Scared to tank

[Artizak]

Yeah so I recently finnished lvling a Tauren Pally in prot spec but only been in one or two dungeons. I've got a few dps and know what it's like to queue for ages only to find your tank is terrible and end up wasting ages wiping.
I'm not too worried about aggro cause I've done some group quests and no one came close but I am worried that my computer isn't the best and freezes quite often, long enough for me to lose aggro. I know I'd rage if my tank just stopped attacking and not moving out of void zones (shiney fire is pwetty) and I don't want to be that bad tank.

What do people suggest, just go for it? are there things I can do to get around this?

Cheers for the help

Arti

[Loganisis]

If you haven't tanked before and are looking to start on a serious level there is nothing as valuable as running with friends/guildies to start with. Especially if one of your friends/guildies is already a good pally tank so they can 'see' things you're doing or respond to questions you have.

There are 4 key elements to succesfully starting to tank - there are many more than that to become a great tank ;-)

1. You need to control the pace. If you let the DPS push you, you'll get yourself into trouble. Mark kill priority - skull and X, so you're not trying to taunt 4 mods running at 4 different people. Controlling the pace will be key.

2. Know your threat abilities. Even if you're not great at using them, know which abilities you should start with in AoE and single-target rotations. At first you may not be 'optimal' in using them, but so often I've run with new (thinking CTA only) tanks that only seem to know about 2 or 3 abilities to create threat.

3. Know your defensive CDs. Knowing how long they last, how long they will take to be ready again, this will go really far into making you 'easy to heal' as you can mitigate the big damage spikes healers hate.

4. Know the fights. Know when the damage is coming. Know where the tank needs to place them, no when you need to kite the boss through the molten lava, etc.

I know all 4 sounds like duh! things - but if you're good with these 4, you'll be in good shape. If you start with guildies and/or friends, you'll be in even better shape. Basically, if you know these 4 things, it may be rough at times, but it won't be a confidence killing wipefest. If you don't know these things you'll have a harder time beating the fight and that's not good for your confidence.

[Dedic]

Your real problem is your PC. Even the best tanks will suck if their PC locks up randomly. Fix that first.

[julescote76]

I am new as well and am in the same boat but I'm getting confident faster and faster everyday for having an alt which is dps I quickly realized one thing: good tanks can be hard to find. This helped boost my confidence knowing I would not make the same mistakes as them. I also used a lot of resources such as tankspot guides, youtube guides and reputable in-game tanks who are usually eager to help 'cause they are a rare breed and could use some pressure relief :P
Do the same dungeons over and over and work your way up. This is an easy way to gain confidence and when you get to the higher tier of dungeons, don't go in blind. Read into the encounters and know what to expect so nothing is a surprise. Keep this in mind too: the fact that you are inquiring about being scared and wanting to be better puts you halfway up the ladder already. I am a new prot warrior and have not dabbed into pally tanking but the role is the same so stick with it, it gets better.

On another note, I have a warrior tank question and since this is about being new, I feel it right to post it here. I'm doing much research into warrior tanking but am only level 30 at this point and I notice that charge is part of a lot of higher level tanks rotations and my question is this: if charge is not part of the defensive stance, do you charge first then switch to defensive stance once you're in range of the enemy or does charge become part of the defensive stance at a higher level? I ask because at my level, if i come out of a fight with some rage and switch stances to charge and then back to defensive stance to tank, i lose all my rage and that seems very inefficient to me. And when Devastate is learned, should it completely replace sunder since it applies the sunder effect and more?

[Tengenstein]

theire is a mid level Talent, Warbringer, which allows Prot warriors to charge in defensive stance. Like you said at low levels theonly reason to charge is to get somewhere faster, but the stancedancing/rage loss without tactic mastery makes it a very expensive and inefficient thing to do. I would recomment getting Warbringer ASAP, I think you can get it at level 30 tho.

[swelt]

Your real problem is your PC. Even the best tanks will suck if their PC locks up randomly. Fix that first.

This. If it really does freeze for a period of time then there is nothing you can do to work around it, accidents will happen. It will undermine your confidence, which is what you need to develop the most.

My first best bet would be that it's some kind of background task or application doing something. Go into your system tray (the area by the clock) and get rid of as much junk as you can. Make sure your antivirus is setup in a discrete mode and not scheduled to do scans at times when you are playing games. Make sure your PC doesn't have a virus. Close any other applications that you have open (including web browsers). If doing all this makes things better, but you'd like to have some of those things re-activated, reintroduce them one at a time. Ensure all your drivers are up to date, your hard disks aren't full. If the rest of your system is healthy, there are things to do inside warcraft (disable and then re-enable 1 by 1 all your addons, turn your graphics settings to minimum, etc). I'm sure you can find plenty of PC/wow optimisation threads with a bit of googling.

[sifuedition]

@ low level warrior-

If I have low rage, battle and charge then thunderclap! Make use of the rage you have then swap to defensive. If you finish a pull with good rage, I would save the rage and just run in.

@pally tank-
Find a good pally to go into low level content with you. I have been taking a level 83 pally friend into northrend dungeons. I facepulled any time she seems to not be ready and do anything I can think of to be a "bad pug". Once she never panics...she's ready.

[HellRaver]

Just try and find a group of ppl you know in-game to start tanking with, and when you feel ready you try out pugs

[Babum]

I don't see much harm in upsetting a pug. When you join one, you don't know what you're getting and frankly; neither does anyone else. That's the beauty and fallacy of the random dungeon finder.

Either way, don't let anyone bother you. As long as you learn something wither you wipe on it or kill it, then your on the right track.

Now go bug a pug.