Advice welcome: Switching to Guardian from Resto

[Hobbidaggy]

So I have been wondering for a while about his and have some average gear (lucky offspec rolls in guild EN runs) any advice I should know before I make the change. I'm dreading the first lot of mythics I start running as a tank unless I can get some guild runs happening. I'm thinking I run LFR EN or ToV and get my experience up with tanking.

Also been thinking about it since I seem to always see a tank shortage in the group finder and figured I would help people out a little with their queue times.

[Deleted]

LFR won't teach you much, since they can pretty much all be solo tanked. Just go and do M+. You will get a feel for when to use AM and when to use CD's in time. Tanking is sadly something you can only learn if the content is hard enough to kill you, otherwise you don't really get any feedback from the game. Also try doing it with healers that are slightly undergeared, so they can't carry you.

[Hobbidaggy]

LFR won't teach you much, since they can pretty much all be solo tanked. Just go and do M+. You will get a feel for when to use AM and when to use CD's in time. Tanking is sadly something you can only learn if the content is hard enough to kill you, otherwise you don't really get any feedback from the game. Also try doing it with healers that are slightly undergeared, so they can't carry you.

That's very sound advice. Thanks mate. I will give it a go. I might ask my guild healers to just hold back a little. They are mythic raiders where I just do the normal runs with them in our pug/alt sessions.

[Thaledwyn]

Prepare to use a def cd when pulling a large amount of mobs without any Ironfur stacks up.

[NightZero88]

So I have been wondering for a while about his and have some average gear (lucky offspec rolls in guild EN runs) any advice I should know before I make the change. I'm dreading the first lot of mythics I start running as a tank unless I can get some guild runs happening. I'm thinking I run LFR EN or ToV and get my experience up with tanking.

Also been thinking about it since I seem to always see a tank shortage in the group finder and figured I would help people out a little with their queue times.

Try and keep IF up as much as possible (should be easy to do 1 stack maybe 2). Use the mark of ursol when mobs are casting spells. Keep in mind IF can stack but mark is only 1 so don't use it more than once until it falls off. Use frenzied regen when needed (after a big hit) or if you start dropping low. You have 2 stacks so plan accordingly. Personally I use barkskin and rage of the sleeper when I do a big pull to pad the meters since I don't really need them defensively but if you do say Maw and pull everything up to the boss these two skills combined will keep you up hopefully until everything is dead but if everything is still alive be prepared to drop fast.

As far as skills go, use thrash on CD, use mangle on CD, spam swipe in between.

Lastly I use incapacitating roar once all enemies are grouped up to interrupt a bunch of spells. You'll learn when to use it after playing. It'll instantly break but it stops casts on a group of mobs so if like 3 things are casting hit it. Same with warstomp if you're a tauren. Skull bash is to interrupt important spells and survival instincts if you are getting wrecked and the healer can't keep up.

Overall guardian is pretty easy to be good at. It seems like a lot of stuff but it's really not. The hardest thing to do is to determine if you should use IF or mark since there is no indicator on abilities if they are magical damage or not so it just takes practice.

Additional note: Don't use maul. Just don't use it...like ever. It is terrible. It does the same damage as swipe but uses rage.

[Hobbidaggy]

Thanks for the tips guys. I will prob be trying this out tonight and will see how it goes. I have been keeping in mind the hearing so have kept a few things over the expat tank orientated vers and mastery gear and a few trinkets. Just have to get to remembering the cooldowns haha

[Cuppy]

Go tank, I've dreaded tanking in every expansion, but once you get to know abilitites, you're gonna love it!
Also, get the addon that shows the healing provided by Frenzied regeneration, makes your life much easier!
Also "Additional note: Don't use maul. Just don't use it...like ever. It is terrible. It does the same damage as swipe but uses rage."
Don't listen to that, Maul is a great ability since it's off GCD. So if the content you're doing is not hitting you for 50% of your health, go ahead and use maul to extra dps!