Circle of Tanks?
What is the name, class, and spec of your primary tank?
Koriel, paladin, 0/58/13
What is your primary tanking environment? (i.e. raids, pvp, 5 mans)
Mostly 10 man raids with the guild.
What is your favorite tanking spell for your class and why?
With such a wide arsenal, this is a extremely difficult choice to make, however I’d have to go with Avenger’s Shield. It’s just a phenomenal pulling ability that so many trigger happy dps have come to love.
What tanking spell do you use least for your class and why?
Probably glyphed Divine Plea, I just forget half the time.
What do you feel is the biggest strength of your tanking class and why?
Front-loading threat has always been a paladin strength and currently in WotLK we are fairly strong on te single target threat battle.
What do you feel is the biggest weakness of your tanking class and why?
Sadly, AoE threat. In BC we were the only AoE tank, but right now our AoE “snap” aggro is only better than Druids.
In a 25 man raiding environment, what do you feel, in general, is the best tanking assignment for you?
Depending on the tank composition, paladins make excellent offtanks/add tanks. I hate to admit that as much as I hated being shoved into that role in BC, but not that the playing field has been leveled a bit, it’s easier to accept that my mitigation is best amongst multiple adds, and my threat suffers little when OT’ing.
What tanking class do you enjoy tanking with most and why?
I’ve tanked with my Paladin through all of BC, and have started tanking recently with a Deathknight, and have a little experience with level 80 Druid tanking. So far I’m enjoying the Paladin most, but the Deathknight is coming up fast as I’m getting her more geared.
What tanking class do you enjoy tanking with least and why?
Either of the rage based tanks. I don’t enjoy the resource mechanics at all.
What is your worst habit as a tank?
Probably relying on my healers and shying away from my mitigation CDs. I trust and love all my healers. They are always there saving my ass.
What is your biggest pet peeve in a group environment while tanking?
Thankfully I don’t have to deal with this in my guild, but in pugs it’s a huge problem: trigger happy DPS. Nothing drives me crazy worse than DPS that don’t realize they have buttons other than AoE (especially on smaller pulls) or people who don’t care about the rest of the group, only their own ePeen.
Do you feel that your class/spec is well balanced with other tanks?
I do, we all have our strengths, except Druids, Blizzard must hate Druids.
What tools do you use to evaluate your own performance as a tank?
As I’ve tried to cover in a previous post, tanking is very hard to quantify. You can look at parses, but unless your raid comp and buffs/debuffs were exaclt the same, it’s hard to compare anything other than gear and skill usage. I feel a better way to gauge a tank is seeing them on action and judging their overall competence of the fight and it’s mechanics.
What do you think is the biggest misconception people have about your class?
While being a tank isn’t too terribly hard, being a great tank is. People forget there is a difference between finishing an instance and having an enjoyable time (as little hassle as possible). Most people consider paladins to be “easy mode” but I think that’s just because they are comic from warrior tanking and that mechanic is so clunky.
What do you feel is the most difficult thing for new tanks of your class to learn?
The right way to spec. Most people don’t realize Tankadins have a very strict rotation, that can only be obtained by a few very specific talent choices.
Effective Health or Avoidance and why?
Right now the obvious choice is EH, but with the new direction Blizzard is trying to take tanking in Cataclysm a good balance will be most optimal. This is a change I’m looking forward too very much.
What tanking class do you feel you understand least?
Warriors, last time I tanked on a warrior was in BC and a lot has changed for them since then.
What add-ons or macros do you use, if any, to aid you in tanking?
I use Grid with several additional modules for keeping track of my raid. I’ll likely be making a tank-centric Grid post soon to expand on this.
Do you strive primarily for balance between your tanking stats, or do you stack some much higher than others, and why? Well I know I kind of covered this a few questions ago, but right now I try to maintain hit and expertise cap while keeping as high EH as possible. My gearing lately has been more concentrating on threat, because when you’ve got DPS like we have in Fury Untold, you have to be able to pump out the TPS or they’ll be showing you how good shaman DW tanking really is!
Trackbacks & Pingbacks
- » Matojo Is A Lemming: Circle of Healers
- Circle of DPSers « Krasus Kronicles
- DPS Survey | The Lazy Sniper
- The Angry Dwarfs » Blog Archive » Tanking Questionnaire
- Tanks Can Meme Too «
- Circle of Tanks…wha? « Falling Leaves and Wings
- Circle of Tanks! Tanking Questionnaire « You Yank It, You Tank it: Blog of a Tanking Death Knight Lady
My survey answer
http://pwnwear.com/2009/11/05/the-how-do-i-tank-survey/
http://epicadvice.com/questions/3417/ea-blog-index-circle-of-tanks/3418#3418
To assist you with your Circle of Tanks post, I have added a community wiki post to EpicAdvice.com (see the address above).
If you respond to the Circle of Tanks blog questionnaire, please head over there so that it can be shared with the WoW Community as well.
Thanks,
Spaz
I’ll be really looking forward to reading your Grid and tanking post! My boyfriend just started using grid as a tank when a healer suggested it, he said it has made a big difference to his tanking. But he’s using just basic grid without any specific modules… so I’d be very interested in finding out how you modify yours for tanking, to pass it along!
Also this was a fascinating survey! I know understanding more about tanks would make me a better healer. :)
If I could reply to the healing ones as a tank, I think the tank one is even more important. Although not quite as much fun. Tanking is serious business, after all.
I joined in and answered. For some reason, the tanking version seemed so less elaborate to answer than the healing version.
http://bossypally.wordpress.com/2009/11/04/tank-survey/
I asked Brade to fill out the survey and posted up his replies :) I tagged a couple of tanks, whose blogs I visit. Hopefully they can keep it going!
I’m posting here on comments, as I’ve posted the healing and dps versions on my blog. Good work, though, Koriel!
What is the name, class, and spec of your primary tank?
Hinenuitepo, Draenei, Blood tank. When tanking, I’m usually something along the lines of 51/5/15.
What is your primary tanking environment? (i.e. raids, pvp, 5 mans)
Heroic 5-mans (although I usually tank those in dps spec with tank gear) and 10-man non heroic T9 content (VOA, Ony, TOC).
What is your favorite tankng spell for your class and why?
Death Grip, as a tank even more than as dps. When I see some mob making a beeline for my healer, it’s ok to hit that Dark Command and see them coming back to me, but it’s so much more satisfying to grab them, pull them to me, smack them in the face, and watch them fume! :P
What tanking spell do you use least for your class and why?
Mark of Blood. I tend to save my ‘bigger’ cooldowns… and save them and save them…. until it’s too late. It’s a bad habit I’ve been working on breaking.
What do you feel is the biggest strength of your tanking class and why?
Self-healing as blood. We can take a beating along with the rest of ‘em, but when a healer is in trouble or the damage gets really heavy, we can do quite a bit to keep our health up there.
What do you feel is the biggest weakness of your tanking class and why?
Multi-mob AoE threat. We have tools and they work reasonably well, but they can take a while to ramp up. Actually, now that I think about it, maybe physical spike damage. Our avoidance is pretty good, but our health pools tend to be a little lower along with poorer mitigation, so getting hit, hard, can squish us flat a little easier.
In a 25 man raiding environment, what do you feel, in general, is the best tanking assignment for you?
Personally, it’s Offtanking. I’m not a main tank. I’m not geared enough for it, and frankly, I have less experience, so give me a few mobs to hold and I’ll do it well.
What tanking class do you enjoy tanking with most and why?
A big contributor to my rerolling a DK was to have a tank capable class. The highest I’ve gone with anything else is my lvl 30 pally. I do enjoy tanking on my DK… so I guess that’s the answer!
What tanking class do you enjoy tanking with least and why?
I didn’t really enjoy playing any of the other three tank classes, but of them, I probably enjoyed druids the most, and warriors the least. I didn’t enjoy the gameplay mechanics of the warrior, but really, I can’t say I’ve given them a fair shot, particularly at tanking.
What is your worst habit as a tank?
Paying more attention to staying alive than making sure I have enough threat on all mobs. /Bad Hine!
What is your biggest pet peeve in a group environment while tanking?
As usual, have to go with the most common complaint here of dps not waiting a nanosecond for threat.
Do you feel that your class/spec is well balanced with other tanks?
In general, yes. DK’s had some overwhelming strengths in 3.0 and 3.1. For 3.2 I felt they were the weakest. I think they have some cool and unique nuances but can certainly hold their own right now and are on a par with pallies and warriors. For whatever reason, the perception is poor for those unfortunate bears.
What tools do you use to evaluate your own performance as a tank?
I agree with Kor than quantifying tanking is difficult. My buddy Gravity is far better with this. EH and threat are typically the two measuring sticks, but really, the only one that matters is if the tank lived long enough to for everyone to kill the boss. I DO care about ‘losing’ anyone, but the priority is the boss kill above all else.
What do you think is the biggest misconception people have about your class?
It used to be that they were ‘uber’ and ‘EZmode.’ Heck, maybe it still is. In trade last night there was a long and tiresome debate about it. That anyone rolling a DK is an adolescent boy who doesn’t know how to play.
What do you feel is the most difficult thing for new tanks of your class to learn?
Proper mitigation cooldown use.
Effective Health or Avoidance and why? EH is king, I agree. I also think Kor is right to say that avoidance has been overpowered just on our ‘everyday’ gear, so with Icecrown Radiance it will paradoxically be more important to pick up (to compensate for the lost avoidance).
What tanking class do you feel you understand least?
Bears, although I really don’t understand any except the DK.
What add-ons or macros do you use, if any, to aid you in tanking?
Grid, Omen (of course), DBM. DBM is actually very nice for a tank. As dps, DBM tells me when to be careful to not die.
As a tank, it tells me when to pick up adds as well.
Do you strive primarily for balance between your tanking stats, or do you stack some much higher than others, and why? I stack stam as much as I can on gems/enchants, but I do try to pick up a mix of other stats. Especially with diminishing returns, it makes sense to not stack just dodge or parry for example.
oh my! another survey, i have a tank myself on my DK, though i admit have not been playing her much, shes dual spec as dps as well. but since i have a rogue already DK is primary frost tank. hmmmm… but this is also interesting. I will tag this to my guild as well. ehehe thanks!
If you’re keeping a list, the druid who co-writes my blog has filled this out here:
http://twentyfiveboxes.blogspot.com/2009/11/circle-of-tanks.html
Been waiting for someone to make a tanking circle! Happy to reply and tag a few tanks I know :)
Fantastic idea – I’m going to link to this from my healing survey. I know there are a lot of healers who also play tanks!
I really hope some tanks answer this one, it’d be great. :D
Lilitharien´s last blog ..Circle of Healers (It’s Going Around)