Enmity Management, Do we want it back?

[Valence]

Small precision, tank stance before the changes was not an aggro stance, unlike what we have today. Sure it gave a 1.7 aggro multiplier on aggro generation, but it was nothing compared to the actual aggro combos. Tank stance was primarily a defensive stance, which is why it was not used at all in serious content. But the way you describe it could also make sense to me.

[Sazuzaki]

Small precision, tank stance before the changes was not an aggro stance, unlike what we have today. Sure it gave a 1.7 aggro multiplier on aggro generation, but it was nothing compared to the actual aggro combos. Tank stance was primarily a defensive stance, which is why it was not used at all in serious content. But the way you describe it could also make sense to me.

Ah that makes sense. If it were to make a come back, ideally it would be an aggro stance that boosts enmity accumulation and unlocks the enmity combo. You would still be encouraged to use the DPS stance as much as you can, but you would also be forced to swap to aggro stance to maintain enmity occasionally. This could actually be pretty interesting with the 2 min burst windows, as tanks would have to do the enmity combo at least once before bursting to make sure aggro doesn't get stolen during bursts. Could pose some other problems though, like tanks getting punished to spam enmity combos if one party member just happens to crit a lot.

[Mikey_R]

Could pose some other problems though, like tanks getting punished to spam enmity combos if one party member just happens to crit a lot.

The whole thing was more of a punishment for tanks, especially when there are several things that are outside of the tank's control. I have made several posts in this very topic about the issues posed by the old stance system. This post in particular I look at specifically how do you actually balance the enmity gain with DPS and how the gear level and skill levels of the tanks compared to the DPS affects this balance.

I know you have no experience with the old stance systems, however, it never worked how you are potentially envisioning it.

[Sazuzaki]

The whole thing was more of a punishment for tanks, especially when there are several things that are outside of the tank's control. I have made several posts in this very topic about the issues posed by the old stance system. This post in particular I look at specifically how do you actually balance the enmity gain with DPS and how the gear level and skill levels of the tanks compared to the DPS affects this balance.

I know you have no experience with the old stance systems, however, it never worked how you are potentially envisioning it.

Well it's not really me envisioning the old system, more of me envisioning how a new system could work. Valence already corrected me on what I thought stances were, and I was just talking about what a revised form could be. It's really nothing but a loose idea and personal preference of mine and not exactly how I thought the old system was like.

Based off what I've seen, aggro management always looked like a mixed bag. It was janky, but there are people who loved and hated that jank. Nonetheless, I personally think gutting and replacing it with what we have now was a bad decision. If we got a fun revised aggro system that still came with some of the jank you mentioned in the post you linked, I honestly wouldn't mind that if it meant abandoning the current aggro system. But that's just how I personally feel, and it's not like it's going to be added to the game. I just like the idea of a system that makes me feel like I'm actively protecting my party, but I could fail if I'm not aware of the different factors that play into it.

[Supersnow845]

The whole thing was more of a punishment for tanks, especially when there are several things that are outside of the tank's control. I have made several posts in this very topic about the issues posed by the old stance system. This post in particular I look at specifically how do you actually balance the enmity gain with DPS and how the gear level and skill levels of the tanks compared to the DPS affects this balance.

I know you have no experience with the old stance systems, however, it never worked how you are potentially envisioning it.

Supports benefitting or being punished for the performance of the others in their role in how these classes should work, just as how the DPSare punished by being bonked if they don’t press quelling strikes

I really don’t understand what the obsession with a full party being 8 people who don’t interact at all with each other and all just vaguely wail on the same boss is

As a support I actively want to be punished if my party is garbage, it’s how I can show my skill that I can pull a bad party back

[Valence]

I liked that having a ninja was also an indirect damage increase since shadewalker allowed them to shirk off someone into the target (the tanks) for 80%, which allowed them to not use the aggro combo much if competently used during bursts. A bit of a shame it was locked behind ninja, I could have seen this as a role thingy for the whole rphys role.

[Lyth]

This is a 2023 thread, so there's not much point in engaging with it now.

While the topic gets resurrected every so often, the bottom line is that tank stances didn't add anything of value to tanking. What tank stance did do was create large discrepancies in player dps output based off of their philosophical views around keeping the button on or off for the entire fight. Simply leaving the button off put you in the top 30% of the playerbase for zero effort whatsoever. If you're a good player, you don't need this sort of differentiation to be competitive, but I can see why some lament its loss.

[Valence]

Imagine if every subject's relevancy was tied to the time they were posted.

[Lyth]

Imagine if every subject's relevancy was tied to the time they were posted.

True, this topic has always been a bad idea every time it comes up, so I suppose the relevancy hasn't changed over time. I was just pointing out that this was force bumped along with several other ancient threads, likely to move discussion away from WAR nerfs, in case you missed it.

[Valence]

this topic has always been a bad idea every time it comes up

Speak for yourself, it's the first time I see that thread and I like it.

The whole thing was more of a punishment for tanks, especially when there are several things that are outside of the tank's control. I have made several posts in this very topic about the issues posed by the old stance system. This post in particular I look at specifically how do you actually balance the enmity gain with DPS and how the gear level and skill levels of the tanks compared to the DPS affects this balance.

I know you have no experience with the old stance systems, however, it never worked how you are potentially envisioning it.

Having played in HW with it, I have experience and I can tell you that I completely disagree with your statement. The enmity generation brought by the aggro combo had such an insanely high margin that keeping aggro was rarely a problem for multiple reasons:

1) Good players knew that they just had to do more of the aggro combo not to lose aggro. If aggro was lost out of greed, it wasn't that big of a problem, provoke and immediately add aggro back on top with the aggro combo or the ranged attack.
2) Casual players mostly all played under tank stance spamming the aggro combo, and therefore never lost aggro. The ones that lost it were clueless tanks.

It sure was a problem in alliance raids because there was no way to properly monitor the aggro levels of other alliances but that's also a problem today for the same UI reasons.

Supports benefitting or being punished for the performance of the others in their role in how these classes should work, just as how the DPSare punished by being bonked if they don’t press quelling strikes

I really don’t understand what the obsession with a full party being 8 people who don’t interact at all with each other and all just vaguely wail on the same boss is

As a support I actively want to be punished if my party is garbage, it’s how I can show my skill that I can pull a bad party back

My hot take on this (I'm using "you" as a rhetorical "you", definitely not pointing fingers to you in particular since I 100% agree):

It's the same age old "I'm a good player, and all other players are bad and there is a high chance they screw me over by not managing aggro properly".

Next they're gonna complain that they hate bad healers because they can't keep the party alive. What do we do then? We remove healing entirely (already close to it anyway)? That way we can truly get the utopian solo gameplay within a party of 7 other strangers all doing their thing without any interactions that we all wished so hard for.

And then (slippery slope on my behalf incoming), they'll complain that if somebody in the party fails a mechanic and wipes the party, then it's no fair and other players shouldn't affect MY part when they're being BAD.

Some people are good and some are bad. Deal with it, and if you're not able to, then don't play online games with strangers, or play exclusively with your group of tryhard friends. And who knows, if they're all that good, then maybe actually pulling out more intricate and rewarding battle mechanics could be... rewarding right?