Is Tank the happiest/most satisfied role right now?

[Vyrerus]

Stormblood was very much a crossroads for this game's design. Prior to that, a lot of fights required tanks to take an active role in positioning the boss like you would see in most trinity-based MMOs that preceded it. The primary reason for the change had to do with the fact that mobs are required to stop to 'cast' any action (auto-attacks included), and movement can prevent and even cancel mob act

Ehh, nah. Almost no tanks really cared about doing that. In fact, it was mostly relegated by the game design itself to the Off Tank, most of the time. I'll list off the bosses that have been in the game where it's been applicable to care about their positioning, dating back to ARR 2.0. I'll also list bosses that move without tank's input.


Halatali - Thunderclap Guivre - It's the tanks job to get enmity and then move it away from the center of the room. Also their job to stun it as many times as possible when it ignores the tank and enmity completely to try and return to the pit center and electrify all of the ground that isn't the in ramps to the room. First boss where the boss doing mechanics ignores the tank completely.

Ifrit Normal Mode - Tank pulls Ifrit in any direction up against a wall. Player made need to ignore Ifrit's positioning to strike the nail that spawns if DPS aren't doing their job.

Brayflox Longstop (altered, no longer relevant to discussion) - Used to move Aiatar out of poison puddles. Said to be first test of a decent tank. Now it just shits puddles everywhere, and doesn't really need to be move at all. No tank really enjoyed moving it, and would stun as many Toxic Vomits as possible to stop from having to move it, since moving it lowered damage dealt.

Titan Normal Mode - Tank pulls Titan to the edge, so no one else gets cleaved, but Titan aims column AOEs at other party members and gaols as well. Tank is exempt from being targeted with them.

Sunken Temple of Qarn - Temple Guardian - Another boss whose mechanics cause it to ignore enmity, always following through with a set rotation where it will do telegraphed AOEs, followed by a knockback stun on one random party member, and then do a room wide AOE that can be stunned if the tank is on the ball and has a stun ready (and stuns the body).

Cutter's Cry - Giant Sandworm - Sandworm ignores enmity when diving underground. Pursues one random party member, and will also turn and spit sludge on random party members as well.

Stone Vigil - Chudo Yudo - When he moves to do Swinge, the tank cannot control it. Koschei - Good for tank to face it away from party and move it out of tornados if a party member causes one to be on top of it somehow. Isgebind - Good for tank to face it at a wall and position themselves away from party before it lands after doing its "divebombs."

Dzemael Darkhold - All-Seeing Eye - Tank has to move it into the Crystal Fields for it to be vulnerable. This only needs to be done twice with an average group. Tank also needs to pick up adds, which can be ignored due to crystal field near invulnerability for Tank. All pretty annoying. May have changed. Have not run this dungeon in over two years.

Garuda Normal - Keep her at the edge away from rock pillars. Similar to Ifrit/Titan. In phase 2 tank cannot control her facing, party has to watch her.

Aurum Vale - Locksmith - Actually more valuable for tank to not move it, so that its wide cleaves aren't angled anywhere else. Precise movement into and out of AOEs, along with stunning Gold Dust every other time helps with this. Miser's Mistress - Tank should face her away from party, but keep her still. She moves of her own accord to lay eggs, always far from where she is currently tanked.

Wanderer's Palace - Giant Bavarois - When using Amorphic Flail, it will target a non-tank party member and chase them down. One of the few early bosses stoppable by original Holmgang but no other tanks could/can. Tonberry King - Tank can move him, but accepted strat is keeping it dead center to keep it as far as possible from all Tonberries. Fight is not controlled in the slightest by the tank.

Castrum Meridianum - Every boss is more or less, MT tanks boss against a wall or without moving it at all, while OT gathers adds. Gathering trash packs to be demolished by cannons is the most interesting movement based tank experience in the original dungeon. It has since changed, but new bosses aren't anymore exciting falling under newer design choices.

Praetorium - Everything was literally tank and spank with either don't move the boss or keep boss faced against a wall. Changed to AOE dodging in modern era. Fairly boring for tank either way.

Amdapor Keep - Psycheflayer - Before we outgeared this place, this boss would animate three golems. Two function as adds that needed to be kill, while one was a giant that forced you to move the boss. Everyone's idea of a good run of this place was only having to move the boss once and later, killing it before needing to move it.
Demon Wall - Tank can't move it.
Anantaboga - Tank's job to position it such that the party can always be behind one of the safety pillars. Fight design was never changed, but eventually power creep caused mechanics to no longer be necessary, negating the need to move it. One of a few instances I've heard tanks complain about over the years, perhaps because Anantaboga sports frontal and back cleaves, requring it to be positioned unlike any other major boss back then.

Ifrit HM - Pull to wall, facing wall, tank and spank.
Titan HM - Same as Ifrit HM
Garuda HM - When she didn't die so fast, you had to move her and the adds along the wall, at a speed dictated by the rotation of the tornados. OT needed to keep at least one add, preferably both.

Binding Coil of Bahamut:
Caduceus - No need to move it until it split, though the tank needed to move themselves to prevent extra slime spawns. After split, just needed to keep the snakes far enough apart that they didn't fuse, facing out against a wall or just away from party.
ADS and Mini ADSes - Just keep faced away from party. No control over where their AOEs go. Goes for the ones in T2 as well.
Turn 4 - OT keeps lesser robots away from Dreadnaughts unless planning to feed spiders (which was mostly done by prepositioning healers on top of MT for first Dreadnaught.) Facing and positioning largely dictated by where the monsters spawn, rather than by the completely circular arena.
Twintania - Move it after it drops a neurolink, otherwise keep still and faced away from party. DPS basically determine when you move it. Group/strat dictates where. Tank just does it.


Good King Moggle Mog HM/EX - Tanks take King/Tank Adds to opposite edges. There's no controlling the positioning of all the other moogles.

Leviathan HM/Ex - Leviathan's head and tail must both be tanked on their respective sides of the ship. Only the OT tanks the adds and interrupts the dreadwash guy. Tank doesn't control positioning/it's irrelevant.

Ramuh HM/EX - Tanks cannot reposition Ramuh. Tanks have to get orbs and tank swap accordingly, swapping out where they stand in front of him.

Copperbell HM - All bosses - Mechanics dictate where the tank moves them which for the first and third is done a single time (to the edge of the bridge/out of the sand), though in the case of the second boss the boss moves completely of its own accord after it's damaged enough, and the tank only controls where its ground cleave goes.

Pharos Sirius - Symond the Unsinkable - You have to keep him out of the corrupted crystal fields he creates, but this isn't up to the tank, but up to the different patterns vs. where you stand.

Labyrinth of the Ancients:
Boner Dragon - Pulled North or Kept in Center. Data Centers disagree, ultimately making Tank on Boss irrelevant (it's North you scrublords). All other tanks take the skeletons as far from it and other skeletons as possible. Not a big ask on repositioning at all.
Acheron/Phlegethon - Just pull it slightly out of center so it walking back to cast Ancient Flare can be seen, but also so no one as further to run to their pads than anyone else. Not necessary though, so tanking largely irrelevant again.

Second Coil:
Rafflesia - Tanks have to swap, and both tanks have to move it out of bulbs /away from bulbs at some point, keeping it faced away from party due to cleaves. Positioning it dictated by where the bulbs fall/how fast DPS can clear a bulb if you don't wanna move it. One of the most movement intensive fights.
Melusine - MT holds Melusine still. OT attempts to catch the adds that move where they spawn. The other adds don't move. DPS or Healers determine Renaud positions, which may or may not make the MT adjust Melusine's position.
Uncle Toucher(err The Avatar, right.) - Cannot be moved, only his facing can be controlled. MT faces him north and occasionally picks up the dreadnaught add. OT is replaced by a fifth DPS.
Nael deus Darnus - Faced out and away, positioning by tank is unimportant, just maintain uptime while completing mechanics. OT again replaced by fifth DPS.

Syrcus Tower:
Scylla - Keep center
G-man Labiosayasafsafsd - Keep center
Amon - Keep center
Xande - Keep center

Shiva HM/Ex - She will move based on Tank following mechanics, minimize movement after mechanics, bring her to the wall during Bow for her targeted knockback shot. Take back to centerish when she goes back to Sword or Staff. Not a big ask on positioning. People annoyed by what little there is. Also tank swaps, sometimes.

Final Coil:
Imdugud - Keep Center by North facing out. OT pick up adds. MT pick up other adds and keep separate. Minimize movement, so ideally tanked where they spawn facing out and away from party.
Kaliya - Kept centered and controls the entire party's positioning via ADS adds, and then later Nanospore Jets/Tethers.
Phoenix - Center and later close to where it comes out of the fire from the add phase. Adds moved away from adds during add phase is only real movement asked of tanks.
Bahamut - Movement during Wyvern adds, keep them apart. One movement per add, and can be preempted. Later on keep Puk adds away from Diresaur adds if DPS didn't kill quickly enough. Barely an ask.

World of Darkness:
Ahriman - Keep Centered and unmoving
5 Headed Dragon - Keep north and unmoving
Cerberus - Keep faced away from alliance, biased center north for chains, but ultimately not required.
Cloud of Darkness - Position controlled by monster, not by tank.

Sastasha HM - Kraken - no control from tank, though tanking it does determine who the tentacles shoot
Hullbreaker Isle - Kraken - no tank required, enmity doesn't even matter.

Stone Vigil HM -
Groynich - Tank can't control where it goes for Swinge
Cuca Fera - Tank not required, enmity doesn't matter. NPCs tank it.
Giruveganaus - Tank can't control either, enmity doesn't matter

Steps of Faith - Vishap cannot be tanked, only the adds. One tank is relegated to cannon firing/dragon killer firing, other positions the adds just in front of Vishap's hit box. Vaguely interesting, but largely boring since it's just gathering trash packs and occasionally stunning bigger adds specials. Whole fight is spent moving by everyone. Nerfed into the ground where cannons don't even matter no more.

Chrysalis - Nabriales goes where the hell he wants via Ascian teleportation. Facing dark sprites out if they spawn during taking balls to the face phase is appreciated by on the ball tanks, if the sprites aren't kill super fast (but anyone can do this if they get enough enmity by damaging the sprites, doesn't require tank levels of enmity management).

Keeper of the Lake:
Magitek Gunship - Targets and goes after whoever it wants. Tank isn't completely irrelevant as there are adds to pick up, and controlling the boss's facing does control where its sustained flamethrower conal goes. Not a big ask.
Midgardsormr - Cannot be moved or controlled. Its possessed dragons can be, but they gain near invulnerability when moved too far from their spawn positions.

I probably missed a few, but that's all that came to mind from ARR dungeons and raids when it comes to tank responsibility and movement. Ones I didn't list I either didn't remember or had no strong need for movement one way or the other, whether the boss was controllable in that regard or not.

Onto Heavensward!

Dusk Vigil:
Ser Yuhlmeric - You can move him to avoid his acquiring damage ups from his adds/giving them to the adds, but it's not necessary and so forgettable I can't even recall what the buffs actually are.
Ophinicus - Moving it behind the rubble piles preemptively is pretty nice for tanks to do. Not a big ask.

Ravana - face away from party, at north center edge. OT controls where Surpanakhas go. Ravana recenters himself several times and becomes unmovable while casting the various slaughters.
Ravana Ex - P. much the same, except you can collect the Surpanakhas marker off whoever it goes on before facing it away from party

Sohm Al:
First boss keeps centered on its own/makes no sense to move anyway
Second boss leaps to the different jellies and cannot be stopped from moving by the tank
Tioman - kept against the wall

Dragon's Aery - Gyascutus - Tank may have to move it out of poison clouds, but most of the time not.

The Vault - Nadda

Bismarck - Only the adds and only sorta.
Bismark Ex - P. much the same

Great Gubal Library:
Can't control Demon Book position. It controls you!
2nd Boss nadda
The Everling Bibliograph or w/e - Repositions itself to center for Void gates and AOEs

Aetherochemical Research Facility:
Regula van Hydrus - largely not controlled by the tank, repositions self all over the arena
Harcmachis - Doesn't need repositioning
Ascians/Ascian Prime - Nothin'

Thordan Storymode - Face away from party
Thordan Ex - Keep First Two Adds apart, Move Thordan for each Dragon's Eye/turn sideways/keep on edge. More movement than usual.

Neverreap - Waukkeon - Goes untargetable and uncontrollable when its wind stacks reach what was it, 10? 16? IDR. Best thing tank can do when it is controllable is keep it on the side, but iirc, it only does it knockback after it comes out of being untargetable, meaning the tank doesn't control that either, whoopsie.

Fractal Continuum - The Curator - Tank controls where it is, and this controls which squares will be exploded. Precise positioning lets your party ignore most of that kinda.

Saint Mocianne's Arboreteum:
Rose Garden - Stays center and returns center to do its spinning bad breath. Tank no controllie.
Queen Hawk - Repositions center for Assail. Can be moved to dodge the bees on the outside. Not a lot of movement
Belladonna goes center when it spawns the bulb adds each time. Has a donut AOE best controlled by keeping it center.

Sohr Khai - Hraesvelgr - Tank controls which platform he's at, but there are no positionals and it has no tank directed cleaves.

Hullbreaker HM:
Sanguine Sirens - Only the Roegadyn/Lalafells can be tanked. Everything else just has to be dealth with/healed through
Ymir - Pull it away from detonating ice/by sticky puddles to dodge lightning. It slicks the floor though, making precise control difficult
Mistbeard - nadda

Pharos Sirius HM - Nadda (and second boss leaps around uncontrollably)

Great Gubal HM - Strix - Tank should pull boss to each puddle or comet hiding spot asap. Obvious, not a big ask.

Gordias:
A1(s) - Pull big bosses apart, not a lot of movement for tanks.
A2(s) - Designate who's getting what, most things are grouped close to where they spawn
A3 - Keep centered for Wash Away. Turn giant hand towards grouped party
A3s - Same as above, but separate/bring together smaller hands phase QUICKLY. Later on, move Living Liquid out of path of ball that heals him. Keep LL out of puddles.
A4(s) - Boss stationary, adds not, but Tanks don't really handle the adds.

Void Ark:
First Boss huge, like 1/5th of the arena. Moves on its own. Tanked where it starts and where it lands.
Second Boss - 1 tank takes dog, 1 tank takes tree. Third tank shoves their thumb up their ass and pretends to be DPS
Cuchulain - Boss tank and spanked. Flan adds should be pulled out of its succccc path. Barely tank control movement required.
Echidna - Separate the snakes, you fools. Yay minor tank responsibility from every tank \o/

Sephirot HM/Ex - Face away from party. Move away from green shit. Kill adds where they spawn. Designate one tank for each add type. Boss unmovable in phase 2.

Sophia HM/ex - Tank swaps and moving to whichever side ain't gonna kill you by gravity. Positioning dictated by Sophia's meteor scales.

Weeping City of Mhach:
Arachne Eve - Tanked center, recenters for web mechs and the ground succc mechs. Not much movement going on.
Forgall - Dragged to green puddles if needed, otherwise not much movement. All three tanks participate in add phase, but not much movement still. Dragon tank has biggest responsibility in not getting alliance tail cleaved
Ozma - Giant, unmovable
Caliofisteri - Tanked by a single tank. Can be controlled at first, letting tank give alliance more uptime/ranged not have to move. Later on, executes moves more quickly, not allowing tank to do this. Very low damage dealt to tank, could be soloed by WAR at the time, given enough time, if alliance already did the DPS add phase with the shampoo balls.

Zurvan (ex) - Recenters for most mechs. Kept center because no need to move. Faced away from party. Mechanics take precedence. Adds grouping is biggest control given to tanks. Minor.

Dun Scaith:
Doomgaze - Giant, unmovable.
Ferdiad Hollow - Small, moveable, but not needed to be moved often. Freezes in place for long casts several times throughout fight
Scathach - Small, moveable, but often leaps away to do things. Doesn't need positioning, though Connla should be kept away from her.
Diabolos (Hollow) - Kept where spawned until moves on his own. One other tank needs to soak meteor/go in big door and tank shadow dragon. No movement really required

Midas:
A5(s) - Move Mr. Moblin Hulk as dictated by which of the puddles you need to drink from. There's some adds that dictate some other movements out of the OT
A6(s) - Each robot is different, but there's not a lot of boss movement for each of them until Vortexer really, if memory serves, but even then the movement is due to mechanics requiring the tank to move rather than the boss.
A7(s) - There's a lot of movement for the tanks and the boss due to the trap rooms, giant balls of death, giant AOEs, and the Cat's Heart. One of the most interesting arenas in an FFXIV fight actually, changing from a small circle constrained by spikes to a giant rectangle constrained by giant balls of death.
A8(s) - Most of the robots are tanked where they start, with needing them to be apart and killed fast. Lots of strange positioning requirements out of the whole party. There's a few drastic movements out of tanks throughout its many phases.

Creator:
A9(s) - Boss itself does not move. All positioning is done for adds, and is dictated by which area is being dunked into the lava next.
A10(s) - Positioning of boss dictated by which trap buttons are being pressed and when
A11(s) - Boss held to edge most of the time with extra care to point it away from group and the arena generators in the final phase. Recenters for quite a few mechanics
A12(s) - Large, in charge, repositions itself for a lot of the fight. Is kept where it goes as the party moves to it or in the center.

There's more HW dungeon bosses to mention, but this monstrosity of a post is getting too large as is. Suffice it to say though, that bosses not requiring a lot of movement out of tanks in Stormblood was nothing new. It was just made more obvious by the move towards several bosses in a row being large and unmovable. It was less a crossroads in the game's design, and more a, "Yeah, no one cares about boss movement. We'll just do whatever we feel like as we have been."

[Renathras]

Ehh, nah. Almost no tanks really cared about doing that. In fact, it was mostly relegated by the game design itself to the Off Tank, most of the time. I'll list off the bosses that have been in the game where it's been applicable to care about their positioning, dating back to ARR 2.0. I'll also list bosses that move without tank's input.

...

There's more HW dungeon bosses to mention, but this monstrosity of a post is getting too large as is. Suffice it to say though, that bosses not requiring a lot of movement out of tanks in Stormblood was nothing new. It was just made more obvious by the move towards several bosses in a row being large and unmovable. It was less a crossroads in the game's design, and more a, "Yeah, no one cares about boss movement. We'll just do whatever we feel like as we have been."

That's an impressive post.

I never realized to this level that it really has always been this way. Huh.

[Oizen]

I think the tank moving the boss point has just been all the more obvious in the abyssos tier because there was exactly one count of it needing to be done, in P5S.
Bosses like P8SP1 and P6S feel like they should have boss movement, but the hitboxes are now so large theres really no point.

I think its had more of a impact on the the balance of DPS jobs really, Melee DPS feels over-rewarded now that Melee downtime is more or less a thing of the past.

[Lyth]

...

You've missed the forest for the trees. It's not about whether you personally 'cared' about movement-based optimizations, but rather whether you were savvy enough to know how they could make a difference to your teammates.

In ARR and Heavensward, you pretty much have free control of boss movement outside of cast locks. There may be standardized locations where you reposition by convention (i.e. to move your team into a safezone, or because NA/EU historically preferred N when JP preferred center) and then hold the boss in a static position during specific phases, but boss movement is by and large under your control. And there are plenty of fights where efficient movement is required, as reading through your own examples demonstrate. Midas Savage had the best overall level of tank responsibility around this, with every single fight requiring effective re-positioning at minimum. One of my favorite mechanics was the Phoenix jump effect where the boss returns to where the active tank is standing during a transition. Midas had some great examples (like the jail phase of A7S) where you could pre-position yourself in the ideal position so that melee could immediately rotate off the lock and into the rear of the boss hitbox. And this was at a time when directional autos were a thing and in some cases accounted for 40% of your outgoing damage.

The reason why all this changed is because of a gameplay glitch which allowed players to break the boss script, because casts were being interrupted by movement. It's also the reason why more modern fights follow a time script rather than following percentage-based phase transitions, and why they removed the knockback/draw-in actions from PvE. From Stormblood on you start to see bosses constantly overriding your control in order to position and even re-orientate themselves in order to set-up mechanics. It's not uncommon to see a boss move to centre, reorientate due north, and then start casting a mechanic, whereas previously it would be the tank's responsibility to do that repositioning before the lock happened (and if you were angled, then the mechanic itself would occur at an angle).

Believe it or not, there still are fights even this expansion where tanks have a degree of control over movement, but they happen sporadically (and they tend to be the points where you can clearly tell a competent tank from one who isn't up to snuff). It may just affect a GCD or two of uptime at points because of a static positioning error going into a mechanic, but your melee will certainly notice, even if you don't.

[RyuDragnier]

I think the tank moving the boss point has just been all the more obvious in the abyssos tier because there was exactly one count of it needing to be done, in P5S.
Bosses like P8SP1 and P6S feel like they should have boss movement, but the hitboxes are now so large theres really no point.

I think its had more of a impact on the the balance of DPS jobs really, Melee DPS feels over-rewarded now that Melee downtime is more or less a thing of the past.

Off tangent here, but I was cackling when I read this, for a second my mind read it as pspsp like you were calling a cat.