Tips for a new tank?

[Transient_Shadow]

Hey all. so I decided to take up tanking but I feel like I'm struggling to grasp the basics. I take agro and hold it but it feels like I'm doing something wrong. I'm a healer main and can dps fairly well but tanking seems to be my weakness.

Any tips would be most helpful

[Thela]

Can you be more specific? You say you feel like you're doing something wrong, but what? And which tank job are you playing?

[Transient_Shadow]

I'm running dark and I try to do pulls like I've seen other tanks do but I feel more comfortable with smaller pulls.

[LittleSparrow]

I'm running dark and I try to do pulls like I've seen other tanks do but I feel more comfortable with smaller pulls.

Then do smaller pulls. You're the tank and you get to decide the pace. It's fine dude.

[Heliantheae]

Yea, pull what you're comfortable with. It'll make the run more smoother. You can make bigger pulls when you're ready.

For DRKs try weaving Dark Arts into your attacks and when you do big pulls, DA with Abyssial Drain will help with restore HP.

[HyoMinPark]

Since you're still relatively new to tanking, don't try to do supermassive pulls like the other "pro tanks" do. It's perfectly okay for you to stick with smaller pulls until you get more comfortable doing mass-pulls. Kindly let your parties know "Hey, I'm new to tanking, and not quite comfortable doing large pulls yet" and many are perfectly okay with that.

Checking your Lodestone, I see that your DRK is level 51, so here's some advice I can give you for now. DRK was my go-to tank back in Heavensward, but I haven't played it much since Stormblood dropped, and I'm not too familiar with all the changes that was made to it, but I feel like the basic concepts of level 50 DRK are probably still the same.

As you know, always keep both Grit and Darkside up. Until you get more comfortable with tanking, it's perfectly fine for you to stay in Grit if it will help ease your tankxiety. Darkside no longer drains MP while active, so there's no reason not to have it up 100% of the time now.

When pulling, pull with Unmend, and once the mobs all gather around you, Unleash. You can activate Blood Price for a little bit of MP regen while everything's beating on you (though they nerfed the amount regenerated with Stormblood) to aid in your Unleash spamming. After Unleash, rotate though the mobs with your Souleater combo, making sure to Dark Arts + Souleater as often as your MP allows. Rinse and repeat for any and all trash packs while also properly rotating your cool downs to ease up on your incoming damage, and so that your healer can also contribute to DPS. Bosses are generally the same.

Once you get more comfortable, you can start dropping Grit and using Blood Weapon, which still has amazing MP regen, in combination with your Syphon Strike to get back even more MP, weaving in Unleashes for AOE damage on multiple mobs between rotating combos, but for now, just focus on staying in Grit and making things a bit easier for yourself. DRKs generally don't have any problem with aggro-generation.

Again, I haven't touched DRK much with this expansion, so I'm just repeating the tactics I used while leveling it up in Heavensward. I don't think much was changed pre-60 minus some nerfs here and there to skills, and the fact that Blood Price can no longer be used outside of Grit, so I feel like this basic explanation can help you at least a little bit. By all means, if more experienced DRKs have any corrections or insight, feel free to correct me/share! (I do plan to level DRK after I finish MNK so, I could use any additional advice on the changes as well!)

[hydralinsk]

tankxiety

I'm a new tank and have absolutely nothing to contribute, but I wanted to say I love this. Thanks for the tips I tanked my first dungeon yesterday and deff felt tankxiety before I queued, but I told them I was new and they were really friendly and patient. I love this community!

[Rhinos]

I found this guide pretty handy for tank basics.
https://www.reddit.com/r/ffxiv/comme...blood_edition/

[Spiriel_Basanda]

There is one question I've been wondering out regarding tanking. Is there a way to tell if you're about to lose hate on a mob via the monster list? I know that if the square stops being red I've lost it, but is there a way to tell you're about to lose it before it actually happens via the monster list? I know that the party list has that gauge that shows hate values, but honestly I tend to tab target too fast cause I'm trying to hit everything with bits of the enmity combo and it doesn't update the list fast enough, heh. A way to tell from the monster list would be useful. I've mostly just been guessing based on how I've divided hate so far.

[Starkbeaumont]

- keep grit and darkside up (if you feel comfortable drop grit during boss fights)
- spam unleash when you have 5 or more mobs on you, use dark passanger
- if you pull less than 5 mobs use you souleater combo once hate on you is solid
- make sure to position the mobs well (as tight as possible and facing away from the group)
- if you evade a move try to move back to your previous position; don't make the mobs spin around
- once you hit 56 spam abyssal drain. never use dark passanger again unless your group does really good aoe damage
- use salted earth on cd (except the pack is about to die)
- use def. cooldowns to ease the life of your healer
- at 62 and 64 you get even more mp regen tools, so make sure to dump that mp when ever you can
- at 70 abuse the blackest night during big pulls

- dye your gear black