Re-activating your WoW account, or interested in "Trying Before You Buy"?Things Every Warrior Tank Thinks Every Non-Tank Should Know
This post is something of a cathartic exercise for myself. If someone gets something out of it great, if not that's fine too. I feel like I got it out of my system before the next pug either way.
Things every warrior tank thinks every non-tank should know.
My ability to generate threat over an extended time frame is inversely proportional to your ability to generate threat.
Huh? Ok here is what I mean, we will use a mage for this example but the same applies to rogues hunters, or anything else not a warrior or a bear druid.
As a fight commences both of us have two bars. We both have big full green health bars. Under my health bar is a big empty bar. Under your health bar is a big full blue bar. When you do dmg, it drains your blue bar. When I give or take dmg it fills my red bar. You have all the ammo you need at the start of a fight to make all kinds of threat which will pull all kinds of aggro. I don't have much ammo to generate threat or take aggro, it takes me a minute.
The difference is that at the beginning of the fight, your threat making resource; mana, is full. You at this moment can activate whatever ability you want and instantly create tons of threat. Mine is empty. My resource, rage, fills up as I give and take dmg. Over the course of the fight I will get a lot to spend, so the longer the fight goes on the more and more threat I make.
Problem is at the beginning of the fight I have little or no rage. It takes me time to build the threat to hold aggro off of you.
So what does this mean to you? It means that if you start every pull with your biggest most evil 10 second cast fireball, it"s gonna be real tough for me to get aggro off of you with my empty rage bar.
How to apply this advice: You need to learn to pace your dps. Whether you are a mage or a rogue or a lock whatever (except hunters who feign death whenever the cooldown is up) start off the fight with lighter lower dmg attacks.
As the fight wears on rank it up to the bigger meaner stuff. You can do the same amount of dmg, but instead of front loading all of your dps (and threat) back load it.
Seriously, this is the biggest problem I see with every single DPS class in the game. Yes, I can taunt the mob off of you, but then the taunt is on cool down. What if the mob then does an aggro wipe like a knock down and it goes after you? What if it stuns me right after I taunt so I can't build threat? You should be trying to play in such a way that you don"t ever have to see the warrior taunt outside of extenuating circumstances like aggro wipes.
When not to stun.
Ok so you have a stun button. I"m happy for you, no really I am. Stun buttons are great. You see a mob start to cast a heal or a "Level 5 Death to Tank" stun him, that"s fabulous. You see something chewing on a healer, stun them, awesome. A mob "attempts to run away in fear" go nuts stun lock them to the floor.
So why insist on stunning a mob I just pulled? Why stun the mob I just taunted? Here is what happens when you do that. When I am tanking I don't really do dmg to make rage. My little red bar fills up when I take dmg. If you stun early in a pull I don't get pounded on so I don"t gain threat so I don"t hold aggro, so someone like a healer or a mage is going to get the aggro. This wont usually produce a wipe, most mobs you can stun aren't a big deal, but seriously, why make things more difficult then they need to be?
If you absolutely need a rule of thumb, wait till there are two sunders on a target before you stun it.
What to do when you get aggro.
The tank won't always hold aggro. That"s a fact. Maybe the tank sucks, maybe he got feared, maybe he got stunned, maybe you just unleashed a cruise missile that crits the target for umpteen gazillion points before the tank had so much as an auto-attack on the mob. Whatever the reason, eventually you are going to have the mob beat on you.
If you are wearing pajamas and the mob is elite I understand the panic that sets in. You don"t want to get two shotted. I don't want that either. So let me explain first the two things NOT to do.
Don't nuke the thing with another cruise missile! You just pulled aggro so why go nuts trying to dps the thing to the floor before it can kill you? This isn't a lvl 11 Defias Pillager, most likely you wont take it down in time. What you WILL do, is generate another gajillion points of threat that the tank needs to top to get it off of you. Stop hurting it. If you have a threat mitigator (cower, feint, fade, feign death) use it, if not. Just hold still for a sec. It wont be for very long, soon enough you will be sticking it full of sharp metal things or setting the mob on fire again. Just don"t make it harder for the tank to get the thing off of you.
Don't run for the hills! I am a bit baffled as to where this gut reaction comes from. When you were lvl 40 did you outrun a bear or something? I don't think you did. Do you think if you run far enough you will drop aggro? In an instance an elite mob will not drop aggro until you are dead or until you have left the instance. Running won't keep the mob from chewing on your keester the whole time you run around, really it won't. The mob runs the exact same speed you do. Guess who else runs the exact same speed you do. That's right, me!
So if train A leaves Pheonix at 5:10 a.m. Pacific time headed east at 45 miles per hour, and Train B leaves San Diego at 5:10 a.m. Pacific time headed east at 45 miles per hour, at what point does train B catch up to Train A? That"s right! Never! So when train A dies in a monstrous fireball or twisted metal and diesel fuel, it is probably even going to blame train B for not saving it.
You need to run TOWARD the tank, at the very least hold still.
Ok Pally OT, bear OT or other Warr OT, when should you taunt off of me?
Um, really close to never. Why on earth are you taunting off of me? Are you trying to prove a point? Are you trying to demonstrate that you can tank as well as me? Great for you! You have tank buttons too. Now I have to burn my taunt to pull the mob back off of you so you don"t die, or so the healer doesn"t waste mana on you. Now my taunt is in cool down if I need it.
The only time you should taunt off the main tank is if I ask you to. When will that happen? Only if the healer dies and I need to bandage, or if it's a fight that requires a tank rotation. That's it.
Now of course there are times when things are confusing, something is chewing on the healer and you are trying to save the day and I taunt and then you do too. That"s fine, you did the right thing in saving the healer, don"t beat yourself up about it, you don't need to apologize to me for it either. I saw what happened, I"m 4% smarter than I look.
When should you bubble me?
I hope this is a priest asking this, I really don't need divine intervention thanks. If you bubble me I don't get threat from taking damage. Don't bubble me before a pull. Don't bubble me early in a pull. If my bar is mostly red, sure if you think I need the extra mitigation and there isn"t time for a real heal, bubble me.
Don't BOP me please, it's a fantastic way to kill healers.
The pull.
Sometimes we aren't going to fight the mob out where it is standing. Some times I will even shoot the mob and then duck behind a corner. This is not the universal "unleash your mana wielding ranged casting might" signal. What probably happened is I saw a little blue bar under the mob out there; I want him to come to me so I shot him, then broke line of sight. If you shoot him, guess what, he will stand right where he is and shoot back. Then I have to go out there and risk pulling the whole room to get him off of you unless you figure out how to duck behind corners too, that is assuming that the Moonkin and the Hunter standing next to you didn't just take your cue and unload their blue wad all over the mob you just launched WWIII on.
The sheep
We pull 3 mobs on accident. You can sheep or seduce or scattershot or whatever. That's a fabulous idea. Don't sheep the thing I am beating on! You know what will happen? It will break and I will already have another move queued up behind the move that broke the sheep which will break the next sheep you are trying to do since you didn"t change targets. You might not be familiar with the "F" key. Click me, then click "F", now you are targeted on my target, so target something else, anything else and sheep that.
Multi mob pull
Ok so we just got more than we can handle and I am tanking 3 mobs with no offtank. Attack my target would you? I only have so much rage to spread around. If you start shooting something that I am not concentrating on your going to pull aggro, then I have to decide whether I let you die, or whether I go pull it off of you and risk letting the rest of the party die while they keep attacking the thing I was attacking. The "F" key works great for this too.
The off tanks target
Just because I am the main tank does not mean that my target is the most important target to kill. In fact, often it is the opposite. I am the main tank because I take the best beating. The Hunters wind serpent that is tanking that other orc over there wont hold up as well as me. His target needs to die first. My target should be the last one to die. Those other tanks aren't built to take the abuse I do, help them out. I will be ok, I have all kinds of squishies watching my back. Seriously, go fight the other guy's target.
If you enjoyed this post, make sure you subscribe to my RSS feed!Related posts:
- Warrior Tank Pre-Raid Gear Guide
- The Great Debate: Who Pulls?
- Helping A Warrior Tank Guildmate Exceed 490 Defense
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I'm not really sure why no-one commented to this, sound advice, and given nicely without cuss-words and taunts (and yet, managing to convey your pissed-off ness ;-)!). I wish more guys would read this, I've got a hunter on Nagrand realm, and I remember when I was low lvl running through Deadmines with a group, i'd see the grp waiting till the warrior pulled defias mages with a gun shot, and then having the clothies blow their load at range; surprise, surprise, the mage decides to stand where he is and blow right back too!
This is freakin awesome!!!
I was cracking up half the time, because so many people do not get this stuff, and I have seen it over and over and over again!
Damn, someone finally published exactly what I have been preaching. But I would like to add a lil something. Mages, hunters, locks, and all others. Your minion, pets, and pyros have no place in a pull. If I pull, as the main tank and we have a couple to deal with, let me pull. The mobs will automatically come to the tank and its makes it much easier for me to do my sunders and shield slams to gain aggro on both of them. If someone else pulls, I now have to chase them and try to gain aggro. Team work is the key to all runs. Let the tank do his job which includes doing the pulling.
I have already done a few groups with my warrior and while he is so low in levels its not even funny, this still bears noticing.
I had a rogue go total batshit on a guy and then (shock) the guy went batshit BACK on him. He was screaming for me to take aggro, but guess what. It takes a bit (like you said).. He died and after doing it 3x's is now on ignore.
The worst thing is in low level dungeons where it 'doesn't matter'... /sigh... yes it does matter, because developing bad habits early is... well.... BAD!!! Yes, you probably won't get 2-shotted... yet... but dammit, learn to play before you get us all killed. I have a level 41 warrior, and whenever I play, its usually in an instance. That being said, I'm usually pretty good at it, and its a fun level range to be in (my opinion) but when I pull 3 mobs, and I'm tanking them all, and mr. hunter/mage/warlock pulls one of them because they used an AE too early (I personally love AEs, but give me a min to generate aggro) or attacks the wrong mob, I'm not helping any more... the one and only time I'll help is if its on the healer... which is usually right after it kills the mage or the hunter went FD. Of course a good hunter/mage would have trapped/sheeped it so I don't worry about them any more... and if they don't get it, I just say "wowgrrl.com" and /ignore them. ;-)
Thank you for the excellent info.
I play a mage and had always thought I should always get the longest casting, hardest hitting spell off first because it takes so long! I never really understood how the whole aggro thing worked. (I haven't played with many groups it seem that everytime I'd get half way in the group would dissolve.)
Thanks again!
yo dude so right i have to go threw the same stuff u do lol its stupid when some of the ppl dont listen to u when u try and help them
Well said. I enjoy your humor.
I was that mage,well ok I still am. Take last night for instance in heroic mech I critted a fireball for 9.6k and was bordering taking agro...did I pause for a second, hell no I fired off another cruise missle for another 9.6k crit and pulled agro. I iced blocked and the druid took agro back. I think Rizzo nailed this with the bad habit remark.
Also if a mob starts to chase me and my iceblock is on cool down I run away because if I get near the mob he will one shot me so Im hoping the tank will taunt him off me or by the grace of a pally I get a shield. I mean cmon you should be watching your agro meter as well and get ready with that taunt because Im burning that b@stard down as fast as possible so hold on tight. ;)
MadMage, hairbrains like you are the reason I only tank for people I know. I will never group with random LFG's as long as I play, lest I wind up with a fool teenager like yourself. Or a grown man/woman with the unfortunate circumstance of being saddled with a teenager's train of thought. Derailed, train of thought. Go die somewhere
Win
Great post! I'm forwarding it to everyone in my guild so we all have this excellent reminder of what not to do to the poor tank in endgame. I wanted to comment because I see one important point that didnt make your list (maybe you dont have a problem with it but its a common on my server.)
And that is if you're melee dps, please dps from BEHIND THE TARGET! If you're standing rght next to the tank and your melee strike is parried the tank will not thank you for making his next beating that much harder! Nor will your healer thank you for effectively 'wasting' that much of his/her mana bar because of the extra damage the tank is taking that you just caused!
Please Rogues, MS/Fury Warriors, Enhancement Shammies, etc. Do it from BEHIND!
I like this article quite a lot. It does explain some things that I did not know, expecially concerning how rage works. I make it a habit to wait for a few seconds before attacking, to let the tank draw aggro. Here is where those large, hard hitting spells are good though, from the mages perspective. Tank pulls, and I have 3-4 sec of casting time before my world ending spell lets loose. How long, if you can say, would it take for a good tank to get decent aggro? Rarely do I pull aggro, but when I do, my death is my fault. This is something all dps and heals should understand. Tanks are 1 player. And not managing your threat correctly means you deserve to die. Its not their fault you're not good. I'd say to any tank if I pull aggro and you can't save me, let me die. Do what is best for the group.
As a level 70 raid healer I always apreciate posts like this to increase my knowledge and ability to heal you guys. However I do want to point something out to all of you tanks out there. You're ability to tank is DIRECTLY related to my ability to heal. It doesn't matter how good the dps is at agro control and how good you are at maintaining threat on 50 elites at one time....If your healer can't heal the damage you are taking then it doesnt matter how much threat you can generate. Understand?
I mostly see this problem with pally tanks that think they can tank the whole room at one time because they will never loose agro but sometimes you warriors get the same thought up your ass. Just because you can hold threat doesn't mean your healer can heal the damage.
I wont start the fight by bubbleing you or casting my uber 7K crit heal if you will wait for me to pop some HoTs on you before you pull.
I just found this site so I don't know if this has been covered under a different post like "10 things healers want tanks to know".
Hasn't been covered yet but it's been a'brewin in my mind since I started healing, so soon!
To Intelligent Mage, above:
If you want a good rule of thumb for unleashing your fireball/pyro/etc., here it is:
Wand 4-6 times before casting. 6 is better if you are a real cooldown poppin' dps machine. That's usually enough (in addition to the zero damage during casting time) for you to not pull, and believe it or not, the longer you wait to start unloading, the more damage you can do to the mob altogether, since the initial aggro build from the tank will let you really pour the cooldowns on. (although I don't recommend PoM anything until at least a minute into the fight).
I also found that even as a Frosty, when I have to hold back, firing off Arcane Missiles works nifty before my first shot - it builds threat more slowly than even a Frostbolt, and gives the tank time to build aggro.
Very funny / smart / true pieces of advice ^^
It's Tuesday and been waiting on servers to go up again, so I was thinking of browsing the web and read something useful about warrior tanking since I feel I do little threat at the beginning. I am not that upset, because I know my real skills and abilities, I just want to do more threat!.
So, I came by this post and it is really good to the point I've read the comments as well (usually I don't).
As a tank, I really have trouble with pugs. I tend to do H Ramps everyday to farm badges, beside the other heroics. So I know the run completely and I know the pulls and everything. Last night, a group asked me to tank it and I agreed. First thing, the hunter was marking /sigh, IMO the tank should mark since he does the judgements when CC breaks or even the tank breaks it by mistake. The tank should have the marks in keybinding for fast marking during the fight and that what I do. There is no time to wait for the non-tank-marker to give orders. Back to the story, he passed lead and I start marking, I was trying to give some notes and comments, while I am doing that, the hunter shouted "PULL".
/sigh again
We did not wipe yet, hunter was breaking cc and laugh and said "Stupid pet". He said that quiet few times. The healer was so awesome and that explains why we didn't wipe. Just before the 1st boss, a druid pulled the pat and guess what? he pulled the group next to it. He died, but we didn't wipe, we managed. I left for diff reasons after a while.
IMO, unless the tank doesn't want to, the tank should mark, pull, build aggro, tank, and break CC. I tend to leave the DPS get some hits before I intervene and taunt just to give him a lesson but it seems it doesn't work either.
After reading this post. I came to realize that I only have problems w/ pug groups, it works pretty much fine and I don't have any problems in raids.
Thank you for the great post!
You want a rule of thumb, get OMEN!! It always surprises me the amount of poeple out there who think they can guess the threat per second the tank is putting out. THERE IS NO WAY FOR YOU TO KNOW w/out both the tank and yourself running a threat meter (Omen or KTM)
Also makes me laugh when tanks bitch about aggro but don't run omen themselves (I mean wtf guys, I don't know what buttons you're pushing).
SO very true. Just started seriously tanking for our guild, but we never really have enough depth to pull together groups on our own.....so we pug one or two. Last night, we're running Arc, and our pugged mage decides that while our Disc/holy priest (healing the run for lack of a better healer) is re-manaing and I'm marking the next pull, to go ahead and pyro the guy one group over and pull two groups. Then pops off a RUN!!!! in party chat. Dumb mage ran all the way out of the instance while I managed to snag all but the one he shot. Our priest managed to keep my shiny orc behind alive while our lock and fury warrior burned the guys down to the ground. Point being....if you aren't pulling/marking....DON'T PULL! I have very few instant "come get me ya big dumb ape" manuvers to use, especially if that fantastic second red bar is almost empty. Hooray Bloodrage/Imp Bloodrage.
Smart hunters (a rare breed in itself) will use MD on their tank as many times as it's off CD. This allows them to continue pumping dps into the target as well as boost the tanks aggro. And if they still begin climbing the threa meter they should pop FD as often as possible to. These two simple tactics will make it so that 90% of the huntards out there will survive every fight and be reinvited back more often.
Mages.... I have to honestly say that Fire mages are the worst! From the omen tyou learn how to cast Pyroblast, you instincively want to use it as an opener! DON'T! I'f you're fire spec'd use your scorches, and don't unload with anything else till you have 5 of them stacked on the target, trust me you'll do more dmg in the end! For you frosties: If you've learned Ice Lance use that till you get winters touch stacked 5 times! Again it does less dmg in the beginning but enables the tank to build the aggro needed for when you really let loose!
Rogues do it from behind! Period! Also you've been given this miraculous talent called "Feint" it doesn't work all the time, I know! And yes it uses energy, who cares! If it keeps you alive longer and the threat on the tank... USE IT! "A dead rogue = 0 dps"
MS & Fury Warriors, well you're basically screwed when it comes to dumping aggro, however, you are a warrior so I hope you have some inclination as to how rage & threat works! Keep that in mind when you're back there with the rogues beating on that uglies backside!
Enhancement shamans, ooooh how i hate and love you at the same time! You know that you can unload with some massive burst dmg, but guess what? If you do it all at the start, the sunders I have on him won't stop him from turning and knocking your head off.
I appologize for the wall of text!
P.S. Get Omen or KTM.. plain and simple! that means you too tanks!
first of all, this is a great post. I have a lvl 54 warrior and I'm just learning to tank, but it's making me really appreciate rage tanking a lot more than I used to.
Anyway, in response to Tinytankz, I just wanted to point out that the amount of threat a mage can build with Scorch is at least the same as Fireball, if not more. My main is a mage, arc/frost now, but when I first started raiding I was a fire mage, and I guess the main difference is that while fireball does more threat per hit, scorch has the ability to hit a lot more. I much prefer to wand, or even stand there and wait, over putting up 5 scorches before I start opening up on something.
Also, yes, sometimes a mage will screw up a LOS pull. If they die, that's their own fault. If they have any sense at all, they saw where you ran to, and once they realized their mistake, they immediately followed you. I know it was mentioned that there are some smart ranged dps that do that, but it just seems like so many don't, and it's such an easy thing to do. Ranged don't be stupid. It's ok to make a mistake, it's how you react to recover that makes you a good player.
to Mad Mage, unfortunately I have to admit, sometimes I do that too. I'll pull aggro and still drop one more nuke on 'em before I ice block. The way I see it, I have 10 seconds of 0 dps coming up, might as well make the most of it while I can. This has backfired before, though, if the tank has other aggro issues, or any number of reasons, and when it does, I know it's my own fault, and quickly apologize.
and finally, to Ephmeroptera, let me just say I can't agree more. The only thing I have to add to that is that when one party member is over/undergeared for an instance, it changes the way all other party members have to play. This is most evident with tanks/healers. For example, if a tank is undergeared, the healer is going to be rolling big heals the whole time, and the tank is going to have a hard time holding aggro. Any tank that doesn't realize this and yells at a healer for pulling aggro doesn't deserve to tank your group lol.
Great post. I usually don't even read comments, much less post them. I might have to make this site a regular read.
Hey there Sygvox! Thanks for your note, glad to hear the post inspired you to leave me a note :)
Take care!
Thanks for the great post, first character here, lvl 33 Priest. Till a week ago I though tanks where useless, I usually did just as much damage and had to heal.
Then I met a guy soloing an instance, he frigging rocked! Always pulled the mob, killed everything in his path, no idea how he threw that much damage, and taught me how to be a group healer, though after reading this article I believe I have a lot to learn.
I'd like to thank all you tankers out there for keeping us alive and helping us get those blue items.
I just wanted to post about heal over time's also. allot of people don't know this, but when you cast a heal over time on the tank on a single pull. that's great. when the tank is range pulling multiple targets though, and you cast a heal over time on him. the second that he gets to the first tick of the HoT. if the mobs havent made it to the group the healer will get aggro on every mob. wait for the tank to get off at least one thunderclap. or at least for the mobs to get to the group.
I just wanted to let you know your Tank post was funny. I play a Shadow Priest, and before the wrath changes, we were probably the number threat producers, to the point of just wanding through VR fights etc. I don't understand why there would be a single person not running some form of threat meter. Also, for those classes that have a threat mitigation, a good tactic is to let the tank get a few white hits in pop your spells and immediately use your threat mitigations at the start of the fight. My rotation is normally a SW:P, VE, VT, MB, SW:D, Fade. That lets me get nice mana regen/health regens going but also prevents me from gaining threat. Bottom Line: If you do 1k dps for 95% of the fight because you're backing off you're going to do more dmg than if you did 1300 for 30% because you pulled and and got crushed. Also, once you pull everyone's position is messed up, healers are producing threat, the tank isn't, so you just wiped 24 people. :(
-Kac
I loved this "article"? i don't know what you would call it but i have a few alts and acutually 2 of them being tanks, and i couldn't help but think that the last paragraph? again idk would confuse a few people newer to the game in an instance. I think that would be a bit more raid frienly of a statement.
-I may be retarded but im not fucking retarded
I'm of course posting this after WotLK but the same essentially goes for a Death Knight but the complete oppisite we do have the means to get all the aggro at the start but its not that much so i created a little trick of counting to 3 before unleashing beast on the target and kinda on go in and out of this because the cooldown on the runes is longer than you think.
Now a level 48 fire mage, this is the first good discussion of what I have been doing wrong my entire life (ok, my entire WoW life).
Thanks for the great post. I hope to be invited to group again, so I can try not to be a horses petute for once.
zomg every single person who plays WoW should have to read and understand this kind of stuff before they're allowed to log into the game...
i have always played DPS characters and understood the '3 sunders' rule, kill orders, etc and it's rare that i pull aggro unless we're already having other issues and i'm not paying attn...
however i have recently started playing my first serious tank toon (a now 62 drood) and i spent all day pugging ramps and blood furnace... with an awesome healer, but fugg me dead if the dps couldnt coordinate an attack to save their damn lives!
i say to them, give me time to build aggo, i need to actually hit stuff to stop it beating on you... mage runs in and drops some kind of AoE knockback spell... every time... /facepalm
i say to them, i'm going to pull these mobs around the corner, no touchie til i can smack them... mage, dk, and others i forget now decide to drop their AoE's as the mobs are running to me... thankyou for taking ALL my aggro, fuggsticks... good luck with it, have fun dying...
and what is it with people these days just wanting to charge through an instance chain pulling until they reach the end and then leave as soon as the last boss loot is done?
why cant people have a little patience, give the tank time to mark, the healer time to get mana, and the rest of the party time to look at their chat window for any instructions that might save them from dying?
though with all the DK's coming up through outlands on my server atm - at least 30 of the bastards in HFP today, maybe 20 others of assorted other classes (and only 2 droods today, being myself and my epic healer) - i'm seriously considering re-speccing resto... everyone needs a healer and then all i have to worry about is the tank and myself, bugger the dps, lol
anyways i do apologise for my rant, i have only just found your site and this post struck a nerve... i shall be doing much more reading and digesting of information without flying off the handle over the next few days/weeks...
thankyou for some awesome information! :D
Thank you in the name of all (warrior) tanks! I spent half a year trying to communicate this to people from my server :D
Hope you don't mind, but I will surely link to this post on some foro!
Great job!
I totally get this - I knew it from the off, it was intuitive and I didn't get why other ppl had such a problem understanding it.
But I'm still a wannabe warrior tank - I need some advice on how to become a passable tank quickly, in particular I'm looking at spell combos to use to hold threat fairly constantly, can u offer any tips or link any guides? I've found one or two but they seem like they are outdated.
http://www.tankspot.com/forums/f200/40491-wotlk-prot-warrior-guide.html
this ones pretty good mate
if your still having problems in big pulls for whatever reason just taunt tank skull (taunt, mocking blow then taunt again) and offload on the other targets this gives about 10 seconds where noone has to worry about threat at all, usually long enough for it to die :) and kinda solves most of above issues
As a fairly new player (6months) and a dps (rogue) this was really helpful to know this stuff. I wish someone would have mentioned it before, I had to learn it all the hard way! Thanks.
Yea, once you've been in a few dungeons you should understand these concepts. If you're level 80 and you don't, that means you either bought your toon and just signed up for a WOW account yesterday or you're just not raid worthy. After WOTLK, the tank simply needs to look at the mob wrong and he's got agro throughout the entire fight. I generally cast Seed of Corruption the second the tank starts running and don't stop till they're dead. That includes the off time that i'm casting Reign of Fire. All these spells are hitting all mobs for 3-4k dmg. And... i never pull agro. or if i do, I soul shatter just before i get pulled on. Plus i usually have vengence on me cause im the crit capitol of the raid :) haha.
After I posted I figured out my problem.
I was used to basic multi-mob tanking where all the aggro gets concentrated on a single target and the tank just has to hold a largely unchallenged mob. In this set-up regular thunderclaps and occasional Taunts largely hold the mob aggro as no-one else is generating threat on anything but the primary target until it dies, then aggro passes to the next marked target.
AOE tanking is however a completely different ball game and much harder for a novice warrior to master. Especially one who's only just lvled his way to 70
Okay as this was a very well put forth section. I have something to add. I have played all classes except shammy so I know the ins and outs you're talking about. The thing I noticed most was my pyro mage. Sometimes it's hard to keep that in check with how often ignite goes off. I crit like a maniac and when ignite keeps going off it creates aggro like a mad man. Most know to chill out, but it can't always be helped. Take that into consideration before you go screaming at one. Also...mages can use invisibility to drop aggro...you lower threat while its ticking, and once you actually go invis. you drop all aggro.
haha awesome. i think those exact same things to myself after every pug!
AWESOME!!! My biggest pet peave...if you get hit RUN TO TANK NOT AWAY!!!
LOVE IT!!!! I'm posting this everywhere i can. :)
As a healer, I wish everyone read this. Most especially, to take on the "run to tank" part.
I've got a tank being pumelled who needs healing, possibly some party-wide damage, and then a squishy goes high-tailing off into the distance with a mob on him. There is no "Glyph of Unlimited Healing Range".
You run away out of my range, you don't get healed.
You bring the monster to me, then remember to aggro dump, I die and we wipe.
Just run to the tank. It's not that hard.
Even a dps can do it.
Really.
You'd be surprised how many *top raiding guilds*, and/or guilds working on progression, who just don't *get it*. I was on twin valks, and right after the ready check, before I even charged, there goes a hunter pew pew pew. When I said "please don't do that." (we lost 2 DPS cuz of it), I was told to "stop whining." and to "just tank better". Really now, taut is for emergencies, don't make me blow my taunt CD just because YOU are a dumb asshole, and please oh please don't make my job even harder than it is. I play for fun. Why don't you tank instead?