Beginner tanking guide

I have done fairly well at tanking so far (just finished Titan) and I know that there will be more difficult dungeons later on. Still, this guide will contain my understanding and experience about tanking in FFXIV: ARR.

First of all, there are a few useful facts that everyone may need to know:
- To take and hold threat (hate/aggro) is easier than to steal threat back from someone else.
- Once you click (target) a mob, the game will show if that mob has a link (or links) to another (other) mob around. If it is linked then no matter how far the distance between those mobs, pull one and you will pull the whole group.
- On the left hand side of your group info (name, HP, MP, TP) are the threat meters. They will be updated each time you change the (enemy) target. If a person has a full bar (white), that person is being targeted by that mob (indicated by 'A' letter). Others' threat meter will be numbered 1, 2, 3 depending on their threat level on that mob.
- Marking enemies with 1, 2, 3 is useful to help your team mates focusing on one target. It helps every single position (tank, DD, healer) of the team. You can find the marking list at the Sign icon (very close to the Emotes list).

Tanking means taking damage for others. This involves attracting attention of enemies and staying alive. This guide will only focus on the former area. The latter is up to you when choosing cross-class skills.


I. SKILL LISTS
First of all, to tank well you need to know your tool. Here I will list them out in parallel between Gladiator (Paladin) and Marauder (Warrior)
- Opening melee skill [OS]: gains threat by pure damage but necessary for combo: GLA: Fast Blade (LVL1); MRD: Heavy Swing (LVL1)

- First melee single target enmity increase skill [MS1]: GLA: Savage Blade (LVL 4); MRD: Skull Sunder (LVL 26)

- Second melee single target enmity increase skill [MS2]: GLA: Rage of Halone (LVL 4); MRD: Butcher's Block (LVL 30)

- AOE enmity increase skill [AS]: GLA: Flash (LVL 8 ); MRD: Overpower (LVL 12)

- Main range enmity increase skill [RS]: GLA: Shield Lob (LVL 15); MRD: Tomahawk (LVL15)

- Additional aggro skill: GLA: Provoke (LVL 22)

- Enmity increase buff [EB]: PLD: Shield Oath (LVL 40); MRD: Defiance (LVL 30)


II. TANKING SIMULATION:
I will explain the tanking/threat mechanic in terms of scenario. This assumes no support (sleep/bind) is available unless state otherwise.

Scenario 1: a very common scenario: 3 targets called Mob1, Mob2 and Mob 3. Your team includes 1 tank (you), 1 melee DD, 1 range DD and 1 healer, assuming no AOE is used
- First of all, if you click on any 1 of those 3 targets, you will see that it is linked to the other 2. Approaching one, or use [RS] on 1 will also pull the other 2.

- 2nd step: Having target and pull mob 1, a common mistake here is to use the [OS] + [MS1] on it. Mob2 and Mob3 simply target you but you have 0 threat on their meters. Assuming that you have marked Mob1 as 1 and both DDs are focusing on it, then both of them will not gain any threat on Mob2 and Mob3. However, the healer will always gain threat on all mobs upon healing (similar to AOE damage). Therefore the first heal will pull Mob2 and Mob3 towards the healer unless you have done some prevention measure. That prevention measure is the [AS]: Flash or Overpower.

- 3rd step: Now that you have gained some threat on all targets, another common mistake here is to focus only on Mob1 and forget about Mob2 and Mob3. As the healer continue to heal you, he/she will still gain aggro on Mob2 and Mob3. Therefore you need to rotate your aggro skills on them. At lower level, it means to cast another [AS]. At higher level, it means to switch target mid combo. For example, use [OS] + [MS1] on Mob1, change target to Mob2 and use [MS2], back to [OS] on Mob2, change to Mob1 > [MS1], change to Mob3 > [MS2]. It doesn't have always be like this. You need to be flexible and keep checking the threat meters and use [MS1], [MS2] and [AS] appropriately.


Scenario 2: same number of targets, same team. Range DD pulls first (on Mob1).
- Here's the thing: no matter how many [RS] you throw on Mob1, you won't get Mob1's attention back on you. Also, once the healer casts the first heal, Mob2 and Mob3 will be on him/her. If you're lucky, the melee DD will be on Mob1 instead of one of the other 2.

- What to do: Use [AS] first so as to protect the healer from the first heal. If the range DD runs far away from you, let him/her kite the mob until he/she runs back to you or if he/she manages to kill Mob1. In the mean time, start chaining combo on Mob2 & Mob3 like in Scenario 1, focus on melee DD's target if he/she is not on Mob1. Remember to maintain threat on both Mob2 and Mob3 to protect the healer.

*Special case: I think GLA's provoke can reset threat meter so if you use provoke on Mob1 + [RS], you might be able to pull it back. In such case, deal with the rest like in Scenario 1.


Scenario 3: continue of scenario 2 but you have taken back control on all targets. However, range DD is on Mob1, melee DD is on Mob2, Mob3 is awake.
- There's nothing critical about this scenario. However, you need to treat both Mob1 and Mob2 as main targets. Maybe one over another, depending on which DD is stronger and generate more threat.
- If you have managed to land a [MS1] or [MS2] on Mob3, it should focus on you for at least 2 more combos ([OS]+[MS1]+[MS2]). How often you need to go back to Mob3 depends on how much damage you receive thus how much healing the healer has to do.


Scenario 4: same or higher number of targets, same team but AOE is massively used by the range DD, melee DD is still on Mob1.
- Assume that step 1 & 2 in Scenario 1 have been cleared.
- Range DD starts spamming AOE on all targets. At this point, your 1st [AS] won't be able to hold for one combo. You need to spam [AS] at least twice if you haven't got the self-buff [BS]. Once you manage to create some distance between yours and the range DD's threat meters, i.e. yours are full on all targets whereas range DD's are about half, you can start the combo and rotation among targets (even if you only have [MS1] and no [MS2]).
- Alternative for Marauder/Warrior: Turn on all of your damage buff and spam Overpower, but slow down if you're low on TP (maybe once every 6s).


Scenario 5: facing a group of 4+ linked enemies with no effective AOE skill available + you can't stand and tank all of them.
- This condition rules out the option to wipe out all targets at once.
- If your team has sleep (Repose), tell your team to use it (on mobs marked as '3' or unmarked) to control the encounter
- If your team does not have sleep, use all damage reduction, parry, dodging buff that you have (maybe in sequence), pull them with [AS] and run around. Mark 1 on the mob targeted by the range DD and hopefully the melee DD will focus on it too. Keep running around and use [AS] occasionally to keep the healer safe. The two DD will have to tank for themselves. Given the number of mobs, they probably are the weak type.
- If a mob happens to target the healer, you need to mix in the combo on your rotation, on that mob, while still use [AS] to control others of course, or again, use Provoke to to reset the threat meter.


Scenario 6: Boss fight + minions (adds)
- All minions will have a short period of pausing before they target someone. Make sure you zoom out and be the first to notice their appearance
- In this situation, there's a big chance that the adds will target your team mates first. In such situation, if those adds are the weak type (die in a few hits), use [AS] once or twice to get the attention of some and let the DDs deal with them (even if you haven't pulled all of them).
- However, if those adds are the strong type then focus on protecting the healer first, use either provoke or combo to pull adds away. Make sure you eventually get hold of all of them because if the DDs keep running around and your healer keep healing, the adds will eventually turn to your healer.
- Don't be too worried about the boss, you can just drag it around as you chase adds. If you have been focused on it, it should take 6-7 attack skills on the boss from the DD or 6-7 heals from the healer for you to lose the attention of the boss.


Hopefully after reading these scenarios, you will finally figure out the mechanic of tanking in this game. It's more about practice and reacting on situation than doing a specific set of commands. I'd like to say tanking between Paladin and Warrior is quite different. Paladin, despite being able to take on a lot more punishment, never really have the option of doing AOE damage to keep control of multiple targets, for which the Warrior excels at. Also, the fact that Paladin needs to wait until level 40 for Shield Oath while Warrior gets Defiance at level 30 makes a whole difference. With a huge amount of HP and higher enmity generation (from damage & buff), Warrior feels more effective at tanking than Paladin from 30 to 40 if not even before that (Overpower vs Flash). Paladin is like a late bloomer in the business. As a Warrior, sometimes I wish I were a Paladin, especially when taking the full damage from boss's AOE. Yet again, to each of his own, there's always a plus and a minus.

By: ReinjiMD of the main forums