Can we remove Tank Stance?

[Reinha]

*Large dungeon trash pulls
*healer(s) are down
*Fresh content
*MT just died
*Enmity reset
*Add phase

Should tank stances be removed, I don't think these situations would cause problems even for below average players if some skills were given a bigger enmity bonus. Add phase and dungeon pulls would be covered by having AoE skills give more enmity. Enmity resets, tank swaps and MT deaths could be handled if enmity combos and the attack for ranged pulling produced more enmity. Situations where the defensive aspect is useful, like in fresh content and when healers die, could be taken into account by turning tank stance into a defensive cooldown or by reducing the recast time of existing defensive cooldowns.

[Gemina]

Should tank stances be removed, I don't think these situations would cause problems even for below average players if some skills were given a bigger enmity bonus. Add phase and dungeon pulls would be covered by having AoE skills give more enmity. Enmity resets, tank swaps and MT deaths could be handled if enmity combos and the attack for ranged pulling produced more enmity. Situations where the defensive aspect is useful, like in fresh content and when healers die, could be taken into account by turning tank stance into a defensive cooldown or by reducing the recast time of existing defensive cooldowns.

The list I brought up are just 'good' times to go back into tank stance. Where the use of the GCD and MP cost hurt the least so-to-speak. Grabbing hate while in DPS stance is still not that big of an issue so long as your group is working with you. Large pulls in dungeons is a bit of an exception to this because you can already be in tank stance prior to the pull.

As I said before, taking away tank stances would force a rework for the devs because abilities are tied to them. Another reason is simply playstyle preference and a lot of tanks want to swap stances because it gives them a little more to do and think about while tanking. I don't feel taking it away would really hurt the game, but we'd probably just end up with three very similar tanks unless they can figure out a way around that.

[Dav2017]

tank is fun
watching enemies ass is not fun
lol

[Vnolan]

My dps is ok

As a tank I'm more concerned on properly keeping the aggro than on doing some more numbers.

wew

There's no advantage to having two, three or ten times as much aggro as the player in second on the list (the white bars with numbers at the bottom of job icons). The OT can provoke and then shirk the main tank, healers have lucid, casters have lucid and diversion, ranged have refresh and tactician, melee have diversion and NIN has Shadewalker and Smokescreen.

If we're talking lvl 70 content, the MT should use their hate combo once in the opener and that's it, especially if they're going to sit in tank stance. This is basic stuff. If you hear or see a tank using Rage of Halone, Butcher's Block or Power Slash and they already have a large enmity lead, they're new to tanking, they're watching TV or they're just bad.

The OT should not be using their hate combo unless they're establishing hate on an add. If a tank swap is being done, the OT will provoke, at which point, the MT will shirk them. If the OT is in tank stance or uses a hate combo while provoking, they're bad or they think the MT is bad (doesn't how to shirk).

Tanks don't go dps stance because the extra dps is needed - if that's the case the DPS in the party are bad - they go dps stance because there is no reason not to. An extra GCD from a healer every now and then if it's even needed isn't going to match the extra dps the tank puts out.

There is no stance dancing. The main tank will have tank stance on for the opening hate combo and that's it.

Tanks lead the party. I'm saying that's why I don't like playing them. They decide the pace of the run. In dungeons anyway.

Not always. If the healer is undergeared, big pulls aren't happening. If the healer is dpsing while keeping the tank healed and the healer decides to pull more, what's the tank going to say, "Spamming one skill is too hard, please don't pull more"?

[Shougun]

Just an aside, I feel like the tank system is flawed at least in their own concerns of when they thought of dark knight. They didn't want a blood tank because they didn't want players harming themselves, they felt it would create issues (at least one of the issues presented against blood magic). The thing is leaving tank stance is effectively harming yourself as your eHP does change. Kind of, imo, makes it seem like a blood tank is back on the table if it's okay to fiddle with your own eHP for damage (tank stance -> not).

[AxlStream]

Also implying all tank stances give defence. Warriors just get max hp and 20% heals.

[shao32]

Also implying all tank stances give defence. Warriors just get max hp and 20% heals.

Well let's be fair, at contrary that DRK and PLD, WAR have equilibrium heal every 60s and inner beast spam in defiance making it being the best defensive tank in the game by a mile, so it's already overcompensated.

[whiskeybravo]

Well let's be fair, at contrary that DRK and PLD, WAR have equilibrium heal every 60s and inner beast spam in defiance making it being the best defensive tank in the game by a mile, so it's already overcompensated.

Have you done Final Omega on War? I know I'm not the most optimal player but I haven't found a way to mitigate the random Target Analysis busters or short stacks without Defiance, outside of just making my healers deal with it. DRK/PLD do not require tank stance to mitigate these since they have Sheltron and TBN. "Best defensive tank by a mile" does have it's shortcomings.

[shao32]

Have you done Final Omega on War? I know I'm not the most optimal player but I haven't found a way to mitigate the random Target Analysis busters or short stacks without Defiance, outside of just making my healers deal with it. DRK/PLD do not require tank stance to mitigate these since they have Sheltron and TBN. "Best defensive tank by a mile" does have it's shortcomings.

i said in defiance is the best defensive tank by a mile with is true, DRK and PLD on they respective tank stances can't compete against the amount of mitigation and self healing of defiance kit + regular kit of WAR.

target analysis can be done easily with holmgang or his current kit, what a surprise, you can even take the hit alone if you get the vuln and healers have a lot of healing power to dealt with you HP without any problem, even if you use defiance and inner beast you can minimize the penalty with unchained, so i don't see any really shortcoming with the most ridiculously versatile kit of the game, specially for only 1 fight.

[Tsukino]

I wouldn't mind this. I don't particularly love or hate the tank stances, but it does seem like there are a lot of duty finder tanks who read what static raid group tanks post on forums about the "right" way to play and then fail all over the place.