Ideas for a Caster Tank

[Mavrias]

1) snip.

1. OP specifically mentioned that this hypothetical tank's gear would have lower defense and magic defense in favor of it lowering damage dealt by enemies. I'm not talking about aesthetics. We can already make our armor look cloth or leather. It's called using a glamour prism.

2. Abilities being instant is specifically not being a caster. Being a caster means you have cast times. This is why bard and and machinist are no longer caster classes. And being interrupted by damage is also one of the core mechanics of a caster. PLD is not a caster class so it got a slight buff to make one of its major utilities more viable.

[Elkanah]

2. Abilities being instant is specifically not being a caster. Being a caster means you have cast times. This is why bard and and machinist are no longer caster classes. And being interrupted by damage is also one of the core mechanics of a caster. PLD is not a caster class so it got a slight buff to make one of its major utilities more viable.

PLD is not a caster class, you're correct. But tank wise, both its new skill for holy and clemency are considered MAGIC, not PHYSICAL skills. And a non interruption rate added to this mechanic for tanks could classify it as a caster tank with some skills. Similar to how rdm works. Only difference is you won't need surecast to make it functional, given PLD's ability to use magic skills without needing to be interrupted.

While I do understand that tanks are not casters, this mechanic can still work in some ways without overhauling the original code. But it would be up to the devs to make that a consideration. Sadly, as we know Squeenix of over 7 years since 1.0, a lot of those ideas had been trashed or thrown away. Honestly, still believe this is due to 1.0's coding in the system.

[Mycow8me]

Personally I think dork knight was as close to a caster tank as were going to get. It would be interesting to see how a magitek knight plays out though if SE wanted to make an original tank class. Using magic, ceruleum, and body machinery (weapon and offhand) to tank maybe... IDK.

[Eloah]

http://Tinyurl.com/geotank

I'm gonna leave this here again for my hopes that SE makes Geomancer a Tank. They would be the perfect candidate.

I still need to adjust it to 70, but the main premise is still there and still solid.

[BluexBird]

This might sound like a crazy idea, but it's something I've always wanted in an MMO: a caster that tanks by summoning a bad-ass companion, while the caster stands at the back and uses spells that help the companion do tank stuff. This includes weaker shields/heals that only affect the companion. The caster would also have some damaging spells for them to use sometimes, as well as certain cooldowns that buff the damage of the companion for a while. Plus a skill that transfers all enmity to the companion.

The caster and the companion's HP percentages are linked. So healing one would heal the other, and damage is shared between the two. However, the companion takes less damage when being hit. So a boss might hit you for 15,000 with an auto, you'll both take 7,500 damage. But if the boss hits your companion instead, it'll only do 10,000 and you'll both just lose 5,000 HP each. You'd have a resource-based spell on a low cooldown that makes you immune to damage (but not your pet's damage) for 2-3 seconds, so that you can avoid getting hit by party-wide AoE attacks, since if you and your pet get hit, if basically means you're taking twice the damage.

Upon the death of the companion, the caster survives with 1 HP and all enmity is transfered to them, but they become invulnerable for 5 seconds. The caster has a skill on a 4-5 minute cooldown that let's them instant-cast another companion that immediately regains enmity. This serves as their invulnerability mechanic.

The shields and heals from the caster wouldn't be enough to keep the companion alive. You'd need healers to help out. Whether the caster chooses to heal/shield the companion as well, or use their DPS spells, would be the difference between tank stance and DPS stance. The spells would be the shared -
under one stance, they're target-based damage spells/DoTs. Under another, they become heals/shields that you can only use on your companion and generate enmity for your companion. You'd have a skill with a moderate cooldown that transfers enmity to your companion. As well as cooldowns that become buffs to your companion depending on your stance as well.

Playing this would require a lot of coordination, as you would be having to position your companion appropriately to make sure the boss is facing the right way. You'd also have to make sure you don't get hit by AoE attacks. I don't see it being easy, but I sure as hell would have a blast playing something like this.

[Ogulbuk]

I am all in for any new tank with a unique flavor, but didn't the PLD basically become a caster tank in Stormblood, with it's heavy reliance on Holy Spirit?

[Opus]

Looks like the nays are mostly about how the game's current design makes it really hard to have variety in each role. I want to be able to play radically different styles. If you had ever played Ragnarok Online you'd know what I mean. Things like

1) Monk Mage
2) Ultra high ASPD thief builds
3) Pet tanking
4) Ability to cloak/hide

Other than my caster tank idea.

[Rufalus]

This might sound like a crazy idea, but (snip)

I love it! One of the best original ideas I've seen on the forum. I was thinking something along those lines but you really went in-depth and answered some questions about how it could work. A caster tank like that is significantly different enough to the melee tanks we have now that it could increase the number of players interested in taking the tank role.

[Shippuu]

This might sound like a crazy idea, but it's something I've always wanted in an MMO: a caster that tanks by summoning a bad-ass companion, while the caster stands at the back and uses spells that help the companion do tank stuff. This includes weaker shields/heals that only affect the companion. The caster would also have some damaging spells for them to use sometimes, as well as certain cooldowns that buff the damage of the companion for a while. Plus a skill that transfers all enmity to the companion.

Tell me, why would you think they'd create a job that requires you to literally be two different places at the same time. They just simplified the jobs in this expansion to make them easier to play, but the idea of a Pet tanking while the master stands somewhere else would be creating one of the most difficult jobs to play, on the least played role. We already have a ton of bad tank players in the game as it is. Please do tell me why you think this is a good idea.

This is also a tank that now takes double damage from all raid wide attacks, and has to worry about not only dealing with enemy positioning and tank dodging, but all the movement involved that ranged and melee DPS and healers have to deal with. The player now needs twice the knowledge of every fight in order to perform their job. They have to know all the tank mechanics, and all the DPS mechanics. Please tell me how an average player could manage dealing with all the mechanics that can happen simultaneously in most of the fights. This is also a tank that can cheese boss mechanics that require damage to be split amongst multiple tanks or players, potentially breaking some fights or drastically changing how they're done, making such a job a potential shoo-in with no other tank job being able to compete.