People who ask for marks in DF

[Caraway]

neither of those things are true

bare minimum, every class should be putting dots on all targets before focusing on a single enemy - everyone has DoTs whose total potency dwarfs their single target abilities

ideally every class uses their AoE abilities, because every single class has them - that whm in AK should be dropping holy on trash packs, the scholar/summoner should bane their dots around, the drg should be using doomspike, the monk even has rockbreaker to throw out rather than snap punch, black mages should be using fire 2/blizzard 2, bards should be using wide volley

literally every class has AoE skills that are orders of magnitude more dps than their single target abilities, and they all have dots which again, much better than their basic single target attacks

the only only only arguement against AoE'ing things is that TP classes might run out, but assuming you're hitting more than 2 mobs with your aoe, it's still a better damage:tp ratio to use AoE attacks and run yourself dry than focusing one mob at a time - so I'll concede that a pull with only 2 targets it's not better to AoE them - although it's still better to apply DoTs to both targets

The main issue with AE spamming mobs in dungeons is one someone a page earlier indicated where the total amount of time having all of those mobs pounding on the tank equates to a much higher damage received than if you were to focus fire down individual mobs.

That said, when you've overgeared content that becomes less and less important but if you're going into new content you should always be focus firing and using crowd control to limit the number of mobs attacking the tank so your healer isn't overtaxed. And marking helps co-ordinate this.

I always make an attempt to mark when I'm tanking as it gives direction (I leave CC marks up to whomever is putting a mob to sleep or whatever).

That said, it does help to drop DoTs on as many targets as you can before focusing on the main one as this will help speed everything up (with the exception of any CC marked mobs of course).