How do you deal with sluggish tanks?

[Akei]

My personal experience is that the healer / DPS really set the pace for the dungeon.

As a tank, sure I go first ... but its upto them to do the majority of the actual killing of crap. In an Ideal world that is. I've found with DF that alot of the time I'll out DPS them (as a paladin sadly) and so the pace of the dungeon is really out of my control. Yes I'll pull the next pack right away (Honestly the ONLY thing I look at is healer MP, healer has 60%+ I'm good to pull) but when it takes 2mins+ to kill a pack of mobs ... well I cant be held accountable for that.

To be fair, its *very* rare that I use RoH combo on a paladin. For most run's I wont use it at all. DPS are just not even in the ballpark of pulling threat from me. Generally any pack of 5+ Mobs I'll be in Shield Oath for (Although I do use full str right side) and bosses I'll start and stay in Sword Oath for. Thats not saying *all* the DPS I get are wank .. just today I had a Bard unload on a fractal boss and snag aggro from me, awesome !!! A RoH combo and we were good. That said on the other bosses I did weave in a couple of RoH combos (Esp that stupid Mino since I move from his 360 swing) and we were golden. When I get great (Hell even good) DPS a dungeon run is fast. When the DPS is slacking it takes longer, hell theres only so much I can do as far as DPS goes /shrug.

Like other tanks here, I take the first pull as a guage to how many I should be pulling from there on. So if you slack on the first pull, expect me to pull light from then on.

People have mentioned Trees and Bees, generally I pull all of them, I do pay attention though and Hallowed / CD as required. I have to say *most* DPS are really good and focus down the Bees correctly, then I'll just drag the tree up the hill and kill it with the 2 totems and Vanu up there. Its rare that DPS dont kill bees first ... CD's will carry you through it though.

I've been pleased to see more and more Healers doing decent DPS now though, thats speeding runs up. Not all Healers DPS and its not something I *expect* of healers, Just really nice to see them laying in some hurt on pulls, makes me feel good about my CD usage that they are comfortable enough to CS and throw out some DPS between heals.

Bottom line though, tanks pull and hold hate, do what DPS we can. The overall *pace* or *speed* of a dungeon comes down to how fast crap dies .. and thats all about DPS. DPS players, Healers doing DPS and tanks pushing as much DPS as poss. When you get a group that does that its a fast run, for each part missing the run slows more and more. So in conclusion .. fast runs are not just about the tank, its a group effort.

And if a tank stops and stands infront of a boss ask him why if it bugs you so much. I know I did it yesterday, Healer was great and throwing out a ton of DPS on trash, mana management may not have been his strong suit though, so we hit the boss with him at 2K mana, so I waited until 9K (About 70%) before I pulled. No way was I irritated at the healer though, the 15s we had to wait was easy made up on the kill times from his added DPS on trash /shrug.

[Kaisersoke]

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Your opinion, but if you get, lets say, a paladin, a black mage, a summoner, and a scholar, and the tank decides to pull 3 mobs at a time, its certainly the tank setting the pace. The reason tanks set the pace is because it is frowned upon for a DPS to pull extra mobs when the tank has stopped. Yes, the damage dealers and healer most certainly effect the speed, but the pace and the speed are two different things. The pace is dictated solely by how the tank pulls, and the speed is what the rest of the party influences. For the example I provided above, its almost guaranteed that the completion speed would benefit from a faster pace, set by the tank by the pull size, because the group has several high potency AoE jobs. The thread is about dealing with sluggish tanks, and how to deal with their sluggish paces when the group is very capable of handling a quick pace.

[Akei]

Your opinion, ....

Well I did say in my post that I, like most tanks, will use the first pull as a measure of what the group can handle. Also lets be fair, the way dungeons are structured your generally looking at 2-3 *pulls* between each boss due to gating. Neverreap - First island is generally 1 pull. Thats my guage. Slow kill I'll split the second island into 2 pulls, good rate next island is a single pull etc. I'm not arguing that there are not tanks out there that try to split pulls as small as possible. Hell I read a thread the other day about a tank who single pulled the trash in Fractal /boggle.

For a tank to pull that small there really has to be a reason. Not comfortable with the instance. Not comfortable on the class. Dubious of other party members (Healer / DPS) Communication is key here. Ask the tank why they are pulling light. If they have a reasonable answer, *I'm new here* you can either deal with it and talk to them about the pace or leave. As I said in my post, Healers who DPS I love, but I never expect it going into a DF. Unfortunatly you will get new tanks or fearful tanks in DF. I'm just saying that with an experienced tank, pace is a group effort and not something a tank alone can control. I've been in many DF groups that run 20-25 mins and just muttered to myself about DPS not pushing hard enough. Its DF though you take your lumps. I'll pull as fast as the group can handle, I love sub-20 min clears. However in DF I generally find my clear time is around the 22 min mark .. and the DPS run sub 800 over all DPS numbers, which is tragic with the amount of AoE that can be done on trash. (Yes I'm talking about SMN and BLM too here )


Your point seems to be that in a capable group that's pushing high DPS and killing fast, the tank can hold up progress by adding wait time between packs. Yup that can happen, probably because of one of the reasons I've covered, maby the tank is new and is'ent confident with the instance and wants X CD up before he pulls again. There's alot of reasons a tank would be slow.

Bottom line, if the tank is waiting between packs the best way to deal with that is to talk to him/her. Pulling ahead wont work for a tank who's already on edge because they are new. Tanks tend to get alot of heat when they mess up, it tends to make new tanks alot more cautious, talk to them, encourage them to push harder and reassure them that your not gonna go apeshit if there is a problem and a wipe. Hell its how tanks get better, some personality types wont deal well with you pushing them without at least some encouragement and reassurance that a death / wipe is not the end of the world.

I've played tanks since DAOC back in 2004 (I was a Druid in EQ O_o) so I'm comfortable with the role, and I tend to join games with friends, friends who dont mind my pushing to limits and getting them killed a fair bit to learn those limits. Not everyone is as lucky and I would imagine that leveling a tank through DF alone with random people all the time can be very daunting for newer players. A bit of communication and compassion goes along way to ease the tank queue and get more tanks in there.

So *how do you deal with sluggish tanks* .... HELP THEM. (Yes I do queue as DPS at times, and I do practice what I preach ... I help them !!)

[Kaisersoke]

At this point, whether youre new or not, youve dealt with level 50 dungeons and large trash pulls, and you should most certainly know your job, so I cant imagine anyone actually using "im new" as an excuse to slow the pace for three people who are capable, but thats just my opinion. all those large pulls are 100% handleable at lower ilvls, and no tank that knows their job will lose aggro. in a game like WoW, there are plenty of other incentives for doing those dungeons to justify slower runs, but in a game like ffxiv, where the ONLY reason people queue is to get their tomes asap and leave, there isnt enough incentive for people to want to spend 10 extra minutes for a tank that wanted to move at a turtle-esque pace. Personally if im not happy with the tanks pace, ill just flat out leave without saying a word because this game is not rewarding enough for me to spend that much extra time in those places because one person is uncomfortable with a quick pace. we're nearly 5 (i think?) months into the expac, and people have done the experts hundred and hundreds of times, to the point where theyre sick of it. The only way people are going to WANT to help new tanks like that is for more rewards, and as is, a few extra tomes of law, we have nothing to spend them on, and for eso, we were going to cap easily by doing our roullete anyway, nobody wants to deal with the slow tank.

i dont mind new tanks. i tank myself sometimes, and i understand that its sometimes daunting and intimidating, but its just about efficiency, and id rather just leave, log out, and go spend some time doing something i enjoy rather than running a dungeon i dont really wanna do and spending extra time in it because the tank didnt feel comfortable with month old content that is extremely easy, i mean really. these new experts are brain meltingly boring, with boring boss mechanics and artificial gating to stop things from turning into 2.0 WP. they arent rewarding enough or fun enough to want to crawl through them

[NovaWulfe]

"Hey, if both the tank and healer feel comfortable with it, could we try bigger pulls?"

Works 95% of the time for me.

[Archaell]

You deal with sluggish tanks by playing one yourself - that way you are also helping to decrease queue times.

For the "bigger pulls", both on my healer and tank, I do not like the idea of bigger pulls - in PUGs. Why should one risk wipe, when you can have nice smooth run and let healer dps without getting heart attack? Now, I do suck it up, if the healer asks, even if its my first run of the instance, but in my opinion it isn't worth the stress. Tank's job is to tank without losing enmity, which can get quite difficult just by gear/level difference alone, without adding "bigger" pulls on the list.

[Disc]

I just pull extra garbage if they won't. I mean what's he gonna do? Tank it?

[Fevelle]

I just pull extra garbage if they won't. I mean what's he gonna do? Tank it?

You're probably going to die if you do it on a party with me healing and will get kicked afterwards. DPS are quite dispendable, y'know.

[Malevicton]

You're probably going to die if you do it on a party with me healing and will get kicked afterwards. DPS are quite dispendable, y'know.

Everyone's pretty expendable. Who's harder to replace is a pretty weak reason to kick or not kick someone though.

Kinda tired of the tanks-and-healers-call-the-shots-because-q-times rhetoric. If the only way you can justify your importance is because you're better than an empty spot, then you can try harder.

[Disc]

You're probably going to die if you do it on a party with me healing and will get kicked afterwards. DPS are quite dispendable, y'know.

And that should bother me why? I dodge a bad party & lockout, looking at ~5 minutes for my next queue. Meanwhile you get a weaker DPS who probably doesn't even have access to raid gear.