Tanking tips, dos and donts

[Aloreal]

Hello everyone, I am a scholar by trade but would like to get into tanking after i do more content with my healing powers.

There are a number of threads around the forum, but i would like all experienced tanks to share their insight of how they do things.

Primarily I am searching information from low level tanking to high level content.

If possible give a justification of what you should believe that a tank can do and where is most probable to do it.

Marking, stuns, leveling advise, anything you can think of that will help your fellow tanking buddies starting off with right footing into the world of tanks. Also what to expect from other classes, even HUD orientation and where everything is for you.

Please keep it civil and constructive.

Thank you.

[Duuude007]

Always have the best weapon possible. If you cannot yet afford/attain something with superior weapon damage, opt for the largest strength boost on the next best weapon damage. Enmity is your life.

Know at a glance whether your party is capable of small pulls or speed pulls, and how often. Flash & riot combo, circle are extremely useful for large groups.

Always maximize mitigation in gear, set up your bars with party mitigation and self heal improving buffs, and cross-class abilities should provide extra mitigation. Priority is always Hate management > survivability > dps.

Always have the accuracy cap for the content you are tanking. The exact value varies on target, but current highest content caps are around 515 for a main tank.

Never start a fight if regen or 'medica regen' are active- first right click the icon to cancel its effect. Train your WHM healers to avoid poorly-timed regens, so that this issue rarely/never occurs.

If you need fast hate on an add but are conserving mp/tp or are low on time, an 'uncharged' Butcher's Block or Rage of Halone is better than Heavy Slash or Fast Blade. Better yet, if you can charge the combo in expectation of needing it for an add, do so. (example: Titan ex gets fast blade/savage blade, egi pops, use RoH on egi.)

Learn the art of hate swapping. Provoke > BB/RoH (or Provoke > tomahawk/shield lob if distant target) is the easiest sequence for a fast hate swap. ALSO: Know both types of hate swapping: traditional and V-Tanking. Both have situational benefits. (ex: v-tanking Ifrit ex is very useful.)

There's more, but I'll have to think it over...

[Aloreal]

Thank you for the input.

Just a question. How do you know if a group is capable of a SR? If its low level content i understand that if they are synch there are possibilities they are. but how about high lvl content? do you see armor and weapon? keen senses?

[Thaliss]

Thank you for the input.

Just a question. How do you know if a group is capable of a SR? If its low level content i understand that if they are synch there are possibilities they are. but how about high lvl content? do you see armor and weapon? keen senses?

Hi,

Ask them
It's is more polite, don't assume players iLvL 95+ wants to speed run. (just a look at weapons, equipment should tell you average iLvL)
And know the skills people have, 2 monks in party as dps there is no point in SR, as I can see sometimes, except healing like mad while healer could dps to speed up.

[JonBigwood]

Just a question. How do you know if a group is capable of a SR? If its low level content i understand that if they are synch there are possibilities they are. but how about high lvl content? do you see armor and weapon? keen senses?

I think SR are usually in level 50 dungeons. I just look at the HP, if they all are high HP you can expect to go quicker. With two melee DPS it doesn't make a lot of sense to do big pulls if they don't use AoE attacks. I usually ask if they want big pulls, or tell my plan asking for confirmation (typically in WP or Brayflox HM.) Other times the party asks for quicker pulls. Sometimes somebody pulls more mobs so that things go quicker, I don't mind that if we don't die, really it's better if we go quicker.

In low level dungeons as you say, a first indicator is the level, but you might have somebody with lower level that may go quicker than others with higher level. You'll see if things go quicker or slower than usual after some pulls, so you'll see if you have to try and have smaller groups and avoid patrols or nearby mobs that might join, or just all will die quicker with a bigger pull if mobs die quick and the group survives well.

[Aloreal]

Yeah, should have guessed that asking is a contributing factor to this.

Nonetheless very informative since as a healer I always go with the mentality that everything worse that can happen will happen and the tank can be killed within 3 autoattacks.
Dont get me wrong, Ive met several awesome people, but thats my mentality. keeps me on my toes. Doesnt help that i have already experienced this. haha

Anyway, to the topics post. please continue this discussion as you see fit. It is interesting even for other tanks to find out certain things that could be doing better. Keep in mind that it is for educational purposes so please write it out using examples and personal experience at it makes everything better. If you need to gloat go for it if it teaches something

[Viridiana]

Try not to spin mobs around if you have melee in the party. If you need to dodge an aoe, move back to where you started once it goes off.

Marking will make your life easier when you're starting out. Just remember to Flash/Overpower as you go.

Sometimes the DD deserves to die, particularly if they don't know how to count.

In some dungeons (Haukke Story and Stone Vigil, for example) there are pulls where it's best to line of sight the enemy back around a corner to force them to group up.

Some enemies don't hit hard at all and can be tanked 100%->0% by a DD. Examples include the faces in Qarn and the green add in Garuda Hard.

I'm sure there are more, but this is what's coming to mind at the moment. . .

[Clavaat]

Communicate with your group calmly and understandably. You are the first to enter a fight, so make sure you type out what you plan on doing. Like others have said, the best way to determine a speed run is to just ask at the beginning. Unless you joined a PF with specifically that purpose, it's best to make sure.

If you are going to do a certain method for handling a pull or a boss, make sure that's made clear beforehand. Lost City of Amdapor is a good example of this; make sure you know who is going to handle doors before entering. Don't assume anything of a group if there are multiple methods.

If people are making mistakes, such as attacking the wrong mob, or pulling hate, politely ask them to stop. If they refuse or give you problems, kick/report them asap, there's no reason for that. If you were polite, so should they.

[Rbstr]

As far as speed runs go, I'm not sure it's much of a thing in anything but lvl 50 dungeons.
Mostly because you can outgear the 50 dungeons by massive amounts. Level sync puts you at something much less overpowered for the content.

I typically only mark if people are new, not demonstrating good judgment or I'm level-synced and don't have my BB combo to use.
DPS that go and pull extra groups intentionally without some kind of warning or agreement are welcome to tank those mobs - I'm trying to make it go smooth and quick already and I've usually got a far better feel for what the group can do.

You can never trust someone else to stun for you in a group of random people. You also cannot trust that your stun will work. Very often melee is use stuns in DPS rotations. If you need/want to make sure something is stunned make sure to tell them not to stun.

[Sanguisio]

From a healer pov.

If doing a speed run, please space your CDs, many tanks pop them all at the same time which is great if you have OP blms who obliterate things quickly, but quite often if you do this you leave the healer to heal you with no CDs which is fine for some but ive seen healers fail to this.