Tanking frustration when others pull

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Originally Posted by Malicewolf

Buffs won't do all that much if you've got weakness because of your impatience.

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Don't get weakness, then.

DPS pulling mobs is like tanks spinning mobs. It's not the end of the world, you'll still kill the mob, but it slows things down and is generally annoying.

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Originally Posted by Paikis

DPS pulling mobs is like tanks spinning mobs. It's not the end of the world, you'll still kill the mob, but it slows things down and is generally annoying.

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^ this. so this. Simply put, it's just annoying, but doesn't necessarily stop things in their tracks if the other party decides to just suck it up and do what they're "supposed to".

But a DPS has NO clue why a tank may not have pulled yet. It could be because they had to do something really quick in real life and weren't ready. Perhaps they have no TP (and guess what a tank can't do if they have no TP?), maybe even out of MP. Yes, we generate hate much easier. Doesn't mean DPS can pull for whatever reason and then blame the tank for a "hissy fit". If I spin the mobs around and you get hit, can I blame you for a "hissy fit" if you didn't circle behind the enemy while I'm moving him?

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Originally Posted by Paikis

DPS pulling mobs is like tanks spinning mobs. It's not the end of the world, you'll still kill the mob, but it slows things down and is generally annoying.

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It slows you down if your dpses keep their dmg buffs and stacks so that they can burn the mobs faster then without? Sorry but there is nothing annoying with it as long as they stay where they are or if they come to you with the mob.
Why do tanks always think they are the center of the world? I play tank myself and i'm doing savage raids and its not rare that a dps pulls because of his buffs/stacks. I don't care, i'll get my mob without problems and it dies faster.

You are out of TP? A few ticks are enough to start tanking. No MP? Could become a Problem but the only two classes who need TP for tanking are PLD and DRK and they can get MP back pretty quick and if you are completly out of MP you should change something in your rotation.

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Originally Posted by Canadane

If people are pulling in order to keep their buffs active, such as Blood of the Dragon or Greased Lightning, then I actually much prefer if they continue to pull, and I'll start to make an active effort to lessen the distance between one group and another if possible.
These are the DPS I want in my groups.

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100% agree with you. More dmg means less time healing or get hit on

When im on my pld, I figure if a DPS pulls/attks another mob, and gets aggro, then they are able to tank it to some degree.
Of course i do take it off them but if i see a pattern, im not in a rush to get it off them (Assuming their target is not just a quick switch from a dying mob to the next)
sorry im evil

I've tanked paladin to 60, dark knight to 45, and I'm doing Warrior now. I've leveled dpses and healers and it's never a huge problem if someone besides the tanks pulls unless...

1) People don't have the MP/TP to start another pack.
2) The tank isn't geared up enough to rip hate from an overgeared party member.

And that's about it. I don't personally care if someone else pulls, hell I do it alot myself, but some people will throw a fit when it happens.

If someone accidentally pulls one or two mobs while we're dealing with a trash pack then oh freaking well. Deal with it and move on. If someone who can't handle it is purposely pulling entire trash packs then just say something to them. Maybe they're doing something that they don't know they are doing. If that's not the case and they're doing it for shits and giggles, then giggle as they die.

I think it largely stems from the notion that the tank is the de facto "leader" of the group and a DPS who pulls an extra pack of mobs is somehow circumventing the leader's "authority," nebulous as it may be. A lot of A type personalities gravitate to tanks (literally every raid team I've ever been in, the raid leader is a tank) and having a DPS insinuate that the ideal pace is not being met ruffles feathers.

Admittedly I used to be like this but now I don't care. My tank classes are geared enough that pulling hate back is a breeze, and I'd rather my DPS keep their buffs and burn mobs faster than cowtow to some implied authority of the almighty tank.

Rememeber in ffxi when bards would pull and if they didn't everyone would riot because then the tank would have to voke pull?

Personally what i do when someone pulls is say in chat "hey you want to tank, alright I'll dps for you" and then watch them die. Then after that i grab aggro, or if it switches to another person. Makes it so the dont do that anymore

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Originally Posted by Nivison

Personally what i do when someone pulls is say in chat "hey you want to tank, alright I'll dps for you" and then watch them die. Then after that i grab aggro, or if it switches to another person. Makes it so the dont do that anymore

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And what would you do if your Monk, BLM or SMN pulls a boss in A6S to keep his stacks or buffs up? Do you let him die or do you just use 1-2 skills, get aggro and be happy that you don't see the enrage? If someone pulls always without a reason, i agree but under certain circumstances it is more important to maintain the dps stacks/buffs then to keep your "I am the tank/boss and i pull no matter what!".

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Originally Posted by SessionZero

I think it largely stems from the notion that the tank is the de facto "leader" of the group and a DPS who pulls an extra pack of mobs is somehow circumventing the leader's "authority," nebulous as it may be. A lot of A type personalities gravitate to tanks (literally every raid team I've ever been in, the raid leader is a tank) and having a DPS insinuate that the ideal pace is not being met ruffles feathers.

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This might have been true historically, in games with 40-man raids and a "Main Tank". Under such conditions, your MT needed to be your most consistent player. Gearing your tank was a priority. Nowadays, it's nearly the opposite. You're actually more likely to run into that personality type on other roles now, unless they happen to be an anachronism from a bygone era. To play the tank role well, you're expected to be flexible where your teammates are often not.

NIN players in particular often tend to be the most stubborn when it comes to pulls, mainly because some of them are completely dependent on having Huton built into the pull macro in order to time their opener correctly.

I think a tank's preferences in pulls have more to do with the fact that positioning is central to our role. If someone pulls early, it displaces the boss off-centre. This can result in some awkward positioning, which in turn can impact your melee players. The initial pull in A7S is a particularly good example of this, as the positioning is fairly tight and influences whether your melee lose uptime during 8-bombs or not. It's much harder to correct for bad positioning after the fact, and it often results in unnecessary movement.

There are times where it is entirely appropriate for a dps to pull, but it comes down to individual benefit vs. raid benefit. In DF, it doesn't particularly matter. In more challenging content, this is probably something that should be discussed in advance.

Tank politics go like this:
- Tanks: set the pace, but at the same they should not take unnecessary pauses. Stay in front, be aware of everyone, and keep the group moving forward. Also, don't assume it's okay to pull big.
- Healer: is second banana. If they can handle healing large pulls, they can give the go-ahead to the tank to kick it into overdrive. Otherwise, let the tank do his job.
- DPS: should stfu and prioritize whatever the tank is focused on or whatever is dying the most. Follow the parameters set by the tank and healer. Don't pull, don't do knockbacks, don't fall behind. If a dps person deliberately pulls aggro, tank should let them deal with it. Tank priority is to hold and stabilize their mobs, not risk more chaos from chasing and cleaning up after clueless pullers.

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Originally Posted by Jas710

Tank politics go like this:
- Tanks: set the pace, but at the same they should not take unnecessary pauses. Stay in front, be aware of everyone, and keep the group moving forward. Also, don't assume it's okay to pull big.

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Yes. This includes being aware of a SMN having ~20-30s left on ther stacks or a monk with greased lightning. If I'm aware of such people I expect them to pull If I'm to slow.

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- Healer: is second banana. If they can handle healing large pulls, they can give the go-ahead to the tank to kick it into overdrive. Otherwise, let the tank do his job.

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If you can handle a big pull mostly comes down to the tank using cooldowns or not.
To be able to do sanctus, aero3, sanctus, assize, CS-off, (DS+)Regen+Tetra + a few heals if necessary after that... instead of having to chain-heal all the time*... is mostly dependend on the tanks CD usage and gear.

*e.g. the difference between a melting tank and a tough one.

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- DPS: should stfu and prioritize whatever the tank is focused on or whatever is dying the most. Follow the parameters set by the tank and healer. Don't pull, don't do knockbacks, don't fall behind. If a dps person deliberately pulls aggro, tank should let them deal with it. Tank priority is to hold and stabilize their mobs, not risk more chaos from chasing and cleaning up after clueless pullers.

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If a person is way to far away to get it with 1 GCD and only slight movement, then he might just keep it. If the person is running to your AoE position anyway or is staying in melee range (like a MNK getting hate on one mob) how do you even decide to not take that specific mob back in an AoE situation?
Also: If I get hate and tank don't want to get it back, I just use my binds/knockbacks/sleep/slows/defensive CDs... and at least with a SCH I draw enough attention of the fairy to stay alive anyway.

Or, even more simple, If I use (quelling) energy drain early on to keep my stacks and I pull something... if tank does nothing the next thing this mob will do is: attack the healer.
"You pull it, you tank it" works only if the dps keeps attacking this specific mob... else any other player attacking that mob afterwards or a healer will take it. Great job.

"Sry healer for that hit that canceled your spell. Since I'm so stubborn I didn't want to attack this mob before it decided to face you, because I wanted to leave it on the dps." - a really great tank


There might be annyoning things, but I won't rank "healers not doing dps", "tanks not using CDs"/"tank melting", "dps attacking the wrong target", "healer regen before pull", "tank doesn't click of regen between pulls", "dps doing to less damage", "healer overhealing a lot" (Cure II/III spam), "tank/melee stun resisting a has-to-be-stunned add", "tank turning adds", "healer/dps with hate running away from tank instead of to him", etc....
And especially I will never ever do anything to make this for anyone even worse, because I feel some entitlement.
If anything I adapt, because tbh this is the only challenging thing anyway... to just keep or even insist on the same rotation/flow every time in a specific dungeon is way more easier than to be able to make the best out of every bad situation.

Personally I just see it as them doing my job for me. If anything it'll make the healer's Medica 2 more effective and it's not like it takes a longtime to take aggro back.

Although it may be very annoying for a under-geared tank who might have to fight for the aggro. The idea of checking people's gear to determine how you do your pulls should apply to others as well instead of just the tank. Play cooperatively for a better experience ya? Selfish attitudes belong in a single player game.

As a healer, if I see a DPS pulling mobs frequently, I simply don't heal them. If asked I say I focus on the tank at the start of the pull. No more explanation is given or required beyond that.

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Originally Posted by DoUrden

As a healer, if I see a DPS pulling mobs frequently, I simply don't heal them. If asked I say I focus on the tank at the start of the pull. No more explanation is given or required beyond that.

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So you don't even consider what other tanks here have mentioned? DPS pulling mobs isn't always a bad thing, and sometimes encouraged.
I mean it's not as if they'll need healing as the tank will rip them back with ease, but the last thing the tank wants is the healer being passive aggressive to a team mate because they think they know how pulls should go.

All I can say is - boy I don't miss leveling dungeons, and at lvl 60 dungeons you just pull a couple packs at a time or till you hit a wall and people are usually good.

There's been times where I've seen a DD pull an additional pack but even though I just let him tank it the healer kept him alive fine and we carried on.

I'm mainly seeing an apples to oranges comparison here. Worrying about DPS keeping timers running really only matters in raid situations here you have to worry about enrage timers, which makes sense for them to pull when they know their tank is expecting it. Most of the complaining seems to be in just basic dungeons where do you don't need to have top end dps to clear bosses. Shaving a minute or two off a leveling/50/60/expert roulette isn't too much of a priority for me, but to each their own. Also on a side note, the only dps I really have an issue with while tanking are the ones who pull everything without realising that having only 1 aoe dps class will make large pulls take much longer.

I think it is fairly obvious if a pulling/tanking DD knows what he's doing opposed to trying to speed things up and effing up any kind of rhythm in the process. A good DD knows when they can speed things up without messing things up. When they do it right, it eases the strain on the tank and healer, not add to it. If you get a knowledgeable and aware DD, LET THEM DO THEIR THING. They will pull when it's appropriate and not a moment before.

I feel it is NEVER ok to be passive aggressive, and deliberately let another player eat dirt. I grow more and more sick of players running content and making assumptions to the knowledge of their teammates instead of coordinating their efforts. We are also passive aggressive by not saying anything. Leaving an instance w/o giving any comms in a fume, or think, "It's DF, and I don't ever have to group with this player again." are good examples a lot of players do. But 40-50-60 minute runs can be greatly reduced if players communicate with each other.

Letting another player die... this should be a last resort kind of thing. You have already communicated to them how their efforts/intentions are hurting the group and they carry on anyway like a deaf monkey. Even then, it might just be best to initiate a vote kick. Players being more flexible in general really goes a long way with making runs go smooth.

My policy when tanking is if,you pull the mob, you tank it. If it happens first explain to only target the mob, especially in low levels before you get stances. Use your words!if they continue messing around then you kick them. There is such thing as a good DPS and it's a team game, just because you play dps doesn't mean you don't have any responsibility.

It's the only way people will learn. I know it's generally frowned upon to yell at players it if you offer them advice and they don't listen what are you supposed to do? Remember that as a tank, they need you more than you need them. Tank queues are practically instant, so just remind them that it's either play as a team or enjoy the queue again.

I am of course referring to casual content like dungeon runs. Raiding is another matter entirely.

Thanks again for all the replies - and yes, in my OP I was originally talking about when I got to synched down dungeons for leveling roulette and don't have my full set of enmity skills yet. I am usually hesitant to kick people since I know it was a long wait for dps (from leveling BRD), so usually I'll say something. If they don't listen and respond even after this, even though it is easy to get back hate or get enmity on a group of trash a dps pulls, it still isn't something that needs to be done in things like leveling roulette. I suppose people will think that in those kinds of dungeons (16-33) you don't even need a tank, which is true, but still. I see the point for keeping buffs on for higher level content and adapt my pulls to the party composition and skill, it was just for those early dungeons and also for newer tanks that I have concern.

Sometimes when I'm a dps in a lower lvl dungeon, I have to deal with a tank getting fussy that I'm switching targets to distribute enmity when 1 is about to make me their target (they get mad and think I'm an idiot for not focus-firing on the tank's target), but it seems most tanks I play with value simplicity over optimization. Main example is DoTs on large mobs and reinforcements, and so help me if I decide to throw DoTs on mobs currently being pulled because I thought the tank would actually stop soon to get more hate.

Though sometimes in the first few dungeons I tactfully rip hate, but only when I'm the healer, because 99% of the time the healer won't understand dafuq I'm doing. The reasoning is to distribute some damage (I do 1 mob) so I can make more use of the out-of-battle regen and thus replace a heal with damage. The regen ends up covering around 1/3 hp on average between pulls. Bad practice for later gameplay, but optimal play for the situation. Good or bad?

I haven't really had issues with hate since roughly after level 50 in general, but in terms of marking, the amount of skills on the bar fill it up to the point that 1,2,3,4 doesn't fit on the crossbar, I have tried playing this game with a mouse and keyboard and wanted to, but it doesn't sit right with me, I am 5% the tank I am with a controller and my layout allows me to react to any situation that is put on me in a fraction of the time, having to flip between more than 2 crossbars is a recipe for disaster when I need to get back to a stun, defense CD or threat and if I have to cycle through its a waste of time and the mechanics will have likely hit me, furthermore, if I have to duplicate these important skills to the third bar, it defeats the purpose.

As a Summoner and White Mage as well, I typically don't heal the tank or DPS a target unless I have seen overwhelm, flash and unleash first.

The real thing that needs to be talked about is not marking this or that, unless it's for a mechanic strategy, what we need to realize is a DPS or even a WHM can take hate from a tank IF THEY TRY, just like in FFXI, Black Mage was always one or two buttons from being a tank, it came down to a choice of weather you wanted to take it or not, eventually, tanks became obsolete since the DPS had it most of the time easier anyway, save for certain content that required it.

The whole "I got to do 99999999 DPS and post it on yewtewb" is honestly sickening, this game has turned into a gear chasing content repetitive elitest thumper where it's difficult to have fun in any role unless you're doing something to bend the design or work against the grain, only to come on the forum and ask it to be reworked, be told to git gud in the nicest way possible, or change to a job with far less responsibility.

i give 2 warnings, on the 3rd pull, dps dies.

If the dps thinks i'm pulling too slow, then they need to speak up, let there voices be heard, just because THEY might be ready doesn't account for the rest of the group. If its unanimous, i pull faster/bigger, and thus the problem will be solved.

Many of us have been on both sides of this argument.

As a Tank I try to balance my pulls based on DPS/Healing on the first pulls. That being said it's my job to TANK. Even if they pulled extra, as long as it isn't going to be the death of me, I will try to grab agro on everything while not losing what I already have. The exception being when something they've targeted would be the death of me/healer/party where I will let it take the DPS down before I try to pick it up and clear out some of the already present danger.

As a DPS/Healer when I tag something extra, I will bring it to the tank so they can hit it with their usual AoE rotation. Especially as a DPS I would rather it come after me than the healer in terms of pathing enemies that weren't yet picked up. I find it INCREDIBLY frustrating when a tank would rather stand and watch me die, than hit their AOE hate when I'm standing with the enemies right next to them because only they can pull.

In every mmo I tanked I did it like so:
If dps runs ahead of me to pull, they tank.
If an accidental pull happens, I pick it up.
If dps or healer pull agro from a group of mobs, I pick it back up and apologize after the fight for my mistake.

Some thing I find kind of ridiculous are healers and DPS who won't pay attention during and before fights. I've done runs where I marked everything and runs where I don't touch the markers at all and in both situations I find people who do what they want in terms of target priority.

Sure marking is a great tool for people trying to learn the dungeon/raid, but other than way-markers during raids as reminders as to where people should group or avoid, I don't think that have some one mark every target is a valid enough excuse for those who don't even try to play in a smart way.

Every time someone switches a target in battle an arrow pops up that shows who their new target is, doesn't matter if it is a mob or party member. Even with constant switching you still get notified that someone is doing something to a different target. This should, imo, cause people to check the aggro bars to make sure that they aren't pulling anything.

While DPSing when a tank is constantly switching targets is annoying more often than not there is one target that has allot of aggro already built up by the tank. finding this target is the safest way to not pull anything else. At the beginning of the pull it might be the mob who ate the tanks ranged skill/third hit in the aggro combo, after a little bit of waiting the target become fairly obvious.

Some people think that the DPS HAS to target the same thing as the tank, but that's not true. Whatever target they can DPS without pulling is valid. If the mob is almost dead you might as well kill it even if you take a few hits. People get so caught up in Tank need control of all mobs, that they ignore easier way to play the game that makes everyone's life allot easier.

TLDR:
Marking is get when learning new content/teaching but it should be a crutch for everyone.
Think about what target the tank has the most aggro built up by seeing which mob eats the 3rd combo
LOOK AT AGGRO BARS

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Originally Posted by Paikis

4. You win.

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Why is it a contest? You're supposed to be on the same team.

Reading over these, I can understand everyone's POV on why it might bother them. It's not something I personally care about. If my dps pulls ahead of me, chances are they are going to bring it to me(which they usually do 9/10). If they don't I grab it if I can though the only ones that do that are DRGs and NINs that I've seen and they can handle a mob solo easily. I've never met an elitist and if I was partied with them, they knew what they were doing so there was never an issue. Honestly, respect towards your fellow man/woman goes a long way. I know, super edgy and outside the meta but that's been my experience thus far. I'm nice to them, they're nice to me, our time does awesome, we get phat lewts, everyone wins.
TL;DR Kindness and Respect gets shit done and done right.