Warrior tanking.

Hey there! I'm level 55 and it seems like in the Aery I get hit for so much I can't come out defiance. I use cool downs and avoid aoes. Is there something I'm missing?

Nope. Just don't stance dance until you've got gear, or can adequately hold threat. It's not worth the extra DPS if you're a smear on the floor.

Honestly, stance dancing isn't even really a requirement outside of high level Ex and Savage raiding, so it's entirely optional while leveling (but only if you can handle it). It may help the group go faster, but your healer will be swearing to their roommate a lot less if you keep your tanking stance on.

Lol Im trying to get ready for trials and stuff so I'm stance dancing on bosses mainly. Tho it seems rough at times. Any advice on how to pop cooldowns? Like use vengeance first or awareness or inner beast that kind of thing?

I'm assuming its the pulls that are hitting you relatively hard? The bosses aren't really threatening when properly managed, I'd argue you can stay in Deliverance most of the fights, only popping out of it to use IB every now and then if you feel you need it, or to cut your healer a break if they're struggling a bit.

Certain groups of mobs in there seem to hit harder than others, I usually see my HP spike relatively fast during the last pull (2 aevis + something else) before the big area leading up to the last boss, some healers don't seem to anticipate this so be aware and have something ready; Also the first pull after (I believe) the 2nd boss can put out some damage if you don't pay attention.


And bear in mind there is one enemy in there (I forget the name of it) which has really delayed, visible cues for its attacks, but no AoE circles. You can avoid those by just moving away when you see the mob start to make a move, and then moving back once the attack finishes.

The dragons before the 2nd boss can put a dent into you too if you pull too many.

Make sure your gear is up to date and all too (54 HQ or 55 Orthodox from the dungeon).

Yea it is up to date mostly cept some jewelry. I'm using all slaying acc as well.. not sure if I should use bit instead

Use vit until you feel comfortable with the dungeon. 5 vit likely isn't necessary, I'd say start with 3 vit/2 str and see how you feel from there.

Trust me you'll be doing your typical pug healers a favor later on in the Vault, more than half of the ones I've run into have serious trouble with the last boss, the extra health pool can really help.
Will probably save you a lot of headache too.

Is your gear NQ or HQ? If it's NQ, it's bad.

If it can be hq it is. So I'm set there and I'll try to put a few bit pieces there.

On trash pulls, use Vengeance at the beginning, since it's the highest mitigation CD. Using it at the beginning makes you get the most out of it since all the mobs are still alive and hitting you. You can use it in conjunction with Zerk and Bloodbath to get some nice counter damage + self healing on everything hitting you physically. When Vengeance ends, you can use Raw Intuition + Awareness (in the case some enemies are not in front of you, it can happen in AoE situations) or Thrill of Battle + Convalescence. You can add Foresight too but it's not a really powerful thing anyway (20% defense is not 20% damage reduction unfortunately). During your Zerk + Bloodbath + Vengeance window, you should be able to tank in Deliverance if you feel like doing it, since you get a LOT of self-healing from Overpower spam while mitigating damage with Vengeance. You still don't have Decimate tho, so if you still feel like you're taking a lot of damage, just stick to Defiance. Pre-60 dungeons can hit pretty hard so it's perfectly okay. Use IB in the case the DPS is very low and you have no CD left anymore and you're still getting pummeled by a lot of mobs. Otherwise, spend your stacks on Steel Cyclone if there is 2 or more enemies, and Fell Cleave if there is 1 enemy left (well, Fell Cleave is also better than Steel Cyclone on 2 enemies but if you want to stick to Defiance you can't Fell Cleave).

Stance dancing is more dependant on your healer than anything. I am a 207 WAR with 90% BiS gear and there are some runs I do for ESO that I have to stay the majority of the time in Defiance becuase my healers is new/undergeared or the DPS are terrible and I have to tank things forever.

When leveling it is not so important to stance dance as it is to learn WHEN to stance dance. Your main job is to stay alive and keep hate. Powerful DPS is the icing on the cake.

If you are using CDs and are adequately geared the problem most likley isnt you.

It gets a bit easier when you have sync'd gear but, because the sync is rather low, it's harder to do in leveling dungeons because the sync cap is so low. Others nailed the other points.

You can't stance dance at that level. Maybe, maybe on the bosses, depending on how good your gear is and whether you trust your healer.

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Originally Posted by Atorimansea

Is there something I'm missing?

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Yes, enough gear to survive mid-size hits in Deliverance. At lvl 55, WAR would simply lack the vitality to make stance dancing viable for large mob packs. When I was lvling, I would change to Deliverance after there was 2 or 3 mobs left (out of a 4 or 5 mob pack).

The way I do it is, I stay in deliverance long enough to double cleave and then I switch back to defiance. I can also triple, but I could end up dead so I don't try it.

"Behind every successful deliverance warrior is a successful healer."

For real though, stance dancing is hard vs more than 1 mob when you're under 60. Especially if you have under average healer.

And just what I'll suggest: run places in full defiance few times to get a base knowledge of when you'll get hit hard consistently and when you could easily go Deliverance cause of the incoming damage being manageable. And when you can sit in deliverance without worrying about using cooldowns and when you need to have them going.

And all this becomes even easier if you have the same healer all the time that you know and that knows you.