Which Tank Class is the Best All Around?

[Damerflinn]

So I'm almost done with my second lock, had to level a new one to change servers. When I'm done I want to level a tank. But I'm not sure which to choose. I have a pally on my old server. But I find it a bit boring. Right now I'm thinking Druid, but I've heard that it's a bit hard to hold threat compared to other tanks while leveling through dungeons. That's not too big of a deal to me though. I should mention that I don't plan on using it much outside of dungeons until next expansion, so I'm kind of thinking towards MoP tanking. (Which we know only a little about.)

I like the druid versatility. Being able to go kitty for a bit more DPS if needed, or to pop out and toss a heal between taunting back and forth and such, I like active tanking much more than passive tanking if that makes sense. Thoughts? I've been drawn to the DK lately as well, but I think it's because it's quicker to level, I've tried three times to level one but never gotten out of the starting zone lol.

[Nobleshield]

I'd say Druid still is best - high survivability, high DPS makes them very useful endgame tanks since you can do ~20k DPS as a tank. I don't know about leveling dungeons but on my druid (like level 30ish) I did Gnomeregan and threat was a joke. Just hit umm.. Swipe I think (and the other aoe one later when you finally get it, Thrash?) and then afk for a bit. It was pathetic.

[skatblast]

I'd say Druid still is best - high survivability, high DPS makes them very useful endgame tanks since you can do ~20k DPS as a tank. I don't know about leveling dungeons but on my druid (like level 30ish) I did Gnomeregan and threat was a joke. Just hit umm.. Swipe I think (and the other aoe one later when you finally get it, Thrash?) and then afk for a bit. It was pathetic.

Threat was a joke in your lvl 30 dungeon?!!? you dont say...

its a joke all around for every tanking class at this point

[Nobleshield]

Threat was a joke in your lvl 30 dungeon?!!? you dont say...

its a joke all around for every tanking class at this point

Yes well the OP said

but I've heard that it's a bit hard to hold threat compared to other tanks while leveling through dungeons

So I was clarifying that it was not hard for me in a level 30ish dungeon.

[Deleted]

So I'm almost done with my second lock, had to level a new one to change servers. When I'm done I want to level a tank. But I'm not sure which to choose. I have a pally on my old server. But I find it a bit boring. Right now I'm thinking Druid, but I've heard that it's a bit hard to hold threat compared to other tanks while leveling through dungeons. That's not too big of a deal to me though. I should mention that I don't plan on using it much outside of dungeons until next expansion, so I'm kind of thinking towards MoP tanking. (Which we know only a little about.)

I like the druid versatility. Being able to go kitty for a bit more DPS if needed, or to pop out and toss a heal between taunting back and forth and such, I like active tanking much more than passive tanking if that makes sense. Thoughts? I've been drawn to the DK lately as well, but I think it's because it's quicker to level, I've tried three times to level one but never gotten out of the starting zone lol.

My opinion, since I have a tank from each class:
Pala-Its probabaly the easiest, yet the one with more spell defensive spells to help the party
warrior- classic one, probably the most reliable
dk-boring,
druid-toughest no doubt, but if u use a tauren then use slam ground spell and it helps a lot,
My opinion only =)

[Damerflinn]

Lol, well, as I've been leveling my lock, I've noticed that a lot of tanks have been pretty horrible at keeping threat. If I popped hellfire and felstorm, I'd almost always take threat and die pretty quickly, even though I'd wait a food few seconds for them to gain threat. But I think this was just people still learning to play, Pally's not using consecrate, and DK's not having death and decay cause they used it on a group of only one or two. I've heard that with a druid it's about tab targetting and cycling through to maintain threat until you get more of your AoE skills, but that may have been before they changed around when some classes got certain skills to make leveling a bit smoother. But I'm not sure, I've tried to level a Druid several times as well, but never gotten to far with it either.

Anyone have anything to say about Warriors, they seem to be the class that gets left out of these kinds of conversations, is there a reason for this? Community bias? Bad player base? Just not many Warrior tanks?

[hexecute]

From a healers point of view id say bear tanks are the best

[Darsithis]

Threat was a joke in your lvl 30 dungeon?!!? you dont say...

its a joke all around for every tanking class at this point

It's different for bears, who don't have any kind of AoE tanking until later than other tanks. The first few levels of dungeons require a lot more work to keep threat.

[Velestro]

my opinion as i have all the tank classes at 85 and tanked raids with them:
Paladins: In my opinion they are great, they can have trouble with really big groups tho like more than 5 or 6 targets it can get a lil hard. I love tanking on my pally, they have alot of group support aswell.
Warrior: The best AOE tank imo, i love there challanging shout makes it easy to get agro on really big groups.
DK: fun to tank with although they take alot more dmg but make up for it with there big death strike(life regen) hits, are the best tanks against magic imo.
Druid:To me they are the strongest dps tank as many ppl have already said can do real good dmg for a tank its almost stupid.
My verdict paladin, they are all around good and they support is very nice for any raid group.
this imo plz dont start flamez

[Raeion]

well at least right now all tanks are balanced good since u want to get serious about in MOP and not in this expansion i'd still go for lvling up a Blood Death Knight, they have great self healing abilities and survivability , well their self heals make em unique tanks,
they give u a good feel of dark and evil as well with their blue glowing eyes hehe
as a blood dk u can easily hold ur treat , stay alive very good, the good thing about them is they can be a bit complicated which is the way to go and its the way blizzard wants all tanks to be like death knights ( thats why they are making other tanks a bit more complicated)
let me elaborate this :
as a pally tank or war or even a druid tank all u do is stand there manage ur cool downs to stay alive and hold ur aggro
WHICH IS BORING !!
now for a dk , what u do is u stand there u use only 1 ability wrong( well 2 spells max) and u will die !!!! why? because u need to manage ur runes as well as staying alive and holding treat
let me give u an example
I'm tanking the boss, my health goes down a bit i use my Death strike to heal my self and build up my shield , ( it will cost one frost rune and 1 unholy) tthen i use heart strike and couple of other stuff to do some damage and all of a sudden health drops with some massive abilities boss does to u, now u want to healurself but guess what? u don't have any runes up and they are all depleted and u will die ... ( well unless u use other cds and all but u get the point)
Point is ifu don't manage ur runes good u will end up dying ! which makes the tanking way funner !

[Sharrel]

Personaly i love tanking on my warrior. but i think i'm a bit biased. having been tanking on the toon ever since i reached the then max level of 70 back in BC. I find DK tanking horribly boring. haven't really tried the other two.
Tanking in general is a lot simpler than it used to be. threat is almost a non-issue as long as the tank hits the mobs first. CCs (when they are even used) don't pull threat.. ect.

[Alannya]

I rarely play tanks, but from a healers point of view. I always enjoy healing a bear tank the most, they seem the easiest.

[Sealbinder]

I always enjoyed tanking as a warrior. It just seemed to have that special something. I could never get into DKs (personally found them boring) and while paladins are nice they lacked that certain cool factor that warriors have. Only did low levels with a druid tank so I am not the best to ask for them.

[Nosonia]

Right now, a blood DK who knows when to deathstrike and use CDs is probably the best tank. Since they are also a hero class, I imagine blizzard also working to keep them at least at par with the rest of the tanks.

Druids seem to take a loss less damage up front, however, a DK who is getting off the right deathstrikes will heal/shield for more then the druid and ends up being easier to heal, especially in those "oh shit moments"

Pallies are pretty boring for tanking I find... and I've never tried a warrior, but they are blizzards "tanks".. so they are probably always going to be decent.

[Simulacrum]

A DK that knows how to death strike and use cooldowns probably is the best tank for 5 mans right now.

I can without hyperbole say that I don't need a healer on my DK, in ilvl ~380, for most 5 man packs or bosses, with very few exceptions. Even the final 2 packs in End Time are doable without a healer as a DK, without using army of the dead, and without cc, by popping a cooldown or two on each pack and timing death strikes for after the burst damage. The final boss in that instance can also be done without a healer, as long as the time between hourglass activations isn't too long.

DK tanks also do enormous DPS, which is nice.

A *bad* DK tank is horrible, though. It's not that DK tanking is hard, just that there are so many DKs out there that seem to have no clue how to use death strike or blood tap, or manage runes well enough that they have death strike available when they need it (my guess is that they must be spending runes on heart strike or something). I've seen DK tanks drop almost instantly on the two packs in End Times because they, for whatever reason, don't use death strike when they get hit with the burst damage and take over 200k unmitigated damage in less than two seconds.

[JimPaladin]

As a Warrior Tank, I have to say it's probably Bear.

Bear is incredibly boring to play but because they have literally no way to block, they have all the best mitigation and defensive cooldowns, as well as being very easy to DPS with.

Bear in general is just an incredibly poorly designed tank and I wish they'd just overhaul them (Which they may be doing in MoP, I guess).

[James Peruggia]

Personaly i love tanking on my warrior. but i think i'm a bit biased. having been tanking on the toon ever since i reached the then max level of 70 back in BC. I find DK tanking horribly boring. haven't really tried the other two.
Tanking in general is a lot simpler than it used to be. threat is almost a non-issue as long as the tank hits the mobs first. CCs (when they are even used) don't pull threat.. ect.

I also like tanking my warrior and dk is clearly not to my taste atm.

[Zheitan]

All tanks are endgame viable, so I would just pick one which you feel comfortably with playing.
In my opinion: Druids have to focus a bit more on getting attacks out, Warriors have to do more micromanagement of abilities etc, but got excellent mobility! Death knights are regulate their own shield which can make them excellent tanks. And I havent played paladin endgame yet this xpac becouse I hate the new holy power system :-P but I really enjoyed tanking with one in WOTLK endgame.

Personally really liking the DK mechanics.

[KaydenGrey]

atm in dragonsoul bears and bloods are the best tanks so if you're wanting to do dragonsoul on it then go for a bear or a blood dk

[roostah]

four classes - four different answers =)

i have a warr and a dk, like the dk little better since i feel like it is easier to keep aggro in aoe scenarios. the dps feels better aswell. i also like the small 'tweaks' available as the raise undead/army, self healing etc. warr feels like more just go.