there's only dps class in ffxiv : dps with high damage, dps that can tank, dps that can heal. thinking like this helped me a lot to improve my uptime as a tank
The only issue I noticed from 5 years of tanking in FFXIV, is that FFlogs is the worst possible way to measure your progress if you are not the only one looking at it. No matter how you improve the goalposts will have moved by then. in many cases by the time you achieve numbers that were a color improved a week ago, now you'd need a huge amount more just to keep what you had. As a result I realized the best way to improve is to not care about FFlogs percentiles and to use it for its real intended purpose, analyzing your logs to find ways to improve. People caring too much about parse numbers already ruined the raid community. For years, even before I started playing FFXIV, which is my first "Classic" style mmo, I knew that tanks and support/healers should be doing significant damage along with the primary role. if no one needs healing, or if there is no reason to not be attacking, there is no excuse to not be doing damage. However, this is not enough to climb the logs. 5 years of practice is not enough. nothing will ever be enough and I dont care who you are. Top raiders arent born any better than anyone else. the people with gold parses are not any fundamentally different from the greys. What seperates them is years of practice and I mean REAL raid practice, usually in a static, and finding a good static for the past couple years has been like finding a needle in a stack of things which look exactly like needles.
@@gavin4056 that would only affect how quickly you learn something and often how motivated you are to learn it and how fun it is to you. eventually practice is the only important factor.
This is something I've always wanted to make, hope you enjoy. Timestamps: 0:00 intro 1:56 you are a dps 3:02 be aware of your melee 4:40 keeping your gcd rolling 6:17 learning fights based on your gcd 7:47 all about skill speed 9:29 save your gap closer 10:44 adps vs rdps 13:30 caring about raid buffs
Brother, I'm just a noob tank that hasn't even gone through Heavensward yet, but these videos are seriously helpful. You are doing a service sharing this knowledge. Please make more guides. Thank you and you're welcome.
I’m level 64, I still don’t understand much. You should be quite a high level now as well. I play most MMOs like when I run past all enemies in a darksouls level but still wanna pick up the shiny’s. Constantly saying oh fuck oh fuck, phew, oh fuck oh fuck
Tanking in FFXIV is pretty chill, you pretty much do a dps rotation. The hardest part is just learning the positions and phases of a fight. But the actual game play is simple.
This is the first video of yours I've ever watched, and I must say the content here is top tier. The amount of useful information and ideas in this one video has been truly inspiring to me in improving my tanking skill. I still have so much to learn being newer to the game, but this makes me want to try that much harder. Keep it up!
As someone who does tank, I don't understand why tanks do this like- at all it's not bobbing and weaving like in a boxing ring. It's literally acting as the placeholder/ foundation of the fight a good foundation sets you up for success.
@@mirror2922 I've played a couple of times more recently, and literally you can sidestep the carpet and move back into position before they budge at all. Let alone the ones that turn them into a spinning top smh!
i'm new to tanking, level 50 DRK. do i need to participate in hitting minions or mechanics like a totem that will make boss invulnerable unless it's destroyed? or i just leave it for my teammate and hold the boss cuz it's sometimes very infuriating on how long they take to destroy it.
@@Loxly-ti4sq if you’re in a normal or hard dungeon it does not matter in the slightest I would say. Most of the people you work with are trying to learn their rotations. Let alone trying maximize their DPS. You’ll be fine. On the note of the mechanics if it makes the boss invulnerable or jeopardizes the safety of a team member I’m pretty sure that qualifies for moving to help. And on minions well yeah you want grab all the minion in the dungeon. But in a trial usually that falls to an off tank to deal with unless said otherwise I’d assume.
I started savage raiding about a month ago as a white mage, and changing my mindset to essentially a green dps as opposed to healer has made a DRAMATIC difference in my damage output. thanks for the guide!
Very helpful and inspiring video. I started this game a month ago and picked Paladin. Loving every minute of it. Never thought I’d enjoy tanking so much. This video just completely cemented exactly why I wanted to play a Tank. Would love to see more Tanking videos going forward. Need to soak up all of your experience. 😜
Thanks so much man! I have a few ideas for future videos but since this one is still fresh i'll probably make my next in june. Happy to hear you're enjoying tanking!
This was a really helpful video! As a DPS main who dabbles in Tanking quasi-casually, it was helpful for me, personally, to frame it as "all the things you think about as a DPS? Do those things as a tank as well." I thought your aDPS vs. rDPS point was really good and subtle. Since tanks bring no raid buffs, tanks are basically greedy DPS and will want to optimize their performance the same way greedy DPS do: look at aDPS instead of rDPS to monitor their own performance. rDPS is a fine metric if you're, say, a NIN who wants to see how much you help out vs. how much you put out, but it's an irrelevant consideration for tanks and greedy DPS. Overall, it helped reinforce the broader point that you should know how the metrics are defined, understand their strengths and weaknesses, and, ultimately, determine whether it is useful in your specific application.
aDPS is a little dependent on party comp when you’re comparing it to others but even for DPS it can be a much better indicator of skill. I can bring much more dps to my entire party by making sure my burst timings line up, and since DPS in this game all have such a heavy weight on their burst, the results show even more dramatically. This raid tier has had me theory crafting over and over again between rushing phases and getting an extra burst before the boss goes untargetable, and holding normal timings to keep the bulk of my potency in trick
Literally did my first dungeon today. I may have understood about 1/3 what moves he was talking about as a gladiator, but he blew my mind! I had no idea making the enemy run after me affected the others so much! I was running in all willy nilly keeping the healer on me instead of allowing them to attack. Really interesting food for thought. Will review again in a month where I'll understand everything better.
New dark knight here. Only been playing the class for a few weeks, but I feel like I know the class and the attacks pretty well. I’m gonna keep practicing it and watching the raid guides, but this guide has already been a huge help to me and will be even more so in the future. Thank you so much
As I'm starting to do current tier savage raids, I was slowly realizing some of the points you've mentioned on your video. Things like not spinning the boss, your rotation will always be the same on specific moments of the fight when you do it right, as a tank you're a DPS as well... All of these things make a lot of sense, and I'm just so happy to see that my path as a tank in this game is being the right one. The content you did is precious, and I sincerely appreciate it. I see you play as DRK as well, and even though I play at a really messy ping rate, watching your guide makes me understand how to make most of it. Thanks, and great job!
This is a really refreshing guide and honestly, I wish more people thought this way. This tier especially has been brutal for melee players, even without the uncaring tanks and people who don't want to do uptime strats that allow melees to flourish. Also, the bit about learning a fight while progging based on your GCD has been absolutely invaluable and it's lead me to improving my uptime as a Samurai significantly. Knowing where I want to be for which combo and where my burst phases are in the fight helps me keep track how much I can greed for without risking my life. It also helps me know if I'm behind a gcd and how much I need to adjust to keep my uptime. It's honestly so nice to hear someone else talk about this useful tip. I found myself doing it naturally over time and I cannot recommend it enough.
Thanks for all the helpful tips! Got my Shiva clear a few weeks ago and struggled getting anything higher than blue. This video really got me into optimization, am now consistent orange with a few wipes that were 99 or 100. Keep up the great work!^^
Not a savage tier tank. I barely even do EX content. But as a DRK main its nice to see these videos from the perspective of a great DRK. Theres a lot to learn and this video is a wonderful tool. Thank you kindly ^^
As someone whos been tanking this savage tier, I was often frustrated with pugs in PF who couldn't get past dps checks even if there werent casualties so I would swap back to dps. I think the biggest challenge as tank is staggering movements to fit GCDs while moving bosses at proper places. Its basically deciding either be at the spot preemptively and miss GCDs or constantly bounce back and forward on the boss to fit GCDs to maximize damage while moving bosses.
I watched this back in July, I forgot to subscribe and dug through my entire watch history to find it since the search function couldn't to make sure I still had it and could sub to you because the content is that kinda quality, appreciate you Lynx!
Good advice, great video. I'm just starting my tanking journey in XIV and this video was good for setting my focus. You also answered some of my concerns/questions about rdps vs adps, I haven't started parsing logs yet, but as long as I'm getting better and I make some progress I'm calling it good, for the time being.
Your tank mentality is the same mentality that I've always advocated for and shared with my peers whenever they asked me what I do to achieve tanking the way I do. It's nice to get some good validation from a current ranking player. I used to be a progression focused raider as well who sat in the 95+ range. Though I don't raid anymore due to burn out, haven't in a good while.
Hey man I just got my first clear on Ramuh savage main tanking and one of the things I kept telling myself while progging is to keep my GCD rolling. After seeing this guide I now have a list of things I need to do to improve! Thank you for sharing tips on tanking.
Learning by GCD and by your cooldown timers is amazing for prog. I’ve progged this whole expac as a DPS and it’s so important to know what you’ll have to consider during mechanics, like dot refreshes, movement windows for casters, when to use mitigation tools, etc. Keeping track of what you’re doing at any moment in a fight and using it as a mental placeholder is huge. And that starts with your point right before it. If you can’t turn your brain off and watch Netflix while you whack a target dummy with minimal focus and stay on your rotation, you’ll have a hard time learning new fights blind.
As a SAM main that decided to pick up Gunbreaker because I thought it looked cool, and ended up enjoying it, I find this guide quite informative. While I don't think I'll get too into the super high level stuff (just started Shadowbringers) this is sure to at least help me get my footing on the later content once I begin levelling my GNB to 80 after I finish off the story.
New to FFXIV, but I used to play WoW in a top 3 world guild, being considered by most to be the best player in my class (although I mained dps). It's good to see so much carryover at the high-end from WoW in this game. I would like to add a few things if anyone cares about an old vets opinion- If there is a way to track damage mitigation (even if it involves third party software), use it. There will be fights that need to eek out every ounce of damage (especially if you're undergeared), and fights where it's more mechanic and survival dependent. Every fight is going to have it's balance, and you want to max both your dps and damage mitigation as much as possible. Play other roles. You want to know the fights as well as you can from the perspective of your entire raid party, that way you know what to do to make everybody's lives easier. You want the mentality of carrying as much of a burden for the party as you can. This rule applies to all positions if you're serious about progression. And finally, do what you're doing now often- look at what other top players are doing, and not only look to mimic what works, but be thinking of ways that it can be improved. I remember when playing my frost death knight, the rule most people abided by was to always keep your runes on cool down. This was almost the case, except there was one exception I figured out- there was a proc based off your auto attack that would sometimes give you an auto crit buff on your highest damaging spell. There was a much higher return if you set up an auto attack tracker and waited for your next AA to go off before spending the rune. I would literally be hitting my ability as the auto went off, and it would often activate the proc simultaneously that I otherwise would have had to waste on a lesser attack in order to prioritize keeping my runes on cd. I ended up using maybe 10% less spells over the course of the fight, but had a return of an additional 15-20% damage. Don't be afraid to bend the rules and try out new things. Test test test.
Ayyy that's my comment on the video. Your first sub on twitch too ;) you helped me improve a lot when I first got into raiding just from watching your pov. Wish that you make this sooner so I don't have the learn things the hard way... That said nice and clean guide, perfect tips, better late than never. Keep up the good work bud!
Novice baby tank here. Thank you so much for this - it's going to help me improve a lot going forward. I love tanking, but I didn't know how to really improve in a way that matters. Thank you, thank you, thank you.
see, as a sad black mage whos being made to move so much in shb, ive found keeping the gcd rolling is easier said than done. at least on my first few attempts at a fight >.>
Very new tank here[lv. 28 Gladiator, been playing less than a month]. Got recommended this vid by a friend and while some stuff is going over my head, I'm still getting some really good info. Thanks for making this!
Super good guide Lynx. I picked up tanking as my main in FFXIV back in Alexander Midas and I can relate to pretty much every single thing here. The timer tip on gcds is especially huge, if you have to think about what to do too often, it makes you either miss uptime/gcd or worse; you question what to do and lose even more. Consistency is king! I personally don't try very hard to push my dps in raid anymore, I still aim for 99s as I know I'm in that skill tier but as a PS4 player it's pretty difficult to fully optimise outside of raid time and playing with a vision disability can be tricky. My group definitely enjoys having me all the same though. Would love to see a part 2 as I think all aspiring tanks should absolutely watch this and learn that tanking while not being the most complicated job in the world, still has an absolute ton of space to really showcase your skill and knowledge as a player.
I don’t tank but this was really enjoyable and a breath of fresh air to listen to. I like your mentality and it’s no doubt an important factor in your play. Keep the videos coming amigo
This actually taught me a lot. I’m gonna go practice rotations on other jobs with raid buffs so I can get used to their intervals and all that and see what icons to look for before hitting fight or flight
I'm pretty sure rDPS is net neutral, it just takes away the dmg added to your dps from party buffs. Not the dmg you would of done regardless. -This actually stops the feeding bs that was happening beforehand, where the top tanks were getting dragon sight and balance.- Apparently aDPS gets rid of the single target ones but not the raidwide ones.
The fact that it takes away the damage added from raid buffs IS the problem, as getting your damage inside raid buffs is a dps increase, and rdps encourages not caring about raid buffs. The padded parses argument is dead since single-target buffs like dragon sight and balance are not calculated into adps.
@@NamesLynx Padding is still a thing clearly. That's why your 100 aDPS run for shiva was 95 rDPS, because you are running in a group full of buffers. You had brotherhood, Battle lit, Chain strat, Divination, Technical step, devotion. That literally gives you an edge in aDPS. rDPS on the other hand is purely want you are doing. So I think it's wrong to tell tanks to look purely at their aDPS cause not everyone is in a party like yours, hell your party isn't even the meta for killing fights fast.
@@JJBCrimsonKnight These comments by CrimsonKnight are so totally correct. The second FFLogs starts looking at aDPS instead of rDPS, as the content creator talks about here, every single top parse will be featuring buffs such as -Dance Partner- Standard Finish, Embolden, Brotherhood, and Divination on tanks/healers. The only reason pad parsing isn't more of a thing is because FFLogs doesn't care about a flawed metric like aDPS. That being said, I understand what the creator means by his comments, utilizing your group's raids buffs is utmost important. However, simply saying that aDPS is a better metric is massive misinformation.
If you want to ignore raid buffs and intentionally do less damage to chase a high rdps parse then be my guest. The fact that my group is non-meta should show you that it’s still possible to achieve high adps parses without needing the perfect comp. Putting your cooldowns in buffs increases your dps, that is the only thing that matters here, doing as much actual damage as possible.
Just started playing a monthish ago. Initially made a SMN, then made a PLD and realized tanking was the way to go. Thanks for these tips, always trying to improve!
I'm actually trying to learn to Tank myself (specifically with the Gunbreaker) from my mostly being a RDM main, and I'll admit that at first I forgot that some DPS (like Lancer/Dragoon) have skills that require hits from the side or back, so out of instinct if I saw a DPS to the side of the boss I'd worry that they could get hit there and try turning the boss away from them (in other words I was trying to make sure that they didn't die. Regardless of my role in a party I'm always trying to watch out for my party and do what I can to try and keep people alive). When I Tank I actually take keeping my party members safe pretty seriously, I don't care much about making "quick" kills, mostly I just worry about making "safe" kills where my party members either don't go down at all, or only very rarely.
Super interesting to listen to with sound advice, the bits about skill speed adps/rdps were new to me. I mostly struggle with the positioning stuff, probably costing the melees some uptime. I am a very casual player and will probably never put some of this advice into effect but it was good to hear regardless. I was a progress raider in WoW and it burned me out so hard that I react allergic to anything remotely reminiscent of that in an MMO now. I am quite happy slapping normal modes around and doing the occasional PUG. Doing that little bit more there probably doesn't even affect the outcome (boss dies regardless even if I afk half the fight) but I feel more comfortable knowing I did my best.
New player waiting on money to keep the subscription to FFXIV here. I main a Warrior. Thanks for the tips, even if things got a little complicated towards the end. I learned the hard way about positioning during Garuda Extreme and moving her to face outside Edit: I also understood very little of what he was saying towards the end because I'm still fairly new and barely got through Heavensward in my 45 day free trial. About all I was able to understand from the video was keep pressing attacks so they're never not on cool down and keep the boss as static as possible
Hey, really loved this video! Would love a part two and also fight-specific ones would be awesome. Just saw this as the first video on your channel. Thanks for all the tips!
I had no idea what you said in the whole video, but it was still interesting to watch from a new player/tank point of view. I wish my teammates weren't such assholes because of my tanking lmao
It almost makes me a bit sad, since I was never really taught most of it by anybody It seems incredibly simple to me, at least, most of it and yet, so many people have such bad experiences with tanks that they just expect the worst Especially when they see that cute little sprout next to their name
Give it a try sometime! First fight in a tier plays a lot like an Extreme Trial, this late in the patch there’s lots of resources to explain mechanics for all of them, and there’s plenty of prog groups still popping up here and there. E5S is actually a lot of fun to learn, probably my favorite to prog this tier
I just started playing the game as a tank I’m Level 60 PLD atm and This Guide really changed my view of the game and I feel a lot better now , I will try to get a good tank ! Thank you so much for this video
As someone who mained prot and holy paladin on wow the move over to final fantasy tank and healing has been amazing takes both those play styles of tanking and healing and spreads it to every job
Hey Man! Respect to your topics, I’m not a good tank and watching this guide just now seems so helpful but I don’t have an fc or an in-game friend to play with and I also work ( real life with kids ) but I’m hoping that I can be a good tant someday! Blessed man gonna subscribe right now!
Haha, I had just commented on your striking dummy tip and got Next Video-ed into this one and ironically practically just echoed this video actually before seeing it. Despite willfully not knowing a few terms since (as my other comment made clear) I've never bothered to seek top%/world-first, I'm glad that ultimately we seem to be in the same head space! (including reading a few of your comments in this and that video.)
I started tanking recently. I am having a lot of fun. I'm not that bad according to my teammates but i will take any information that i can to improve so tanks for the tip (i am so sorry for the bad pun XD)
I love this guide. Back before heavensward i was a real good tank if not one of the best on the server. Back in ARR you had your tank mode which also decreases your damage by 20%, but using tank mode while tanking, its not hard to keep aggro. So i tried to keep my rotation as seamless ass possible to get max dps, which was easy since you had quite a few cooldown attacks to use inbetween. Keeping my rotation a seamless as possible, and my buffs always ready when i need damage increasing and reducing buffs the most. So i went like this. Getting only as much aggro as needed when fighting many ads or mobs, turning tank mode off to increase damage, keeping enemies in a good position for the other dps, using shield buffs, and damage buffs so the whole party could do as much damage as possible, whilst not needing to heal me so often.
This video for advance tanking and mechanics needs a Part 2, Part 3 and he’ll maybe a Part 4 for goodness. I say that because Part 1 was very revealing for understanding. I’m a former WoW Tank and Paladin and understanding these king of mechanics, mindset, theory-crafting is what helped me a lot in WoW as a Tank. It would be great to learn more from the continued series so I could be a better player and Tank.
I thought I wasn’t gonna understand this, seeing I’m just finishing 3.0 MSQ, and only play DRK, and am only at level 68. But since you mainly were using DRK abilities as examples, I understood all of it and am confident in my ability to improve my tanking!
I'm a new tank, picking up DRK to join a static to clear Shiva. I'd always been a SMN before o.o Very different playstyles but the change has been a ton of fun. I'd love more videos to help me work on my new Tank love.
As a tank main I enjoyed this video. You get a Sub from me lol. I already try my best all the time to follow these steps to the best of my improvised ability as a PS4 player, but it would be nice to have these other applications like on PC to help improve personal DPS. But nevertheless thank you for sharing your wisdom.
I use PS4 controller and I plug in wireless mouse to sit on my lap so main stuff I use on controller and set a hot at up above the PS4 loadout hotbar for other stuff ...of that makes sence :)
Any tankning guides are welcome 😁 started playing 1 month ago main paladin and really enjoying it 🙂 only problem atm i have is im too scared pulling too much in dungeons.
This was great to listen to! I'd definitely be down for a part 2 or an extension to this, since I main NIN on my main, but I main GNB on my alt so I'd like to get better as tanking.
Miji here-you actually showed up on my recommended while having breakfast. Great video! I’m often always PFing and rarely have been in a team long term, so I feel like I can work better on how to improve my adps. The people I get are pretty inconsistent in class/type and I haven’t put in a ton of effort on that front but I think it would help me a lot * rambles *
I agree with the fact that tank is a dps with defense tool and can hold the boss. I’m a new player to mmo and joined ffxiv at the end of Stormblood and don’t take it seriously till a few weeks before shadowbringer. I start as DRG and transition to DRK, and I can affirm that I deal dps but now I can defense myself and hold the boss. None of defense tool ruin your dps as of now and you should used it when tank or to support your party.
Started the game a couple of months ths ago. Played DPS, Healer but fell in love with tanking. There were a few of the things that I was already doing like keeping my rotations, not turning the boss, keeping a gap closer if its a new fight. I'm now at the point to begin the savage content because it looks really fun! I never thought to optimize my skill speeds as timers and will begin doing that. Especially syncing with the players im playing with. Very helpful. Thank you. DRK ❤
Your skills are one thing but what makes you such a great tank in my book is your advice. I've used alot of it in my raids and dungeon runs and its helped so much.
I just came back after a long layoff. I last played heavenward. I feel so lost. The game is completely different from what it was. I miss managing stacks, but maybe this is better.
having started FFXIV as a melee dps myself (DRG) and still playing DPS from time to time, awareness of melee dps needs was always my priority when tanking, so immediately facing mobs away from the party and minimizing movement as much as possible are main focuses as a baseline. Another thing i have picked up along the way is space management, as a tank, consider how much space you actually need for yourself to manage a boss or pack of mobs, and give the rest to the party so that range can capitalize on their strength, attacking from afar and not crowding out melee. your party composition will change how you behave in regards to the above of course, all-melee parties don't need as much space, and all range/caster parties don't care about positionals, so if you have to move the boss or mobs more, it will not impact them AS much (still some impact if aoes miss a target for example, but less detrimental than melee being unable to hit positionals). All that said i do not tank savage content myself, but everything mentioned should apply to tanking anything really.
About using CDs in raid buff windows, this is a great way to improve and push fights. Back in 4.0 on Drk, when I learned to pool MP and spam Dark Arts (rip) and such in Trick Attack windows and LItany, it shot my parses up to solid oranges and my first 99. 8 clears and I had 4 oranges just from improving on that. Of course rDPS doesn't care now, but your party sure will.
![FFXIV: Tanking Guide | Learn how to Tank [Patch 6.5]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/uYUUY34UnCM/mqdefault.jpg)
there's only dps class in ffxiv : dps with high damage, dps that can tank, dps that can heal.
thinking like this helped me a lot to improve my uptime as a tank
The only issue I noticed from 5 years of tanking in FFXIV, is that FFlogs is the worst possible way to measure your progress if you are not the only one looking at it. No matter how you improve the goalposts will have moved by then. in many cases by the time you achieve numbers that were a color improved a week ago, now you'd need a huge amount more just to keep what you had.
As a result I realized the best way to improve is to not care about FFlogs percentiles and to use it for its real intended purpose, analyzing your logs to find ways to improve.
People caring too much about parse numbers already ruined the raid community.
For years, even before I started playing FFXIV, which is my first "Classic" style mmo, I knew that tanks and support/healers should be doing significant damage along with the primary role. if no one needs healing, or if there is no reason to not be attacking, there is no excuse to not be doing damage.
However, this is not enough to climb the logs. 5 years of practice is not enough. nothing will ever be enough and I dont care who you are. Top raiders arent born any better than anyone else. the people with gold parses are not any fundamentally different from the greys.
What seperates them is years of practice and I mean REAL raid practice, usually in a static, and finding a good static for the past couple years has been like finding a needle in a stack of things which look exactly like needles.
almost bad game design
ZeeHero aptitude exists, but yes practice does help quite a bit.
@@gavin4056 that would only affect how quickly you learn something and often how motivated you are to learn it and how fun it is to you. eventually practice is the only important factor.
Antonin delete ‘almost’
This is something I've always wanted to make, hope you enjoy.
Timestamps:
0:00 intro
1:56 you are a dps
3:02 be aware of your melee
4:40 keeping your gcd rolling
6:17 learning fights based on your gcd
7:47 all about skill speed
9:29 save your gap closer
10:44 adps vs rdps
13:30 caring about raid buffs
I guess I'll just quit instead. Seems easier :)
@@Pmak TO SUCCEED YOU GOTTA FAIL, AND TO FAIL YOU GOTTA TRY.
@@NamesLynx Sounds like my sleep schedule dude...
@@Pmak Sleep schedules are pretty easy to keep when you make a fuckton of alarms telling you to go to sleep already.
Is there a beginner guide? Most of this went over my head.... (I just started this game 3 days ago as a paladin)
Brother, I'm just a noob tank that hasn't even gone through Heavensward yet, but these videos are seriously helpful. You are doing a service sharing this knowledge. Please make more guides. Thank you and you're welcome.
Glad to help!
mans thinking about so many things at once and i just wanna fell cleave
I'm only level 20 and I don't realy understand any of this, I will someday i hope lol
I believe in you
I’m level 64, I still don’t understand much. You should be quite a high level now as well. I play most MMOs like when I run past all enemies in a darksouls level but still wanna pick up the shiny’s.
Constantly saying oh fuck oh fuck, phew, oh fuck oh fuck
@@GriziDaWiz 😅😂🤣😅🤣😂🤣🤣😅🤣😂🤣😅🤣🤣😂🤣😅🤣😂🤣🤣🤣😅😂🤣
That's what she said.
Tanking in FFXIV is pretty chill, you pretty much do a dps rotation. The hardest part is just learning the positions and phases of a fight. But the actual game play is simple.
Love how concise you are and how sternly you deliver your information. Smart guy!
Ty bro I appreciate it!
This is the first video of yours I've ever watched, and I must say the content here is top tier. The amount of useful information and ideas in this one video has been truly inspiring to me in improving my tanking skill. I still have so much to learn being newer to the game, but this makes me want to try that much harder. Keep it up!
Thank you!
OH MY GODDDDDD "DON'T SPIN THE BOSS. EVER."
CAN WE MAKE THIS MANDATORY FOR ALL TANKS TO WATCH???
As someone who does tank, I don't understand why tanks do this like- at all it's not bobbing and weaving like in a boxing ring. It's literally acting as the placeholder/ foundation of the fight a good foundation sets you up for success.
@@mirror2922 I've played a couple of times more recently, and literally you can sidestep the carpet and move back into position before they budge at all. Let alone the ones that turn them into a spinning top smh!
So what if I die ?
i'm new to tanking, level 50 DRK. do i need to participate in hitting minions or mechanics like a totem that will make boss invulnerable unless it's destroyed? or i just leave it for my teammate and hold the boss cuz it's sometimes very infuriating on how long they take to destroy it.
@@Loxly-ti4sq if you’re in a normal or hard dungeon it does not matter in the slightest I would say. Most of the people you work with are trying to learn their rotations. Let alone trying maximize their DPS. You’ll be fine.
On the note of the mechanics if it makes the boss invulnerable or jeopardizes the safety of a team member I’m pretty sure that qualifies for moving to help.
And on minions well yeah you want grab all the minion in the dungeon. But in a trial usually that falls to an off tank to deal with unless said otherwise I’d assume.
I'd say the biggest dependence on being about to do this is being in a group you can trust and depend on. Great advice for those with that.
I started savage raiding about a month ago as a white mage, and changing my mindset to essentially a green dps as opposed to healer has made a DRAMATIC difference in my damage output. thanks for the guide!
oh this is great. I'm a horrible teacher for new tanks but this puts everything into words really well. Thanks Lynx!
Very helpful and inspiring video.
I started this game a month ago and picked Paladin. Loving every minute of it. Never thought I’d enjoy tanking so much. This video just completely cemented exactly why I wanted to play a Tank.
Would love to see more Tanking videos going forward. Need to soak up all of your experience. 😜
Thanks so much man! I have a few ideas for future videos but since this one is still fresh i'll probably make my next in june. Happy to hear you're enjoying tanking!
I didn’t realize you came back! It’s good to see your vids again. You’ve helped me improve a lot!
This was a really helpful video! As a DPS main who dabbles in Tanking quasi-casually, it was helpful for me, personally, to frame it as "all the things you think about as a DPS? Do those things as a tank as well."
I thought your aDPS vs. rDPS point was really good and subtle. Since tanks bring no raid buffs, tanks are basically greedy DPS and will want to optimize their performance the same way greedy DPS do: look at aDPS instead of rDPS to monitor their own performance. rDPS is a fine metric if you're, say, a NIN who wants to see how much you help out vs. how much you put out, but it's an irrelevant consideration for tanks and greedy DPS.
Overall, it helped reinforce the broader point that you should know how the metrics are defined, understand their strengths and weaknesses, and, ultimately, determine whether it is useful in your specific application.
aDPS is a little dependent on party comp when you’re comparing it to others but even for DPS it can be a much better indicator of skill. I can bring much more dps to my entire party by making sure my burst timings line up, and since DPS in this game all have such a heavy weight on their burst, the results show even more dramatically. This raid tier has had me theory crafting over and over again between rushing phases and getting an extra burst before the boss goes untargetable, and holding normal timings to keep the bulk of my potency in trick
Literally did my first dungeon today. I may have understood about 1/3 what moves he was talking about as a gladiator, but he blew my mind! I had no idea making the enemy run after me affected the others so much! I was running in all willy nilly keeping the healer on me instead of allowing them to attack. Really interesting food for thought. Will review again in a month where I'll understand everything better.
Been raid tanking since 2.1 and I gotta say, excellent informative video. Thanks for the contribution to the tanking community brother :)
New dark knight here. Only been playing the class for a few weeks, but I feel like I know the class and the attacks pretty well. I’m gonna keep practicing it and watching the raid guides, but this guide has already been a huge help to me and will be even more so in the future. Thank you so much
As I'm starting to do current tier savage raids, I was slowly realizing some of the points you've mentioned on your video. Things like not spinning the boss, your rotation will always be the same on specific moments of the fight when you do it right, as a tank you're a DPS as well... All of these things make a lot of sense, and I'm just so happy to see that my path as a tank in this game is being the right one.
The content you did is precious, and I sincerely appreciate it. I see you play as DRK as well, and even though I play at a really messy ping rate, watching your guide makes me understand how to make most of it. Thanks, and great job!
This is a really refreshing guide and honestly, I wish more people thought this way. This tier especially has been brutal for melee players, even without the uncaring tanks and people who don't want to do uptime strats that allow melees to flourish.
Also, the bit about learning a fight while progging based on your GCD has been absolutely invaluable and it's lead me to improving my uptime as a Samurai significantly. Knowing where I want to be for which combo and where my burst phases are in the fight helps me keep track how much I can greed for without risking my life. It also helps me know if I'm behind a gcd and how much I need to adjust to keep my uptime. It's honestly so nice to hear someone else talk about this useful tip. I found myself doing it naturally over time and I cannot recommend it enough.
Thanks for all the helpful tips! Got my Shiva clear a few weeks ago and struggled getting anything higher than blue. This video really got me into optimization, am now consistent orange with a few wipes that were 99 or 100. Keep up the great work!^^
Daaaaamn that's super impressive! Great job dude!
Not a savage tier tank. I barely even do EX content. But as a DRK main its nice to see these videos from the perspective of a great DRK. Theres a lot to learn and this video is a wonderful tool. Thank you kindly ^^
As someone whos been tanking this savage tier, I was often frustrated with pugs in PF who couldn't get past dps checks even if there werent casualties so I would swap back to dps. I think the biggest challenge as tank is staggering movements to fit GCDs while moving bosses at proper places. Its basically deciding either be at the spot preemptively and miss GCDs or constantly bounce back and forward on the boss to fit GCDs to maximize damage while moving bosses.
I watched this back in July, I forgot to subscribe and dug through my entire watch history to find it since the search function couldn't to make sure I still had it and could sub to you because the content is that kinda quality, appreciate you Lynx!
Good advice, great video. I'm just starting my tanking journey in XIV and this video was good for setting my focus. You also answered some of my concerns/questions about rdps vs adps, I haven't started parsing logs yet, but as long as I'm getting better and I make some progress I'm calling it good, for the time being.
Hey man, great video. Not just your advice, but how you explained and how second nature it seemed for you to talk through it on video. Subbed!
Thank you! I feel like my explanation skills have gotten better but I’m glad people are enjoying this video :D
Your tank mentality is the same mentality that I've always advocated for and shared with my peers whenever they asked me what I do to achieve tanking the way I do. It's nice to get some good validation from a current ranking player. I used to be a progression focused raider as well who sat in the 95+ range. Though I don't raid anymore due to burn out, haven't in a good while.
Hey man I just got my first clear on Ramuh savage main tanking and one of the things I kept telling myself while progging is to keep my GCD rolling. After seeing this guide I now have a list of things I need to do to improve! Thank you for sharing tips on tanking.
Congrats!
Learning by GCD and by your cooldown timers is amazing for prog. I’ve progged this whole expac as a DPS and it’s so important to know what you’ll have to consider during mechanics, like dot refreshes, movement windows for casters, when to use mitigation tools, etc. Keeping track of what you’re doing at any moment in a fight and using it as a mental placeholder is huge. And that starts with your point right before it. If you can’t turn your brain off and watch Netflix while you whack a target dummy with minimal focus and stay on your rotation, you’ll have a hard time learning new fights blind.
That was a lot of fun to listen to, did learn a lot too.
This stuff is golden. Thanks for making this lynx ❤️
Thank you for watching!
As a SAM main that decided to pick up Gunbreaker because I thought it looked cool, and ended up enjoying it, I find this guide quite informative. While I don't think I'll get too into the super high level stuff (just started Shadowbringers) this is sure to at least help me get my footing on the later content once I begin levelling my GNB to 80 after I finish off the story.
You get a sub from me, this is what people call quality content.
New to FFXIV, but I used to play WoW in a top 3 world guild, being considered by most to be the best player in my class (although I mained dps).
It's good to see so much carryover at the high-end from WoW in this game. I would like to add a few things if anyone cares about an old vets opinion-
If there is a way to track damage mitigation (even if it involves third party software), use it. There will be fights that need to eek out every ounce of damage (especially if you're undergeared), and fights where it's more mechanic and survival dependent. Every fight is going to have it's balance, and you want to max both your dps and damage mitigation as much as possible.
Play other roles. You want to know the fights as well as you can from the perspective of your entire raid party, that way you know what to do to make everybody's lives easier. You want the mentality of carrying as much of a burden for the party as you can. This rule applies to all positions if you're serious about progression.
And finally, do what you're doing now often- look at what other top players are doing, and not only look to mimic what works, but be thinking of ways that it can be improved. I remember when playing my frost death knight, the rule most people abided by was to always keep your runes on cool down. This was almost the case, except there was one exception I figured out- there was a proc based off your auto attack that would sometimes give you an auto crit buff on your highest damaging spell. There was a much higher return if you set up an auto attack tracker and waited for your next AA to go off before spending the rune. I would literally be hitting my ability as the auto went off, and it would often activate the proc simultaneously that I otherwise would have had to waste on a lesser attack in order to prioritize keeping my runes on cd. I ended up using maybe 10% less spells over the course of the fight, but had a return of an additional 15-20% damage. Don't be afraid to bend the rules and try out new things. Test test test.
Great tips, I hope more tank players see this. Turning Shiva into a beyblade is _not_ a cool thing to do x)
This video will be underated. But I will share it to my diying breath. Every high end raider should do this.
Ayyy that's my comment on the video. Your first sub on twitch too ;) you helped me improve a lot when I first got into raiding just from watching your pov. Wish that you make this sooner so I don't have the learn things the hard way...
That said nice and clean guide, perfect tips, better late than never. Keep up the good work bud!
The original homie!
Very informative VERY! And congratulations on the getting rank 1
Thank you, friend!
Novice baby tank here. Thank you so much for this - it's going to help me improve a lot going forward. I love tanking, but I didn't know how to really improve in a way that matters. Thank you, thank you, thank you.
Glad I could help!
see, as a sad black mage whos being made to move so much in shb, ive found keeping the gcd rolling is easier said than done. at least on my first few attempts at a fight >.>
Subscribed. I'm a newbie who fell in love with tanking in this game very quickly, and could use more educational content like this.
Thank you for this. The raid buff/Brotherhood advice is really useful because I always spam cooldowns whenever they're up.
watching this a WHM, knowing I am never going to tank but his content is just that good!
Thank you! At least now you can give bad tanks some tips to help them out xD
Very new tank here[lv. 28 Gladiator, been playing less than a month]. Got recommended this vid by a friend and while some stuff is going over my head, I'm still getting some really good info. Thanks for making this!
Super good guide Lynx. I picked up tanking as my main in FFXIV back in Alexander Midas and I can relate to pretty much every single thing here. The timer tip on gcds is especially huge, if you have to think about what to do too often, it makes you either miss uptime/gcd or worse; you question what to do and lose even more. Consistency is king!
I personally don't try very hard to push my dps in raid anymore, I still aim for 99s as I know I'm in that skill tier but as a PS4 player it's pretty difficult to fully optimise outside of raid time and playing with a vision disability can be tricky. My group definitely enjoys having me all the same though.
Would love to see a part 2 as I think all aspiring tanks should absolutely watch this and learn that tanking while not being the most complicated job in the world, still has an absolute ton of space to really showcase your skill and knowledge as a player.
Thank you!
New sub from a new tank on a fresh sprout account on ff14. Thanks for the video!
No problem my friend! Should have another guide going over dungeon tanking coming out soon!
@@NamesLynx awesome! Cant wait
I don’t tank but this was really enjoyable and a breath of fresh air to listen to. I like your mentality and it’s no doubt an important factor in your play. Keep the videos coming amigo
I appreciate that!
This actually taught me a lot. I’m gonna go practice rotations on other jobs with raid buffs so I can get used to their intervals and all that and see what icons to look for before hitting fight or flight
I'm pretty sure rDPS is net neutral, it just takes away the dmg added to your dps from party buffs. Not the dmg you would of done regardless. -This actually stops the feeding bs that was happening beforehand, where the top tanks were getting dragon sight and balance.- Apparently aDPS gets rid of the single target ones but not the raidwide ones.
The fact that it takes away the damage added from raid buffs IS the problem, as getting your damage inside raid buffs is a dps increase, and rdps encourages not caring about raid buffs. The padded parses argument is dead since single-target buffs like dragon sight and balance are not calculated into adps.
@@NamesLynx Padding is still a thing clearly. That's why your 100 aDPS run for shiva was 95 rDPS, because you are running in a group full of buffers. You had brotherhood, Battle lit, Chain strat, Divination, Technical step, devotion. That literally gives you an edge in aDPS. rDPS on the other hand is purely want you are doing. So I think it's wrong to tell tanks to look purely at their aDPS cause not everyone is in a party like yours, hell your party isn't even the meta for killing fights fast.
@@JJBCrimsonKnight These comments by CrimsonKnight are so totally correct. The second FFLogs starts looking at aDPS instead of rDPS, as the content creator talks about here, every single top parse will be featuring buffs such as -Dance Partner- Standard Finish, Embolden, Brotherhood, and Divination on tanks/healers. The only reason pad parsing isn't more of a thing is because FFLogs doesn't care about a flawed metric like aDPS.
That being said, I understand what the creator means by his comments, utilizing your group's raids buffs is utmost important. However, simply saying that aDPS is a better metric is massive misinformation.
Dance partner is not calculated into adps. I don’t know how many times i have to say this, it is only aoe raid buffs.
If you want to ignore raid buffs and intentionally do less damage to chase a high rdps parse then be my guest. The fact that my group is non-meta should show you that it’s still possible to achieve high adps parses without needing the perfect comp. Putting your cooldowns in buffs increases your dps, that is the only thing that matters here, doing as much actual damage as possible.
Just started playing a monthish ago. Initially made a SMN, then made a PLD and realized tanking was the way to go. Thanks for these tips, always trying to improve!
I'm actually trying to learn to Tank myself (specifically with the Gunbreaker) from my mostly being a RDM main, and I'll admit that at first I forgot that some DPS (like Lancer/Dragoon) have skills that require hits from the side or back, so out of instinct if I saw a DPS to the side of the boss I'd worry that they could get hit there and try turning the boss away from them (in other words I was trying to make sure that they didn't die. Regardless of my role in a party I'm always trying to watch out for my party and do what I can to try and keep people alive). When I Tank I actually take keeping my party members safe pretty seriously, I don't care much about making "quick" kills, mostly I just worry about making "safe" kills where my party members either don't go down at all, or only very rarely.
Super interesting to listen to with sound advice, the bits about skill speed adps/rdps were new to me. I mostly struggle with the positioning stuff, probably costing the melees some uptime. I am a very casual player and will probably never put some of this advice into effect but it was good to hear regardless.
I was a progress raider in WoW and it burned me out so hard that I react allergic to anything remotely reminiscent of that in an MMO now. I am quite happy slapping normal modes around and doing the occasional PUG. Doing that little bit more there probably doesn't even affect the outcome (boss dies regardless even if I afk half the fight) but I feel more comfortable knowing I did my best.
By playing melee in savage raids , really improved my tanking skill positioning the boss .
Well said and easy to follow. Thanks for the tips dude!
New player waiting on money to keep the subscription to FFXIV here. I main a Warrior. Thanks for the tips, even if things got a little complicated towards the end. I learned the hard way about positioning during Garuda Extreme and moving her to face outside
Edit: I also understood very little of what he was saying towards the end because I'm still fairly new and barely got through Heavensward in my 45 day free trial. About all I was able to understand from the video was keep pressing attacks so they're never not on cool down and keep the boss as static as possible
excellent video and should be seen by everyone, Tanks, DPS and Healers
Highly agreed
Hey, really loved this video! Would love a part two and also fight-specific ones would be awesome. Just saw this as the first video on your channel. Thanks for all the tips!
I had no idea what you said in the whole video, but it was still interesting to watch from a new player/tank point of view.
I wish my teammates weren't such assholes because of my tanking lmao
It's a real good feeling knowing I've already been doing most, if not, all of this.
It almost makes me a bit sad, since I was never really taught most of it by anybody
It seems incredibly simple to me, at least, most of it
and yet, so many people have such bad experiences with tanks that they just expect the worst
Especially when they see that cute little sprout next to their name
Good to know that im on the right track, thanks for the vid
Don't do savage raiding but this has given me something to think about
Give it a try sometime! First fight in a tier plays a lot like an Extreme Trial, this late in the patch there’s lots of resources to explain mechanics for all of them, and there’s plenty of prog groups still popping up here and there. E5S is actually a lot of fun to learn, probably my favorite to prog this tier
Even for casual tanking, these are good advice.
I just started playing the game as a tank I’m Level 60 PLD atm and This Guide really changed my view of the game and I feel a lot better now , I will try to get a good tank !
Thank you so much for this video
Really good material. Earned a sub, keep it coming!
this makes me want to try maining a tank again when 5.3 comes out, kinda left it aside in shb.
Best tanking guides on TH-cam, bar none.
As someone who mained prot and holy paladin on wow the move over to final fantasy tank and healing has been amazing takes both those play styles of tanking and healing and spreads it to every job
Hey Man! Respect to your topics, I’m not a good tank and watching this guide just now seems so helpful but I don’t have an fc or an in-game friend to play with and I also work ( real life with kids ) but I’m hoping that I can be a good tant someday! Blessed man gonna subscribe right now!
Thank you! I wish you luck!
Switching from Main DRG to Main Tank. Because of this, i subbed!
Haha, I had just commented on your striking dummy tip and got Next Video-ed into this one and ironically practically just echoed this video actually before seeing it. Despite willfully not knowing a few terms since (as my other comment made clear) I've never bothered to seek top%/world-first, I'm glad that ultimately we seem to be in the same head space! (including reading a few of your comments in this and that video.)
I started tanking recently. I am having a lot of fun. I'm not that bad according to my teammates but i will take any information that i can to improve so tanks for the tip (i am so sorry for the bad pun XD)
This is actually really helpful, and reminds me a lot of Graehl’s old tanking guides for Stormblood, but to a new level.
I love this guide.
Back before heavensward i was a real good tank if not one of the best on the server.
Back in ARR you had your tank mode which also decreases your damage by 20%, but using tank mode while tanking, its not hard to keep aggro.
So i tried to keep my rotation as seamless ass possible to get max dps, which was easy since you had quite a few cooldown attacks to use inbetween.
Keeping my rotation a seamless as possible, and my buffs always ready when i need damage increasing and reducing buffs the most.
So i went like this. Getting only as much aggro as needed when fighting many ads or mobs, turning tank mode off to increase damage, keeping enemies in a good position for the other dps, using shield buffs, and damage buffs so the whole party could do as much damage as possible, whilst not needing to heal me so often.
If everyone focuses on ADPS, the damage can be scary.
New tank and new to the game. Good stuff.
Thank you my friend, I wish you good luck!
What’s RDPS and ADPS?? What’s it stand for?? And what dps meter is that I’ve been looking for one.
the tank every melee loves.
This video for advance tanking and mechanics needs a Part 2, Part 3 and he’ll maybe a Part 4 for goodness. I say that because Part 1 was very revealing for understanding. I’m a former WoW Tank and Paladin and understanding these king of mechanics, mindset, theory-crafting is what helped me a lot in WoW as a Tank. It would be great to learn more from the continued series so I could be a better player and Tank.
not a hardcore raider, but i've been thinking about getting into it. definitely picked something up from this video. thumbs up!
I thought I wasn’t gonna understand this, seeing I’m just finishing 3.0 MSQ, and only play DRK, and am only at level 68. But since you mainly were using DRK abilities as examples, I understood all of it and am confident in my ability to improve my tanking!
Just started the game last night. Enjoyed the char customization, ready to tank. Being a wow tank for over 10 years.
I started playing FFXIV about a month ago. I prefer straight DPS, but I like playing WAR, this was a great video breakdown about being a Tank.
I'm a new tank, picking up DRK to join a static to clear Shiva. I'd always been a SMN before o.o Very different playstyles but the change has been a ton of fun. I'd love more videos to help me work on my new Tank love.
Thanks for the nice words :)
Can this have more views, like all of the information is not only for tanks but for every class.
I have been watching your videos recently and find them very inspiring, I love your passion and insight, I can't wait to get back on FFXIV again! 🙂
i don't tank savage but videos like this are always super helpful. more would be great!
As a tank main I enjoyed this video. You get a Sub from me lol. I already try my best all the time to follow these steps to the best of my improvised ability as a PS4 player, but it would be nice to have these other applications like on PC to help improve personal DPS. But nevertheless thank you for sharing your wisdom.
I use PS4 controller and I plug in wireless mouse to sit on my lap so main stuff I use on controller and set a hot at up above the PS4 loadout hotbar for other stuff ...of that makes sence :)
Great video, Hopefully this gets more people to try tanking in savage.
Any tankning guides are welcome 😁 started playing 1 month ago main paladin and really enjoying it 🙂 only problem atm i have is im too scared pulling too much in dungeons.
Just Look at your healers mana
This was great to listen to! I'd definitely be down for a part 2 or an extension to this, since I main NIN on my main, but I main GNB on my alt so I'd like to get better as tanking.
Totally agree with this video u actually gave really good insight i 100% agree and find this Super useful
+respect for your views on rdps vs adps
Miji here-you actually showed up on my recommended while having breakfast. Great video! I’m often always PFing and rarely have been in a team long term, so I feel like I can work better on how to improve my adps. The people I get are pretty inconsistent in class/type and I haven’t put in a ton of effort on that front but I think it would help me a lot * rambles *
Hi miji! I look forward to seeing your improvement!
I agree with the fact that tank is a dps with defense tool and can hold the boss. I’m a new player to mmo and joined ffxiv at the end of Stormblood and don’t take it seriously till a few weeks before shadowbringer. I start as DRG and transition to DRK, and I can affirm that I deal dps but now I can defense myself and hold the boss. None of defense tool ruin your dps as of now and you should used it when tank or to support your party.
Started the game a couple of months ths ago. Played DPS, Healer but fell in love with tanking. There were a few of the things that I was already doing like keeping my rotations, not turning the boss, keeping a gap closer if its a new fight.
I'm now at the point to begin the savage content because it looks really fun! I never thought to optimize my skill speeds as timers and will begin doing that. Especially syncing with the players im playing with. Very helpful. Thank you. DRK ❤
Nice video, I recently started doing end game content with my Drk, this was enlightening :)
Your skills are one thing but what makes you such a great tank in my book is your advice. I've used alot of it in my raids and dungeon runs and its helped so much.
I just came back after a long layoff. I last played heavenward. I feel so lost. The game is completely different from what it was. I miss managing stacks, but maybe this is better.
having started FFXIV as a melee dps myself (DRG) and still playing DPS from time to time, awareness of melee dps needs was always my priority when tanking, so immediately facing mobs away from the party and minimizing movement as much as possible are main focuses as a baseline. Another thing i have picked up along the way is space management, as a tank, consider how much space you actually need for yourself to manage a boss or pack of mobs, and give the rest to the party so that range can capitalize on their strength, attacking from afar and not crowding out melee. your party composition will change how you behave in regards to the above of course, all-melee parties don't need as much space, and all range/caster parties don't care about positionals, so if you have to move the boss or mobs more, it will not impact them AS much (still some impact if aoes miss a target for example, but less detrimental than melee being unable to hit positionals). All that said i do not tank savage content myself, but everything mentioned should apply to tanking anything really.
This may be a long shot, but what site did you use to track your rankings in FFXIV?
FF Logs.
@@crowdemon_archives TY
was thinking what role I wanted to play and watching this video makes me wanna play tank and just go grind to get better
Do it!
About using CDs in raid buff windows, this is a great way to improve and push fights. Back in 4.0 on Drk, when I learned to pool MP and spam Dark Arts (rip) and such in Trick Attack windows and LItany, it shot my parses up to solid oranges and my first 99. 8 clears and I had 4 oranges just from improving on that. Of course rDPS doesn't care now, but your party sure will.