From a tank to a dps

[Elim Garak]

Excuse me, but Taunt has an 8 second CD. If 3 DPS hit three different mobs, it would take 16 seconds to get them all back.
No, I'm not taunting off stupid DPS with RD, that I always save for the healer.

Did you just confess that healer can overaggro you?

[Casseille]

Why is that when I don't mark ever single mob that dps feel it is an open invitation to aoe everything?

Dear tank,

When you mark mobs with a skull, a cross, a moon, a star, whatever you like, I will gladly follow your appointed kill order, CC an appointed target, interrupt another appointed target, ToT some treat to you, and feint and vanish to make your life a little easier. You show leadership, I will follow.

When you don't mark mobs but simply charge/run in, gather them up and start AoE tanking like a madman, I will assume you are comfortable with zerging, have done the instance many times before, (slightly) overgear the place, and I will respond by AoEing into the mobs, providing you assistance in the form of unparalleled DPS. You show leadership, I will follow.

It is in both our interests to cooperate in order to finish the instance fast and clean. Please speak up and assume leadership. If you do not, another person in the group will, and he/she might not handle things like you would want them.

Love,
DPS.

PS: I can also recommend the addon Threatplates, so you can see exactly how much threat you have on each mob you are in combat with. Neat!

[Autofollow]

Having played a healer first I never had to worry about threat. I changed to playing a tank after a while because our group needed a solid, reliable tank. I had a great person to use as a mentor so I learned quickly which addons to use, "best" ways to generate and hold threat, etc.

I guess it still amazes me that everyone is so fast to call each other bad and terrible. I suppose it shouldn't.

Personally, I really only mark targets that I want CC'd by a specific class/ability if I feel that I need to. This is normally if I'm in a pug group and we've wiped once due to what I think may be inefficient or ineffective use of CC. I don't start calling people out, I just start marking. This doesn't happen often, sometimes it's because it may be a full group of people that are either playing new classes to them, or possibly the healer just hit iLevel 329 and has issues with mana and people not understanding trash mechanics. you know, what not to stand in, what TO stand in.

My AoE threat is pretty good and I use a name plate addon to monitor threat. I recommend all tanks use it since there are multiple versions and they work great. If someone pulls aggro I can usually taunt it back pretty quickly, OR I start attacking that one when I start to see they are overnuking something I'm not actively hitting. I kind of like the challenge I suppose.

Also, healers CAN get aggro during encounters that spawn or summon adds or a mob dies and spawns multiple adds, or other mechanics that bring new mobs to the fight. That is probably what the people speaking about using RD on healers are talking about. I know that's what I would be meaning anyway.

Now that I play a DPS I still use my name plate threat addon to know if I'm overnuking or if anything new to the figt is already headed my direction. It's saved my ass on a number of occasions. I recommend DPS use these as well.

Just my 2 cents.

[Fujisaw]

love being a mage dps what ever i want if i pull thats fine MI are up pull again still fine i got IB pull again good i have invis and if the tank still cant get aggro they fail. life as a mage is fun

[Elim Garak]

Also, healers CAN get aggro during encounters that spawn or summon adds or a mob dies and spawns multiple adds, or other mechanics that bring new mobs to the fight. That is probably what the people speaking about using RD on healers are talking about. I know that's what I would be meaning anyway.

The cases with spawning/summoning are rare cases especially in dungeons, and all those cases CAN and SHOULD be dealt withOUT RD. Not every tank has it ya'know. Even if there would be a case there RD is required - holding it for that case as a principle regardless of the current encounter - is just wrong. If you tank with CC - mobs that summon should be CCed. If you don't CC - you tank those mobs and their summons will be on you anyway. If there are mobs that spawn on death - you tank dying mob and his spawns will be on you anyway. If there are add(s) coming out of nowhere as an encounter mechanic - healer should stand in tank or run to tank every spawn. Bam! No RD requried whatsoever. You do not need a taunt to take aggro from a healer - just hit those adds with your aoe abilities.

So use RD every time there's a need for it (even for healer, sure), Its cd's not that long.

[Sly]

Dear tank,
When you don't mark mobs but simply charge/run in, gather them up and start AoE tanking like a madman, I will assume you are comfortable with zerging, have done the instance many times before, (slightly) overgear the place, and I will respond by AoEing into the mobs, providing you assistance in the form of unparalleled DPS. You show leadership, I will follow.

As a (warrior) tank and a rogue, please tell me this doesn't mean you stop using TotT. Using it on every pull makes the tank's life so much easier at essentially 0 cost to you. One of my best run ever was actually a PUG with two geared hunters who MD + AoEd every single pull. Gathering mobs and keeping threat was a joke.

Not only does TotT keep you from pulling, but it also provides a buffer for the tank so that other DPS won't be pulling off him nearly as easily.

[Elim Garak]

As a (warrior) tank and a rogue, please tell me this doesn't mean you stop using TotT. Using it on every pull makes the tank's life so much easier at essentially 0 cost to you. One of my best run ever was actually a PUG with two geared hunters who MD + AoEd every single pull. Gathering mobs and keeping threat was a joke.

True. As a hunter I always MD packs with Multishots. Helps a lot.

[andr0id]

Did you just confess that healer can overaggro you?

No, if stupid DPS fight wrong mobs, healer has to heal them too much and will start to turn yellow, then I can RD and pull threat back from healer. I don't like healers to feel uncomfortable.

The best fights are when the healer and I are the only two left and then we can rez the DPS.

In reality, I very rarely have to use it, but it is not for DPS, when I enter an instance, I set focus to healer and that button is a macro and is only for healer. Just like I'm not going to cast LoH on somebody else, it's a priority system.

Also, healers CAN get aggro during encounters that spawn or summon adds or a mob dies and spawns multiple adds, or other mechanics that bring new mobs to the fight. That is probably what the people speaking about using RD on healers are talking about. I know that's what I would be meaning anyway.

This too.

[draticus]

This works the other way around too all your tanks reading this.
You all got addons like OMEN which shows you the amount of threat on each target.
If you tab and you see a dps getting a lot threat on a mob, it's your job to tank that.
And yes, I'm a tank myself. Have no problems with dps going crazy on different mobs at all.

Let me explain why this is a stupid argument. There is one tank. There are three dps. Why should one tank try to babysit three other peoples threat for them by tabbing through all three of their targets just to save them the trouble of assisting, tabbing, feigning or watching their own omen? Do I still try? Yes. But just because i try to pick up an idiots slack doesn't mean I'm obligated to, or that he doesn't suck for being a tunnel vision zombie dps.

[Dameondark]

Sweet,

Love the tank bashing tank dialog. Speaks volumes to the civility of people playing the game. Let me put the original post in a different way to make it more in the spirit of how it was intended.


To DPS,

If you want to aoe mobs, fine. I didn't mark targets and you made an assumption from that. If you find that my aoe threat is not greater then your aoe or single target threat please don't complain to me about how fail I am. Realize that you have ways to help me out and if you can not bother to use them then please leave and wait your 30 minutes for a new tank that may or may not have the same problem. By bashing on tanks that may have more the learn, you are not encouraging bad tanks to leave. You are encouraging potentially great tanks to stop tanking altogether.

Bottom line is if you want more tanks to queue then start doing your part to make it less of a pain in the ass. The game can be played with or without markers in exactly the same way. Whether I mark or not does not mean that if you pull and die that I am a bad tank. It means that you are not capable of attacking my target without it being marked.

As a tank, I have a lot of patience with dps. I have only ever initiatied one kick of a dps and it was simply because the dps was not enough to complete the dungeon boss. As a dps, I accept the fact that if I pull off the tank and die, it was my fault for not watching my threat and do not lay into the tank for not holding aggro.

Maybe the real difference is a lot of dps have never played tank while a lot of tanks have played dps so that is were the lack of understanding comes from. It doesn't explain the elite gods gift to the game tanks but maybe they just need a hug every once in a while.

[draticus]

love being a mage dps what ever i want if i pull thats fine MI are up pull again still fine i got IB pull again good i have invis and if the tank still cant get aggro they fail. life as a mage is fun

Unfortunately you are about the only mage in LFD who knows what those three abilities are. I've run with mostly raid geared mages recently who blow CD's and do 30k dps single target while I'm trying to AoE tank a group on my warrior and then they just tank it and say "Sorry, I'm just so OP I can't help it."

[baelon]

Get Elv's edit of TukUI, or the TidyPlates addon (although TidyPlates isn't as good IMO, and I heard it's not updated and causes fps issues). Elv's will let you know by the color of the nameplate what you have threat on (green), what you don't (red), and what you're about to lose (yellow). The problem isn't dps, it's that in order to tank randoms well, you need to have this sort of UI functionality.

Edit: If you're clicking your abilities and/or turning with your keyboard, 5man tanking is the worst possible role. For this role you need to have nimble control of your character. IMO any other role in PvE can be done halfway decently by a clicker, but not dungeon tanking.

[mihaitha]

@Autofollow:

My point exactly. If I, as a tank, go through the trouble of marking the mobs, and accept responsibility if I fail at that (like if I leave a healer mob uncontrolled and as last target), I expect you to follow my marks. It's people that meat tanks like in your first example, and act like in your second that bother me and OP.

Also, a healer can get aggro if the DPS that pulls uses some threat dump (IB/Vanish/f**ing fade/whatever) and they are above the tank on the threat list because that target wasn't on the aggro priority list. Just a thought.

[Elim Garak]

No, if stupid DPS fight wrong mobs, healer has to heal them too much and will start to turn yellow, then I can RD and pull threat back from healer. I don't like healers to feel uncomfortable.

1. Healer won't have to heal them TOO much, take note that he will have to heal you LESS, cause there's one(2-3) mob(s) less hitting YOU. So the delta will be minimal.
2. Healer CAN NOT overaggro DPS especially those who overaggro YOU.

Also, a healer can get aggro if the DPS that pulls uses some threat dump (IB/Vanish/f**ing fade/whatever) and they are above the tank on the threat list because that target wasn't on the aggro priority list. Just a thought.

That can only happen at pull (I don't know any content that apply though) and it should be dealt without any taunts. Cause all that is required is just one hit from a tank. (I'm not saying to not use taunts evar, but just a thought)

[Balbo]

If its a ranged that pulls off me, i play a nice little game, each time they do it i let them have agro for longer and longer, i taunt off straight away first time, let them run close to them 2nd time, let them get hit once for the 3rd time and so on. Keeps me amused in the boring AoE fest trash packs.
If they whine or get offensive towards me i just have a laugh on vent and carry on without feeding them.

[Casseille]

@Sly: I use TotT on every pull, and on cooldown. Don't worry

Not using TotT would make the tank's and my own life harder. Why would I want to do that?

[Culexus]

Im just laughing at tanks that get emo when a dps pulls aggro of them on a trash pack. Just use your taunt button and move on. I do that on my tank chars all the time. And if taunt is on cd and someone pulls off he eventually dies. Who cares?

[Mexa]

Why is that when I don't mark ever single mob that dps feel it is an open invitation to aoe everything or better yet pick a random target and bash buttons? Imagine a wold in which tanks could pull 5 to 10 mobs and not have to tab target every mob while the dps is going nuts on EVERYTHING. If you claim to be a competent dps then please make this macro

/target [target=focustarget, harm, nodead]

and set me as the focus. I will just spam my aoe attacks when up and single target the mob that needs to die first. You will never pull from me again.

hi, i play a decent geared tank, 346 ilvl paladin. I never mark, i never CC and i get frustrated when ppl dont AOE because it takes too long time. I dont lose aggro and if i do, i have tons of abilities to get the mob back.

I also have a mage, i AOE with him to make it faster, i dont over aggro cus the tank generates more AOE treath than I, and if i should over aggro, i just dump treath of freeze the add or something.

AOE tanking is the easy way, AOE DPSing is the easy way.

I see so fucking many threads on MMO-Champion from tanks whining about DPS not being able to play.

you know what ?

Its You...

All of you, every single one of u whiners who post on MMO-Champion when u lose aggro or get kicked from a pug...

"was it right of me to report this guys", "Was it right of me to need on this", "this guy flamed me", "i got kicked from a pug", "i lost aggro to a noob AOE DPS"

[Deleted]

Meh just mark one target with a skull, get a decent threat lead on that then work through the rest of the group.

If you are geared to the point you can ignore CC just tell your DPS what to attack first

Assisting the tank doesn't always work either depending on how they work through the group. Not to mention a lot don't target anything till the last second which is detrimental to DPS

Nice attitude Mexa, I bet you don't bother using any cooldowns on hard hitting trash either....

[Dameondark]

To summarize:

Threat management is not just a tank responsibility. Maximizing threat for a tank is a very important trait of what a tank does but if a dps has the capability to pull mobs off of tanks then it is their responsibility to accept the consequences of doing so and change their play to meet the needs of the group. It is a lot easier for a dps to lay off on the fly then a tank to change a rotation or priority to increase threat generation. The goal of dungeons to complete it, not to get in the face of someone for not doing what you perceive is there job. Take the energy you used to type in chat about how bad someone is and use it to figure out how to change your own play style to help achieve the goal.

VERBALLY ABUSING TANKS does not help or motivate the tank get better. In reality, it will cause the tank to stop queuing or stop tanking which takes a potentially great tank out of the pool.

This does not apply to tanks who simply are not trying. If taht is the case then they deserve the name calling, slander, and verbal abuse. The same goes with dps.