How do we feel about tank damage right now?

[ReiMakoto]

And yet if it was the safest, easiest option for a bunch of random to go and do the content, an all Tank as damage dealers would become the meta.

We saw this with Rathalos on it's EX at first. It was simply easiest to bring 3 tanks and a healer, as the tanks could still pump out enough damage but also not instantly die to messing up mechanics. Sure as people got used to the fight, and gear came up, you started seeing more DPS in that duty but I still see to this day 3 tanks 1 healer.

Rath EX is different as it was literally designed to be beaten by any team comp and the nature of WARs burst made it the best choice combined with its defence. In anything with a meaningful enrage you would get issues taking multiple tanks

[MerlinCross]

Rath EX is different as it was literally designed to be beaten by any team comp and the nature of WARs burst made it the best choice combined with its defence. In anything with a meaningful enrage you would get issues taking multiple tanks

Now, yes.

If people get the Damage numbers they seem to want, and the balance isn't taken into account, how would that shift the meta? Yes Rath EX was designed to be beaten by 'any comp' but Tanks became the preferred choice.

Look we have 2 endings here; 1) Tanks get their much demanded damage and fights aren't changed leading to Tanks possibly taking DPS slots because why wouldn't they if they do enough damage and are safer, or 2) Tanks get their much demanded damage and Fights are changed, making the enrage checks even tighter to compenstate for the new expected damage numbers or just giving the boss more HP, which makes the 'feel good damage numbers' basically a band aid.

[ReiMakoto]

Now, yes.

If people get the Damage numbers they seem to want, and the balance isn't taken into account, how would that shift the meta? Yes Rath EX was designed to be beaten by 'any comp' but Tanks became the preferred choice.

Look we have 2 endings here; 1) Tanks get their much demanded damage and fights aren't changed leading to Tanks possibly taking DPS slots because why wouldn't they if they do enough damage and are safer, or 2) Tanks get their much demanded damage and Fights are changed, making the enrage checks even tighter to compenstate for the new expected damage numbers or just giving the boss more HP, which makes the 'feel good damage numbers' basically a band aid.

The only slot a tank would ever take is the flex dps slot otherwise you lose the party diversity bonus and even by taking that one extra tank you are going to make the fight harder in some instance as mechanics that would normally target one of the dps would now target one of the 2 tanks without aggro randomly meaning instead of consistency you have to adjust around rng. And if we go with the 75% figure, sure some parties would take a tank there, the problem is the parties that would feel the need to take a third tank are likely the parties that won't be clearing anyway as they would be missing dps and one person not dying as much isn't going to help that. So there's your first scenario basically debunked, sure some would take extra tanks, and either lose thier diversity bonus which tanks everyones dps or make the fights mechanically more challenging.

Scenario 2, well if they inflated the boss health to match the new tank dps, you'd see no difference, unless you were bad at your job and the new expanded tank dps makes your numbers even worse by comparison. Im also kind of fine with tighter dps checks anyway unless you're doing week 1 prog the dps checks arn't stupidly tight anyway adjusting up a small amount to account for new tank dps won't make or break a party, unless again your party isn't that great, demanding your tanks have better rotational execution isn't much of an ask when its probably currently the easiest job to optimise dps on.

[MerlinCross]

The only slot a tank would ever take is the flex dps slot otherwise you lose the party diversity bonus and even by taking that one extra tank you are going to make the fight harder in some instance as mechanics that would normally target one of the dps would now target one of the 2 tanks without aggro randomly meaning instead of consistency you have to adjust around rng. And if we go with the 75% figure, sure some parties would take a tank there, the problem is the parties that would feel the need to take a third tank are likely the parties that won't be clearing anyway as they would be missing dps and one person not dying as much isn't going to help that. So there's your first scenario basically debunked, sure some would take extra tanks, and either lose thier diversity bonus which tanks everyones dps or make the fights mechanically more challenging.

I don't see how it's debunked. If the damage a tank is given allows the team to STILL Clear, a DPS slot is going to be taken, how is this hard to understand? If you can still clear with a third tank, why would you not take it instead of say, MNK, or at this point Ninja which was the lowest DPS I saw for a bit. Yes I'm taking into account Party Diversity Bonus for this. If you can clear with 3 tanks, why would you not take 3 tanks? People will use the easiest, most practical, and most consistent way to beat a fight; that's just how things are. Look at people complaining about the DPS teir lists and BLM being basically a must pick these days because the math shows it's good so the community follows. I've already covered this before, people will follow the math.

And if the math ever comes up that 3 tanks is better, safer, and more consistent way to clera; guess what the meta becomes. I don't think this is hard to understand; if there's little to no difference between the end result, a tank is a better choice as it can eat a DDR mess up and not instant die.

Scenario 2, well if they inflated the boss health to match the new tank dps, you'd see no difference, unless you were bad at your job and the new expanded tank dps makes your numbers even worse by comparison. Im also kind of fine with tighter dps checks anyway unless you're doing week 1 prog the dps checks arn't stupidly tight anyway adjusting up a small amount to account for new tank dps won't make or break a party, unless again your party isn't that great, demanding your tanks have better rotational execution isn't much of an ask when its probably currently the easiest job to optimise dps on.

Look I don't think either of us want to go through FAUST again, regardless of your skill level. I do agree that tanks are currently in the easiest time to DPS. Healers might actually be even easier given their heals are so strong they can find more than enough time to DPS, which is part of their problem but that's a separate problem. But no, we can't have Healers deal more damage than us because the Devs messed their role up, we simply need add more damage to Tanks because that's the only acceptable solution. No Healer should out damage us!(sarcasm).

1º more dps: it's unrreasonable have healers breathing at our necks when we are supose to be much more agresive than them and our contribution to the raid it's frankly low.

Something people don't seem to understand is that Healers out damaging us is more a problem on the Healer end than on the Tank end. I'm pretty sure the Devs didn't go into this expansion with the idea of making Healers out damage us, no the idea was different if I recall. The idea was to make their damage skills hit harder to make up for the fact they'd be healing more often. More damage, over less hits. That was the intent I believe which if I'm wrong, I'll own up to that but that's how I absorbed that info.

And we all know they messed that up. Being higher on the damage chart is a by product of the devs not understanding what to do with Healers. Put a different way; how many people would actually be happy if Healers were nerfed into being below us either by fixing their game play(Having to use more GCD heals) or just lowering the damage numbers? Would people still be asking for Tank Damage buffs?

We all know the answer here which is Yes. So quit blaming it on the Healers.

[ReiMakoto]

I don't see how it's debunked. If the damage a tank is given allows the team to STILL Clear, a DPS slot is going to be taken, how is this hard to understand? If you can still clear with a third tank, why would you not take it instead of say, MNK, or at this point Ninja which was the lowest DPS I saw for a bit. Yes I'm taking into account Party Diversity Bonus for this. If you can clear with 3 tanks, why would you not take 3 tanks? People will use the easiest, most practical, and most consistent way to beat a fight; that's just how things are. Look at people complaining about the DPS teir lists and BLM being basically a must pick these days because the math shows it's good so the community follows. I've already covered this before, people will follow the math.

Youre setting up a ridiculous standard, untraditional party comp runs have ways been a thing (solo heal ect), if youre saying that a party could clear with 3 tanks then thats enough for it to be to much then that is ridiculous, we probably already can do some fights this tier with 3 tanks and i dont see the rush to do so. Also as i mentioned before losing diversity bonus and dps players will likely make the fight harder not easier due to less consistent mechanics and even less health and damage. Theres also the fact that being a tank wont help in most cases either, unless you die to unavoidable mechanics extra defence wont let you live binary pass fail mechanics like most are in this game

[TheRealQuah]

I don't see how it's debunked. If the damage a tank is given allows the team to STILL Clear, a DPS slot is going to be taken, how is this hard to understand? If you can still clear with a third tank, why would you not take it instead of say, MNK, or at this point Ninja which was the lowest DPS I saw for a bit. Yes I'm taking into account Party Diversity Bonus for this. If you can clear with 3 tanks, why would you not take 3 tanks? People will use the easiest, most practical, and most consistent way to beat a fight; that's just how things are. Look at people complaining about the DPS teir lists and BLM being basically a must pick these days because the math shows it's good so the community follows. I've already covered this before, people will follow the math.

And if the math ever comes up that 3 tanks is better, safer, and more consistent way to clera; guess what the meta becomes. I don't think this is hard to understand; if there's little to no difference between the end result, a tank is a better choice as it can eat a DDR mess up and not instant die.

Something people don't seem to understand is that Healers out damaging us is more a problem on the Healer end than on the Tank end. I'm pretty sure the Devs didn't go into this expansion with the idea of making Healers out damage us, no the idea was different if I recall. The idea was to make their damage skills hit harder to make up for the fact they'd be healing more often. More damage, over less hits. That was the intent I believe which if I'm wrong, I'll own up to that but that's how I absorbed that info.

And we all know they messed that up. Being higher on the damage chart is a by product of the devs not understanding what to do with Healers. Put a different way; how many people would actually be happy if Healers were nerfed into being below us either by fixing their game play(Having to use more GCD heals) or just lowering the damage numbers? Would people still be asking for Tank Damage buffs?

We all know the answer here which is Yes. So quit blaming it on the Healers.

Just some points which address your contributions in this thread

1 - Tank damage needs to be halfway between DPS and Healers. Before any discussions about making tanks more engaging (which needs to be had), there needs to be a base to work from. Healers are doing more damage that tanks now, and it's only going to get worse next tier. This isn't about tank pride or wanting big numbers. Healers doing more damage breaks the game. There are already technically times where a PLD using clemency is an overall rDPS gain, and more scenarios where things like this happen are only going to get more prevalent the higher iLvl gets. At an extreme level, it gets to the point where you wouldn't take a tank at all, because letting a DPS take a buster and raising them with weakness will be an rDPS gain. This will happen if tank damage is not addressed.

2 - Enrage timers now are not tight, outside of the first 2 weeks. I don't know who's been telling you for 3 expansions otherwise, but they're wrong.

3 - The fact you have to use Rath EX as an example to attempt to prove your points speaks for itself. This is a fight deliberately designed to NOT be a normal FF fight and to be as close to a monster hunter fight as the the battle system allows. It is completely irrelevant in any discussion about job balancing whatsoever.

4 - The majority of people in this thread are talking about endgame tanking, have extensive experience of it, and I know in the case of some, contribute to theory crafting on the subject. The likes of Rei and Shao are good tank players who actually have knowledge of endgame tanking so I'd say their opinions hold a bit more weight.

5 - Stop contradicting yourself. Shao did not "blame" healers anywhere. "Healers out damaging us is more a problem on the Healer end than on the Tank end", "quit blaming it on the Healers". Make your mind up.

6 - I'm pretty sure you could clear any of the fights with 3 tanks now. But people don't. Because it's quicker not to. In fact, I see people attempting to solo tank fights way more often. If you are at the point where you need to take 3 or more tanks because the only way you can clear is tank privileging mechanics, then you don't deserve to be challenging that content.

Between this thread and Silverquick in the other DPS thread, what is it with the trend on this forum of people having an opinion on savage content balancing, when they don't have any experience of it?

[MerlinCross]

Just some points which address your contributions in this thread

1 - Tank damage needs to be halfway between DPS and Healers. Before any discussions about making tanks more engaging (which needs to be had), there needs to be a base to work from. Healers are doing more damage that tanks now, and it's only going to get worse next tier. This isn't about tank pride or wanting big numbers. Healers doing more damage breaks the game. There are already technically times where a PLD using clemency is an overall rDPS gain, and more scenarios where things like this happen are only going to get more prevalent the higher iLvl gets. At an extreme level, it gets to the point where you wouldn't take a tank at all, because letting a DPS take a buster and raising them with weakness will be an rDPS gain. This will happen if tank damage is not addressed.

2 - Enrage timers now are not tight, outside of the first 2 weeks. I don't know who's been telling you for 3 expansions otherwise, but they're wrong.

3 - The fact you have to use Rath EX as an example to attempt to prove your points speaks for itself. This is a fight deliberately designed to NOT be a normal FF fight and to be as close to a monster hunter fight as the the battle system allows. It is completely irrelevant in any discussion about job balancing whatsoever.

4 - The majority of people in this thread are talking about endgame tanking, have extensive experience of it, and I know in the case of some, contribute to theory crafting on the subject. The likes of Rei and Shao are good tank players who actually have knowledge of endgame tanking so I'd say their opinions hold a bit more weight.

5 - Stop contradicting yourself. Shao did not "blame" healers anywhere. "Healers out damaging us is more a problem on the Healer end than on the Tank end", "quit blaming it on the Healers". Make your mind up.

6 - I'm pretty sure you could clear any of the fights with 3 tanks now. But people don't. Because it's quicker not to. In fact, I see people attempting to solo tank fights way more often. If you are at the point where you need to take 3 or more tanks because the only way you can clear is tank privileging mechanics, then you don't deserve to be challenging that content.

Between this thread and Silverquick in the other DPS thread, what is it with the trend on this forum of people having an opinion on savage content balancing, when they don't have any experience of it?

Okay. Let's do this.

1) Halfway between DPS and Healers... how? Halfway above Healers? Below DPS? A combination of half of each? Yes, how you word it might matter when dealing with math and formulas. However I personally would like to go 25% 25% 50% for Tanks, Healers and DPS. We can make Tanks go up to 35% or so. Healers dealing more damage is a failure on the Devs to manage the Healers, not the tanks. Granted they failed on both issues but they are not linked to one another and I dislike people trying to force that. Put a different way, we shouldn't blame Healers for having so much damage, we should blame the Devs for not giving Healers more to do, which is something we Tanks could ALSO use. "Not about tank pride or wanting big numbers", history has proven you wrong but okay(Read, People jumping on the WAR bandwagon in Heavensward). And yet if you cast it, you will get flamed for daring to use Clemency until it becomes the meta to do so. I also question why you think the Item level is going to spike that high to the point you can do that DPS only. Please, I would like to see someone take all DPS into Titan 2.0 and see how that works out, never mind the group having to balance aggro so the boss isn't flipping between BLM and SAM.

2) If Enrage timers are not that tight, then why are people complaining about them so much and that we need more damage to push them? And if they aren't that tight, why do tanks need more damage to push the non threatening enrage timer? It's either a threat or it's not a threat. Or is the issue that Item Level makes fools of everything after X time, regardless of how much damage your built in kit does?

3) You view it as irrelevant, I view it as a test bed. A way for them to experiment with trying new mechanics, temp comp, and other ideas. I found it fun, interesting, and I hope they take the right lessons and feedback from it. I dread them taking other ideas from it though, like the push for Tank Damage.

4) I actually do value Shao's insights, I just disagree with them more from a Dev and Community side of things. I do truly want to see this car get turned around but then I see some responses and just think "Well might was well let them step on the gas and end it faster". If Shao thinks they can help turn things around and convince other people, more power to them but I'm not expecting things to change due to both community and devs.

5) I did not say Shao blame them, at least outright. I just see so much hate on "OH healers deal more damage than us, woe oh woe, we can't have that can we", so how about the community pulls up thier pants and own up to the fact they don't want to be below the sticks and books? Oh no, not like that won't change next expansion. As for the Contradiction, you seem to want to force that. Healers do more damage than us so we need more damage; no no no. Healers do more damage due to a failing on the Devs to get their gameplay this expansion, not because their damage was heavily spiked/favored over us. They just have far more time to DPS than they should, something the devs didn't account for. If anything, I'm blaming the devs over how they handled Healers, not healers themselves. Now I asked this before, if Healers got the damage nerf, would you Tanks be happy now that you're above them in the Logs? Oh wait, you don't need to tell me. I can take a guess.

6) It's quicker if everything goes right. If it was safer and far faster than what we have now thanks to our 'poor poor' dps, which is something people in this thread seem to want, I question if we would have this issue.

Oh and you didn't number it but
7) Let's just seal off the forums to the elites then. But until that happens, I'm going to have a voice in this which questions why people want to be DPS's on Tanks and suggest that more Damage is simply a band aid of a solution at least, and the wrong direction for balance at worst.

People seem to hate tanks/tanking here, so why not just remove that entirely then? I ask you, what do you people have to lose from that considering there's not much left of Tanking anyway.

[Kalise]

People seem to hate tanks/tanking here, so why not just remove that entirely then? I ask you, what do you people have to lose from that considering there's not much left of Tanking anyway.

It's not really about hating tanks/tanking.

It's about having an actual effect with what you do.

Tank duties, literally amount to:

1) Hold aggro

2) Don't die

After that, the only thing you can do, is maximize damage.

Given that duty 1 is auto-completed by merely existing, due to how XIV's aggro system has functioned, you then focus on duty 2.

Though, duty 2 is completed by, not standing in the bad and pressing CD's during tank busters.

So, with minimal effort, we're down to focusing on damage.

However, with low damage output, there's little reason to try and optimize what little we have to do (Which is mostly just uptime). Like, what's the point in trying to play that bit better if the result is so marginal anyway, especially in relation to the overall parties damage output? This is also exacerbated by Tank DPS being heavily focused towards their IR windows which further reduces the actual benefit of you know, playing well and having higher boss uptime.

Yes, given the choice of simply damage buffs or more gameplay depths (Especially for tank related duties) most Tanks will opt for the latter.

However, such a thing would require a massive overhaul of the games systems. Meanwhile, damage buffs, would help make playing well to get higher uptime, oGCD weaving and resource management have more of an impact and thus bring more satisfaction in the game as it exists right now.

Since the game as it exists right now is what is currently the most relevant because that's what we can play right now. That's also what we're going to have to play for the next year and a half too. A system overhaul of the likes we'd love to see won't happen until AT LEAST 6.0. So why not ask for the thing that will actually be relevant for us for the next year and a half? As opposed to asking for stuff that will only be at minimum, implementable after then?

[Nedkel]

I don't see how it's debunked. If the damage a tank is given allows the team to STILL Clear, a DPS slot is going to be taken, how is this hard to understand? If you can still clear with a third tank, why would you not take it instead of say, MNK, or at this point Ninja which was the lowest DPS I saw for a bit. Yes I'm taking into account Party Diversity Bonus for this. If you can clear with 3 tanks, why would you not take 3 tanks? People will use the easiest, most practical, and most consistent way to beat a fight; that's just how things are. Look at people complaining about the DPS teir lists and BLM being basically a must pick these days because the math shows it's good so the community follows. I've already covered this before, people will follow the math.

And if the math ever comes up that 3 tanks is better, safer, and more consistent way to clera; guess what the meta becomes. I don't think this is hard to understand; if there's little to no difference between the end result, a tank is a better choice as it can eat a DDR mess up and not instant die.

Why would a team pick 3 tanks in content with tight enrage timer?

Your math simply does not add up, why would anyone optimize their team for normal easy content that could be done with one hand? The team optimization appears when there is a necessity, mainly in savage/ultimate content and nowhere else.

No one in their right mind would ever pick a third tank for a sake of making it "safer", because joining static you are required to know the mechanics and do as little mistakes as possible, people already are playing safe enough to the point where second healer almost does not even cast any GCD healing. Thinking teams are going to take a third tank is just a wish, if a tank were 25-30% weaker than dps it would not make them choose a tank over dps, simply because 30% extra dps is 30% extra dps in a game where players go through great lengths in order to increase the dps even by 1%. A lot of statics refuse to take redmages or machnists into their team because their dps is on average lower than the others, so what makes you think they would go for a third tank that does 70% of dps? It would not be optimal even in the slightest in a content with enrage timer, even in normal content its far better to finish the fight faster than later avoiding unnecessary mechanics and potential mistakes.