Blu Tanking

I'm interested in putting together a blu tanking set.

the main guide talks about how blu has such fantastic enmity generating spells and damage mitigation tools, and its true.
However it doesn't appear as if anyone is actually trying to tank on blu.

I'd like to give it ago. I also noticed a lack of enmity + set or tanking spell set ideas. I'll see what I can put together, but I thought I'd check to see if anyone has already tried things out or put sets or lua rules together for it.

Honestly, because we already do it... Tanking on BLU you can do with pure dmg in the current game, occultation is fantastic for mitigating non-aoe hits, saline coat/magic barrier are awesome for incoming magic dmg, cocoon, barrier tusk, and diamandhide are great additions too. Couple all that with your PDT/MDT sets that honestly, everyone should have even if not a gearswap/ashitacast user, and the fact that we can push Magic Fruit incredibly high for cures... (seriously I just did a 1104 magic fruit on myself) we are machines. May not be kings of dmg (but damn good at it) but our sustain and survivability are insane.

Yes, BLU is very capable of tanking a great many things and probably able to tank current End-Game content as well. However, BLU's tanking in some form relies heavily on spell casting; usually making some fights tricky if the NM keeps spamming TP. This is likely the reason that the times I saw Spicyryan tanking he was either disengaged or PASSIVELY engaged.

What it all boils down to is that it won't be quite as well suited for it as PLD or RUN as any attacks that made it passed BLU's impressive defenses would hurt it more than it would the RUN/PLD. Add onto that, the fact that a lot of NMs have buff erasing moves too. BLU is considerably more vulnerable with it's buffs stripped vs PLD or RUN who naturally have silly-strong defenses even when stripped or can recover their defenses very quickly.

PLUS
PLD can get stupid-high HP which is a factor on some NM's special attacks. I think RUN can as well? Not sure on that one actually. BLU can also get high-er HP but not without sacrifices I believe. I could be wrong.

***Edit***

More to it, I honestly dislike tanking myself because I have trust issues with WHMs that I don't know lol. Because if they are too slow on the cures/nas/etc I'm kinda screwed. I mean it's kinda hard to Magic Fruit when the NM is trying to pull off a combo.

I would MUCH prefer to sit there with an awesome tank that can actually hold hate against me so I can have some fun and really tear that poor NM to shreds! The best tanks I've ran with are usually able to hold that NM for around 35% of it's HP with me going as hard as I want before it eventually starts swinging at me. It works more favorably that way imo. BUT I am prepared to tank if its a slow night and one can't be found.

you wanna tank on your TP, PDT/MDT accordingly depending on how the enemy behaves.

Whenever you provoke you wanna equip your Enmity+ Set

But don't full-time Enmity+ SET that is just not good.

I will show you my sets for BLU:

TP Set:
ItemSet 338919

PDT Set:
ItemSet 353339

MDT Set:
ItemSet 353341

Enmity+ Provoke Set:
ItemSet 353340

I never use pdt/mdt anymore, hybrid when shadows are down, otherwise always dd.

You do whenever you get Petrified/Asleep

and also, you wanna keep up:

"Occultation"
"Erratic Flutter"
"Sudden Lunge"
and make sure you have "Magic Fruit" Equipped so you can heal yourself.


If you got all the right Sets of armor it will heal for between 1,000~1,500 Each Magic Fruit :)

Also with good enough Blu skill+ your Occultation will be quite useful :)

GL ^^/

(You can refer to my Itemsets if you wanna check the Gear you need to be using).

BLU can't use those gloves; I use Nilas.

I did /tank/ all T1 and most T2 so far escha related, sometimes also Ambuscade when DPS tanking was viable - depending on if you /WAR or /RUN you will cast more or less just flash in all forms and turtle up urself in maxed PDT/MDT when big moves are incomming. Rest you try to stay alive self buffing and WS spamming while usint temp items to increase your survival chances (something most PLDs and RUNs dont do - lol) :x

As for gear, i only tried Sword/shield once and i think its a huge loss in performance ;/ So i sticked to 2 swords and played DPS tank while beeing able to survive ***because of turtle gear :x

To know when to put magic shield up, when to recast MG, when to use saline coat, when to go /war and when to /run has prolly more value then all the enmity+ you could aim for.

Knowing the mobs pattern/moves was half my bread and butter, so thats that. I also started with a pure PDT/MDT- set with barely any acc on it to Herc gear with DMG-5% augments and at least some acc on it, so i can actually hit sometimes when in turtle mode.

Other then that, putting spells together for each single higher NM was a huge PITA, for most T1s and T2 so can go full DD spell list with 2 or 3 support spells wich switch depending on the NM (dispel/saline coat/abusive use of White Wind/fantod/nukes/etc).

Most of the T1 i been able to land some Sudden Lunges wich greatly helped surviving at times, its good to know what you can stun and how often ^^

Thank you for the blue enmity set Kuro. thats very useful.

I have decent dt set on blu.

My thoughts were more about holding hate in a full party setup.

Sure PLD and RUN are the kings of tanking; thats not the point.

It can be plenty beneficial be able to focus blu just on tanking sometimes. I'd rather swap my spells than swap jobs alot of the time.

The real test would be if blu can hold hate in a full party situation/supertank in a party/Boss situation. Can retake hate quickly when hate is reset/etc.

Can it tank in ambu/omen/ geas fete t3+

yes, the niche is that blu can generate lots of hate w/out engaging/facing/feeding tp but can it manage in a situation where normally you would use a PLD or RUN.

when talking about sets, I was thinking about spell sets for controlling enmity.

Can switch Begrudging ring with Supershear ring - it has no downside like taking 10% more dmg :x

Get a Goading Belt imho, it also has Haste and contributes towards recast for spells.

Yeah and hands would be Nilas.

Don't see any other improvements.

I would tend to recommend Obatala or Zoar over Ocelot for similar reasons. It isn't a huge deal when using JAs for enmity, but for anything with a cast time, I'd rather not use non-ilvl gear.

If you're looking for just raw enmity on your JAs and low recast spells, this is the best you can use:

ItemSet 353351

BLU has their native 15% Fast Cast from Erratic Flutter, so you probably won't need to make swaps, but if you find some of your spell recasts are too long for your liking, swap in some FC in place of low enmity options. Examples would be Weatherspoon over Pernicious, Witful over Goading, Carmine Mask +1 over Rabid Visor. Again, not likely you'd need it, but if you wanted to build the set for longer recast enmity spells, such as Jettatura, it's an option.

What? they can't use Enif Manopolas ? :O wow........ I learned something new now, even tho says BLU in there and I Can equip them.

Cool thanks for letting me know Bro !

He's correcting Kurys Gloves that were in that itemset before it was edited.

So I watched Ruaumoko's "State of the Tank Jobs" video listed here.


And it's lit a fire from the community that several proven tank jobs have been overlooked in the video. He says he's making a followup video soon to explain his reasoning but it got me to thinking about what an Optimized BLU tanking setup might look like.

I myself have a post here from nearly 3 years ago:

My chief concerns here were BLU's lower than desired HP and not having nearly as much MEva. BUT that was Fairly true 3 years ago, a lot has changed as of now and BLU is probably a scary Powerful tank now. The potential is very high. Here are some sets and thoughts.

ItemSet 371984

I named it "Idle" but I mostly mean you'll be tanking in this set.
Tizona R15 for MP Regeneration; As long as you are swinging at and hitting your target, you should not ever run out of MP.
Colada with Acc +20, Enmity +5
Unmoving Collar R15 for The Extra 200HP
Rosmerta with HP+60, Acc/Atk 20, Dual-Wield+10, PDT-10%(Can exchange for HP, MEva, PDT also if desired)

This set caps PDT and MDT and Most of Breath if it were a thing.
Acc +345 (+375 Main Hand)
HP +914
MEva +674(Jesus...)
Enmity +18 (Not largely important for the Regular Engaged but adding hate to your swings counts for something)
HP, PDT and some DW to keep DPS swings nice and fast. Can also do straight HP and MEva instead of Acc/Atk. The Malignance Set and Tizona should give plenty of Acc for most things.

ItemSet 371985
Credit to Oraen and Kuroganashi for the core of this Enmity set.
Had to swap Odnowa and Gelatinous so as to not bounce HP too much. For serious tanking, HP is critical and you still have lots of Enmity to work with.
HP +914, Enmity +69(Giggity) Or +73 if you opt for the Rosmerta Cape.

ItemSet 371986
This is the High HP Fast Cast set.
Carmine Boots Path D
Carmine Mask Path D
Rosmerta HP+80, Fast Cast 10%, PDT -10%
+986 HP to keep you from Dipping
+67 Fast Cast means that as long as you have Eratic Flutter, you are actually overcapped on Fast Cast.

Now, that said, we all know that our BLU spells are very fast and should not ever really get interrupted if our timing is good.

but JUST IN CASE you want some SIRD in your life, our Gear options very closely line up with RUN's. I personally never have troubles getting spells off but if you want it, here are some options for a SIRD toggle or something.
ItemSet 371987


Recommended Spell Set Credit to Spicyryan's "Out of the BLU" guide on BG-Wiki:


Of these spells, I'm personally fond of

DW III
Delta Thrust -2
Barbed Crescent -2

Fast Cast + Haste II
Erratic Flutter -6

Max HP IV (+180)
Barrier Tusk -3
Glutinous Dart -2
Restoral -7

Auto Refresh + Hate + Erasega
Actinic Burst -4
Winds of Promyvion -5


Defensive Tools
Occultation -3
Cocoon -1

Magic Evasion III
Blinding Fulgor -8

Defense Bonus III
Entomb -8

Magic Defense Bonus III
Rending Deluge -6

Accuracy Bonus III
Nature’s Meditation -6

Store TP III
Sudden Lunge -4
Fantod -1

Healing
Magic Fruit -3

Hate Tools
Jettatura (1020VE/180CE) -4
Temporal Shift (1020VE/180CE) -5
Fantod (320VE/320CE) -1
Quick Note, Fantod has the same CE but less VE than Foil. However, Fantod's recast is only 10 seconds at default, 5 seconds with capped haste/FC.
vs Foil's 45 seconds. So BLU has a tremendous advantage here for building CE.

With the equipment listed above and these traits, BLU gains:

• +1109 HP, easily pushing into 3000+ HP with Capped HP Merits

• Something around +700 MEva from Fulgore

• PDT OverCapped to 57.5% Through Barrier Tusk

• Defensive bonuses out the ***

• Fast Cast value a RUN and PLD would kill for

• The best hate-generating spells in the game, most of which are readily spammable

• Stun Tool

• Basically infinite MP through Tizona

• Still perfectly able to DPS for VE as well as CE spam

Here's what I dug up so far and BLU's potential for tanking right now scares me lol.

if you put this to the test you'll probably find yourself crippled with very annoying status debuffs despite malignance which will tank your damage output. the spamming of hate spells will further tank your damage output therefore MP generation and thats where BLU tanking will fall apart in most scenarios.

Given that Malignance set + Blinding Fulgore puts us directly on par with RUN I simply don't see how that's possible without making RUN tanking impossible in the same light. That's also without taking into account that BLU can sub RUN for even further Evasion towards specified ailments. Add also that all tanks will bring meds, so even if Impacted, one Panacea will cure all. Same with Remedy for Poison/Silence/Para. And Amnesia will not shut us down.

Edit:
This would be more of a concern if it werent for the fact that the primary Hate spell is Fantod, which only costs 12 MP.
Actinic Burst 24MP
Jettatura 37MP
Temporal Shift 48MP

I could definitely see it if the BLU were spamming Nukes or 100+ MP spells but most of the arsenal is pretty cheap

Edit #2:
There's also the fact that you do not actually NEED to melee to hold hate, you can just step back and spam hate spells. Since this would be a practical application, someone from Alliance will Refresh you. You can also set Magic Hammer which will transfer 100% of Damage dealt into MP.

It's not very easily shut down once the HP hurdle is cleared lol

You gotta think, RUN has 3 rune enchantments each giving 84 resistance to 1 element with 5/5 merits and master. and put on barspells thats well over 380 resistance to 1 element paired with 70 Magic evasion gifts from job points. And the insane high M.eva from gear. Also add in AF +3 body for All ele +39, so that 380 resistance goes to 400+. BLU isn't as high, but close.

And BLU tanking would be far superior gaining enmity from DPSing rather than spells. Unlike RUN and PLD, BLU doesn't have JAs which generate near enough enmity, so BLUs casting spells would no doubt result in lower enmity gain than if they were DDing.
To put it into perspective, RUN has Valiance, a decent enmity set hitting 5-6 people is over 12000 Volatile Enmity right off the bat. That's where BLU falls short; so spamming spells for hate just won't work like it seems.

Also maintaining Cocoon and other buffs is a substantial DPS loss which further results in a lot of enmity being missed out.
I can see BLU tanking being effective on mid-tier content, without a doubt, but I can't see it being reliable on higher stuff.

i had to backup tank quite a bit when things went south and i've always ran out of MP within a minuete or two. although my experience is pre malignance and i usually had to spam magic fruit, white wind and winds of promy. to keep the party alive/hold hate.

maybe it would look very different with malignance, main heal focusing on you as a tank and no one expecting you to do BLU stuff like winds of promy. and white wind. i'd be glad if you prove me wrong.

then again any job that can hold hate could probably "tank" as long as he has his WHMs unshared attention.

AM3 + Maligance is actually pretty solid for dps. Survivability with the DT/Meva and STP for all the oat you get from am3.

most of this was available for a while now, the only new thing is malignance extra meva. as already mentioned above you lack job abilities for hate generation, the extra meva gains thru runes/job points/exclusive equipment.

you'll probably have interrupt issues unless you ditch MG for cacharian verve. your buffs have short durations and some spells long cast times (barrier tusk for instance with 6 seconds). there is also that extra delay after each spell cast. your DPS will drop very low at which point you might as well just take a PLD.

I wonder what situation would allow for this actually. A Zerg or Burn scenario, this is an instantaneous win, yes.

RUN's absolute highest MEva from only gear is 724 and requires Aettir Aug. Just as an FYI, not saying BLU could catch it, just saying it's clearly in the same range enough to reliably resist things. Gotta remember, Malig Set and armors like it are enough for normal DPS to reliably shrug off Ailments without being nearly as specialized so it seems for now that the MEva requirements aren't THAT steep except for certain targets.


Not necessarily because DPS damage is all VE. Perhaps a more laxed Spell spam then? Once every few seconds instead of constant. That way you could build hate steadily and also cement it as you go.


Theres not really that much to maintain in all honesty. Cocoon, Tusk and Occultation. If a proper effort is made, the BLU will receive the same buffs as the RUN so you'll be hasted, Protected, Regened, etc. The Target will be Enfeebled by a RDM making things even easier as Slow and Paralyze really mess things up for the Enemy. Cocoon's recast is a pain in the *** BUT the spell is instant. So idk, I'd love to see an experienced Tank take a stab at it, Other than hate-reset, I'm not seeing many weaknesses here.

And to be clear: I am NOT saying a BLU should take the place of a RUN or PLD. I am saying that it is an abundantly viable tank if properly applied. Like not even a "It'll do" either, this thing actually performs well. It should be on that list of tank jobs.

Edit:
Don't forget how powerful CE is either, idk if anyone here remembers RDM/NIN tanking at 75. Dispel and Bind only had 300something CE each but once you cast 3 or 4 spells the NM was on you and NOT coming off for anything. LOCKING Hate on Tiamat, Khimaira, JoL, etc while KC Darks burn away at it. So unless SE went and changed the way CE works, this should be worth looking into.

Ok are we serious right now, when was the last time you built a run on something and looked for a blu tank. Rua made a video and everyone got butthurt. The last time you looked for a tank for something you looked for a run or pld, sometimes a nin depending on content and warrior if you are kinggalka and go anon for **** and giggles. But jesus christ are we really going to make posts about tanking on jobs that no one will ever use for tanking? 1st pups get all offended now blu's. Waiting for the geomancer tanking guide..........

Maybe this doesn't belong here, but you forgot to include titan on your tank list. Have you seen how BIG and BEEFY he is? Add him to the list, he belongs there.

hey, geo/war and do indi barrier and geo wilt and provoke non stop, that works too, someone start a thread and lets start geo tanking

Yup.

Completely ignoring the rest of the troll here and just gonna say that People like having options. Perhaps a career tank has been doing RUN or PLD literally forever and is getting bored of it and wants to try something new. Or you're in the middle of a run and your actual tank get's flattened by something, gonna wipe? Nah, a BLU was already there in Most of the Tank Spells anyway because they're all Normal Utility spells, flips on the Tank Gearsets and gets the mob back under control while the main Tank gets back up. "Oh no, the BLU's gonna die.. wait.. he's actually holding this thing, dafuq?"

As for butthurt? meh.. I will admit that adding WAR to that video was a bit.. poor? when MNK is the exact same type of "Tank" with much better MEva? All I did was make an effort on what the current state of things for BLU Tanking would be while discussing its merits and faults. That's all :P

ok, holding a mob if the tank dies and actually being the main tank are 2 different things, i can hold a nm on my brd if the tank dies, does it mean brd is a good option for tank, no.

preeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeettttttttyyyyy sure the main point of a tank is to hold hate, not take low damage

exactly, and to say blu is a good tanking option is just silly. I have tizona and malignance gear and saying 'ok i am gonna be the main tank' is just no. like no with a capital N

Now you just sound ignorant, Were you even using Ribbon? Did you have dual capped Vampirisms for the additional effect hate gains? Did you use gaze-spell rotations for extra enmity from the % landing increase? Did you sub geo for the indi-barrier cocoon exploit?

For someone who's played this game so long, sometimes it's like you don't even understand the basics.