Please Reconsider Splitting Main and Off-Tank Roles Based on Job

[Emitans]

The healer split also worked because realistically the only change that happened was AST getting locked into Diurnal Sect. WHM and SCH were the baselines for the Pure and Shield archetypes, so there weren't any changes to healer design needed.

[Carighan]

The healer split also worked because realistically the only change that happened was AST getting locked into Diurnal Sect. WHM and SCH were the baselines for the Pure and Shield archetypes, so there weren't any changes to healer design needed.

This will be different from the tanks being split how exactly?

(not just meaning you in particular tbh)

All these excuses seem to focus on "what differences can I find, however meaningless to the underlying idea of splitting a role into two sub-roles?". You're ignoring the core problem with trying to use that to worry about a tank sub-role split: The sub-role split did not meaningfully impact the role as a whole. Regen healers and shield healers are both healers. They heal you. So long as main tanks and offtanks are both tanks, and both tank, this means the split will be a success, yes?

And now comes a crucial problem: We already have that split. And it doesn't work well right now.

See, the healer-split was not actually into two sub-roles on a class-level, but on a group-level: It formalized the setup that you want a healer to refill your HP bar, and one to prepare you for the next damage intake. Two healers are more optimized for the former role, and two more for the latter role.
The incoming tank split entirely emulates this. It formalizes the setup that one tank keeps the boss-attention for 99% of the time, the other is a blue DPS (before you keyboard-warrior, I'll mention the second scenario right below). We already have that setup anyways, in fights such as M11S or M9S just mentioning the recent ones! Right now we could assign any tank to any of the two slots, albeit some tank classes already moderately prefer either of these (e.g. Paladin prefers blue DPS because it allows them to act as normal while also being more free to help out with support and DR if needed, while DRK and WAR prefer MT due to their short invuln-timers coupled with abilities naturally working better if you suffer autoattacks). All the "split" does is formalize the setup.
In the other tank scenario (this is where we differ from healers!), you have both tanks taking damage consistently. Two current examples are M10S and the Shinryu. Here, tank sub-roles do not matter, and given how we'll be soft-locked into 1 MT + 1 OT anyways in EC, again, they do not matter: Every class gets to tank damage.
The first scenario is being fully formalizes in EC. Including splitting classes into these two roles. But like I said, this already exists, just not formally. The second scenario, unless they stop using it (a shame, it ought to be used more) makes no distinction, or not much, between the roles so the split doesn't matter, formalized as in EC or not.

Again I have to ask: So why is this a big deal? You are both tanks, assuming you understand yourself as both tanks right now.
Are you just happy which schoolyard football team picked you, or well, your class?

And don't get me wrong, I get that part - to a degree. Because if we want to universally apply this, we also need to allow all healers to pick whether they want to be the regen or the shield healer for this particular fight, and all DPS whether they want to cast spells, fight in melee range or shoot arrows from a distance (essentially), again, for each fight. Either we split roles, or we don't. And there's good reason to do splitting, as the game already has way too much homogenization, and hence splitting into sub-roles (and expecting one of each) allows more differentiation. Which we have way too little. Hence my above comment that in an ideal world tanks would be split into five sub-roles, as in, each tank has a speciality they're better at and something else they're worse at, each is unique. Compare TBC-era WoW tanks where Paladins were the best add-tanks, Druids the best DoT/Magic tanks (with a speciality for Demolocks for 2 particular extremely magic-only fights) and Warriors the best anti-physical tanks.
Or, alternatively, we don't want such a "This isn't your fight, wrong class!"-setup, in which case we don't want sub-roles. But then why do we accept them for DPS, again? Why are melees different slots than ranged DPS, why can't a Ninja choose to go r2 and fight from range for a fight?
Or, alternatively, we split into sub-roles but also ensure that each is presence in a fight and accept that hybrid between some differences but also ~equal (doesn't work for damage dealers) representation. Exactly what tanks are now also getting in EC, after damage and healers already have it.

[Terhix]

The tension is between "dps optimization" vs "tactical use". If the ability is already used "on cooldown" it already fails at that IMHO. Charges do mitigate that though.

What dps optimization? There are no raid buffs in 8.0, you don't even have FoF, presumably pots are still there and you might want to squeeze 3 counters into one, but since there are no raid buffs and your burst is on a gauge you can move the pot timing wherever you want. The only optimization in any meaningful sense here is not overcapping the gauge, something you do already today, and timing your blocks correctly, which is the opposite of tension.

[Mukuku]

presumably pots are still there and you might want to squeeze 3 counters into one, but since there are no raid buffs and your burst is on a gauge you can move the pot timing wherever you want.

That depends on encounter length (ignoring special scenarios like the boss becoming untargettable at the wrong time). E.g. in a 9:30min encounter you would have zero flexibility: you would have to use the pot at pull and on CD to not lose buff uptime.

[Carighan]

That depends on encounter length (ignoring special scenarios like the boss becoming untargettable at the wrong time). E.g. in a 9:30min encounter you would have zero flexibility: you would have to use the pot at pull and on CD to not lose buff uptime.

True, although it'll be a massive improvement to now if encounter length pot optimization is the only issue remaining.

[Terhix]

That depends on encounter length (ignoring special scenarios like the boss becoming untargettable at the wrong time). E.g. in a 9:30min encounter you would have zero flexibility: you would have to use the pot at pull and on CD to not lose buff uptime.

So we went from "cursed" game design to maybe losing pot bonus on 1-2 strong attacks over a whole encounter with a very specific kill time, if and only if a tank buster happens at inopportune time, something so inconsequential to overall dps it's completely dwarfed by crit variance alone. That's your goal post?

[Mukuku]

True, although it'll be a massive improvement to now if encounter length pot optimization is the only issue remaining.

Which to be fair could be fixed if they somehow make the DPS gain unaffected by buffs, but at that point why even have DPS as reward? Even the design space for the job and encounters becomes limited if you have to ensure nothing interacts with the counters' dps portion in a way that leads to degenerate gameplay.

What could be rewarded for a proper counter instead of DPS and which pros/cons would that have compared to rewarding DPS? Why would rewarding e.g. a heal not be better?

[Mukuku]

So we went from "cursed" game design to maybe losing pot bonus on 1-2 strong attacks over a whole encounter with a very specific kill time, if and only if a tank buster happens at inopportune time, something so inconsequential to overall dps it's completely dwarfed by crit variance alone. That's your goal post?

We went from "CDs that are both DPS and defensive will be optimized primarily as DPS CDs" to "CDs that are both DPS and defensive will be optimized primarily as DPS CDs". If you think that will not happen because it's "only" 1-2 attacks per pot I think we are playing a different game.

This whole discussion could be avoided by just rewarding something else than DPS for properly countering. Is there seriously no alternative?

[Terhix]

We went from "CDs that are both DPS and defensive will be optimized primarily as DPS CDs" to "CDs that are both DPS and defensive will be optimized primarily as DPS CDs". If you think that will not happen because it's "only" 1-2 attacks per pot I think we are playing a different game.

Not 1-2 attacks per pot, 1-2 attacks per the entire encounter and only on a specific kill time and only if tank busters happen right after your pot, that's a lot of qualifiers. Pot window is 30s, Defense gauge takes 20s to recharge, you can fit 2 counters into a pot window while keeping a charge for a tank buster if it happens to happen after the pot, so your loss per pot is up to 10% of a delta of whatever potency Answering Strike is and the average filler GCD.

And yes, apparently we are playing a different game. In current game DRK's dps resource is also its short CD resource as it happens, and moving Edge away from raidbuffs to TBN later happens all the time. Just to pick one example current guide for FRU, which is optimized for dps mind you, asks you to TBN a Powder Mark which happens right after the opener, and you can only do that if drop an Edge of Shadow from raidbuffs. Here is a video of a DRK doing exactly this.

Dying is a bigger dps loss than aDPS gain from buffs on a single Edge of Shadow, and even if you weren't to die due to missing mits it's still better for the group to not grief your healers in high end content.

[Azurarok]

My go to tank's always been WAR and I usually prefer to off tank so this works out for me personally.
I don't really like the responsibilities of a main tank and also enjoy spot healing and throwing out mits while having to consider more than just 2 buttons to dps.

Maybe if healers were allowed to be more than whatever they are now things would've been different.