Failed at Brayflox - or Why I Suck at FFXIV

[Papa_Wilkins]

First off, why can I only post here? When I try to post elsewhere it tells me my primary character's level is too low (39 is too low to be allowed to post outside New Player? Well, maybe that's part of my problem ...).

FFXIV is my first MMO (unless you count Defiance, which I don't). That said, I've been playing games for over 30 years, and, while I'm not the best at multiplayer, I'm definitely not the worst. I've yet to find a game that I could not figure out on my own.

I know a Tank is supposed to attract the enemy and thus keep hits off of the spellcasters. I can generally do this, even though it seems that Healing tends to agro disproportionately.

However, I fully admit that, probably due to the lack of years of experience at paying attention to others, I'm not quite as quick on the uptake to note that enemies have slipped by to attack the casters - a bit tunnel-visioned, which I'm working on. As soon as I see this, or when some mentions "healer getting agro'd", I'm on it, but sometimes they do slip past.

It baffles me that a healer would spend more time attacking than healing, and blame the tank when said tank falls down ("You took too many hits"). It also baffles me that the same healer would not mention they're being agro'd, instead complaining after that "You didn't take my hits".

What is worse, when I ask for suggestions, I get answers like "Do the same thing you've been doing for the first 25 hours you played the game" (What? 25 hours to get to lvl 39? I've been playing when work allows since the game came out - conclusion - I must suck). Or even better "How f*ing hard can it be to take the hate?" (this is them to me, like Tanking should be something any dummy can do) ...

I would say that "I can't be THAT bad, after all, I got to Brayflox", but I know that is BS - things do get harder, and lack of good strategy becomes much more impactful as things progress (and maybe I've lucked out up to now, getting teams that made up for my suckiness).

So, I guess what I really need is a Beginner's Guide To Tanking (or MMOing in general), and maybe to be able to find some players who'd be willing to not act like a$$es and tell me how much of a duma$$ I am for not knowing what I've never had the opportunity to learn before.

Any suggestions are welcome. I expect a few insulting ones too - I've read other hate-mail here and on other boards that show the disdain casters have for a tank that lets them get hit. However, I hope a few people can give me some useful advice and not just waste words building enmity.

Thanks for reading.

[ZanderMist]

(Note: you can edit your original post to bypass the 1000 char limit)

Disclaimer: I'm not a tank and I probably couldn't tank if my life depend on it, so I'll leave more specific tips to experienced players but as a melee dps there's a few suggestions I can give you:

1.Brayflox is the first dungeon that puts your tanking skills to test, beating Aiatar basically depends on you, so use it as training grounds for harder/more complex content.

2.Flash is your friend. I ran Longstop yesterday with my BRD and I could see that the PLD I was with only Flashed on the initial pull, thus it was really easy for me and the other BRD to pull aggro from him, especially because he didn't

3.Mark the mobs. You'll eventually get to the point where this isn't needed anymore, but until then, it's great help for your party members, and for you.

Again, this is what I can come out with off the top of my head, so wait on someone else to give more in-depth advice!


Pay attention to the enmity list, be communicative, also try levelling up other classes to gain cross-class abilities.


(Edited for char limit )

[Ferth]

There is a wealth of tanking information compiled in this thread; http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...mpendium-2.0.1.

The biggest problem in this game is that everything happens at such a fast rate it's not usually possible for people (like healers) to stop what they are doing to type something.

The first thing I would recommend is to edit your HUD so that the enmity list is somewhere where you can always see it. Mine is left of my character so I can see it in my periphery as long as I am looking at something centered on my screen. That will ease some of the tunnel vision concerns because it will be a lot easier to see when you lose hate on something.

[Papa_Wilkins]

@ZanderMist, OK, I'm a dummy. OP edited and other deleted (although how to delete the deletion message eludes me).

Thanks for the advice - I have Overpower equipped, but will try to add Flash - I just figured, since it goes on MP, and MRD MP are very low, it'd be pretty worthless.

By "marking the mobs", you're meaning mark the enemies to tell the others which ones I'm / we should go for first to focus attacks?

Thank you - I shall Tank and Tank again... :-)

[Papa_Wilkins]

@Ferth - thanks for the link (looking at it now), and the HUD suggestion (done!).

[Raldo]

1) Your weapon is abysmal for your level, assuming the lodestone is correct. Fixing that alone may be enough to remedy your problems. At 39, your gear is also really bad, but since you mentioned Brayflox, it's... passable for lv32, though far from ideal. Aside from accessories, you should never have a piece of gear that's more than 10 levels below you (it's nice if accessories follow the rule as well, but they are far far less important).

2) If your healer is complaining, maybe you need more HP. I see you're wearing a ton of STR accessories, so maybe you should switch to VIT. Same applies for your allotted points.

3) If there's a 3+ monsters and no one in your party is adamant about sleeping things, get the monsters all lined up in your front cone and Overpower a few times. That'll get you pretty solid hate on all of 'em.

4) I'll echo some of the statements above and below my post
• Get flash, and use it on groups (for brayflox, flash is very handy for the adds that pop in the first miniboss room)
• Dodge things (this is especially important in brayfox)

[ASnogarD]

This role guide is a pretty good primer on the roles in a party.

http://www.reddit.com/r/ffxiv/comments/1kpl3m/

Dont get too disheartened, occasionally you will get a bad healer or DPS who will inevitably blame the tank (same with bad tanks blaming the Healer).
As a Healer all I ask is that the tanks try dodge the cone or melee AoE attacks (the ones marked out) instead of just assuming the Healer will fix it, the more the healer has to 'fix' the more aggro the healer is collecting so it helps you to not take unnecessary hits.
Check your gear, is it good enough for that level.
Do try keep an eye on your Healer at least, if not all the 'squishies' and try grab aggro back as soon as possible.
Thats my viewpoint as a Healer, dont like Paper tanks and tanks who just sit there eating attacks they can dodge/avoid just cant be arsed.

[ZanderMist]

@ZanderMist, OK, I'm a dummy.

^^ I wasn't intending that, just a heads up for future reference

By "marking the mobs", you're meaning mark the enemies to tell the others which ones I'm / we should go for first to focus attacks?

Exactly, put numbers on them to tell the party the order they need / you want them to be killed!

Good luck!

[MirielleLavandre]

I'll echo what everyone else here has - read the compendium linked and maybe upgrade some gear. Tanks will always have a hard time the first time in Brayfox due to the way it requires more healing than any dungeon beforehand (so WHM/SCH will need to actually cure much more than they are used to), and due to the more unique and challenging mechanics compared to the starter dungeons. As to the WHM dealing damage...all I can say is that if they noticed you already had a few enmity issues, and yet they still cast damage spells or god forbid went into cleric stance to do so, then it is their own fault. Any good healer who sees the tank is having problems keeping hate will try to use cures as sparingly as possible (unless you're just not holding any hate at all..in which case they may need to spam to keep you alive), and won't be DPSing.

Also, not that you want to be an egotistical meanie...but if they are talking to you in the language you used in the OP, I'd tell them once to calm down and that you're learning. If they keep it up, just leave. It is a game, and there is no call for insults or abuse (which is bannable, btw, on their part). Plus, to be quite frank, the DD especially have long queues...you have none. If they are aggressive and rude to you, then maybe they haven't waited in their DD queue long enough (and no, I'm not PLD main -- I'm bard main and that is coming from a dps who is actually nice to tanks since I am one as well).

[Enfarious]

At Brayflox you also don't yet have your full tanking/enmity generation suite (mostly cross-class stuff missing). It makes things harder and often this is something that is overlooked by people.
Gearing more level appropriately certainly will help, both with your healers not having to work as hard (and in turn not pulling as much hate), and with holding mobs against well geared DDs.
Flash is your friend, even as a war, to grab initial hate and get mobs into a position where Overpower can be used effectively you can spam flash til your out of MP.
Provoke followed by a Tomahawk will "usually" be enough to grab a straying mob and get it back to you too.

Vit is your friend, Str might let you do more damage, but let's be honest here, your job isn't dealing damage, it's taking damage and vit well let you take more.

Down the road you may find that you no longer need the added vit and you'll be free to swap for Str again, but early on every point counts.

Oh and you are wearing your War soul right? In defiance?