Lore Incentive Is Ruining Duty Roulette

[Shurrikhan]

Funny thing, I just got in a dungeon, and a tank LEAVES, just because he doesn't Stone Vigil. Ugh, I am tired of how people treat the duty roulette.

Some of my best memories come from no-tanking when the DF tank leaves or 4-DPSing Stone Vigil (with a FATE group who got tired of the zerg grind)... The only loss we really felt was any Warrior AoE dps, seeing as CCing instead of mass-tanking ended up more raid-dps efficient when not having to heal at all. Since int and mind weren't split yet, the 4-dps composition was significantly faster, as long as we had both a SMN and BLM.

I hope you actually went ahead and attempted the instance after his departure instead of giving up and/or just waiting. Dealing with abnormal conditions can be eye-opening to the real underlying rules of gameplay.

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As for the whole "just let the tank die, then", there's a huge difference between a tank keeping pace and a tank not performing his role. If he's going into every fight without tank stance, occasionally losing enmity in ways that can impair clear times, CDs to be saved, or your mana rate, and just generally under-mitigating or unrealistically prioritizing his own damage over the rest of the group's (including yours), he's not performing to par, and if I were a dps in your group, I would not be shocked or hold it against you if maybe possibly *let* him die.

I had a broken ~ key, where my Cleric Stance was bound, in a Dusk Vigil run once with a 100% Deliverance tank, post Vit/Str change, all STR accessories. The key tended to double (turning CS back on) unless I queued it mid-prior-cast and slowly released. He wanted me to deal decent dps while keeping him up. When he finally died due to the Cleric Stance double and insults were made, I asked him why he couldn't survive for 4 seconds despite Stoneskin, Noct AB shield, and a buffed Diurnal AB regen. While sarcastic, he slowed down after that.

But a tank who's just doing his job and excepting the same from you... Feel free to mention that you'd rather not perform at peak right now; you're tired or for whatever other reason. But you don't just let him die. You're the tactical conscience of the group if the tank ends up paying too little attention to the party's actual resources and therefore overextending himself, but the last thing the dps need is their tank and healer butting heads.

EDIT: that said, it doesn't sometimes infuriate me that people think that playing a dps is essentially license to be lazy or think of nothing but their parsers. As a DPS, I track CDs so that I know how pack clear times will be affected by raid dps taken vs. dealt. Though so, so many of these considerations are dependant on the healer and tank both knowing how to time out their CDs and go more dps-based as fits the situation.