my thoughts on how to make tank jobs more engaging

[bundythenoob]

Firstly, I want to say I am satisfied with a few of the changes to tanking in 5.0. Some of my favourite changes to tanking in general were the removal of emnity, which helps lower the barrier of entry to tanking. I also like the streamlining of the various actions, such as AOE combos and defencive cooldowns, which makes it easier to carry your fundamentals over between jobs.

I do not, however, feel that the identities of classes were preserved. It does not feel as rewarding to play the new DRK in comparison to the older gameplay, nor does it feel as impressive to dole out damage as a PLD, despite their toolkit evolving as opposed to WAR and DRK. I feel that a lot of this has to come down to the loss of both unique gameplay between the jobs, as well as the lack of decision making that helps differentiate the experienced players from the newcomers.

EDIT: Since I am almost 100% sure Square will not give us back STB DRK and WAR due to their obsession with accessibility, I have been thinking a lot about how to make the current DRK feel more rewarding to play, since I believe they are more likely to change this build. I want to mention a few general ideas that I've been thinking about first though.

1. Streamlined Abilities:
there is a distinct lack of job identity that is not present in the form of tank stances. I loved how awesome it felt to be a sturdy PLD and take less damage than the other jobs, I loved seeing a fully geared WAR walk into the instance and seeing the HUGE health pool in comparison to the others. I am sure that the feel of the older tank stances can be reintroduced with some modifications to their mitigation values, then this would help add some flavour to the tank jobs.

2. Tank damage
As stated above, I feel that Tank damage is at a low, and it's not due so much to the numbers in my opinion, but due to the lack of reward a tank gets for maxing their kit. I feel that DRK and WAR do not reward skillful gameplay choices or rotation optimization. Tanks should be able to dish out a lot of damage if they are willing to put in the work to learn their jobs, and this will give new tank players a skillset to look up to, medium level tanks some goals to work towards, and end level tanks will have a rewarding experience once more. this i think can be achieved by tweaking both WAR and DRK abilities so that they come up more often, thus giving them faster actions per minute, which would give them more resource to spend, and as a result they will deal more damage. PLD and GNB both feel that they have the speed, but they would have to have their potencies adjusted to make up for new damage threshold of WAR and DRK, as well as their sustainability buffed in terms of their defencive kits, as they are more defencive/support orientated tanks.

Ultimately, as i am not a game dev, so I am not sure if my opinions will be of any help. I only have feelings that I hope can be conveyed, and ideas which i hope can lead to better, more rewarding gameplay. I have a hunch as to how we can increase Tanking damage by increasing actions, and therefore make the jobs more engaging, but I will need a test dummy to propose my ideas with. so lets use my old favourite job, DRK!

[bundythenoob]

DRK problems:
currently, DRK "gameplay identity" is known for its barrier TBN, and EOD/FOD mana spenders, by which I mean that those skills are the only thing that separate DRK from the other 3 tanks. This decision ultimately gives DRK a unique problem that no other job faces, which is that their DPS is tied to the mana they generate. I feel that the most important question of this design choice is:

since its DPS AND its sustain are tied to its mana, why is its mana generation restricted so much, which only hurts the damage and healing it can do?


The simplest, and best change for the CURRENT build in my opinion, is to the leveling kit of DRK. I feel that if stalwart was learned at lv 40, this would help DRK increase its mana actions allowed in battle, as well as adding more of that natural damage curve to go along with it. with Blood Weapon being moved to lv 30, then Edge of Darkness can be learned at lv 35, so that stalwart can fit into lv 40.

Another change would be to Abyssal Drain. I think that AD should return as a mana spender with the same cost as EOD/FOD, so that an experienced DRK will be given the chance to think about what to spend its mana on. I also believe its cure potency should be changed to be something like 400% of damage dealt to target, 50% less for the rest, so that it does not become grossly OP in dungeons and it also helps give DRK another option for spending mana in boss fights. Living Dead is another huge problem in the jobs kit. I believe it should offer a 50% self healing received boost, so that a good DRK can help their healers by having the ability to almost fully cleanse themselves, and as a countermeasure so it cannot be abused so heavily to cheese mechanics.

Both Blood Weapon and Delirium should retain their current forms, but at least have their duration extended to the 13 second window that Requiescat has. this would make for a fairer version of Delirium, and does not compromise on the new burst window that tanks have, which I am aware some people like.

Salted Earth is in such a terrible state at the moment, I'm honestly surprised it wasn't outright deleted. Either return it to its former 21 second blood generating glory, or just delete it and move its potency to a DOT on bloodspiller or something.

The final, arguably biggest change i propose, is to Dark Arts. Dark Arts felt as it was the soul of DRK, and it should be at the heart of most of the key abilities. I believe that TBN should still give you Dark Arts once it pops, but I would LOVE to see its old animation return, as a visual indicator to both the beginner DRK that stares at their hotbar, and the experienced DRK that stares at the boss and their own character in motion.
along with that change, I would love to see Dark Arts once again have varying effects, but perhaps only on a few key skills, such as:
Free Edge/Flood of shadow/darkness
Dark Mind 30% magic defence buff + old Blood Price (make it generate around 2000 mana so its not such a sink yet not too OP)
Free Abyssal Drain (in case DRK needs it for LD cleanse or for emergency sustain)
Soul eater being a guaranteed direct crit heal (would help with LD or emergency heals)
Carve and Spit restoring even more mana (currently only gives us 600. I believe it should be base 1200, DA 2400)
Quietus/Bloodspiller leaving a damage over time ability, so that there can be some interplay involved. this last one i am hesistant about though, as i believe it might require the removal of Salted Earth (which is terribad in its current state anyway)

[bundythenoob]

I feel that overall, these changes would not only bring speed and power to DRK, but the reason behind these changes would be that this version of DRK should be the BASELINE for all other tank job damage to be balanced around. a few minor changes i would point out to other jobs:

-WAR-
I do not know much about WAR, but I believe that its gap closer should only cost a negligible amount of the Beast gauge, and that Tomahawk should generate that amount needed, so that they wont have to forego so much dps just to optimise damage. I also feel its old sustainability should be given back to them through the hp boost and self heal boosts from their tank stance, for most players miss those clutch moments which keep them coming back.

-PLD-
this job currently feel as though it is missing a personal cooldown, which I believe can be eased if Sheltron's duration was made to be a base of 8 seconds, and the trait it later receives can be changed to be a cost reduction so that it is lowered to 30 gauge units, which would help get more uses during most content, but cover and intervention should be kept to 50 so that they are not spammable or abusable. Its tank stance should return the 20% passive defence boost, to further aid its sustainability while being different from the hp restoration of DRK and WAR. PLD should also gain access to its gap closer at lv 52 (there is a hole here in PLD kit) , with a trait that upgrades its charges to 2 at lv 74, similar to DRK and GNB, and to help bring that good ole homogenization to benefit something.

-GNB-
as stated before, i do not play GNB, so I dont know what else it could receive other than potency buffs to match the new power base of tanks, and maybe buff the self heal on aurora and solid barrel to keep its sustain in line with the other jobs, but I expect other players will post better solutions.


feel free to post and roast way !

[Lucy_Pyre]

Both Blood Weapon and Delirium should retain their current forms, but at least have their duration extended to the 13 second window that Requiescat has

No. If you do this it will allow for 6 Bloodspillers under Delirium and 6 GCD's under Blood Weapon, which will be a decent and unnecessary DPS buff. The only reason that Requiescat is the length that it is is due to the fact that the PLD casts spells while Req is active, and spells do not benefit from Skill Speed. This means that his GCD on those 5 casts is exactly 2.50. Req's buff lasts for the length of time it does in order to guarantee that, with proper weave timing on the activation, PLD can get all 5 GCD's under Req's buff.

[bundythenoob]

No. If you do this it will allow for 6 Bloodspillers under Delirium and 6 GCD's under Blood Weapon, which will be a decent and unnecessary DPS buff. The only reason that Requiescat is the length that it is is due to the fact that the PLD casts spells while Req is active, and spells do not benefit from Skill Speed. This means that his GCD on those 5 casts is exactly 2.50. Req's buff lasts for the length of time it does in order to guarantee that, with proper weave timing on the activation, PLD can get all 5 GCD's under Req's buff.

I wasn't thinking about the 6 GCD's so much as the fact that squeezing 5 is already hard enough for new players to do;however, if getting 6 GCDs is the case, why not give PLD the extra 3 seconds on Requiescat to further buff their damage output? there should be a way to buff all the tanks damage while adding more skill usage under their belt

[Lucy_Pyre]

I wasn't thinking about the 6 GCD's so much as the fact that squeezing 5 is already hard enough for new players to do;however, if getting 6 GCDs is the case, why not give PLD the extra 3 seconds on Requiescat to further buff their damage output? there should be a way to buff all the tanks damage while adding more skill usage under their belt

I don't think tanks necessarily need a big damage buff across the board. Tanks can already do 10k+ single target with 490+ gear..

[shao32]

DRK problems:
currently, DRK "gameplay identity" is known for its barrier TBN, and EOD/FOD mana spenders, which gives DRK a unique problem that no other job faces. since its DPS AND its Defence are tied to its mana, why is it restricted in the damage and healing it can do?

The simplest, and best change in my opinion, is to the leveling kit of DRK. I feel that if stalwart was learned at lv 40, this would help DRK increase its mana actions allowed in battle, as well as adding more of that natural damage curve to go along with it. with Blood Weapon being moved to lv 30, then Edge of Darkness can be learned at lv 35, so that stalwart can fit into lv 40.

Both Blood Weapon and Delirium should retain their current forms, but at least have their duration extended to the 13 second window that Requiescat has. this would make for a fairer version of Delirium, and does not compromise on the new burst window that tanks have, which I am aware some people like.

DRK problems with gameplay identity are not bcs TBN, it's bcs Delirium and the whole blackblood system it's a simplified copy-pasta version of WAR rage system and putting another tank in the "spam the same skill 5 times in a road" train, for no mention the MP management identity being almost complety removed, DRK will never being unique as long blood weapon and delirium stay with the current awful design.

in fact the current TBN proc system is not a problem, it's a good design since this system allow the job being MP oGCD intensive and sustitute any MP oGCD with TBN to mitigate properly without problems and get the resoruces back with a free MP skill proc, this sytem could have been godly with HW and SB gameplay where the job use to have more constant with MP usage, now it's mostly wasted.

the better learning process of several skills is a good change i will support from this.

Another change would be to Abyssal Drain. I think that AD should return as a mana spender with the same cost as EOD/FOD, so that an experienced DRK will be given the chance to think about what to spend its mana on. I also believe its cure potency should be changed to be something like 400 on target, 50% less for the rest, so that it does not become grossly OP in dungeons and it also helps give DRK another option for spending mana in boss fights.

i hope you notice that edge of shadow is 500p, bring back abyssal drain as a 400p will still make it useless in boss fights, it will only usefull on aoe situations where it does more damage than flood of darkness 300p and offer variety on the MP usage.

The final, arguably biggest change i propose, is to Dark Arts. Dark Arts felt as it was the soul of DRK, and it should be at the heart of most of the key abilities. I believe that TBN should still give you Dark Arts once it pops, but I would LOVE to see its old animation return, as a visual indicator to both the beginner DRK that stares at their hotbar, and the experienced DRK that stares at the boss and their own character in motion.
along with that change, I would love to see Dark Arts once again have varying effects, but perhaps only on a few key skills, such as:
Free Edge/Flood of shadow/darkness
Dark Mind 30% magic defence buff
Free Abyssal Drain
Soul eater being a guaranteed direct crit heal
Carve and Spit restoring even more
Quietus/Bloodspiller leaving a damage over time ability, so that there can be some interplay involved. this last one i am hesistant about though, as i believe it might require the removal of Salted Earth (which is terribad in its current state anyway)

Dark arts could better come back as an active skill again, lets be clear, caling the TBN proc Dark arts was pretty much awful, the skill could come back again with a short recast like 30s and offer diferent effects across the kit and use it for one thing or another depending of what you need as long it contribute to the dps. as i mention before TBN current proc system it's good and Dark arts could benefic better becoming a skill again wich is more easy to balance.

keep in mind if you make the proc become old dark arts you have to ensure every effect being equaly worthy of 3k of mp in potency, other whise certain uses if not most of them will become undesirable and useless, aka will end spaming edge of shadow all day, and if you tied dot effects to bloodspiller obviously will need being a dps gain over edge of shadow otherwise you don't wanna use it and will make DRK want to use TBN much more to keep the dot up with can be really annoying.

[ReiMakoto]

I don't think tanks necessarily need a big damage buff across the board. Tanks can already do 10k+ single target with 490+ gear..

Tanks are also however being out damaged by healers from the 90th percentile and up. Purely subjectively I think tanks output should be buffed even if that meant making dps checks tighter, as with emnity being gone along with any damage tradeoff mechanics, tanks focus nowadays is almost purely on optimising dps, yet they are not as rewarded for doing so.

[Lucy_Pyre]

Tanks are also however being out damaged by healers from the 90th percentile and up. Purely subjectively I think tanks output should be buffed even if that meant making dps checks tighter, as with emnity being gone along with any damage tradeoff mechanics, tanks focus nowadays is almost purely on optimising dps, yet they are not as rewarded for doing so.

That's a fair enough point. I wouldn't be adverse to giving tanks some DPS buffs across the board if they increased the DPS requirements in various EX/savage/ultimate content a similar amount. Healers doing more DPS than tanks is admittedly a bit silly, though I never actually look at logs for healers since I rarely, if ever, play that role. Had to take a double look when I checked because I thought I was reading the page wrong.

[ItMe]

Firstly, I want to say I am satisfied with a few of the changes to tanking in 5.0. Some of my favourite changes to tanking in general were the removal of emnity, which helps lower the barrier of entry to tanking.

God, I hated stance dancing.
It was just a vehicle for other people to tell you how to do your job and peer pressure new tanks (like me) into dropping their stance to DPS more.
I'm glad it's gone and I agree we don't need it back.