How to make tanks more fun to play (devs please read)

[therpgfanatic]

I know from experience that the names of things matter a great deal to a significant portion of players. Final Fantasy has a lot of sacred cows to it, and the most die-hard fans hold this stuff pretty close to their chest.

It may not matter to you if Riot Blade is a crappy ability, but when FF6 came out it was my favorite game for months and months. You better believe seeing Riot Blade trigger made me quite excited, and this nostalgia still burns in me even decades later. The same is true of others in my age demographics, who happen to also be the target age demographic for MMORPGs.

[Xandim]

and the most die-hard fans hold this stuff pretty close to their chest.
It may not matter to you if Riot Blade is a crappy ability,

But then again not everyone playing IS a die-hard fan of Final Fantasy. I get it's cool to see moves you know appeared in any other final fantasy, but FFXIV still has its own lore. Like for example, "Rage of Halone". Halone is a goddess of war and she is "depicted as a relentless warrioress armed with a bronze greatshield." So the name actually fits in with lore. But then again, I agree that some fights are very boring for a PLD (I hate being some stun ho for ifrit)

There ARE some aspects of the game that should change, but that isnt only to a class or another, its more to the game itself.

[therpgfanatic]

But then again not everyone playing IS a die-hard fan of Final Fantasy. I get it's cool to see moves you know appeared in any other final fantasy, but FFXIV still has its own lore. Like for example, "Rage of Halone". Halone is a goddess of war and she is "depicted as a relentless warrioress armed with a bronze greatshield." So the name actually fits in with lore. But then again, I agree that some fights are very boring for a PLD (I hate being some stun ho for ifrit)

There ARE some aspects of the game that should change, but that isnt only to a class or another, its more to the game itself.

When every other Dragoon I see is named Highwind, and an unusually large number of players I've met have never played an MMO before by their own admittance...I do not think it is wrong to assume a lot of people are trying this game because they are Final Fantasy fans.

The PS3 versions especially are enabling people who don't have gaming PCs to play. I've seen a similar thing occur in Phantasy Star Online.

As for the "lore" about the shield, it is a brand new lore made for this game. You're misunderstanding my point there in that we have no emotional attachment to The Twelve because they don't even appear in the game, unless you consider the opening cutscene having a bunch of floating orbs to be an "appearance".

Compared to, say, Odin who has been in like 30 games in the series.

[Xandim]

When every other Dragoon I see is named Highwind, and an unusually large number of players I've met have never played an MMO before by their own admittance...I do not think it is wrong to assume a lot of people are trying this game because they are Final Fantasy fans.

You are confusing fans with die-hard fans. Highwind is 'famous' because he was a main character in FF4 and the first dragoon, just like Cecil, Celes or Terra are famous. But does it mean that every highwind knows by heart EVERYTHING about ALL games in the franchise? I played FF6 but didn't know that Rio Blade was a move from there (I believe you said that, right? Can't remember right now). I consider myself a fan of the franchise, as do other people, but doesn't mean we KNOW everything bout everything. Yoshi is already doing lots of fan service (LB names, golden saucer, etc). Simply renaming a move won't make people go "OMG, IM SO GONNA PLAY THAT CLASS NOW"

[Duelle]

(I hate being some stun ho for ifrit)

This is less the fault of PLD and more the fault of the devs for making stuns, 1-second silences and 1-second pacifications replace interrupts seen in other games. Generally the DPS are supposed to be responsible for interrupting with the tank being part of that interrupt order/rotation if gameplay allows and they have the opportunity to do so. This aspect of combat is ass-backwards when the tank is expected to do the brunt of the interrupting (moreso when BRD's selling point is not so much DPS or buffs but the ability to interrupt spells with Blunt Arrow...). In a perfect world DRGs and MNKs should be the ones equipped to do interrupt rotations on encouters like Ifrit.

You could chalk it up to the fact that DF forces people to have two tanks for Ifrit, but I can counter that by saying that Bowl of Embers should be a dungeon with two or three bosses before facing Ifrit himself, with mechanics for those other bosses to justify having that second tank in the group.

[UBERHAXED]

This is less the fault of PLD and more the fault of the devs for making stuns, 1-second silences and 1-second pacifications replace interrupts seen in other games. Generally the DPS are supposed to be responsible for interrupting with the tank being part of that interrupt order/rotation if gameplay allows and they have the opportunity to do so. This aspect of combat is ass-backwards when the tank is expected to do the brunt of the interrupting (moreso when BRD's selling point is not so much DPS or buffs but the ability to interrupt spells with Blunt Arrow...). In a perfect world DRGs and MNKs should be the ones equipped to do interrupt rotations on encouters like Ifrit.

You are mistaken... DRG do have a stun (with the same cooldown as a warrior) and MNK has 2 stuns and a silence. It's the people you play with (and the tendency to only use ranged) which makes the tank do interrupts. Don't blame the game mechanics. In fact, the sole fact that you didn't know this invalidates your entire argument.

[therpgfanatic]

It's all about balance in an online game. You can't expect a tank to dish out enough dmg to compare to a DPS role, the PLD's dmg is fine as it is (after all, he IS there to tank, not DPS)

I've played MMORPGs since the mid 90s. I have experienced this kind of debate every possible way you can sling it, because old-school MMORPG devs had the same attitude you have.

And they were 100% mistaken, as all those games rebalanced so tanks could deal decent DPS, and that was the only thing that ever increased the number of tanks to the levels needed to reduce wait times for players to acceptable levels. It doesn't unbalance the game if tanks are able to DPS while tanking. It's only unbalanced if they are the best DPS while not getting hit by enemies.

I didn't design Paladins. I would have made Shield Swipe part of a combo if that was the case, rather than a low threat ability.

There are many ways to fix the issue, the point is stuff needs changing and here is a bunch of well thought ideas on how. It's a good starting point. But we must admit there is a problem; denying there is a problem just because it doesn't personally impact you is not constructive to the greater community.

[veg]

I think tanks are fun as they are... paladin isnt quite as fun (imho of course) but still fun none the less.

[Crevox]

I'm just giving 100% truthful feedback as a long time Final Fantasy fan

And this is the problem. You're not thinking about the balance or game design at all.

Also, stop trying to make XIV something it's not. This is XIV. This is not FF6. This is not FF10. This is not FF whatever. This is FFXIV.

[Reiryuu]

I disagree with calling Circle of Scorn "Runic Blade" as Celes 1) is NOT a paladin, she is a Rune Knight. ( See Rune Knight: http://finalfantasy.wikia.com/wiki/Rune_Knight )
2) Runic Blade from Celes absorbed magic attacks directed at her, not spammed light from the heavens to do AoE DoT damage.

I see where you are coming from in your posts, however, I don't see all the characters you listed as tanks either. I have all the jobs at 50 and quite frankly, they all suffer from the same problem as the Tank classes: They are just too watered down. All of them lack a certain bit of luster that made them shine and fun in FFXI, for example. The problem with the tank classes is that how much fun you have is directly correlated to how hard the other people in your party make your job to do. That black mage opening with fire III > Flare > convert > swift cast > Flare for example... (yes, really... it's happened to me. relic +1 blm assuming I could get hate back from that when I didn't even have my relic yet...)