Threat Mechanics for dummies

[Celeras]

My second thread now in the past week that doesn't involve how bad this game is. I know, I apologize. Now that that's out of the way, I felt this thread had to be made. "Advanced"? Probably not, it's pretty obvious. Either way, let's get the info out there.

Short and sweet: Threat in FFXI was pretty basic. Threat in XIV is similar, with differences that you need to get pounded into your fucking head so you stop sucking because I'm tired of dieing. Here is the number 1 rule you need to remember:

Mobs that are not engaged do not have a threat list.

That rule ties into everything. You being 'engaged' happens after the act of turning a mob from yellow, to red, and is dictated by a message in the chat log. Mobs that are in parties are engaged in the same way, with the same message showing that the entire party is engaged.

http://img833.imageshack.us/img833/2974/threat2.jpg

Duh, right? Now reread the golden rule, apply it to game situations. People who aren't retarded can stop reading here and skip to the last paragraph, people who need it spelled out.. read on.

Why the fuck are you still OPENING WITH PROVOKE/TAUNT. Mobs that are not engaged do not have a threat list. They get the threat list AFTER being engaged. When you blow your taunt BEFORE they're engaged, all you've managed to do is waste your best threat gaining ability engaging the enemy.. and then probably bitch about how 'broken party play' is when the target makes a b-line for the next person to touch the mob.

Advanced scenario, you're in combat as a tank and you aggro a link. Surely, you must off-voke the add so it doesn't rape the healers.. right? Mobs that are not engaged do not have a threat list. That add will beat on you all day, through heal spam, without even turning to anybody else in your party. There is no need to try to split your threat between to targets, focus on the engaged enemy.. then move on to the next. Your healers will be fine.. unless they're the ones that aggroed.

Advanceder scenario that requires additional testing. You 'aggro' a pack of linked mobs, A and B. As proven through the above scenario, you can be healed all day long without the mobs budging off of you. Now, you engage the group by attacking enemy A. Enemy B *should* have a threat list even though he hasn't been touched, but testing has shown mixed results in this category. Sometimes they will B-line towards support when the group is engaged, other times they will continue to act as an aggroed mob and ignore everything else until they themselves are touched. Further testing is required, feel free to discuss.

[Khamsin]

Since using any ability on a mob, including provoke, automatically engages it, shouldn't opening with provoke start off it's hate list with you having X enmity (where X is whatever provoke gives you)?

That is, mobs that are not engaged do not have a hate list, however, when using an ability on it, it becomes engaged and does have a hate list when that ability is processed.

Doesn't it go:

1) Issuing the command to use an ability against it causes it to become engaged, which initializes its hate list
2) The ability is then processed, and you generate X enmity
3) You now have X enmity on its hate list, from the ability used to first engage it
4) The next person to touch it will not pull hate if they generate less than X enmity from that action

?

Or is the first ability used against it not counted, even though it is automatically engaged through that very action?

By the way, what's all this about 'threat'? Did SE change the terminology on us? As far as I know, it's officially 'enmity' and colloquially 'hate'. There is no such thing as 'threat'.

[Celeras]

Doesn't it go:

1) Issuing the command to use an ability against it causes it to become engaged, which initializes its hate list
2) The ability is then processed, and you generate X enmity
3) You now have X enmity on its hate list, from the ability used to first engage it
4) The next person to touch it will not pull hate if they generate less than X enmity from that action

?

Nope

Or is the first ability used against it not counted

Yup

By the way, what's all this about 'threat'? Did SE change the terminology on us? As far as I know, it's officially 'enmity' and colloquially 'hate'. There is no such thing as 'threat'.

Call it what you want, I used the general MMO term. It will always be threat, and I will laugh at anybody that ever utters the word enmity over ventrilo. But being that this is an XIV thread/forum, feel free to change the title and ctrl-f-replace my post if you wish.

[jPuff]

I'm going to make a WoW thread about Epic Mounts and refer to them as Chocobos exclusively.

[Biggie]

When you blow your taunt BEFORE they're engaged, all you've managed to do is waste your best threat gaining ability engaging the enemy.. and then probably bitch about how 'broken party play' is when the target makes a b-line for the next person to touch the mob.

LOL

I agree not to open with taunt or provoke, but any person that is tanking should realize now that taunt and voke do nothing for enmity. If you still think it does, switch to another class now please. Both actions simply add a buff to the mob for about 2-3 sec keeping the mob on the player that used the action. As far as I can tell, and just about every other GLA in my LS and others on my server that I have talked to, all say the same, forget voke and taunt, only use in emergency, focus on phalanx and heavy slash.

I can easily tank just about any mob with out using voke or taunt, with a mage spamming cures and nukes. If you want to talk about "our best threat gaining ability" then talk about Phalanx and heavy slash. So you are either talking out your ass (like just about always) or you are an awful tank that does not have a clue what you are doing.

Or is the first ability used against it not counted, even though it is automatically engaged through that very action?

Not sure why in the hell he says, Its not counted, but I'm sure it is.

[Celeras]

I agree not to open with taunt or provoke, but any person that is tanking should realize now that taunt and voke do nothing for enmity. If you still think it does, switch to another class now please. Both actions simply add a buff to the mob for about 2-3 sec keeping the mob on the player that used the action.

Let somebody take threat. Provoke. Both of you stand there and do nothing as to not further alter the threat list(preferably with stoneskin or something, as you also lose threat with damage taken), and watch the debuff wear off. Proceed to watch the enemy remain on the tank, because it builds fucking threat.

[Biggie]

Let somebody take threat. Provoke. Both of you stand there and do nothing as to not further alter the threat list, and watch the debuff wear off. Proceed to watch the enemy remain on the tank, because it builds fucking threat.

Oh the lols, yeah I think I'm done here in this "advanced thread"........................................... ....

Enjoy the rest of your discussion.

[Celeras]

Yeah, I'd leave to when your entire post is proven wrong with a 30 second trial that can be completed by any two people.

[Edit] Or I don't know, by reading the skill description: "Gesture threateningly, increasing enmity and temporarily focusing the target's attacks on you."

[jPuff]

Hey, you referred to threat as enmity in that quote-- I don't understand what you're talking about. Don't you want to change that to general MMO terms?

[Celeras]

Then it wouldn't be a quote.

[Mytiwar]

Oh BG.... you are so humourous.

Can anyone actually do the test Celeras proposed and post the results so we actually know? Just cuz I don't feel like picking a side, although according to the in game description it should be pretty easy. But then again SE HAS broken things in the past.

[Kurokikaze]

I usually open with Heavy Slash and Aegis Boon. Once I see the heal go off from the block I use Phalanx and just keep spamming it with the occasional Light Slash (to keep TP up). I find it fairly easy to hold hate on single targets... Add another one in the mix and shit becomes a little chaotic... more so when we're around mobs that like to /autofollow and won't let me use Circle Slash.

I made a video during Beta 2 purely just testing out Provoke and its effectiveness. Unfortunately my account got the hammer so I'll have to explain this. I let Rag hit a mob and basically solo it to 10% before I used Provoke... what happened? It came to me. This would not happen in FFXI. If you're using Provoke to engage a mob you are wasting it. It's WoW Taunt not FFXI Provoke.

While the hate system is still a little off (i.e. me doing 400 damage to engage a mob and THM pulling with 50 damage Dart) a lot of it stems from people not understanding how Provoke/Taunts work in this game.

Edit: I'll check if I still have the video on my external and upload.

Edit 2: Yes I do. Gimme like 10 minutes.

[GSDragoon]

I made a video during Beta 2 purely just testing out Provoke and its effectiveness. Unfortunately my account got the hammer so I'll have to explain this. I let Rag hit a mob and basically solo it to 10% before I used Provoke... what happened? It came to me. This would not happen in FFXI. If you're using Provoke to engage a mob you are wasting it. It's WoW Taunt not FFXI Provoke.

Maybe more like mocking blow and not taunt? It makes the mob attack you for a short while but does not affect the "threat table"?

[Lucavi]

Here's a question, though I doubt you can answer it: What determines who unclaimed mobs will go for? Is it some form of sight aggro? Smell? Is it conal? Proximity based?

I asked because there are plenty of leves where my conj is standing behind an army of front-line troops, nobody but the tanks or DPS have done anything to the mobs, and mobs will still fly or run past the front-liners and attack us in the back row. I've been 3-shot by imps and does so many times just from running to the leve mobs a good 30 yards behind the front-liners.

I don't think this thread has a purpose until SE decides to fix the mechanics overall, because if someone wants to tell me that mobs randomly ignoring physical hits on them by a mar and instead running to blast a back-row mage that has performed absolutely no action yet on anyone is "working as intended", I've got some waterfront property down south I want you to take a look at.

[Kurokikaze]

A bunch of tests with Provoke. The one I mentioned in my previous post is at the end of the video. Don't mind the vent chatter. Also, I had annotations up during the last video explaining what I was doing but I'm too lazy to redo them. ><

Lucavi, thats part of what I mentioned earlier; how threat is still not working correctly altogether. I don't know why... But I have this nagging suspicion that leve mobs tend to go after the person who started the leve as soon as they are popped. <--- This is me trying to make sense out of the situation. Clearly speculation.

[Tezz]

Well it's safe to say taunt/voke aren't "uesless" in a tanking situation. I can effectively hold hate (at R14) against a conjurer & thaum (nuking/healing, R16) the whole fight with only taunt/voke & blocking. I did notice that initially voking the mob(we were doing crabs) would cause it to turn to anyone who touched it next, so i had to taunt after voke to keep the mob on me.

I'm not sure, i just voke & taunt when both are up while keeping shield up & i never lose hate. Especially with Phalanx etc...

I doubt it's based off the monster or number of party members, but i know they're not "useless".

[Kurokikaze]

No one is saying they are useless. What we're saying is that its useless to utilize it for the sole purpose of bringing the mob back to the group since you put your self at the top of an empty threat list.

Provoke and Taunt in FFXIV are the exact same thing. They are reactionary abilities that you use when you need hate NOW.

[Chakra]

No one is saying they are useless. What we're saying is that its useless to utilize it for the sole purpose of bringing the mob back to the group since you put your self at the top of an empty threat list.

Provoke and Taunt in FFXIV are the exact same thing. They are reactionary abilities that you use when you need hate NOW.

This. What I usually do On Pugilist is Attack first (really anyone can attack first and I get the same results) then use Taunt. Against a party of mobs though, this doesn't hold all of their attention and from what I see they don't share hate. To combat this and keep the mobs from straying off and hitting the support members I use class abilities buffs such as Featherfoot, Presence of Mind, Rampart (if it's up), and self cures on top of standard attacks / weapon skill actions.

However, this doesn't exactly build hate significantly if used back to back. From what I see, the groups attention spam bounces around a lot, but spacing out buff abilities and taunt seems to do the trick. When you notice one about to stray just use one of your class buffs. It relies a lot on spacing of your actions more so than trying to build aggression from the get go. It just doesn't work anything like it did in XI.. at all.

[Celeras]

Here's a question, though I doubt you can answer it: What determines who unclaimed mobs will go for? Is it some form of sight aggro? Smell? Is it conal? Proximity based?

I asked because there are plenty of leves where my conj is standing behind an army of front-line troops, nobody but the tanks or DPS have done anything to the mobs, and mobs will still fly or run past the front-liners and attack us in the back row. I've been 3-shot by imps and does so many times just from running to the leve mobs a good 30 yards behind the front-liners.

I don't think this thread has a purpose until SE decides to fix the mechanics overall, because if someone wants to tell me that mobs randomly ignoring physical hits on them by a mar and instead running to blast a back-row mage that has performed absolutely no action yet on anyone is "working as intended", I've got some waterfront property down south I want you to take a look at.

The only time I noticed this happening is when enemies spawn engaged. Either via flee+spawn, or transformation. Id have a hard time saying its 'random'... since they always b-line right for me all the damn time.

[Naruto3]

Here's a question, though I doubt you can answer it: What determines who unclaimed mobs will go for? Is it some form of sight aggro? Smell? Is it conal? Proximity based?

I asked because there are plenty of leves where my conj is standing behind an army of front-line troops, nobody but the tanks or DPS have done anything to the mobs, and mobs will still fly or run past the front-liners and attack us in the back row. I've been 3-shot by imps and does so many times just from running to the leve mobs a good 30 yards behind the front-liners.

I don't think this thread has a purpose until SE decides to fix the mechanics overall, because if someone wants to tell me that mobs randomly ignoring physical hits on them by a mar and instead running to blast a back-row mage that has performed absolutely no action yet on anyone is "working as intended", I've got some waterfront property down south I want you to take a look at.

From what I notice, when a leve mob runs and spawns couple more, they will always go for the person who started the leve.