Quote Originally Posted by Kosmos992k View Post
Yes, but this evaluation of 'better' is entirely dependent on "MOAR DEEPS". That's great for DD classes, but tanks should (IMHO) be evaluated/judged on things other than DEEPS... When you adopt the stance you seem to have, you are effectively telling tanks that focus on being tankier that they are bad at their job. Not very friendly IMHO.
There's not much you can do beyond a certain point for survival. Just use your CDs appopriately, survive the tank busters, otherwise mitigate as much as you can without jeopardizing tank buster survival. It's not too hard or complex, and ultimately just doing this is not useful to a group. It's useful in the sense that you are finishing the survival check but what about the party-wide DPS check? Or killing a boss so fast that you have to get healed that much less?

Funny thing is, in a dungeon boss, a PLD going Sword Oath with full STR gear on, is going to fulfill his survival role almost as well as a Shield Oath PLD with full VIT on. Will the Sword PLD have much less eHP on paper? Yep. Will he ever actually need all of it? Nope, even if a healer is DPSing a lot. I dare say the PLD with Sword Oath is doing his job more effectively in terms of survival, because the fight is going to end that much quicker, requiring less MP and mechanics done that could endanger the party.