First Blog... damn pallys
Posted 06-20-2008 at 11:53 PM by Magnuss
Well i figured i would go ahead and write something in here for once since i had a bit of downtime and a very interesting day today.
AS soon as i got off work and logged into my account today one of my buddies whispered me and asked if i wanted to do a heroic. This friend of mine has always been of the highest quality and skill and so i very rarely turn him down for an opportunity to tank. Then he hit me with a bombshell. He asked me to DPS!
Now this normally wouldnt be a big deal for most of you out there but for me, i have a general rule for my warrior. NEVER respec. My warrior will not respec anything other than protection. He might adjust his prot spec here and there but he will never go dps. So being asked to DPS when typically i am asked to be a tank was surprising, but i of course said sure.
I get invited to the group and come to find out the tank for this group is a paladin. Not just any paladin, one who had just hit 70. Now dont get mistaken this bad boy is a powerleveling fool who had his epic patterns crafted before he was level 60. So he went straight from quest greens and blues to half epics and is now about to tank Heroic shattered halls (the daily quest).
Our lovely paladin tank has never really tanked anything against hardcore dps like we were bringing (my dps gear gives me 2000 attack power unbuffed and i was the lowest one in the group with my prot spec). So we had our mage who plays another prot pally walking him through a few key do and do nots as we started the instance.
Now me, being the jerk that i am decided it would be fun to whirlwind and cleave everything i could. make this paladin work for it and pull mobs like i typically do with my warrior. Such was my horrible mistake.....
Protection paladins do what took me months to learn in about 2 and a half seconds. consecrate, shield throwy-thing and BAM threat. With my devastate/heroic strike spam and WW as i could i was pulling down 680 dps. The mage in the group was pulling 1200-1800 dps and the warlock around 1100... and this boot paladin was holding it like it was nothing.
Sure there were some occasions where he lost a little something here or there but then we would just throw his shield and BAM, its his again.
I hate you guys... not because i actually hate you, but because it makes me realise how fail warriors really are in a HUGE element of the game. Yeah i can tank a raid boss more efficiently than a paladin can mostly. But i am considered a very capable warrior because i can do about half of what the average barely geared protection paladin can.
We ended up running 6 heroics this afternoon. Not once did we wipe on anything and not once did a heroic take longer than 45 minutes. I couldnt have been happier with the badges i got and how everything went but i did get a real kick in the nuts in terms of how good i am versus a prot paladin.
After today it makes me wonder why anyone would prefer a warrior in an instance, i really dont understand why i would be asked to tank something over any number of even half decent paladins with how gimped i am comparatively.
Let me ask you guys... why would you want a prot warrior over a solid paladin if you had the choice?
AS soon as i got off work and logged into my account today one of my buddies whispered me and asked if i wanted to do a heroic. This friend of mine has always been of the highest quality and skill and so i very rarely turn him down for an opportunity to tank. Then he hit me with a bombshell. He asked me to DPS!
Now this normally wouldnt be a big deal for most of you out there but for me, i have a general rule for my warrior. NEVER respec. My warrior will not respec anything other than protection. He might adjust his prot spec here and there but he will never go dps. So being asked to DPS when typically i am asked to be a tank was surprising, but i of course said sure.
I get invited to the group and come to find out the tank for this group is a paladin. Not just any paladin, one who had just hit 70. Now dont get mistaken this bad boy is a powerleveling fool who had his epic patterns crafted before he was level 60. So he went straight from quest greens and blues to half epics and is now about to tank Heroic shattered halls (the daily quest).
Our lovely paladin tank has never really tanked anything against hardcore dps like we were bringing (my dps gear gives me 2000 attack power unbuffed and i was the lowest one in the group with my prot spec). So we had our mage who plays another prot pally walking him through a few key do and do nots as we started the instance.
Now me, being the jerk that i am decided it would be fun to whirlwind and cleave everything i could. make this paladin work for it and pull mobs like i typically do with my warrior. Such was my horrible mistake.....
Protection paladins do what took me months to learn in about 2 and a half seconds. consecrate, shield throwy-thing and BAM threat. With my devastate/heroic strike spam and WW as i could i was pulling down 680 dps. The mage in the group was pulling 1200-1800 dps and the warlock around 1100... and this boot paladin was holding it like it was nothing.
Sure there were some occasions where he lost a little something here or there but then we would just throw his shield and BAM, its his again.
I hate you guys... not because i actually hate you, but because it makes me realise how fail warriors really are in a HUGE element of the game. Yeah i can tank a raid boss more efficiently than a paladin can mostly. But i am considered a very capable warrior because i can do about half of what the average barely geared protection paladin can.
We ended up running 6 heroics this afternoon. Not once did we wipe on anything and not once did a heroic take longer than 45 minutes. I couldnt have been happier with the badges i got and how everything went but i did get a real kick in the nuts in terms of how good i am versus a prot paladin.
After today it makes me wonder why anyone would prefer a warrior in an instance, i really dont understand why i would be asked to tank something over any number of even half decent paladins with how gimped i am comparatively.
Let me ask you guys... why would you want a prot warrior over a solid paladin if you had the choice?
Total Comments 13
Comments
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I like to think that I can do better than a paladin in many places as long as they dont have aoe. Not having to drink certainly means i can keep on pulling esp with a decently geared healer. All the paladins i've run with need to stop to drink. Shattered halls however certainly can be depressingPosted 06-21-2008 at 01:29 AM by Evelaula 
- The arrival of badge gear, welfare epics, and changes to heroics have distorted the 5-man scene quite a bit. Not to mention that you seem to be running with a group of epiced out folks, doing content that simply was not made for this type of gear.
A year or so ago -- when heroic Underbog Lords could two-shot a decently geared tank -- the increased mitigation of a warrior (Thunder Clap, Demoralizing Shout, among other things), was pretty significantl. Then, it often didn't matter how fast you did a heroic, but whether you had a reasonable chance of success (for the record, we're talking about 8k melee hits that could co-occur with 8k instant attacks).
Of course, Blizzard did drop the ball in the tank balance department. It's not really great that tanking classes are so over-specialized that each excels in a completely different area. (I am not sure I can adequately convey how moronic I find the idea of having a tanking class specialized for off-tanking, i.e. feral druids.)
On the other hand, it's not entirely Blizzard's fault. Part of it is also the obsession of the playerbase with minmaxing, even when there is absolutely no need to minmax. There's also a refusal to entertain alternatives: Pre-TBC, mages prided themselves on being able to solo AE situations. These days, too many want their hands being held by a paladin tank.Posted 06-21-2008 at 05:33 AM by Roana - Yes, a warrior provides increased mitigation in a 5man situation. Not to mention, the warrior's primary threat scaling (block value) shines at providing mitigation in heroics. When I wear boss gear, with 2k more armor, I actually take more, not less damage. Blocking 800+ off a 2.5k attack is huge.
I've accepted that paladins excel in speedruns/aoe runs. Regardless, I actually enjoy the challenge of a no-CC Shattered Halls heroic, pulling as fast as my groupmates will let me.Posted 06-21-2008 at 07:38 AM by Finelle -
On the topic of running heroics with epic grade gear that the instances were really not balanced for, I put forth the question following question: When most of us are actually throwing on full threat gear, sitting down to get crit, mooning mobs so we can't dodge attacks, why does damage mitigation matter in a 5 man? Yes, warriors have superior mitigation vs a paladin. What does it matter when you're begging them to put curse of the shattered hand on you and sitting down for rage?Posted 06-21-2008 at 01:33 PM by Alent -
@alent: I do the same thing. I beg my mages to not decurse me in SH. I need that extra damage coming in for the rage. I'm getting to the point now where I find myself rage starved in some situations.Posted 06-21-2008 at 03:26 PM by Vissara - Alent, it really only matters because of badges (i.e., getting T5/T6-equivalent gear from T4-equivalent content). If it weren't for badges, nobody with rage problems would even care about running a heroic (except to occasionally help undergeared friends, where it really doesn't matter). And heroic Shattered Halls would be about as popular as Stratholme these days (or non-heroic 5-mans, for that matter).
Posted 06-22-2008 at 04:15 AM by Roana - As kind of an odd echo to the Opener, I experienced the "zomg pally tank!" phenomena for the first time in a long time last night when tanking UB and SP on my paladin... two mages and a hunter w/ a bear pet who didn't seem to understand the concept of turning off growl.
They went balls to the wall as soon as I pulled, which was not so good because I'd respec'd to 35/21 for sanctity aura and don't have avenger's shield anymore... was quite the "omg... how stupid is this pug?!" moment.
I'm not sure how I feel about the strength of pally AoE tanking, there's a strong opportunity cost in the form of the knowledge and gear requirements to make it work. My run was successful only because I know how to generate single target threat in addition to my dumbfire consecrate + holy shield threat, and have prepared my gear to make it possible.
On the other hand, my main is a druid, and I feel all too personally the pain of being a "specialized offtank" I despise humping every raid boss' ass while spamming shred and rip, trying not to drop below the survival hunter's pet on the DPS meters, all the while thinking "I have the gear to main tank this... why don't they let me tank it just once to validate my existence?" (I'm sorry for the language, but that's just how rogue's do it.)
Incidently, I teamed up with the healer to kill the hunter's pet once just to see if he'd turn off growl - he did not. That was the only time the pet had aggro.
But, to finish my thought and where I was going with this... Remember that what a paladin has naturally that a warrior has to work for, so too a paladin has to work for what a warrior has naturally. Single target burst threat on a paladin is extremely difficult and until you learn it, the current kill target basically goes untanked, which is never a problem for warriors or druids.Posted 06-22-2008 at 10:13 AM by Alent - [QUOTE]I'm not sure how I feel about the strength of pally AoE tanking, there's a strong opportunity cost in the form of the knowledge and gear requirements to make it work.[/QUOTE]
This.
[QUOTE][B]Remember that what a paladin has naturally that a warrior has to work for, so too a paladin has to work for what a warrior has naturally. Single target burst threat on a paladin is extremely difficult until you learn it.[/B][/QUOTE]
And especially this.Posted 06-22-2008 at 04:10 PM by Joanadark - Pretty much what joana said so eloquently..
Posted 06-22-2008 at 05:08 PM by Nicki - Fair enough. In threat gear generating single target threat is easy is hell, even without a rotation, just /rollface and if Shield Slam is anywhere on your keybindings, you'll do fine.
Posted 06-22-2008 at 07:44 PM by Finelle -
You still take 4% less damage than a Tankadin (Right Fury versus Defense Stance).
You still have two essential debuffs (TC and Demo).
Your threat still scales better at the deep end game.
You are still better panic buttons.
You are still better on single targets, and single targets = bosses.
So yeah, Tankadins get to be a trash tank, and fly through 5 mans. Meanwhile when it comes time to tank something with a skull where it's level should be, unless you find a rare guild, you choose a Warrior.
Basically I'd gladly trade some of my 5 man ability to get more 25 man single target Boss tanking ability.Posted 06-23-2008 at 08:31 AM by Honorshammer
Updated 06-23-2008 at 08:52 AM by Honorshammer -
I I gave up my epic raid tankadin and re-rolled warrior. Never again will I be asked to heal - or 'relegated' to trash tanking. Yes it's ego-boosting to tank the boss, yes the other jobs are important too, but it's a game I play for fun; and tanking bosses is more fun to me.Posted 06-23-2008 at 10:15 AM by Bosk -
Eh, I understand to an extent where you are coming from though I have tanked so much and for so long, a little messing around as DPS would be a relief to me in alot of ways.
Do paladins have it easier in tanking multiple mobs? On paper and from what most people say, yeah, I guess so but I've never leveled a pally past 20 so I don't really know. What I do know is that when I am tanking, I have to control the action and keep all the mobs on me. In other words, I have to do my job. If someone thinks a paladin or druid can do it better, I'm not doing it(my job, that is).
So I don't dwell on what I cannot do, only work on what I can do and do it the best I can.
If you get turned down for PuGs because thet want a pally tank.....hell, I dunno...I haven't PuGged since Moby Dick was a minnow so I wouldn't know. Other than that, throw on some fury gear and at the very least, do some DW Devestate DPS and have fun. You don't get an extra badge for tanking it.Posted 06-23-2008 at 01:15 PM by Horacio
