Is demon hunter tanking satisfying?

[Saverem]

I recall like back in MoP or sometime, that either the Paladin or DK Tanks got a talent to allow them to walk 30% faster, all the time ? Why was that ever removed ? I think all Tank classes should have faster mobility, for the important reason of needing to be ahead of the rest in Dungeons and Raids.

DKs had UH Presence which I think was like a 20% run speed buff or somewhere around there. But it required them to be in UH Presence, which was a DPS presence, so tanks didn't get it.

[Shakari]

I have four Tanks in Legion, and I'm more of a casual player, most hard content I play is lower end Mythic dungeons and Normal Raids;

- Level 110 DH @ i865
- Level 110 Paladin @ i840
- Level 104 Warrior
- Level 103 Death Knight

Demon Hunter;
Out of those four, I would say the Demon Hunter is the most FUN to play, but yes they are very spikey on health, and I am never 100% confident with them on big boss fights. I like the DH class, but the squishy feel is worrisome at times as a Tank.

Paladin;
My Paladin I am finding very boring, yes he feels rock solid and a tough guy Tanking, but man it plays so lame. But the Paladin just owns trash mobs, I feel like I can handle 30 mobs all at once with this Paladin. The AoE is amazing

Warrior;
Warrior Tanking I am new at, just started War Tanking at Level 100, now 104, and I do not like it one bit. Self healing seems very low, and the overall play style I just can't get used too. Not a fan.

Death Knight;
I just dusted off my old DK, got him to 103 this weekend, and I am surprised at how easy and smooth they play. And the self healing is off the charts great. The spell rotation is very simple, maybe too simple, and Death Strike is always there to heal you BIG TIME. I thought the Demon Hunter had great self heals, but this DK seems even better at healing. And they dish out some good DPS. Not sure if they tweaked DK Tanks in patch 7.1 ? But I recall playing him last in the pre expansion for Legion, and I hated him, but they seem improved since then now ?


To wrap up, I'd rank my four Tanks, as far as fun, and self healing, tough guys;

#1 = DH
#2 = DK
#3 = Paladin
#4 = Warrior

Thing is with Warriors, you don't need the self healing you either mitigate, avoid or absorb it. It is different than all the other tanks really now when legion launched I was dubious but now I love it lol

[Zenislav]

My main (with few breaks) was always my prot pala since TBC. Every expansion it is less and less fun to play with him. Even thought he is 885 geared in basicly BiS gear i feel like chore when i need to go raid Mythics w him (still amazing as his utility is top of all tanks it is just that i find him boring)
Tried all other tanks, some were my alts or on my brother account and almost quit wow again as they were just not fun to me.

Decided to roll DH one class I had no interest in. At the moment he is only 864 ilvl but oh man i find him fun as hell. I finally don't feel like wow is second job but game I play for fun after starting w him.

He is a bit downgrade from paladin but I am making my DH my main now and having a blast playing w him. Guess that i always preferred mobile classes just never gave them proper try.

Anyways now just to gear him up and replace paladin in my Mythic team. We are on Cenarius just now and as soon as i feel comfortable to enter raid I will make final switch.

TLDR DH is so much fun to play compared to other tanks that I dont care if he performs a bit less than other options. I will give my best playing him and not give up.
I am not in top 10 progress guild so never again will i choose performance or OPness of class over fun! Other tank in our mythic team is warrior so this combo should work pretty decent.

[Deleted]

I used to play a prot pally, until wrath, only just came back and lvld the pally, a priest and my DH. And while I really do not enjoy Havoc, Vengeance is the most satisfying tank I've played in a long time. It feels much more active than pallies and you can still be pretty decent.

Yesterday I had a pretty good run at mythic Ursoc, with 185k dps and 172k HPS (was wearing 879 ilvl I think, I am 885 ) and it feels good. It's hectic, but I do really like the active tanking style. On PTR we're even stronger, which makes me worried a bit (100% extra armor on meta, which is up around 15-25% of the time according to my logs.

[Nakotsu]

Vengeance is very spikey yes. It's just how the spec plays and learning to play around that is part off the spec. It's something you'll get used to with experience. Also our damage really isn't that bad. It's lower than it used to be but mostly in M+ aoe.

25% nerf'd damange is not bad thats bad bro when your doning 300k less damage then a dps does thats bad. When you outgear dps and they are still doing 250k+ more dps then you then yes thats bad.

[diachroniko]

25% nerf'd damange is not bad thats bad bro when your doning 300k less damage then a dps does thats bad. When you outgear dps and they are still doing 250k+ more dps then you then yes thats bad.

I'm referring to our damage compared to other tanks here. It's lower than most of them, but not by a lot. Tank vs dps damage is a different story, and is too low all around in general.

[Firehorse]

I personally enjoy Monk and DH Tanking... But compared to the other tanks, they're just a bit weaker in most situations. They're not Bad, just the others can do most things better and more efficiently. (Though, I feel I can AoE farm NPC's a lot easier as a Brewmaster than the other classes in the Tank Role.)

Gearing up, Heroics, General World content, and probably early Mythics it's mostly just play what you want to play, or what feels right. Don't need to worry about playing to your classes full potential.

DH are probably the strongest tanks in the game for extreme spike dmg. They can survive hits no other thank in the game could survive through.

Take mythic renferal. 2 of those adds buffing the boss is a 1 shot for warriors/dks/druids/pallys. DH can meta/brand and not drop below 30% HP with 3 of those adds on the boss for the duration of the cool down.

Peoples problem is they don't weave their mitigation and their self heals correctly. You don't want to be spending pain while spikes are up, you want to be building it and then when you're active mitigation are no longer usable you use the self heals(and the 4% dmg redcut that comes with it) to sustain yourself till your next set of spikes are available.

[Ham on Rye]

I am on the fence on mains and figured I would post

how is the tanking? compared to other stuff

is it engaging and fun

Fun for the tank? probably

Fun for the healer? not in a million years. DH's are horrible to heal compared to other tanks. Way too spiky.

[Deleted]

DH Tank is super satisfying, but the main selling point is the mobility.

I am tanking 885 and and trying to go higher Mythic+. At Mythic 12 i die. A lot, well thats high mythic content for you i guess, you need to know every boss mechanic perfectly, but you are still squishier than most tanks.

Raiding is way better, since its singletarget you can focus more on your rotation and your upkeep, but you should never compare your class, it doesnt matter if we take our bear with us or we sub him with an 870 pala, they both outdo me in healing/dmg absorb.

Its very hard to reach "other tanks", but the mobility is surprisingly amazing for example in the odyn encounter, or kiting a bunch of enemies through half the dungeon cuz your healer ran out of mana and giving your group some time to get the trash.

Hardest part was probably finding good information about the DH tank.
And even with 885 gs i still am not sure if i play him correctly ... the dying alot part.

It's very fun to tank, but i heard from 3 competent healers so far, that they will never heal dh tanks again since its like "healing a dps".

[Deleted]

Fun for the healer? not in a million years. DH's are horrible to heal compared to other tanks. Way too spiky.

I would like to disagree here... (not entirely though)

A bad DH is a nightmare to predict, not to heal though (see below for detail), a good one is a breeze and actually predictable.
I do see a lot of "off specc" healers popping up everywhere because they get invited faster if they aren't tank or heal.

The way I see it, the healer knows every encounter way better than most tanks and certainly better than almost all damage dealers.
Also they should know almost all tanks and how to deal with them or what their skills mean and how they function.
So he does know when to expect spikes to pop in, on any tank and ideally he knows his peer healers as well.
He also knows when the tank has tools left to deal with it or not.

So if the pala for example has just popped his consecration and light/hand of the prot a sec ago, and a spike hits I know he wont deal with it himself.
Same goes for the DH, even not knowing how many stinky clouds lie around if I saw him using Fel Dev short time ago, and he did get a non healed HP spike in I assume he wont deal with the next spike himself maybe.
Monk, different story I find this to be the most enjoyable tank as a healer today in general.

Now here's where I agree with you, there is still a higher potential for overheals and "seemingly scary" drop offs on a DH than with any other tanks based on predictability.
(a meta triggers on a soul fragment and he leeches himself full, fiery brand gets off CD at the same time as the artifact etc. etc.)
It is easier to predict hp behaviour on other tanks granted, yet that does not make it "horrible" to heal a DH.

In my mind any healer should be able to go into "fuck it I'll spam" mode, completely ignoring tanks mitigation, whenever he feels unsafe (without him leeching himself dry completely).

Also tbh I see this problem only appearing in low level mythics, lfr or normal raids as I expect communication going on between the tank and the healer in anything remotely progress oriented.
A single "I got this" from the tank lets me focus on damage dealers on a suicide run, for example.

I did infact die last mythic as a pala tank(don't hate me, I rarely ever do this) because the healer said:
"Not my fault he is hard to heal, sometimes he heals himself sometimes he doesn't..."
(see my quote above on off specc healers )

Maybe that is just me though, but I have seen brilliant healers that could deal with this way better than even I can.
Also I was used to healing an avoid based warri tank back in BC and keep switching back and forth between tanking and healing with multiple classes myself.

[Yhcti]

Really is something you need to try for yourself. I find it extremely satisfying.. Dropping to 20% health then 1 skill bringing me back to 70% + is great fun and keeps everything active. Love it. Tried Guardian (which is by far the best tank) and hated it.

[Deleted]

Now if only we had a speed boost on the gliding, like the goblin glider.

If you had a speedometer addon you'd know that Gliding is +75% speed

[mickybrighteyes]

If you had a speedometer addon you'd know that Gliding is +75% speed

are you sure that's +75% and not 75% movement?
Certainly didn't seem like it was at all a movement speed buff and infact only a slowfall effect.

[shanthi]

are you sure that's +75% and not 75% movement?
Certainly didn't seem like it was at all a movement speed buff and infact only a slowfall effect.

The initial activation gives you a movement boost, after that it's just a slow fall effect. That's the same way a Goblin Glider works, except Goblin Glider gives you a larger movement boost when you activate it.

[mickybrighteyes]

certainly never seems like it. I could swear I could run across an the terrain faster without gliding.

[Tech614]

certainly never seems like it. I could swear I could run across an the terrain faster without gliding.

You run around faster by cancelling the glide, not letting it go. You just activate wings for the initial speed boost.

[Bathory]

I am on the fence on mains and figured I would post

how is the tanking? compared to other stuff

is it engaging and fun

I have a war/pally/monk/DK tank and I loveeeee DH tanking.

[Felfaadaern Darkterror]

Fun for the tank? probably

Fun for the healer? not in a million years. DH's are horrible to heal compared to other tanks. Way too spiky.

I eased my M+ healer's concern and stress level by building him a WA. It lets him know when Last Resort has proc'd, and when it becomes available again. I tell him the only times he really needs to worry are during those 3 minute windows.

[Super Kami Dende]

I love DH tanking. One of the funnest Tanking specs in WoW. Takes a little getting used to and can be a bit scary at some moments when you realise Shear hasn't been proccing Soul fragments. but Overall fun and effective in the right hands.

[Felfaadaern Darkterror]

Honestly I like the change of pace between my Paladin and Demon Hunter. Like Captain America & Batman.