Need some help, guys

[Lachlann]

Hi everyone, I'm new to Tankspot but not new to tanking. I've been tanking pretty much for 5 years now. I was there when you could main tank pretty much as arms, was great at it too, BC made for some adjustments and I realized that prot was the only way to go. I couldn't play through the first half of WotLK because of a computer issue, but I came back strong in May and realized one thing... WotLK has an annoying gear curve.

The character I'm currently playing on was one of my first warriors, and he took a lot of work to redo. I don't have high lvl BS on him or mining, so I had to pretty much buy some of my gear while already being ab it poor. Here is my armoury:

The World of Warcraft Armory

The spec might be out of date, which could lead to some of my problems. I'm def capped and it took ages because people on my server would not run the instances I needed. I'm still getting people asking me if I'm in tanking gear when I join a group which is annoying. I know I'm only 24001 in health, but it seems like everyone expects you to somehow get gear without running the places you need. My guild is also kind of crappy right now, there's only 3 people on at a time. I'm also stumped on what my minor glyphs should be. Also, I'm having a lot of issues holding aggro, which I think might be missing a patch note and the specs probably have changed by now. TL;DR I know, but I could really use some help. Thanks in advance.

[Atalon]

I am no expert, but your spec could use a lot of work.


You have at least 6 too many points in Protection tree. Improved disarm is not useful (for your purposes), Same for improved Spell Reflect, also it can be argued that you can remove improved blood rage, and without the glyph of shield wall the 2 points you put into improved disciplines aren't that great either.

Move those points into arms to get deep wounds, which can help significantly with threat. As far as I know you should never gem for strength.

Lastly, it really really really sucks if you can't get groups to run heroics; the way i did is i came up with a crappy arms spec and then rolled on tank gear when the tank didn't need it. That is what worked for me.

When you say you are not holding agro do you mean single target or aoe threat?

-Atalon

[Lachlann]

I am no expert, but your spec could use a lot of work.


You have at least 6 too many points in Protection tree. Improved disarm is not useful (for your purposes), Same for improved Spell Reflect, also it can be argued that you can remove improved blood rage, and without the glyph of shield wall the 2 points you put into improved disciplines aren't that great either.

Move those points into arms to get deep wounds, which can help significantly with threat. As far as I know you should never gem for strength.

Lastly, it really really really sucks if you can't get groups to run heroics; the way i did is i came up with a crappy arms spec and then rolled on tank gear when the tank didn't need it. That is what worked for me.

When you say you are not holding agro do you mean single target or aoe threat?

-Atalon

Thanks for the heads up!

I'm fine with single target, it's the aoe that's giving me problems.

[Thedom]

Aoe as a warrior just requires a little work and some experience and knowledge of positioning. Shockwave and thunder clap and lots of tabbing are about the best thing to tell you. There is probably an in-depth post of guide somewhere around here as well.

As far as gear Atalon made a good suggestion about dps'ing. Its easier to pull a weak dps thru an instance than a weak/undergeared tank. Also unfortunately as "easy" as it is to get epics many PuG groups have outrageous expectations for tank health and gear but theres not much to do there except keep running and keep trying.

With your gear you can also get enchants to help a good bit. Its difficult for people to believe a player is trying if they don't have some kind of enchant on gear and no enchants looks pretty bad to most people.

Best of luck with it, any more specific gearing/enchanting/gemming/speccing advice can be found in the multitudes of informational guides found on the site here.

[Lachlann]

OK, I just redid my talents for my prot spec. Found the thread where they overview all the talents and everything's starting to make a little more sense now. Should have done more research when I was specing, hah.

Yeah, I've been shockwaving and thunderclapping, but I have a feeling that it was my spec that was mostly the culprit. Hmm, I'll have to search around here for something on it.

Thanks for the tips! You guys rock.

[Rominoodle]

Isn't it just amazing how you can pug a group and have dps or healers in mostly blues or even some greens and they won't think twice about being there? However if the tank is not 100% epics they will question your abilities and try and replace you? It's twice as hard to make it as a starter tank unless you are being carried through content and showered with free gear. It's the life we live and the path we've chosen. Just stick it out, you've got a long road ahead of you.