Is it time to kill the second tank?

[Evil Midnight Bomber]

All humans are vain. It's the human condition. Only hypocrites claim they are Jesus Christ.


Do you think it's a coincidence most people like to fight over DPS meters instead of tank?


Or that healers are more than tanks since they get to show off more on meters?

Most of the raid won't have numbers they can really show off though. If you aren't the top DPS on a fight...no one cares about you unless your DPS is really low...in which case you are likely to be kicked. Tanks don't have to rely on a high number for the raid to know they did their job right.

If you are looking for glory and having your ego stroked...being a tank is absolutely the best thing for you to do. A successful tank gets far more credit that the Top DPS. There isn't much to brag about being #8 on the DPS chart.

[Lucetia]

If you are looking for glory and having your ego stroked...being a tank is absolutely the best thing for you to do. A successful tank gets far more credit that the Top DPS. There isn't much to brag about being #8 on the DPS chart.

For me it wasn't so much of an ego stroking as it was hearing other's compliment me on how I tanked and that I did a better job than some other people they did. It helped me feel like I did my part in the fight despite me knowing my dps wasn't up there (pre-tank damage buff). But it wasn't only that it also helped me get invited back to groups quicker too. Though at the same time it made it so I couldn't swap to dps either ><. There were a few times I wanted to just dps for the raid (pugs mind you) and the raid leader (whom I knew and ran with for awhile) would beg me to stay tank because he didn't want to find someone else and them possibly being bad and knew I could help pick up the slack of the other if he wasn't so great either.

I mean I guess some could see it as an ego thing, but to me it made me help feel like I contributed rather than just sit there and make sure the "big bad mob" wasn't going to roam around and spank them

[thunderdragon2]

If you move the boss it's annoying to DPSes and others when done excessively, so "move it around a lot" would be a good idea at first glance but it would make the game annoying.

this point is made alot worse when the bosses have pathing issues like kilrog and tryant do, even the slightest movement makes the boss do sircles around the tank which makes positioning a nightmare

[Zelendria]

I like the HC alt day when some DPS turn up, have a load of banter calling each other out, before pulling the boss and see who can back up their bullshit with the deeps.

[thunderdragon2]

But it might actually be time to re-instate 3rd (and maybe 4th) tank..

i'd be happy with this......when they remove 20 man mythic, i dout 4 tanks 4 healers 12 dps would work well

[Evil Midnight Bomber]

For me it wasn't so much of an ego stroking as it was hearing other's compliment me on how I tanked and that I did a better job than some other people they did. It helped me feel like I did my part in the fight despite me knowing my dps wasn't up there (pre-tank damage buff). But it wasn't only that it also helped me get invited back to groups quicker too. Though at the same time it made it so I couldn't swap to dps either ><. There were a few times I wanted to just dps for the raid (pugs mind you) and the raid leader (whom I knew and ran with for awhile) would beg me to stay tank because he didn't want to find someone else and them possibly being bad and knew I could help pick up the slack of the other if he wasn't so great either.

I mean I guess some could see it as an ego thing, but to me it made me help feel like I contributed rather than just sit there and make sure the "big bad mob" wasn't going to roam around and spank them

I'm not trying to suggest that's why everyone decides to be a tank. I'm just saying that, if vanity were the deciding factor in what role you choose, most people would want to be a tank...because that's the role that gets the most credit for the success.

In reality though, people choose not to be tanks because it is more responsibility...which means more pressure. Playing DPS is a lot less pressure. If you aren't at the top of your game one night...the raid doesn't suffer for that nearly as much as it would if you were the tank. If you want to blow off the raid...it's easier to be replaced as DPS than as tank. If you want to try a different spec out for a fight...you can do that as DPS but not as a tank.

[Raiju]

I would be happy if tanking was more fluid / number flexible to avoid awful taunt forcing mechanics, but making 1 tank the standard? sounds like it'd be awful for encounter design.

also I feel like I mention this everytime - if you make it through a tough situation in a fight its hte healer that generally gets credit, not the tank.

[Evil Midnight Bomber]

also I feel like I mention this everytime - if you make it through a tough situation in a fight its hte healer that generally gets credit, not the tank.

That depends on the situation. Regardless, both Tanks and Healers get more credit for victory than DPS does.

[ssviolett]

No!
They should add 3rd tank instead, not to reduce required amount of tanks to 1.
You know how difficult to find a tank for a dungeon, challenge, or any old content - there are very few tanks, and you are even suggesting to reduce their amount.
Things should stay as they are now, probably with adding offtank mechanics for, say, shamans, warlocks - like 2 tanks for boss, and one offtank for add that comes sometimes and does not hit hard.

[Pua]

In your model what would be discouraging bringing two tanks? In the current model. Tanks do alright damage and having a backup could be the difference between a wipe being caused by a poor lag spike or not.

I think it's unfulfilling to be there "just in case the real tank dies".

Surely the designers can do better?

It would be difficult to design around a single tank.

If you have two tanks and one dies what happens? The offtank usually pops some CDs and does his best to get the situation under control while the other tank gets rezzed / healed / rebuffed.

Now play that scenario in your head with one tank. It's one thing for a DPS to tank 5 man trash for a handful of seconds, even if CMs. Heck, even pets can do it. But in a raid that isn't going to hold up well. You are either going to have a mess or you're going to have people there ready and able to pick the boss up in the event the primary tank dies...in which case you're basically bringing a secondary tank anyways.

That's all true, but I'm one of those weird people that doesn't believe you should be able to just recover from any death. That's power creep, and is arguably what's causing raid encounters to end up so threatening that they have to one-shot people. Should there only be one tank for an encounter, Blizzard can tune accordingly and remove mechanics that outright kill tanks for making a single error when they're busy doing other things.

Remember; consistent damage, even when heavy, doesn't kill tanks. Spikes kill tanks, and they don't need to be in the game. Because there's always two tanks, Blizzard simply puts them in there (along with the taunt swaps) so the second tank has a reason to be there.

I think it's lame.

Also PUGs can be pretty damn toxic to a tank not doing the perfect pull

The number of tanks I've seen kicked for simply saying "I've not tanked this before" is, honestly, embarrassing for the entire community.

I would even go a little further and would like to see some bosses that require 1 tank, some that require an offtank and the occassional boss where you need 3 or 4 like we used to have in the past.

I'm largely persuaded that this system would be preferable. A main tank who does every fight, the offtank who's the default second tank, and specs that can cover as auxilliary tanks as required. Hell, it could go a long way to restoring some of the unique flavour that's been put through the homogenizing blandifier these last few expansions.

If there was 15 tanks and it was about who can take the aggro most it would just as competitive as current DPS wars are.

It's laughable, but there are tanks out there who consistently have aggro wars.

also I feel like I mention this everytime - if you make it through a tough situation in a fight its hte healer that generally gets credit, not the tank.

That's generally my experience, but the mileage varies. I think it's a symptom of current encounter design that relegates DPS players to pure numbers, and no real opportunities to "be a hero". It's a shame, IMHO.

[Zelendria]

That depends on the situation. Regardless, both Tanks and Healers get more credit for victory than DPS does.

Don't agree not with this tier fixated on add fights. If DPS is low or slacking the raid will wipe.

[smokii]

they could make LFR require 1 tank, which would speed up queue times

but honestly, no, they should probably make more tanks a requirement and sort out the ratio of healer : tank : dps - have more adds that hit harder and need tanking, more multiple boss encounters that require tanking.

i've actually been kinda coming to the conclusion that they actually need to completely break balance - balance is actually quite boring. the game was a lot more fun when some specs and items were OP.

there's too much homogenisation in game now in order to try and achieve balance - whereas the chaos was what made the game interesting to many, trying to find that secret combo of spec, rotation and gear that made you kill things like a pro. when everything is balanced, there's no incentive to try harder or to break the mould.

honestly, i think they should use the swtor level sync system as an example and do the same thing to azeroth. make old raids and dungeons meaningful again - bring back broken old pieces of gear with procs that are ridiculously OP but from bosses you can't solo any more. bring life back to the WORLD of warcraft, not just the latest tier of raid. it'd be interesting to see vanilla, tbc, wotlk, cata, MoP and WoD gear become relevant in legion, anyone with the time to grind out the original thunderfury again would get a full lvl 110 version, or sulfuras etc - put in the time, the effort, get something ridiculous OP.

obviously that idea needs a lot more fleshing out, but in principle, they need to bring back the crazy, let players break the game every now and then, let players find unique and wonderful ways to pwn bosses and other players using items already in the world, just covered in dust.

[Evil Midnight Bomber]

Don't agree not with this tier fixated on add fights. If DPS is low or slacking the raid will wipe.

But DPS don't get credit for victories....they only get blamed for low DPS on failures.

[Sharrel]

DS was pretty much just that. almost entirely one tankable.. as a Tank I HATED it, mostly because our other tank didn't have an off spec, so I was mostly stuck dpsing. which I don't enjoy.

[Deleted]

Every fight on PTR already devolves into a "is there anything that prevents us from 1-tanking this fight or not?" during testing. With the way tanks are currently designed in the post-Vengeance world, you're always rewarded for finding a way to cut down on tanks because they don't bring anything other than usually being mandatory. Bar exceptions like prot paladin with class trinket on a few fights this tier, they do fuck-all damage and require healer attention.

I don't see any coherent argument as to why there shouldn't only be 1 tank in Mythic raids going forward - or at least why 1-tanking fights shouldn't ultimately be possible, even if perhaps it'd require perfect play/a boatload of externals. Blizzard simply aren't good enough at designing compelling tank mechanics for tanking to currently be interesting for two people at the same time.

[dixincide]

I don't see any coherent argument as to why there shouldn't only be 1 tank in Mythic raids going forward - or at least why 1-tanking fights shouldn't ultimately be possible, even if perhaps it'd require perfect play/a boatload of externals. Blizzard simply aren't good enough at designing compelling tank mechanics for tanking to currently be interesting for two people at the same time.

I think it relies outside of raiding and more so on attendance/connection

If you have a 10 minute fight and your 1 and only DC in the fight happens to be the tank at the 8 minute mark, you're looking at a wipe.
If your guilds roster only has the one tank who is geared and some other off set tanks and the tank doesn't show up, you're pugging or SoL.


The game caters to more than the mythic crowd so these are both very real and very valid points as to why having 1 member of the raid make or break a boss fight would not be ideal.

[PosPosPos]

I don't see any coherent argument as to why there shouldn't only be 1 tank in Mythic raids going forward - or at least why 1-tanking fights shouldn't ultimately be possible,

If you are going to only need 1 tank for every 20 man, then there's absolutely no reason to have to maintain 5 separate tank specs - so unless you want to prune 2-3 tank specs out of the game(not that it's necessarily a bad thing), the minimum of 2 tanks has to stay.

Edit: Soon to be 6 tank specs.

[Rioo]

Moving down to one tank wouldn't allow more mechanics, it would do the opposite. I do like the idea of giving some DPS a kind of hybrid role between DPS and tanking on certain bosses though. Would certainly give groups some incentive to bring melee. Personally I love to do stuff other than just DPSing while playing my feral and hunter.

[Deleted]

We need more tanks, not less!

I remember back in SSC we had up 4 tanks on some fights.

We even had a warlock tank one of the bosses...

In any case, it would be better if we could scale up closer the 5-man roster so we don't produce more tanks than can be used to raid (and it might help with tanks for 5-mans too).

[Zelendria]

But DPS don't get credit for victories....they only get blamed for low DPS on failures.

There's quite a few fights as the difficulty goes up where it's critical DPS do more than just hit the boss until it dies.
Our first Kormrok kill made it absolutely essential the Rogues doing empowered explosive runes didn't fuck up for example. That entire fight when we started at Orange depended on them 2 Rogues. They make a mistake we all die.