How to get people to tank!

[Llus]

i agree but we are talking about people here even if others tell them it gets better, Ive seen to many times and I myself have stolen argo time after time on tanks in low level stuff and if you dont have thick skin this can easily make you want to quit all together. I think having the stance your first dungeon will show you exactly what your roll is because in low level dungeons a whm or scholar can basicly and will take over tanking the whole dungeon. Its much more to tanking than dungeons I think starting the easy part as early as possible would be good because its a whole different learning curve in trails which is alot harder than any dungeon runs.

PLDs have it the toughest definitely and I agree about the mistake SE made by giving PLD their tank stance 10 levels later than WAR and DRK. As soon as you can wear that soul stone, you should have your tank stance and level 30 isn't too bad at all. That's 15 levels that you have to endure the flash & overpower spam and marking your targets (and praying DPS follow your marks). It really does force you to watch the aggro list of mobs so you know which one you need to give that extra enmity combo to/lob/tomahawk while weaving in flash. It really is EXTREMELY easy to lose hate at those low levels, even to a single AoE heal; but I still think what you learn from that outweighs the negatives. For tanks that are first timers (and even more so, first time tanks on their first MMO like me) it is truly disheartening and can make you want to give up. Leveling WAR was pretty easy, but PLD made me want to give up altogether so I understand that completely. But, I think I gained a lot from that experience and I'm glad I didn't have a tank stance until level 30 WAR (still HATE that I didn't get a tank stance with PLD until 10 levels later)

As HW was introduced a lot of people in my old FC wanted to try tanking for the first time and went with DRK. They were instantly at level 30 with tank stance and had no idea how to hold aggro even in HQ BiS crafted gear. A few pointers and forcing them to level PLD and WAR w/o their tank stance to get their cross-class skills really did help them out a ton and they became much better. I really do think that them having to level PLD and WAR really gave them the experience they needed to understand how aggro is generated (not just from themselves, but by other party members' skills and attacks) and how to overcome deficiencies introduced by gear as well as the missing tank stance.

For trials, I never really had an issue with damage mitigation; positioning, aggro generation etc. I learned these through dungeon runs and dungeon bosses. Specific positioning for specific trials did take some learning; but it was generally, hold at A; move to B when X happens. What did surprise me were the hard and extreme primals, this is where I learned the tank swap and tank buster mechanics which is something that I'd never had to even think about. It wasn't hard once I understood it, but those were the only real surprises.

[Llus]

By the the time they would have gotten their tank stance lots of people have already given up trying to tank and started to play some other role instead.
Starting out difficult and then making it easier is generally not a good way of making people learn.

All research into learning shows just the opposite. People learn better when they're under stress and tanking and healing are both very stressful jobs. There are levels of stress that will make it impossible to learn, but you have to push yourself into uncomfortable and stressful situations in order to best learn. For those people who understand that and learn that lesson early, the more likely they are to pursue savage content because they understand that; while stressful at first they'll learn fairly quickly and be able to improve their game play substantially.

[crazedtoo]

It's actually more of a middle ground for learning. People learn best when they are challenged, that is true. But there is a zone that occurs that makes learning become tiresome and the individual feel defeated. Tanking needs to start in your zone of proximal development and move accordingly.

[bswpayton]

PLDs have it the toughest definitely and I agree about the mistake SE made by giving PLD their tank stance 10 levels later than WAR and DRK. As soon as you can wear that soul stone, you should have your tank stance and level 30 isn't too bad at all. That's 15 levels that you have to endure the flash & overpower spam and marking your targets (and praying DPS follow your marks). It really does force

but the thing is I think having the stance early will help you learn how to do whats expected of you later on in the game which is big pulls, see ill admit i feel dum for saying this but I didnt even no about the Argo bar until I had my alt tank up to level 50 somehow I didnt cause to many wipes. Once I started tanking on my main I had a full handle on it, but what ive notice as Ive gotten better at the game is those low level dungeons can take 15 to 20 mins instead of , 30 mins.


There is no gettin around it big pulls are apart of this game whether people like it or not and having a tank stance early on at level 15 would have new players prepared for whats to come , and also a good explanation of the Argo bar as well. You shouldn't be forced into a situation where you are certainly going to lose Argo, which is the case in lower level stuff even in high level gear if im in level 15 to 20 dungeon on my pali i have to flash about 5 or 6 times.

Tank stance early will allow players to see that they can pull more than two adds at a time so they arent intimidated by it later on in the game and it may resolve some of the conflict when it comes to that. And like someone said by the time someone reaches level 30 they have an idea of whether or not they want to keep playing a job or not or whether they want to only play that job in a potd type environment. By leaving it as it is now Im sure we have lost alot of future tanks that way, instead of holding on to them as low as level 15, I know it would of given me tons of confidence if I had a stance at 15 and I started off seeing I could take on 6 to seven adds at a time.

[Llus]

It's actually more of a middle ground for learning. People learn best when they are challenged, that is true. But there is a zone that occurs that makes learning become tiresome and the individual feel defeated. Tanking needs to start in your zone of proximal development and move accordingly.

True, after a certain point of difficulty you'll not learn anything but matching the learning required for tanking or healing with the individual is going to be extremely difficult.

[Llus]

but the thing is I think having the stance early will help you learn how to do whats expected of you later on in the game which is big pulls, see ill admit i feel dum for saying this but I didnt even no about the Argo bar until I had my alt tank up to level 50 somehow I didnt cause to many wipes. Once I started tanking on my main I had a full handle on it, but what ive notice as Ive gotten better at the game is those low level dungeons can take 15 to 20 mins instead of , 30 mins.


There is no gettin around it big pulls are apart of this game whether people like it or not and having a tank stance early on at level 15 would have new players prepared for whats to come , and also a good explanation of the Argo bar as well. You shouldn't be forced into a situation where you are certainly going to lose Argo, which is the case in lower level stuff even in high level gear if im in level 15 to 20 dungeon on my pali i have to flash about 5 or 6 times.

Tank stance early will allow players to see that they can pull more than two adds at a time so they arent intimidated by it later on in the game and it may resolve some of the conflict when it comes to that. And like someone said by the time someone reaches level 30 they have an idea of whether or not they want to keep playing a job or not or whether they want to only play that job in a potd type environment. By leaving it as it is now Im sure we have lost alot of future tanks that way, instead of holding on to them as low as level 15, I know it would of given me tons of confidence if I had a stance at 15 and I started off seeing I could take on 6 to seven adds at a time.

That's probably the best argument for having your tank stance at an earlier level. I'm wondering what that would do for stance dancing too. Would new tanks be more willing or less willing to stance dance?

[Zojha]

All research into learning shows just the opposite. People learn better when they're under stress [...]

Mhm...briefly skimming over some journal abstracts and conclusions, the findings actually seem quite torn. The only unambiguous results seem to be that chronic, extreme and early childhood stress can damage the hippocampus and have long-lasting detrimental effects on learning and memory processes.

In mice/rats, I found some findings on an inverted U-function and individual differences.
http://learnmem.cshlp.org/content/17/10/522.short

Seems to be mostly a:"It depends!" sorta thing.

[Venjenz]

This is my second go 'round with FF14, and I have never played anything but a tank (MAR-WAR), and since I am in the early phase for the second time, here's how it is according to my anecdotal evidence - tanking is a thankless job that you do because you want to see content, don't want to wait in queues longer than 10 seconds, and are OK with taking blame that isn't yours.

Bottom line, when you PUG tank in FF14, everyone is either dead silent or a vocal critic of your performance. That's life in the queue for a tank. The good news though is that as the content gets tougher, there's less dead silence and tons more criticism!! Oh wait, that's not good news, is it?

If you want more tanks, be nicer to the ones you group with. Period.

[Rinari]

tanking is a thankless job that you do because you want to see content, don't want to wait in queues longer than 10 seconds

I get a lot of comms from otherwise silent groups, so I take that as my thanks. The short queues and 'in need' bonuses are a nice incentive. I don't play the game for random groups though. Duty finder is just a thing I use to fill in spots or get group content out of the way in a pinch. Playing with friends is where an MMO shines and that is the content I enjoy most. I tank because it's fun to lead the charge and feel like I'm protecting my friends... and I did enough years as DPS in WoW raids that wanted to take on the extra challenge for something new.

[Venjenz]

I get a lot of comms from otherwise silent groups, so I take that as my thanks. The short queues and 'in need' bonuses are a nice incentive. I don't play the game for random groups though. Duty finder is just a thing I use to fill in spots or get group content out of the way in a pinch. Playing with friends is where an MMO shines and that is the content I enjoy most. I tank because it's fun to lead the charge and feel like I'm protecting my friends... and I did enough years as DPS in WoW raids that wanted to take on the extra challenge for something new.

Believe me, in second go 'round, I am almost exclusively tanking for friends and not using Duty Finder. Nothing ever so pressing I can't wait until my friends are online.