O5S PF groups doing the solo-tank strategy

[Rathael]

What is with this obsession PF groups have with doing the solo tank strategy in O5S despite having two tanks?

Every PF group, despite having 2 tanks and the ability to tank swap, wants to place one tank marker in the closest corner and endure huge damage to the party, risking deaths and adding healer pressure.

Even if your healers are experienced at the fight and capable of managing the marker damage, all you are gaining is some 10 seconds tank up time. A tank does less than a quarter of the damage of (good) 4 damage dealers, meaning all you are saving is 2 to 4 seconds on the enrage timer. Furthermore, a tank swap allows the tanks to take one doom-strike each per phase, allowing for stacking of cooldowns against them.

When you run a solo-tank group for O5S, it is mandatory that the tank stays close to the boss, otherwise the connectivity & doom-strike combo kills you without HG/LD. This is the only time it is appropriate for the tank to place the marker in the close corner, since he has to stay close to the boss to survive.

People have become so obsessed that this is the "normal" way to do things that even healers have started placing their markers in the close corner, giving the reason that this is always how things are done.

[ImDingDing]

A tank does less than a quarter of the damage of (good) 4 damage dealers

Do you mean tank does less dmg than 1/4 of sum of 4 DPS (which is equal to tank does less dmg than DPS) or tank does less dmg than 1/4 of a single DPS?

[Tristann]

Do you mean tank does less dmg than 1/4 of sum of 4 DPS (which is equal to tank does less dmg than DPS) or tank does less dmg than 1/4 of a single DPS?

For normal shitty PF groups, both is correct.

[Rathael]

Do you mean tank does less dmg than 1/4 of sum of 4 DPS (which is equal to tank does less dmg than DPS) or tank does less dmg than 1/4 of a single DPS?

Should reasonably be less than 1/4th of the sum of 4 DPS, assuming the DPS are worth their salt. I know a lot of them aren't... but if the issue is that the tank is doing more DPS than the DPS, then tank up-time is definitely not the issue that is causing the group being unable to beat the enrage timer. If the DPS are doing their job, 10 to 15 seconds tank uptime should definitely not matter.

[NotADps]

the issue is not running into enrage because of those few gcds the tank would lose. the thing is just losing dps for no reason, since if you do it right(the tank on 1 side, pt on the other, healer on the back), and have shield(succor,aspected helios) you dont take nearly enough dmg to die. and speaking of uptimes, the worse this would cause is 1 extra healing gcd for at least 2 the tank would lose, therefore a dps loss since the tanks losing more than the healer. also you can tank swap and still stay in front with the marker for better cd uptime on the busters

[Samsta]

the issue is not running into enrage because of those few gcds the tank would lose. the thing is just losing dps for no reason, since if you do it right(the tank on 1 side, pt on the other, healer on the back), and have shield(succor,aspected helios) you dont take nearly enough dmg to die.

Losing dps literally doesnt matter as long as you don't hit the enrage, the damage they lose absolutely will not make a difference, all it does is it adds healing pressure and potential wipes. It's irritating that because tanks cant be bothered to swap the healer has to make up for it, just do the mechanics as they are meant to be done. The extra time and mp spent to aoe heal the huge damage is not negligible, what is negligible is the few tank cgd's they lose.

[Thoosa]

I’ve yet to be in a group who says they want to do warrior strategy and then are actually able to do it. Usually it fails the first time and they do normal after. :P

I’ve also seen groups asking to send tanks to the back and then expecting them to survive the bomb and doom strike, so when I get groups like that I shirk.

Most of the time groups just struggle with dps and make stupid mistakes on the mechanics and it seems a rarity to even beat it, even in clear “you must know what you’re doing, fail and be kicked” groups which are set at a high level requirement. :P

[Dualgunner]

Should reasonably be less than 1/4th of the sum of 4 DPS, assuming the DPS are worth their salt. I know a lot of them aren't... but if the issue is that the tank is doing more DPS than the DPS, then tank up-time is definitely not the issue that is causing the group being unable to beat the enrage timer. If the DPS are doing their job, 10 to 15 seconds tank uptime should definitely not matter.

I think the question was more "Why did you word it so weird?" Instead of "Less than 1/4 of 4 dps" you could have said "Less than a dps" and been far more succinct in your message.

As far as the damage it's not something a gcd or two of healing can't recover and tank dps is worth more per gcd than healer dps.

Some people like optimizing like that. Advertise your pf to specifically avoid it if you don't wanna run like that.

[HoodRat]

Losing dps literally doesnt matter as long as you don't hit the enrage, the damage they lose absolutely will not make a difference, all it does is it adds healing pressure and potential wipes. It's irritating that because tanks cant be bothered to swap the healer has to make up for it, just do the mechanics as they are meant to be done. The extra time and mp spent to aoe heal the huge damage is not negligible, what is negligible is the few tank cgd's they lose.

The added "healing pressure" is insignificant unless your group doesn't know what they're doing. And if they don't know what they're doing, losing dps probably matters even more.

If the DPS are doing their job, 10 to 15 seconds tank uptime should definitely not matter.

If everyone is doing their job, there's no reason not to keep that uptime.

[HyoMinPark]

Losing dps literally doesnt matter as long as you don't hit the enrage, the damage they lose absolutely will not make a difference, all it does is it adds healing pressure and potential wipes. It's irritating that because tanks cant be bothered to swap the healer has to make up for it, just do the mechanics as they are meant to be done. The extra time and mp spent to aoe heal the huge damage is not negligible, what is negligible is the few tank cgd's they lose.

All a healer has to do to protect the party from the additional damage they’ll take from having one proximity AOE up front is to shield the party. Everyone else except the marked healer just stands in the corner opposite from the marked tank to reduce the proximity damage while also allowing melee to keep uptime. Everyone should have shields on them.

You should always have an SCH or Noct AST in your party; Succor/Deployed Adlo or Noct Aspected Helios are enough to mitigate some the damage, with the second healer healing up the party before any following raid-wide AOE (e.g., Acid Rain); the healer that had to run back can single-target heal themselves if they don’t make it to the safe corner in time and take a bit of extra damage, or have a single target shield/mitigation on themselves, like Adlo, Noct A.Benefic, or Divine Benison. Tanks can also Reprisal; a WAR can SiO; PLDs can opt to last-second Passage of Arms if they want, but with shields/Reprisal/SiO, it shouldn’t be necessary. That all seems to fit within the job description of healing and mitigating damage; nothing out of the ordinary there, and none of these options really take that much more effort to do. Why have a tank lose GCDs when it is literally 1 GCD of adjustment on the healer’s part (e.g., casting Succor instead of Broil II)?

Mind you, healers do significantly less damage than a good tank, so healer damage isn’t a good arguing point there. And, like I said, the “healing adjustments” are negligible, and should be performed anyways—really and truly, the shield healer should always be shielding for that damage (or any AOE damage, really) to try and mitigate as much as possible, regardless of where the markers end up going. If they aren’t doing that, then they aren’t playing their job correctly.