Would you want stances to come back?

[SargeTheSeagull]

For that matter, I did have a little thought the other day. Not a tank main so this probably isn't a perfect idea but: For PLD. What if FoF was turned from just a dps buff to a stance? Oath gauge wouldn't be generated by auto attacks anymore. While FoF is active you get vfx swords behind you (shout out to papachin) and it slowly drains your MP, slowly enough that if you do your rotation correctly you can keep full (or nearly full) uptime, and that is what allows you to generate oath gauge. Each attack you deal or attack you block while FoF is active generates X oath gauge.

[Mikey_R]

For that matter, I did have a little thought the other day. Not a tank main so this probably isn't a perfect idea but: For PLD. What if FoF was turned from just a dps buff to a stance? Oath gauge wouldn't be generated by auto attacks anymore. While FoF is active you get vfx swords behind you (shout out to papachin) and it slowly drains your MP, slowly enough that if you do your rotation correctly you can keep full (or nearly full) uptime, and that is what allows you to generate oath gauge. Each attack you deal or attack you block while FoF is active generates X oath gauge.

That sounds like a concept not unlick HW DRK's Darkside, where your MP drained slowly and through the use of other actions, you kept it high whilst also making sure you had enough to use Dark Arts.

However, I will ask the obvious question, why? Why have 2 stances where the only thing differentiating them is how you generate Oath? (You have already said they shouldn't have a DPS difference and you can keep your MP high, despite it draining), so all that is left is generating Oath via AA or actions.

Even if you want to say it might feel different to play, just because of the MP drain, does it really do that? You would just do your rotation as normal and nothing changes, it has become change for the sake of change without actually affecting anything, so what is the point?

This is what you have to consider when you want stances, they shouldn't be something you just turn on at the start of a fight and be done with it, that isn't interesting. It should also have meaning as to when you use it. You shouldn't use a stance to swap to for a few GCDs before swapping back, that is needless busy work for nothing.

If you want an example of (at least in my opinion) what would be a good stance system, you can look at BLM. AF and UI can be considered stances, each of them do different things and swapping between them doesn't get in the way of other things. They are also not there to solve a certain mechanic and are baked into the rotation.

On the other hand, if we go by Renathras' idea of having an enmity stance and a defensive stance, you have to consider how you want to balance it all. How is enmity going to be balanced around player skill/gear, how tight do you want this balancing to be. If we then go to the defensive stance, how strong do you want it to be? Too strong and you make it mandatory, too weak and you make it useless. Which ties into how it conflicts with the enmity stance. Too strong mitigation, you have no time to build enmity, too weak and you might as well not use it. You can say it is balanced around only being needed for tank busters or high damage moments, but at thta point, why not just make it a mitigation cooldown just like everything else as that is what you have made of it (which, coincidentally, then makes enmity stance the only things left, which is the current tank design).

I will say again, stances shouldn't be a one and done choice at the start of a fight, you should have reason to swap between them during your rotation and they should complement each other in achieving a coherent rotation that makes sense.