A lesson for tanks with hot tempers.

[Yunona]

So I started my morning with my alt, who is a 38 WAR and I grind a lot so I just unlocked Brayflox yesterday. Started off good, til the SMN suddenly decided to bring out Titan, I hadn't lost aggro,no one died, I was doing good. I got a bit too upset and said "Tank it" the healer and him went on to fight and died, then I did, the other dps sat with me and I guess she agreed with me. The talk after that was the healer berating me which was fair. I let them die, Then the SMN said it was just for fun. We went the rest of the dungeon without talking, until we beat the last boss. Then I said I was sorry, said I felt a bit insulted but overall I admitted I overreacted. The healer gave no shits, and my friendly dps said its okay. The SMN said this "thats why you chose tanking, cause you love Titan." during the arguing I said as a SMN I love titan, he wasn't mad he just understood and even laughed. I even got his player com. So I guess, I should control my anger, but he was a good guy.

[rawker]

Tanking ain't for the weak of heart and pride higher than Mt. Everest.

[Hayward]

Tanking ain't for the weak of heart and pride higher than Mt. Everest.

^ right here. There's no place for egotism or arrogance in the Tank role.

[Yunona]

^ right here. There's no place for egotism or arrogance in the Tank role.

I wasn't trying to be.. I was saying I learned my lesson.. geez

[rawker]

Though you subconsciously did it. Don't worry. We're not picking on you or anything. What's important is you learned a valuable lesson.

[Lan_Mantear]

Tanking ain't for the weak of heart and pride higher than Mt. Everest.

I disagree. There is plenty of room for ego and pride. Just don't let it get in the way of the party's objective.

[Ralvenom]

To be fair, that was a dick move on the SMN's part. Even "for fun", there's no freakin' reason a SMN should have a pet that grabs aggro during a dungeon.

[Jpec07]

It can be extremely easy to forget that leading a dungeon group means serving a dungeon group. As tanks, we inherently lead. To tank well, we must lead well, which means we must serve well. And a temper is not conducive to these goals.

Still, when you're just trying to have a quick, smooth run, having something like this happen can be incredibly frustrating. Sometimes I feel like tanks have to deal with the most mental and emotional pressure in group content, because we're dealing so much with expectations on us that we may not even realize. We need to be conscious of these pressures and take time to manage them properly (i.e. If you're chaining dungeons and a group just pissed you off, take five minutes to rant about it on your private Twitter before continuing).

I've gotten to a point where I usually won't be mean anymore (though sometimes, I let the uglier side show). And if I'm mean, I usually try to apologize promptly and completely. Communication at the start of a dungeon or trial is usually extremely helpful in managing expectations, I've found, and makes runs go a lot more smoothly, and give me less opportunity for the latent ugliness in my personality to show. I've almost thought about making a macro to hit each time to help manage those expectations, but that could get annoying pretty quickly.

[Lan_Mantear]

I think there is a misconception, especially among tank mains, that Tank = Leader. I used to think so as well, but after some thought, I no longer think that to be true or at least, not completely accurate. The tank is doing the pulling, yes, but that's a pertinent role of a fisherman, not a leader.

Its easy for a tank to fill the leadership role, I agree. However, one could argue that a healer or a dps could also fill that role. In reality leadership of a PUG party goes to whomever has the loudest voice, and as we all know, that's not always a good thing.

In my experience, most players are very passive aggressive, they'll silently gripe about a situation or abandon it entirely, and rarely will they do anything to resolve something, without it devolving into some kind of pissing match. I think that attitude needs to change. Though I don't know how we would go about changing this game's culture so drastically.

In response to the OP, it was perfectly fine to show your displeasure at the Summoner, just as it was perfectly fine for the Summoner to respond with, "It was just for fun". How you guys deal with the situation will determine if you come out of it in a good or foul mood. It seems as though you ended it well enough with no hard feelings, that's the important thing, and kudo's to you, OP, for owning up to your attitude afterwards. Not many people do that.

[ArdorGrey]

To be fair, that was a dick move on the SMN's part. Even "for fun", there's no freakin' reason a SMN should have a pet that grabs aggro during a dungeon.

Seriously. The irony in the first two posts sermonizing tc like there's something wrong taking issue with a smn pulling out titan is staggeringly ironic.