Tanks, please use strength gear.. :(

[Nektulos-Tuor]

This brings up the other half of the "skill" thing. Let's remember the rules of fist:

If you are not an experienced tank who knows the ins and outs of a given dungeon, run with Vitality accessories (not necessarily full VIT, but two or three pieces to lend some wriggle room.)
If you are not an experienced tank who knows the ins and outs of a given dungeon, don't do multi-pack pulls.
If you are an experienced tank who knows the ins and outs of a dungeon, run with Strength accessories to accelerate kill times and look badass.
If you are an experienced tank who knows the ins and outs of a dungeon, do multi-pack pulls as you see fit to accelerate clear times and look badass.

If your group has absolute garbage AoE capability (like, say, PLD, double NIN and a SCH), take whatever build you want but for the love of the DarkWaradin don't pull half the sodding dungeon in one go.

Now notice how the scenario you describe doesn't jive with those guidelines? Like as not your tank was just a novice who thought he was the new hotness about to go solo Savage.

Except this has happened repeatedly and most tanks, even experienced ones just run full vitality and seem to go afk in the dungeon after they pull the room. One even had 3 counters on them. Then went to pull another room after he was dying and said: "Sorry, I usually live through that."

Then vote kicked me.

You are not every player, have you run with a healer yet or are you the tank yourself? You have to see both sides to get the full effect of the story. You yourself sound like a strength tank, so my favorite and pref to run with.

He was a ilvl 180+ novice then...

Every tank I have ever played with in my runs as a healer pull rooms regardless of how geared or class they are.

Some don't even wait for your faerie or protect. Lol.

[Duelle]

Except the leveling in this game is a giant tutorial. Honestly how do you not understand a basic rotation after leveling? You get 1 ability at a time in a way where it pretty much spells out when and how it should be used as well as a decent span of time before they give you the next step. Oh that's right they assume you have a brain and actually read what the abilities say in the tool tip.

Would you rather feel like a genius in a giant sea of bad, or would you rather have more people performing at near-acceptable levels? In some cases every little bit helps, and chances are this is why they're working on that "beginner's palace" thing.

I'll also disagree on the tutorial bit. Otherwise you wouldn't be seeing so many tanks in the 30's that still don't know that Fast Blade combos into Savage Blade for increased enmity on single targets and that Flash should be used for the enmity instead of the Blind effect.

[Erit]

-Snip-

Perhaps "experienced" wasn't quite the word I was looking for. Vitality says one of two things at this point: "I'm lazy" or "I'm scared". Once you move past "scared" and gain confidence in the dungeon and start pushing to do things better and better with every pass, that's what I meant by "experienced"; sadly, lazy can't be pushed past. It can only be dealt with and carried like a millstone tied to your genitals.

And no, I myself don't play as a healer very often. I let my girlfriend who plays right next to me and gives me constant feedback do that job, and sometimes FCmates if they feel like capping Esos. I've carried a handful underperforming DPS who could have done more damage by just sitting still and auto-attacking, and I can attest that if the healer runs out of juice on garbage, it's because either they goofed up, the tank goofed up, or the DPS forgot to equip their brains that run. Tank DPS can only accelerate matters one way or another, but a tank's itemization is not the root of the problem in the situation you described.

If they chain pull regardless of gear then... well, you can't heal stupid no matter how much MP you throw at it. I know when I first hit my experts in i147 I pulled everything one pack at a time and finished them off semi-cleanly. Then again, I come from Aion's style of tanking, which is the kind of trial-by-fire that puts the fear of god into you.

[Sapphidia]

However when EVERY SINGLE TANK, goes into full room pulls you don't really have time to switch out to DPS especially if your a ilvl154 new healer like I am. Every time I have had a strength tank we have been doing fine because I am able to keep him up and the mobs die fast.

I figured this thread was starting to devolve into the OP's personal whining rather than actual proper theory, and this explains why.

You're a new scholar. In average gear. You are worried about fight length and worried about running out of mana.

No Scholar should ever run out of mana unless they're managing cooldowns incorrectly, DPSing hard, having to resurrect people or terribly geared.

Even in i154 a scholar should be able to find a few cooldowns to DoT up a pack and bane them. Scholar AOE dps is much much bigger than the difference between a tank going vit vs str accessories.

All of the sweeping statements you've made are from a few runs where some bad/lazy tanks have had issues and you've equated it with Vit/Str. Strawman arguments all over the place. Good tanks are good, bad tanks are bad, the best tanks choose their gear setup as appropriate to the lineup of the party. A paladin in a group with a BLM/SMN/SCH would probably be better off going heavier vit and pulling gigantic packs because they'll be mostly Flashing anyway and doing much lower AOE dps compared to the rest. A Warrior would most likely always be full strength.

There's 100% truth that a bit of extra vit on the tank should allow a few extra seconds of DPS on a healer, and for a scholar who wants to throw up 4-5 cast times for maximum AOE dps on a pack, it really sucks to have a tank with 14000 hp who needs a heal after 3-4 gcds. Yes, it depends on gear level, and once a tank is in 190+ gaer on the left side then yes, go strength. I'd never want to see a fresh 145 tank going full strength and pulling huge packs though unless the group was prepared.

If you're worried about -running out of mana- in a 4man instance, then it's nothing whatsoever to do with whether the tank runs vit or str, and it's purely coincidence. They're managing cooldowns incorrectly, or you're healing incorrectly. The 15-20% extra tank DPS gained from going glass cannon compared to full vit should never be the difference between killing a pack fine and the healer running out of mana.

[Duuude007]

I'm a fan of the OP's suggestion. and I still get the occasional crap healers who struggle with half-pulls and blame me specifically because while I am overgeared, I prefer to use str accessories as a WAR. The horror.

There is no happy medium.

[Nektulos-Tuor]

The 15-20% extra tank DPS gained from going glass cannon compared to full vit should never be the difference between killing a pack fine and the healer running out of mana.

That seems rather foolish.

Bonuses multiply with bonuses, that extra 20% + the extra 15-20% you get from darkside and maim or the extra 30% you get from FoF makes a HUGE difference. "Glass Cannon?" you lose no mitigation from switching vitality to strength. Gaining more health just makes the fight last longer, it does NOT make your healer heal any better. It does not improve your mitigation, it does not suddenly make the mobs on you hit for less.

As for pulls, yes I don't run out of mana with normal pulls and I can heal just fine and even cleric stance. However, most tanks "do not do normal pulls" They pull 3-4 encounters at a time and usually mass pull. 5 seconds is the difference between full HP and dead. Your full HP does not help.

However, doing the following for example does.

Warrior:
Maim+Internal Release+Full Berserk+Bloodbath+Vengeance+Infuriate+Unleash+Overpower+Full Strength Gear. ((Huge combo I know...))
Now you are healing significantly every time your attacked and every overpower hit. You are also doing a good chunk of damage and killing the mobs faster.

Dark Knight
Darkside+Salted Earth+Unleash/Or Abyssal Drain. (Use a CD if needed!)
Now you are dealing significant threat and pushing that damage on the mobs. It does a bit more damage then the Warriors version but has less sustain.

I don't play and have never played Paladin past 30 so I will not comment on them.

10000 and (2000 hps) vs 5000 (4000 hps)

Sustain beats it out every time unless the mob hits for 5001.

[Gooner_iBluAirJGR]

Str gives all the tanks extra damage but Warriors are the only one of the three tanks that get massive defensive returns from the added attack power i.e. 30 seconds of Bloodbath, Inner Beast, Storms Path, Eqilibrium, Berserk + all of those skills.

DRK doesn't have as many self healing options as the warrior so I can understand a DRK opting for more VIT gear. Same goes for PLD.

If you're wondering, I use 3 Vit / 2 Slaying on my warrior and paladin.

[Erit]

Str gives all the tanks extra damage but Warriors are the only one of the three tanks that get massive defensive returns from the added attack power i.e. 30 seconds of Bloodbath, Inner Beast, Storms Path, Eqilibrium, Berserk + all of those skills.

DRK doesn't have as many self healing options as the warrior so I can understand a DRK opting for more VIT gear. Same goes for PLD.

If you're wondering, I use 3 Vit / 2 Slaying on my warrior and paladin.

VIT is still a detriment for Dark Knights due to Living Dead. Enough VIT to not be mistaken for a DPS, and then as much STR as you can hoard after that is the optimal setup, especially in the context of AoE tanking. I'll see your Warrior Overpower spam with Bloodbath and Vengeance on, and raise you Blood Price plus alternating DA>AD and Unleash spams with DP weaving. Assuming all other variables normalized, methinks that situation works out to about the same amount of effort for the healer to carry you through, but I'll defer to the judgement of the people who know how numbers work on that.

[Sapphidia]

Bonuses multiply with bonuses, that extra 20% + the extra 15-20% you get from darkside and maim or the extra 30% you get from FoF makes a HUGE difference.

You're assuming that a tank with some Vit wont use Maim/FoF/Darkside. Of course they will. 15-20% damage from Strength accessories is 15-20% damage. Not more. The tank's rotation wont change. They'll still use those skills regardless of stats.

5 seconds is the difference between full HP and dead. Your full HP does not help

If the extra Vit you gain changes it from 4 seconds to 6 seconds that's a whole extra GCD of damage a healer could do from a quick swap to cleric stance. And you CAN use cleric stance on big pulls. I have no issue with tanks pulling multiple packs of mobs when im healing on scholar, with a prepull shielding you can easily get a quick rotation of DoTs to Bane. Unless your tank is toting 14,000 health.

I'm not advocating full Vit. I'm just saying that a LOW GEARED tank trying to make big pulls will be hindering things if they go purely strength and dont hit a minimum threshold of comfortable health that means they can stay alive for 5-6 seconds without heals rather than 3-4.

And on the subject of paladins, they have next to no useable self healing on huge pulls and do far less AOE damage than other tanks as most aoe enmity comes from Flash which does no damage. They only have a crossclassed Bloodbath and Flash of course wont heal them from this. Bar Circle of Scorn on a 25 second cooldown, paladin aoe damage is limited to just cycling single target attacks. There's a reason that in 2.5 most paladins doing speed runs in instances tended to stack pure vit for the gigantic pulls, because they did minimal damage compared to the AOE of the healer/dps, so may as well let the healer DPS more.

[Gooner_iBluAirJGR]

I'll see your Warrior Overpower spam with Bloodbath and Vengeance on, and raise you Blood Price plus alternating DA>AD and Unleash spams with DP weaving.

Yeah the HPS / AoE dps from those combos probably end up evening out—you're right. Without doing any hard testing though, I'd like to think (or hope) Berserk and Equilibrium put Warriors AoE dps/hps ahead lol.

@living dead, you're right, having HP in the 18k range makes a full heal pretty difficult but from my personal experience with seeing the skill in action, benediction is always mysteriously available LOL.