Is provoke broken or am I doing it wrong?

[Coldea]

If you provoke a mob that isn't on the hate list of anyone in your alliance, it misses.

Nope, provoking a mob that wasnt pulled will give you 1 enmity on him. You can use that to pull a mob from a great distance : Shield Lob and Tomahawk have a range of 15y, provoke is 25y.