User:Itazura/Enmity and Tanking

(Originally from Enmity.)

Enmity and Tanking
A Tank's primary function in party, then, is to create and maintain enough Enmity so in battle the monsters would not attack weaker members of the party with lesser defense or less effective damage mitigation abilities. This minimizes the amount of MP needed for healing, and lessens the chance of death.

Normally, this means using high Enmity job abilities (like Provoke) and spells (like Flash) on a regular basis so other members can perform their roles like damaging dealing and healing without the monsters' attention.

In some party set-up's, however, the optimal performance can only be achived with finer control on Enmity. An example of this would be a Tank who maintains enough hate so normal hits from a powerful damage dealer wouldn't turn the monster, yet not so much so when a weapon skill is used, the monster does turn, and the Thief can plant a SATA (Sneak Attack + Trick Attack) weapon skill on the Tank. By working this way, a Thief is allowed to maximize his damage on his weapon skill, and at the same time transfer the Enmity from the damage to the Tank, thus permitting the Tank to conserve his Enmity resources without endangering the party.

Most often, however, the most pressing concern is maintain enough Enmity to function as a Tank. Different jobs have different means at tanking, but they all fall under these basic categories:
 * 1) High Enmity Abilities:  Use the likes of Provoke, Flash, Boost, Cures on a regular basis to create and maintain high level of Enmity.
 * 2) Damage Mitigation: Taking damage reduces Enmity, so Tanks utilize Utsusemi, armor, and job abilities like Defender, Sentinel, and Dodge to reduce amount of damage received.  (Spells like Protect and Shell also help a great deal, although Tanks do not typically cast those themselves.)  Recently, the addition of Blue Magic like Cocoon also created new damage mitigation possibilities.
 * 3) Damage Creation: Doing damage to monster adds significant amount of Enmity as well, and is the route taken by Warrior and Ninja when tanking.
 * 4) Enmity Modification: This involves equipping armor with Enmity+ attribute (e.g. Mercenary's Mantle), eating food with Enmity+ effect (e.g. Dorado Sushi), or using charged items with gives the character Enmity+ effect (e.g. Breath Mantle).  At level 75, it is possible to use the Merit Points system to increase the innate Enmity modifier by a few points, further aiding a player who is a full time tank.