Druid AOE tanking, need help!

[Jelako]

Im having issues with AOE tanking..im using a swipe heavy rotation mixing improved demo roar, and droping mangle/taunt to the primary dps target. but dps is pulling targets off of me after the first mob drops, its like swipe isnt producing enough threat even after being spammed for ~4-7secs, whats the problem?

[Swiftly]

well first question is which mobs are getting pulled off you... the focus target that the dps is on or the other mobs your trying to hold off from getting peeled off by heal aggro or by an idiot that is using multi-shot or some other form of multi-hit ability.

unless you have 2200 AP (live servers) lacerate will produce more threat then swipe. so if your problem is the focus target (ie skull) then you need to up the threat on 1 target then across the board of all targets. this means you have to produce enough AE threat so the healer doesnt pull aggro off you but build single target threat to hold off form DPS. which sounds like your problem.

in my opinion this is all done form the way you pull. personally i like to pull back to a safer area to tank. which means i range pull then run back about 10-15 yrds shift to bear > enrage> CHARGE... charge is the up most important thing. you have to learn to time this so you will charge in every time. personally i like to use La La La La Moonfire! not only because it is a tick that gives threat but it is an instant cast like faerie fire with better range. keep in mind as your running back the moonfire ticks are generating threat on the focus target. also since the mobs are engaged then you shift into bear and hit enrage, enrage it self will produce 10 threat for each tick (5 ticks). also keep in mind that enrage threat effects all mobs that is engaged. this is also where feral charge comes in. i dont know why but mobs are attracted to charge like if it produces threat. i havent been able to confirm this or not. if ALL mobs are in range use demoralizing roar. (now this part is questionable) if not then Mangle > Maul...because this combo will produce the max frontal threat for thoses trigger happy DPS. others will say open with lacerate or swipe, the reason for this is that if you miss mangle then your going to lose rage and good chance to have dps pull off you. but lacerate & swipe is low rage cost and produces more then on the long run.

i would start off with a mangle > 3 swipe rotation use taunt to keep focus target even if your at the top of threat. taunt also will hold threat even if your not #1 on threat for 6 seconds. in this 6 seconds get as many lacerates / mangles (mangle > 3 Lacerates). after this the focus mob should be close to death. even if peeled let the dps finish them off. if the mob still has alot of health then go into a mangle > 3 (swipe / lacerate) either 2 swipes 1 lacerate OR 2 lacerates 1 swipe. also order doesnt really matter. you just want to hit the other mobs a couple of times to make sure your keeping threat while keeping lacerate up on the focus target.

[Malfuron]

Another thing I like to do while AOE tanking is swipe spam, and assuming you're generating plenty of rage and getting hit a lot, every 2-3 swipes, throw a Maul at the main target because it's the only ability we have that's not on the GCD

[xebtria]

if you have enough rage due to enough mobs bind to you with swipe - you can "spam" maul while swiping.
same thing works with singletargetmobs, e.g. bosses, when you have enough rage.

for this I use this macro:

/cast lacerate
/cast !Maul

/cast swipe
/cast !Maul

these two ensures that you primarily spam lacerate/swipe and if you have the rage and the autoswing is ready, maul is casted. high usage of rage, but if you have it, it's the best way of producing high TPS. Mangle is bind on an extra key and is pressed if ready manually.

[Beetlejuice]

From your post i am not exactly sure what you do (spamming taunt for example is completely useless, taunt has no effect if you have the agro) and what exactly the problem is (you loose aggro of main target or off target, do dds get the aggro or the healer?) so i keep it general.
Swipe is there to counter healaggro, if you do not seriously outequip your dds you won't have a chance to keep aggro on your swipe targets against your dds. So if they pull of off targets then your dds simply attack the wrong target. If the healer pulls of off targets then you either still don't swipe enough or have some serious gear issues. Also keep in mind that on live servers swipe has a target limit of 3 targets, so if you tank more you will only build aggro on 3 of them with pure swipe spam.
If the dds pull off your main target then again either they outequip you and don't know what omen is or you use a bad rotation for your main target tps.
So bottom line, be more specific what the problem is. It is not neccessarily anything you did wrong if you loose aggro. If your dds are dumb like a brick, and at least on my server most of them are, then there is not much you can do other than outequip them and/or keep taunt on cooldown.

[Jelako]

Sorry for not being more specific, im only taunting when i need to thats why i said mangle/taunt...the mobs that are coming of of me are the one that are taking aoe like dmg from the dps, like whirlwind, aoe spells, etc. the main dps target is fine he sticks to me np. i had 2900 AP in the PTR heroic when this finally bugged me to the point i wanted to ask for help. and yes im blowing my aoe taunt any time i can to save the dps but imo swipe isnt doing the job that consencrate can do, idk how warriors feel but ya...i feel like ill never be a good aoe tank bc dps will get mad and not wanna do aoe dungeeons witha druid.

[Beetlejuice]

Oh i guess then your problem is that you want to do something no one really can reliably do. Even a paladin won't hold aoe aggro against an even equipped bomber. That's why you only bomb non elites and that's why the bomber gets shielded and all the heal focus.
As said before aoe aggro is to counter heal aggro (and some low scale aoe dmg maybe), not to counter straight forward aoe nuking. If this would be possible you would see mages as the only damage dealers in all instances.

[Jelako]

ok so it sounds like i need to tell my dps to calm down the aoe...what about shamans using fire nova totem or warriors whirlwind given if the delay the use of it till a few swipes have happened are they gonna be ok or even then are they gonna cirt and die?

[Ghash]

Oh i guess then your problem is that you want to do something no one really can reliably do. Even a paladin won't hold aoe aggro against an even equipped bomber. That's why you only bomb non elites and that's why the bomber gets shielded and all the heal focus.
As said before aoe aggro is to counter heal aggro (and some low scale aoe dmg maybe), not to counter straight forward aoe nuking. If this would be possible you would see mages as the only damage dealers in all instances.

Hyjal? What?

[Swiftly]

i agree in AOE cases there isnt much you can do especially if the DPS is using AOE abilities from the start like how some hunters do with multi-shot... you dont see many mages run up and AE everyone on every pull i dont know why some classes like hunters and rogues (blade furry) from the start. as tank i warn them if they ignore that then i let them tank the ones they peeled off... good chance they will come back to be once they are dead. as a healing priest i let them die because if i heal to much they will come after me as a healer when they die.

so it is simple your DPS is under skilled...

[Morganaugh]

in pure aoe situations I sometimes barkskin-huricane. Thats just on.. huge groups of non-elites. You'll take alot of damage but alot less than mages would so it works, and you'll keep aggro easily for those few seconds while they get aoe'd down. (just be ready to quickly go bearform in case your healer is sleeping)

taunt does give more threat, even if you already have primary aggro. It also ensures that during its duration the primary target cannot be pulled from you.

How you multi-mob tank also depends on the dps of your group. If say you are a 500-700dps tank and your party is barely out-damaging you. You can swipe heavy without much concern.

If your party is heavy dps, like.. everyone is 1200-1500 kind of thing, things will die very fast. In this situation you dont need to really 'establish' aggro, just get enough of it. You might mangle/taunt the primary target while swiping, but stop worying about it to immediately build up on the 2nd and so forth because of how quickly things are going to be dead.

Tab-target alot. It helps spread out your damage from lacerates, makes sure swipes absolutely hit everything, and you dont have to give much thought into it for it to work well.

[Töasty]

It all depends on the number of targets I am tanking. If there are three targets, (skull, x, diamond) (in that kill order), I will cast wrath on diamond, and then target x, cast moonfire, then shift into bear and cast faerie fire on skull, then enrage, mangle, demo shout, and alternate swipe and maul (if rage allows) on the main target, mangling when cooldown is up. When skull is down to about 10% health, switch targeting to x, mangle, alternate swipe and maul, repeat. Once swipe is able to hit more than three targets, I would assume it will get easier to tank more than three mobs, but your AoE dps needs to wait a little for you to build aggro before they go balls out. If there are more than three targets, I open with hurricane. I think too many druids forget all their tools when tanking and only use bear agilities. I love pulls where I get to use hibernate, moonfire, etc.