Gladiator tanking in dungeons losing enmity

Hello all

I have a gladiator lvl 26 and just started tanking in dungeons. Yesterday I was with a lancer, conjurer and an archer. I kept losing enmity every time we encountered enemy. But I was using Savage Blade and Flash, Shield lob to gain enmity on distant target and provoke to gain instant aggro. I think I was doing fine but I was not able to maintain enmity on all 2-3 enemis (enemy pack).

So my question are :
1 - I know that archer gain enmity very fast and must learn to hold fire some time but does the conjurer gain enmity just by healing.

2 - I noticed that even if i marked the enemy 1-2-3, sometimes the other in my party did not focus fire and gained enmity on target that i wasn't attacking. So If someone in my party targets other enemy, am i right to say that if the other players don't follow the order that the tank sets, it is really difficult even with flash to maintain enmity??

3 - Am I right to say that if I start attacking a pack of enemy, I gain automaticly all agro from the pack. If the others in the party attack the same enemy as I am, i will maintain indefinitly aggro and the other enemies?

Hope this was clear

Thx for your answer!

*looks at gear* looks like your up to date on everything but accessories...

1- 1 point of damage is equivalent to 1 point of enmity, 1 point of healing is equivalent to half a point of enmity. so yes, cnj gets hate by healing

2- at the beginning of each dungeon for now on say this: "you pull it, you tank it." then proceed through the dungeon. if they don't listen, they get their face mauled by a mob. flash shouldn't be solely relied on for hate building. seeing how your level 26, your "rage of halone" combo should be your primary hate builder. (fast blade, then savage blade, then rage of halone)

3- NO. you gain 1 enmity for running into a mob group. you gain 250 from a single flash. you need to micromanage all of the mobs if you want to keep hate on any of them. if your dps is coordinating with you, the healer also generates hate from healing (its distributed throughout all of the mobs.)

I'd suggest only marking a kill target (I use "x"). My experience is that DPS go full retard if you have a numbered kill order marked. If you open with flash, and your dps are attacking the kill target, you should be able to hold aggro just fine.

ideal situation:

Mark your target

Fight or flight ----> Shield lob that target.

Flash twice

Fast Blade---> Savage Blade -->Rage of Halone

Flash

Repeat.

Also, in groups of mobs you can do the same thing but "cycle" the Rage of Halone combo (do NOT do this if players are sleeping other targets).

Start out by lobbing, then flashing.

Fast blade on target one, savage blade on target 2, rage of halone on any other target. Flash again, then focus on one mob

Alright, very nice insight!

So, what do you suggest I open with

Lob -> Flash -> micro manage the fight as it goes?

basically, using fight or flight at the start helps as well.

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Originally Posted by saber_alter

basically, using fight or flight at the start helps as well.

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You start with that skill because you can do more damage hence more enmity for the first 30 sec of the fight?

To help you out, I'll give you my scenario whenever I run dungeons as my PLD.

I mark all the mobs using the numbers. I usually don't mark the last mob cause its obviously going to be last since the others are numbered.

I target the mob with 1 marked, I use Shield Lob (or sometimes Fight or Flight and then Shield Lob).

I let the mobs gather around me, then I Flash about 2-3 times. I try to stand in such a way that all the mobs are facing away from the party and they are all directly in front of me (so that I can block all of their attacks)

I then do Rage of Halone Combo on mob marked 1. Then I Flash again. I usually do Rage of Halone combo then Flash and repeat that.

If none of the mobs are getting cc'd by a blm or whm (they aren't being Slept) then I like to do Fast Blade - Savage Blade on my main target, then switch target to another and finish with Rage of Halone on that mob, then switch back to the main target. I do this because when you use Rage of Halone in the combo, it gives you a big boost when it hits in enmity, so to try to keep the enmity on my main target, but add a big chunk to the other enemies so the healer doesn't take aggro, I'll finish the Rage of Halone combo on the other mobs.

In my experiences, I have groups where the dps will do things such as run ahead of me and aggro mobs, or kill things out of order.

- When they kill things out of order, if I can hold the hate on all the mobs, then I don't complain about it. If I can't handle the hate then I will first ask them to please follow the order. If they don't listen, I'll ask once again. After that, I let the mobs kill them.

- The same for dps that run ahead and pull mobs. I'll ask them to please let me lead and pull. I'll ask twice if necessary. After that, if they pull, I don't even engage in the fight until the dps dies or the party wipes. Sorry if that seems a bit harsh...

Hope that helps you. I didn't really say anything about other skills that you can weave in there since you're level 26 but you'll learn your own style as you progress. :)

teach that dps to read the enmity gauge and follow the marking, or "you pull/ peel- you kill".

Thx all, I'm gonna use all of these advice and if the DPSers don't understand and don't listen to me, so be it and die. tank are supposed to lead. And the more I think of it, tanking is the most important role in a party in term of leading the group and taking decisions.

Quote of the day : "You must listen to you tank!!!!"

:)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by NoRyoKu

You start with that skill because you can do more damage hence more enmity for the first 30 sec of the fight?

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Yes. it won't be up all the time mind you, but it certainly helps.

Also, as you progress, use flash more. I usually start with one per mob. It basically insures they stick to you. Toss a riot blade in there every so often if you want to top off MP.

shield lob is definitely the way to start. If people are not following the kill order, flash, and cycle the rage of halone combo through all mobs and u should still be able to hold hate.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by NoRyoKu

snip

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Provoke generates +1 enmity, its useless for a pull.
Halone combo is how you generate enmity on a target.
Flash is when they DPS AOE's everything down.

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Originally Posted by Leiron

Provoke generates +1 enmity, its useless for a pull.
Halone combo is how you generate enmity on a target.
Flash is when they DPS AOE's everything down.

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Not necessarily true.

Flash is useful in all situations, not just when DPS are AoE-ing. A mob that has low enmity on you will attack a healer if they heal. Healing generates as much enmity as the amount they heal for. If you are doing 0 damage and/or not doing anything else to generate enmity on it, it will attack something else besides u.

Flash will allow you to maintain hate on everything.

BTW, im not trying to lecture you. You are the level 50 and i but a lowly 46. Just wanted to give the OP some more perspective so that they have more information for various situations.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Leiron

Provoke generates +1 enmity, its useless for a pull.
Halone combo is how you generate enmity on a target.
Flash is when they DPS AOE's everything down.

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I used to think this too. But in some situations, a Provoke pull will work because Provoke has more range than Shield Lob does. For example, in Dzamael Darkhold after the first boss, you go across the bridge and to the right, I like to try to pull the giant frogs that patrol the ramp. If they are below me over the edge, my Shield Lob can't reach them, but I can pull them with Provoke.

Again this is just preference because there's no need to pull the frogs this way. You can always wait for them to come up or just kill the trash mobs at the top and work your way down to them.

So SOMETIMES you may want to pull with Provoke if you NEED the extra range. If not, use Shield Lob for sure.

Provoke is nice for the extra range, but it does NOT generate anything more than Highest person on the threat list +1.
Unles they ninja fixed something, it hasn't changed.

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Originally Posted by Lord_Zlatan

Not necessarily true.

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The only times that you should be using Flash are when there are a massive number of enemies that your DPS buddies are AoEing down (the beetle packs in WP or speed runs that grab numerous groups at a time) or right at the start of the fight because, even with 3 targets, it doesn't have the enmity per GCD even with 3 targets to justify it. It takes in excess of 4-5 targets for Flash to overwhelm your ST rotation on mean enmity per GCD. If your DPS are not being complete idiots, they should be focusing upon your explicitly designated focus target. As such, all you need to do on the other targets is keep enmity off of the healer. The best way to do this is with *target swapping* (it also happens to be the best way to keep enmity on targets that your DPS are split on).

For a group of 3, Lob the focus target, Flash 1-2 times when the group up, throw a Halone on the focus target and then start doing this: Fast Blade on non-focus 1, Savage Blade on non-focus 2, Rage of Halone on focus, Fast Blade on non-focus 2, Savage Blade on non-focus 1, Rage of Halone on focus, repeat.

For a group of 2, Lob the focus target, Flash once, and then start doing this: Fast Blade on focus, Savage Blade on non-focus, Rage of Halone on focus, repeat.

Flash is not an efficient enmity generator without a buttload of targets; it's only useful at the very beginning so as to keep aggro off of the healer while you establish effective enmity cushions with your single target attacks. One of the most important skills for a tank to learn is target swapping because, without it, they're pretty much *never* going to maintain enmity on more than 1 target at a time.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Leiron

Provoke is nice for the extra range, but it does NOT generate anything more than Highest person on the threat list +1.
Unles they ninja fixed something, it hasn't changed.

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No ninja fix. Still does the same. I like to use provoke on a pull if i want to pull a patroller (Stone Vigil comes to mind) but thats about it.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Leiron

Provoke is nice for the extra range, but it does NOT generate anything more than Highest person on the threat list +1.
Unles they ninja fixed something, it hasn't changed.

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You are correct. It only does Highest person +1 so if you pull with it you're going to want to get hate on all mobs immediately. Especially since many DPS only wait for you to pull, they don't like to wait until you get some hate before attacking.

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Originally Posted by NoRyoKu

You start with that skill because you can do more damage hence more enmity for the first 30 sec of the fight?

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coming back.

yes. i have it macroed in with my fast blade skill. the initial damage boost helps a lot with big pulls.

on the topic of provoke:

if your going to provoke, it should and must always be followed up with a shield lob or a comboed rage of halone. that includes if it is used as a longer range pull skill.

..and multi target tanking:
It, once again, depends on who is in your party. the higher the average Ilvl of your dps' weapons: the more micro-managing, the more attention required, the more flash that is used.

i will keep my recommendations simple,
start with shield lob follow with flash, then do rage of halone
flash spam is more when your pulling groups of mobs and aoeing them all down
if your dps attack the wrong mob, tell the whm to let them die

also, according to some number crunches, doing the full rage of halone combo, your rage of halone will do damage x5 for total enmity, (x10 with shield oath) and flash will do ~550 enmity (1110 with shield oath) and your limited on mp, should only use flash enough to keep hate off your whm
this link here shows a rough estimate on enmity generated per ability and multiplies for them to give you a better idea and may help you tweak your tanking style with ideas you can come up with as well, im not sure if its 100% spot on, but seems fairly accurate
http://valk.dancing-mad.com/?page_id=231

Great advice here so I'll just add the healer's perspective. Ask you healer to cast Stoneskin/aldo before each pull. (Stoneskin lvl34) Ask your healer to let you get a hit in before cure/regen and not to overcure. Click off regen before pulling (lvl 35).

If dps keep pulling off you and the healer is having to spam heal the whole party this can cause the healer to surpass you in enmity. As a final resort ask your healer not to heal dps who pull in order to maintain hate over the healer.

Keep all mobs in front of you at all times to reduce the need for healing. Keep your gear and accessories up to date. Every time you level check AH for crafted upgrades. Even NQ is typically better than lower level items.