New Tank here...

[Syndication]

So I have gotten Bard to lvl50 and done the eg dungeons save Coil so I got an idea of what to expect. But I am leveling a PLD to try and tank for once as I'm usually support or dps. I'll eventually do Scholar as well. My question is, what makes a tank good or bad? Besides holding aggro obviously. Like what should I do, as someone who has hardly any tanking experience, so I can become a good tank and not have to deal with the horror stories I keep seeing.

[Eightbit]

Communicate. The more information that is shared from you on your plans in a dungeon the better for every. Marks, chat calls, anything else. Use them.

[Shuon]

1.mark primary target, and making sure everyone is only attacking the primary target
2. u cant just hit the primary target though. tanks are meant to cycle through all the mobs that are engaged to make sure they are glued onto the tank.
3. exception to point 2 is when the healer or blm sleeps the mob, during which you should try not to hit the mob, but use flash to try to maintain hate. its slightly trickier.
4. know all the mechanics of the fight well, because u r responsible for the position of the boss/mobs
5. stun when u need to. there r abilities that stunning would be a nice addition, but there r abilities that MUST be stunned. simple example is Dark Mist used by the Maidens in Haukke Manor.

[Eightbit]

Almost forgot, remember flash is free. Use it liberally.

[SkyBlueLogan]

Almost forgot, remember flash is free. Use it liberally.

Is it free for Warriors or something? At level 50 it costs me 212 MP and is a mana whore, by far the most expensive ability we have.

[SkyBlueLogan]

To the OP I believe the best advice I can give is put on your big boy pants and make sure to grow some thick skin. Communicate the best you can, and try to ignore the jackasses who bitch, whine, and complain constantly because you're going to get a lot of it if you run dungeons often in random groups. In addition to that, try to weed out the constructive criticism that will be mixed in with the QQ, and be willing to learn from it, because from time to time people do actually offer some helpful info/tips.

[juniglee]

Is it free for Warriors or something? At level 50 it costs me 212 MP and is a mana whore, by far the most expensive ability we have.

It's not entirely free per se, but as a tank, more often than not you are not using MP for anything else. As a Level 46 Paladin, the only skills I have that consumes MP are Flash, Protect, and Cure. In that sense, you have an entire MP bar to spend on Flash.

[Syndication]

If a mob is going for healer or something, do I provoke it? Because I've seen people say provoke just puts you back on top of the hate list but you don't necessarily actually get aggro.

[juniglee]

If a mob is going for healer or something, do I provoke it? Because I've seen people say provoke just puts you back on top of the hate list but you don't necessarily actually get aggro.

Provoke puts you at that character's aggro +1. Basically, all they need to render Provoke useless is to use an auto-attack after you have used it. When you use Provoke, always have a skill like Shield Lob or combo'ed Savage Blade/Rage of Halone ready to immediately follow-up after using Provoke to gain back aggro.

[Shuon]

u do get aggro. if the healer accumulated a million points of aggro, provoke will instantly give u 1000001 points of aggro, and thats extremely useful.

as to how to use it, it depends. if the mob has been on u e whole time, but u accidentally lost a little aggro and it starts going for the healer, it is probably unnecessary to voke (unless healer is dying) - in that case, a simple RoH is usually enough to claim it back.

but if the mob came out of nowhere as an add while you are fighting 3 other mobs, and u didnt notice it until much later, chances r that the healer has already accumulated a large amount of hate, so u need a instant aggro boost with voke, then build with RoH on top of thay to secure hate