With the introduction of random dungeon tool, everyone and their grandmothers are doing heroics. We posted a guide, and talked about it already. This time it’s another guide – more like guidelines, with the similar theme, inspired by the frustration random heroic can bring to the tank, no matter how experienced they may be 
Guide: Don’t spank the Tank! is written by Sourabaya of Bloodscalp, (EU). Original post can be found on the forums.
Guide: Don’t spank the tank !
Many people have been asking questions regarding the shortage in tanks.
Therefore I have decided to make a short “guide” on what “prevents” people from tanking/scares tanks away,
and how we ALL can work on the solution (in other words increase the number of people who are willing to tank) , or at least decrease the number of tanks that we scare away.
Targeting and knowing the way in an instance:
A tank is expected to mark the targets. But occasionally it happens that the tank doesn’t know which mob is priority. In this case the tank either pretends to know and dashes in, hoping no one will notice so he won’t get flamed.
Or, the Tank admits he doesn’t know, with a huge chance of getting negative responses. The exact same goes for not knowing the way in an instance.
Those negative responses can easily scare away the tank. Those responses really are unnecessary.
Instead of flaming the tank, let him/her know that it’s good to admit to not know something, and help out. If you have been a Wow-player for a long time, you probably know the instance and the mobs in it by heart, so how much effort and trouble will it be to lead the way, and (help) mark the mobs ?
And you might feel it is not your job to “take over Tank tasks” , but it is your job to work together as a team, and clear the instance as a team.
Nobody benefits from flaming the tank and not helping out.
Not much experience and aggro:
Nobody has instant experience, we all need to learn how things work, and yes we fail at times but eventually will grow. That goes for tanks as well.
Unfortunately, tanks are expected to have instant experience. They are expected to be an expert in holding aggro, taunting of mobs the dps pulled etc.
When a tank admits not to have much experience, don’t flame him ( and most certainly do not vote kick him ). Give the tank the chance to earn the experience.
Here are a few tips (things players should know, but apparently don’t know).
-Don’t pull the mobs, just let the tank pull them. Yes, a tank has abilities to taunt it off, but you’ll make tanking a lot harder.
- Give the tank a couple of seconds to get solid aggro before you attack (wait even longer before using aoe attacks).
- Attack the same target as the tank (if the mobs are not marked, keep an eye on your threat meter, switch mobs if your threat level almost reaches the tank’s level ).
- Manage your aggro : Cut down on the dps (don’t look at your dps meter, not important. I mean would you choose high dps over massive repair bills ? ), or use threat losing abilities if you have them.
- If you do get aggro, don’t run away with the mob chasing you. There is (almost) no way the tank will be able to taunt it off you. Just stay or get closer to the tank, so he/she can taunt it off. And stop attacking that mob, to make sure you don’t surpass the taunt.
“Low” gear and hitpoints :
Nobody starts off in full epic gear, and most instances do not require it either. Still the tank gets made fun of when he/she has some blue gear.
Instead of flaming the tank, help out a little if you think the tank may have some trouble staying alive.
- If you are a full epic and experienced healer, you should have no trouble to keep up a lower geared tank.
- Dps with some healing abilities can throw in a heal as well if needed ( don’t look at your dps meters, not important).
- Use abilities to lower the damage caused by the mobs.
- Use crowd control.
“Gogogogogogogogogogogogogo”:
This actually enrages basically every tank, it’s pushing and annoying, and could easily be replaced by: “I’m ready ” or “Pull when you are ready”.
- If you want your tank to accidentally let you die, use gogogogo.
- If not, just use a more friendly way to let the tank know you want to move on.
- Give the tank some time to get ready, find out what is the best way to pull the mobs, regain mana/rage etc.
- Keep in mind that the Tank might be waiting for the healer to be on full mana.
- Don’t pull. And by that I really mean, don’t pull. If you’re out of luck, the tank and healer will just let you die.
Don’t blame the tank, if:
- the instance doesn’t load.
- Your dog ate your homework.
- The healer forgot to heal.
- The dps pulled and wiped the party.
- The dps attacked an entirely different mob and dies.
- The dps used aoe 0.1 second after you pulled and dies.
- The healer went afk.
etc.
Conclusion : Your tank is your friend, be kind and friendly and help out. If you are an imba WoW-player, or one of those players that thinks Wow has become to easy, go do instances with starting tanks, and help out.
You will find the instances more challenging that way, that is the right way to show how imba you are (instead of tearing down someone else), get more people willing to tank, and you won’t cause Tank tears on the other side of the screen.
You’ll be a Hero !
LOL, I once spent an entire H.UP run chasing a tree because he would run to the next group and drag them to me… lucky for him I use consecration all the time… but I had a 5400 gearscore and the tree had a 5700 gearscore, so there was almost no chance of either of us getting whacked much.
I sincerely hoped he inspected me before doing that shit though, because if we hadn’t been so OP it would have been ugly.
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My frist character was a DPS, a warlock to be specific. I alway hated tanks that though to be like a “pillar” of group, well they are, but I mean acting like they’re a must, I always hated those that though we must follow them and they choose all we do, I always loved teamwork. So when I rolled my warrior, which is now my main, I played him as tank from the start to the end. I FORCED the team to do everyone quests and to work as a team, just not to be like these tanks I once seen, I wait for heals, I give everyone a chance and help with advices before boss. I never acted like “i’m the tank so you do only what I needand you must have me”, I work for the team. Just wanted to remind this to some fellow tanks.
But yes, I always had some fun letting those persistent one that think they can do anything to die. Never liked the GOGOGO type, always let them die, normally it put in their head to stop charging and take time without dying.
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Just my 2 cents. I leveled Falconys (Kargath) as a tank from day 1, and he was my very first toon. I started playing shortly after BC went live, so by the time I hit 70 and was wanting to start tanking heroics: my gear was garbage, I had almost no enchants, and NOBODY HAD EVER BOTHERED TO INSTRUCT ME ON HOW TO PROPERLY TANK FOR A 5 MAN GROUP. In fact, the only thing I did right was taking mining/jewelcrafting on him.
Currently, my single target tps is around 10k and last week I was clocked at 8.2k dps while tanking the opening pull in 25 man ICC. So what happened? How did I go from fearing heroics, to raids fearing me?? A random person in a pug told me of a few websites where I could go L2P my class… I had never imagined how much information is available about WoW.
Here are some things I’d like to add to the article though;
-If your tank has a few dps/mp5 items on, ask him but dont v/kick him. I can put on both rings, neck, and shield from my healing set and still be uncritable because the rest of my gear is so OP for heroics… and then we can gogogogogogogoo!
-Loot your kills! For every wipe your tank spends 10-30g on repairs, and 1g on reagents when begining the instance (you know you want your paladin blessings!). If everybody stops to loot you will make money doing 5mans and raids as long as you dont wipe… thats why I have only done my JC daily for the last 3 months!
-If you see a tank struggling because of poor gear or inexperience, and they follow directions when you try to help them, get them into your guild asap… you never know how far a player can grow if you give them the right people to grow with, like I did. Also, if you are doing randoms and the are not on your server spend an hour or 2 chain running heroics with them. If they are doing one after another then they are putting forth effort to get geared and experienced, and need reliable partners to run with so they can see what tanking really should be like instead of the skull-cramp some people make it into.
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I have 2 tanks main is a dk and second is druid.
IVe run all the heroics naxx and some of uldaur..classes prevent me from commiting the time for a raid..barely have time for a cpl randoms a day lol.
I am so tired of hearing gogogogogogogogo and if i dont go soon enough then ive got dps pulling for me..this is 8 out of 10 times..and w/e happened to staying behind the tank..ive done the heroics soo many times i know where to stop so dont get aggro..but if 1 dies that pulls aggro b4 i do or does a facepull i hear like wtf..there are times when i answer a wsp rq and someone pulls the mobs.
On most the heroics i can get thru them in under 20 min and h fos h pos in ubder 35min h hor w good group who will los the waves under 40
Just tired of the ones teling me that i dont know what im doing(this is after a facepull and my dnd is on cd and all i have is bb to aggro w or dark command) which wont do it if dps is going all out.
So yes tanks r tired of the crap we take and ill dps b4 ill tank anymore!!
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Thank you all for posting your comments. This blog warms my old warrior heart. Pugging has been a pain due to AoE Recount calculator l33ts, and hopefuly this will change.
A big EU guild had me as a tank with blues just when i dinged 80, and i told them to be careful with AoE, everyone listened and we managed to do a few heroics without wipes. And it didn’t take that long either. It was Friday night so beerpee and refill breaks were appreciated alot i guess. But nevertheless, they made my warrior 10 feet tall by being patient.
Same guild let me even be tank in naxxramas with their friendguild, and we made it witout a wipe. A blue warrior tank against Patchwerk was exciting, and fun…
So thanks all in Exitium/Nagrand, you made me a tank the right way.
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I am now on my 3rd 80 and its a DK tank. I have a ICC 10 geared hunter (my main) for a dps class, an ICC 10 geared shaman for a healer and now this toon (not ICC geared but I am not worried about that as it is a farming toon that supports my hunters and shamans profs). I am in full agreement with almost everything in this article. I now fully understand why so many tanks complain about dps.
When I am on my hunter I use the misdirect ability everytime its off cd. Always have. But alot of hunters don’t. Rogues are another class with an aggro diversion ability. Tricks of the Trade is a wonderful spell for them but they rarely use it. So many dps are way too concerned about how much they can do. FORGET ABOUT HOW MUCH DPS YOU CAN DO AND PAY ATTENTION TO WHAT IS GOING ON!!!!!! And here’s something else to be aware of dps, just in case you don’t know this. TAUNT HAS A COOLDOWN!!!!!! I will do my best to help you but as a tank I have no problem letting the dps die time and time again becuase they pull aggro off me. The ONLY person that I will go out of my way to protect and watch constanly is my healer. Even on my hunter if I pull aggro and die I know its MY fault and NEVER BLAME THE TANK OR THE HEALER. Blizzard has added so many IN GAME threat warnings that you dont even really even need addons anymore. Use them. Use focus target and targets target so that you know what the tank is hitting and hit the same target. Don’t get all brave and start tanking another target. Most tanks, including my-self, will just let you die.
When it comes to my healer, that is the only person that I ask if I’m going to slow or too fast. I don’t care what the dps thinks. I still stop and wait if they need mana. But heres the thing don’t ask me to stop when you have 80% mana or after every pull. Most tanks get very impatient with that and won’t wait for you. you can catch up. That is enough to dps down 3 or 4 more mobs, or a boss for that matter before you go OOM and even then almost every class has a mana regen ability (for example: Hunter has viper, Warlocks have life tap, Mages have evocate).
When it comes to marking the only time that I usually mark is when it is a multi-target boss fight (like the faction champs in H ToC). I have an addon to make it easier but most heroics don’t require marking. I am very tolerant of fresh 80′s that dont know fights and if they don’t know the fights I stop and explain. Tanks are fairly good about that most of the time. I just remember that everyone was fresh at one point and not everyone knows what a boss does.
If more dps could read this article there would be alot less wipes and faster runs which makes everyone happy. I have even posted this on my guilds forums so that people can spread the word.
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i wish that i had more people like you in my daily rnd with my pallytank
if just more dps would read this article i wouldnt be that scared to hit the “queue” button for my rnd hc … my tank is decent geared but yes also a icc 10 geared tank needs a few seconds to get aggro and how often (like so much of you wrote) the dps starts aoe 0,0001s after you pulled a larger grp *sigh*
i know that i am not the best tank, i watch out for my healer (how is he equipped, how about his mana etc) and then decide the pace. what the dps do – i really dont care. i taunt 2 or 3 times for every dps (shit happens ^.^) after that: you pull it – you tank it. not my problem. i also whisper the heal that i dont care if he lets the dps die to show them that they are NOT the tank and let him-/herself consider what he/she does.
whem i’m queing whith my heal i also look at the tank (gear/threat etc) and look at the dps. if they pull aggro too often, i let them die and they can walk. i don’t ress stupid dps that are so concerned to hit 10k in a 5man hc.
i know that this isn’t the best way to make many friends – but seriously, i don’t want tanking-dps as my friends
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Alot of what i have seen on this post has been great!!! I myself have 3 different toonz on the server i play. my first toon is tank/dps and is a pally and does very well manageing or throwing away threat. and my second toon a deathknight which i only dps in i always wait before aggroing anything since i cannt heal him worth a shit yes thats Megatron!!! and i got my healer Adrianann who is still lvling right now but i have gotten shear joy out of healing people and helping them lvl, and the biggest thing that i have seen is that it is this!!!
ITS BETTER TO GO SLOW AND ALIVE THAN QUICK AND DEAD
The last guild i was in the leader decided to go go go and not let my pally get aggro aggro aggro and since then has lost another tank from his guild as well as myself.
Which makes the wait into the new guild for over 5 months that i am in all worth the while, helping build dps toons and letting them know what to look for not to get themselves killed when in 5 man heroics as a basic rules for when they get into 10/25 man raids, and at the rate they are learning it wont be long until icecrown
Savor every moment of sucess its way more fun than this quote from Meathook “NOT FUN” after he dies in culling of strat, which is what will happen if you go go go
Meagtron – Argentdawn
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This article is awesome. I think people should read this more often. I just started tanking too and half of this stuff i see every once and a while and its just annoying.
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I know many of you commenters said inexperience is not a sign of failure, and in truth it shouldnt be, but more than half the time if a tank doesnt know something he will be FLAMED to the point of retaliation/ragequitting. This is one of the reasons raiding pisses me off in wow, I have this little 14 year old bastard in my guild, everytime we go into a new raid and I say I don’t know this fight/which way to go/what mobs to and not to pull he flames me and goes on and on over vent telling everyone that I’m mentally slow, retarded, etc. This pisses me off because I know he’s just a dps death noob who wussed out of tanking with the class probably for the 2nd time at least.
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(recognize that guy?
April Fools yall
(Moohgáz -Moonglade)
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This should be a required reading when someone hits 80, or when anyone uses the random dungeon finder for that matter! O.o
I recently rolled my first tank and now I see why tanking is so hard: it’s dependent on the rest of the group cooperating >.> If the group doesn’t feel like cooperating and helping, I usually just leave and deal with the debuff. When your healer complains to you that you don’t have all epic gear (at level 16 no less!) and blabbers on and on about dumb gear that doesn’t even exists, you wouldn’t want to stick around very long either. Tank flamers are why tanks are so scarce – we just don’t want to deal with jerks.
Share this with everyone you know; if everyone, or at least more people, read this, then pugging might be more enjoyable.
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To the person that said Misdirect “will only get you killed”, you clearly don’t understand the mechanics of the spell. I’m not going to explain it as i’m sure most folks reading this do understand class specific threat re-direction spells.
I do want to mention some common dps issues i’ve seen in randoms. seems like dps often AoE’s before tank has had any time to get aggro. i think sometimes it laziness on the part of the dps and a GOGOGO mentality that prevents them for waiting a few seconds for tank to generate threat. What I love as well is the recount whores who dont kill targets in their marked order because AoE damage looks better on recount…
I can only speak as a hunter (I know, hunters are notorious for bad dps habits), but hunters also have some of the best cc and threat direction spells in the game. however too few hunters actually use these spells the way they should. if healer gets aggro, use a distracting shot to force mob onto you while charging toward tank. when you get to tank feign death and tank will pick up mob. use misdirect every chance you can, and use cc traps for particularly annoying mobs. I know your dps will suffer a bit, but your group wont wipe and you wont look like the huntard that did nothing to help the group even though you have an action bar full of spells that could have prevented a wipe. I personally don’t mind if I only pull 3.5K dps in an instance if thats what it takes not to grab aggro from the tank. I know i can pull 8K if i go all out….for about 5 seconds until i’ve pulled all the threat in the fight and I die..
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great comments. i have 2 tanks pallys 1 at 3kgs and one alot lower. i had same p[roblems with lowered gear tank but here are plenty of good teams out there(phew). Tanking is only hard when people make it hard by over agroing anbd any misstakes all do time to time, itas a game. I also find it anoying how everyone wants only 3kgs characters for raids that are more than fine alot lower, likethey were ment to be, but people use their own gs excure to leave after one wipe, seems that it could be nothing to do with knowing tactics!
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Being that my DK just started tanking (regulars, she’s only 75) I have noticed that DPS is usually the biggest issue in a group.
This isn’t to say I haven’t come across healers with attitude issues, but by far I’ve had the worst issues with DPS that doesn’t like the pace I set.
I’ve also had large issues with the Knock-back abilities and idiot an druid who, when asked “please don’t use knock-back” responded with “This place is so easy it doesn’t matter if I use it, quit bitching” when a level 75 dk is tanking for a 78 DK a 77 Paladin and a 79 priest Healer…
I find that DPS generally assumes any tank can do anything instantly, whether or not you warn them you’re new to tanking. I’ve had plenty of DPS call me an idiot for them spamming Blizzard or Volley or the druid storm thingy IN FRONT of the DnD I drop and wonder why I can’t keep aggro.
Unfortunately I don’t think enough DPS will read this wonderful gem of an article
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Been running as a warrior tank for about 6 months, I love it BUT I don’t do it as much anymore. I really dislike dealing with random groups where the only major concern is the dps meter. I’ve dropped groups, let’em die, kicked just before last boss, etc. Even told them (I love this rule), “You pull it, you kill it!!!” if I’m not allowed enough time to gain aggro.
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Probably one of the best wow articles I’ve read to date.
We have big shortage in healers and tanks in the game due to the above exact reasons. If you don’t belive it just Q as dps and see how long it takes as opposed to a healer or tank – it’s day and night.
Another new issue I’ve seen is the call for only “ranged” dps in ICC runs. I’m topped out in Heroic gear but getting included in a ICC run and being a fury warrior or melee dps is next to impossible if not with guildies.
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So many nice tales. Sorry I didn’t get to read them all before posting this.
I got a couple of tanks. A DK and a Pally. The DK is Frost for heroics most of the time due to the distinct lack DPS patience, usually. The pally is much less geared and occasionally get the battlegroup douche bags’ knickers in a bunch for not being ICC10/25 geared – seriously, if you’re that geared and you’re skimping badges from daily heroics rather than being content with all the badges you get out of ICC clears, you’re not likely to get any sympathy from the party when you start whining about your “undergeared” tank the LFD system stuck you with.
It usually takes me a pull or 2 to get into the swing of things due to the number of alts I run. I’ve found that this is also quite useful in getting the DPS to wake up and watch themselve as I under-perform/noob-out for the first couple of pulls. It also helps spot the douches in the party you will want to vote kick at your earliest opportunity and/or avoid in the future as they will likely immediately QQ. Yes, you’re infecting another party with that douche, but if all tanks and heals are on the same page here, such people will slowly be weeded out of the system and we will all queue better knowing negative elements reducing perfectly good tanks in the system are being sent off.
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Very timely article.
I have a Prot/Ret pally and I am too well aware of the difficulties encountered when you start learning the tanking trade. I did exactly as suggested here…let the group know that I am in-experienced at tank and I normally find that folks are more than willing to help and not even fuss about the occasional wipes. Chances are you could have an experienced tank in the group either on an alt or a different spec and they normally give great advise.
I have becomes somewhat of a more than average tank and I also try to assist other tanks whenever I feel like waiting the 15-20 min to get into a random (sometimes you just have to take a break from tanking).
So why are tank so hard to find? Well my assessment is that most realms have too many alt toons (mostly dps) leveling up and these alt put a strain on the limited number of tank and or heals available. So I personally make it an habit to spam trade first “Tank doing a random need heals and 3 dps” and join as a group before going all out randoms.
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Having done all 3 roles in pugs in different classes, I totally agree with the DPS doesn’t matter as long as you get a decent number (1.5k dps in original heroics, 1.8k for toc, 2k for the new heroics is enough to get the job done) and in all honesty, if you prepared a bit during your leveling there’s no reason you shouldn’t get those numbers quite easily the moment you hit 80.
I’ve been told over and over by guildies and randoms that I’m a good tank (I have tanked the whole first quarter in ICC in some epics and blues to allow the guild to go and it went well), but I won’t queue as a tank any more unless I have a healer and at least 2 dps in my group before we queue, even if nowadays I’m tanking heroic ICC. And yes as my pally tank I will deliberately wear some dps gear if I end up in original WOTLK heroics simply to make sure I take enough damage to keep my mana up, otherwise I’ll be sitting down after just about every pull. I’ve actually tested it with a group of guildies and some of the original heroics I can tank without a healer (we did have JoL and a shadow priest in the group).
I’ll gladly take a 22K health 530+ defense tank through any heroics as a healer as long as the person is willing to listen and learn. However they too have to know their limitations, on my best healer I won’t go oom even with a tank like that, at least if dps watches their aggro. If they overaggro I can go oom and then in fact they will be slowed down because of me needing mana breaks, instead of being able to continue without mana breaks (also I usually refuse to use drinks then).
Lastly and perhaps most importantly, all those people screaming that lesser geared people slow you down, the random tool puts reasonable limits on what dungeon you end up in based on your gear level. If you find those limits too low, pre-make groups, get an awesome tank, awesome healer and 3 awesome dps and queue with them. You’ll get dungeons even faster, and can run as fast as you want. Part of the fun of the random dungeon finder is finding people at different levels. Yes, there are totally clueless people out there, but that’s what you sign up for if you join the queue with open spots. The vote to kick is there for the clueless people that think they are superior beings and see all friendly advice as negative criticism and get all defensive.
I know that at least 5 of the tanks I’d take into heroic ICC with me on our realm are only queueing with guild groups any more as tanks. Mainly because of the “gogogogogo”, cause usually they take a few seconds to set up a few things and you know what? Usually it’s the gogogogo-people that end up not being able to keep up with those guys, cause if you are lucky enough to be in their group they’ll have their own healer with them and at least 1 or 2 dps. If you don’t gogogogo them they’ll take time to help you out with your dps spec, gear and rotation and 90% can still learn from these guys.
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OMG – Definately a huge YES! This little note sums up tanking these days quite nicely. I run a human warrior tank – currently only gear scored at 2450 and constantly have folks hollering about holding agro. I beg to wait till I “Stomp” before using big hits.
Most of the time I feel it’s a healer that gets the most fustrated as once the dps begins pulling the mobs off me he/she must work twice as hard to keep the group alive. A little patience with the tank goes along way – many times I wait because of the needed cool downs aren’t reset – this is a must before taking on the next threat. All in all when a group runs and works as a team tanking is fun – if you have a player or two with a huge ego on dps then I would just a easily want to pass on tanking for the group!
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This is a very good guid it really is. don’t have problems myself of a bad tank because i’m a tank myself, but the things you should and shouldn’t do are really good.
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intresting post, agree entirely with alot of the post being a tank myself, its funny to go into hc’s and everything going so nice till you pause healer has asked for mb, dps normaly dk’s so impatient thats why they start at lvl55, decide to pull, my answer let them die. You spank it you tank it, once there dead i will take over funny how quickly the other dps turn on them.
anouther example you pull a group and take up the aggro, dps decides his aoe spell would pay off more dps with anouther group so pulls one into the area where the first group was pulled, and imediatley aoe’s DIES because the one he pulled by whatever means i will leave aggro off, funny to listen to them moan and bixtch that tank hasnt taken up aggro.
some Dps are intrested in one thing having the highest Dps of the group, not all Dps are like this, there again some tanks give tanks a bad name pulling more than a healer can handle.
Tank is the healers shield, the healer uses the shield by keeping it healthy to protect the healers gunners(DPs). Simple thing is no healer most likely event is a wipe, no tank ive seen plate dps be healed through small groups, all dps dead, might take a while but tanks can hit upto 4k. simple thing is tanks need to test there healers abilty on trash if health drops quickly only pull in small groups, if healer starts throwing dps out cause hes bored pull a bigger group.
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