Tank Adjustiments -re-b

[Carighan]

Tanks and healers have always contributed to DPS because there has to be a differentiator to allow a floor, there has to be give so that it’s possible for more than only the most pixel perfect players to engage with the roles, but if there is give then some will exceed the baseline and have overflow ability. Those players need a way to meaningfully push the encounter forward

This isn’t encroaching on the DPS (like say WAR does to healers in dungeons) this is just a core facet of how games work.

But then at what point is DPS also tanking or healing, tanks also healing and healers also tanking no longer acceptable, if tanks and healers also DPSing so readily is? Why is one direction of role-invasion acceptable, but the other two are not?

(that is to say, maybe the issue is not Warriors healing, but that not every other tank, healer and DPS is also off-classing into something else)

[Supersnow845]

But then at what point is DPS also tanking or healing, tanks also healing and healers also tanking no longer acceptable, if tanks and healers also DPSing so readily is? Why is one direction of role-invasion acceptable, but the other two are not?

(that is to say, maybe the issue is not Warriors healing, but that not every other tank, healer and DPS is also off-classing into something else)

As I said, it’s because all roles need a way to push the encounter forward when the baseline of their role is being met

That can be 50% of a DPS’s contribution or it can be .01%, but there has to be a give between the floor and the ceiling and that give must be filled with a way to progress the encounter

DPS simply don’t need this because they are always progressing the encounter

[AmiableApkallu]

But then at what point is DPS also tanking or healing, tanks also healing and healers also tanking no longer acceptable, if tanks and healers also DPSing so readily is? Why is one direction of role-invasion acceptable, but the other two are not?

Because one direction isn't actually role-invasion in any meaningful sense.

In an encounter model where the goal is to get the boss's HP down to zero as quickly as possible, damage dealt per second is an unlimited need. The only way a healer or tank can take away from a DPS's ability to fulfill that need is to actually deal more damage per second than the DPS -- i.e., the point at which people would say, "Screw the standard comp, let's replace a DPS slot with an extra tank or healer because it's faster that way."

On the other hand, healing -- for the sake of argument, think "HP restoration" -- needed is a bounded quantity. An encounter deals only so much damage to the party. This need is supposed to be fulfilled by the healers, but because only so much is actually required, any other role that can restore HP encroaches on the healers. And, indeed, if you can find a way to fulfill that need for HP restoration without a healer, you drop the healer and replace them with a tank or DPS -- anyone who actually deals more damage per second.

[Carighan]

Because one direction isn't actually role-invasion in any meaningful sense.

In an encounter model where the goal is to get the boss's HP down to zero as quickly as possible, damage dealt per second is an unlimited need. The only way a healer or tank can take away from a DPS's ability to fulfill that need is to actually deal more damage per second than the DPS -- i.e., the point at which people would say, "Screw the standard comp, let's replace a DPS slot with an extra tank or healer because it's faster that way."

You know what this actually implies though? That either:

* All jobs need to be DPS first (not some tanks or healers conceptually, only red icons).
* Or, no job is. There are no DPS, as DPS is a function everyone has to provide anyways, so everyone is X, but also DPS. There are no "just DPS".

Either would work. But the issue becomes that half the jobs are "pure", but the others are not, yet mechanically they are forced to be required (so there is no upside to the hybrid nature). GW2 for example opted to go "All DPS", and it works for them, but it was of course something designed from the group up with every class having a dedicated healing button and all classes having at least some group support or group healing actions, and all classes having at least some options for enhanced endurance. Everyone is a "DPS hybrid".

And that would work here, I think. Maybe the issue isn't that tanks and healers do too much DPSing, it's that tank or healer is a concept including its own role and all. Or like I said, inverse, that DPS is a role that only does DPS. If say, we had 4 roles called "Tank", "Healer", "Buffer", "Debuffer" and it's automatically included that all of these are 50% a DPS and only the other half is that role, that'd also work of course.

Maybe the issue that annoyed me in the previous post was more that FFXIV wants to have its cake and eat it, too: That it wants to superficially say "Yo we got tanks and healers here!", but actually wants everyone to DPS. Unwilling to commit to either bit even to a rough degree. That whole "Either all DPS classes or no DPS classes"-thing.