Tanking, Transition from pre-30 to post-30

[Kibagami]

I guess i deserve an award being able to keep hate with defender on (I tried a really wierd thing, i used meat kabobs +defender...what you get is no att loss, no def boost but +5 str to make your WS stronger. Believe it or not i was up to par in damage with our SAM/WAR using kote and kabobs. The SC was Sturmwind>Enpi or the other way around i can't remember.)

You know it's really important to keep 2 sets of armor with you when you xp. If you are gonna tank go full tank. +VIT and +HP where you can alongside seafood. If you are going to be a DD then equip all the +STR,+DEX,ATT,+ACC you want .

As Elesirdur said. If you are tanking then your job is to keep the hate and take the least damage posible. Don't worry even when gearing yourself torwards defense you'll still be doing more damage than a paladin

About WAR/NIN. After the frist 5-6 shadows you sure as hell can recast. Just learn to time it so you get hit just as you start casting and the second hit just as it's finishing. Ive managed to almost blink tank the whole fight in the right situation (Well not the whole fight since utsu has a recast timer but at least half of the hits where blinked). You just burn a lot more shihei per fight than a NIN.

About WAR/MNK. In garliage and CN you'll have no problem at all. Last week while lvling my BLM we had a Mitrah WAR/MNK in mitrah RSE doing very good against crawlers. If she had actually bothered using real armor and sea food it would have been amazing. We still managed to get 2 or 3 lvls no problme in that party. Heck after she left we had a MNK tank it in Mercs Captains Gear. Or course he was geared as a DD with +STR rings and ouchidos kote. So in conclusion: CN is a pushover aslong as your party is good. Tanks are the ones that suffer the most with incompetent party members.

[Lmnop]

Without a bard, a lucky parry, or momentary hate-loss (which casting utsu brings back), I still have not managed to use ichi between swings. I spent quite a bit of time trying to practice it solo and see if I can get it down and never succeeded except when fighting things with 2 handed weapons (scythe wielding wights, for instance). I guess I've never had haste on me while soloing and things like that and a slowed mob help a lot I know. But I still have my doubts that anyone can blink between hits reliably without a bard.

[Darkedge]

; ; It seems that War tanking depends heavily on the party, and I forget who said this, but tanks suffer the most from gimped parties.

I'll start leveling WAR again next time Altepa is under my countries control, which gives me time to level thf and mnk some more.

Anyway, because Bards are so rare, will that allow me to use /mnk or /thf even longer, considering /nin blinking sounds way harder without a bard?

Also, would I have to change earrings for /nin tanking? I have 2 Beetle+1s and they lower evasion

[Voila!]

You should be able to blink very well with either a bard or red mage or both. I went through two stacks of Shihei tanking as War/Nin because of slow, paralyze, and haste. Haste does decrease the casting time of Utsusemi.

As War/Nin I kept hate with my attack and with the blinks. It's important that you get the blinks up, but at the same time are dealing out the damage to keep the hate. If you're continuously interuppted trying to recast you'll find yourself losing a lot of hate. Evasion earrings(Lv29?) are very helpful when recasting. Expensive, but the +6 evasion you'll recieve from them will be very helpful. If you're rich enough you could have a macro switching the two sets of earrings in and out when blinking.

[Elesirdur]

Originally posted by Kibagami
Tanks are the ones that suffer the most with incompetent party members.

A little off-topic, but a funny story nonetheless.

I'm out exping a few days ago with some people and we decide to head to Bibiki Bay to train off Goblins. I was excited at the prospect of killing some form of beastmen; I'm alway a little disheartened when I'm slaughtering crab, after crab, after crab...Anyways, these gobs are pretty tough, good exp for our party but we were without a Whm (Smn/Whm was healing) or a Drk - pt setup of Pld, Mnk, Rng, Smn, Blm, Rdm. Problem was that I was too low-lvl to effectivly tank these buggers and, spending all my gil on lvl 30-ish equips to work on my Warriror sujbob, I was forced to eat boiled crayfish for food, ugh.

After about 25 mins of okay, but dangerous exp, the ranger pulls a BLM-type Goblin. I had used my Shield Bash ability on an early bomb toss and much to my dismay I see the following message:

The Goblin X starts casting Flare.

I have no TP, no Shield Bash, so I'm frantically trying to get my pt members to stun the Goblin. No Dark Knight for Stun, and our BLM was off in space somewhere. After a few /p Stun Now! and /p For the love of Altana Stun the gob! I hold my breath and see:

The Goblin X casts Flare.

I had managed crank my hp up to almost it's max, over 1200 and as soon as the Flare was hit was left with a mere 29 HP left. I frantically fumbled around my keyboard for my Invincible macro but it was too late.
Elesirdur is defeated by the Goblin X.

In any event I got a Raise I (which blows at lvl 61 past, still lost over 2500 exp on that death) and the pt disbanded after trying to move somewhere else. Nothing against the people I was pt'ing with - I had played with almost all of them before and they're great players - but the party just didn't gel. Ah well, just the day in the life of another Paladin.

PS: Sorry for the thread hijack, please resume your regularly scheduled discussion.

[little ninja]

as a 66 ninja i rarely can get off a utes ichi inbetween swings. even with slow, blind, an paralyze. it still seems like the mobs hits it at the right time to cancel it out. an trust me when i say that haste as made little difference in it as well. as a rule when casting a ichi or ni spell. i find myself countting to about four before i hit the trigger. lately it has saved me both ways. i can take advantage of all 3 or 4 shadows, or just have enough time to get it back up. it also works well sometimes when i go from ni to ichi.

actually if you can get a cast of ichi off. it will generate some type of hate. how much is not known. but i have caught the mob facing away from me durin gthe cast, only to turn back towards me.

ELESI you were on topic with your story. you proved how important it is to have a good pt, an good pt set up for where you plan on going. cause even the mighty pld, an mighty nin. will easily fall when a pt set up is poor. lol reminds me when i tanked at lvl 50 in kuftal tunnel with the pt who was 2-3 lvls higher then me. let me just say. it wasnt no picnic,

[Voila!]

I always heard that it won't be interupted before 20% and after 80% but that doesn't seem correct. I can constantly time it so they hit me ~15% and I'm always interupted around 70%. Only half the time can I really get it off between swings.

I think it's odd that if you're hit any time during casting it doesn't actually interupt you until ~70%. That makes keeping hate a lot harder.