I used to think you shouldn't SR as a tank unless the healer says it's okay. Then I started tanking my way through the Zodiac quest and running the early 50 dungeons a lot. 95% of the time that I asked, the response was either silence (which meant yes in those cases, obvious from context/gear) or "please" (or, quite often, "oh god please yes, I'm sick of this [censored]"). Most people doing those dungeons were in the same boat as me, or reasonably similar - people going for Zodiac drops or Animus book clears. 90% of the "first time player" bonuses were people running alts through the dungeons for the first time and they wanted to get them done as fast as possible just like anyone else (though they were in worse gear than others). The very few times we had a truly new person in the party, they still wanted to go as fast as possible (except, they liked having bosses explained, which was fine). The only times going fast wasn't okay was when the healer was new, and in those cases, I just pulled half the map instead of the entire map. Or, if the AoE DPS was high enough, I still did the usual pulls if Hallowed Ground was on CD. The healer couldn't keep up, but didn't have to with HG up, and if the DPS was high enough, enough of the mobs were dead before the healer needed to actually heal.

What I started doing, rather than asking and waiting for a response, which 95% of people found irritating (when you run a dungeon 10x in a row and it takes only 12 minutes, spending 2 minutes checking with people about SRing was a substantial waste of time), I would ask while doing the first pull. If someone felt strongly about it, they could respond, but more likely, I'd find out at the first pull how they felt. If we wiped on the first pull because the heals just weren't enough, or the DPS was so low the mobs took forever to die resulting in attrition killing us, then you pull slower next time and take the dungeon a bit more carefully. You don't blame people, you don't make a scene when a wipe happens, but you also don't need to take it slow by default. Most people don't want that, and that's forcing most people to play in a way they don't want to play, and not necessarily for any reason.

So, as a tank in the early 50s dungeons, go fast if you can, but if you die, don't say stuff like "omg, where were the heals?" or "I used CDs, wtf" or "wtf dps" or anything like that. It serves no purpose, creates a hostile environment, and slows everything down while people type angry responses. Just go "haha, sry, I'll take it slower" or "ah well, was worth a shot!" or "my bad, let's do this" or something that doesn't assign blame to other people.

And, if you get the new player notice, you don't have to take it slow (unless they're a healer, then that depends, use your judgment), but you should ask if they're an alt. If they don't respond, assume they're not. The only difference is, if you have a new player, explain the bosses or important non-boss mechanics (CPM HM - kill first big guy, ignore the rest, jump in the elevator; don't attack the mobs in the miner bit, just stand near the rocks, kill the rocks, and run through to the boss asap, etc).


The best part about SRing, even with new players, is that it's fun. If you disagree, you are welcome to, but while there is a very vocal minority of anti-speedrunners on the forums, that's not representative of what I've personally seen in game. The vast majority of players (new and experienced) that I've run with are totally fine with SRing, and the ones who talk prefer it and/or find it makes the dungeons much more fun.