Tanking in 4.0, hopes for the expansion

[SargentToughie]

Hey guys! As is common knowledge at this point, 4.0 will release two new DPS jobs under the assumption that all 3 tanks and healers are going to be better balanced going into the new expansion. While this is a pretty weak explanation all things considered, and not something I entirely approve of, there's already another thread on the forums covering the more interpersonal, communal reactions to these changes. Instead, I'd rather try to take a look at the part that concerns me more, which would be what mechanical changes they could possibly make in order to bring in more tank players.

From my own experience, I was a tank main for 2+ years through the later parts of ARR and the early to mid section of HW, until I got massively burnt out on it and nearly quit the game. I'm now a DPS main, only tanking the occasional EXR whenever my friends need me to. However, the state of tanks in this game and their approximate power levels has always been a passionate subject for me, due to the extreme amount of time I invested in the role.

As such, even before Samurai was announced I would often find myself wondering what changes would need to be made to tanks in order to make them appeal to me again, among other burnt out players. After a bit of reflection and theorycraft, I was able to break it down to one big fundamental problem I personally had, when I was tanking.

I personally found tanking in 3.0 to be somewhat unfulfilling to maximize, due to the fact that it is the only role of the trinity in which you are required to actively conflict against your design principle in order to play it optimally, a flaw inherent in the design of tank stances. I played Warrior for 2 years, I eventually got used to the flow of pulling things in Defiance, switching to Deliverance, popping cooldowns, you know the drill. However, all through that entire time, even though technically Deliverance was the optimal thing to do, it never felt like it was entirely correct. There was always that small voice in the back of my head, telling me that I was doing something wrong.

I mean, just look at Inner Beast. Warrior has access to one of the strongest and most useful tanking tools in the entire game, but it nearly never gets used due to the fact that Fell Cleave just cranks out such wild amounts of hate. Eventually it just got to the point where I felt as though I was trapped, and no matter which decision I made with my wrath, I was losing out on either the S tier mitigation and self healing of IB, or the damage output of Fell Cleave. It made tanking frustrating, stressful, and flat out unfun sometimes.

I see a lot of people on these threads that bash on the 'DPS meta' and hope that it goes away. While I can completely understand where those people are coming from, I also feel like that's a little bit unfair. I'm of the opinion that if you are playing a tank at the highest possible level, you should be able to provide your maximum possible damage, and your maximum possible defensive value at the exact same time. Let the people have their brick wall Paladin, while also being able to provide damage output that, while not quite keeping up with dedicated DPS, certainly is enough to make an impact, as it is now.

With that in mind, I legitimately hope that one of the changes they make going into 4.0 will be the complete removal of tank stances, while making the bonus enmity generation from them a passive that each tank class gains from level 1. We've all been that level 15 baby tank, and we remember the nightmares trying to keep hate in of Copperbell and Thousand Maws. Throw on the defensive values from each as a perk for the job at level 30, and you're basically done already.

This would serve the dual purpose of making the early levels of tanking not such a nightmare for inexperienced players who might get pushed away from the role, while also boosting the skill ceiling upwards by allowing the best tank players to be both a brick wall AND an offensive powerhouse at the same time. More fine tuning would obviously be required on a job by job basis, lest Warrior completely run rampant once again. However, right now the current best way to play tank is to get enough threat to hold the boss, and then drop your tank stance like a bad habit, mitigation be damned. Why not just get rid of the system all together and replace it with something better?

TL;DR- I think that tank stances should be reworked into class passives while not reducing tank damage output.

[CafPow]

Yeah but no... enmity should be able to be turned of. Or else, oftanking won't be that ... "easy to do" anymore... even becomes impossible.
When it comes to low lebel dungeons... it's idiotic to do not have accsess to your tankstance in low level (stance or passive, same same)

I'd liketokeep the stances, but change the mechanics. Less need-of-dps and less need-of-aggro, butmore "i don't wanna die pls"... that will "force" you automatically into defstance (one could also apply to CDs to only be activated in defstance or whatnot)... andthere you go.