[Raginbull]

I can't answer this for the rest of the people out there, but I can discuss it coming from my own experience. From the time I hit 70, I spend 4 months chain-running every heroic and karazhan I could get my hands on. I basically lived in instances, and always wanted to pug in new people to see if I was good enough to cover for them or to hold up aggro against them (in good or bad settings, of course). I would try my hardest to get through every instance with as little CC as possible to teach myself how to best react to certain situations and how to best deal with multi-target aggro and overcoming bad players.

All this to say: I cannot take it anymore. If I'm in a heroic instance now, I want to be in it with the people I ran with while learning it. I don't want to even have the opportunity to say "LAWL I OUT-DAMAGED THE ROGUE" because that's not fun. It means that I was doing my best, and watching out for people who just wanted to carry on and do their own thing, and I'm tired of it. I left a guild who took multiple nights on kara after months of having it on farm for another guild who fully cleared BT in 3 weeks start to finish. I have been spoiled by playing with good players in equivalent gear to my own, and I just don't want to worry about dealing with players who don't even know how to spam the 2 buttons they have to hit to do well anymore.

With me, it's not that tanks are in short supply, it's that good tanks get tired of bad players. Yes, I sound like everyone else in the thread, but there might be a reason for this. We get scrutinized more than anyone else in the instance, we're the only ones who don't get any room to screw up, and we're the first ones to receive blame regardless of whose fault it was that something went wrong. I would rather off-tank or devaspam in fury gear than have to MT with a group of sub-par players again, and every time I find myself running alts through things where there are good tank alts/newbies available, I cringe.

To the OP, I think that you hit a nerve with the community without intending to, because you brought up a subject that the majority of the people here are all too familiar with. We aren't some pack-mules that you can just send along our way with no incentive, hoping that we can just carry an instance group without any whining or objections. Please, have one of the players who needs a tank find one on his/her own, or better yet, roll one up and see what it's like to do it: a love/hate relationship that more often than not ends in frustration and irritation until you learn it, and a position that you just can't force yourself to give up because it's too much a thrill when it does go well.

[skreed]

You might try to tap your guild's pool of non-tanking Pallies/Druids/Warriors to work on their offspecs a bit. Maybe offer to pay their respec bills or donate all shards if they tank a couple of runs.

IMO... Humping trash mobs is the definition of tedium (I'd assume this is the case for most tanks). When your tank greatly outgears the content youre in (T5 tanks in most low and mid difficulty heroics), everything is a trash pull.

[Turmoil]

The sentiment of the original poster is very familiar to me.. from 6 months ago, when my priest was my main. I saw more and more of our guild tanks just not bothering to help - as many people have said, they just don't find it fun. As soon as they were out of a raid, they'd be either offline or PVP spec.. until next raid.

The solution I found? Well, there were two.
1. I made friends with one of our raid tanks. I chatted to him and we built up a friendship, and we'd go to heroics together to have fun with other people from the guild. He didn't mind, because he was having a good time - he knew I was a great healer, and I knew he was a great tank.
2. I finished levelling my warrior alt, and started to take it through heroics and kara. I was happy to tank anything and everything that I could handle, and not just because I needed the badges... but because I really enjoyed providing the service to my guildmates - it was the main reason I levelled the character. I know the frustration of spending hours waiting on a tank; it sucks, and if I can ease others' pain while having fun.. well, so much the better. I also know the pain of being pretty much guilt-tripped into playing a specific character (long, long ago, I played an enh shaman...), and it really feels like crap, so if I could help take the pressure off our tanks to play their tanks, I was happy to.

These days? My tank is my main, and usually I'm the one asking for heroic groups, so I can get to know people and have some mindless braindead fun chainpulling my way through something for the millionth time. And no, I don't need badges, or heroic gear, since I'm kitted from old & new badge kit, and my large stash of badges on my healer pays for all my gems. I admit, sometimes I'm just not in the mood, or the wrong person asks me, and then I will make my excuses.

It does frustrate me a little seeing other tanks in-guild just refusing, especially if they actually could use the badge loot from heroics, when there's at least another whole group's worth of good players online and looking for a tank. Especially when one of those tanks is the GM.. but that's a rant all its own.


My advice? Try to foster the friendship element within your guild. If you're a casual raiding guild, then this should be emphasised anyway. If you're a more hardcore raiding guild, then you'll probably have to accept it is the way it is. If your healers make friends with your tanks, not only will it help in raids (because that trust & interaction is a very precious synergy), but a solid healer/tank team is always successful in getting a heroic group up. Of course, that depends on your healers not being bored with heroics too..
I guess it just depends on the player's history as well. If they've been in the "can't find a tank" situation quite a lot themselves in the past, then they'll possibly be more sympathetic.

[Ciderhelm]

Source: Turmoil her

Yes.

/gasp it got edited

[Turmoil]

Source: Ciderhelm Yes. /gasp it got edited

Not because of your reply Cider <3 I just realised that my mind had wandered while reading through the thread and I hadn't directly addressed the OP's point.


Yes, I am a girl. I think female players do tend to be more sympathetic.. thus the ultimate solution could be... only recruit female tanks!? You'd just better hope they have staggered cycles, or once a month you'd have a week of complete hell... not to mention all the girl-talk in the tanking channel!

[Ciderhelm]

Half the chat in our tank channels is girl-talk anyway, even when it's just males.

[Muggs]

Source: Ciderhelm Half the chat in our tank channels is girl-talk anyway, even when it's just males.

*picks up some ice* I swear, it's all Klimpen.

[Elyvern]

Source: Turmoil It does frustrate me a little seeing other tanks in-guild just refusing, especially if they actually could use the badge loot from heroics, when there's at least another whole group's worth of good players online and looking for a tank. Especially when one of those tanks is the GM.. but that's a rant all its own.

Precisely! After reading through the 2 concurrent threads about Heroic 5man burn-out, it seems that almost every contributor agrees that they are truly sick of heroics, they've done those to death, and the last thing they want to do is carry alts and lesser geared people through heroics.

If you are the kind of tank that has run everything possible, gotten every single upgrade you could get on your own, I salute you. However, I must play the devil's advocate.

I've mentioned this in a previous post: too often, I see raid tanks that only log on for 25man raids. When asked to tank a kara run or a heroic, they plead tiredness, boredom, yadada. But when I inspect them, all I see is sub-par raid loot - many of these inferior to badge gear. Tanks with virtually no expertise, tanks in t5 gear wearing a blue belt, blue trinket "because so-so 25man boss refuse to drop my loot".

I am an alt tank - I have my Gyro-Khorium Destroyer, my Tankatronic goggles, my Darkmoon Card: Vengeance, I have every tanking item I can get my hands on through badges and heroics, every gem slot socketted with epic gems. As an alt, I don't have the obligation to get all these items, because I can afford to slack. I don't tank cutting edge content, but a raid MT does. A Raid MT cannot be waiting for the RNG system to smile on him. He/she is obliged to get every single piece of upgrade that can be obtained via solo play - in fact those are the best, because you don't need to depend in 24 other people to get them.

I feel that being a main tank is a special calling, and those that are truly passionate about it understand the need to go beyond and above what is required of other classes. This includes running heroics whenever there are upgrades available. I'm exalted with almost every faction in outlands, I've done 'em all to death. (and this is my 2nd alt, mind you, I've gotten exalted with almost every faction on my other toons too) But when new badge gear come out, I would organise kara and heroic runs because by god, I am going to get those pieces even if it means clearing Kara another 5 times.

Source: Turmoil My advice? Try to foster the friendship element within your guild. If you're a casual raiding guild, then this should be emphasised anyway. If you're a more hardcore raiding guild, then you'll probably have to accept it is the way it is. If your healers make friends with your tanks, not only will it help in raids (because that trust & interaction is a very precious synergy), but a solid healer/tank team is always successful in getting a heroic group up. Of course, that depends on your healers not being bored with heroics too.. I guess it just depends on the player's history as well. If they've been in the "can't find a tank" situation quite a lot themselves in the past, then they'll possibly be more sympathetic.

Yes, I have been very fortunate in the sense that several of my guildies are very serious altaholics with alts good enough to raid BT/MH. My healer alt friend and I have our pick of dps for any heroic run we want. Even so, we've about run everything to death and gotten just about everything we wanted out of heroics.

But the table is totally reversed when I log on my dps toons. It's come to the point where if I want a run to happen, I *must* play my tank. It's depressing that I get to pick from the cream of the crop while I tank, but I am forced to PUG when I'm playing dps. Do I expect to be carried through? No, I don't - I always make sure my toons are on par or above what is needed for the content I am doing. I don't blame raid MTs for being reluctant to tank, but few people roll healer alts, fewer roll tank alts. And tank alts do get tired of the same content the way MTs do.

I am always grateful for the fact that I never have problems finding groups as a tank. And when I start feeling uppity about it, begging for groups on my dps toon reminds me again of how fortunate tanks have it sometimes.

To some tanks, I do say, get off your high horses, run some heroics with your guildies and get those badge upgrades.

Let the flames begin.

[Auron]

Source: Ringthane Yeah, what was he thinking, hoping people would help their guildmates? What kind of insanity is that? Sigh...

This post was the soul reason I registered and am replying to this thread. "Good" tanks that have their gear and know how to play are indeed hard to come by. However, if they don't want to run a 5-man because they don't need anything from that instance or they simply just don't want to, don't guilt them into going or try to make them feel bad, as if they're letting you down.

I pugged all my runs when I was gearing up. Do you think I always got decked out priests or mages or competent hunters who knew how to trap to run with me? No. If I did get geared/competent people, do you think they stayed when they saw my health or inspected me? No. I just had to keep trying and pull together groups that weren't optimal. I did what I had to do to get the gear I wanted.

I don't consider it bad form to deny my "services" to undergeared people. If they think I'm mean for not helping them out, tough s***. Pug your group like I did. It's not fun to pug a healer when you don't know if they're going to spam Lesser Healing Wave, Flash Heal, or Flash of Light on mobs that regularly hit for over 4k (ie Defenders in SP or Bog Lords in UB) or DPS in cat form until I get "low". It's not fun to pug DPS that might rotate between fireball and frostbolt "because it's fun" or takes 20 seconds to go up and sap a mob after you told them to do so. Take your lumps like I did. Fair is fair.

For all the tanks that say they do help undergeared people with 5-mans, all I can say is kudos to you and your giving soul. Excuse me while I run heroic MGT for a trinket that I actually need. Enjoy the repair bill on those badge legs!

P.S. Ring, If that's your warock on Sen'jin, nice Int gems =P

[Jatz]

Source: Ringthane Yeah, what was he thinking, hoping people would help their guildmates? What kind of insanity is that? Sigh...

If all he was doing was hoping for was some help from in guild you might have a point, but to me it sounds like he's trying to order people to "help". How many times have you ever logged in going "I wonder what thankless person I can give my time and money to today?", cause I'll tell you from my experience most of them are just that.

As has been said if I ever got told that I had to run 5 man's for new recruits it would be the last thing i ever heard from my guild, it's a game not a Job. I have no problem with charity and helping people gear up to come play in new content, but I will do it as I see fit not as some guild master who likely isn't a tank anyway thinks I should. The key to this whole thing is Fun. Without it why bother?