Shortage of tanks a myth - thoughts?

[KaedrianLiang]

As someone who plays all 3 roles to a competent degree, Tank is the simplest role. My 2 cents on the situation is that, DPS is "more fun," and the general game populace can't handle the pressure of being a tank.

Tank role is very delicate, a tank error often lead to a wipe, whether its forgetting to count stacks, repositioning/placement or not getting a CD off. These lead to wipes right off the bat. However tank management is very simple, and often a tank can focus on their task without having to think about the party. Threat management is very easy in ffxiv. Simple, but little room for error

Healers have the most complex role in the game. Often healers are expected to dodge, add dps, manage debuffs, manage mana, watch for 1-shot attacks winding-up while healing and constantly looking back and forth between the action and party health bars. However there is plenty of leeway for healing errors.

DPS, know your rotation, know how to dodge, know target priority, know when to LB. Threat management is non-existent after the first 7.5 seconds into an encounter. However a dps death is medium-high on wipe factor as DPS checks are always a thing, and raising anyone costs a huge chunk of mana. Medium room for error.


In the ole XI days, tanks were generally loved, especially while leveling up. It was an untold rule that a tank bears the burden of death to save the party when things go terribly wrong. "Good tanks" were the talk of the town whenever they showed up to a scene or made their presence known.

In XIV, when tanks are blamed, much of the time its a dps that can't assist tank target. They are unjustly kicked or harassed for the rest of the dungeon/raid/trial run. Tanks set the tempo of battle, not the dps, but often dps (sometimes healers) feel the need to pull extra mobs so they can aoe stuff, down and in the end blame the tank for not picking up the adds. The list is endless. So its a crap situation, of illogical blame game.