True fault of current tank design: Lack of identity

[Tunda]

I think I haven't made my point clearly enough. I really don't think it matters at all, we could have two shield tanks, or two block tanks without diluting identity. Consider for a moment two abilities that are on paper mechanically distinct:

WAR's Thrill of Battle: +20% max hp, +20% healing received.
PLD's Bulwark: Guaranteed block.

Thrill is effectively a 16.(6)% mit, and ignoring the fact that it has an extra function in that you can use it just for the heal, if you were to use either of those for a tank buster they are functionally the same ability: 10s of roughtly the same %mit/eHP increase on 90s cooldown with no interaction with any other part of the kit of either job.

Of the short tank cooldowns Bloodwhetting and Heart of Corundum are also functionally the same button regardless of individual effects. Holy Sheltron stands out due to its 5s cooldown and Oath Gauge being the limiting factor, and TBN love it or hate it is the most mechanically distinct.

It does not matter what effects are being applied if the actual gameplay - the why and how you press buttons while you play the job - are the same. It wouldn't be a problem if two tanks were build around just plain % mitigation if they are actually different in how you play the job, maybe one tank has to stand in a ground aoe effect for it's mit to work, while another has to make sure to maintain a buff at all times to use theirs, etc. It's not trivial, for sure, but it's also not impossible, other games have done it, often with more available tanks than 4 we have.

Hmmm... you are actually right.. the are same button but with different type of mitigations.. the answer that I assume is how their DPS kit could be part of mitigation.. it is like how SGE use Pneuma to heal and damage at the same time.
but at the same time I would like to have some tanks that uses straight up mitigations(of any type) like how classic mitigation used to be.

I was thinking of a different thing that could be unique..
A combination of 2 type of defensives..

Like if I was hired to design a kit for current tanks it will be like it:
1- Dark knight: 40% shield, 40% Max Heal/healing-per-action, 20% other type of defensive utility
2- Paladin: 40% defensive both magic and physical, 40% Block (active/non-active), 20% other type of defensive utility
3- Warrior: 40% Max Heal/healing-per-action, 40% defensive both magic and physical, 20% other type of defensive utility
4- Gunbreaker: 40% shield, 40% Block (active/non-active), 20% other type of defensive utility
we can have 4 extra tanks in the future..

the most important thing is how they can design the interaction between 2 different type of mitigations.. in a way that makes sense.
like for example how we can have thrill of battle interacted with other defensive utility.
or how Gunbreaker can have different type of continuation that give shield instead of damage.

at this rate we can have 8 different tanks (tanks in the future) that can have unique kit.

[CKNovel]

In my opinion, this issue is not a tank issue but a support issue as a whole.

90% of the utility is tied to HP in one way or another, those who aren't are most likely useless (Looking at your Warden's Pean).
We need buff/debuff/interrupt/shield play to come back in all battle content.

Just like with pure and shield healers, we could have the protector and the wall breakers.
One could excel at helping teammates, the others would shine at tearing down ennemy defenses and enhancements.
But we can't exactly fall in the same position as healers where a copy of SGE but without the fairy, sprint and debuff.

Warrior's identity could be to self cleanse and shine against ongoing damages (buff that ramps up at each tick of damage for example)
Gunbreaker could be the purging tank, stealing an ennemy buff to convert it in a cartridge or have a buff/passive that allows it to deal bonus damage to shields.
Dark Knight could have its anti magic identity back by inflicting a debuff that silence the target but also reduces its magic damages, purging ennemy buffs.
Paladin being Paladin, it should be able to cover both sides to remain the tank by default.

[Carighan]

More ideas for smaller differentiations that can more easily be moved towards:

1. Tanks are differentiated in 3 key areas: Minor CD, Invulnerability, and "extra" style.
2. For the minor CD, DRKs gets the strongest, but with an extra resource. Warrior gets the weakest.
3. For the Invulns, Paladin gets the strongest, DRK the weakest.
4. For the style, this balances them and is built to augment the way the CD and the invuln fit into the job.

Dark Knight
- TBN CD removed
- Manacost kept
- If not procced, puts a free Oblation onto the target after it runs out
- Damage of most attacks reduced significantly
- Most attacks now apply 3s of a DoT
- This is the same DoT for all attacks, it stacks in duration
- This DoT heals the DRK for each tick of damage it deals
- Living Dead blocks incoming healing, saves it, after it runs out or when it fires, the deferred healing is applied as a HoT with a 3s-60s duration based on how much healing was blocked (caps at 100% of DRK HP = 60s HoT). Most self-healing after proc removed in turn (needs active healing again).

Warrior
- Bloodwhetting healing normalized and as a result massively reduced.
- New trait: Unstoppable Berserker. All damaging attacks cause some damage-based amount of self-shield. These shields stack. Essentially just hitting target makes you ignore a non-trivial amount of damage, all the time.

Paladin
- Bulwark removed
- Wings is now a 2,5s cast (with bar), then lasts while you can do other stuff, so long as you don't move from a tiny area at the front of the wings.
- Intervention damage reduction improved, but that extra reduced damage is Cover-like moved to the Paladin.
- Block-force added to Shield Bash: Raise Shield, if hit during the GCD will auto block, then hit back with damage based on blocked physical hit damage + stun + 10 Oath Gauge. Shield centric tank, blocks damage for others, uses shield actively as a combat implement.

Gunbreaker
- Little to do here, already strong and with quite some flavour to its style and CDs.
- All attacks can now be done from 25y range, use a different animation if used as a ranged attack. 100% uptime tank, basically. Lightning Shot removed since it's no longer needed.

I would also urge them to consider removing Rampart. Or rather, upgrading it into the job-specific ones, then introduce the minor CD earlier, and focus way more on that, not only giving the triple-effect version at 82 or so. Simplify those effects, but also give it all very early. Including TBN and so on. Make the minor CD the "default CD", not Rampart.