Please Do NOT Introduce Another Melee Tank

[Reynhart]

Lets just say that if you pay attention to the ST story, it hints very strongly at one character being or becoming a DRK.

The way I see it, that one character is not hinted as becoming a Dark Knight but a Warrior of Darkness. The two have nothing in common, and from both the lore of FFIII and FFXIV, Warriors Of Darkness could probably be the opposite of Warriors Of Light.

And even if they create DRK from it, that character is not really a "tank".

[ArlettLeonor]

Maybe this was already suggested, but it would be cool if the non melee tank would use like a shotgun like weapon.

Imagine pulling enemy with an equivalent of Shield Lob/Tomahawk, then use an aoe attack like Flash and Overpower, probably at spread shot looking attack.

Then you'll have your standard combo to keep aggro, and hopefully another one for dpsing, as well as defensive/Offensive CDs.

The difference would be if you're OT, you can sit back at range and dps away.

[Kydi]

swtor has a ranged tank in the bounty hunter/trooper and actually works damn well. A ranged tank in this game isn't that far off base imho

One of the key abilities for a vanguard/power tech is a melee rocket punch, and most of their abilities are conal/AoE around them as the start point. A shadow or assassin is more of a ranged tank as they could do an entire rotation at range, they just don't as it cripples them and would be a nightmare for dps.

The concept of a ranged tank is pretty much impossible unless you have a turret boss who can't move. However, it may be interesting to have a magic tank using high threat spells rather than hitting things, but ultimately they need to be in melee range else they'll just be kiting.

[16bitBounty]

Fingers crossed for Whip wielding dodge tank.

[Duelle]

The idea of a Samurai tank would be crazy close to what Warrior already is.

Not really. There's a lot of mechanics for tanking that have not been touched with WAR and PLD. Parries, damage split, dodges, stacked damage reduction, short-cooldown abilities, etc.

PLD is your textbook tank with cooldowns and a defensive stance. WAR got a small self-heal and a damage shield. There's plenty that can be done with SAM.

[Lord_Zlatan]

just adding more that hasn't been done yet

Evade and counter, Reverse effects, Repostes, etc.

[MythToken]

While some of these ideas are pretty cool, the game in its current state is just not set up for a ranged Tank. I can think of a ton of bosses where positioning is incredibly important, and you can't just ignore it. You also can't redo the entire game to fit this in.

So while the phantasm idea is cool, I really don't see SE doing any of this. And the next tank class will most likely be melee. Personally I don't think we need another tank class atm.

[TouchandFeel]

I touched on positioning and how that was really tough to do with ranged tanking but i did note that the ILN could reposition their phantasms in a number of ways to give them more fine control.
The only part that leaves me a little stumped with pet tanking is quick reactionary movements, such as dodging a telegraphed aoe attack. This could potentially be handled by having two tanking phantasms up and positioned well and then letting the one currently tanking to eat the attack and get killed and the mob then switching to the other tanking phantasm and then summoning another tank phantasm and placing it where the killed one was. You would then have to have the ILN have an ability that would stop them from taking damage when their phantasms take damage or greatly reducing it so that letting a tank phantasm eat a potentially lethal attack would not overly hurt the ILN. However that is way more complicated than simply moving out of the way like a melee tank would do and that is the main problem with my ILN concept, it is very complex and can require a lot of actions to do something that would be very simple for a melee tank.

My ILN idea was however not a "SE should do this" but more an exercise in whether it would be possible to do something like creating a ranged tank. I too believe that the next tank SE will be making is going to be melee. Also Yoshida said that we would probably be getting a new tank and healer class with the expansion. The expansion is a ways off, but since they have stated that no other classes/jobs were going to be added after Ninja until the expansion, the contemplation of what the next tank will be is relevant.

[Ashkendor]

P.S. Please also revamp Paladin and Warrior before another tank is added so people don't abandon ship.

Who cares if they do? Tanks are tanks. Honestly, I can't see a new tank class making a bunch of healers/DPS have a random epiphany and decide to play tank instead (aside from, y'know, leveling it up to level it up or completionism). Maining tank takes a certain kind of person; i personally think that it's very likely that the vast majority of people that swap to the new tank class were already maining PLD or WAR anyway.

As long as there's tanks in the DF, who cares what class they are?

As far as a non-melee tank... I really don't see how that would work.

[dragonfire8974]

I actually had an idea about a regeneration tank off the thaumaturge. ThE job ability is mana shield where damage is taken to mp instead of hp. There's already a regeneration mechanic built into the class as well as maybe a couple defensive cool downs and a couple of enmity generation buff. My th ought is fire will have enmity generation on it and an early job ability would be allowing Astral fire to buff damage while allowing umbra ice to regen for a short time on a small cooldown. That's 3 job abilities without any extra defensive stuff. I think it could be work and be interesting