new warrior tank question

[Gible]

Hey guys, so I've been tanking pug groups since 70, I'm 73 now which means I still have a lot more experience left to gain as a tank before I will dare consider myself decent.

As a new tank, and a new WoW player in a lot of ways, I'm finding some things confusing. I don't seem to have much trouble with AoE tanking at all, this is typically what I do - do general single target tanking while useing my AOEs, when I have sufficient threat, change targets and cycle through mobs to maintain threat throughout.

What confuses me is this debate between single target/aoe tanking. I've been hearing that it's either or. I have been focusing more on single target tanking only when my group is doing that on their own and only when they aren't spamming AoEs, but really I tend to be flexible. People are telling me that single target tanking went out with vanilla wow, but some raiders are telling me otherwise. So from my very limited experience, it seems like maybe it's somewhere in between?

The other question I have is this - I try to be resourceful and problem solve on the spot when tanking. But those damn casters always get in my way. I will try to aggro them while moving out of their line of site so I can get them where I want them to be, this isn't fool proof however and sometimes I still have a pesky caster far away. Sometimes, I'll be able to drag the mobs too that caster but not always, especially when that caster is dangerously near other mobs. In these cases, I'll tend to taunt the caster and hope he doesn't aggro to anyone else while taking care of the trash that is where I want them.

Casters bug the hell out of me. What's the best way in dealing with them, if I don't have anyone to do good crowd control?

Thanks a lot guys! I'm excited about becoming a somewhat decent tank.

[Tycho]

For casters, two big talents you should have are Gag Order and Warbringer. Gag Order allows your Heroic Throw (lv80 skill, doh!) and Shield Bash to silence the target. Warbringer makes you very mobile. Typically if I have say two casters set a bit apart from melee on me, I'll HT one and charge the other the silenced one will walk over. If HT is on CD, I'll charge one, Bash, then intercept the second causing the first to walk to me.

AoE tanking is pretty easy while leveling, as most people have gear at similar levels to your own. At 80 it can be frustrating when a dps has gear vastly superior to yours (and it will happen in pugs, and yes they just won't "get" why you don't hold aggro as well as their guild BiS-geared uber raid tank in full Arthas gear). I must admit that I had a LOT of fun tanking 70-79, but switched to Fury at 80 because tanking became to much of a pain in the butt with superhero dps allstars with twice your gearscore giving you crap :-P.

When people talk about AoE vs single-target tanking, they're most likely talking about Wrath and pre-Wrath. For much of pre-Wrath there were a lot of situations that CC was very, very preferred vs. just rounding up everything and burning them down. In Wrath, it's rare to see CC. As well, they could be talking about trash vs. boss tanking, which is self-explanatory.

[spaace]

for your current state... glyph devestate and cleave and always blocking, and you can get by with dev/cleave/tc spam for aoe.
single targ just ss/dev, hs with extra rage.

[Vashdakari]

The other question I have is this - I try to be resourceful and problem solve on the spot when tanking. But those damn casters always get in my way. I will try to aggro them while moving out of their line of site so I can get them where I want them to be, this isn't fool proof however and sometimes I still have a pesky caster far away. Sometimes, I'll be able to drag the mobs too that caster but not always, especially when that caster is dangerously near other mobs. In these cases, I'll tend to taunt the caster and hope he doesn't aggro to anyone else while taking care of the trash that is where I want them.

Casters bug the hell out of me. What's the best way in dealing with them, if I don't have anyone to do good crowd control?

Regarding the caster problem, there are a few different ways you can handle them when LoS fails, and also depending on the situation.

If you have good aggro over most of the group, why not charge/intercept on over and shield bash the bugger? Sure, melee classes will have to follow the mob you're dragging behind you, but it's not that big a deal really. (Extra fun, charge over, shield bash, then intercept back to the main pack. Zip, zip!)

Option two, your "don't want to aggro other groups strat." Taunt him just after he finishes a cast, and then spell reflect that next cast. Refresh Spell reflect as often as possible, and that should hold their interest until the group is ready to finish the caster off.

Third option, depending on healer competence, just have any and all ranged classes nuke the hell out of said mob, and then hope he doesn't run.

As for AoE versus Single Target, it's going to largely depend on the group. So "somewhere in between" is a good description, but as the tank, it's really whatever you're comfortable with.