Opinions: Should tanks work for aggro?

[Mikey_R]

You have to be careful when increasing a tank's dps contribution though. Make it too high and you start to blur the line between, do I bring a DPS, or can we replace them with a tank. Yes, they do slightly less DPS, however they can survive more things, have defensive cooldowns to make healing easier and can potentially cheese mechanics where it could mean more uptime and therefore a higher DPS contribution compared to another melee. Personally, I don't play tanks and expect to do close to a DPS in terms of damage output. I play tanks because of the defensive nature of play and being the one that holds the boss, or groups up all the mobs for the DPS to be able to effectively do their job.

Also, to comment on the enmity discussion quickly. I wasn't aware that MMOs in the past had the mentality of, DPS had to be close behind the tanks enmity and threaten to take it constantly. However, since there are problems with it, it was adapted over time to what we have now. It might have taken a while and some thoughts, can we keep this system going....hmm, didn't expect that to happen, etc. before they arrived at the conclusion that, tanks just need to hold aggro/enmity, everytime we try and make it interesting, it backfires, might as well just go overboard and make it a non issue.

However, Anhra did not actually address my main issue. Where do you balance this. with gear levels that can change between players, there is no hard defined edge you can make based on gear. It is a fuzzy line where the system might work as intended, it might not and the fussy line only gets bigger when you add in player skill and take into account the different jobs available. You can draw the line anywhere in this fuzzy region and there will be a case where you make someone's experience worse, just for the fact an arbitrary line was drawn where the balance should be. People always argue that it keeps the job more engaging, however, I would argue that you can find different ways for the job to be more engaging and again, I'm not looking for a harder rotation, just something else the tank has to look out for.

[DRKoftheAzure]

You have to be careful when increasing a tank's dps contribution though. Make it too high and you start to blur the line between, do I bring a DPS, or can we replace them with a tank. Yes, they do slightly less DPS, however they can survive more things, have defensive cooldowns to make healing easier and can potentially cheese mechanics where it could mean more uptime and therefore a higher DPS contribution compared to another melee. Personally, I don't play tanks and expect to do close to a DPS in terms of damage output. I play tanks because of the defensive nature of play and being the one that holds the boss, or groups up all the mobs for the DPS to be able to effectively do their job.

Also, to comment on the enmity discussion quickly. I wasn't aware that MMOs in the past had the mentality of, DPS had to be close behind the tanks enmity and threaten to take it constantly. However, since there are problems with it, it was adapted over time to what we have now. It might have taken a while and some thoughts, can we keep this system going....hmm, didn't expect that to happen, etc. before they arrived at the conclusion that, tanks just need to hold aggro/enmity, everytime we try and make it interesting, it backfires, might as well just go overboard and make it a non issue.

However, Anhra did not actually address my main issue. Where do you balance this. with gear levels that can change between players, there is no hard defined edge you can make based on gear. It is a fuzzy line where the system might work as intended, it might not and the fussy line only gets bigger when you add in player skill and take into account the different jobs available. You can draw the line anywhere in this fuzzy region and there will be a case where you make someone's experience worse, just for the fact an arbitrary line was drawn where the balance should be. People always argue that it keeps the job more engaging, however, I would argue that you can find different ways for the job to be more engaging and again, I'm not looking for a harder rotation, just something else the tank has to look out for.

The same argument can be made if the fight is originally designed with 2 tank and 2 healers where if the fight only really needs 1 tank but 2 are recommended because mechanics but needs 2 healers for mechanics, then the fight really only needs 5 DPS, 2 healers, and 1 tank, which is probably why the devs went with the enmity toggle system we have now, but at the same time it probably shortened the lifespan of the game drastically as a result and further makes fights that REQUIRE 2 tanks because of mechanics otherwise it's nonstop wiping, and WILL be less interesting if enmity is a nonissue without making early levels still fun to play to make up for the fact that enmity is no longer an issue...


The only way to make enmity interesting is by letting the players figure it out for themselves and taking away that ability to figure it out and that's going to promote laziness even more to where FF14 might as well just be another offline single player game with auto-battle... the only reason it isn't is because it requires an internet connection and forces you to play with other people with few exceptions like solo instances(a while different discussion on it's own) and you need to pay a subscription fee AFTER you BOUGHT AND PAYED for the game just to even play the game(again; a different discussion on it's own) only for your first log into the game to see that people don't want to do anything because the game is boring and it's just another social media platform...

Provoke change was probably the only good tank change but the removal of Ultimatum was not necessary. And I still believe Shirk had to go instead as it was basically what ultimately led to the removal of enmity as whole mechanic, while also being VERY redundant with the removal of enmity combos because we might as well just be spamming enmity combos A.K.A. ARR PLD... Seriously, why the devs thought that ARR PLD was fun in the early levels and constantly doubling down on that concept I will never know...

I don't find ARR PLD playstyle until a certain level to where it has it's own identity fun... I don't find Fire 4/Fell Cleave Spam fun... this isn't turn based 8-16bit RPG where animations are limited and even then those turn based RPGs are at least innovating on the animations where MMORPGs are struggling with animations unless they are fast paced action games, in fact I still think that Heavensward DRK is more fun to play as well as look at, even at the early levels where DRK is normally not seen with some exceptions(Sastasha NM)...

[aodhan_ofinnegain]

You have to be careful when increasing a tank's dps contribution though. Make it too high and you start to blur the line between, do I bring a DPS, or can we replace them with a tank. Yes, they do slightly less DPS, however they can survive more things, have defensive cooldowns to make healing easier and can potentially cheese mechanics where it could mean more uptime and therefore a higher DPS contribution compared to another melee. Personally, I don't play tanks and expect to do close to a DPS in terms of damage output. I play tanks because of the defensive nature of play and being the one that holds the boss, or groups up all the mobs for the DPS to be able to effectively do their job.

I mean you have a good amount of damage to increase tank damage by to even put it into the realm of, do we take a second or third tank in place of a DPS, content depending. As it stands, most people don't make the same leeway to help tanks keep uptime like they did in HW or SB. So, take o11s for example, I joined a random PF, there so happened to be a BRD, This BRD told me to stand in the corner for Pantokrator II and soak the missiles with hallowed Ground, because they weren't able to or were babied through the mechanic I dunno. But I instantly told them to f*** off, I ain't sacking my DPS because they were bad, and the party sided with me, so the BRD had to do the bait. (Unfortunately it was more common than it should have been in some PFs for a tank to just invlun it)

This expansion, tank damage has felt lacking, and more often have heard, "but your just a tank, not like your damage matters anyways". It really is a stark contrast comparing even one expansion. Every last bit of tank damage was literally mandatory if you even hoped to clear Gordias, and even Midas to a lesser extent. A lot of tanks have asked for some sort of damage increase this expansion for all tanks but has been met with opposition at every corner, and no doubt, more to this comment also.

Of course it won't happen this expansion, but hopefully tanks can get a bigger slice of the pie in 6.0, and it's one thing that opposition usually decide to ignore, or happen to go blind midway through reading, we're not asking to match the same DPS as DPS, but somewhere between a 5-10% increase for all four tanks equally wouldn't hurt, and would give a bit more impact leaving tanks feel a bit more satisfied seeing the bigger numbers. Everyone enjoys hitting those big numbers, especially when you crit DH, it's not reserved for DPS only, contrary to what some might think.

[Anhra]

Back then, Healers used to generate even more enmity than any dps when relying too much on spamming healing abilities as well.

As for your question on how to balance this, i can't give you a straight answer for this, i am merely a person with some ideas and thoughts to share without much technical knowledge. If enmity had to be regulated in a "fair" way in the way i mentioned it before, then the generation of aggro in itself had to work in a way that it doesn't rely on the damage being dealt, but in a form of a "threat meter" which would be its own thing, invisible for players, but influenced by every possible skill differently.

Once said meter reaches a certain point, it makes the boss do a "mild enrage", where he starts using abilities that don't necessarily cause a wipe, but make life itself harder, like tankbusters being used more frequently or even a entire new set of skills.

[Kabooa]

Of course it won't happen this expansion, but hopefully tanks can get a bigger slice of the pie in 6.0, and it's one thing that opposition usually decide to ignore, or happen to go blind midway through reading, we're not asking to match the same DPS as DPS, but somewhere between a 5-10% increase for all four tanks equally wouldn't hurt, and would give a bit more impact leaving tanks feel a bit more satisfied seeing the bigger numbers. Everyone enjoys hitting those big numbers, especially when you crit DH, it's not reserved for DPS only, contrary to what some might think.

I'm just sayin' hard slash going from 6500 to 7150 isn't trigger the fun sensors on this side of the boat.

[aodhan_ofinnegain]

I'm just sayin' hard slash going from 6500 to 7150 isn't trigger the fun sensors on this side of the boat.

This response from you doesn't surprise me in the slghtest, almost like you constantly deny tanks asking for any form of DPS increase at every opportunity it arise. I guess tanks mains don't get to have a say over their own role if DPS mains say no. Feelsbadman.

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[Kabooa]

This response from you doesn't surprise me in the slghtest, almost like you constantly deny tanks asking for any form of DPS increase at every opportunity it arise. I guess tanks mains don't get to have a say over their own role if DPS mains say no. Feelsbadman.

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

I deny everyone flat potency boosts, to be fair now.

[Absurdity]

This response from you doesn't surprise me in the slghtest, almost like you constantly deny tanks asking for any form of DPS increase at every opportunity it arise. I guess tanks mains don't get to have a say over their own role if DPS mains say no. Feelsbadman.

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

They're not entirely wrong though, for a lot of the tank jobs simply increasing their potency wouldn't fix the issues with "game feel", the tanks just flat out "feeling" boring to play.

While I do think tanks should definitely have a higher overall dps contribution I would want to achieve that through new gameplay additions, just more potency wouldn't fix how unsatisfying it feels to play DRK or WAR and even PLD has a few skills that could be exchanged for something more engaging.
Gunbreaker on the other hand already feels pretty great to play, it would most likely just need potency increases.

[Lyth]

Do flat potency reductions have any impact on fun?

If we progressively whittle tank dps to the point where they only generate enmity and do no damage, would that be fun? I suspect not. Most people want to see skillful gameplay translate into having impact. DPS is one of the ways that jobs have impact. But yet we've been seeing systemic reductions each expansion. Initially these changes were obvious and the devs received a lot of pushback over them (see Stormblood and STR accessories). Now it just happens on the sly.

So yes, undoing these changes has an impact on fun. More fun for tanks and healers, less for dps mains. The rest of this discussion shouldn't come as a surprise.

[aodhan_ofinnegain]

They're not entirely wrong though, for a lot of the tank jobs simply increasing their potency wouldn't fix the issues with "game feel", the tanks just flat out "feeling" boring to play.

While I do think tanks should definitely have a higher overall dps contribution I would want to achieve that through new gameplay additions, just more potency wouldn't fix how unsatisfying it feels to play DRK or WAR and even PLD has a few skills that could be exchanged for something more engaging.
Gunbreaker on the other hand already feels pretty great to play, it would most likely just need potency increases.

I mean I have advocated for more than just DPS increases for tanks in the past, just because the topic of tank damage has come up, doesn't mean I'm disregarding other aspects.

Personally, fight design is an important factor to consider also, but the only tanks that are samey in my books are WAR and DRK, while PLD I find enjoyable to play with the various means to adjust it's rotation around specific fights, recent example includes e11s, and it's intermissions allow for optimisation outside of people's typical generalisation of PLD's rotation. Admittedly, still a lot of muscle memory to fight.