A Thread By A Tank For Future/Current Tanks.

[NoctisCaelus]

One important thing Id like to encourage for every tank is to level up cooking to at least 20 and always carry the +vit +parry +skillspeed food (i forget the names but they are lvl 16-20) and buy some mega potions for emergencies.

Super useful mate. Thanks. :3

[teh_nam3less]

One of my favorite things about being a tank is that I can excuse myself to get some water or take a quick bathroom break without fear that the party might have moved on without me.

It's the little things for me that makes me happy being a tank.

THIS! I can get a few chores done while in a dungeon :P

[Eliniell]

Luckily I met nice people including my Free Company who took the time and patience to make me a better tank.

Going to make me blush sir. A lot of points in this I agree with completely. I know the reason I eventually decided to start tanking was because you have to be a leader as the Tank. You can't just sit back and follow everyone else. Success hinges on you doing your job properly while leading the group. I'm glad we were able to help you become a better tank. I can honestly say I'm glad you looked us up, because it's rare to find someone who can pick the role up as quickly as you do, who learns from their mistakes without getting defensive and takes constructive criticism to become better. Cheers sir. I look forward to continuing to tank beside you in the future.

[Denyantras]

By the way, just as a fyi c: My friends who started playing with me all decided they no longer want to play, so I wanted to try Marauder on a different server. Because of this thread right here, I know that Behemoth has at least one player who deserves sainthood. That's where I'll be. Hope to see you around, OP

[MrJiggyFly]

There are flatbreads available from merchants that are 8% parry, +vit and + something else, speed i think, useful until you get your cooking up

[NoctisCaelus]

Snip

Lol. Likewise!

By the way, just as a fyi c: My friends who started playing with me all decided they no longer want to play, so I wanted to try Marauder on a different server. Because of this thread right here, I know that Behemoth has at least one player who deserves sainthood. That's where I'll be. Hope to see you around, OP

Behemoth is an amazing server. It's not that bad really. The only jerks I met were near end game where people yelled at me to skip cutscenes.

There are flatbreads available from merchants that are 8% parry, +vit and + something else, speed i think, useful until you get your cooking up

Thanks! :3 I'm kind of cheap though but I'll remember this when I make enough.

[Ryios]

As a tank, the thing I struggle with the most and get the most annoyed at is punchy dps boss or trash pulls. Us tanks, like everyone else have a Global Cooldown. Unlike games such as Wow, we do not have a direct Taunt. You could call provoke a taunt (which I have as Warrior with Gladiator leveled to 22), but it's not exactly a taunt. All provoke does is move us +1 point of enimity past the top of the list. That means if you have a dot on the boss and you have hate on the boss and we provoke it to get it off you it will go right back to you because your dot will instantly pass that 1 pt of enimity. That's a problem for us if we used provoke because now we have to wait 2.5 seconds to hit something else.

My point, as a tank, I shouldn't be running into a fresh fight trying to get hate on all the mobs and get them off a healer or dps. DPS/Heals etc should be patient and let the tank pick up everything and know that all we have for AOE Threat is Flash and Overpower and at level 50 one flash and one overpower isn't going to hold 2 level 50 dps going all out on aoe.

DPS need to focus the tanks primary target until he has popped out enough flashes and overpowers in his/her rotation to hold agro through an aoe burn, then open up on the aoe burn.

Further more, if you do get agro from some trash, don't just run around like omg omg get it get it.... Bring the trash to the tank. Many bosses/trash piles have directional aoe dmg. We can't just run around the room trying to get an add off of you. IN the process we might loose another one to someone else or worse, turn some deadly frontal attack towards the group and get people killed. Tanks have ranged threat abilities, but in my experience post level 50, I need a good 5 of them to get hate back. Or worse, the dps getting chased by the mob is still spamming the mob with DPS.

If your not the healer and you have agro... Stop making more agro. This isn't wow, dps is just as responsible for threat management as the tank is. I know some are undergeared for the encounter, and some have bad rotations, but you should work with your tank to allow him to hold hate if you want a successful run, not be like "Oh you can't hold hate, not my problem, I'm still going to dps"

[LitoOrigo]

Please let's not turn this again into the usual "Healers and tanks are the only important role, DPS is an inferior and less important role" argument.

Nice read OP, I'm thinking on starting to tank myself, but I don't really know whether I should go for PLD or WAR. Apparently WAR has an easier time to tank from lvl 1 to ~45, but then gets rejected a lot for endgame content. Is that true or?

DD outnumber tanks and healers. They have their roles to play. It might not seen as critical at times but they are needed just as much.

They each have an advantage and disadvantage. From my experience healing, I prefer paladins. They seem to take the hits better and I don't have to cure bomb them as often. I think they work best vs a single enemy. When fighting multiple enemies I've seen warriors usually handle it better. I'm more likely to run low or out of mp when healing a war vs a pld no matter the amount of enemies. However not all tanks fall into that mold

[LitoOrigo]

Couldn't post everything I wanted to say. Kept getting a 1k character limit error :-\

Threads like this =

Like, seriously, this is my first MMO ever in the history of everything ever, and I already feel so attached to and protective of the tank role that I see myself helping to start support groups for it to bolster us all.

<3 the Doctor Who gif!

[Eliniell]

As a tank, the thing I struggle with the most and get the most annoyed at is punchy dps boss or trash pulls. Us tanks, like everyone else have a Global Cooldown. Unlike games such as Wow, we do not have a direct Taunt. You could call provoke a taunt (which I have as Warrior with Gladiator leveled to 22), but it's not exactly a taunt. All provoke does is move us +1 point of enimity past the top of the list. That means if you have a dot on the boss and you have hate on the boss and we provoke it to get it off you it will go right back to you because your dot will instantly pass that 1 pt of enimity. That's a problem for us if we used provoke because now we have to wait 2.5 seconds to hit something else.

I generally tend to do one of two things if a DPS pulls agro. If I'm at a point in my threat rotation that I can quickly taunt - enmity ability, I'll just do that. If not, I'll taunt - ranged enmity and then move to the mob to begin an enmity rotation to grab it back. Taunt is off the GCD, so you can immediately throw in something that will solidify your threat lead if you're quick. That doesn't mean DPS should still be going balls deep if they pull aggro though, at some point they need to realize that they should just stop pressing buttons. I've intentionally let plenty of DPS die because they decided to just start spamming the wrong mob, or decided to pull themselves or some such. Sure, it's my job to hold aggro, but it's your job as a DPS to make sure you aren't pulling hate by not letting me get more than a Shield Lob or Tomahawk off.