Mass pulls: don't do this.

[Sleigh]

This whole issue isn't so black and white. There aren't (or really shouldn't be) two camps, camp A: aggro ALL the things and camp B: face pull ALL the things, because neither one leads to the best pulls in every scenario. The more fluid camp is camp C, the "tanks don't have to aggro every single thing at every point in the pull" camp. It isn't suggesting to face pull the whole dungeon, nor to even do every single pull without grabbing things. I'm in camp C, and some pulls, usually particularly short ones or particularly long ones, I'll grab everything (up to a point) because it makes sense, and sometimes you can do more with your TP and attacks without compromising your survivability. Also the fact that the 50 potency hit from Vengeance's counter right before you get to your pull destination outdoes a Cure II's aggro in a large group certainly doesn't hurt - not something to be relied on by any means but it's nice.

The fact is not grabbing some things in favor of putting up Maim shortly before the pull is fine for survival, especially if that makes you get 2 Infuriates for free basically by Infuriating pre-pull and keeping your stacks mid-pull. Only grabbing one mob out of 3 while you're running past them, when you're 10s away from the pull stop point and your SS isn't even broken yet and you are guaranteed to hit them within the pack with our Flash/CoS before you require a heal, that's fine. Face pulling a lot of enemies because you know you're going to Sprint and HG at the pull point, with the WHM guaranteed to only start with a Holy and no possibility of pulling early because they know about it, that's great. Having done a dungeon 30 times before with the same healer and you know exactly how long you'll last and they know what to do, do whatever works best and fastest for you guys.

Trying to do the entire first part of AK with face pulls, that's not fine. Skipping completely free aggro you could get by Flashing through a pack you have to go through in favor of nothing but being lazy, that's not fine (and I don't think anyone arguing against full aggro advocates this). Trying to do pulls with excessive enemies proximity pulled who could kill the healer without being on the same page as the healer or at the skill/gear levels required, also not fine. I will say as a PSA advocating full aggro is a good enough sentiment, especially for the people who actually need to hear it because they don't know WHY you'd put aggro on everything, but much like a lot of generalizations and recommendations in life, it doesn't apply to everyone.

Just keep an open mind and most importantly, stay versatile.

[Ceodore]

This whole issue isn't so black and white. There aren't (or really shouldn't) be two camps, camp A: aggro ALL the things and camp B: face pull ALL the things, because neither one leads to the best pulls. The more fluid camp is camp C, the "don't have to aggro every single thing at every point in the pull" camp. It isn't suggesting to face pull the whole dungeon, nor to even do every single pull without grabbing things. I'm in camp C, and some pulls, usually particularly short ones or particularly long ones, I'll grab everything (up to a point) because it makes sense, and sometimes you can do more with your TP and attacks without compromising your survivability. Also the fact that the 50 potency hit from Vengeance's counter right before you get to your pull destination outdoes a Cure II's aggro in a large group certainly doesn't hurt - not something to be relied on by any means but it's nice.

The fact is not grabbing some things in favor of putting up Maim shortly before the pull is fine for survival, especially if that makes you get 2 Infuriates for free basically by keeping your stacks. Only grabbing one mob out of 3 while you're running past them when you're 10s away from the pull stop point and your SS isn't even broken yet and you are guaranteed to hit them within the pack with our Flash/CoS before you require a heal, that's fine. Face pulling a lot of enemies because you know you're going to Sprint and HG at the pull point, with the WHM guaranteed to only start with a Holy and no possibility of pulling early because they know about it, that's great. Having done a dungeon 30 times before with the same healer and you know exactly how long you'll last and they know what to do, do whatever works best and fastest for you guys.

Trying to do the entire first part of AK with face pulls, that's not fine. Skipping completely free aggro you could get by Flashing through a pack you have to go through in favor of nothing but being lazy, that's not fine (and I don't think anyone arguing against full aggro advocates this). Trying to do pulls with excessive enemies proximity pulled who could kill the healer without being on the same page as the healer or at the skill/gear levels required, also not fine. I will say as a PSA advocating full aggro is a good enough sentiment, especially for the people who actually need to hear it because they don't know WHY you'd put aggro on everything, but much like a lot of generalizations and recommendations in life, it doesn't apply to everyone.

Just keep an open mind and most importantly, stay versatile.

Smartest person here.

If you have to go out of your way to get enmity on an entire group, don't do it. And I'm not going to pretend to advocate for this, and that's not what I ever said. But if it's possible to manipulate your enemies with one skill to move your enemies and group them better, then able to run through them like normal with a flash or overpower, then there is no reason not to.

[Deliciou5]

Even when my tanks are geared poorly as long as no one does anything before end of pull i can easily keep tank alive. I swear some people are too focused on playing it safe or are worried about tank's health dropping below 50% for a second or two.

Tank pulls>no does anything besides run while tanks pulls>we stop>tank uses CD's>Divine seal>med 2>regen>SS(Optional)>holy bomb+party aoe attacks>mobs dead>Next pull.

Divine seal will be back up before end of next pull, pop shroud alot. Dungeon done.

Edit:Sometimes i dont even exit cleric stance after i start holy bombing cause i use bene when tanks health is at 20%.
very rarely will i open up with Cure 2 when i pop divine seal. More often than not my runs ...even with the shitiest tanks go smoothly cause as a whm i use all my abilities the fullest advantage and i dps as much as possible while mitigating dmg with SS/Stun from holy/ and regen/med 2. Tanks just need to get them all in one spot and nothing more you dont really have to worry about playing it safe by flashing and shield throwing every mob while running...thats for people who want to spend a lot of extra effort just because they think something MIGHT go wrong. Fear based gaming that does make a dungeon run more efficient. Just do what works...if everyone dies cause they don't know how to speed run....THEN change tactics.

[Alahra]

You don't need to sprint to avoid damage in most current dungeons at all. So many of the mobs stop to do conal/360 AoEs or cast spells as you run that simply running through the pack and using Flash/Overpower keeps you from taking any noticeable damage (and lets the healer do little things like prep Eye for an Eye as you come around to the last group). Mind you, there are a lot of tanks out there that can't seem to use abilities on the move, which means they do take a lot more damage if they're focusing on aggro like that.

Aggro is just generally safer since you really don't know what your healer is like (assuming a full DF group). Ditto for DPS that for some reason love to randomly start their full single-target combo on a mob when you're doing a long pull. I'll never understand that one.

[spelley]

You don't need to sprint to avoid damage in most current dungeons at all. So many of the mobs stop to do conal/360 AoEs or cast spells as you run that simply running through the pack and using Flash/Overpower keeps you from taking any noticeable damage (and lets the healer do little things like prep Eye for an Eye as you come around to the last group). Mind you, there are a lot of tanks out there that can't seem to use abilities on the move, which means they do take a lot more damage if they're focusing on aggro like that.

Aggro is just generally safer since you really don't know what your healer is like (assuming a full DF group). Ditto for DPS that for some reason love to randomly start their full single-target combo on a mob when you're doing a long pull. I'll never understand that one.

I see this really rarely, but it's usually just a Monk trying to get his Greased Lightning stacks up before the pull ends.

[Alahra]

I see this really rarely, but it's usually just a Monk trying to get his Greased Lightning stacks up before the pull ends.

I saw it a lot while I was doing my recent Zodiac runs for Excalibur. Oddly it was very rarely Monks (which isn't as big of an issue since they generate a low amount of initial damage) and more often Dragoons and Bards. I don't know if they just weren't familiar with the common pulls for the dungeons or if they were just trigger happy.

[spelley]

I saw it a lot while I was doing my recent Zodiac runs for Excalibur. Oddly it was very rarely Monks (which isn't as big of an issue since they generate a low amount of initial damage) and more often Dragoons and Bards. I don't know if they just weren't familiar with the common pulls for the dungeons or if they were just trigger happy.

I'd guess over eager, trying to put in just a bit of damage to "help." I know I've been tempted before. Usually end up throwing a Leg Sweep on my DRG if a mob does a cone/aoe that we will be hit by if we keep running by but that's the extent of it (and DRG at least has some armour so they can easily survive a few smacks by a single if needed)