Time to Address the Tank Queueing Problem

[Stephanius]

This 'Call to Arms' scheme sounds really interesting to me. I cannot get anything but gold or mats from valor or justice points, so offering a goodie bag with a chance of pet or mount is a nice incentive. The fact that it's a chance also plays off the 'just one more, it might drop this time' lottery effect that keeps people playing, farming and raiding.

In Wrath I had a tank of each class and was running heroics with all of them, raiding regularly with my tankadin and occasionally with my alts. In Cata I've decided not to bother to get gear on alts which would just be reset each tier. If they put this in, it'll be - together with the fun and challenge to do a heroic in a pug - enough to make me run some heroics per week.

[Loganisis]

If they manage to complete the dungeon like this i can't see the problem and if not.. there's always the "vote: kick" option.

By completed I assume you mean carried a poor tank to the end? Maybe it's because I don't typically like to vote-kick, it becomes hard - at what point do you pull the plug and vote-kick a learning tank because you simply don't want to spend 3 hours in VP and how much do you try to help them when running as DPS.

I'm of the same mindset, I typically will only run heroics with guildies, but sometimes, timing is just off... and I would never queue as a tank, I"ll just run TB dailies until I pop as DPS.

***

I do like the idea --- a 'nightmare realm maybe' where it's almost a gauntlet style event, a la Violet Hold. Each wave releases trash from a different instance, buffed to level 85 heroic, ilvl 353, and then a different boss after 5 waves. Or something like that...

Maybe the storyline is twilight cultists have released a nightmare toxin or something and the 4th boss is cultist high-priest avatar in the nightmare realm - so the heroes are saving the people from unending nightmares...

That being said - I actually like deadmines' feel. All of it except for the mario brothers part... I'd like to see that skippable. But it isn't the quickest run, that part I get.

[swelt]

Coming back to 'things they can do to make tanking easier', one thing I think they never really implemented fully is the 'main assist'. In a raid, you can set a main assist, and if you have custom unit frames you can actually see who they are and what they are targeting, but that's about the extent of the implementation. There are some very simple things that they could do to make this job easier:

- Make the main assist a role that's assigned through the dungeon finder, perhaps replacing or inherited from the 'leader' tickbox
- Make the 'main assist target' easier to see in the UI and easier to target. e.g. Add a key binding for 'follow the main assist'
- Possibly give the main assist a button to prompt (or even force, not so keen on this) dps to switch to their target

It seems a lot of issues come down to dps 'not hitting the skull'. If you are DPSing in a multi-mob encounter, the user interface doesn't make it easy for an inexperienced character to know which target to hit. Building some UI helpers around this, finishing what they half-started, would alleviate this.

[klausi]

I do like the idea --- a 'nightmare realm maybe' where it's almost a gauntlet style event, a la Violet Hold. Each wave releases trash from a different instance, buffed to level 85 heroic, ilvl 353, and then a different boss after 5 waves. Or something like that...

A gauntlet or yet another Violet Hold? Please no! VH got boring pretty fast, all i did was looking at the wave bar and counting the time until the next wave approached us. Or do you remember wiping to those ICC5 mans? Ouch.. all this brings up memories from Mount Hyjal wipefest and that's surely not my best raiding memories.

I was thinking about random generated dungeons in a diablo-esque style so one time i can go to the left, one time to the right and one time i've to search for a hidden switch to reach the next room. There could be several settings (city, jungle, cell, .. you name it) and a selection of enemies you can encounter - they should fit into the area (no drakes in a jungle, no pirates in space..).

And how could this be implemented to the WoW-niverse? Thanks to the Goblins technology we get our own 'Holodeck' where we can train and fight without having the red t-shirt guy hang himself.

[truculent]

im just wondering .... how much gold? If i can bank 1k-2kg per day from heroics like i did in wrath, Id start running them again.

[Hnetto]

The Call to Arms appeals to me since i collect pets and mounts. However i wonder how long it's going to take until the other classes start to complain that they never get the chance to do Call to Arms.

I love tanking and will tank anything if a guild member asks me to. The problem is when you enter randoms you get in group with some people that are really terrible. I remember more than one time pushing more DPS on single target boss fights than most of the group. When that happens i mostly likely drop the group.

Alsto there is the factor that VP caps way too fast when you are downing 12/12 and there is little incentive to get more VP each week since there is nothing to do with it besides selling VP boots.

[nserafini]

There's 2 problems right now with the Q.

1 - non-tanks take forever to Q ( dps / heals )

2 - morons in PVP gear q'ing as tank to get in zone; then cause 40 wipes and the dungeon takes 2 hours until a skilled or at least competent tank walks in

Simple solutions for you

Find or make 4 friends and run your 5 man(s).

Go join a guild and run 5 mans with a group.

Go roll a tank and learn to do it.

This isn't the end of Wrath; the q's were short because you could buy / craft gear that facerolled the randoms at the time. Ret pally's could q tank and survive. Right now you need to have decent gear AND know what you're doing.

Listen, I hate that DPS and Heals get shafted in the Q, but what do you want. If there aren't tanks, what can you do ?

[feralminded]

I'm an over-geared tank and healer (359 and 360 respectively). I refuse to random Q as anything but DPS because I absolutely HATE being responsible in any way for 4 other people I don't know and as either tank or healer you implicitly are. It's worse as tank because you're expected to actually "run" the group ... I have to do enough of that while raiding. No carrot they can put on a stick will get me to randomly queue.

[Tengenstein]

We could just go back the Daily dungeon quests.

[Theotherone]

This is kind of like what they did to get people to run Occulus - it still didn't make it suck less.

I don't mind healing pugs on my priest, it's kind of a challenge. But these "rewards" will not make me want to tank heroics in a pug; I do it because I have toons to gear; right now it's a pally. Once the healing gear is up to raid ready (three more pieces), it will take more then some .0000000000000000005% chance at a mount or vanity pet and 30g to make me want to pug heroics on my tanks.

[Nez]

I think the whole idea of rewards is fail. Tanks do not tank lots of heroics because they do not want too for what ever reason. This will not change that fact. It is simple math, there are more DPS than their are tanks and healers. Queues will always be longer for them, no matter what, when using the dungeon finder.

Blizzard needs to stop trying to give away mounts and pets that people put in the effort to farm for in the past. Make your game better and more fun, people will play it instead of having to be bribed to do so.

[Reev]

If Blizzard makes the rewards too weak, they won't incentivize tanks to run more instances. If they make the rewards strong enough to incentivize tanks, it will be decried as inequitable for the healers and dps. Plus, too strong will incentivize some really piss poor dps geared noobs to queue as tanks just for the leet gift bag.

[feralminded]

The primary difference for me between tanking heroics during Wrath and Cata is that during Wrath the other 4 people in my group could be total idiots and it didn't really matter, the dungeon would be over in 15 minutes and I could nearly solo it. Now I have to rely on those total idiots, even guide them and be responsible for them, and I'm just not up for that after raiding so much. I'm not saying the Wrath model was better, subjectively it was much worse imho, but I am explaining why I as a tank am unwilling to give a damn about running heroics in Cata and I was willing to do it in wrath. About the only thing that would get me to randomly queue is if they triple or quadrupled the random queue bonus ... make it high enough so that again, I can solo it regardless of who is attached to my ass.

Hell the only thing between me and my Defender title right now on my tank is a deadmines run that I just cannot bring myself to do with random people ... it's just that bad.

[Theotherone]

The dps QQ to the Blizzard attempt to improve the situation is priceless - truly priceless.

A problem is created that is at least somewhat the result of idiot dps attitudes, then when the Blizz comes up with an idea to address the situation people complain because they don't like the solution.

[Droyed]

I still dont think the long que times are an issue. Guess I played too long in the pre-dungeon finder days when a person had to put together a group. Im grateful for what we have.

[Katzazi]

Well you always can try build a group anyway.

[truculent]

I just laugh at the situation. "Tanks arent special" "WTF, why is this q so long". Its not a trick question, there is no great anomaly at work... your just wrong. Maybe if people respected tanks a bit more the q time wouldnt be 40 minutes. After watching 3489564235 warlocks stand in melee and spam aoe, or listen to some random dps qq the entire run while in greens "oh but my main is pro". Sorry...But If thats the attitude, Im not going to argue about it. Im just not going to q for a random. So, one of two things has to happen.. either A) you start seeing things my way or B) I better get some huge bonus for running these things. It really is that simple. Like it, dont like it.... dosnt change the fact of the matter. comply or have a 40 minute dungon q.

[Reev]

I just laugh at the situation. "Tanks arent special" "WTF, why is this q so long". Its not a trick question, there is no great anomaly at work... your just wrong. Maybe if people respected tanks a bit more the q time wouldnt be 40 minutes. After watching 3489564235 warlocks stand in melee and spam aoe, or listen to some random dps qq the entire run while in greens "oh but my main is pro". Sorry...But If thats the attitude, Im not going to argue about it. Im just not going to q for a random. So, one of two things has to happen.. either A) you start seeing things my way or B) I better get some huge bonus for running these things. It really is that simple. Like it, dont like it.... dosnt change the fact of the matter. comply or have a 40 minute dungon q.

Demo locks are supposed to stand in melee and spam AoE.

[Shivan]

The problem is and always will be that there are not enough tanks to support the DPS that want to queue for heroics. This was the case prior to the LFD.

The only short term solution that Blizzard can use it to incentive more tanks to queue for dungeons. With this though, you get tanks that will have little to no experience tanking trying to tank for the added rewards. In many cases this will be fine in others it will not be so good.

Long term, Blizzard really should consider some sort of in-game tanking training simulator. It need not be overly complex but allow a tank to face a medium size trash pack or two, mark cc, and practice tanking multiple mobs. Then it should have a generic boss trainer that has a couple of basic mechanics. This will allow some one that has not been tanking a place to practice basic tanking techniques without feeling the additional pressure of the group environment. While it is not a perfect scenario, it would help produce some competent tanks which will reduce the shortage.

[jere]

In a raid, you can set a main assist, and if you have custom unit frames you can actually see who they are and what they are targeting, but that's about the extent of the implementation.

As a quick side note, you can do this with the default frames as well. You can have it setup to show the main assist and his/her target.