The 4th Tank.

[Phoenicia]

...Why? because we gotta copy Druid somehow XD

lol no we don't! We hate WoW! Go away! .... j/k!

Blue Mage shouldn't work as a morpher though. It never did in the FF history. I would rather SE doesn't deviate too much from FF history. However, we had "Morphers" at some point that were basically shapeshifters that changed to different monsters.

As much as I love BLU, it probably won't make an appearance in FFXIV no thanks to how it is setup to have a set number of abilities and traits on all classes.

As for a Morpher, I think it should transform into more lore-friendly monsters instead of the Shishin/four gods (Sì Shòu in Chinese). But I guess it could still work in the forms of Adamantoise, Wyvern, Couerl and Fire Bird. Maybe be literally named as Genbu, Seiryu, Byakku and Suzaku like they were in FFXI. I don't know how it'd pan out though. It'd require massive development time. SE is a bit stingy when it comes to shortcuts and development time! Look at the new jobs being called "Extra Jobs" and having no base classes!

....... Extra jobs... Extra..... EXTRA. They didn't even bother calling it something more creative like "Ishgardian jobs" or Celestial or just I dunno, unique? lol... but extra? /sadface

Oh, I would like to know why you think WAR is reactive? Out of the three tanks it is the most proactive since 2.1. Well, I guess having ways to heal damage post fact makes it more reactive? I dunno. I feel WAR is the most proactive of the three.

[Iagainsti]

As much as I love BLU, it probably won't make an appearance in FFXIV no thanks to how it is setup to have a set number of abilities and traits on all classes.

easily implemented. Bluemage learns his "enemy skills" actions from the job quests at each level interval. It'd make an awesome tank. Aggro Combo could be Goblin Punch>Thrust Kick>Asuran Claws, OT/Debuff combo could be a ranged, mp based like Magic Hammer(MagicdefDown)>Acid Splash(PhydefDown)>Bomb Toss, then an aoe aggro combo Aquabreath>Electrocute>1000 Needles. Mighty Guard, White Wind, Vanish, all cool CoolDown potentials. Vampire Kiss could be a cool dot/Bloodbath hybrid, the possibilities for Bluemage are endless really.

[Rhaja]

aoe aggro combo Aquabreath>Electrocute>1000 Needles.

I just don't feel proper with the idea of a Blue Mage whose AoE isn't Detonate or a similar explosion. Not saying your wrong, just that I want to go boom all day in town.

[Iagainsti]

I just don't feel proper with the idea of a Blue Mage whose AoE isn't Detonate or a similar explosion. Not saying your wrong, just that I want to go boom all day in town.

You're right, drop 1000 needles for Detonate. I would've preferred to use Shadowflare for the big boom, but it's been taken.

[Giantbane]

easily implemented. Bluemage learns his "enemy skills" actions from the job quests at each level interval. It'd make an awesome tank. Aggro Combo could be Goblin Punch>Thrust Kick>Asuran Claws, OT/Debuff combo could be a ranged, mp based like Magic Hammer(MagicdefDown)>Acid Splash(PhydefDown)>Bomb Toss, then an aoe aggro combo Aquabreath>Electrocute>1000 Needles. Mighty Guard, White Wind, Vanish, all cool CoolDown potentials. Vampire Kiss could be a cool dot/Bloodbath hybrid, the possibilities for Bluemage are endless really.

It can really go much further than that. Give them an ability called "Learn" that will reduce the damage of the next ability he's hit with by 30% and give him 1 charge of that ability. When an ability is learned, the "Learn" icon switches to "Cast" (or something like that), much like the AST's Draw ability changes to using the card. You get 30s or so to send a scaled down version of that ability back.

That's in addition to permanent skills like Mighty Guard.

[Duelle]

As much as I love BLU, it probably won't make an appearance in FFXIV no thanks to how it is setup to have a set number of abilities and traits on all classes.

Still needs a lot of cleanup, but I just want to prove BLU can be in this game.

I wouldn't mind the 4th tank being based on a similar model to WoW's Brewmaster Monk or Guardian Druid. Evasion based using either a huge health pool to mitigate bad streaks, with self-heals to supplement healers. Or a shunted damage pool that absorbs a percentage of damage taken, which then slowly bleeds the excess damage back to the player. Dancer could work as the latter, Beastmaster as the former.

Personally, I figured SAM would get something akin to the Brewmaster's Stagger mechanic. It just seems like a natural fit since samurai armor (traditionally lamellar stuff) isn't as sturdy as plate and if we were to go by real life analogs, SAM may end up with lower native defense compared to PLD, WAR and DRK. Some adaptation of Shuffle would work for Dancer if you want to make it a tank, though you'd need additional mechanics to make it work.