Maintank prio and recruiting.

[orcstar]

Hello,
After listening to the podcasts and specifically the subjects on recruiting and maintank gear priority and some bad mishaps in the past I'd like to ask the following:

In our guild we used Maintank priority. It allowed us to progress pretty fast through content and the value of it was clear. At this time we are seeing the downside of it though. (our guild disbanded). 3 of our best geared tanked (who had most everything they could wish for all the way up to Illidan) were "stolen" by other guilds. Even one swapped server and are now happily tanking SWP. Because they got all they could while only like half of the our raid was ready for SWP. This was because we progressed through Black Temple quite fast and not everyone has had luck enough.
The other thing is on the same note: tanks not being interested in content because they got all possible loot? (although this goes for dps and healers also but for tanks it happens often sooner because of loot prio).


Would you recruit a MT from another guild? Knowing that possibly you will cripple the other guild that put a whole guilds effort in maintank prio gearing that player?

[Minya]

hmm..

we didn't have a loot priority from MC to SSC/TK but started with is at BT und HS.

there's always the possibility to lose geared up people to other raids / server, no matter if they had loot priority or not. It doesn't really matter if the tank has 5/5 tier 6 oder just 4/5 an kaz-shield instead of the bullwark.

When I think back I have to say that most of the people that left our raid was DDs or healers.

Our tanks (including me) are raiding with us since the first ragnaros pulls or razorgore wipes. We lost exactly one (warri) tank during this time, and for that we have to blame RL

The other raids' situations are very similar to ours.

A "real" maintank or tank feels a kind of responsibility to the raid and the people, I think.

If 3 of your tanks left your raid, they would have done it even without loot priority, for sure. there must be other reasons than just progress so it was just a matter of time and you just had bad luck in this case.

I'm sorry if my english is kind of bad right now, but I'm from germany and it's deep night right now for me

[squishmitten]

I posted about this on the maintankadin forums several months ago. It ended up being a few page thread with the consensus that some guilds do give tanks loot priority and others don't. :P

My guild does not give tanks loot priority. Tanks don't last forever. Its a stressful job and they burn out. When they do it can be crippling if you've put all your focus into one tank. My guild (and my previous guild) consistently lost main tanks either to pvp, dps or other guilds. I would say we were burned by this atleast 6-8 times in the past 3years.

Because of this we distribute loot more equally. The only problem we've had with that so far was one warrior who was our last MT to get loot priority who bailed on us for pvp and crippled us pretty badly. As soon as we got our tanking set up again he offered to start tanking again. When he found out he wouldn't get loot priority he freaked out and tried to get our tanks to bail on the guild. We could understand if he had burnt out and needed some time to relax and pvp, but loot whores aren't welcome.

Anyways I'm strongly opposed giving loot priority to tanks. If they make a big deal about it explain the reasoning. If they make a big stink about it they are probably loot whores so start looking for some decent replacements and rotate them out. Don't tolerate players who are dicks.

[Andenthal]

Would you recruit a MT from another guild? Knowing that possibly you will cripple the other guild that put a whole guilds effort in maintank prio gearing that player?

Just wanted to comment on this part.

First off, I'm not a big fan of player "poaching". I.E. going to a player that is all ready in a raiding guild and asking them to join yours. But that aside, just because a tank would be the MT for your guild, does not necessarily mean he is the MT of his current guild. Although at your level of progression (T6) this is likely not the case.

Many factors go into being the "main tank". Gear, skills, time commitments, personalities. If a player is not a main tank in the guild, it's not automatically inherent that they are not MT material. It's likely that they came into the guild after a MT was all ready well established. The "If it ain't broke" story. Many fights only require 1 tank, and some guilds (and players) feel that 1 person has "earned" the right to main tank it. And to a certain extent I agree with them. If you have 2 players with fairly equal gear/skills/etc. the one that has gotten you to where you are now should have first right at the encounter. But that - by default - does not mean the other tank is any less qualified.

Just wanted to throw that out there that if you do recruit from another equally progressed guild - you may or may not be tanking their "main tank".

[Lodron]

I sometimes think people don't realize that the raid group/guild can only progress as far as the weakest member. Be it skill or gear wise. At any given time some of your raid members are going to be geared enough to go to the next level of progression. While the other half of your raid group is still going to need gear at your current level.

I believe it is the responsibility of the better geared members to be patient while the rest of the guild gears up. Leaving because "you got yours" because of preferential loot distribution to tanks is classless.

[byechee]

Give priority to a person because of who they are, not because of what class they play. There are some people who are lifers, in it for the long haul, for the good of the guild, thick and thin, etc. I'm not saying these people will never quit, but there's much less perceived risk there. If one of them happens to be a tank or the main tank, then all the better. Blindly throwing loot at people and hoping they're going to stick around is not the key to success. Yes you want your tanks to have good gear, but not at the expense of everyone else. Also, don't feel that because a tank doesn't have 4 pc t6 or a single specific item that you can't do the content. A tank would have to be SEVERELY undergeared for it to even be a real issue. The old adage of not putting all your eggs in one basket holds true here as well.

[bludwork]

if your MT is not a core guild member then yea there's cause for concern.

I've been with my guild since the first attumen kill (and earlier but I always find that picture funny) all through gruul and vashj/kael and archimonde now staring at illidan. We MT prioritize if it's an upgrade but frankly other than tier sets who else is going to use tank loot?