If the healer won't heal, is it appropriate as the tank to leave the group?

[Jester Joe]

I've read all those Tweets when they were originally sent by the devs. None of them say 'And we're crippling Tank self-sustainability'.

The closest we've gotten is someone asking if Tank Healing will be a role again, since it disappeared in MoP, and some passing comments that a) reduction in Smart Heals and b) changes to Vengeance may have an impact on the viability/need for dedicated tank healers. We've had no further confirmation either way. Since the purpose of AM is, to some degree, to allow tanks to show off by keeping themselves alive, I'm sceptical we'll return to an era of "PALLY = TANK HEALER", especially since even in WOTLK (way before AM) my Block tanks were doing 4-DPS dungeon runs with an offhealing DPS for a few pulls or bosses.

You didn't specify about tanking, you said that I was wrong about them saying they wanted trinity/triage healing to be more important, and I showed that they were talking exactly about that.

He asked our opinion, I gave it to him. If it wasn't the one he wanted, I can't help that.

And you're grossly mis-characterizing my statements. I'm clearly discussing an environment where no significant amount of healing is needed and a Tank is completely capable of sustaining themselves. If a healer wants to DPS and no one is dying, who cares? Again, you waste more time trying to kick them or complaining about it than just finishing the run.

Because you're saying it's wrong for the tank to leave because that's not what he wanted to deal with, but it's fine for the healer to do whatever the heck they want, despite queuing up as a healer? If the healer can keep the tank up with no effort, whatever, but the tank was the one ensure their own survival, the healer did nothing except a few healing surges, no totems or anything, AND the clearly said that they "suck at healing". Pretty sure that's obvious that the healer had no intention of ever healing, just felt like dodging a queue.

Until someone produces actual collected data comparing the speed of dungeon runs between "4 DPS + 1 Tank" and "Tank + Healer + 3 DPS" across the leveling range, I'm going to consider arguments that "It's so much faster with a healer!" biased anecdote since a geared/experienced leveling tank can do a run without a healer.

Then throw out your argument that it's faster with 4 DPS, because you don't have any actual collected data to contest that it's faster than with a healer.

Well, we've already done this throughout the thread, but okay: Because he wasted the time of 3 DPS who did nothing wrong and wasted his own time ending a run early when he could have survived fine, gained practice from it, and gained plenty of XP. This is essentially throwing down your controller and saying "YOU'RE DOING IT WRONG I'M LEAVING", in an environment where 'doing it wrong' doesn't mean anything and you still win.

Yet the healer wasted no ones time at all? If the healer just did what they queued up as, this wouldn't of happened at all. You're ignoring the fact that the tank DID NOT WANT TO DO IT WITHOUT A HEALER. He wasn't confident enough to, and he didn't want to play like that. If the healer was perfectly fine to say "lolscrewhealing, I'mma dps", why is the tank not justified in leaving because they didn't want to deal with that.

You seem confused. No one is telling him what he has to do. He asked if this is what he should have done. We said, "No" or "Probably not" because it's true. Most of us (if not all) have not proposed strapping him to his chair with duct tape and forcing him to tank this traumatizing experience, but if he asks "Did I do the right thing?" I'm going to subjectively say: "Nope."

I don't see how I'm confused at all, especially by what you quote. He didn't ask if he did the right thing, he said this

I realize there could have been better options. I could just have kicked him, but with the rules on kicking and as trigger happy as people are in leveling dungeons, that would have been tricky. I could have seen it as practice, but I wasn't comfortable with having such a trial by fire on my first run. Was leaving one of the better options?

If it was one of the better options, since he did not feel comfortable with doing the dungeon with no healer, and you're saying "No, you should of done it anyway". I don't see how that even works honestly, that's like telling someone to go on the worlds fastest roller-coaster despite never even being on a roller-coaster in general.
Granted, it's an exaggeration, but still, you keep talking about in general, and how dungeons are faceroll at this level anyway, and how other's can tank it without a healer, yet you're not paying attention that this thread is not about others, it's about the OP, and his first time tanking in who knows how long, and the only thing he had to go by was a guide he read beforehand.

[Lovestar]

yet you're not paying attention that this thread is not about others, it's about the OP, and his first time tanking in who knows how long, and the only thing he had to go by was a guide he read beforehand.

I'm going to avoid most of this since you're really not reading most of what I write, but to reiterate here: whether he is uncomfortable because of his specific situation is not a blame to be put on everyone else expecting a standard trivial dungeon run and InvinciTank™.

Was leaving one of the better options?

No. Staying and getting some tanking practice and not wasting the time of 3 DPS who did nothing wrong was one of the better options.

Votekicking the healer you're mad at and seeing if the other 3 group members agree was one of the better options.

Accepting you have 3.5 DPS (we'll take 0.5 off the healer on the assumption he's an idiot and doing low DPS, although the OP is vague about this) and should just pull smaller packs, more frequently to get through the run is one of the better options.

Leaving was a legitimate option, it was not one of the better options. I am answering the OP's question. Since this is a topic requesting an opinion, I don't expect everyone to agree with me, but the people who spun this out into a high-concept debate about the "rightness" of things being this way during the leveling process is tangential to the original issue.

- - - Updated - - -

Because you're saying it's wrong for the tank to leave because that's not what he wanted to deal with, but it's fine for the healer to do whatever the heck they want, despite queuing up as a healer?

Yes, because you can still complete the run, making their actions irrelevant. Additionally, a crappy player staying there and shooting at things is significantly more useful to a group than a mad tank who is no longer present at all, especially since there's no mechanics for a lazy player to mess up in early-midrange leveling dungeons.

Observing the tank probably should have kept going is not the same as condoning the pseudo-healer being a lazy ass (if, indeed, he was as bad as the tank claims — we're dealing with a potentially biased witness). They're totally separate issues.

Then throw out your argument that it's faster with 4 DPS, because you don't have any actual collected data to contest that it's faster than with a healer.

But that's not what I'm arguing. I'm saying that I'm very sceptical the difference is actually as significant as a few posters claimed when comparing the two options, especially since a healer in full DPS mode can throw out insane numbers during the leveling process, and mass dungeon-size roundups will suffer from diminishing returns on speed from the AoE damage cap, and the fact that you can end up with DPS with very poor AoE during large chunks of the leveling process.

I mean, if you're at 40, and you get a group of Rogue x1, Shadow Priest x2 DPS (it happens), you're just making 3 people frustrated and bored by rounding up huge AoE packs. On the other hand if I see 3 Hunters I'm going to pull as much as possible.

I fully believe it's 'fast' to have a dedicated healer and round up the entire dungeon in one, or nearly one, pass, because I've done it many times. In my own anecdotal experience, though, it's not really that much faster than pulling smaller packs of 5-10 and letting them get burned down quickly while I move on to grab more (and this pacing has low/modest healing requirements, especially as a Brew due to all the snares).

Ultimately, I've found that adapting your pull pacing to the group composition is what makes for the consistently-fastest runs when dealing with unpredictable, matchmade groups.

[Ceethemage]

I'd have just kicked him I have a big pet peeve for people queueing as something they are not or don't want to play and then refusing to be the role they queued for.

[Jester Joe]

I'm going to avoid most of this since you're really not reading most of what I write, but to reiterate here: whether he is uncomfortable because of his specific situation is not a blame to be put on everyone else expecting a standard trivial dungeon run and InvinciTank™.

I don't know about you, but when I go into low level dungeons, I don't expect anything. But then again, if you're going to dismiss other's arguments because there's no proof, I'll dismiss that you say everyone expects to have a trivial dungeon run with 1 tank and 4 DPS, because there's no proof that's what everyone expects, and obviously OP didn't expect that.

No. Staying and getting some tanking practice and not wasting the time of 3 DPS who did nothing wrong was one of the better options.

OP wanted practice with actual leeway, not "You mess up we die". If anything, they should be blaming the healer, who could easily go resto and a dps could tank the dungeon like pointed out already.

Votekicking the healer you're mad at and seeing if the other 3 group members agree was one of the better options.

You seem to know enough about leveling dungeons, how often does that actually work out? There's all sorts of nonsense, ranging from "Too soon after combat", "Too soon after entering a dungeon". By the time that was all over and the healer was replaced, the tank could of dropped and they'd have a new tank.

Yes, because you can still complete the run, making their actions irrelevant. Additionally, a crappy player staying there and shooting at things is significantly more useful to a group than a mad tank who is no longer present at all, especially since there's no mechanics for a lazy player to mess up in early-midrange leveling dungeons.

You can still continue without a tank in low level dungeons, as long as you pull small, which is what you said to do with no healer anyway.

But that's not what I'm arguing. I'm saying that I'm very sceptical the difference is actually as significant as a few posters claimed when comparing the two options, especially since a healer in full DPS mode can throw out insane numbers during the leveling process, and mass dungeon-size roundups will suffer from diminishing returns on speed from the AoE damage cap, and the fact that you can end up with DPS with very poor AoE during large chunks of the leveling process.

To clear this up, this is where I got it from

Meanwhile my function as a 4th DPS increased the tank's life by about the same amount, but also sped up the run.

Even once I swapped to Resto, I mostly just kept Earth Shield & Riptide on the tank while continuing to spam DPS spells and come in 1st or 2nd on Recount (which I don't care about, but just saying — having 4 DPS speeds up the run, 5 if you could the tank's DPS while leveling).

Not saying there's a contradiction, just showing where I got that from. I'm not you I don't know what you were thinking when you wrote that, I just know what I read.

Honestly I understand what you mean, and I agree, dungeons aren't very challenging leveling and can be done with almost any composition, the only reason this whole thing started was because, if you recall, I said I don't really see why it's a common thing in most threads to complain about the tanks in situations. In this situation, I think the tank was fine in leaving, it does suck for the DPS, but if the tank is being the sole reason for his survival, I'd think the healer was doing a bad job at even off healing, and I'd blame the healer more than him. Although I suppose we should probably just agree to disagree at this point.