Breakfast Topic: Why be a tank?
by Dan O'Halloran 
Nov 26th 2007 at 8:00AM
Big Bear Butt Blogger is a feral Druid who asks the all important question: why be a tank? His answer is "because it is a heck of a lot of fun tearing your way through everything in front of you" as shown in the clip above that he provided.
I think this is also a larger question to you die hard tanks out there. Why do you tank? Is it the thrill of being on the front lines? Is it the command of the situation? Or do you like to smash things?
I'm not a big fan of tanking myself. I've done it enough on my feral Druid to know that it's too claustrophobic and too easy to mess up for my tastes. I prefer to stand back and heal to see the big picture or cat dps while keeping an eye on everyone else to make sure I don't have to shift to another form to help an over-aggro'ing Mage or a Hunter pet that's going down.
What is your motivation behind playing a tank?
I think this is also a larger question to you die hard tanks out there. Why do you tank? Is it the thrill of being on the front lines? Is it the command of the situation? Or do you like to smash things?
I'm not a big fan of tanking myself. I've done it enough on my feral Druid to know that it's too claustrophobic and too easy to mess up for my tastes. I prefer to stand back and heal to see the big picture or cat dps while keeping an eye on everyone else to make sure I don't have to shift to another form to help an over-aggro'ing Mage or a Hunter pet that's going down.
What is your motivation behind playing a tank?
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Breakfast Topics, Classes
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
Kanuris Nov 26th 2007 8:13AM
Why am i a tank? Because healing as a Paladin has bored me to death and it's way to hard to get a raid slot as a Ret Paladin.
Plus AoE grinding the Blood Elf Demon Hunters outside Black Temple is a great way to make cash. Got a Four of Furies yesterday :D
Ghen Nov 26th 2007 8:13AM
I tank because everyone else is so bad at it.
Also, finding groups is easy.
Also, if someone challenges me to an agro contest I win.
templare Nov 26th 2007 8:15AM
I think that the video sums it up nicely why be a fragile dps when you can have a gun and peeps in your head?
Matthew Rossi Nov 26th 2007 8:33AM
Perhaps Ferals 'tear through everything', but a prot warrior doesn't. For me, tanking is about helping out my friends by sacrificing my own viability. Which is why I only do it for guildies most of the time.
Gilius Nov 26th 2007 8:33AM
Luke... it is your destiny... together we will rule the universe as father and tank...
JeffreyM Nov 26th 2007 8:37AM
Because without a tank there is no such thing as a Raid, and also because no one can pump out at much threat as me.
Wats Nov 26th 2007 8:46AM
Its challenging and people learn they can depend on you. Nothing is better than saving a group by bashing/FCing a mob headed for the healer. I get more respect and groups come easy.
Watsfordiner
Coenheart Nov 26th 2007 8:57AM
-Because I can.
Fantus Nov 26th 2007 9:02AM
I'm a horde player so the only two tanks you can have before TBC were warriors/druids. I leveled a warrior but is the most useless class at 60 and needs someone to heal you and dps to solo anything.
Druids - I just don't like the druid models and taurens :S
When paladins came to TBC I made one and I am currently enjoying it. I can Off heal or do mass aoe damage and be a kick ass tank. Currently just starting in Mount Hyrjl
Callandra Nov 26th 2007 9:04AM
This question needs to be asked in two parts....why do druids/paladins tank and why do warriors tank.
Druids, its a natural extension of the feral tree. many talents provide benefits to both cat (dps) and bear (tanking) forms. For paladins, its not the same but the protection talent tree is 'the' soloing tree as well as the tanking tree.
For warriors, they are masochists/ The protection tree has no solo viability/fun-factor. Most warriors tank to level and gear up for DPS.
Draelar Nov 26th 2007 9:04AM
As a tank, I'm usually the leader of the group. I get to decide who does what before the attack, in which order the targets go down and how fast we move through the instance. It requires me to not only be aware of the mob I'm hitting, but also if there's no mob going for the healer, or one of the squishy dps. And during fights I need to look at mana levels, health levels.
I think that none of the other roles is so involved in what happens during an instance. So for me, it's mostly the decisionmaking role. Of course, it also feels awesome to stand before a boss and just taking the hits, seeing your health drop and shooting back up because the healers are just as "on the ball" as you are and knowing that as long as you're standing there, keeping the aggro, the boss will go down.
Zechleton Nov 26th 2007 9:14AM
It's absolutely fucking impossible to find groups on my realm unless you're a tank. Luckily i happened to have a 70 warrior more or less sitting idle except for playing 10 arena games a week. Prot is pretty horrible and i'm glad to see Blizzard are finally thinking about maybe considering giving us a way to play outside instances (i mean after all, it's only been 3 years...) but if i get a group that isn't retarded it's a pretty good money-maker. Besides, the new badge rewards aren't that useful for my warlock.
Jess Nov 26th 2007 9:36AM
For me tanking is a lot of fun. I got bit by the tanking bug back in gnomeregan and it never really left me. For a while I mostly did the dps/emergancy innervate/battle rez thing in 40 mans but one day I asked my raid leader if I could tank Molten Core since half the warriors were already dps spec in preparation for Burning Crusade and it was allll over after that. I love going toe to toe with the bad guy. I kind of like getting all the focuses heals. I like that being a good tank is something you can't quite quantify on a dps meter.
Hollywood Ron Nov 26th 2007 9:36AM
I tank because no one gives DPS slots to fury/arms warriors.
bonse Nov 26th 2007 9:36AM
never heard of a warrior tanking to level, least of all most of them, but hey, you live and learn
As to the question in hand, why do i tank? I'll answer it with another question. Why repeatedly press the same frostbolt button over and over when you could be living on a knife edge with each action and reaction determining the fate of the group, with nothing but the healer watching over you?
some people enjoy the challenge that is doing greater threat than the dps can do damage when the odds are so heavily stacked against you.
It's also worth noting for young paladins that its not a case of just spamming concecrate and leaving it at that. Later on you will have to decide between Def gear (staying alive) and spell damage (keeping aggro), too many l60 palas successfully running UBRS and then acting shocked when ramparts rips them apart (yeah, I rolled to see what it was like with the frostbolt thing :)
Nathan Nov 26th 2007 9:37AM
Because I love to laugh at the Hunters in the trade channel spamming "LF2M, need healer and tank." Really? You managed to find three dpsers looking for a group? Good job there champ.
My main is a healer, but my primary alt is a tank (level 33 so far). The fact is, healing and tanking are the two most important roles in the group, and the ones that can call the shots. When I'm in one of those positions, I know it's filled by someone I can trust (not that I'm the best ever, but at least I know my health isn't in the hands of some 13-year old who's mom is yelling at him to take out the trash).
Very few groups are going anywhere until they've got those two roles covered. When I'm one of them, it's one less thing I need to worry about. Usually, I just send tells to priests/warriors, depending on what I'm playing, and line up a complement for my class. Then I broadcast "Healer and Tank LFM" in general chat and watch as I get 10 tells in under a minute.
Tanking is hard, so why do I do it? Because when I say "I'm at the meeting stone. If someone isn't here to help me summon in 5 minutes, I'm leaving,' people listen.
Skrilla Nov 26th 2007 9:43AM
@10
Ret is 'the' solo tree for paladins. Prot tree stinks for soloing unless you are grinding on a group of non-casters - that is the ONLY good thing about it. This starts to get boring very fast.
@1
There are much better ways to make money than farm the demon hunters.
I tank because I dont want to heal. I dont play my paladin unless I am tanking, soloing while prot is a major pain and needs to be fixed.
idburns Nov 26th 2007 9:56AM
All my friends started playing at launch, I started late since I had to wait for Christmas to get the game (blame my wife) and no one had rolled a warrior. So I was our tank. At 60 I specced prot and MT'd for 2+ years, through MC, BWL, AQ40, etc. Then BC came out and when I hit 70 I realized I was burned out on tanking. I leveled my hunter to 70 and then switched that to my main and that's where I currently am. Every now and then I get the bug where I want to tank and I've started tanking in our alt Kara runs to start to get back into it.
Anyway, why be a tank? There's a thrill to it. Being the lifeline for the entire raid. This was a much bigger deal when the tank was the single thin thread between a a 40-man killing a boss and wiping horribly. Your skill (and your healer's skill) was the only thing keeping the raid afloat. Now that the raids are smaller and more of the boss encounters focus on multiple tanks the thrill isn't there as much for me as it used to be, especially since many of the fights are now a DPS race to beat enrage timers. Of course being a hunter means I can flex my ePeen at the top of the damage meters. :p
I also have a 70 druid who was feral from 60-70 (now balance) and I tanked quite a bit in BC instances until I hit 70 and I've got to say...druid tanking is easy mode. It's almost a joke how easy it is in comparison to tanking with a warrior.
Anyway, warriors rule and druids drool. :D
Usu Nov 26th 2007 10:21AM
I tank because no one will take a feral druid as DD to an instance. So I've always been asked to tank (I really don't enjoy healing) and have started liking it. And of course, having to find only one more DD to start an instance run is so much more convenient than trying to find a tank (impossible on my server).
Xanielyene- (US) Destromath Nov 26th 2007 10:45AM
@13 guilds WILL NOT give you a slot as an arms warrior. Now that I've said that.... if you want to be accepted as a fury warrior, you start in kara. I currently outdps everyone in the raid except the Hyjal geared rogue and boomkin.
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25% Crit
1700 BASE attack power unbuffed
Vindicators brand in mainhand
merc. gladiators offhand in offhand
170 hit rating
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That is what I'm sitting at ATM and fury pvp is actually viable in some situations(lol).
In conclusion, get those stats, find a progressing raiding guild, and if they don't want you, challenge them to let you into a raid and dps one night, and show them whos boss.
And for all you that say fury warriors are wanna be rogues, when geared, its the rogues who are the wanna-be fury warriors