How much HP should a Tank have before they enter a heroic?

[Spartanoble]

they should do a test on the heroics to lock out the retards.

[aqthedruid]

cata is as much about avoidance as stam stacking, both are 100% necessary, tanks in top guilds are not foregoing stam gems and stam chants and never will

yes but in wrath tanks only gemmed for stam. cata is different

[exangel]

For my new raid we started equipping a tank and a healer when they both just hit 329, which was around 115k unbuffed. We had to execute everything properly and use multiple cc's on every pull.

As heroics got easy for people who raid, expect to have a harsh time when pugging below 130k unbuffed. I had a few runs as tank where the healer said cc is a waste of time here.

If you are skilled and have patience you can start way earlier.

Precisely.

[Phoef]

Well, imho 125 is fine. I was tanking HC's (PUGS) with 115k hp as tank(unbuffed) but with good avoidance stats.

Avoidance is so important imo, but in certain heroics you can take 50k hits, and with a small hp pool you get seriously spikey.

[Holyspartann]

yes but in wrath tanks only gemmed for stam. cata is different

Cata is NOT different

In WOTLK tanks gemmed for Max DEF, then Max Avoidance, then Stam
However, due to the gear, Max Def and then Max Avoidance was easy to reach, so all the slots went to stam

Currently:

1. The gear is "crap" in that you can't even get close to the "avoidance cap" in which all of incoming attacks are either blocked/parried/dodged

Stam is IMPORTANT, but not "priority", yes there is a minimum stam that you need to have...but block/parry/dodge are of more importance due to their help on healing

Mastery is definately up there either helping on damage reduction, selfbubbling, blocking with "mitigates" wotlk like hits.

To the original poster:

Druids Stack Stamina, so they should have a minimum of 145k unbuffed, or self-buffed (more the better)
Dk's Stack Stam/Mastery mostly - They need a 140-145k health pool, they take BIG hits, but self heal most, so a bigger pool = less chance to die from big hits
Pally/Warrior - 130k unbuffed, 150k is actually really good for a pally/warr, they stack doge/parry/mastery, if they dont dodge/parry they mitigate hits, so they need less health, however take roughly the same amount of damage...You can stack one way or another but More mastery = less Health More Health = Less Mastery

You need both but you can "stack" one or the other and be fine.

[Kelleton]

I was tanking heroics with 110k health as a DK- I had less than most of the dps but if you know how to use your abilities then you should have no problem as long as u arnt in DPS or pvp gear. Dodge and Parry are your friend

[blackvivi265]

Seriously, people are already saying 125k is too low? It's like Wrath with people saying 35k is too low when people started tanking with just above 20k? I started with 115-120k I think, and ran normals many times beforehand to try and gear up. I had no problems with groups I got through LFD apart from the usual people breaking CC, people standing in stupid places and what not. Nothing due to health or avoidance being low.

[Huntingbear_grimbatol]

Skill > gear
aslong as you're doing a premade and dps know how to interrupt and healer know how to use cds etc even 115k hp would be enough. For a pug 130k unbuffed would be recommended.

[Rubert]

I started Tanking Heroics w/ 120k life unbuffed and it was a pure biotch. There was a difference and it was because EVERYONE was undergeared. I'm a Prot Pally Tank w/ 164k unbuffed and i have reached 198k buffed in raids, i believe its nerfed now. I'm usually at 189k buffed in instances.

I'm one of two tanks that go all out Stam in our guild. I have not heard any complaints about tanking or being squishy by anyone i have run with.

good luck sir

[harky]

110k+ assuming the healer is equivalently geared and people aren't stupid. You can do them in much worse if the healer is already heroic geared. I've healed some of our alts just as they hit 85 (using cloth/mail/leather/healer/etc gear to hit 329) and it was fine. They had well under 100k unbuffed health.

I'd say minimum before you can run heroics smoothly is ~125k unbuffed, but also 20%+ avoidance (not including miss chance). At that point you can run them without needing to rely too much on CC.

Contrary to popular belief Heroics are quite a bit under-tuned. A tank who has their equipped gear at 329 average will have well over 125k health and if it's tank gear they'll also have more than that 20% avoidance number. This means by the time you can even queue for them in your equipped gear you're sufficiently geared to farm them. If Heroics are meant to be a challenge then they are definitely too easy. Tanks in BC were definitely not prepared for Heroics in leveling greens. At least it's not as bad as Wrath. My guild did a number of 'grey challenges' in Wrath doing heroics in nothing except grey gear. It's not nearly that bad in Cata, but Heroics in greens is definitely kosher. Even as a tank/healer.

[Chaltione]

My first 2-3 heroics tanking, I had to enter the dungeon manually as I didn't have the iLvl for them. I was around 120-125k buffed with kings+fort (or equivalent), and it was rare that they took more than 2 hours to complete, including time spent on learning boss mechanics.

That said, I have tanked since vanilla, and were not one of the many newborn tanks in wotlk who trained their tanking skills in "pull more groups so I can AoE more".

[Belross]

Is 125 too low?

Tanked Heroic halls on my druid about 20 minutes after I hit 85, granted I had some rep gear from questing and such, But if you have good CC, decent healer, and a general understanding of the mechanics you should do fine.
One thing about stam stacking, Do it in moderation. blue sockets should be the only straight stam gems. The rest should be mixed with class's ideal secondary stats. hit and exp should never be top priority either, vengeance pretty much covers threat. Survival is #1

[masterprtzl]

yes but in wrath tanks only gemmed for stam. cata is different

Uh... Stam is still the best tanking stat; this also depends on your class. For example, our pallys go for max mastery as well as as much stam as possible leaving them at almost perma 30% dmg reduction due to block.

[Belross]

Uh... Stam is still the best tanking stat; this also depends on your class. For example, our pallys go for max mastery as well as as much stam as possible leaving them at almost perma 30% dmg reduction due to block.

Same with warriors, chance to block and crit block.

[wowplayer]

Uh... Stam is still the best tanking stat; this also depends on your class. For example, our pallys go for max mastery as well as as much stam as possible leaving them at almost perma 30% dmg reduction due to block.

not sure if this is as true for DKs. mastery is important due to blood shield but avoidance is important as well since we are pretty stupid not to carry around an actual shield. that kinda leaves out stamina but i know i try to get that in whenever i can but the other two take precedence. this could be preference though as some guides say to runeforge stoneskin (stamina) and others swordshattering (avoidance).

[Tharkkun]

I don't know if i can believe you. That means you had close to 105k health, which also means that you had maybe 5k more than your average dps. Must have been hell for any healers. It had to have been, since they were basically healing a tank with the health of a dps. Mitigation can only get you so far.

120-125k is more than fine. I did the same on my druid. I did BH with 130k. And our ret-paly who put on prot gear was tanking heroics with 115k health. If you have a competent healer, non-retard dps and a tank who knows to use cooldowns on trash you'll be fine.

I see tanks with more health dying because they refuse to use their cooldowns just because it's trash.

[DarkPhoenix]

Friends and I get nervous when our tank has under 130k UB, Doesnt seem to be the HP thats an issue its more the mitigation that you lack from the ilevel of the items required to only have 125 or so. I.E- you get smashed harder.

[Drakoes]

Skill > gear
aslong as you're doing a premade and dps know how to interrupt and healer know how to use cds etc even 115k hp would be enough. For a pug 130k unbuffed would be recommended.

o noes, here we go again (in a good sense). There's still gonna be a lot of variables and factors that will need to be taken in though that can make lower HP tanks tolerable. As some people have already mentioned, stuff like CC or even a geared healer can help pull things through fine. However, in a pug situation, you won't always get the best of the best or have everyone who knows what to do, since there will always be idiots or underperformers (DPS).

Bottom line - Low HP tanks can trigger some wild responses, such as people complaining, kicking or even leaving in worst case scenarios, assuming pugs. I guess it all depends on how the group fares, since the tank is obviously not gonna always be the only one undergeared.

[Stealthedbear]

I think it depends on the class of the tank doesn't it? Some tanks have innately higher Health pools than others?

[Kirbysan]

tanked with 120k unbuffed first week of cata. no wipes, no problems. manage your cooldowns, mark and cc properly and you can do it with that much easily, especially if you get grouped with people better geared than you.