Does Tank Stance mean you're "bad?"

[Temaridesertstorm]

Don't the tank stances either increase HP or reduce damage? There's very few times where having your tank stance off is a good idea since the healer can put out a LOT more dps than a tank, and if you don't have that mitigation then they can't do so.

Agreed. Especially if you're MT, tank stance is a must. It may mean a decline in your DPS, but you're the tank, not a DPS. Better to stay alive and prevent healers from dying than die due to being out of tank stance. I'm fairly new to tanking, but I like to have my tank stance on as much as possible for situations where the MT dies due to being out of tank stance. That way, no one can complain that the OT wasn't picking up the slack.

[Ashkendor]

Agreed. Especially if you're MT, tank stance is a must. It may mean a decline in your DPS, but you're the tank, not a DPS. Better to stay alive and prevent healers from dying than die due to being out of tank stance. I'm fairly new to tanking, but I like to have my tank stance on as much as possible for situations where the MT dies due to being out of tank stance. That way, no one can complain that the OT wasn't picking up the slack.

Having tank stance up as OT is actually a bad idea. If your MT is using a DPS rotation (which they should be doing after initial aggro is established) you can rip the boss off them if you're not using your skills correctly and you have tank stance up, especially those of us that like to tank more aggressively (which usually entails swapping to DPS stance and using cd's). This leads to situations where the boss will cleave the party, or at the very least, will cause melee to lose positionals which can be a substantial DPS loss.

There are plenty of fights where "main tank" just means "the dude that needs more accuracy since the boss faces him" because the damage output is laughable. I don't see anything wrong in tanking in DPS stance when additional mitigation just isn't needed.

[Rampage]

I don't see anything wrong in tanking in DPS stance when additional mitigation just isn't needed.

This and other comments are very good, but the OP described a situation where a person got into tank stance and kept it on when sh** hit the fan and was called a bad tank. I think we can all agree the answer here is no. Our priority is to maintain hate especially when people arent cooperating. I would rather be "bad" and finish the fight than wipe from hate bouncing around.

[Ashkendor]

This and other comments are very good, but the OP described a situation where a person got into tank stance and kept it on when sh** hit the fan and was called a bad tank. I think we can all agree the answer here is no. Our priority is to maintain hate especially when people arent cooperating. I would rather be "bad" and finish the fight than wipe from hate bouncing around.

I understand what OP was talking about. My reply to OP was this:

Using tank stance doesn't make you bad. Knowing when you need to use it is actually part of being good.

The reply you quoted was aimed only at the person I quoted, regarding the notion that tanks should always be in tank stance.