Starting Tanking BC instances

[lespaul5895]

I posted a couple days ago about a spec for doing BC instances for leveling and I found a good tanking spec I've chosen. My question is what defense rating should I shoot for or should I be ok with minimal? Another thing I wonder about is health, I have right around 6k unbuffed currently....is that enough?

[Gunwolf]

Don't worry about defense. Just focus on getting as much of the plate drops with gem slots on em, and gem all stam.....you only have to worry bout defense after lvl 70.

[lespaul5895]

Thanks a lot, I appreciate it.

[Nalloa]

Agreed. I mean, if you think about it, starting Death Knights can tank out of the gate in Hellfire at 58 and i don't think any of their gear has DEF on it. Granted, they are all blue items, but it isn't really important until you enter a heroic of any kind at 80, or 70 if you are sticking with BC.

[deadjack]

On a side note, if you are around the start of BC lvl 59-62, take it easy with the pull.
There is a jump with stam on item between vanila and BC.

especially vs enemy with special attack like CC (mostly fear) or mortal strike (-50%healing)

[lespaul5895]

Just did Ramparts and had no trouble with aggro or staying alive for most of it, good healer I guess It did seem that the last dragon guy was a bit difficult to hold aggro on, either that or he just likes to target random people. It's been forever since I've done it.

Oh and the stupid other dk in there stole my tanking boots

[Squishie]

58 to 68 I didn't tank much because I had friendly guild mates for late night boosting. Some advice I would give though based on the 12 levels I did tank.

Choose blood. My reason for saying this is blood is harder to tank dungeons with and it will help improve your reactions and awareness as well as help make up for poor healers with bloods self healing.

Plan your gear. Take a little bit of time out of game and decide what gear you want to pick up ahead of time. Aim to get tank pieces that will see you a good few levels. Then you can stick some cheap gems in them. Check your other toons for old BoJ and trade them for TBC epic gems.

Most of all enjoy the runs. You will have plenty of situations where you are pulling your hair out and want to just jack it in. But always keep in the back of your mind end game. Tanks are in great demand and if you can hit 80 ready to tank heroics. you will hear to sets quicker than a pure DPS can do one.

Good luck

[dubbz]

Agreed. I mean, if you think about it, starting Death Knights can tank out of the gate in Hellfire at 58 and i don't think any of their gear has DEF on it. Granted, they are all blue items, but it isn't really important until you enter a heroic of any kind at 80, or 70 if you are sticking with BC.

When I leveled my holy priest, I had dk's running around in full starting gear trying to tank just because they had a dk tank spec and in frost presence. Sure, they can take a "semi" beating, but that gear is mainly strength based. Meant for doing damage. Not tanking. Their hp isn't higher than any normal warrior or paladin dps. And compared to a pally or warrior tank in stamina based gear, they blow.

And they are like "I have a xxxx tank as a main, i know how to do it..." and they pull huge mobs, and pretty much get one shot.

I HATED dk tanks in 58-68 instances, and even some in early WOTLK instances.

[Halicia]

as well as help make up for poor healers with bloods self healing.

big agreement there. the bigger healthpool doesnt hurt either. (especially with newbie reactive healers)

i've actually outhealed at least one healer on bossfights for whatever reason. (usually because blizzard's more concerned about ppl abusing /kick then abusing /afk and /autofollow)