Val the Moofia Boss wrote: ↑
June 3rd, 2023, 16:35
somerandomdude wrote: ↑
June 3rd, 2023, 08:48
What I remember about Final Fantasy XI, and my memory is a little fuzzy, but I remember being on a full team just roaming around on a beach and we had to pull single enemies that were our level range, if you pulled 2, the team was ripped. And this is one of the things I do remember, because I was asshurt over losing a boatload of exp to "beach slugs". This was really early in the game's life, it may have changed a lot near the end. I also remember teams needing at least 2 people with taunt because 1 tank couldn't keep aggro the entire time even if they did everything they were supposed to do. Successful teams had 2 tanks who worked together to cycle their taunt cooldowns. I was a warrior/monk tank, and I tried to coordinate this with others, but not everyone wanted to listen. Retarded players made the game difficult for everyone who was teamed with them. And my experience with this game shaped my view that I'd rather solo, or not play at all than roll the dice with a team of random players.
You only need one tank. To maintain aggro, the tank has to have the highest amount of threat. This can be done either one of two ways: 1. the easiest way is to just equip the Warrior job (as a main or subjob) and use the Provoke ability when you begin your damage burst so that you have the highest threat. The threat gained by Provoke wears off over time so you have to keep spamming it and try to use your damage abilities right after you pop it. The other method is to equip gear that increases your threat (so you can have tanks who do not have warrior equipped as either a main or subjob). You still need to be dealing a lot of damage to maintain aggro. In either case, even if the tank is doing everything correctly, it is still possible for other DPS to spike and exceed the tank's threat and get aggro. So the DPS also have a responsibility to not pop their damage abilities immediately and wait until after the tank has built up enough threat before going ham.
This isn't quite right. At low levels and pre-subjob basically your only option for tanking was WAR, for provoke. At higher levels, with subjobs, and with access to advanced classes, options opened up. The key to tanking in XI (at least in groups, raids were absolute chaos with very weird setups) was your subjob, and whether you had a THF (which made tanking easy-mode). Your choices for subjob were either: WAR (Provoke, breaks), SAM (for fast TP gain, Third Eye and Hachi), THF (could do a weak SATA once you hit 60), DRK (could maintain threat forever through pure damage, but no defensive value at all) and NIN (Utsu:Ni, dual-wield, utility through self-invis and self-sneak). MNK was never a desirable subjob for tanking.
The premier tank job was PLD (stuns and heals, defensive abilities and the ability to cast a lesser version of Protect and Shell, could hold group agro forever). But SATA made most group tanking considerations moot: the tank could consistently start with a massive threat lead that the DPS would have a hard time overtaking prior to mob death.
I don't remember ever, even as a lowbie with no subjob, feeling like IT mobs of a proper level range (+3-5 levels over the pt) outclassed us to the point xping was a threat. It was only doing experimental or dangerous stuff (+7-10 levels over the pt using SC and MB, etc) that I felt seriously in danger. If we were dying a lot during a standard grind session it was almost always down to either having to settle for a non-standard tank in subpar gear, or having a shitty healer.
The great thing about XI, especially pre-WOTG, was there was a near-infinite ceiling for group skill expression through SC and MB. The difference between a standard, no-effort grind pt and one that coordinated for proper SC and MB was absolutely incredible. You could literally double or triple xp over time if you were with players who knew what they were doing. The only limit was mob density (very good groups could easily depopulate portions of the zone, leaving 2-3 mins before respawns).