How to: TANK

Tips, tricks and stuff you all should know

First off, a tank has two main objectives in dungeons and raids:

1. keeping mobs off other players (keeping aggro)
2. surviving!

How do we do these two things? By utilizing the abilities and talents available to warriors, which make them great for both keeping mobs off other players, and mitigating the incoming damage.

Tanking see, easy as one, two, three

With this thread I would like to start a healthy discussion about tanking in raids or dungeons or dealing with boss mechanics as a warrior tank. A good raid falls or stands with good tanks, they set the pace of the raid like the bass does in a song. So reason enough for us to put our heads together and share our thoughts on problems we face or solutions we have found! I’ll start off with a topic about building threat, some issues faced and solutions I came up with.

As you all know some attacks do more or less threat than other attacks, some attacks have cooldowns others don’t. Because of this a warrior tank builds aggro using an attack sequence based on priority of attacks. The more threat an attack does the higher the priority of the attack. I’m pretty sure you all know what I mean, but to make the topic complete I will explain it anyway 

Shield bash is the attack that does most threat, with 250 base threat added with the damage it does multiplied with the threat bonus from Defiance talents and Defensive Stance this attack makes an insane amount of threat. Therefore this attack should be used whenever possible. Revenge is second on the ladder, this attack makes 315 base threat added with around 70 damage while you’re raid buffed. The great thing about this attack is that it only costs 5 rage! Even when you use a shield block to trigger Revenge, it will still be more rage efficient than a Sunder Armor. Sunder Armor works as a ‘Filler’. When Shield Bash, Revenge (and Shield Block) are on cooldown you can fill the time up using Sunder Armor. Sunder Armor produces 388 threat without any bonus by damage.

Heroic Strike is outside of this rotation because you don’t have to choose to use a Heroic Strike or a Shield Slam for instance, you either use Heroic Strike or Cleave. This is because the attack uses your auto-attack instead of the global cooldown. This way you can activate it on every auto-attack while spamming your threat rotation at the same time. Shield Block should also be added to the rotation since it helps mitigating attacks and helps you survive. This attack’s threat generation is ignorable.

So that’s a lot to keep attention to while tanking a boss who can kill you any second if you don’t pay attention! Another problem is if you want to execute this rotation to perfection you will end up fisting your keyboard harder than Mohamed Ali. Not good for your nerves nor for your keyboard. There is a lot to think about other than your rotation and because of that you will make error’s during the fight and therefore will not make the threat your character is able to make.

So now the solution! It’s an extremely easy macro, ugly yes, but efficient. I’m no coder but this is what I came up with:

/script UIErrorsFrame:Hide()

/cast Shield Slam

/cast shield block

/cast Revenge

/script KLHTM_Sunder()

/cast heroic strike

Oke, so what does this macro do? Well I’l tell ya!

The first line will shut your character up, it won’t tell you it can’t perform an attack because it’s on cooldown or you don’t have enough rage or whatever its problem is, thank god!

The second line casts Shield Bash whenever it is up, if Shield Bash is on cooldown the next time you click the macro it will cast Shield Block instead. When you used Shield Bash and Shield Slam and press the macro again it will cast Revenge. The next time you click the macro all your previous attacks will be on cooldown and it will execute the fifth line which is Sunder Armor. You now performed a successful tank rotation 😀 Next to this macro you should be spamming your heroic strike, so you will end up spamming two buttons mindlessly during a boss fight.

I used /script KLHTM_Sunder() instead of /cast Sunder Armor because I read somewhere on a forum that KTM bugs when you use Sunder Armor in a macro and doesn’t add it’s threat to the meter. I didn’t test this, I just took it for granted, it works anyway.

Now I know what you’re thinking: ‘what I don’t need some lame macro to do my work for me?! I’m capable of doing a good threat rotation myself’ yes maybe you are although an error is easily made.

But the most important thing this macro does is keeping your mind of your rotation so you can actually keep a close eye on your health bar, the positioning of the boss, the threat meter or pictures of Kuroku’s mother.

Thank you Mouzzie for a wonderful section on threat, aggro mechanics, the macro, and tips on what to pay close attention to during a raid. Please share pictures Mouzzie.

Taunt:

Taunt is a great ability which puts you on the top of the aggro list. The taunt itself lasts three seconds, which is the time the mob will not go for anyone else (unless someone else taunts it). However, when using taunt, you get the same amount of threat as the person who had aggro before you used the ability.

Say, hypothetically, if Nerfit or Mcsuperstyle were to take aggro from a tank (duh, never happens), where the tank had 1000 threat, and one of them aggros the mob by generating 1500 threat, the taunt will make the mob focus you for 3 seconds, and give you 1500 threat in total. This means that you should spam your highest generating threat abilities in the wake of a taunt, as you at the second you use taunt have the most threat of everyone in the raid / group, but as soon as the taunt runs out, the mob will focus the player who have the most threat. So if Nerfit or Mcsuperstyle continue to do amazing damage, and you do nothing but white hits during your 3 second taunt, they will take aggro again as soon as the those 3 seconds are over.

Mocking Blow:

Mocking Blow is different from taunt as it makes the mob focus you for 6 seconds instead of 3, but it does not, however, put you on top of the threat list. That means that if you use mocking blow as a taunt, you will need to generate even more threat in those 6 seconds, compared to using a taunt, in order to keep aggro once Mocking Blow wears off.

Damage mitigation:

A warrior tank mitigates damage through blocks, dodges, parries, as well as having a huge amount of armor. Armor will reduce the damage you take from physical attacks, block will reduce that damage further, and dodges and parries will allow you to avoid damage from physical attacks completely. However, relying on mitigation alone is not going to get you very far. You also need as much health points as possible, in order to allow time for healers to get you to full hp in between blows from mobs.

The ‘crit-cap’:

You have all probably heard about the crit-cap before, and frankly, most of you probably know about it already. The crit-cap is basically the amount of defense you need in order to avoid being critted by a raid-boss’ physical attack. The amount of defense needed in order to avoid being the victim of a critical strike from a level 63 mob (which is the level of all raid bosses), is 440. That means you would need to get +130 defense from your gear, in addition to the +10 defense from talents. Which brings us to the next section.

Optimizing your gear:

As mentioned, getting the right amount of +defense is important if you ever want to be tanking raid-bosses, in order for them not to slap you straight to the graveyard. However, +defense also adds to your chance of dodging, blocking and parrying, which makes it the most useful stat out there. I would like to add though, that you should not gimp all your other stats only because an item has +defense on it. It all depends on what other choices you have.

Here is a list of items that are considered pre-raid best in slot, which you should all work hard to obtain, if you wish to secure a spot in any of our raids:

Head:

Gyth’s Skull – http://db.vanillagaming.org/?item=12952

or

Golem Skull Helm – http://db.vanillagaming.org/?item=11746

Neck:

Medallion of Grand Marshall Morris – http://db.vanillagaming.org/?item=13091

or

Evil Eye Pendant – http://db.vanillagaming.org/?item=18381

Shoulders:

Stockade Pauldrons – http://db.vanillagaming.org/?item=14552

or

Bulky Iron Spaulders – http://db.vanillagaming.org/?item=18493

Cloak:

Redoubt Cloak – http://db.vanillagaming.org/?item=18495

Chest:

Kromcrush’s Chestplate – http://db.vanillagaming.org/?item=18503

or

Ornate Adamantium Breastplate – http://db.vanillagaming.org/?item=15413

Bracers:

Fel Hardened Bracers – http://db.vanillagaming.org/?item=18754

or

Anything with lots of stamina on them.

Gloves:

Stonegrip Gauntlets – http://db.vanillagaming.org/?item=13072

Boneclenched Gauntlets – http://db.vanillagaming.org/?item=14525

or

Force Imbued Gauntlets – http://db.vanillagaming.org/?item=18383

Belt:

Stalwart Clutch – http://db.vanillagaming.org/?item=12115

or

Anything with lots of stamina on it.

Legs:

Legplates of the Eternal Guardian – http://db.vanillagaming.org/?item=11927

or

Warmaster Legguards – http://db.vanillagaming.org/?item=12935

Boots:

Master Cannoneer Boots – http://db.vanillagaming.org/?item=13381

or

Corpselight Greaves – http://db.vanillagaming.org/?item=14537

Rings:

Band of Flesh – http://db.vanillagaming.org/?item=13373

Hardened Stone Band – http://db.vanillagaming.org/?item=18674

Band of the Ogre King – http://db.vanillagaming.org/?item=18522

Trinkets:

Force of Will – http://db.vanillagaming.org/?item=11810

Frostwolf Insignia Rank 6 – http://db.vanillagaming.org/?item=17909

Vigilance Charm – http://db.vanillagaming.org/?item=18370

Ranged Weapon:

Carapace Spine Crossbow – http://db.vanillagaming.org/?item=18738

Willey’s Portable Howitzer – http://db.vanillagaming.org/?item=13380

Satyr’s Bow – http://db.vanillagaming.org/?item=18323

or

Gorewood Bow – http://db.vanillagaming.org/?item=16996

Main Hand:

Quel’Serrar – http://db.vanillagaming.org/?item=18348

or, more affordably

Bone Slicing Hatchet – http://db.vanillagaming.org/?item=18737

Shield:

Draconian Deflector – http://db.vanillagaming.org/?item=12602

just get this shield, it’s amazing.

Now, if you are invited to a raid, there are some items we would like you to bring along, which will help you keep aggro, stay alive and just make everyone else super happy, and your classleaders swell with pride. There are quite a few guildies who would be happy to craft you some of these items, as long as you bring them the materials needed.

Elixir of Superior Defense – +450 armor – http://db.vanillagaming.org/?item=13445

Elixir of Greater Agility – +25 agility – http://db.vanillagaming.org/?item=9187

Elixir of Fortitude – +120 hp – http://db.vanillagaming.org/?item=3825

Major Healing Potion – http://db.vanillagaming.org/?item=13446

Rumsey Rum Black Label – +15 stamina – http://db.vanillagaming.org/?item=21151

Greater Fire Protection Potion – http://db.vanillagaming.org/?item=13457

These are the essentials, for some fights it might be useful to bring other consumables such as elixir of the mongoose, rage potions, greater stoneshield potions, juju embers (if tanking Raggy or Vael), etc.