What do you guys think is the cause of severe lack of Tank users?

[aodhan_ofinnegain]

While I agree with your point on enmity combos, how does turning AoEs from mod-1 actions into mod-2 actions make for better economy, let alone more flow? All that's accomplished is to lock the major benefits of your AoEs behind a GCD of ramp-up and to remove the ability for PLDs or DRKs to grab AoE threat w/o breaking their ST combos.

I'd much sooner take back diversity in AoE choices (such as between the heal of Steel Cyclone vs. the pure damage of Decimate, the damage of AD vs. the lack of combo break on UL, or the mitigation and lack of combo break on Flash vs. the damage of TE) over this A-B-A-B-A-B bloat we have now.

By all means, if enmity was all the other combos would accomplish and matters of enmity itself were to remain as easily compensated for by just boosting our damage stats, let's be rid of them. But let's not pretend that substituting one failing for another makes the second any less a failing. Enmity combos were bloat. The AoE combos we have now are likewise bloat.

I mean there's not many if any situations that I can recall where I need to go from ST to AoE outside of dungeons and even then it doesn't really happen often.

I mean if you want to revert back to spam one button repeatedly even though everyone gives out about how braindead tanks are because of spam...maybe they will maybe they won't.

Also I wouldn't call AoE combos bloat per se, since I get plenty of use of of them, aggro combos I personally went out of my way to avoid using, shield bash is a perfect example of this, while only still around for thematic purposes really, it's not on my hotbar, as there's no need for it.

[aodhan_ofinnegain]

Snip

I only complain about people using Clemency when it is NOT NEEDED or when people advocate that people should use it to compensate someone too clueless to use half their toolkit. Clemency is an awesome skill when used correctly where I stipulated.

Okay so first and second aggro mechanics occur in o4s, earthshakers, Shinryu Ex, o12s tankbusters, e3s auto attacks, e4s P2 tankbusters (cannot remember names right now), while line AoEs during adds in e7s target dps players.

The issue with aggro though, either you have it or you don't, it was nothing but an afterthought in most fights, only time aggro was an issue was initial pull, mob spawn and it's initial aggro, or tank died, after that aggro was a non factor. This has been aggro since HW.

I mean both PLD and GNBs rotations flow quite smoothly, especially making use of Atonement shifts in PLDs rotation as part of optimising on a fight by fight basis, GNB has everything lines up nicely under No Mercy, but your "Sit there and push your go ham button when Up" describes DPS jobs just as much as it does tanks.

I have literally seen no where other than you claiming this to be a fact, in both this thread or the tank damage thread, but nobody asked tanks to be DPS, most people have asked for more mechanics that give both tanks something to do, but in absence of that, we would like a minor increase in tank damage to compensate for the lack of this thus far.

Myself personally, have asked for more tank involvement in mechanics so please stop making sensationalised sweeping statements. Asking for potency buffs does not equate to asking tanks to be turned into a DPS.

[Shurrikhan]

...

But that's the thing. We had two AoE actions. Now we have one AoE action across two buttons.

Or, to put it another way, you had two possible decisions, and now you have one. You had choices between defensive vs. offensive benefit. Now your choices are... none.

How is using two buttons to perform the same action, with all decision-making beyond "Are there 2/3+ enemies?" removed, less braindead than having actual decisions available, even each only takes a single button to perform its function?

[aodhan_ofinnegain]

But that's the thing. We had two AoE actions. Now we have one AoE action across two buttons.

Or, to put it another way, you had two possible decisions, and now you have one. You had choices between defensive vs. offensive benefit. Now your choices are... none.

How is using two buttons to perform the same action, with all decision-making beyond "Are there 2/3+ enemies?" removed, less braindead than having actual decisions available, even each only takes a single button to perform its function?

There was never a decision in AoE for tanks like you are making it out be, you had no aggro tied to Total Eclipse, you had to Flash to get an aggro lead, which eventually blind effect was diminished, you only used unleash for initial grab, because the potency was so bad, then you pretty much TBN for gauge so you could quietus for more mp to fuel AD spam and steel cyclone vs decimate was usually a comfort choice more than a mitigation vs damage choice.

[Shurrikhan]

...

And between the two design choices of making something more practical out of each decision and removing decisions altogether to replace them with button bloat and reduced fluidity, they chose the latter. You rejoice; I lament.

The very fact that Blind was a flat accuracy reduction based on your level, while all mobs in turn had Accuracy correlative with their other stats kept the mitigation value of Flash relatively consistent (on all but, eventually, bosses whose specials were only much later changed to be unable to miss), and the reduced value via diminishing returns gave it more opportunity for decision making therein ("Do I want two uses (1.5 durations) of Flash? Three?"). Had DRK and PLD not been left with such horribly clunky stance mechanics, or even had TE just been retuned slightly, or enmity given a siphon component, as to better scale with gear differentials, instead of the excessive 10x multiplier it received) that would have allowed for something far more impactful.

But instead, design shifts have consistently sided with the removal of choices from tanks rather than making those choices more meaningful. And then we wonder why tanking feels stale.

...But I guess design is fine as long as we hit the few buttons we have often enough, right?

[ReiMakoto]

Okay so first and second aggro mechanics occur in o4s, earthshakers, Shinryu Ex, o12s tankbusters, e3s auto attacks, e4s P2 tankbusters (cannot remember names right now), while line AoEs during adds in e7s target dps players.

.

Adding to this, Lakshmi cone attack targetted second aggro, so do the auto attacks in E8s dragon phase as well as the ahk morns in E8s, its a fairly common mechanic so im surprised you were 'challenged' to just show one. Guess thats what happens when you dont have much experience with the role and try to talk about it

[Vyrerus]

Dunno why people still try highlight this as if it was something good, Aggro combos sucked hard, they were terribly implemented and disrupted the flow of rotations. EVERY tank actively looked to avoid using their respective aggro combo, especially paladin who took the biggest loss by a large margin compared to the other tanks as it forced it's rotation out of raid buffs. WAR saw the ability to circumvent any use of Butcher's Block combo thanks to utilising unchained, equilibrium and the stupid amount of burst from IR. DRK suffered a loss of mana and blood gauge, but initial potency remained the same on the aggro combo as it did on the Souleater combo, iirc.

Honestly to argue they should have kept combos, that were actively and adamantly avoided to quite extreme levels kinda stands to reason they should not be kept which I agree with SE decision in their removal, only adds to button bloat for some of the tanks, and keeping them would have prevented the rotation that we have for GNB, or prevented devs fleshing out AoE a bit more for tanks. The only people I've seen use Aggro combos en masse are the idiots that insisted on OT followed up with spamming aggro combo and not having a clue at level cap what they are doing, thus punishing tanks that wanted to avail of tanking in dps stance. It was more whatever if they were actually holding aggro as it didn't impact the other tank.

Only in Stormblood, and only after WAR was fixed. Not before. As far as hate combos, "disrupting" a tank's rotation, that is only because SE chose to make it a design where to generate enmity would deal less damage or to focus on higher damage would = less enmity. And really, tanks only got away with not using hate combos in Stormblood raiding because SE took the responsibility out of tanks' hands by giving everyone and their mom huge enmity mitigators or dumps, with mitigators having the edge. It then became the party's responsibility to let the tanks tank, rather than the tanks' responsibility to keep agro because, "Muh parse, muh what if 0.1% wipe?!" But really more because, with other people being able to reduce their enmity, it meant the function of hate combos became moot. Why trade damage for enmity when you don't need to?

Without those mitigators in place, like in Heavensward where they were either non-existent or so weak that they hardly affected hate, the importance of agro generation was always a consideration. Riding the line was where the fun was at. No way to ride it now.

[Rasikko]

There was never a decision in AoE for tanks like you are making it out be, you had no aggro tied to Total Eclipse, you had to Flash to get an aggro lead, which eventually blind effect was diminished, you only used unleash for initial grab, because the potency was so bad, then you pretty much TBN for gauge so you could quietus for more mp to fuel AD spam and steel cyclone vs decimate was usually a comfort choice more than a mitigation vs damage choice.

Abyssal Drain spam is dead now unfortunately.

[Ultimatecalibur]

Only in Stormblood, and only after WAR was fixed. Not before. As far as hate combos, "disrupting" a tank's rotation, that is only because SE chose to make it a design where to generate enmity would deal less damage or to focus on higher damage would = less enmity. And really, tanks only got away with not using hate combos in Stormblood raiding because SE took the responsibility out of tanks' hands by giving everyone and their mom huge enmity mitigators or dumps, with mitigators having the edge. It then became the party's responsibility to let the tanks tank, rather than the tanks' responsibility to keep agro because, "Muh parse, muh what if 0.1% wipe?!" But really more because, with other people being able to reduce their enmity, it meant the function of hate combos became moot. Why trade damage for enmity when you don't need to?

You are discounting the benefit of Shirk which was a major reason that tanks could tank in dps stance to the point of not needing tank stance outside of openers and enmity resets. Circle Shirking had the tanks OT Shirk -> OT Provoke -> MT Shirk (OT swaps in with a 140%+ the enmity the MT started with and the former MT is likely between 80%~90% the enmity they started with) during swaps and OT Provoke -> MT Shirk -> MT Provoke -> OT Shirk (MT ends with ~156% their starting enmity and OT ends with ~94% the MT's starting enmity) without tanks swaps to increase their enmity leads by massive amounts.

Without those mitigators in place, like in Heavensward where they were either non-existent or so weak that they hardly affected hate, the importance of agro generation was always a consideration. Riding the line was where the fun was at. No way to ride it now.

In HW, enmity was mostly ignored as well. The main way fights were done involved a Warrior pulling and abusing Equilibrium, Unchained and Strength Accessories to generate a massive enmity lead that would allow both Tanks to swap to DpS stance for the remainder of the fight with the lead mostly maintained by tank dps rotations.

Even if you had a Vit Accessory tank, enmity was not a problem if they sat with tank stance on and did their dps rotation. The "Enmity Game" was completely artificial and made possible by tank access to Str Accessories.

[Vyrerus]

shirk stuff

Nobody forgot about Shirk. It's not worth mentioning, in the context of hate combos, because it's one of the things that helped people shy away from them. You know, swapping before Shirk entailed loading up that enmity combo and then provoking and getting up past the other tank by force.

In Heavensward, if you had a WAR, and if they were MTing like they should have been, yeah, sure. And that's largely also due to Butcher's Block at the time being the higher damage combo for the WAR's rotation as well. DPS did catch up to tanks in those days, PLD and DRK, DRK especially, were really easy to catch on hate. Of course, then came swapping with the WAR, and what did that entail? The WAR either curbing his use of Butcher's Block or the PLD or DRK putting on their tank stance on top of the enmity combos... unless you wanted to risk that back and forth. Enmity was much more of a game back then.