Insight on most fun tank?

[Ultaniku]

So I’ve been trying to rotate out which tank I’ve been playing every few days or so when I run my roulettes etc, just for some variety. I think I’ve rekindled my love for warrior and I’m enjoying it a lot more now.

[Tracewood]

PLD seems to scratch that soloist itch. Also I tend to lean on jobs that have clutch abilities and utilities that I don't have to rely on healing too much.

DRK has the cool factor going for it and TBN for the safety net.

WAR is fine. It's the easy to pick up tank.

GNB is the new flashy job that feels like a DPS, but I can't get over the whole blade-over-shoulder animation/stance.

[RopeDrink]

PLD seems to scratch that soloist itch. Also I tend to lean on jobs that have clutch abilities and utilities that I don't have to rely on healing too much.

DRK has the cool factor going for it and TBN for the safety net.

WAR is fine. It's the easy to pick up tank.

GNB is the new flashy job that feels like a DPS, but I can't get over the whole blade-over-shoulder animation/stance.

I (personally) don't consider Paladin as the go-to solo itch scratcher. In fact, I find them to be the squisher of the bunch - and have a much more stringent damage rotation that is at risk of being ruined if you're in a position where you need to heal. That is assuming that using a Heal breaks your combo. Alas, I haven't played Paladin all that much since Shadowbringers compared to the others, so I'm a bit outdated. The fact that PLD can heal others makes it more suitable for supporting groups (in my eyes), even if it's a perfectly fine solo-heal ability with a more direct punch. It's similar to Prot Paladin's in WoW. Yes, their self-heal is a big part of their defensive kit, but the real appeal is that it can be used on other targets, not just themselves, and usually comes at some expense. In their case, it's the use of Holy Power. In FFXIV, I assume it still breaks damage-combos and eats mana that you'd want to pump into the Reqi damage phase.

By comparison, your basic bread-and-butter tri-combo as GNB not only applies a defensive buff, but also heals you, and it also has a large rota defensives - some on very short CD's that can also be shot at other players, including the HoT. In short, you can self-sustain without risk to your rota. The only downside is that your secondary 1-2-3 does not apply Brutal Shell.

Warriors, similarly, have a default self-heal just by going through the motions, not to mention potent self-heals (direct + via AoE), and a massive healthbar increase, on top of all their other defensives. Last I checked, DK had some passive self-healing, but not nearly as much. Alas, it's my lowest level tank right now, so I won't comment on them overmuch.

GNB is my go-to for group and solo because, while it isn't an in-your-face support like old or new Paladin, you still have passive self-healing, group utility, and a marginally engaging damage system. I don't keep my finger on the pulse of meta and can only go by hearsay, but I recall hearing at some point that they're currently the tank with the highest DPS potential to boot. When it comes to solo'ing content, that's not to be sniffed at.

[Absimiliard]

I (personally) don't consider Paladin as the go-to solo itch scratcher. In fact, I find them to be the squisher of the bunch - and have a much more stringent damage rotation that is at risk of being ruined if you're in a position where you need to heal. That is assuming that using a Heal breaks your combo. Alas, I haven't played Paladin all that much since Shadowbringers

You might find yourself needing to heavily revise this stance if you invest a bit of time into the job. While yes, you do need to sacrifice a bit of DPS to drop a big heal on yourself, doing so is not any issue when you are soloing. After 78 Requiescat makes your spells instant cast during the effect in addition to greatly augmenting their damage/healing potential. Clemency is strong enough to still restore a substantial amount of health even if used without Requiescat, however. Your damage output is (generally) less important than staying alive when soloing. To this end, there are things GNB, DRK, and WAR are simply mathematically incapable of soloing at this time, while PLD in fact can. The other tanks have their heals tied to cooldowns and offensive actions, whereas the PLD can heal itself at will. Its strong self-healing coupled with its higher passive mitigation, versatile rotation, and mobility (during Requiescat) makes it ideal for soloing pretty much any content.

Rotationally, the PLD is also in good shape. Its rotation is such that you can seamlessly slip back into it in the event of a disruption, even should said disruption occur during your Requiescat window.

[Kalaam]

I remember the time when my DRK could solo a FATE boss in yanxia thanks to his high sustain x)

[Marxam]

The changes in ShB made the tanks "easier" to play than previous iterations and the removal of tank stances to a straight up enmity buff brought the tanks more in-line with each other, meaning that any tank can MT and OT in general use. The only defining factors of each tank is how they are designed as all tanks have a pretty universal kit i.e. 1-2 combo rotation, aoe combo, short tank exclusive cd, 120 def cd, gap closers, 60-90 sec burst windows. etc. So the design of each tank are as follows:

WAR is the unga-bunga self-healing tank. The only tank to be able to heal themselves from 1 HP back to full by doing damage.

DRK is the damage negate tank. TBN is so strong and on such a short cd you will see 0 damage from boss tankbuster more often than any other tank.

PLD is jack-of-all-trades tank. It has the most utility and party support while getting 100% uptime on the boss if you use Requiescat properly.

GNB is DPS tank. For people who want to feel like they are playing a DPS without playing a DPS job with some decent defensive cds.

Personally I've always been a WAR main ever since 2.0 and stuck with it though the highs and lows because the idea of healing yourself back to full HP, while hurting others was always my favorite gameplay design. I also stick with DRK because its the opposite of WAR, whereas damage is negated to 0. Inner Release and Delirium also function similar as a spam 5 buttons ogcd (unfortunately), which makes the transition between the two even easier than with PLD or GNB.

[Vyrerus]

When it comes to solo'ing content, that's not to be sniffed at.

It is though *sniff sniff*, because in anything that's challenging to solo, except for Deep Dungeons, you're going to be taking huge hits. Gunbreaker's healing is all done over time in low amounts, meaning that when you take those big hits, you don't recover from them, really (Aurora's 1200 potency overtime is misleading because each tic has crit variance, meaning it's often slightly more than 1200 due to crits, but never reaches a true 1200 pot heal crit). It always has the option to break combo off at Brutal Shell and loop from Keen Edge > Brutal Shell over and over to try and restore as much HP as it possibly can, but that usually results in very middling results or a very very slow kill.

PLD by comparison has a gigantic spike heal(1200 potency flat, 1800 potency flat under Requiescat a crit under this restores just under 2/3rds of your HP), with DPS that isn't so far behind (It's second highest tank DPS, last I checked). As well as true invulnerability with no real downside (GNB's costs it its entire current HP pool). In addition to this, because Holy Spirit is a 25y ranged attack, PLD has more mobility options/engagement options while maintaining DPS during mechanics. It will never achieve 100% uptime(Sorry Marxam, you lose auto attacks which are a large portion of any physical class's DPS), but achieves much closer to that than GNB, if mechanics dictate.

[Derio]

GNB followed by DRK followed by PLD followed by WAR.

GNB simply because it has it all, damage, healing, shielding, AOE, etc.

DRK simply because of the cool factor.

PLD because of the 100k finishers

WAR is last for me personally because of the gap closer being tied to gauge and the gauge

[Rayne6665]

I personally love Warrior tho they dont get much love anymore. All i see now is paladins, gunbreakers and dark knights in dungeons and raids. Might as well put warrior in melee dps category yoshi XD Jk . I have fun playing warrior. Its most fun for me.

[KatieConnr]

WAR is last for me personally because of the gap closer being tied to gauge and the gauge

I feel like this needs moar attention!
It just seems silly to me that War is the only tank that has to "pay" for the gap closer :/