Tanks that think they are DPS, just stop...

[Fyce]

I don't like tanking, I suck at tanking. But what I can say from my experience is that this is false.
Extra HP is irrelevant to the extent that every tier we get ripped the same amount of HP percentage per buster. The only variation being the order in which you use your mitigation.
And chances are you are using a CD, outside of tank stance and getting shielded by a sch or an ast. If you are doing it right that is. Any more hp than necessary is a waste of stats.
Having more hp doesn't equal mitigation because you should be mitigating as a team anyways. And no, you shouldn't be dropping as hard as I think you are implying.

If a Tank buster hits for 50-55k and you have 36K HP, you'll need more mitigation to survive than if you had 47k HP. If I'm wrong on that statement, please tell me exactly why. I may not be good at math, but I think this is pretty straight forward and simple enough.

For example, in the situation I described, the 47k HP Tank can survive a 50-55k hit by simply staying in its tank stance or by simply poping Rampart. The 36K HP tank cannot. It needs either an additional defensive cooldown of its own, or from the team, or a Healer shield (Divine Benison, Adlo, N.A.Benefic... you name it).

This is also the reason why Defiance and Thrill Of Battle do what they're supposed to do.

Mitigation or not, it doesn't matter. All that matter is your eHP. And the less ressources you have to invest in that during battle, the better it is, because it means that you get more leeway, more room for error. (And easier cooldown management.)
Not every group can afford having a high risk/high reward type of gameplay.

So yes, saying that we have 5 useless equipment slots that does nothing if we put VIT accessories in them is silly and completly false.
It definitly does something, and something important. Some groups won't value that as much as others, but spreading the idea that "hurr durr, VIT is useless!" is the reason why we have noob tanks "following the meta", only to die like a DRG jumping in AoEs.

[HoodRat]

If a Tank buster hits for 50-55k and you have 36K HP, you'll need more mitigation to survive than if you had 47k HP. If I'm wrong on that statement, please tell me exactly why. I may not be good at math, but I think this is pretty straight forward and simple enough.

For example, in the situation I described, the 47k HP Tank can survive a 50-55k hit by simply staying in its tank stance or by simply poping Rampart. The 36K HP tank cannot. It needs either an additional defensive cooldown of its own, or from the team, or a Healer shield (Divine Benison, Adlo, N.A.Benefic... you name it).

Or the tank with 36k hp can use holmgang/hallowed ground/living dead to bypass the tank buster while rotating through the other CDs to keep damage intake down and then tank swapping as necessary in order to keep both the tanks' and healers' dps up. You know, like the tanks who actually know what they're doing do.

[Kinkoz]

snip

You're throwing out a LOT of theoretical circumstances here while treating them as hard evidence. The problem with that is, with the way content has been designed thus far, anything that hits for as hard as your maximum HP, MORE than your maximum HP, or just a LITTLE BIT LESS than your maximum HP is generally stuff that's intended to force you to use your panic, last ditch "not die" button (Hallowed, Holmgang, Living Dead) in order to survive regardless of how high your maximum HP value is. Or the attack is a hard enrage that's supposed to kill you anyway.

In addition, nobody said that we "have 5 useless equipment slots that does nothing if we put VIT accessories in them". The thing that everybody keeps saying is that it's a waste to give yourself MORE than what you need.

[KorenA]

If tanks aren't dps, then what are they? Do they not sit there and hit the boss or poke the adds? Such a mystery !

[Chrono_Rising]

Rule 1 of tank slaying: have enough hp to survive.

Rule 2 of tank slaying: don't equip anymore.

The situation you described sounds like it omits rule 1. Can current content be done with full slaying? Sure. Does that mean every group can/will? No. Not every strategy works for everyone, and not every strategy allows for full slaying. Our first mission parameter is to live, everything after is gravy. It's about adapting to the situation at hand.

[KalinOrthos]

And if the tank gets hit with a few unlucky crits in a row? What then? Boiling it down to "lol git gud" is a stupid dismissal to act like a glorified DPS. Your first priority should be, as a tank, to hold aggro and mitigate damage, which is what the accessories do by giving you more eHP. The idea that we have to forego the accessories for our item level to get accessories from the last expansion because "hurrdurr its more dps" is not what I signed up for as a paladin.

[Chrono_Rising]

And if the tank gets hit with a few unlucky crits in a row? What then? Boiling it down to "lol git gud" is a stupid dismissal to act like a glorified DPS. Your first priority should be, as a tank, to hold aggro and mitigate damage, which is what the accessories do by giving you more eHP. The idea that we have to forego the accessories for our item level to get accessories from the last expansion because "hurrdurr its more dps" is not what I signed up for as a paladin.

If this is an issue then you don't have enough HP for the strategy you are using. See rule 1. However, I strongly expect 270 slaying to be patched out in 10 days and so this issue will likely be settled or pointless by then.

Honestly I don't like having to make this type of adjustment, more damage or vit, but as long as it exists it is a massive gain for the group. I hope SE just makes the sensible decision and puts some strength on fending or fixes the damage calculation or fixes tenacity to scale better.

[KalinOrthos]

If this is an issue then you don't have enough HP for the strategy you are using. See rule 1.

That's what I'm saying. Vit should be taking priority, and if you can skim off the top without sacrificing your tankiness to make room for some DPS accessories, then consider it for a few lower damage fights to make sure you can make it through.

[Chrono_Rising]

That's what I'm saying. Vit should be taking priority, and if you can skim off the top without sacrificing your tankiness to make room for some DPS accessories, then consider it for a few lower damage fights to make sure you can make it through.

Agreed, as long as you are healable and not dieing every time the wind blows your fine.

[Lyth]

And if the tank gets hit with a few unlucky crits in a row? What then? Boiling it down to "lol git gud" is a stupid dismissal to act like a glorified DPS. Your first priority should be, as a tank, to hold aggro and mitigate damage, which is what the accessories do by giving you more eHP. The idea that we have to forego the accessories for our item level to get accessories from the last expansion because "hurrdurr its more dps" is not what I signed up for as a paladin.

This is a valid concern. You should, as a tank, always strive to develop an understanding of how much damage each attack does, and what the timings are. You should know the average crit values for autos. You should know the timing of cleaves. This information gives you an idea of what is safe, and what isn't. If there's a risk of autos syncing up with tankbusters, then you need to be able to have enough eHP to at least survive both a crit auto and the tankbuster by a reasonable factor of safety. If you don't have this information, you're forced to play it safe until you've gathered the knowledge that you need. The most aggressive tanks in farm are often the most defensively minded in prog.

Tanking is an active process, not a passive one. As you learn more and more about the fight, you become more efficient. You learn the HP thresholds. You learn which parts have less tank damage and more raid damage, allowing you to drop stance more. You learn places where you can shield your teammates to reduce the healing load, allowing your healers more windows to dps (your healers are learning how to heal more efficiently to push their dps while this is happening, too). You learn where to use your active cooldowns in a way that makes you far, far more defensive than any "defensively-minded" tank, without compromising your damage contribution to the team either. You learn to quickly identify when your team is in trouble, and what defensive countermeasures you can take to stop things from spiralling out of control. You learn when to be greedy, and when to be safe. Tanking is about knowledge, awareness, and good judgement. A sizeable number of the tanks who are playing with their offensive and defensive balance aren't simply being reckless or blindly following trends. They're making measured decisions based a thorough understanding of the defensive requirements of a fight.

I think the point isn't really to show off certain tanks as being "higher skill", but rather to show an ideal towards every tank should strive towards.