Tank adjustments we can agree on?

[eagledorf]

DPS TANK's DPS at FIVE PERCENT BELOW the other two NOT-AS-DPS-TANKS.

A WAR adds almost 10% to the other tank's DPS so here's the reasoning.

PLD+DRK=100+100=200
PLD/DRK+WAR=110+95=205

A WAR would still bring more DPS than running the other two. (In actuality, only like 80% of your DPS is buffed, so it would be like 203 for PLD/DRK+WAR, but still higher than leaving out the WAR).

Even if your DRK is MT:

DRK MT+WAR=88+95=183>180=PLD+DRK

With NIN:
PLD+DRK+NIN=220+NIN
PLD/DRK+WAR=205+NIN+α (NIN will gain a few percent DPS by riding off of Eye)

As you can see, lowering WAR DPS to 5% lower than the other two is actually almost perfectly balanced while retaining WAR's DPS utility and without messing up the play-style at all.

The idea of a DPS tank needs to go. That's why WAR was useless in 2.0. There is no DPS tank and no defense tank. A tank needs the defense to survive, then all that matters is DPS. Failing to bring either is no good.

Excuse me sir, but its not insane, 50% uptime on a 30% damage boost is the same as 100% uptime on a 15% damage boost, which is what DRK has

The problem is with things as they are PLD DPS is very close as OT to DRK DPS (effectively the same), so this buff would push PLD maybe 6-7% over DRK (maybe more since then every Scorn and every Spirits Within should fall under FoF). At the same time, it fails to fix the gap in DPS as MT or when swapping in and out of tank stance.

[Syzygian]

The idea of a DPS tank needs to go. That's why WAR was useless in 2.0. There is no DPS tank and no defense tank. A tank needs the defense to survive, then all that matters is DPS.

Ah, now I see. And I agree with you 100%!

However, its not going anywhere because Yoshi P came out and (in a complete contradiction of your statement) said that DPS is part of WAR's utility, effectively giving them the most valuable utility there is. So really, when discussing nerfs for WAR, which may or may not ever happen, we have to consider the fact that the devs are unlikely to go back on that design. I feel like if anything PLD and DRK need some sort of raid DPS boost, albeit slight (nothing like Battle Litany or Trick Attack, save those things for actual DPS), if they're going to give WAR so much personal DPS, that way WAR is like the MNK of tanks, and DRK and PLD are like DRG and NIN.

Even that is unlikely though, cause then DPS would be part of DRK and PLD's utility as well, albiet raid DPS rather than personal DPS. This is really the only reason I've entertained the thought of defensive nerfs for WAR instead, very slight ones, that is, since I've been keeping in the back of my head all this time that WAR's DPS is probably here to stay, at least as an OT, and if DRK or PLD get any buffs to DPS they'll likely be raid DPS utilities, or narrowing the gap between their OT and MT DPS.

The problem is with things as they are PLD DPS is very close as OT to DRK DPS (effectively the same), so this buff would push PLD maybe 6-7% over DRK (maybe more since then every Scorn and every Spirits Within should fall under FoF). At the same time, it fails to fix the gap in DPS as MT or when swapping in and out of tank stance.

I wouldn't worry too much about this, as most of DRK's extra DPS is not in offensive cooldowns but in off-GCD weaving. They have 6x as many oGCD damaging abilities as WAR and 3x as much as PLD. One reason why I think tanks will never be "homogenized" is because DRK is so consistently fast-paced and active, and WAR is slow but heavy hitting, with PLD somewhere in the middle. Regardless of how they deal/take damage, they all have very different pacing.

Assuming you have very poor parry RNG and only get 3 Low Blows, DRK has-
2 Plunges (400)
3 Low Blows (300)
2 Reprisals (420)
1.5 Salted Earths (787.5)
1 Carve & Spit (450)
3 Dark Passengers (450)
...off GCD every minute. Every minute that's almost 2800 extra potency, 2400ish without Reprisals, off the global cooldown, while maintaining FoF-esque damage through Darkside and Blood Weapon being roughly equivalent to the DPS increase from Sword Oath, not to mention Blood Weapon's higher MP returns enabling you to push out 4 DA Souleaters per minute while keeping Scourge/Delirium up. And then all their potencies on their combos are higher as well. It'd take more than cutting the recast of FoF to bring them up to DRK DPS, but it'd at least make them competitive. In fact considering everything DRK and WAR have, now that I think of it, FoF not being on a 60s recast is straight-up kicking them when they're down, imo.

[eagledorf]

we have to consider the fact that the devs are unlikely to go back on that design

It literally cannot be fixed unless the devs figure out that this doesn't work. They already learned the lesson in 2.0 and eventually pulled their heads out, they just are slow to fix things. Nerfing WAR as a tank just forces it to be OT, which is terrible design, not a fix. You would always use a WAR as the OT because it brings so much more DPS-added until you hit a fight that needs both tanks and then you suddenly wouldn't be able to bring a WAR no matter what.

As a community, we need to make sure the devs know that that's stupid design, not think of a compromise that lets them hide behind their mistakes.

[RapBreon]

snip

This seems like a supporty route for a class sold as a solo brute. Seems thematically more suited for the PLD (which I support). I like the idea of a DPS tank; it's my 'power fantasy'. But this needs to translate into results or it 'feels' hollow.

I do think thematic design is as important numerical balancing in a co-operative fantasy MMO.

[Syzygian]

The fact that they cater to the power fantasy of dealing high damage on a job of a type that traditionally caters to people who's personalities favor power fantasies of taking pitiful damage is just bizarre, awkward, asymmetrical, clunky, UNBALANCED design.

WAR shouldn't=(insert other tank here)+(more dps). They have to have some disadvantage just like every other job in this game.
What would be exceptable is WAR=(insert other tank here)+(more dps)-(xyz).
The fact that they don't is what has people in such a tizzy and why PLDs are all upset because they're on the other end of the seesaw.

And as far as buffing the other tanks instead of nerfing WAR...

You would need to literally give the other two tanks a buff, the magnitude of which would be enough, in a given scenario for someone to say "We could bring a WAR, but DRK/PLD has abcxyz and WAR doesn't, and abcxyz would be really good for this fight". Currently, THERE IS NO SUCH SCENARIO IN FFXIV 3.0.

The reason why I don't think they will do this is because if you literally just took WAR out of the game and were just looking at DRK and PLD, there's very little wrong, IMO with how they play, mitigate damage, deal damage, and support their party, but they still have basic advantages and disadvantages. WAR just feels more like the outlier, and makes the tanks unbalanced in a way that, as of now, the melee, healers, ranged, and casters simply are not.

[RapBreon]

The fact that they cater to the power fantasy of dealing high damage on a job of a type that traditionally caters to people who's personalities favor power fantasies of taking pitiful damage is just bizarre, awkward, asymmetrical, clunky, UNBALANCED design.

WAR shouldn't=(insert other tank here)+(more dps). They have to have some disadvantage just like every other job in this game.
What would be exceptable is WAR=(insert other tank here)+(more dps)-(xyz).
The fact that they don't is what has people in such a tizzy and why PLDs are all upset because they're on the other end of the seesaw.

Yeah, I understand your point of view, but it somewhat high-lights you don't understand the fantasy (not sharing the fantasy). The typical difference is DPS attack, but don't receive, they get in, they do their damage safely, they're not really meant to take a beating. WARs represents the brawler/bruiser archetype (something I play in almost every game, DOTA/LoL/HOTS being prime examples), they do good damage but can also take a beating. PLDs represent the 'pure tank' archetype, damage being low but can take one hell of a beating and are annoying as fuck to deal with; support suits this archetype far more than the selfish bruiser, whose intention is to kind of perform both roles but sub-optimally. It's kind of like the weird situation BRDs and MCHs are in really. WAR is far more hybridized in that respect. Not every tank wants to be a wall :P

I actually support the PLDs complaining about their 'power fantasy' being unbalanced by the DPS meta; hence why a lot of my suggestions revolve around making them more defensive and other utility that allow the jobs to make up for the deficit. I do agree that WARs are too tanky and bring more utility (not in the way Yoshi means, like SP and SE, etc.) than they should for their archetype. Utility might be harder to balance, but seems the better long term option to hit.

The specifics I bet would be very difficult to deal with. To be honest, I'm not sure they can please both groups simultaneously - or at least, not in totality.

[Syzygian]

snip

Yeah, the game isn't designed with these archetypes, there's only 3 job types, and if you incorporate the brawler/bruiser type deal in with the tanks, it makes one of them objectively better, because the game doesn't favor a defensive approach, like, at all. If they want to make this work they'd have to actually give WAR even more damage, but make PLD WAY beefier (like double the potency of all their defensive CDs) and probably buff DRK a bit too to put it in the middle of that spectrum. That way PLD would be able to cheese mechanics like WAR helps people cheese enrage timers and would take so little damage that you could actually have a WHM parse 900-1000 dps on an endgame raid.

[RapBreon]

Yeah, the game isn't designed with these archetypes, there's only 3 job types, and if you incorporate the brawler/bruiser type deal in with the tanks, it makes one of them objectively better, because the game doesn't favor a defensive approach, like, at all. If they want to make this work they'd have to actually give WAR even more damage, but make PLD WAY beefier (like double the potency of all their defensive CDs) and probably buff DRK a bit too to put it in the middle of that spectrum. That way PLD would be able to cheese mechanics like WAR helps people cheese enrage timers and would take so little damage that you could actually have a WHM parse 900-1000 dps on an endgame raid.

But it did favour a defensive approach; in first coil. Most of problems stem from the tier interacting with the class designs. The game isn't designed with support archetypes, BRDs and MCHs are pretty much mandatory because of their support. The jobs are sub-categorized for sure in this game. Some far more subtle than others.

As for your suggestion, if they could do it well; I would support it. Naturally the community would still gravitate to the more effective of the two relative to the tier (or boss) though and we'd be complaining about that, but alas, one problem at a time.

[eagledorf]

snip

You can't really buff PLD defensive utility enough without breaking the job. Either you need content so punishing that you need that defense, in which case you have the problem from 2.0 where the tanks that can't keep up are abandoned, or PLD becomes so powerful you get things like a Paladin tanking Bahamut and all the adds with the tether and not batting an eye because they're invincible and you don't even need a co-tank anymore and bringing three Monks is better than having two tanks. Neither of these is good design compared to just fixing things.

In my opinion PLD is almost perfect from the defense side of things. They're very strong against physical damage and weak against magic damage, but able to deal with it by using their trait for Convalescence and Stoneskin. This is basically how much variation there should be in tanks in terms of what they're good at and what they're bad at. PLD's ability to sustain DPS when they tank is broken, DRK's ability to take burst physical damage is probably broken (Reprisal is clearly intended to be the solution, but I question how well that would work if they actually bring back physical tank busters), and WAR's ability to contribute as OT is broken.

[Syzygian]

DRK's ability to take burst physical damage is broken.

Every DRK including myself that has cleared A2S and died less than their WAR OT in the process wants a word with you.

PLD's ability to handle physical damage in a way that is somewhat better than DRK is dubious at best.

PLD: "Flatten is coming! oh no!" (Rampart/Sentinel+Bulwark/Convalescence+pray for a block)
DRK: "Flatten is coming! oh no!" (Dark Dance 15s in advance, proc Reprisal, apply it, then Shadowskin/Shadow Wall+Convalescence+pray for a parry)

Having to push more buttons to achieve the same effect doesn't mean they can't do it.