would also remove the difficult aspect from the encounters just as much as the enrage timer, not to mention force devs to redesign the game from the ground up removing the addition of new content. As limited as the functions are for tanks and healers which differ them from dps, the functions are still pretty clear.

Honestly they need to add more tank responsibilty, and aggro was never really one for tanks since late HW. (As a paladin main I approve of aggro combos being deleted from the game, nothing more irritating having to pick up adds as OT while obliterating the entire flow of your rotation). Removing auto-positioning bosses, no more side of the arena bosses, making more use of adds during boss fights, not as a segment when the boss runs off for a minute, which needs swapping boss and add from time to time between tanks, while also requiring CC for certain abilities, stop with bosses glued to the side of the arena they ain't fun or engaging. (yes I mentioned this twice, but they really are boring fights). While I will still agree with tanks needing a bit more damage, the gap is just widening further and further as the expac goes on between tanks and dps.

As for healers, they need to tune down their oGCD heals, they have way too many and they're already pretty broken in terms of potency, requiring more GCD healing than current would be a move in the right direction I think, while allowing them still quite some time to dps, but not as frequent as it is now. I don't play healer that often, so I won't speak much of it, but I would also like to see more DoTs return to healers to manage, one is just not enough Imo.

[MerlinCross]

So what, you suggest they remove enrage timers? then where's the challenge in that, it makes things pointless. If you can't do it, you then either, accept that you can't clear, or git gud and or get better gear until you can beat it. Clears shouldn't be just handed to every player that walks into the instance on a silver platter, there is no fun in that, people already complaining there nothing to do for tanks and healers, removing enrage timers will only further destroy any semblence of difficulty left in the game. Personally I wish they would add enrage timers back to casual content again and stop pandering to the casual scrubs that don't bother their arse to learn how to play their job let alone read tooltips.

Removing the trinity would also remove the difficult aspect from the encounters just as much as the enrage timer, not to mention force devs to redesign the game from the ground up removing the addition of new content. As limited as the functions are for tanks and healers which differ them from dps, the functions are still pretty clear.

Honestly they need to add more tank responsibilty, and aggro was never really one for tanks since late HW. (As a paladin main I approve of aggro combos being deleted from the game, nothing more irritating having to pick up adds as OT while obliterating the entire flow of your rotation). Removing auto-positioning bosses, no more side of the arena bosses, making more use of adds during boss fights, not as a segment when the boss runs off for a minute, which needs swapping boss and add from time to time between tanks, while also requiring CC for certain abilities, stop with bosses glued to the side of the arena they ain't fun or engaging. (yes I mentioned this twice, but they really are boring fights). While I will still agree with tanks needing a bit more damage, the gap is just widening further and further as the expac goes on between tanks and dps.

As for healers, they need to tune down their oGCD heals, they have way too many and they're already pretty broken in terms of potency, requiring more GCD healing than current would be a move in the right direction I think, while allowing them still quite some time to dps, but not as frequent as it is now. I don't play healer that often, so I won't speak much of it, but I would also like to see more DoTs return to healers to manage, one is just not enough Imo.

No, I don't suggest removing enrage timers as if that's the cause, may as well just be beating on a sandbag. But we've been discussing how tight some of these enrage/DPS checks are since Heavensward, and what I count the beginning of the decline of 14's oh so Holy Trinity by demanding Tank and Healers output far more DPS than before. Need I bring up Faust?

I do agree, Tanks need more things to do in battle but in the current community, I can't see them adding enough to change how the tank game is played without it being cheesed or complained about. Adding Aggro back in and making it matter seems to be a hot button issue, along with giving the tanks more to do besides.... be a blue DPS.

So we're stuck in a game with the Holy Trinity that doesn't actually value two of them, in a battle system so scripted and tight the only lever we have of control is DAMAGE, with a community that will hear of nothing other than pushing damage as that's all that matters, and a group of Devs that are either too scared to upset their community or too unwilling to change up a formula that DOES work regardless of how much complaining there is about it.

Yeah. I suggest just ripping out the Trinity now and getting it over with. Either way at the end of the day, to solve the issue I believe we would have to get the battle system redesigned to SOME degree. And because Damage is the only thing that matters and is cared about now, might as well head in that Damage heavy focused direction as opposed to reeling the community back into something closer to the Trinity.

I'm just tired of some people holding up "BUT THE TRINITY" as a defense only to see them turn around and demand more Damage because..... well those parts of the Trinity need it.