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Q u o t e:
This is a very interesting thread.

While we think many guilds will have one of each type of tank, we don't want to build encounters for particular tank classes. We don't like the idea that you might have to bench 3 of your tanks for those encounters than only require 1. We want you to be able to go raid with whatever tanks you have (assuming they know what they're doing). We actually think the game will be more interesting if different guilds approach fights differently because they have different comps.



That is the definition I tend to use. Everyone is a hybrid except for locks, hunters, mages and rogues. Fortunately every tank by that definition is a hybrid class.

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then give pallies a normal taunt.

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Q u o t e:


then give pallies a normal taunt.

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God I hate people like you. Stop ruining good discussion with your single-sightedness.

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Q u o t e:


then give pallies a normal taunt.

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do you have any idea how much you can front load your aggro? or how much aggro gen is actually possible by a pally tank....especially after patch? if you need to constantly taunt then you are doing something wrong. (it can't even be a matter of being comparatively undergeared unless you are in greens because of the amount of aggro you generate)

The only time i've needed to taunt something off a player is when doing hyjal aoe mobs and a mob doesn't set in right.

i guess when you say normal taunt you mean that you have to target the player instead of the mob, well if you did your research even slightly you would realize there is a very efficient macro that allows you to taunt off regardless of whether you have the player or the mob selected. Not only do we have a taunt but we can taunt up to 3 things which....and surprise....greatly helps when you are aoe tanking....you know that aoe tanking thing that pallys are knows for?

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Q u o t e:


I'm sure the top 1% (aka the crazy hardcore) will still do that kind of sillyness, but it's good to know that I shouldn't encounter it.


tanking all the trash then pretending to heal for bosses... stinks

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actually in my healing gear but still specced as prot and unbuffed my flash of light heals go off for 2k and crit for 4k. thats a pretty damn viable additional healer. i might not have all the utility that i would if i had specced holy, but its more than a little extra when my tanking is not needed.

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Q u o t e:

do you have any idea how much you can front load your aggro? or how much aggro gen is actually possible by a pally tank....especially after patch? if you need to constantly taunt then you are doing something wrong. (it can't even be a matter of being comparatively undergeared unless you are in greens because of the amount of aggro you generate)

The only time i've needed to taunt something off a player is when doing hyjal aoe mobs and a mob doesn't set in right.

i guess when you say normal taunt you mean that you have to target the player instead of the mob, well if you did your research even slightly you would realize there is a very efficient macro that allows you to taunt off regardless of whether you have the player or the mob selected. Not only do we have a taunt but we can taunt up to 3 things which....and surprise....greatly helps when you are aoe tanking....you know that aoe tanking thing that pallys are knows for?

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Well, see my post on this regarding Righteous Defense. There are designed encounters were taunt is necessary, and that is major flaw with it, but that belongs in a different post. Going off track like this really is not necessary in this post.

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Q u o t e:

do you have any idea how much you can front load your aggro? or how much aggro gen is actually possible by a pally tank....especially after patch? if you need to constantly taunt then you are doing something wrong. (it can't even be a matter of being comparatively undergeared unless you are in greens because of the amount of aggro you generate)

The only time i've needed to taunt something off a player is when doing hyjal aoe mobs and a mob doesn't set in right.

i guess when you say normal taunt you mean that you have to target the player instead of the mob, well if you did your research even slightly you would realize there is a very efficient macro that allows you to taunt off regardless of whether you have the player or the mob selected. Not only do we have a taunt but we can taunt up to 3 things which....and surprise....greatly helps when you are aoe tanking....you know that aoe tanking thing that pallys are knows for?

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Except for four horsemen when you only want to taunt ONE mob, and except for gothic where you need to target the MOB to taunt as the player is on the other side of a gate and out of LOS.

We need a single target mob target taunt. Those two fights are designed with normal taunt mechanics in mind and that is just the FIRST raid in the expansion.

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Q u o t e:

do you have any idea how much you can front load your aggro? or how much aggro gen is actually possible by a pally tank....especially after patch? if you need to constantly taunt then you are doing something wrong. (it can't even be a matter of being comparatively undergeared unless you are in greens because of the amount of aggro you generate)

The only time i've needed to taunt something off a player is when doing hyjal aoe mobs and a mob doesn't set in right.

i guess when you say normal taunt you mean that you have to target the player instead of the mob, well if you did your research even slightly you would realize there is a very efficient macro that allows you to taunt off regardless of whether you have the player or the mob selected. Not only do we have a taunt but we can taunt up to 3 things which....and surprise....greatly helps when you are aoe tanking....you know that aoe tanking thing that pallys are knows for?

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You just saw the blue post, went to it, and didn't read the other 10 pages, huh?

Littered within those 10 pages, there were a good dozen examples of when/where/why/how RD fails. Go back and read.

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Q u o t e:


Except for four horsemen when you only want to taunt ONE mob, and except for gothic where you need to target the MOB to taunt as the player is on the other side of a gate and out of LOS.

We need a single target mob target taunt. Those two fights are designed with normal taunt mechanics in mind and that is just the FIRST raid in the expansion.

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for every post like this there has been one made by other class tanks on why even to set foot in hyjal there better be at least one pally tank around. its part of the game. if you could do everything by yourself then there would be no need for team work and the game wouldn't be dynamic.

do i wish i could do everything, have the most mitigation, stamina, aggro gen, dps and still heal myself doing it? yeah...maybe....but the game wouldn't be nearly as much fun then.

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Naxx was designed a LONG time ago with warriors in mind

any truely new WotLK encounters will not be designed that way.

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This isn't necessarily true. Refer to http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=12065155543&sid=1

There are scenarios there where our taunt fails us, and why, most of the examples are in content developed well after Naxx in vanilla BC. There are a lot of issues with RD with raid design that do need to be addressed.

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We don't like the idea that you might have to bench 3 of your tanks for those encounters than only require 1.

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I didn't read through the original 10 pages, but once again I think people are forgetting the dual spec option that is coming.

If you have 3 tanks normally for fights and you come to an encounter that only requires 1 tank, what happens? In the past, only the crazy progression guilds would bench two of those tanks for that boss fight, and bring in 2 more DPS (or healers). But now we have that nifty "other spec" button. It isn't a big leap to assume even semi-serious raid leaders saying, "Bob is tanking this fight, Jeff go Arms, Mike go Kitty." They aren't benched, they are just in their "other raiding spec" for that one fight.

This is the same discussion we've had on the mage forums over and over. If a particular boss fight favors fire, then every mage will be asked to "hit their raiding fire spec button" for that fight. It isn't like that is asking a lot. It's free, right?

The idea that people will have one raiding spec and one pvp or farming spec might hold for very, very casual raid environments. But everyone else will, I imagine, be running with dual specs both dedicated to raiding.

So no one is going to be benched, they are just going to be asked to swap roles (and specs) each boss fight.

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Q u o t e:

do you have any idea how much you can front load your aggro? or how much aggro gen is actually possible by a pally tank....especially after patch? if you need to constantly taunt then you are doing something wrong. (it can't even be a matter of being comparatively undergeared unless you are in greens because of the amount of aggro you generate)

The only time i've needed to taunt something off a player is when doing hyjal aoe mobs and a mob doesn't set in right.

i guess when you say normal taunt you mean that you have to target the player instead of the mob, well if you did your research even slightly you would realize there is a very efficient macro that allows you to taunt off regardless of whether you have the player or the mob selected. Not only do we have a taunt but we can taunt up to 3 things which....and surprise....greatly helps when you are aoe tanking....you know that aoe tanking thing that pallys are knows for?

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Do you realize that a single target taunt is a completely different issue from threat? Do you know what a taunt does? Did you know that certain raid encounters specifically utilize taunt mechanics and screw Paladins when they only want to taunt one mob instead of three? Do you not see the problem here?

Also, did you know that you don't need that stupid ass macro because it is baked into the ability just like Intervene?

How you could acquire the gear you have with that level of utter fail is mindboggling.

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for every post like this there has been one made by other class tanks on why even to set foot in hyjal there better be at least one pally tank around. its part of the game. if you could do everything by yourself then there would be no need for team work and the game wouldn't be dynamic.

do i wish i could do everything, have the most mitigation, stamina, aggro gen, dps and still heal myself doing it? yeah...maybe....but the game wouldn't be nearly as much fun then.

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Ok, but things have changed. Blizzard has stated their goal, that all tanks will be able to tank all content. Stop looking to the past, and look to the future where Blizzard wants to take the game.

Will there still be differences? Yes, of course there will, but skill will make up those differences for all classes.

The Righteous Defense discussion is about design of an ability, not taking away anything from any class to be masters of the tanking world.

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Q u o t e:
Finally, Death Knights are hybrids. They have two DPS trees, and a tanking tree. Once again, for the sake of posterity, they are a dps hybrid.

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Minor correction for accuracy here: All 3 death knights trees are viable for both DPS and tank specs. While Frost may have originally been "the tanking tree" it hasn't been that way for a very long time. Unholy was very popular for tanking on the Beta, Blood less so due to its weaker AOE tanking ability.

I quite like this forum thus far, only thing I would want is more consolidation of posts. I don't want 100 page long EJ type posts but we don't need 20 front page posts about the same topic. Not to pick on prot pally's, but we don't need every paladin to start their own thread about pally tps nerfs when there are several active threads going. Creating a thread pushes an existing thread off the front page, effectively limiting discussion.

I am pretty sure a single thread with actual discussion is of more us to developers than 20 threads that say the same thing. Maybe it is just GC's way of doing things but I feel confident that any well-thought out post will be read now even if it doesn't get a reply.

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Q u o t e:
This is a very interesting thread.

While we think many guilds will have one of each type of tank, we don't want to build encounters for particular tank classes. We don't like the idea that you might have to bench 3 of your tanks for those encounters than only require 1. We want you to be able to go raid with whatever tanks you have (assuming they know what they're doing). We actually think the game will be more interesting if different guilds approach fights differently because they have different comps.



That is the definition I tend to use. Everyone is a hybrid except for locks, hunters, mages and rogues. Fortunately every tank by that definition is a hybrid class.

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You have failed to address the concerns the protection warriors have brought up. They are the same things that the paladin tanking community has been whining about from the beginning, Min/Maxing your raid for optimal performance. The only reason you picked a protection warrior over a paladin to main tank a boss was from a min/max perspective.
There are fewer tanking spots in a raid than any other role. Why should I choose to bring in a protection warrior? From a min/max perspective why should I give one of my few tanking spots to a protection warrior? Don’t tell me skill because there are plenty of skilled paladins that I can take as well that offer more to my raid.
You are also forgetting that raid guilds recruit the classes they want so that “whatever tank I have” is the tank I want to take. Why should I recruit a protection warrior into the guild?
What do protection warriors offer to my raiding group?