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

[TofuPenguin]

After re-experiencing pld and drk to some extent...

Aside from tankxiety, it's also lack of respect from dps and healers for your role. Add in the stupid-easy level of gameplay while leveling and you also end up with bored players.

I love tanks in a lot of games. But in ShB I find myself veering away from tanking in favor of DPS. Which actually saddens me because tanking used to be engaging when I played during the 2.0 era.

I'll still level my tank to help fill out group comp. But really... its lost its' flavor. I feel like I could roll my face across my keyboard and still manage to hold aggro.

[Jim_Berry]

I still main the tanks. Only issue is I just somehow cannot properly do tank mechanics in Eden Savage after E1S. This is the first time where I couldn't catch on, so I'm primarily on NIN, SAM, RDM, or AST.

[Sqwall]

The reason I keep hanging up my tank roles that I have is this. I'm bored. I might try to do some prog runs or help out my fc mates with roulettes, but at the end of the day that's all I really can do. By default tanks and healers usually get level cap first, and usually have the best gear due to low que times.

I think it's like that in any MMO, and it's probably the honest truth of why the amounts of tanks (on my server anyway) has dwindled. I think healers have it better this expansion with fast que times tbh.

With SE "dumbing down" the tank roles and really making them all the same (my thoughts tell me for getting rid of button bloat were the real reason why) and prepping for the future expansions. We should see a change in the future as far as making each tank identity more diverse.

Take GNB for instance, this is DPS role through and through. Great damage, flashy, and honestly set the standard for the direction of the other tanks this expansion. I play GNB and it feels like I'm playing a DPS role. I play the other tanks PLD, DRK, WAR and it feels like I have lead boots compared to GNB. I don't know what SE is planning, but they are definitely hitting the reset button for tanks for the last 6 years, and it's turning people away from tanks.

[Ursa_Vonfiebryd]

I haven't seen a tank shortage on Cactuar, unless you mean and EXPERIENCED tank shortage and honestly that depends on the duty. There are tons of sprout/returner tanks out there but you mostly see them in the lower end duties. I've seen quite a few in Expert and Alliance but for the most part, if the skill level falls through most of the time the party/alliance tries to compensate.

Tank is a leader role. A basic knowledge of the map/enemy groupings/and enmity skills (including what skills you use to actually pull *eyes tanks that use voke/auto attack to pull*) is expected and almost a zero-tolerance attitude if the tank can't play to that expectation. Many many people on this very forum have stated that they'll vote kick tanks that don't wall-to-wall pull or otherwise perform to the community tank stereotype of 'go big or go home'.

That's a lot to ask from a new player. Out of all the jobs, I think Tanking is the most thankless of all and it can be the most stressful because of the added weight of expectation and the fact that bad tanking is very readily apparent while mistakes on other roles are not quite as visible and often more forgiveable.

[Renato]

I haven't seen a tank shortage on Cactuar, unless you mean and EXPERIENCED tank shortage and honestly that depends on the duty. There are tons of sprout/returner tanks out there but you mostly see them in the lower end duties.

I'm on Goblin but I can agree with this. I've been playing a healer for the last few weeks and I have come across nothing but sprouts in the DF. I can count on both hands the times I had smooth runs. A lot of them were making a ton of mistakes. Constantly moving instead of finding a spot facing the boss away from the party, not utilizing cooldowns, pulling too big or not pulling enough. A lot of them took criticism well and there are some who took offense to it.

I am by no means an elitist or someone who thinks they are the best at the game. But I have all 4 tanks maxed to 80 and have been maining tank since 3.0. All I want to do is help improve those looking to tank if possible. And you really see people's flaws way more playing as a healer.

Tanking can be difficult but it's not as hard as some claim. I admit that at first, I found it stressful and I still do. Especially during 8 and 24-man content. But dungeon runs are some of the easiest content for tanks. And I totally get the disdain people have for slow pullers. I wouldn't kick as I understand that everyone plays at their own pace. But I don't see a reason why tanks don't at least try it. I think the real problem is people not trusting their healers.

Someone said playing tank is the hardest role to play and I totally disagree. Try playing a healer and your opinion will change. While the tank draws the attention from the enemy, your life is in the hands of a healer. One wrong heal (or lack of a heal), if you run out of MP, if you're out of range and can't heal, if your gear isn't up to par, etc. and your whole party gets wiped. A tank is only as good as it's healer in my opinion.

[LaughingBanana]

It's strange to see people say Tanks are the most thankless job in the game. If anything, it's the DPSes that I think are the most thankless jobs.

Why do I say this? Because when I roll my WAR/GNB or my WHM I almost always get player recommendations after every mission, whereas if I play my DPS I never seem to get any, hahaha.

It's because Tanks and Healers are the most visible ones during missions--DPSes can seem like a dime a dozen.

[Xtrasweettea]

It's strange to see people say Tanks are the most thankless job in the game. If anything, it's the DPSes that I think are the most thankless jobs.

Why do I say this? Because when I roll my WAR/GNB or my WHM I almost always get player recommendations after every mission, whereas if I play my DPS I never seem to get any, hahaha.

It's because Tanks and Healers are the most visible ones during missions--DPSes can seem like a dime a dozen.

You can't use commendations as a way to determine if specific roles are more thankless or not. People will hand out comms for whatever reason. I do mean for "any reason" (like my character being commd for reminding the person of their mother).

Social media, such here on the forums, is a better place to see if the player-base views a certain roles are thankless or not.

If you want to use the forums as an example, tanks are the most thankless.

• Tanks are reminded every-so-often that they are not needed in dungeons or causal content: a healer and DPS can do their job just fine.
• Tanks get threads created for TSAs by the community (there's always a "Tank use CD" thread every expansion start for example).
• Tanks get called out in threads that was not tank focused.
• Tanks get told all the time on the forums how to do their job by non-tanks, even if what they are being told is completely contradictory to each other.
• Tanks are always told by the other two roles that they have big egos and that is a problem.

Healers and DPS on the other hand:

• I have not seen one thread about Healers or DPS being told they can be replaced (there's two threads going on now that the OPs were upset that special comps didn't include a healer).
• There's no TSA for DPS and Healers. I remember one TSA for Regen use during pulls and the outcome of that TSA was for tanks to "pull better." This was a TSA for healers, but it turned into a TSA for tanks.
• There's no TSA for DPS because someone always sabotages the conversation by mentioning parsers and then it becomes a parser conversation (with the same arguments since 2.0).
• Don't bother to tell healers or DPS to stop pulling for the tank in dungeons, tanks get told "you should have pulled," regardless of the circumstances that gave the tank the conclusion they couldn't pull big (Cure 1 healer bot, weak DPS, etc.)

These are just some items off of the top of my head. Some of these topics I have discussed in.

[Marxam]

It's because the most important part of tanking is non existent or so minute that it's hardly noticed. I'm talking enmity control. Exdeath is probably the best example where enmity resets after grand cross. Paired with the fact that tanks are most likely in their dps stance enmity was both scary and thrilling to hold and maintain because you always straddle the line between loosing it and high dps. For those who didn't like stance dancing I compare those people to drivers who choose Automatic or Manual transmission.

Tank stance is auto where you always have enmity even if not doing an enmity combo, though not to the extent of doing said enmity combo. OT stance is manual, where you need to carefully deliberate your rotation or risk losing it but you have far greater control and higher damage for it. However this can't exist in the current state tanks are in due to how the reworked stances as just a straight enmity buff and really that's what it is. Your tank stance is nothing special and its just a buff you turn on/off that increases enmity for all attacks. Sad to see such a lack of creativity.

IMO they need to bring back tank stances and design job quests that teach you important job skills. Ex. if at lvl 30, the WAR job NPC challenged you to an enmity contest on a single target then multiple targets or a job quests where they teach you the importance of Provoke and Shirk. Giving casual players a job skill with no context is not gonna help them in the long run and they are going to get confused when they reach endgame where they build on top of those basic principles.

[Ultimatecalibur]

It's because the most important part of tanking is non existent or so minute that it's hardly noticed. I'm talking enmity control. Exdeath is probably the best example where enmity resets after grand cross. Paired with the fact that tanks are most likely in their dps stance enmity was both scary and thrilling to hold and maintain because you always straddle the line between loosing it and high dps.

Everyone who claims this either has Rose-tinted glasses on or doesn't want to admit that simple actions were letting them greatly increase their dps at little risk and tries to justify it by claiming the enmity game was "fun" and not forgettable.

Neo-Exdeath is more an example of why the old system was bad. The resets were there to punish the MT not being in tank stance which "the enmity burst at the start of the fight then dps stance for the rest" meta pushed for.

For those who didn't like stance dancing I compare those people to drivers who choose Automatic or Manual transmission.

Tank stance is auto where you always have enmity even if not doing an enmity combo, though not to the extent of doing said enmity combo. OT stance is manual, where you need to carefully deliberate your rotation or risk losing it but you have far greater control and higher damage for it. However this can't exist in the current state tanks are in due to how the reworked stances as just a straight enmity buff and really that's what it is.

You didn't need to "carefully deliberate your rotation" and it was just about as automatic as being in tank stance the whole time: Generate a big lead at the start of the fight and then mostly maintain the lead with dps rotation and circle-shirking on cooldown/tank swap. Using enmity combos outside an openner just said you were undergeared or the MT died at some point.

Your tank stance is nothing special and its just a buff you turn on/off that increases enmity for all attacks. Sad to see such a lack of creativity.

They had to do it because the dps meta was making it difficult to tune fights based on tank dps. Tanking in dps stance was letting MTs deal close to 50% more dps than intended in fights while maintaining sufficient enmity and they didn't want to punish those players who played as they intended, so they removed the dps penalties from the tank stances and normalized OT and MT rotations.

[Lyth]

Even historically, tanks didn't manage enmity. Ninjas did.