Taunt Mechanics Guide/Discussion

[Satorri]

It contributes, but you shouldn't assume that, you simply need to be aware of the possibility. I don't always have a kin or spriest available.

[Helistar]

A question about the taunt mechanics which comes from yesterday's experience on Instructor Razuvius. I was assigned to tank one of the adds (as usual), taunting it immediately after the mind control ends to keep it under control.
Now, the problem is I was getting constant Immunes (not miss, I checked). And I mean ALWAYS, after the end of the MC I ended up with the add running around uncontrolled, impossible to taunt. Looking on omen it was targeting heals, so it's not like another tank had taunted it. The only way to regain aggro was pure brute force (= damage).
Now, even if the palatank was spamming his aggro things (something which paladins have tendence to do.......), the duration of the mind control should be more than enough to let the "invisible debuff" wear off, so it should be impossible for me to get a taunt immune just after the mc ends. Any idea if MC is on the same timer as taunts in some way?

[Pwnanapuddin]

Just a note in addition. Death Grip also carries a fixate ability on it.

Harness the unholy energy that surrounds and binds all matter, drawing the target toward the death knight and forcing the enemy to attack the death knight for 3 sec.

[Satorri]

Helistar, MC technically IS a taunt (not officially, but it has that effect). When a priest MC's a target their threat is set equal to the highest threat on them, and when the effect break it has a fixate mechanic the same way. Usually a taunt will work afterwards, though. There may be something on that fight that is pausing or drawing out previous taunts during the MC effect so the new diminishing effects keep stacking.

Was this happening on the first break or only later in the fight?

[jere]

The Razuvious adds seem to act very weirdly and have done so for a while now. While most MC'd adds act as Satori has explained, they do not. They do a complete threat reset upon break of MC. Also, while they are not immune to taunt, your threat never changes on them. In either case, the way to pick them up is to taunt for the fixate (which still works though the aggro changing part doesn't) and then burst DPS them (Shield Slam, Shield of the Righteousness, Mangle+Maul, etc.). They act very differently than most mobs.

EDIT: If I remember correctly, the amount of threat the formally MC'd mob has was equal to its max hit points though now that I think of it (not the razuvious adds though)

EDIT2: Yep, just tested it. A normal MC'ed mob will have threat against the MC caster equal to its max HP when MC breaks (the mob's max HP, not the caster's).

Just a note in addition. Death Grip also carries a fixate ability on it.

Yep, all taunts have a fixate ability in them, including Death Grip.

[Bluespirit]

I'm confused as to why Blizzard don't class it as melee hit to cap it, why would they allow the chance to be resisted, its just stupid. Why give a hit cap to taunt when no tank will ever get it?

[Helistar]

Helistar, MC technically IS a taunt (not officially, but it has that effect). When a priest MC's a target their threat is set equal to the highest threat on them, and when the effect break it has a fixate mechanic the same way. Usually a taunt will work afterwards, though. There may be something on that fight that is pausing or drawing out previous taunts during the MC effect so the new diminishing effects keep stacking.

Was this happening on the first break or only later in the fight?

Thanks for the explanation. maybe it would be nice to add MC to the list in the 1st post of this thread then
As for when: it was happening from the beginning. At the same time, if someone had spammed taunts before the MC it may be possible that the timer was NOT going down while the MC was being channeled, leading to a resist later on. What is strange is that I was dealing always with the same add, so after the 1st MC noone else tanked it except me, and I most definitely didn't spam taunt..... so the timer would have had the time to reset, but I kept getting resists throughout the entire fight.
It was some time since I had last tanked in the Razuvius fight, but I remember that in the past Naxx runs I never had any trouble with taunting the adds, maybe something was hotfixed?

[Satorri]

MC doesn't belong on that list. =) It is a taunt as a consequence to using the spell to create a reason not to try and MC everything in sight. This thread is primarily aimed at people who want the attention.

[junkilo]

Do we know if taunt returns will diminish regardless of what player taunted?

[jere]

Yes, while I haven't done directed testing, I have seen it occur on Archavon. I have had the other tank taunt him multiple times and when it came time for me, my first taunt went immune.

[Darwar]

I can confirm that the hit cap for taunt is greater than 8% melee hit for a prot warrior. I missed two taunts on Steelbreaker in two weeks at 7.20% melee hit. Last night I missed a taunt on Brundir at 8.05% hit.

[Brittmari]

Does a taunt that misses start the diminishing returns timer?

[jere]

Nope.

[commacozzee]

Helistar, It was said in one of the patch notes that Razuvius' adds were no longer tauntable. Whether it was patch 3.1, 3.2 or a minor patch, I don't remember that clearly.

Junkilo, it doesn't matter who taunts, all taunts give DR for that mob.

I haven't done extensive testing but have suspected since I started tanking (or playing a melee class in general) that for abilities that can't be dodged or parried, Blizzard uses spell hit as opposed to melee hit. This includes Demo Shout, Thunder Clap, Shield Bash, and Shockwave, as well as Taunt.

Since Ulduar opened, it seems that Blizzard is taking full advantage of tauntable bosses by making encounters that require precise timing and execution on Taunts. Because of that, I've personally been using Glyph of Taunt, reducing my chance to miss to 9% spell hit. Depending on the boss, I'll either expect Misery from a spriest or not. If I get Misery, I only need 6% spell hit, which is 158 hit rating. Otherwise, I'll gear up for 237 hit rating for that all important taunt. I also use 20 Hit Rating to gloves now because of the lack of Hit on our gear. Thanks Blizz for making taunts so important then giving us NO Hit. Much <3

[jere]

Whether or not an ability can be dodged/parried won't affect whether it is spell hit or not per say. There are attacks that cannot be dodged/parried but still work off of melee hit. Judgement and Shield of Righteousness to name a couple.

Abilities that function off of spell hit are actually spells by the way the game flags them. Shouts and taunts, for example are of the "physical" magic school (yep, that school exists, check out the combat log API).

[GravityDK]

Just wanted to commend Jere on this work. Good to have an authoritative answer on these.

[Kandiru]

How do fixates behave with the taunts DR, did anyone test?

We have hunter and warlock fixates as well as the warrior/druid ones which might behave differently.

[jere]

Just hopping on my druid:

Growl
Challenging Roar
Growl
Growl ==> IMMUNE

So fixates count against you. I also noted in my sequence that while Challenging Roar normally lasts 6 seconds, when it followed that initial taunt, it only lasted 3 seconds

[Satorri]

Also, this will be changing, or they want it to.

In 3.3 they're testing some changes. Specifically, this system is being stretched out to 5 taunts without immunity, and they're making it a flag they can turn on and off depending on the target. That way it will not be the case in general, but only in specific encounters where they want your tanks not to be able to taunt juggle stuff.

[drae]

Thanks Jere, this should get stickied! With all the people moaning about lack of hit on T9 gear, and considering how important well timed taunts are in ToGC; it's really nice to have comprehensive guide that I can point people to on how taunt works.

Anyone know if vigilance refreshes taunt if your vigilance target takes environmental damage? Or from DoT's?

If so it would be really easy to do additional (and possibly more accurate, due to the quicker refreshes) testing by placing vigilance on a player and have him stand in a campfire.