Fledgling tank here and looking for tips!

On my alt I have been having trouble keeping hate off the SCH I play with. Last night in a party with him at Brayflox I could not for the life of me keep Eos from stealing hate nor the SMN in the party from grabbing hate. The SMN was using Bane a lot even on single targets and Eos was on auto healing. Sword Oath was up and I was flashing and dropping all the skills I could but to no avail someone would always pull the mob off me. Was I not flashing enough? I dunno.. halp!:(

Sword Oath doesn't increase your enmity much. Shield Oath at 40 will help alleviate your problem a bit. Did you rotate your Rage of Halone combo through your targets? The SMN wasn't helpful in letting you get aggro on mobs if all he did was Bane. Bane on single target is ..... well, useless so I don't know why he even use it. Eos probably got aggro from healing you or the SMN too much. What I do in a group of 3 mobs pull is: Shield lob target 1, run in, Flash, Fast Blade target 1, Savage Blade target 2, if your dps is focusing target 1, Rage of Halone target 1, if not, rage of Halone target 3, Fast Blade target 2, Savage Blade target 1 and so on. The goal is to have enmity skills Savage Blade and Rage of Halone on targets building aggro on your other party member (either through healing or doing dps on it) . You can mark target to make it easier to focus but more experienced tank wouldn't need it.

I wasn't rotating as good as I could have been fault lies with me there. I would mark the target I was focusing on then shield lob - flash the additional mobs and combo target 1 only rotating if there was a loss of hate via bane or Eos so that tip is greatly appreciated.

Your goal is to not wait till you actually lose hate and then use your aggro combo but generate enough hate on each mob so they don't get away from you. I hope it helps and you have as much fun tanking as I have. The rotation will change from group to group but as long as you aim to keep aggro high enough from other people on all mobs, you've done your job, for now. Later on, you'll need to weave in defensive CD to help healers. Remember that the less they have to heal you, the less aggro they gain.

As mentioned, the trick is to juggle your attacks.
If on PC, I like to Shield Lob once and then flash, so I have them all show up on the enemy list.
And there id Fast 1, Savage 2, Rage the 3rd, then change it. Fast 3, save1, rage 2.
Usually every 1 or 2 rotations I toss another flash to be safe if more than 3.
If down to do, then fast/savage 1, rage other. Youll get the hang of it.

You will definitely want to get one full rotation in the primary target before starting the rotation.

If your group does a lot of AoE damage quick and early, what I do is:

Shield Lob > Flash > fast blade > flash > savage blade> flash > rage of halone. At that point I assess the group of mobs and cycle my rotation on them as necessary, only dropping more flashes after rage of halone.

Thanks guys this has given me a lot of clarity!

Currently there no way a tank can prevent Eos to steal initial aggro. Unless the Pet's owner out her on Obay.

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Originally Posted by Remn

Currently there no way a tank can prevent Eos to steal initial aggro. Unless the Pet's owner out her on Obay.

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Under 50, eos can tank for quite a while! Don't let it get you down- it's not a real player character anyway. Just make sure to taunt and get it back from him as soon as he grabs agro. Most of the time this transition can be done without eos even getting hit- leading to a 100% dmg mitigation for a short period of time. While you should actively try to keep agro on all mobs, under level 40, it doesn't really matter if a pet grabs agro for a second or two.

Don't forget to upgrade your weapon. Aggro is tied to weapon damage too.

EDIT: As a warning, everything changes at Lv50, when holding threat becomes super easy, using Circle of Scorn. This only applies to your level range.

If your DPS is good, spreading your combos will result in you holding no threat at all. (EDIT to be clear, spreading your combo around, is roughly equal in AoE threat, as using flash. But less reliable, and more random. But doesnt mean you wont be doing it somewhat. The most effective way to maintain threat, is to focus fire on a single mob, and only AoE/spread comb os, for the sake of keeping enough hate from cure bombs. NOT to keep hate from DPS. (unless the situation calls for AoEs, like low HP mobs, adds in a boss fight, or overgeared Speed Runs.)

It depends on your group, but as people have mentioned, make sure u have the best weapon you can have, eat some STR food if you still need more threat, then do as u mentioned, lob/mark attack1, and flash the number of times there are enemies.

This will ONLY hold threat over cures. (IF they arnt over curing, i seen ppl used to endgame, and precast before i take dmg, and over cure me constantly, which DOES rip hate)

If your DPS is really good, you will NOT have time to land a 3rd flash, before you lose hate.
Instead, Flash once, then fast blade. From there, dependent on threat, you either use another flash, or if you're seeing them about to pass you in threat, use savage blade.
Might as well get your Rage of Halone off if you're this far... UNLESS the healer is about to rip hate from adds, and or you have someone using AOEs. (never mix AoEs with single target dmg. Flash holds hate over AoEs easily, but not single target bursts. Combos hold hate well over single target bursts, but not AoEs.)

Anyways, once you have your 1st Rage of Halone off, and roughly 2 or 3 flashes, you have time to cycle around threat.

Fast blade actually causes you to LOSE threat (compared to their gain), but is needed to make Savage blade more potent. Which Savage blade (if paired with good DPS) will cause you to remain still in threat (not gain more threat over them.)

So if you split your combo around, you will NOT gain threat using fast/savage on which ever target u put it on, just simply try to hold your ground, before the DPS over takes you.

Rage of Halone obviously lets you gain some more ground.
(Plus puts a -STR debuff on mobs)

So I'm in all favor of spreading Rage of halone to mobs, to lower their dmg, but make sure your DPS arent too good at their job.

Since your SMN is using BANE, I'm sure there is quite some AoE threat to deal with. Which means u better hope your 2nd DPS isnt going full force on a single mob.

As for SCH pulling hate, the only 2 scenarios where i pulled hate as SCH were;

(1) I used all my DoTs and then Bane.
(2) I over healed them constantly. (aldo also counts)
(3) AoEd constantly.

Only time my fairy pulls hate, she starts curing before the tank can land a flash, or while tank pulls, to which then she's in the lead in threat for a bit.

But getting hate back from a fairy is slightly easy, so if thats being an issue, I would assume something else is wrong.
Either the speed at which you execute your abilities, or your gear may not be good enough. (the difference 1 point of DMG makes in threat can be pretty noticeable.)

Flash doesn't reset your Halone combo, so you can also weave in some flashes while you're comboing target 1. Shield lob 1, run in, flash 3 mobs, fast blade 1, savage blade 1, flash, Halone 1, Flash, etc. I'll even weave in flash on my warrior during his hate combo.

good healer will alway precast heal before the boss big move. aggro problem only happen within the first min or 5 sec of the initial pull. after that healer should not beable to pull aggro form you. (unless they spaming AoE non stop, then may be)

A Pre-Cast Cure 3, right b4 GeoCrush is GOD Send!! ;D