Dealing with tanking stresses!

[Samius]

Hi,
I recently returned to wow (somewhat casually). I have been thinking of what spec I wanna focus on (on my paladin).
Anyways, I have been playing around with some Prot spec on my pally, and found some great instructional material.

I have always desired a tank, but one thing that has always got in the way is the stress of picking up all of the mobs etc. I usually find myself grinding my teeth throughout the instance (not good).

The thing that gets me is that I don't hate tanking, but I need advice on how to get over the teeth grinding stresses involved with tanking...

Does this improve over time?
approx how long until I can calmly tank an instance?
What advice would experienced tanks offer to help me in my quest of becoming a PPP (pro prot pally)?

[Fetzie]

Practice

Practice

Practice

Practice

You get the idea?

Run instances that you know will be easy to tank and you probably won't have to worry about surviving in. Stuff like Throne of the Tides, Blackrock Caverns, Stonecore, Vortex Pinnacle (all non-heroic). Practice picking up mobs and keeping their attention. Learn to recognise which types of mobs need to die quickly, which are more dangerous to yourself and to the group as a whole. As your confidence grows, pull more, learn the boundaries at which you need to use more than just Holy Shield and Divine Protection to stay alive. Put yourself next to a target dummy and practice the rotation/priority until you know it better than the way from your computer to the fridge (Seal of Insight provides enough mana to keep you going indefinitely). When you feel confident enough, find a healer you trust and go for heroic 5 mans and Baradin Hold. Guess what, you just tanked your first raid.

[Tengenstein]

Mark targets; it gives the breathing room you need when DPS won't. If they can't focus on killing the skull first then its their bad and you probably call them out on it, when all else fails remember the dps are really just ~100k meatshields, it's not your job to deal with their stupidity

[Charon]

Also, pallies have enough AoE that once you get the mobs that weren't CC'd (HINT!!) you GOT them.

[Bigbad]

Have the self confidence that you're doing it good. If a dps overaggro's taunt it back and if a dps dies /point /laugh /mass ress.
Know the fights, learn how to avoid damage or when lots of damage is incoming and use cooldowns appropriately.

If you're confident your threat is good and that you can survive stuff there won't be any stress.

[Tengenstein]

I think one of the best things you can do is Tank for your mates. They should be honest and understanding of your mistakes.

[rwhitmarsh]

I find it alot easier to communicate kill order with my dps by binding my function keys to F1 = skull F2= X etc...helps alot of confusion between u n the dps. Alot smoother runs when u can mark mid pull without breakin ur concentration

[truculent]

Practice

Practice

Practice

Practice

You get the idea?

Run instances that you know will be easy to tank and you probably won't have to worry about surviving in. Stuff like Throne of the Tides, Blackrock Caverns, Stonecore, Vortex Pinnacle (all non-heroic). Practice picking up mobs and keeping their attention. Learn to recognise which types of mobs need to die quickly, which are more dangerous to yourself and to the group as a whole. As your confidence grows, pull more, learn the boundaries at which you need to use more than just Holy Shield and Divine Protection to stay alive. Put yourself next to a target dummy and practice the rotation/priority until you know it better than the way from your computer to the fridge (Seal of Insight provides enough mana to keep you going indefinitely). When you feel confident enough, find a healer you trust and go for heroic 5 mans and Baradin Hold. Guess what, you just tanked your first raid.

This.

[Samius]

Well thanks for all of them tips guys. So... from what I understand, the stress will diminish as I get more practice? I did have a short experience of Seal of Cleave tanking in WOTLK, but that was kinda cheating imo LOL.
Anyways, I also saw about the addon "Threat Plates", is this really as good as it looks ? Seems pretty solid.

[Pruke]

Yes, threat plates are very good to have. That is one addon that is a must for a tank.

[Charon]

I hear it's pretty awesome. Might have to get it myself, especially since I plan on tanking heroics after a nap.

[aresius]

Also, pallies have enough AoE that once you get the mobs that weren't CC'd (HINT!!) you GOT them.

I dont disagree Paladins have "enough" AoE to grab mobs, but paladin aoe aggro is not remarkably storng in comparision to other tanks, and i feel alot of people didint catch up on this. Since WoTLK we mostely stopped using consecration (few spec for hallowed ground - if not specced its a huge mana drain, mine isint on my bar). So all we have is avengers (if not glyphed), holy wrath and hammer.
A competent (in terms of high values) dps can pull off a AOE mob that is not your main target easly.
Warriors and DKs have much stronger aoe threat presently.

As to OPs question, Fetzie awensered it. Alot of practice. (Some UI configurations are very usefull, threatplates is a good recomendation).

[sifuedition]

Also, when a dps pisses me off, pulls, whatever, I have tried to let them die before. It can be surprisingly hard to do.

Slow is calm
Calm is controlled
Controlled is fast

Take the time to make sure you have the correct mob targeted before you taunt. That extra second or two ensures your taunt is not on an 8 sec cd. Just one example of what I mean by that.

You'll find a calm and sure approach has much better effect than slightly panicked even if panicked is "faster".

[Charon]

Definitely pull at your own pace, not that of the DPS saying "go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go." EXPLAIN that you're getting used to tanking again, and if he doesn't like it, he'll drop group. Possibly pull a trash pack to intentionally wipe you first, but he'll drop group. Or he'll vote-kick you. It may even work! But as a tank, you look at the i key, and the queue pops. It's like google search. "Did you mean you'd like to tank something? We have a group ready!" lol.

[Icebreaker]

Yes, the one keeping on "go, go, go" is ALWAYS the stupi... ehrm... the most unexperienced one. He doesnt understand that healers have mana bars, that tank also wants to loot at least once in awhile and that tank have to think a couple of seconds before unknown pack pull. So just do your job and try not to pay attention to all "go-go-go!". Actually it's a healer who determines the pace and the size of the pulls. But be ready - there are stupid healers too. Remember about it when you see "the bigger pulls pls!!!" from the healer that just almost drop you down on a 3-mobs pack. The final decision is still yours.


Be calm, do your best and grow thick skin. Remember - your goal is not to show how awsome you are. Your goal is to complete dungeon without letting anybody die.

[Charon]

Be calm, do your best and grow thick skin. Remember - your goal is not to show how awsome you are. Your goal is to complete dungeon without letting anybody die.

Which will have the group pretty much declare you awesome, assuming they aren't stuck in LK mode and think the whole game is facerolling for DPS and mushroom-stamping CDs. Now that I think about it, we didn't really use cds in LK. LOL

[JollyWarrior]

As said before, and I think most important, pull at your own pace. I've been tanking so long I pull at my healers pace. Let Dps who pull aggro from other targets which are not skull, die, and never except fault for a wipe! These are my pro tips

[Outbackjack]

Whiskey works well for me.

[Charon]

LOL Jack. Get used to tanking via regs or with guildies then hit it full force! That's my plan, anyway.

[Exiledknight]

The most important things that I haven't seen people mention are not things to practice in a 5 man or even a raid, but alone.

First and foremost get a name plate addon, most swear by threat plates....personallly I prefer threat plates with the neon plates plugins, this goes back to H LK25 when it made it easier for me to find loose ghouls while juggling CDS for shamblings and dispelling the plague. Either way see which you like better and get it, get used to snap recognition(immediate taunt or AS when the plate changes)this can be practiced in any area with fast spawning mobs(i.e. molten front) make a game of it, pick up EVERYTHING before it hits a defender. This will be a tremendous help and also eliminate the stress of that worry. Also download Magic marker, its a marking addon for quick marks.

Secondly you need to be aware, you need to be able to run and move while operating your camera independently(ciderhelm actually did a video on this a few years ago(looked it up for you http://youtu.be/KmOPuziOWuA)practice this again outside of a group until you have it mastered.

Once you have these two down then take to the dummy for rotation practice.

The rest you need to learn on the fly as you go, but with these three things under control it will make 5 mans a breeze.