The Plight of the Tank, a Design Flaw?

[Twofeets]

I cant speak for other servers, but I know on Crushbone decent tanks are becoming harder and harder to find.  It seems 2/3 of most groups are 'Just need a tank to start'.  The reason for this is simple, though what the solution is I cannot say. While leveling, and doing most of the old content, any Joe Schmoe tank will do.  Since Niz, Castle Mistmoore, and other such zones its becoming more and more common for groups to only want raid equipped tanks.  Considering the difficulty of these zones, I really cannot blame them.  Even fabled tanks get chewed up and spit out without a strong group backing them up, and most pickup groups already have 1-2 weak links. The trouble is that tanks are pretty much required for most group content.  There are a few zones where a brig, a summoners pet, etc can stand in, but more and more content seems to require a well equiped tank.  Unfortunately for tanks, most raids simply dont need more than 2-3 fighter classes.  Sure, the 'older' raid zones can be done with mix-n-match grab bag classes, but most of the newer or tougher content requires specific setups (usually 2-3 tanks, 6-7 healers, and the rest DPS/utility).  Its not a knock on the raid guilds, they do what they must to beat the content.  But the fact remains is that this makes a well equipped raid tank a rare find indeed, especially during 'off hours'. More and more tanks, myself included, have had to switch to DPS or healers if we want to raid.  With most of the fabled loot, and even a lot of the raid legendary loot 'No Trade', there is no way to outfit our tanks, and they simply begin to collect dust. Who knows, maybe the ability to move 'No Trade' loot between toons on the same account is one answer.  Maybe then at least left over loot can be moved to alt tanks (without having to log out, change toons, and hold up the whole raid).  Perhaps there is another answer.  But in the meantime, I guess groups will just have to keep searching for that elusive meatshield.

[Talz]

My SK will never do a PUG because of poorly played dps classes more concerned about winning the parser than they are the zone.

[rubels]

<p>The problem your really seeing is based in raiding. As most people are rolling alts at this point , they are picking classes that are needed in raiding. There is no need for multiple guards hence why there is a shortage of tanks in general currently. </p><p>As for MMC / Niz I whouldnt touch those with a pug if you paid me.</p><p>- Krovax 70 guard 100 AA naj</p>

[TuinalOfTheNexus]

<p>When it comes to any heroic content, you absolutely do not need a tank decked out in fabled from a numerical standpoint. But I will concede a lot of players seem to think they need one.</p><p>I'd say it stems from 2 main factors:</p><ul><li>The tank is (assuming they're doing their job) the first to die. So people naturally blame their survivability, rather than poor healing / debuffing. In reality mitigation and resists now mean jack - generally tank deaths are a result of slow healing or, more often, slack debuffing. A Guard can delay the inevitable a bit and a really good one can turn a wipe around, but no more easily than a very good healer or chanter.</li><li>A fabled tank is likely very experienced, and is going to be able to lead a group and pull knowing exactly what to expect. It's this game knowledge - being able to tell the DPS not to use blue AE in a certain area, or exactly how to pull a tricky room in CMM and time repops, that's valuable, not their gear. In this respect it's rather unfair that people seem to expect to get a tank to lead them through Nizara or CMM when they don't have a clue about the zone; but then it's also frustrating trying to give instructions to a tank who doesn't have a clue themselves.</li></ul><p>The shortage throughout the game is naturally because SoE continue to fail to give extra tanks roles on raids. Any raid can be done with 3 tanks, but try clearing EH with 3 healers. It's not an easy problem to fix - I'm not sure if it could even be descibed as a problem - and it's nice for those of us lucky enough to be raid Guardians that we get a lot of loot because there are no other fighters in the raid <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /></p>

[Tyrion]

<cite>TuinalOfTheNexus wrote:</cite><blockquote><p>When it comes to any heroic content, you absolutely do not need a tank decked out in fabled from a numerical standpoint. But I will concede a lot of players seem to think they need one.</p><p>I'd say it stems from 2 main factors:</p><ul><li>The tank is (assuming they're doing their job) the first to die. So people naturally blame their survivability, rather than poor healing / debuffing. In reality mitigation and resists now mean jack - generally tank deaths are a result of slow healing or, more often, slack debuffing. A Guard can delay the inevitable a bit and a really good one can turn a wipe around, but no more easily than a very good healer or chanter.</li><li>A fabled tank is likely very experienced, and is going to be able to lead a group and pull knowing exactly what to expect. It's this game knowledge - being able to tell the DPS not to use blue AE in a certain area, or exactly how to pull a tricky room in CMM and time repops, that's valuable, not their gear. In this respect it's rather unfair that people seem to expect to get a tank to lead them through Nizara or CMM when they don't have a clue about the zone; but then it's also frustrating trying to give instructions to a tank who doesn't have a clue themselves.</li></ul><p>The shortage throughout the game is naturally because SoE continue to fail to give extra tanks roles on raids. Any raid can be done with 3 tanks, but try clearing EH with 3 healers. It's not an easy problem to fix - I'm not sure if it could even be descibed as a problem - and it's nice for those of us lucky enough to be raid Guardians that we get a lot of loot because there are no other fighters in the raid <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /></p></blockquote><p>QFE is all I can say. Well said. As others have stated, a real lack of tanks needed in the end game, which is raiding, which conversely becomes more and more popular, means people will roll classes most needed in a raid force. Unfortunately, most raid zones you dont' need more than two tanks, some just one. Why bring more when you could bring dps that do 50% to twice as much damage?</p><p>Equipment is one thing, but finding a skilled tank willing to put in the effort to learn zones, finish quests that yield good (tanking) rewards and one that doesn't give up easily is very hard. They're worth their weight in platinum. If anything, it's survival of the fittest. The best tanks survive, and the bad ones are left in the dust. A shame, but considering how important the role of tank is, you only really do want the best, right?</p>

[Bewts]

<p>A lot of tanks who were skilled at playing the game in general have found themselves with two choices:</p><p>Sit out raids</p><p>Roll a more useful raid class</p><p>I can say that with 100% certainty because as an unguilded 70 monk, I get a very similar response upon asking about openings in raiding guilds:</p><p>Roll A Brigand, Bard, or <insert mage class>.  Sometimes I get a lucky strike and they ask me if I have any 'alts' that would contribute to the raids.</p><p>That is the plight of the unestablished tanks or more generally speaking unguilded fighters.  In most raids there just isn't the room - so the people who play tanks well but don't have the room find themselves re-rolling.  Thats the boat I'm sitting in as well.</p>

[Jrral]

<cite>Bewts wrote:</cite><blockquote><p>A lot of tanks who were skilled at playing the game in general have found themselves with two choices:</p><p>Sit out raids</p><p>Roll a more useful raid class</p></blockquote>Then those guilds are being short-sighted. The current main tanks won't be around forever. They may not even be around tomorrow. Their players have lives, and life can cause short-term to long-term absences on a moment's notice. From personal experience, things like suddenly having a car on top of you tend to <i>really</i> put a crimp in your gaming time.<img src="/smilies/9d71f0541cff0a302a0309c5079e8dee.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /> So do things like commitments you can't get out of, eg. a wedding or funeral or something else that'll keep a player away from the computer come the next scheduled raid. A smart guild will plan ahead and put forth a bit of effort to help keep their alternate characters well-equipped just in case one or more of their key players aren't available.

[RpTheHotrod]

<p>A lot of content requires a certain type of class. Just the way it is, really.</p><p>You need a tank, you need a healer, and you need DPS.  I'm not sure if MMORPGs will get away from this idea any time soon, if ever.</p><p>We should be thankful that they implemented a variety of classes for each type. Sure, some tanks arn't as good as others in certain areas, but that is what makes everything more interesting. As a ShadowKnight, I realize that I will probably not be chosen as a raid's main tank since I accepted the fact that I am tank/DPS when I made my character...not tank/tank.</p><p>As for the parse statement, I really do NOT like parsers. As you said, everyone ends up competing against eachother constantly to get higher parse numbers...and that normally gets everyone killed. If I am a group leader, one of my rules is NO PARSE MESSAGES.</p>

[Drewx]

<p>Well I am a lvl 65 SK, I choose not to partake in guilds. (guildless since launch day hurray!)</p><p>Anyways...I know as a unguilded tank that I will probably never see a raid, or any tough instances/dungeons. Reason...no Fabled gear. Also I'm a SK...I'm a tank/dps (which I like because I can fill two group roles and I don't always like being MT), only those tank/tank can really take on the bigger stuff. Also only those raids really give fabled thus those unguilded just have no fabled let alone a place in a raid (which is understandable).</p><p>I agree that the amount of no trade items is alittle overboard. Almost everything I see past level 60 is no-trade, it hurts those casual players with no time for guilds in the long run. I mean thanks to EoF drops the crafted gear both weapons and armor is now sub-par and for the gamers who have no time for high-end guilds, or play solo this is a death blow for a hope of grouping. I try to get what I can off the broker but the amount of gear brokered is so low now. Most groups won't let an unfabled tank near unrest and definately not near Mistmoore. I won't go into Raid details as people who do raids and are in raiding guilds can give factual in depth info on them. I'll only go into a casual and solo player's outlook on it.</p><p>Also...tanks deal with alot, soloing can be slower (although we can survive it better), also armor, weapon, and spell prices tend to be pretty high (Especially Taunts), then there is the flak factor, if a tank has equipment peopel don't agree with they make a mess out of it, I for one am trapped in Xegonite Devout atm and I tank just as well as some other tanks in fabled, I hold hate and keep the group from wiping, but there are always some people (healers) who say you need to raid and get fabled or reroll, you have no business being a tank (Which in my opinion means nothing coming from someone who sits behind and clicks heal and has armor thats weaker than my own). Then if a tank messes up 1 pull and wipes the group, it sticks with the tank forever (60 chat was all over this zerker earlier today) and thus that tank is ruined from grouping forever cause people are unforgiving.</p><p>IMO thats the plight of the tank. There is no way to really change it, maybe lessen the amount of No-Trade items. SOE can easily have a legendary set of armor that is tradeable and very useful and stil la step below fabled. So those less fortunate can get some good gear and thus ACTUALLY be eligible/considerable and capable of joining raids and playing a useful role. I'm happy as I am though, I fear tanking because it only takes 1 accident to ruin your life though I am often told that I am a better tank than I let on. Meh...it only takes seeing a fable tank in action once. However I am fine being a solo tank.</p>

[Dimgl]

Tanks lost a lot of what made them unique and highly desirable when the EoF combat changes came. The EoF combat changes brought for most tanks: - A massive drop in mitigation. - A moderate drop in evasion. - A -massive- drop in accuracy while tanking. Average tanks became worse than well-geared scouts on survivability. Couple those mechanics challenges with the following: - Mobs in zones like MMC gained 6 second uncurable stuns. - Mobs gained the ability to hit well-geared tanks for 1k+, very regularly. - Tanks are the only class in the game expected to have very high stats, high dps/haste, high mitigation, high evasion, and yet on top of all that, we also have to pursue items with +skill mods. - Combine the above with the simple truth that plate armor has the -worst- stat tables of all armor types. It pays out of the "budget" to be plate. But is plate at an advantage? No. Why? - The class base avoidance system was changed so that classes in non-plate will have better avoidance tables in a way such that the longevity of each armor type was roughly equal. So in the end, EoF brought with it for tanks: A tremendous drop in effectiveness, both defensively and offensively for any tank. Incredibly spikey mobs, often coming with devastating debuffs, which the design team seemed completely unaware that if a tank was doing their job, 95%+ of which would hit the tank. It brought with it huge nerfs to plate armor, and completely broke the balance between armor types, a problem which still remains unaddressed to this day, and ultimately it destroyed "toughness" balance between classes. Couple this with the fact that a tank without any combat skills buffs will only hit 50-60% of their attacks on high yellow/orange content and you've got a recipe for re-rolling. Who wants to sit debuffed/stunned for an entire fight, miss half their attacks, die in a random spike on pulls, and be blamed for many group problems. Example: Walk into MMC. Tank is AD3ed, and heroically geared. Pretty intelligent tank. How do things go? Tank body pulls a group of 4 vamps. 2 of them activate 35% riposte. The tank uses encounter taunt. Resisted on at least one mob. Tank uses an AoE doing 300-1000 AOE damage. One vampire uses Greater Impale. Tank is uncurably stunned for 6 seconds. Vampires beat on tank, healer or DPS take aggro. One of them goes down. Tanks out of stun, taunts, CAs for 300-1200 damage maybe. Let's just -pretend- the tank gets it back. Now the tank has two mobs with a default 35% riposte, another 6 second stun coming soon etc. Eventually you get it down to one 35% riposte mob. You're trying to hold hate, but it's level 74. You're missing about 60-70% of the time. Even though you can do 600-1000 dps normally you're doing 200-400 now while your scout is doing 1000ish. No tank can hold threat on that. The mob turns. Your scout gets hit for 2k, your scout gets riposted 4 times for 600, your scout gets hit for 2.5k. Your scout dies. Who's going to be blamed for the deaths early on? Who's going to be blamed for the death at the end? No one was overDPSing. So it has to be the tank's fault. That's life for a typical tank. *Disclaimer: That's not what I experience, but I have seen it firsthand. I do raid tank, I am fully m1ed, and even still I think zones like MMC are the reason why tanks would quit EQ2. After spending 3 hours in the zone, I used ACT to figure out how long I was stunned in the zone. Out of almost 105 minutes of combat, I was hit with enough greater impales to be stunned over 17 minutes. What fun is a zone where you don't have control of your character 16% of the time!? Now take all of that, and throw in this: A tank that isn't in great gear, with full adorns, is going to be weaker than a good Rogue with good/great gear and full adorns. So unless you're going to be one of the 2-3 tanks on a raid, why not roll a Swash or Brigand instead? At least you'll get raid invites, and with the raid gear you'll get, you'll tank a lot better than a heroic geared tank. Far too many times have I gone down on pulls while raid-tanking only for my MT group swashy to take over and tank like a champion. Tanking became less about being tough as a tank, and more about having a mob debuffed. The EoF combat changes hit NO ONE as hard as tanks, specifically plate tanks. I made an effort to show this; I was the guy who tanked Nizara naked and catalyzed even more combat changes. But still to this day, plate armor has worse stat tables, and the warrior defensive buffs (which give mitigation, and are class-defining) still give pathetically low defensive boosts. They still remain unexamined, unconsidered, and give a pathetic 2% more defensive power because their power was designed and balanced in EQ2/DoF/KoS.

[Couching]

Kemt@Venekor wrote: <blockquote>Tanks lost a lot of what made them unique and highly desirable when the EoF combat changes came. The EoF combat changes brought for most tanks: - A massive drop in mitigation. - A moderate drop in evasion. - A -massive- drop in accuracy while tanking. Average tanks became worse than well-geared scouts on survivability. Couple those mechanics challenges with the following: - Mobs in zones like MMC gained 6 second uncurable stuns. - Mobs gained the ability to hit well-geared tanks for 1k+, very regularly. - Tanks are the only class in the game expected to have very high stats, high dps/haste, high mitigation, high evasion, and yet on top of all that, we also have to pursue items with +skill mods. - Combine the above with the simple truth that plate armor has the -worst- stat tables of all armor types. It pays out of the "budget" to be plate. But is plate at an advantage? No. Why? - The class base avoidance system was changed so that classes in non-plate will have better avoidance tables in a way such that the longevity of each armor type was roughly equal. So in the end, EoF brought with it for tanks: A tremendous drop in effectiveness, both defensively and offensively for any tank. Incredibly spikey mobs, often coming with devastating debuffs, which the design team seemed completely unaware that if a tank was doing their job, 95%+ of which would hit the tank. It brought with it huge nerfs to plate armor, and completely broke the balance between armor types, a problem which still remains unaddressed to this day, and ultimately it destroyed "toughness" balance between classes. Couple this with the fact that a tank without any combat skills buffs will only hit 50-60% of their attacks on high yellow/orange content and you've got a recipe for re-rolling. Who wants to sit debuffed/stunned for an entire fight, miss half their attacks, die in a random spike on pulls, and be blamed for many group problems. Example: Walk into MMC. Tank is AD3ed, and heroically geared. Pretty intelligent tank. How do things go? Tank body pulls a group of 4 vamps. 2 of them activate 35% riposte. The tank uses encounter taunt. Resisted on at least one mob. Tank uses an AoE doing 300-1000 AOE damage. One vampire uses Greater Impale. Tank is uncurably stunned for 6 seconds. Vampires beat on tank, healer or DPS take aggro. One of them goes down. Tanks out of stun, taunts, CAs for 300-1200 damage maybe. Let's just -pretend- the tank gets it back. Now the tank has two mobs with a default 35% riposte, another 6 second stun coming soon etc. Eventually you get it down to one 35% riposte mob. You're trying to hold hate, but it's level 74. You're missing about 60-70% of the time. Even though you can do 600-1000 dps normally you're doing 200-400 now while your scout is doing 1000ish. No tank can hold threat on that. The mob turns. Your scout gets hit for 2k, your scout gets riposted 4 times for 600, your scout gets hit for 2.5k. Your scout dies. Who's going to be blamed for the deaths early on? Who's going to be blamed for the death at the end? No one was overDPSing. So it has to be the tank's fault. That's life for a typical tank. *Disclaimer: That's not what I experience, but I have seen it firsthand. I do raid tank, I am fully m1ed, and even still I think zones like MMC are the reason why tanks would quit EQ2. After spending 3 hours in the zone, I used ACT to figure out how long I was stunned in the zone. Out of almost 105 minutes of combat, I was hit with enough greater impales to be stunned over 17 minutes. What fun is a zone where you don't have control of your character 16% of the time!? Now take all of that, and throw in this: A tank that isn't in great gear, with full adorns, is going to be weaker than a good Rogue with good/great gear and full adorns. So unless you're going to be one of the 2-3 tanks on a raid, why not roll a Swash or Brigand instead? At least you'll get raid invites, and with the raid gear you'll get, you'll tank a lot better than a heroic geared tank. Far too many times have I gone down on pulls while raid-tanking only for my MT group swashy to take over and tank like a champion. Tanking became less about being tough as a tank, and more about having a mob debuffed. The EoF combat changes hit NO ONE as hard as tanks, specifically plate tanks. I made an effort to show this; I was the guy who tanked Nizara naked and catalyzed even more combat changes. But still to this day, plate armor has worse stat tables, and the warrior defensive buffs (which give mitigation, and are class-defining) still give pathetically low defensive boosts. They still remain unexamined, unconsidered, and give a pathetic 2% more defensive power because their power was designed and balanced in EQ2/DoF/KoS. </blockquote>The combat changes hurt casual plate tank but it hurt leather tank a lot more than plate tank. A casual brawler isn't a tank anymore. A casual brawler has hard time tanking in heroic encounter nowadays. Moreover, what you described is totally different in well geared plate tank. The well geared plate tank is overpowered already. Why?  A well geared plate tank in raid can hit 65% mitigation and 70% avoidance with proper group setup. It's plain and simple that no matter how well geared you are, a plate tank shouldn't hit 70% avoidance. It's ridiculous that a plate tank can avoid as well as leather tank. Though, a leather tank has far less mitigations comparing to plate tank. The itemization in EoF is screwed. The EoF fabled plate suit has around 1800 more mitigation than leather tank suit. Though, plate tank can hit 70% avoidance in raid. It's a slap on brawlers. The leather tank is mostly shafted in EoF no matter you are a casual or hardcore player.

[Quda]

<p>Lets just be honest, what SOE done to the tanks is bad.</p><p>Most people already have a tank main (turned retired because no one wants them for raid)</p><p>Most people have already rolled a dps toon, or another non-healer toon to raid.  Man it is sweet just sitting in the back, having the tank bring the mobs to you.  dps, or not dps, who cares.  A lot of groups isn't parsing, so who is monitoring what your doing.  If your taking it easy then your not pulling aggro.  You can sit and talk in TS/Vent, talk to your friends in tells, be social.  There is no stress about pulling, holding aggro, not dieing, trying to keep the group alive, watching for pops, timing the kills, looking for roamers, watching your group's life, keeping an eye on the healer, keeping an eye on the scout who ran past you you to get behind the mob because he didn't want to turn.  Man, being dps/utility class is sweet.</p><p>So what do we end up with, No tanks, barely a healer on, and all dps/utility.</p><p>Solution: 1.  Tank in O mode should be able to do good dps - reduce their defense to scout/mage level to be able to dps to scout/mage level.  Basicly, like any good fighter, the abilty to take off their plate to get a better swing with the blade. 2.  Make it so tanks buff each other to make an instoppable force, ie SK and Pally together in the same group prevents all stuns.  Like brothers sticking together, nothing can stop them.  Guards and Zerks make them immune to fear.  A Monk and brawler together increase each others avoidance.  This solution would work 2 fold, get tanks wanted in raids, let them learn the zones, and help them gear up when something happens to the main tank.</p><p>I hear all the time groups looking for tank to roll, or looking for healer to roll.  What SOE has done was make a server full of dps and furies(yea I  know they are healers, but no one wants them because there are so many)</p>

[C]

<p>My zerker is a victim of these same circumstances.  I have no interest in being a raid tank, but I would like to be able to lead groups through some of the tougher instances.  BUT she is wearing a mix of mastercrafted and legendary, with little to no chance of being able to ever get anything better.</p><p>Outfitted in this manner I am unable to tank in the zones I need to go into to get the decent no-trade equipment, and no group will take an extra tank as a "passenger" when there is so much dps lfg.  I can't even tag along with an understanding guild group, as at the best of times we can just about scrape up 4 or 5 high lvl 60s/70s, never mind a full group, so I'm always needed on my warden or necro. (And no, I'm not running off to find a bigger guild, apart from this one problem, it's a terrific guild).</p><p>I wouldn't dare try to join a PUG in this condition, they'd take one look at me and laugh <img src="/smilies/499fd50bc713bfcdf2ab5a23c00c2d62.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /></p><p>On Splitpaw today, 60-69 lvl chat with awash with groups just needing a tank to go.  It's not only hurting the tanks themselves, but everyone else who has to hang around for a long time waiting for that elusive tank.  The amount of no-trade gear has simply reached ridiculous proportions.</p>

[YummiOger]

<p>Yup, Kemt is 100% correct in his assesment. </p><p>Being a tank sucks. plain and simple. Im a raid tank w/ multiple sets of Fable items, and it still sucks. Tanks took a hard HARD hit in EoF, which im personally still reeling over.</p><p>Mitigation is crap. </p><p>Aviodance is crap.</p><p>Taunts are crap.</p><p>I feel like a Punching Bag instead of a Tank.</p>

[Domiuk]

<p><span style="font-size: small; font-family: Times New Roman">I  too have a fully fabled/mastered tank that no longer has any interest in playing the high end group content.</span></p><p>Its a long time since I would even consider going anywhere with a pickup group : ( thats probably the biggest shame.</p><p>I do still get to raid tank if i want to but basically my Guard is now retired.</p><p>It isnt just me like this our guild has 5 fully fabled Tanks and another couple of alts and frankly none of them want to tank group content </p><p>Whats worse is I am still group tanking, but these days I use a ..........  Warlock.</p><p>Well at least I no longer have any aoe agro issues.</p>

[Mistletoes]

<cite>Quda wrote:</cite><blockquote><p><snip></p><p>Most people have already rolled a dps toon, or another non-healer toon to raid.  Man it is sweet just sitting in the back, having the tank bring the mobs to you.  dps, or not dps, who cares.  A lot of groups isn't parsing, so who is monitoring what your doing.  If your taking it easy then your not pulling aggro.  You can sit and talk in TS/Vent, talk to your friends in tells, be social.  There is no stress about pulling, holding aggro, not dieing, trying to keep the group alive, watching for pops, timing the kills, looking for roamers, watching your group's life, keeping an eye on the healer, keeping an eye on the scout who ran past you you to get behind the mob because he didn't want to turn.  <b>Man, being dps/utility class is sweet.</b></p><p><snip></p></blockquote><p>On my coercer (utility), I am almost always more alert, more active that when I'm on my Mystic. Maybe none of the other utility classes have much in common with coercers, but as utility, I constantly try to keep aggro on the tank for the group, keep from dieing, keep from letting others die, watch for pops / roamers, watch the group's life and power, keep power levels high, etc.</p><p>Maybe those things can be said about DPS classes, but I bet there are a fair number of DPS classes that mind all of those things too.</p><p>On the other hand, a good tank will always mind those things, spin mobs, etc. But I've seen just as many tanks do hardly any of them, which is probably why I end up working so hard when I play either coercer or mystic. Not complaining, mind you. I enjoy the challenge.</p>