You’re sure to gobble up this group of wonderful pictures from readers who donned both feathers and beak in celebration of Turkey Day, 2008!
A thread topic that comes up over and over is “Where are all the tanks?” They tend to come in groups, and I’ve seen them since at least the launch of Burning Crusade (prior to BC, all the threads seemed to be lamenting the absence of healers), with little sign of dissipating completely.
I read a lot of those threads and watch as people offer explanations and criticisms and just snipe stupidly at other people for little reason other than to push buttons. There are accusations of elitist tanks, the inevitable bickering between Warriors/Paladins/Druids, and the random Shaman clown who thinks buying Toughness from Enhancement should secure him a ringside seat.
Whenever a thread like this raises its ugly head, one of the most frequently seen flippant responses is, “Re-roll a tank if you need one.”
It’s the same response that gets trotted out whenever someone laments the lack of healers, or the difficulty of what they do, or the lack of appreciation for their role. “Roll DPS if you don’t like healing, nub.” As with all stupidly brief responses to forum topics, the answer avoids the issue and indeed, exaggerates it should the target follow said input.
Oddly, it seems that their advice may have been followed to some degree.
Most Warriors in Burning Crusade seem to be DPS, ostensibly to PvP but also because of the “massive” buffs they provide to group DPS or conversely, the massive DPS output they can achieve with the perfect group. The majority of Paladins are still healers, though a growing proportion are picking up a Warrior’s 2-hander, putting on Warrior DPS plate, and smacking things, too. And Druids… well, foliage spec is still an amazing instance healer and remains our best ticket to 133t PvP stuffage.
So perhaps there really are fewer tanks because they decided to go dps either within their class or with another. Perhaps two of the tanking classes have rediscovered that their DPS specs can be viable (as the player of both non-Warrior tanking classes, I can say with a fair degree of certainty that this is definitely a factor). Everyone needs DPS if just to farm or do dailies, and many raid encounters are as much DPS checks as anything. DPS climbs ever higher in the ranks of desirable traits and specs.
Some say that tanks, like the healers of old, are busy tanking for their guilds and won’t touch a PUG. While there is some truth to this, I also find that I am in high demand even in my guild. That isn’t to say that many tanks don’t feel this way. Hell, I feel this way a lot, but given the level of demand I see for my services even within the comforting bounds of my own guild, there’s definitely something else going on.
Like many others who choose to tank, I really enjoy it. It is without a doubt the hardest thing I’ve done in the game (I’ve done DPS and played two raiding healers at the cap extensively), but the payoff for doing it successfully is equally great.
My success, though, is tied to the rest of the group. “But so is mine,” you may opine, but the truth of this is simply greater for a tank. No matter how tuned in and on my game I may be, 1-2 bad players can make me look like an idiot. No matter my level of skill, my job requires everyone else to be part of the plan. I can’t do it without the rest of the team pulling their weight and paying attention. If my healer and I are the only ones on our game, we will fail. It really is that simple.
Tanking is work. I’m not going to say the other jobs aren’t because I know healing can be but my DPS experience is fairly limited. But when you accept a PUG invitation you’re risking a lot. It can be an absolute blast to tank, but it’s work, and it’s not unexpected that most people either don’t want to do it or don’t want to do it for people they don’t know and therefore, trust. Let’s face it, as the tank, I have to trust all of you even more than you have to trust me. Only the healer is in a similar situation. So if I don’t know you, I’m risking my playtime and I’m not always willing to do that.
But sometimes I will. After all, I learned to tank by tanking for PUGs because my guild doesn’t challenge me to step up my game. They’re really good and I don’t need to. For a PUG, you’ll need all your skill to succeed.
Inevitably that begs the question, what skills are those? What does it take to be a tank? What if you’ve read all this and still think tanking sounds fun? Well, that’s what I’m here for. Rather than discuss the specific tools used to tank as a bear, I’d like to talk about what any tank needs to be successful, in no particular order.
Arguably the most important trait for a tank to have is situational awareness. As a tank you need to be aware of everything. During any given fight, you need to have an idea who is being hit and why, and if you’re not trying to lock them down, why you’re not. It’s your job to enable the DPS. Without you, they can’t do their job because…well, because they’ll die trying. Just as important (and Phae would undoubtedly argue MORE important) is protecting the healer. Without her, you’re dead. Sure sometimes you can pull of something amazing with a few standing DPS and no healer, but that isn’t the norm, especially for encounters at your gear level.
It’s crucial to be watching for patrols, managing your positioning so that runners are handled effectively, pulling behind corners to corral casters and so on. You more than anyone in the group need to be aware of everything that’s happening and understand why it’s happening. Sometimes you can do something about it and sometimes you can’t, but every bit of information builds knowledge that paints the greater picture of conflict. It is this picture of the tactical landscape that determines what you can, should, and will do.
You will also need cash.
Tanking is expensive business. Sure anyone can make that claim but the reason I point it out specifically is because it is vital to any tank that they have the best gear they can obtain. The best enchants and gems are also crucial. The reason is simple: you want to give you healer the biggest cushion you possibly can because the easier you are to heal, the better able the healer will be to cope with the inevitable wandering damage all encounters stupidly sport these days. That inevitably involves cash: cash to buy rare gems, cash to buy armor kits, cash to buy craftables to use until the drop you need comes. You will find yourself at your most successful when you aren’t stingy with what you’ve made, when you are willing to dump it on gear, materials for crafting, and the right enchantments.
Your repair bills will be enormous.
A sense of sacrifice helps. No, tanks are not altruistic paragons of self-sacrifice such that the Dalai Llama comes to us for monthly training seminars, but you do need to have a healthy dose of “team” over “self.” After all, you’re the one getting hit in the face so the pretty DPS corps and the healers can use their fundage for vanity nose jobs and not reconstructive surgery. You will often die while others live either by running out to reset an encounter, feigning death, vanishing or even the semi final application of Divine Intervention. This is in part why your repair bill will suck, but it can also easily leave you with a sour taste in your mouth as you and your healer are running back while your Hunters and Rogues (and even Mages it seems, from time to time) slap each other on the back for living through the deadly pull — sometimes repeatedly.
If you can’t deal with that, maybe you should rethink your goals.
As I pointed out earlier in the article, you are utterly reliant on your team. You cannot survive without them, you cannot succeed without them, you cannot kill without them. Their performance will override yours. Most often this means that if they stink, your run will fail, but it also means that if they’re good enough, they can carry you on a bad day or struggle through teaching you the ins and outs of your job.
It’s because of this reality that I believe tanking for competent groups, while helpful, is not ultimately educational the way it should be in order to hone truly impressive tanking skills.
Marking your targets is a skill every tank should hone. Perhaps you don’t believe this to be a skill, but if that’s the case, you’ve probably never had to alphabetize anything either. Marking targets is a carefully coordinated opus where you’re taking the resources you have (your teammates, their skill, their tools, their gear…) and comparing it to the obstacle at hand whereupon you prioritize targets, assign control duties, and discuss what to do when you have leftover targets.
This requires a knowledge of your class, a working knowledge of the capabilities of other classes, a knowledge of the mobs you’re dealing with and their capabilities… and most importantly, a willingness to listen to input.
Sometimes you don’t know what’s best and you need to listen to your team so they can tell you what they’re capable of or comfortable doing. One Hunter may barely know what a trap is while another could chain trap anything you pointed her at. The other side of this is that eventually, you have to make a decision, and that decision may fly in the face of what those people say they can do. Ultimately, you’re the one that takes the fall for control and you’re the one that needs to say, “I know you don’t like trapping or feel you are best at this, but I need it done.”
It’s also possible to have someone else mark targets. This is less than ideal because it means you have to react to someone else’s priorities and assumptions, ones you may disagree with. You aren’t in control, and you need to be. It can be helpful when learning an instance from someone who knows, though, and in that light, it’s an option to be considered, but learning to effectively mark targets is fairly critical for a tank.
Finally, you need to be something of an attention whore. All of us are attention whores on some level, but the dirty secret of tanking is that it puts you firmly in the spotlight, and who doesn’t like to be there? In a hard encounter, when the Main Tank goes down, it’s a wipe. Keeping you alive is priority one for most groups because when you fall, so do they.
While there is significant responsibility to the role of a tank, there is also a significant amount of narcissistic self-indulgence. You stand toe to toe with the biggest and the baddest with absolutely everyone there relying on you to do your job so they can do theirs and collect the magical treasure that comes with success.
I’m sure other tanks have other lists, and this one is by no means complete, but if none of this has turned you off and you have the requisite dash of prima donna, give it a shot and see if you can help minimize the tank shortage.
I’ll see you at the reconstructive surgeon between instance runs.
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It’s always been like that. Ether you can’t find a healer or you can’t find a tank. At least it isn’t like the old WoW days or even EQ with the old war and priest/cleric domination.
I know myself being a healer that i only accept invites most of the time if it is a guild or mostly guild run. On the rare occasions that I run something out of guild is with old friends of mine I like to help out once in a while or people that I know for a fact are decent. It’s just too much of a risk or a waste of time.
Back when the first new badge loot came out there seemed to be a huge amount of healers in my guild and only 1 tank every day for the heroics. Our war main tank always did his heroics early in the day; our other war off tank was on vacation so usually there would only be the one solitary feral everyday so we healers had to take turns with him.
Making your main a tank is very serious business. I will always believe that tanks have the most hazardous job in any group. A good tank can make or break a good group. DPS could be terrible and a healer could be decent as long as he healed the right people but having a sub par tank just means that that one mob slips by him and wrecks the group as he is oblivious to his error. I cringe every time I EVER group with a PUG tank.
I always feel much more pressure to perform in PUGs, always afraid they’re going to fall on the old “blame the healer” standby T_T
That being said, there is nothing more dear to me than a good tank. Thanks for doing what would normally break my face.
/cheers
I specc’d tank not long after I turned 70 to help the guild and I’ve never looked back. It has had its ups and downs, gear dry-spells, wipes, wasted nights but its all been worth it.
I hear some of the warriors and pali’s not wanting to tank because its ‘boring.’ You’ve got to be kidding me. I get to be the first man (bear) in to smack a god in the face. How could that ever be boring?
Great list.
The last Armory survey I saw actually indicated that a majority of level 70 warriors are protection specced.
What I think is actually the case is that there is a shortage of tanks *willing to tank for PUGs*. I know I won’t do it. Our raiding alliance with another small guild has plenty of tanks, but I don’t think *any* of us do PUGs for the most part.
I seriously don’t tank anything beyond raids any more because I’m burned out.
Similarly though, The Rambling Bear posted an article about the tank shortage as well.
I actually rolled my paladin because I got sick of never being able to find a tank. Granted, this doesn’t really do anything to help my hunter on the same account, but that just goes to show I never bother to think these things through.
And, as such, I tried to tank where I could. I think I tanked instances a dozen or so times (it may not sound like much, but with the times I play at, it is) and came away wanting to just delete my character entirely. I couldn’t believe the number of unbelievably stupid, self-centred morons out there who will gladly dps before I’ve landed a single hit. Healers that will MIND BLAST THE MOB BEFORE I’M IN MELEE RANGE. I’m damn proud of the fact that when I tanked, although there were a few wipes, I managed to keep those mobs on me for the most part.
But afterwards, I was just so sick of it. I was sick of people who just didn’t care; who saw me as a necessary evil and would put forth the absolute minimum cooperation required to get the instance done and get their loot. I was sick of people complaining that I didn’t pull fast enough, or generate enough threat on all of the mobs, or that I was asking them to CC when everyone knows paladins don’t need it, ever.
The worst thing is that I’ve discovered how much fun retribution can be. I understand your reasoning on tanking for PUGs, but I just can’t do it. I can’t watch another huntard who just refuses to not hit aimed shot as soon as I look in the general direction of the next pull. I can’t cope with mages that spam instant pyroblasts in order to PULL. People who know with absolute conviction that their way is best, and that I’m simply incompetent. Maybe I am, but there are some things which I know, even as a DPSer, that you DO NOT DO.
So whenever I see someone begging in LFG for a tank, for the tenth time in the last hour, I have to hold back the urge to say “there are no tanks because you all suck, and I’d personally rather saw my own head off with a soup spoon!” Because that’s how I feel at times, which is a shame, because on the one or two groups that *did* know what they were doing, tanking was a joy. DPSing is fun, and I actually find healing quite relaxing, but when you really hit a groove as a tank, it’s euphoric to have a whole group of mobs pounding away on you as you smash their faces in, protecting the rest of your party.
The one bright side to all this is that I feel it’s made me a better DPSer. I already knew about letting the tank generate threat, not pulling aggro, etc., but the whole experience has simply made me more determined to be a good, reliable DPSer. Even if I can’t stomach the thought of tanking full-time, hopefully I’ll never drive away any that enjoy it.
I honestly think that a lot of things have caused the tank shortage to occur. A lot of tanks I know have respecced to DPS or are working on DPS alts because grinding out dailies as prot is a living nightmare (once again a big ‘YAY! My tank is a feral druid!), and also because they just can’t seem to get 5 man runs happening anymore, and if you are in a non-raiding guild life can get pretty dull. Also, PvP rewards for people who aren’t raiding fairly high end 25mans are better than what they can get their hands on in groups. The only PvP I have seen prot function effectively in is AV.
Another factor – a much more personal one for me – is that tanking is outright SCARY. I find tanking to be more intimidating than healing, to be honest – all those people nuking something and you have to try to keep its attention? Perhaps it is more intimidating for me because I have yet to ‘really’ tank a full instance on my druid – being level 63, there aren’t that many people out there keen for runs, and I quite often end up in groups with warriors or paladins who want to tank, so I heal or cat it up. The couple of times I have gotten the chance to play tank, someone always says ‘Oh, my level 70 friend is coming to help!’ thus killing my tanking. So I think there is an intimidation there – lots of people aren’t getting alot of practice in low levels, and are afraid to take on the big stuff at 70!
But, hey, these are just the ideas of a small druid! (and oh my god was that a lot of rambling!)
I was thinking one of the reasons why there are being fewer tanks, a little more healers and a lot of dps because of the way the game is designed — because fewer tanks are needed in certain segments of the game.
So let’s assume WoW is made up of only 3 general groups of people and no alts: PVPers, Raiders and Casuals (who only do 5 mans)
Group 1: PVPers – Ratio of Tank: Healer: DPS is let’s say 0:2:3
Group 2: Raiders (10 mans) Ratio of Tank: Healer: DPS is 2:2:6 ~ 1: 1 : 3
Raiders (25 mans) Ratio of Tank: Healer: DPS is 3:7:15 ~ 1: 2.3: 5
Group 3: 5 mans – Ratio of Tank: Healer: DPS is 1:1:3
So if your server is mainly made up of raiders who are in kara or like to do 5 mans, you’ll get the golden ratio needed for a successful 5 man.
However, if your server has a higher proportion of PVPers and guilds in 25 mans, this skews the population and there will be more dps than there are tanks. So if you are in a 25 man guild, logically speaking, tanks and to a lesser extent healers should be in short supply in the guild as well, unless more people rolled tank alts than dps alts.
I actually rolled my paladin because I got sick of never being able to find a tank. Granted, this doesn’t really do anything to help my hunter on the same account, but that just goes to show I never bother to think these things through.
And, as such, I tried to tank where I could. I think I tanked instances a dozen or so times (it may not sound like much, but with the times I play at, it is) and came away wanting to just delete my character entirely. I couldn’t believe the number of unbelievably stupid, self-centred morons out there who will gladly dps before I’ve landed a single hit. Healers that will MIND BLAST THE MOB BEFORE I’M IN MELEE RANGE. I’m damn proud of the fact that when I tanked, although there were a few wipes, I managed to keep those mobs on me for the most part.
But afterwards, I was just so sick of it. I was sick of people who just didn’t care; who saw me as a necessary evil and would put forth the absolute minimum cooperation required to get the instance done and get their loot. I was sick of people complaining that I didn’t pull fast enough, or generate enough threat on all of the mobs, or that I was asking them to CC when everyone knows paladins don’t need it, ever.
The worst thing is that I’ve discovered how much fun retribution can be. I understand your reasoning on tanking for PUGs, but I just can’t do it. I can’t watch another huntard who just refuses to not hit aimed shot as soon as I look in the general direction of the next pull. I can’t cope with mages that spam instant pyroblasts in order to PULL. People who know with absolute conviction that their way is best, and that I’m simply incompetent. Maybe I am, but there are some things which I know, even as a DPSer, that you DO NOT DO.
So whenever I see someone begging in LFG for a tank, for the tenth time in the last hour, I have to hold back the urge to say “there are no tanks because you all suck, and I’d personally rather saw my own head off with a soup spoon!” Because that’s how I feel at times, which is a shame, because on the one or two groups that *did* know what they were doing, tanking was a joy. DPSing is fun, and I actually find healing quite relaxing, but when you really hit a groove as a tank, it’s euphoric to have a whole group of mobs pounding away on you as you smash their faces in, protecting the rest of your party.
The one bright side to all this is that I feel it’s made me a better DPSer. I already knew about letting the tank generate threat, not pulling aggro, etc., but the whole experience has simply made me more determined to be a good, reliable DPSer. Even if I can’t stomach the thought of tanking full-time, hopefully I’ll never drive away any that enjoy it.
I tried feral for a while, and tanked exactly once, I thought my head was going to explode. I’ve been a healer the better part of my priests life, and tanking made me want to heal. Situational awareness is not something I’m great at. I am good as a healer, but it’s so much more to be aware of as a tank. I love my tanks, and admire their ability to do something I am just not cut out for. I also won’t pug as a healer, as you said…trust, the only pugs I’ve done have been with guild tanks:)
Long time reader, first time commenter (blah blah
)
Definitely one of my favorite WoW related blogs around, and this subject is one rather close to my heart, so I figured I’d contribute for the first time!
I’ve been playing WoW for far too long now (3 years?… I think…) and after the initial getting to level 20 with various characters and trying to find out what I liked most, I ended up with a warrior as my main character.
I _LOVE_ to tank. I can’t emphasise that enough. Currant has it completely about the attention whore part, and it’s a great feeling to KNOW that you’re all but vital to the good working of the group. But at the same time, you’ve got to keep a good sense of humility. The tank that acts like he’s God is a crap tank. (Had one of those in a PUG last night… the hero paladin tank that thinks he can AoE 8 mobs at once and survive. He held the threat for certain… then he died ;P even with me shifting out for emergency 2-man healing!)
The tank that knows that he’s nothing without a good group behind him is a GOOD tank.
My wife tells me that’s what I am
Anyway, to the point.
My warrior has been protection spec her entire WoW-life, for all intents and purposes (barring the occasional 2-3 level experiments with other specs in my late 50′s). I LEVELLED as protection spec, partly because I hated the 2-hander playstyle, it was far too slow and inactive for my taste (same problem I had levelling a paladin
) and partly because my wife was a shadow-priest.
) that raids Karazhan fairly regularly, and that’s now my only potential route of improvement. But anything I get there is only going to add to my tanking potential, other people will get all the DPS upgrades (and rightfully so, as that’s what they prefer to do 
) but this leaves me in the situation that none of the normal instances give me any soloing improvement, and raiding is only ever going to improve my tanking and raiding potential.
And I can tell you right now, levelling with a trigger happy shadow-priest teaches you how to generate threat fast
Once Devastate was introduced, Protection spec got a new lease of life. Previously I was only any real use in groups, soloing stuff was just an exercise in frustration. But with Devastate, and a couple of decent weapons, it finally became a pleasure to kill stuff myself again. Levelling to 70 was a breeze compared to 50-60
But now… I’m stuck. I genuinely DON’T like the 2-hander style of fighting. It’s just boring in PvE. I DO like to tank still, but none of the instances offer me anything that’s an improvement. I’m part of a smallish guild (lovely place
So… though it’s what I love to do, it’s sort of like a one-way road without any real turns on it (except the occasional boost from heroic tokens
)
This may be a big part of why there seem to be a lack of tanks, and it’s the same problem there has always been. If you’re a tank, you get your tanking upgrades, and stagnate in any area that DOESN’T involve tanking.
Fortunately, I also love playing a Druid, in ALL it’s play-styles… so I have backup enjoyment for when I can’t raid with my warrior. But… this, I think, is a big part of the reason why tanks dry up in the end-game
I have to say that having played a healer, a tank, and a dps class, in five and 10 man instances being a tank is the hardest from a technical standpoint. My DPS is a hunter, and I would say that if I am expected to trap that he is the second most technically difficult to play. If I don’t have to worry about trapping then hunter is pretty much the easiest thing ever. I really only have to press one button to dps, although I frequently press others just to help other people out. Being a healer is pretty easy from a technical standpoint, I find that usually I don’t even really need to know a fight to heal it. Healing can be tough because you get blamed for a lot of things that aren’t your fault.
@Itsnoteasy If you are playing a Beast Master hunter, unless your target is likely to be healed by an ally you wouldn’t ever use Aimed Shot. It has too long of a cast time to be efficient for a regular DPS rotation. BM hunters usually roll auto-steady.
On my server (and guild) tanks shortages don’t seem to be an issue. In fact as a Feral tank, I often end up DPS’ing rather than tanking as Prot Pallies and Warriors don’t have that option once they join a group.
Healers on the other hand seem to be in short supply. Or at least very picky about who and and when they heal. I’d kill for a extra heroic level healer (or two) in our guild. I really think we have them, but they are too timid to give heroics a try (we mostly run 5-mans). However, last night I tanked a guild run in hUB (a great starter heroic) with a Shammy healer that had never “finished” a heroic before. He did great. And I made a point to tell him so. I’m hoping I have just created an heroic guild healer for life….lol.
Loved the article, I play healers for the challenge of it, and reading things like this make me think that maybe I’ll try tanking next. I have just have one piece of constructive feedback for you (hope it doesnt come across as a flame) – it’s that you’ve misspelled Dali Lama. Llama, the way you have it spelled, is the animal not the Tibetan monk. As a Buddhist I feel obliged to clear up little things like this. Anyway, thanks for getting me to think about rolling a tank!
Heh, Runycat beat me to it.
Of course, now I have a second level 70 tank (Everyone’s favorite 5-man machine, at that, a Pally). And now my personal problem is that there aren’t enough of ANYTHING running anything outside of raids. You just can’t win, I tell you.
I tanked today as feral for the 2nd time (level 65 Mana Tombs pug). Didn’t do so great. Lots of mobs slipped by on their way to the healer, and I found myself without any rage in the beginning of a fight several times (forgot to pop enrage. Its kinda funny when you realize you can’t do ANYTHING). I read Karthis and BBB and others regularly so i thought i knew what i was doing… reality is very different
On the other hand there was only a rogue for CC, and we ended up finishing it. But i didn’t come here to talk about my run.
I read you blog to just keep a casual eye on the healing side of durids, so i was pleasantly surprised to see a TANKING article. Very nice thank you. I also started my feral druid because of a lack of tanks for my hunter
I really like it so far, and even though I currently suck I think i will be up to the task with a little practice. Love the spotlight too, although i didn’t know it before I started.
Out of topic, 90% of the rogues i pug with are just awesome. They know their role, do their job, and use all their abilities to make the group go well. Anyone else have the same experience or am i just lucky.
@Bodhimofo:
D’oh! If it makes you feel any better, it isn’t the only typo in the article, but thank you for pointing that out!
Thanks for all the input folks, it’s nice to see so many people interested in getting their faces smashed in for fun and profit!
I disagree that you need to mark your own targets. I generally find it more fun to try different approaches to different fights, not all encounters need to be executed the same way. You learn more by trial and error than just going through the instance by rote alone.
Otherwise, I agree that a tanking class is generally one who needs to show leadership potential, have a good understanding of their limits and strengths, and have a cool head to help counter any tension (especially in a PUG). This is on top of the situational awareness and a basic grasp of how other classes play or what they bring to the table.
I love to tank, too. The first alt I brought up to 70 was a Paladin. Although I healed with him at times, he’s Prot at heart. My theory (for guilds anyway) has always been that your first character should be DPS, and your second should be a healer or a tank. That way there’s never really a shortage of those utility characters.
Another reason I could see there being a shortage of tanks is that it’s hard to come up and break into raid tanking unless you have a guild that is already supporting you and bringing you in. Getting gear is one problem, but you also have to deal with the scarcity of tanking “jobs.” How many tanks does a good guild need? If they already have a few, plus some extra tanks for screwin around in five mans, why do they need you?
As for dealing with stupid people – both in PUGs and guildies that want to flex their e-peen – here’s a simple solution. Let them die. It’s hilarious.
A little update to add to what I posted yesterday. As I mentioned, my warrior is in a relatively small guild who raids Karazhan regularly (been in bigger ones before, there always ends up being bickering, stress, and too much bloody arguing, so nowadays we just remain in the friendly smaller guild, and enjoy the game
) and while there’s very little left for me in instances, Karazhan still holds a fair bit of allure.
As everyone knows, a Prot warrior basically devotes themselves to tanking. Their solo play is slower and their PvP is laughable (until they can start to get a decent amount of block value anyway
which I’m trying to work on… but anyway) and so usually I’m the Main Tank, and it’s the role I like best, that’s why I’m specced the way I am.
But… when there’s someone else around that day who’s way better equipped than me, and way better suited to leading a smooth run, I of course defer to them. The good of the group is a lot more important than me flexing my e-muscle
But it really did remind me of how… impotent you can feel when the ONLY role that your spec caters to isn’t what you’re doing.
So… again, to go back to the original point, another reminder of why tanks dry up a little in the end-game. Unless they’re able to do the job they’re specifically built for, they just can’t perform as well as others can in their backup roles.
(Though my DPS was fairly significant once I just decided that was a better use of my raid slot than offtanking stuff that the other tank could easily handle without assistance
The nice moment of the evening was a rather remarkable execute crit with about 90 rage on Curator while he was evocating… biggest number my character’s ever seen that’s for sure!)
In my limited experience it seems that a lot of tanks get burned out pretty quickly too– not blaming ‘em for it at all, cause it is hard work. But a lot of times I can sit down and do three heroics in a row if I’m up for it, while I think more tanks, on a whole, are going to… not be able to do that quite so well.
I adore good tanks, warrior tanks especially… they always seem like they’re doing so much work! And I really appreciate it.
Thanks for all the great comments, everyone! I just wanted to pop in and point out to those who might have missed it that this article is by Currant, a good friend and the resident (but intermittent) Feral author on Resto4Life. I had a couple of e-mailed questions about whether R4L was going F4D (Feral4Death) and thought that a few might have been confused.
I’ll try to post more. Promise!
Druid tank here. At least I occasionally tank. I tanked all saturday, I believe. I just got started in outlands, we’re in zangamarsh. I play with my wife, but she’s too casual for instances. She has a very short tolerance of WoW, maybe an hour of dual play. For her WoW is a solo adventure. Anyway, my experiences.
1) SP (of course not heroics, i’m 63). This group had a hunter in level 60 blues and purples. But the blues were rogue gear, and the purple was a level 40 gun. Then we had the two healers. holy paly and a resto druid. Add to that a fury warrior I believe. Anyway, just about anything would work in below 70 instances. So we chugged along and did fine. Until we got to the 3rd boss, and we wiped.
No problem. We run back, but one person had to leave and left, the other (the hunter) said they had to go and clean their house and take a shower. No problem, we removed them from the group to get on with our lives. 5 minutes later, the hunter comes back. Lots of cursing. I apologized 4 times, was under the impression they were leaving. Others had same impression. Didn’t help. Finally I put him on ignore. THen he proceeded to cuss out every other group member, until everyone had him on ignore. Then he proceeded to cuss out our guild on Trade chat. I submitted a petition to a GM at this point. I have no idea what happened. Hopefully he got a ban.
So to replace this guy,we found another hunter via LFG. He was a solo hunter, didn’t believe in pets. We all laughed a bit (my main is a hunter, been playing for a year, i know the class quite well). Okay, whatever. Its a RP server. Fun enough guy, didn’t have any problems. (but what’s with hunters anyway?). Turns out this guy RPs that he’s a bounty hunter, anyway, a fun, strange person. We finished the instance fine I believe. Well, I would inevitably die when the boss was at 10%. I blame this on healers. I may be wrong
2) UB. We did it with a shammy, resto druid, a lock, someone else. Me tanking. We get to the 3rd boss, the hunter. I tell the lock to sic their pet on the bear add. He said fine. Sure enuough, felhunter was on the main hunter boss. We wipe. I asked what happened. He got confused between the two bears (me and the mob). That was funny. Take two, was fine.
3) Ramps. This was a mostly guild event, fun. Again a hunter, a prot paly, a level 70 raiding holy paly who insisted he had some good thing to get from one of the bosses here (whatever), me and another feral druid. After several trash pulls I realized that we had a prot paly – he tanked the rest. I could dps well but his was lacking for obvious reasons. We lived mostly because of healing uberness. I had to explain chain trapping to the hunter. The prot paly never heard of LOS pulling. We didnt’ wipe at all, it was great. The last boss was fun though, two of the party members (inc the tank) accidently fell through the place you jump down to exit the instance quickly. So we finished with the uber healer, one dps, and me tanking, and standing in fire and not realizing it (because i’m an idiot, but also because I wasn’t taking any damage thanks to the heals).
Anyway, TL;DR, so far PUGs are entertaining for me, I raid in a serious guild, and this is my fun char. I never know what to expect with PUGs. As long as we can get through the instance fairly easily, it remains fun. But I like being able to switch from healer, to dps, to tank, depending on gear and spec.
Hi there,
I’m a bit late responding to this, but I just wanted to thank you for putting together a great article. I read it back when it was first posted, but didn’t have a chance to comment until now. I found it to be a very honest and even-handed overview of tanking (and tanks!
). I can very much relate to everything you’re saying. My druid is what I would call an “up and coming” tank. I’m still fairy new to it, but am getting better all the time. I didn’t really have a chance to try it until I got to Outland. I soon discovered that tanking is like a whole other game! In fact, over the course of my first few runs, I made sweeping changes to my UI (and playstyle) just to accommodate all the new things I had to pull off!
Although it’s true that tanking is a lot of work, in some ways I find that there’s an extra degree of freedom that I don’t get when DPSing in cat form. My feline self has to be so careful about always hitting that one correct target, watching my burst damage and threat, and making sure to respond to changes in the tank’s focus if the battle becomes complicated. It can actually be sort of awkward and stifling. When bear tanking, however, nobody’s off limits!
Your job to to lay the bear-powered smackdown on everyone! (Well, almost everyone. Gotta watch out for those freezing traps… darn butter paws! 
). It can be a lot of fun when generating threat is a goal, not a danger!
You’re right though, that situational awareness is a very challenging and important aspect of tanking, and probably the part of what they do that’s most under-appreciated by others. I think it’s especially hard for Druids, because shifting into feral form seems to lower your camera’s centerpoint, making it even harder to see everything that’s happening (especially since most instances are indoors, requiring you to stay zoomed-in pretty close to the ole’ bear butt). It makes it even harder to be responsive and agile with your targeting
In regard to the underlying question of “where are all the tanks?” the only thing I would add to what’s already been said, is that in my limited experience doing PUGs, I found that people are sometimes very impatient and discouraging to one another, often out of ignorance to what that other person’s role entails. If there’s a shortage of tanks, it’s probably not a good idea to aggravate people like me who are moving up to fill the ranks. Some of them may just decide it’s not worth the trouble! It’s not productive for DPS to complain that a tank is taking too long marking and pulling. At the same time, it’s inappropriate for a PUG tank to expect perfection, and rudely chew out a DPSer for pulling aggro off them once in a while (I’ve seen this too). I think some people just get stuck in their own point-of-view on things, and forget that a 5-person effort has 5 people, each with their own experience of the events. For that reason, I can especially appreciate this article for presenting the role of tanking, not as a discussion of what abilities to use and when, but as a discussion of what things look like through a tank’s eyes. Great stuff!
But regardless of any frustrating experiences, I do love tanking… enough so, that I’m also leveling a Prot Paladin and one day, I’d like to try a Warrior as well. I don’t plan to quit it anytime soon… that is, unless I finally give into the voice inside me that’s pushing me to go full Resto! For the good of all Azeroth… keep the Feral articles coming!!
Feral4Death!!
-Tone