Ranged Tank...

[kidalutz]

I practically never play Tank but not for the reason many might assume. I also never play Sam, Nin, Mnk, or Drg. I simply don't like melee classes at all. That got me thinking about the idea of a ranged/caster Tank just for the hell of it and whether it would work for something lik Puppetmaster. Simple lore explanation being that the aetheric bond to control the puppet goes both ways and so you suffer the damage of your puppet while the puppet would obviously have abilities and defenses that a human might not.

Honestly not something at all that I'm saying they should make, just a random thought that I felt was interesting and could make a very different kind of tank. Of course I know their would be all sorts of potential problems (positioning comes to mind right off the bat) and it's not something I would ever expect but I was curious, do you think a "ranged tank" of some sort would be plausible and if so how would you think to make it work?

No a ranged Tank simply wouldnt work if you need and example of why theres several you ever witness the aftermath of what happens when ranged people pull bosses? Thats right they run right into the group and everyone panics and dies a boss will by default move right into the person who has the most aggro which in turn would mean one of two things either the bosses would need new mechanics built around that ranged tank or dps would be screwed as they would be forced to constantly move out positionals in order to follow the kited boss around the room.and the turrets would lose casts when the boss got kited behind just as they were about through a cast.

[Khalithar]

Wow, did no one in this thread ever play the Star Wars Old Republic MMO? Guess not. Alright then, let me say that yes a ranged tank absolutely can work, does work, and could work in this game if it was designed in a similar vein to the ranged tanks in SWTOR and adjusted accordingly. If you do not believe it can work, you are in fact mistaken and I will explain why.

To elaborate, I will explain how the ranged tanks in SWTOR worked and add that while I didn't main it as my tank I absolutely had tons of fun playing it. I will go in to more details about it using the Empire version which was what I played. One of the four classes of the empire was the Bounty Hunter and it could go in to an advanced class (similar to the job system only you change at level 10) called a Powertech which had a tank spec. The main weapon of the Powertech was a pistol and that's what it used for it's attacks, also the majority of it's weapon skills were ranged attacks such as missiles and flamethrowers along with some powerful AoE attacks. Mechanically speaking, the tank had the same cooldowns and mitigation tools as any other tank but the majority of it's "weapon skills" were ranged attacks.

Now I hear you asking, "but Khalithar you charismatic stallion, don't enemies run up to the tank and melee them making the ranged point moot?" To answer your question, yes but no. There were indeed many enemies that were melee and you as a Powertech tank would just stand close to them and hit them point blank in the face with pistol shots, missiles, and your flamethrowers while CCing, aoeing, holding aggro, controlling positioning and mitigating cooldowns. The only real difference were that in situations where you had to run out of melee range, the Powertech could maintain their DPS on a target better than the other tanks in addition to having better AoE damage.

So yes, a "ranged tank" could absolutely work in this game if they follow a similar route. I'm not saying they will or they should, but as I said, SWTOR already proved that you CAN have a ranged tank even with melee focused enemies and it can absolutely work in FFXIV if they were to make say... a Magitek style tank armed with a ranged weapon and similar Magitek gadgets. It probably wouldn't work with a spellcaster though since you can be interrupted while casting and during magic casting you can't parry or block.

[MaraD_]

I dont think we need a ranged tank just for the sake of the diversity in the role.

this logic applies to all roles.
also, all roles dont need to be the same for uniformity sakes eithers.

Puppet master like tank would be a nightmare for healers. Puppet would eat all aoes all the time.

you forget the player is another bar of health the healers now have to keep up.
if anything it would be unfair to make a pet take AoE dmg. (But for gameplay sakes, id have a short CD like sheltron, meant to neutralize most AoE dmg, except the few for special mechanics, which it would lower them based on the content.)
As long as the player dodges the AoEs, theres no reason to also make them have the pet dodge them too. simply an "AoE mitigation only" CD is fine.

Stuff...
So yes, a "ranged tank" could absolutely work in this game if they follow a similar route.
Stuff...

As the poseter above me stated, having the option to maintain your DPS when having to get out of AoEs, or mechanics require you to stay away from the boss, is still part of being a ranged DPS.
as a ranged DPS ive stayed in melee range in most fights, due to cones which grow harder to dodge, the further away u were from the boss.
along with being out of range of aoe heals if i was too far away.

there are definitely issues with pet healing, if the game doesnt handle the pet client side, like your own character.
no one disagrees with that.
you have to adjust the content obviously.

the best way to position the pet, is honestly with the MC themselves. having the pet tank the whole fight, i feel isnt very good either.
The pet should be a temporary thing.
Mostly likely u build up a bar/gauge, and when u summon it, its in ur current position.
Its HP is your gauge/bar. the ONLY way for it to be healed, is for YOU to be healed. (making things easier on healers)
Various ways can handle this, depending on how much of the UI would be adjusted by the DEVs, such as when you are healed, the heal is redirected to it, IF you are at max current HP. (to your gauge/bar) or your HP is constantly feeding HP to the gauge/bar, to reflect the pets damage intake. (In the later, a "reverse shield" colored bar could show how much healing is needed, before the pet is back to full, and the tank stops feeding HP to it.)
how you want CDs to work with it, doesnt matter too much, w/e flavor u want to give it.
but when its out, its enmity is considered based on YOUR enmity.
YOU need to have the highest enmity of the group, for your pet to be hit. you simply pick it to be attacked when summoned.
(you could have an extra provoke, and give it threat, but this creates imbalance in other ways)
The pets attacks dont actually generate threat. (and at most, are a weak DoT)
Its a mitigation tool for the tank.
it can be used for offense (mostly will be) for TBs (as an HP shield) or to cheeze mechanics by having the tank get into a range position for a boss mechanic.

having a boss run across the field, because the pet dies, and dashes to the player isnt always a very good idea for melee uptime on the boss, so the player needs to plan out how to handle this.
(as all tanks should do, if they plan to provoke from a distance)
unsummoning preserves the gauges/bars spot/progress, but allows the boss to move towards the player.
This way the player can be ready to move the boss themselves, rather than having the pet do it.

over all, it may be different, and require the ranged tank players to get used to it, but it can work just fine in FFXIV. (the pet isnt a requirement, just a way to do it differently, based on making more than 1 ranged tank, such as caster tanks, who wont have the freedom of movement a physical ranged would have. but thats another long reply)

[TouchandFeel]

*pet tanking ideas

I actually created a ranged tanking build on my Mesmer in Guild Wars 2 that functioned similar to what you are describing.

For those not familiar with Mesmers in GW2, their gimmick was that they would summon different illusions of themselves that would do different things before disappearing or would stick around until destroyed but had very little health so would die very quickly. You were able to summon multiple illusions at once and with enough frequency that you could easily string them together to constantly have at least one up. You could also detonate certain illusions to create a sudden burst of damage, also freeing you up to summon more illusions to replace the ones you just blew up.

Basically what I did was dual-spec between a ranged and melee build which allowed me to summon more durable melee illusions that would directly engage the enemy and keep agro on them, while I stayed back summoned some ranged attack illusions and blasted the enemy from a distance. Once my melee illusion was getting towards the end of its brief life or when I wanted to preposition the enemy I would then position myself in the direction that I wanted the enemy to move, detonate the melee illusion, allow the enemy to then came at me until it was in the place that I wanted it and then sick a new melee illusion on it to keep it in place.

So it is definitely possible to do a fully ranged tank if something like the above was done, but it would definitely be way more complex than what we have now with the other tank and likely far more difficult to control. Still could potentially be pretty darn cool though and I really loved my Mesmer build.

So some general off-the-cuff ideas and thoughts on implementing something like that in this game.
- You would likely have to have a primary "tanking" summon that you would summon and destroy to keep agro on and position the boss.
- Your "tanking" summon would have to redirect damage to the tank just so that there is enough of a similarity with how the tank takes damage compared to the others to not complicate how healers would deal with the tank and how stats/gear would work. A "Cover-like" link between the summon and you could pretty much do this, visual representation and distance need not apply.

[Videra]

There really isn't a plausible way to make a ranged tank.

[Valic]

Beast Tamer, plz look forward to it.