So you want to be a tank?

[Mathias]

I enjoyed reading your guide. Thanks.

You forgot one key issue that as a tank you have no control over. Hate is a party thing, not just a tank issue. Unfortunately, most DPS feel the need to start every fight with the biggest damage skill they have before allowing the tank to gain full hate. Like the Blm that starts every main fight with a double Flare because the cool downs are up.


Very good guide though.

those blm's n brd's do that crap and its one of the things I hate cause everything can go smooth if I ain't chasing a mob they pulled away from me because they want to use their biggest skills

[Baldur]

Thank you for this guide, nasomi! I've been wanting to try tanking for a while, but I hadn't the slightest idea of how to do it proper after all this time being the DPS in 1.0 and the healer in 2.0. I'll keep this thread bookmarked.

[nasomi]

I didn't either, that's why I started over. Level 50 boss's isn't where I wanted to re-learn how to tank.

[Gaddes]

I'm always amazed at how many bad tanks there are in this game... I have to admit, initially I didn't understand why people couldn't grasp the idea of hate management. The thing is though, playing FFXI for years as a THF made me really adept at hate management (the best THFs worked hand-in-hand with the tank to keep hate bounced exactly where it should be) and I'm assuming made me much more receptive to playing effectively as a tank... not everyone entering FFXIV has that advantage... so OP's guide will be a helpful first step for them.

[Grailer]

Doesn't matter how good you play ,

if your DPS focus on incorrectly marked target.

AOE mobs when you are focusing on single target .

If DPS attack the instant you throw shield before the mobs even get to you .

DPS purposefully do more damage when they know they will get agro.

Pull mobs for you.

Break sleep on purpose .

etc etc . For every bad tank there is 2 bad dps lurking out there ready to get into your group .

[nasomi]

Agree'd, I partied with a terrible ARC tonight. Kept running ahead, pulling agro, going where he shouldn't. I was PUG and the tank was inexperienced. When I tried to help, the ARC just plowed ahead and didn't really care about what anyone else was doing.

[nasomi]

I'm always amazed at how many bad tanks there are in this game... I have to admit, initially I didn't understand why people couldn't grasp the idea of hate management. The thing is though, playing FFXI for years as a THF made me really adept at hate management (the best THFs worked hand-in-hand with the tank to keep hate bounced exactly where it should be) and I'm assuming made me much more receptive to playing effectively as a tank... not everyone entering FFXIV has that advantage... so OP's guide will be a helpful first step for them.

Playing XI as a tank, you start at 10, and don't stop until 75. In XIV, they have these stupid fate things that everyone grinds through. They go through 3-4 dungeons and have only had to tank 3-4 times for roughly an hour each, and can easily be carried if everyone else in the party is skilled. How many hours did you have clocked as a tank by the time you hit qufim, vs by the time you hit 20 in xiv? Everyone said "I don't need xyz hours to learn how to play my job." Apparently, you do.

[Caraway]

This is a great thread to see! Being a tank myself, and having been a tank in many games before this I knew these things already but from the horror stories I've heard from my FC there are plenty who don't. Sadly, they are the very types of people we'll never see on the forums either. Shame really. Especially love the diagrams you put up! Very good for learning, there.

Maim has NO enmity bonus. If I lead in with it, I will lose threat. I don't put it into my list until a few cycles in, when my threat lead is solid.

From:
http://distantworld.enjin.com/forum/...-warrior-guide

So the only time to EVER use main is right BEFORE using Bloodbath:
So that maim will boost damage during the duration of bloodbath, for more self healing.

Any other use of Maim is asking to lose enmity to that Bard over there in the back...
- But its great when I'm soloing. :P

I need to bring up this though. Maim is a lot more useful than just 20% damage. That's multiplied by your enmity bonuses too. It doesn't equate to a whole lot per hit, but when you have Maim going and you can run through your enmity chain it makes a big difference.

That said, going to cast Maim at the wrong time can spell pain for your Healer or DPS. What I find best currently (at 49 WAR) is going through one enmity combo and then casting Maim, then Fracture, drop a Flash, then go back to the enmity combo.

You don't get an equivalent tool as Warrior. Provoke can only be cross-classed from Paladin.

You can take Provoke as a Warrior though it does take up one of your slots. That said... Provoke's usefulness is proportional to how bad your party is. The more co-ordinated your party and the more they manage their own enmity then the less valuable Provoke is going to be because it only puts you to "top hate"+1. Unless it's followed-up immediately with an enmity attack you can expect that mob to go running again and waste your cooldown.

Another thing I think new tanks need to do as well though is learn to communicate, and appreciate their DPS classes. Work with your party members and remember that it's your job to make sure that the bad things are positioned in a way that makes DPS' life easier for killing the bad things. Try to minimize the amount of movement you do, and if you do have to move do so in a predictable manor.

As someone else has mentioned, try to ignore adds. Do just enough to get them on you instead of chasing off the DPS but it's not your job to kill them. That's what the DPS folks do, and they do it much better than you do.

[Makeda]

Doesn't matter how good you play ,

if your DPS focus on incorrectly marked target.

AOE mobs when you are focusing on single target .

If DPS attack the instant you throw shield before the mobs even get to you .

DPS purposefully do more damage when they know they will get agro.

Pull mobs for you.

I've been a tank in various MMOs since 2007. You can recover from things like this but it is not pretty and often draining. I love challenges, but not uneeded ones. But you CAN outplay this kind of mess if your'e way on top of your game at the right moment. Few tanks will admit that often because giving bad DPS the excuse just ruins it for everyone else.

Up thread concern on provoke and warrior. Warrior gets better cross skills than paladin... but to get them we need to get gladiator up to 22 and pugilist to 42... but they go a long way towards improving our survivability. Paladin needs less from cross but has less diversity in actions (more of a rotation).

On getting between a DPS and a mob they pulled - not so bad as it can bring awareness to that DPSer. But good to turn the mob. You can quickly learn how far the cones and red circles go and then feel free to fsce mobs as desired. Melee DPS do better when flanking or behind. Setiing that up is a shared duty of tank and said melee DPS. If you have a melee DPS with you just keep an eye on turning and mob kiting in ways that make it easy for them.

I need to bring up this though. Maim is a lot more useful than just 20% damage. That's multiplied by your enmity bonuses too. It doesn't equate to a whole lot per hit, but when you have Maim going and you can run through your enmity chain it makes a big difference.

That said, going to cast Maim at the wrong time can spell pain for your Healer or DPS. What I find best currently (at 49 WAR) is going through one enmity combo and then casting Maim, then Fracture, drop a Flash, then go back to the enmity combo.

Maim has no enmity bonus, and all enmity bonus moves other than tomahawk and overpower are 2nd and 3rd steps of combos.

So if you use maim, it will be 2 GCDs until it benefits enmity. Such as:
maim - heavy swing - skull sunder.
- it gives 20% which comes in by skull sunder.
More value most of the time in:
Heavy swing - skull sunder - butchers block.

After you are confident of you threat lead, swap in maim to get the self heal that combos off of it (forget the name and typing on my tablet so can't look it up right now...)

[Caraway]

Maim has no enmity bonus, and all enmity bonus moves other than tomahawk and overpower are 2nd and 3rd steps of combos.

So if you use maim, it will be 2 GCDs until it benefits enmity. Such as:
maim - heavy swing - skull sunder.
- it gives 20% which comes in by skull sunder.
More value most of the time in:
Heavy swing - skull sunder - butchers block.

After you are confident of you threat lead, swap in maim to get the self heal that combos off of it (forget the name and typing on my tablet so can't look it up right now...)

You're right in that Maim itself has no enmity bonus, but adding a 20% boost to your enmity skills is actually a multiplicative effect and nets you a much larger boost to your hate. Obviously you want to drop it into your rotation when you are comfortable with your hate lead (I will sometimes drop in Flashes between combo skills as it doesn't break combo) because going two GCDs without a boost in hate can be a bad thing.

As to the combo'd item off of it, Storm's Path isn't worth the GCD. The heal is minimal and you're better off using that spot for either a jump back into the enmity combo or dropping in a Fracture. That said, the debuff you get that combos off of Maim is much better, and that is something you want to keep up all of the time. (If the self-heal actually gave you the buff for prolonged self-healing when used in Defiance stance then I'd say it'd be more valuable but that doesn't apply anymore).