First tanking experience- (tips for future)

[MonkeyPaws]

Sorry in advance for the long post

So just got to level 17 with my Prot Pally, took a deep breath and decided to give tanking a go in my first dungeon, so I did the random dungeon queue, I was placed in deadmines, the problem was I went in blind not knowing where to go and what to expect during the boss fights.

It was clean run though and I felt with the avengers shield, and using reckoning I held taunt, so kept damage on me, I was definitely a little panicky throughout the dungeon, resulting in missing, not utilising my holy power effectively or just trying to spam abilities that are on cooldown, also wasn't too sure if I should be pulling the single target and then once near death pull the other single target or just pull 5 people at once as the rogue rush ahead in stealth and attacked a group of four on numerous occasions which had me switching constantly to get aggro from another group (which one of main reasons for missing keybindings/cooldowns)

Another problem I noticed is I had stopped using my WASD keys and was just the mouse to move forward and around as I was trying to focus on the cooldowns as well as keybindings so would this indicate that I have set too many keybinding at once, obviously I only have a number of abilities at 1 (I set most of them as I want to start learning keybindings and not clicking abilities as I feel it is less efficient) and with moving the mouse I was tab targeting and I have been doing from the start as I frequently switch to mouse to move while running further distances for questing

A distracting I found was because it is a compact and tight spaced area throughout the mines, camera distance wasn't great for making see what was going on around be at all times.

So I was just wondering on any advice that could be given;

I know it is still very low difficulty of a dungeon for most as the game has been out for over 10 years now but as a tank should I be researching these fights, I know for raids and higher leveled dungeons this will be a must

Was I right to start single target and then go for the group? and how to decide if I should pull multiple groups

Better movement with WASD, no more tab targeting, also I use strafing (A+D and turn with camera)

Should I addons to change my UI to have abilities more visible/boss ability times like I think its Deadly boss mod?

Any advice/criticism is welcome as I want to be a reliable tank for people while they are leveling up and doing dungeons

[Lodreh]

Generally, pull with avengers shield targeting casters. I use Omen to see threat and cycle through the group while holding argo. Try to interrupt casters when you can and when you get down to the last enemy start toward the next group. Glance at healer's mana at this time and if they are under 20% slow down. Otherwise just have fun.

Disclaimer: It has been a while since I have tanked with a paladin.

EDIT/ PS ~ I use the mouse for movement and hotkeys for abilities.

[LongJohn]

Low level dungeons don't really need tanks (if the group is mostly heirlooms). It's even harder if you have a person who runs ahead and pulls. Just go at your own pace (not too slow), and learn the class/role. Once you get consecration and Hammer of the Righteous it makes aoe a cakewalk.

Get the addon Tidy Plates and Tidy Plates: Threat Plates

[Cacker]

As someone who was a clicker for years, yes keybinding is SO much better. Your response times are lots faster. However, standard keyboard binding isn’t for everyone. I lack dexterity in my hands and my fingers are on the shorter side, so I struggle with keybinding. How do I compensate for this? Easy, I bought a Razer Naga gaming mouse. It has 15 buttons on the side that are controlled by your thumb. Total game changer. I used to be stressed when tanking, but after making myself learn to use that mouse I love it.

The best way I;ve found to practice strafing is to just run around a column over and over again. Switching direction, etc as needed. Pretend the weed is fire on the ground now you have to strafe the column while avoiding said weed and so on. Sounds silly, but helps a ton.

Go solo into somewhere like Ragefire Chasm. You can learn a lot about how to play a class when put into situations that you have to figure out alone.

Tanking gets easier as you go, in most regards, but for now focus on mob control and being aware of your surroundings. Nothing worse than a tank that doesn’t see the patrol come in and rape the healer or the tank themselves getting knocked back into another group. How well you can adapt to accidental pulls (Hunter barrage…) and the like really shows your skill as a tank. I’m neither the best tank nor healer in the game, but I have gotten a fair few friends added to my list by being aware of surroundings and saving groups from wipes.

Face the mobs, never turn your back on mobs. You cannot mitigate damage from something hitting you in the back. If you need to move something, strafe. Always strafe, back-pedaling is bad, never do that.

Learn your mitigations and which work best for what encounter. Generally shield is best for overall mitigation, but if you are getting rocked by a caster it may well be better to use word of glory. Once you get consecration (Around 20-25, I think) your aoe threat becomes a non-issue…well even more so than it is already. I love Glyph of the consecrator, it makes consecrate move with you. Such a fun way to tank.

Make a macro that casts your big bubble and immediately clears it with another press of the same button. This allows you to remove nasty dots/boss mechanics without fully losing agro on the mob/s in question.

Hand of protection is a great tool for saving someone else from getting killed by physical damage or dropping their mob threat. Hand of salvation also helps with that. Mouse-over macros for those are amazing.


Haste is gravy. Get all the things with haste. It makes your cd timers shorter for almost all of your moves, this increasing holy power generation, thus increasing survivability.

Mouse-over taunt macro
#showtooltip
/cast [target=mouseover,harm,exists,nodead] Reckoning; Reckoning

M-O Hand of Portection (targeted bubble), salvation, freedom, and sacrifice
• #showtooltip Hand of Protection
• /stopcasting
• /cast [@mouseover] Hand of Protection
• #showtooltip Hand of Salvation
• /stopcasting
• /cast [@mouseover] Hand of Salvation
• #showtooltip Hand of Freedom
• /stopcasting
• /cast [@mouseover] Hand of Freedom
• #showtooltip Hand of Sacrifice
• /stopcasting
• /cast [@mouseover] Hand of Sacrifice

Self-bubble/cancelaura macro for removing bad stacks.
• #showtooltip Divine Shield
• /cast Divine Shield
• /cancelaura Divine Shield

Addons I suggest:
Deadly Bossmods, Recount or Skada, GTFO. I do not use GTFO or any other addons not listed to tank, but these are suggested. All macros and suggested addons pulled from Icey-veins.com

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Generally, pull with avengers shield targeting casters. I use Omen to see threat and cycle through the group while holding argo. Try to interrupt casters when you can and when you get down to the last enemy start toward the next group. Glance at healer's mana at this time and if they are under 20% slow down. Otherwise just have fun.

Disclaimer: It has been a while since I have tanked with a paladin.

EDIT/ PS ~ I use the mouse for movement and hotkeys for abilities.

This. Always pull with avengers shield, if there is CC it won't hit hem unless they are the primary target. Also, keep in mind that AS only silences the first enemy it hits, so it won’t silence all of them.

[MonkeyPaws]

Generally, pull with avengers shield targeting casters. I use Omen to see threat and cycle through the group while holding argo. Try to interrupt casters when you can and when you get down to the last enemy start toward the next group. Glance at healer's mana at this time and if they are under 20% slow down. Otherwise just have fun.

Disclaimer: It has been a while since I have tanked with a paladin.

EDIT/ PS ~ I use the mouse for movement and hotkeys for abilities.

Yeah on multiple groups I use shield to pull targeting the caster as priority, and I was making sure mana was good

Low level dungeons don't really need tanks (if the group is mostly heirlooms). It's even harder if you have a person who runs ahead and pulls. Just go at your own pace (not too slow), and learn the class/role. Once you get consecration and Hammer of the Righteous it makes aoe a cakewalk.

When do dungeons start needing tanks? I was ahead of the group for the majority just when rogue decided to pull mobs and yeah just need to get rotations down with other cooldowns and learn when to use proc correctly like later in the game will probably need a better UI by then as well

Thank you both for the mod suggestion will check them out

[endersblade]

Once you hit 20 I think, you get consecration. That will solve all of your thread issues. Just drop it on CD, anything that it hits will come to you. Pally tanks are ridiculously easy to use, especially at lower levels. I find them more enjoyable than DKs and War tanks, as far at plate users go.

[Deleted]

You are doing just fine. Sure if you want to nitpick anything (like I am doing with my performance - still) I'd recommend just doing what you are doing already. Maybe look up what happens in dungeons you are going to encounter or just be careful when you are pulling. Most players wont be asshole-pulling everything while you are telling them, that you are new to this (despite the forums might want to make you believe).

Try to learn how you abilities interact beforehand so if you are in a panic you fall back to the basics - your rotation/abilties overall. Which is probably the one thing I'd say you should get out of the way earlier.
I can't say how you have to do things - I am just telling you what I personally found the most useful when I started tanking back in the day. And yes, I shat my pants as well. One of the reasons I am doing my video series - to give you newer tanks the chance to learn from my mistakes (over many years ).

And yes, about lvl 20 you are getting Consecration. Which should help you out as well. Throwing the Avengers Shield at the Mob with Mana is btw a great idea. Carry on, solider!

[PixelFox]

From 15 to 20-something there's always a hunter or someone who runs ahead pulling and it's just a free-for-all. But eventually people start paying more attention and follow the tank. It helps to have a good healer who will just let the morons die until they learn

The random dungeon finder has necessitated nerfing all content to make it easily puggable, which means no communication is required, and when you layer on full heirloom sets it's mostly just a cake walk and people get mad if you don't know where to go and don't make every run a speed run.

Tanking is still super fun compared to DPSing (Healing is also very fun most of the time), and the instant queue times are a nice perk.

Just relax and don't let yourself get stressed.

[MonkeyPaws]

Thank you all, this information is priceless! Will be sparing sometime on training dummies to try and get some muscle memory for keybindings to get rotations down, in between dungeons as well as questing! May look into a new mouse if I cant get use to using SHIFT&CTRL+1-5/6, unfortunately, didnt get a chance to do anything after writing the OP but later today be starting again!

Off topic if you guys can help;

As I am not far into my game progress, I have a work colleague that plays the game daily, but he is on a US server and as we live in Australia the ping is like 200-300ms where as the ping I get from the oceanic server I am currently on like 10-15ms which does feel like heaven at times, after so many games without good ping ha would it be worth switching at a cost of that extra ping?

Note: I will probably want to play all classes effectively in the future

[Bigbamboozal]

I almost always bring this up when I read 'new tank' threads.



The videos presented represent some of the best foundational thinking I've seen in video for tanks to consider.
Keybinding is important, rotations and cooldowns are important, but awareness and positioning are incredibly important too, and practicing and mastering the concepts in these vids will take you a lot further than half the people that call themselves tank today.
If you want to have people say things about you like "I can't believe he lived through that" watch them and take it to heart
Welcome to a deeper game

[MonkeyPaws]

And yes, about lvl 20 you are getting Consecration. Which should help you out as well. Throwing the Avengers Shield at the Mob with Mana is btw a great idea. Carry on, solider!

WoWWiki says 20 is Hammer of the Righteous but this will definitely help retaining aggro as well as a steady AoE damage

Just been watching your videos some helpful tips, would have come in handing in deadmines due to shortage of space would have placed the camera as birds eye view or slightly angled looking downwards, similar to how you are doing through of most of your videos, also what is the enemy health bar as it got from red to blue when you seem to have aggro definitely a good tool for fast visual display for.

Will definitely look to have that similar sort of screen set up as it was one of the problems I was having to keep looking at the bottom to quickly to look up and the enemy is behind me!

The videos presented represent some of the best foundational thinking I've seen in video for tanks to consider.
Keybinding is important, rotations and cooldowns are important, but awareness and positioning are incredibly important too, and practicing and mastering the concepts in these vids will take you a lot further than half the people that call themselves tank today.
If you want to have people say things about you like "I can't believe he lived through that" watch them and take it to heart
Welcome to a deeper game

The first 2 tactical and situational I think I did pretty well especially for the first go but obviously doing this constantly with improve each time, encounter awareness, my mind will probably explode if it had to keep that knowledge stored in there but will definitely give it a go for end game content, I definitely struggle with positioning, camera and movement at the moment especially strafing, do you know if he circle strafes to get the clusters of mobs in that nice ball for AoE or does slight movements left and right like he did with the raid boss

[Bigbamboozal]

WoWWiki says 20 is Hammer of the Righteous but this will definitely help retaining aggro as well as a steady AoE damage

Just been watching your videos some helpful tips, would have come in handing in deadmines due to shortage of space would have placed the camera as birds eye view or slightly angled looking downwards, similar to how you are doing through of most of your videos, also what is the enemy health bar as it got from red to blue when you seem to have aggro definitely a good tool for fast visual display for.

Will definitely look to have that similar sort of screen set up as it was one of the problems I was having to keep looking at the bottom to quickly to look up and the enemy is behind me!



The first 2 tactical and situational I think I did pretty well especially for the first go but obviously doing this constantly with improve each time, encounter awareness, my mind will probably explode if it had to keep that knowledge stored in there but will definitely give it a go for end game content, I definitely struggle with positioning, camera and movement at the moment especially strafing, do you know if he circle strafes to get the clusters of mobs in that nice ball for AoE or does slight movements left and right like he did with the raid boss

Lol, yah it takes time to develop encounter awareness, don't sweat it too hard, the more you see and play, the more you experience the idea of it to a degree anyways
One thing that helps there is to at least get an idea how each class and spec plays out, but a lot of it just comes with experience
Sometimes I take gear off in varying amounts and solo old content to practice positioning and mob handling, pats, rotating my cd's and such.
Because it's fun, and it's good practice.

[MonkeyPaws]

As someone who was a clicker for years, yes keybinding is SO much better. Your response times are lots faster. However, standard keyboard binding isn’t for everyone. I lack dexterity in my hands and my fingers are on the shorter side, so I struggle with keybinding. How do I compensate for this? Easy, I bought a Razer Naga gaming mouse. It has 15 buttons on the side that are controlled by your thumb. Total game changer. I used to be stressed when tanking, but after making myself learn to use that mouse I love it.

This. Always pull with avengers shield, if there is CC it won't hit hem unless they are the primary target. Also, keep in mind that AS only silences the first enemy it hits, so it won’t silence all of them.

How much more effective would it be to have a gaming keyboard and mouse? I was think about doing this for some other games in the past as well but could never really decide which ones I would prefer; if I get more addicted to WoW which I can see being the case would this be something I should invest, not just for tanking but playing all classes?

Use AS to pull even on single targets?

[Deleted]

Tanking is easy compared to healing.

[MonkeyPaws]

Mouse-over taunt macro
#showtooltip
/cast [target=mouseover,harm,exists,nodead] Reckoning; Reckoning

M-O Hand of Portection (targeted bubble), salvation, freedom, and sacrifice
• #showtooltip Hand of Protection
• /stopcasting
• /cast [@mouseover] Hand of Protection
• #showtooltip Hand of Salvation
• /stopcasting
• /cast [@mouseover] Hand of Salvation
• #showtooltip Hand of Freedom
• /stopcasting
• /cast [@mouseover] Hand of Freedom
• #showtooltip Hand of Sacrifice
• /stopcasting
• /cast [@mouseover] Hand of Sacrifice

Self-bubble/cancelaura macro for removing bad stacks.
• #showtooltip Divine Shield
• /cast Divine Shield
• /cancelaura Divine Shield

Very new to macros, what is the /stopcasting for and mouseover, does this mean I just have to have my mouse over the player icon instead of targeting them, this would be better to use an addon to make the players more visible to me, no?

Also the Divine Shield macro, does this remove the 8 second of damage I can take? so is this best used just before a boss uses an ability that may kill me? or more just removing dots? what dots should I be focused on removing seems though it has a 5 minute cooldown,

[Cacker]

How much more effective would it be to have a gaming keyboard and mouse? I was think about doing this for some other games in the past as well but could never really decide which ones I would prefer; if I get more addicted to WoW which I can see being the case would this be something I should invest, not just for tanking but playing all classes?

Use AS to pull even on single targets?

I don’t know that gaming keyboards make THAT much difference. I have one that came with my pc. It seems pretty decent. The difference, I think, really lies on if you have the ability to get used to basic keybinds or not. Can you use a series of buttons reliably to perform the tasks you need to, possibly including shift/alt/ctrl to increase the number of binds you can do? Or are you more like me and able to type reasonably well, but not good at running/strafing while pushing other buttons like 5 or 6 to do abilities at the same time? That is what made the decision for me.

For single target, unless it is a caster that you need to move away from another group/patrol path I’d pull with judgement. Get that holy power rolling asap.

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I sent you a pm, I will be happy to help you as much as I can there. This site is buggy on my work pc.

[Kantoro]

5 man - If the tank dies, blame the healer, if the healer dies blame the tank, if the dps dies - good, the encounter will go easier without them.