Tales from a Tank: There's no Such thing as a Bad Party

This might be my last Tales of a Tank entry for a while, so I'll cap off this trilogy on a positive note.  Since I started playing Final Fantasy XIV AAR, I make regular stops on the game's message boards.  Mostly, I just want to keep up to date on other people's experiences and maybe learn something for myself.  Most times, the topics are what you would expect, but sometimes, there will be negative topics.  Things like Tank/DPS/Healer's stink type of topics.  Basically, a lot of horror stories.  I never understood this because for the longest time, I have only been in one bad group.  Surely not the world ending crisis some people make it out to be.  Granted, later on, as the dungeons get tougher, the wheat gets sorted from the chaff but all in all, there are faaaaaar more good groups than there are bad.  Which leads me to say…  there's no such thing as a bad group, only bad group dynamics.

 

To see what I mean from a Tank's perspective, I'd like to share with you something I heard from the top salesman of a sporting goods company.  He told me once, that what makes a professional athlete different from a mere athlete is the ability to compensate.  Whatever conditions are there out in the field, a true pro would use everything in his or her skillset to compensate for the negatives and lean on the positives.  And so it is with tanking.  A lot of these so called bad groups are simply a lack of compensation between one party member to another.  Tanking is hard, yes, but not because of the tools you are given.  In fact, what you are given as a Paladin or a Warrior is more than enough to do your job with.  The rest is all about how you use them.

 

I ran a dungeon once with a Black Mage who complemented me because I can hold aggro while he went on an AOE spree.  AOE stands for Area of Effect, and denotes skills which affect a wide area, and thus, can target multiple enemies.  Using AOEs present a danger to lesser tanks because it's possible to pull aggro away from the tank and onto yourself.  A good tank, however, can compensate for this with their own AOE moves (such as Flash or Overpower).  If a black mage or an archer or a healer spams AOE, simply use your own more often.  In fact, if you use Flash or Overpower at just the right intervals, the crazy AOE spamming DPS cannot, I repeat, cannot, take aggro away from you.  Ever.  I know because I did this.  The opposite is true also.  I was with a group involving two black mages.  I was healing and my buddy C-Rox was tank.  The mages put all the enemies to sleep except for one.  It was literally the most boring dungeon run of all time, as there was no way we'd ever die, but at the same time, the tank doesn't have to AOE as often, and can focus on dealing damage (such as it is). 

 

Though a tank has all the moves necessary to compensate for all sorts of situations, it's important for healers and DPS to realize that they aren't miracle workers.  Compensation works both ways.  If you find that the tank has trouble holding onto multiple targets, then stop doing your AOEs.  For healers, just try to focus on cure rather than cure 2 and for god's sake, don't use Medica if you don't have to.  The DPS can compensate for weaker tanks the same way a strong tank can compensate for all sorts of play styles.  Also, please try not to hit enemies out of order.  Always damage the tank's target.  When a tank is focused on one target, there isn't a hope in hell of anyone pulling that target away (believe me, I tried).  That said, tanks can even compensate for this, somewhat.  I notice that it takes a long time to pull out of order enemies away from a good tank (I know because I often hit enemies out of order if the tank doesn't mark them first).  Even if the tank isn't focused on that target, it still takes 2 or 3 combo cycles to transfer aggro on to you.  That's good news for small mistakes.  Even so, the tank can compensate for this by giving the target of the offending party member a quick savage blade or a skull splitter.  This can be hard to do in the middle of a hectic fight, however.  One of my favorite tactics when tanking just two enemies is to use (as Paladin) Fight or Flight (increase damage), then hit one enemy with fast blade/savage blade combo and then the second enemy with rage of halone, then repeat.  I find that no matter who hits what this tactic lets you keep aggro and do wicked damage.

 

This is why I say there are no bad groups, only bad group dynamics.  Confict usually occurs when someone is too set in their ways.  I've seen so many different fighting styles while doing dungeons but have almost always manage to complete the instance.  There really isn't much right or wrong in the game, just what works.  While a smooth group works best, a lacking group can also be successful provided that party members adjust their tactics accordingly.  Of course, not every problem can be solved in this way.  If someone is a jerk, there's not much you can do.  If someone doesn't know their role, all you can do is educate them.  But if you want to talk game mechanics, there's very, very little (outside of outright sabotage) to trip up a party where at least half the people know what they are doing.

 

So maybe, the next time you are in a 'bad group', the best thing to do isn't to rage quit or call people names, but rather, think about what it is you can do differently to make things work better.  Easier said than done, I know, but it can be done.