The "Tank" : a bright invention back in the day I have grown to hate!

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I'd say that it's rather that there are no pvp mmos and only pve or pvx ones.

A pvp mmo would have a purely pvp progression, just as a pve one does. But most pvp people dislike unfair matchups, which is why the mmo genre just doesn't fit a purely pvp game and why we got all the session-based pvp games instead of pvp mmos.

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The game could still have npcs to give quests. There could still be crafting. The quests would just be purely player-directed and crafting could come from rng-based mats given to players on respawn and then used in all kinds of crafting through destruction/reconstruction.

And removing mobs would be the point, if you were making a truly pvp mmo. There's already the closest thing to this. Foxhole is pretty much a pvp mmo with crafting. It's just that the progression is more social than really rpg-like. And crafting, at its core, comes from "pve". There's also no quests or npcs. But if you were to add those things into the game - you'd have yourself a truly pvp mmo with the majority of features that mmorpg players are used to.

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Which is why I said that it's the closest thing, instead of saying that it was the thing.

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And to me a "pve" mmo is not an mmo If there's no meaningful interaction between players outside of fighting a mob together - I don't see that as an mmo.

But as I've said from the start of this subdiscussion, the "pvp mmo" design pretty much went into the rust/arena battler/foxhole-like games. Though I guess even Rust could be seen as a pvx game, because there's a ton of pve there.

I just find it silly for "pve" mmos to exist comfortably, but pvx mmos not even being considered a sub-genre. A game where 99% of your gameplay is pve is not a fucking pvp mmo. And that's pretty much what L2 was, even for players that sooner or later started only participating in the pvp arena. You still had to spend a shitton of time getting gear through pve if you wanted to succeed in the arena (which is exactly the issue that a lot of pvp players see with any potential "pvp mmos").

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A ton of mmos rn let you play as a single player and even if you need a party to clear mobs - you autofind some silent players who might've as well been replaced with npcs with no noticeable changes to your gameplay.

That content then gives you your gear, gives you your progression and usually finishes out the game's story. So, in a way, you can play the game as a single player with a few "npc helpers" along the way.

Of course there's the RP and/or some mingames or smth, but pvx games can have that too, so it's not like only pve mmos can provide that kind of content.

But yes, to me, mmos that don't have you interacting with other players outside of pure cooperation are as bad as a theoretical pure pvp mmo that doesn't let you cooperate at all. If you see that pov as invalid...

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But I'm talking about the current realities of the genre. I'm sure that there's older mmos that did this much better, just as older mmos did pvx stuff much better. But just as I'm not going back to L2 to play a good pvx mmo, I'm not gonna go play EQ2 to experience a proper pve mmo that provides good and meaningful player interaction.

And I'm interested in Ashes exactly because it's going for what I consider to be a good mmo design. A combination of pve and pvp, that pushes people to party up and that then lets them socialize/politicize/whateverize.

If Ashes wasn't going to do that - I wouldn't be here. And if it changes its design goals, I'll probably leave. What drew you into Ashes? The ephemeral promise of top lvl pve in the open world or the hope that they'll change their stance somewhat and will have more instanced bosses that would match your very high standards for them?

And to swerve this as least a bit back to topic, those pve mmos were the biggest reason why the tank are the way they currently are. You suggested to just refine the classic threat system, but that doesn't address the tank's role in the pvp part of the game. Do you think the classic threat system can be somehow fitted to pvp or do you just want it to be a separate thing, just as pve should be separate from pvp for it to be the best self?

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Cause we live in the now and not 15 years ago? I dunno. Either way, this is off topic and I'm sure that no matter what I say you won't agree with my pov on this matter, just cause our initial experiences are way too different in this genre. So I'll just say that I lost this argument and move on. And I'd ask you to answer the tank question, cause I'm genuinely curious about your pov on that.

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The 'Tank fantasy' is whatever you want it to be as long as it does the above.

That's why this thread is so weird, though I can't fault the OP for not having experiences.

To me, it just feels really silly.

FFXI made the Ninja class intending for it to be a DPS/Debuffer.

Players looked at the 'shadow clone' ability it has which negates single target attacks and went 'That's a LOT of MP saved, y'know... let's make it a Tank'.

The Devs didn't support this for a while. They fought against it a bit (relatively, because again, anything can Tank if you really want it to, but they basically didn't want it to, so I mean that they fought against 'the community perspective of it being a tank').

AoE abilities destroy all shadow clones and still do full damage. The ability has a long recast. The class has good evasion but couldn't DPS well while built for evasion and also for using the shadows. Square Enix just left it. And players kept going...

"Nope, that's a Tank. Let's start getting these people geared up and work out strats."

So they did. Strats for dealing with 'things that outpace the recast'. For dealing with 'magic and AoE defense'. For 'figuring out how to make sure that the class could save someone else other than by just hitting Provoke'.

The Devs eventually gave in and gave the class an Enmity Boosting stance when in front of enemies, and that's about it. Players just all found their own way, because someone decided "I can see how to use a long recast ability that negates strong single-target damage to maximize MP/Survivability".

The game contained like, one actual Taunt skill for 10 years or so. Everything else is 'affect the enemy so they're actually annoyed because you stopped them from doing something'.

If I'm tanking and I lose the mob, I Provoke (/WAR - I don't actually play this), Flash(/WHM - high level option only), use a DPS Spike option (innate to class), use a big heal on myself or them (usually them, /WHM again), or the other person just switches to their Defensive mode until it's hit them enough for it to be off them.

Most of the rest of this thread is just discussions of 'I think this SHOULD be this way' and 'I never experienced anything OTHER than this way' while I'm over here like 'what are you guys even talking about?'

Some days my Paladin tanks, some days I tank, some days our Monk tanks, sometimes our Summoner Summon-Tanks, sometimes our Dark Knight tanks, and sometimes our Bard tanks. Whoever's abilities will win the MP/Survivability ratio 'contest' in any given moment is the 'best tank', and some days you can just ignore that too because all you want is for the mob to be ineffective at stopping your DPS before it dies.

The very concept of a 'Tank Class' is artificial to me, but simplicity helps, so I'm not willing to crusade against it. Even if the majority of people have the 'Tank Fantasy' of 'being the walking juggernaut totem that shrugs off blades and laughs in the face of explosions', it's up to the game to lean into that. If the game is full of mobs that kill through stacking Bleed damage and your Tank Class doesn't come with Anti-Bleed, whichever class has Anti-Bleed is the Tank.

When the enemy is going to drop massive AoE/conal lightning bolts on you every few seconds, you don't call me, the Paladin, or the Monk.

JustVine summons Ramuh and we work out how to get enough MP to her so that the Summon can Tank.