Forum post of the Day: Tank shortage
by Amanda Dean 
Mar 6th 2008 at 10:00PM
In World of Warcraft if you want to find a group, roll a tank. Tanks are hard to find and good tanks are worth their weight in gold, even Tauren tanks. Goosesausage of Cenarius posted some suggestions he believes might resolve the current lack of meat shields. He suggests that non-protection specialized Warriors would be capable of tanking if the Sunder Armor buff was tweaked a bit.
The poster reported that he has a hard time finding heroic groups since his warrior character is currently specced for DPS. To resolve this issue, Goosesausage suggested that removing the cost of changing one's specialization might resolve the issue. I both agree and disagree with this suggestion. True it's pretty expensive to switch back and forth from prot to DPS and back regularly, but thanks to daily quests money is not nearly as short as it once was. Just make sure you do your grinding before you spec to prot. Even if there was no respeccing fee, tanks would need to acquire two sets of gear.
The rest of the thread discussed strategies for tanking and whether or not there is, in reality a tank shortage and strategies for being successful as a tank. As a healer, I certainly always begin searching for a group by looking for a tank. It's always a bummer to gather together three DPS and have to disband because a tank search is fruitless over time.
Barb Dybwad posted a Breakfast Topic on the custom of tipping tanks. Responses seemed to be split. Many believed it was appropriate to tip them enough to help pay for the repair bill. Others expressed that is absurd to tip anyone for playing their role in an instance, since they all have important things to do.
If there is a tank shortage, what should be done about it?
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 7)
Alch Mar 6th 2008 10:05PM
"Even if there was no respeccing fee, tanks would need to acquire two sets of gear."
Like druids who can dps and tank in the same raid.
twl23 Mar 7th 2008 12:26AM
Replace druid's Feral 21pt talent of Feral Faerie Fire with some type of group tanking ability such as thunderclap or consecration...Some AOE tanking ability. The problem is that 1/3 of your tanking community (probably more) hate tanking 5-mans cuz it's a bitch to hold aggro against 5/6/7 mob pulls.
AlmtyBob Mar 7th 2008 1:52AM
Less QQ, more CC. Group composition is everything.
AlmtyBob Mar 7th 2008 2:04AM
Less QQ, more CC. Group composition is everything.
Allison Robert Mar 7th 2008 2:40AM
The vast majority of raiding feral druids have almost entirely different cat and bear gear sets. Our tier sets have zero +defense and almost zero +hit, which means your enchants, cloak, rings, and trinkets usually have to be tank-oriented. If you do the usual feral druid job of tanking adds then switching to cat, you're usually awful cat dps in bear gear, but you can't start the pull in cat gear because you'll get insta-gibbed even in bear form. Trust me, the dps you do in bear gear and the dps you do in actual cat gear are MILES apart.
h8rain Mar 7th 2008 9:52AM
To Allison:
I have not really raided yet, but you are 100% right on the difference in gear. I don't have to respec to dps or tank, but I do have to change gear. (Note the only epic I have is Night Watchman) In dps gear I can *barely* break 10k armor and 12k hp in bear. Defense is plain 350. In tank gear I have about 14k hp, almost 21k armor, and 419 defense (which I have SotF, so crit protected).
Basically the opposite is the same for wearing tank gear and dps'ing. I have another set for healing, but I never heal (except when helping my wife level, but I can fully heal her 61 mage in one shot). Druids probably have the greatest flexibility, but we probably have the most soulbound equipment that we keep (dps (feral), dps (boomkin),tank,heal, and probably even pvp sets.....).
Ehrgeiz Mar 6th 2008 10:08PM
My main is a prot spec warrior, most people refuse to tank they only want to pewpewpew. I think the bigger issue is that myself and many other people refuse to pug, pugging is good for 2 things frustration and a big repair bill.
George M. Mar 7th 2008 12:42PM
Increase the HP and Spell Damage output for Paladin Talents, right now we are too gear defendant to be end-game tanks unless your 25-man raid is cool with giving you Warrior Gear or T4 and T5 tokens for Tank Gear rather than Healing Gear.
Quote: Raid Leader, "Don't use it for Tank Gear, you a Healer."
Eternalpayn Mar 6th 2008 10:08PM
Wanna fix the tank shortage? Roll a tank.
KiwiRed Mar 7th 2008 2:24AM
I did my part to solve the tank shortage by rolling a prot warrior and leveling her to 70. Unfortunately it didn't help me any, as I still find it hard to get a tank when I need to run anything on my main, and I get more requests to "Just log onto your tank for this heroic - don't worry, it'll be quick."
Cynra Mar 7th 2008 8:03AM
KiwiRed, I know JUST how you feel. My main on my server was and always has been a hunter. However, I rolled a healing priest pre-TBC because my guild didn't have a single healer at the time and I had extensive experience with the class. Now, over a year later, my priestling is decked out in T5, but I have problems getting my hunter into anything - much less the guild's Karazhan group because I have the flexibility to log onto a healer and let another guildie in as a DPSer, rather than try to spend hours looking for a healer.
I've also got a tank on the side, but I learned my lesson and didn't tell anyone about her.
themann1086 Mar 6th 2008 10:21PM
Yeah, I had a LOT of trouble rounding up a Tank for SLabs today, on a full server (Burning Blade). Granted it was at a bad hour, but still.
My buddy is a DPS warrior, and it's impossible for him to get groups together because people mock him for not tanking.
Sky_Paladin Mar 6th 2008 10:22PM
Come to Area 52, there's tanks everywhere. It's the healers that we're short on.
Snailking Mar 7th 2008 5:39AM
Not on the horde side.
Marcus Mar 6th 2008 10:27PM
Blizzard can't force tanks to do random pugs. Sorry, no change you do will fix that Blizzard. Make people learn how to play their classes while they're leveling and maybe we'll see some better dpsers come up. Until that happens I'll roll with my guild.
Byrthor - Uther
CunningB Mar 6th 2008 10:28PM
I think another major factor in the tank shortage, rather than just the respecing, is the fact tanking requires you to have to take responsability.
This comes mostly from leading the group, marking and knowing the instances, hell if your dps you can just roll up and hit stuff, if you die or take to much damage its not to much of a problem.
I enjoy tanking as a feral druid as it is but even I feel the need for a break to dps or heal and getting out of having to lead a group and tell people what needs doing.
Matt Mar 7th 2008 1:08PM
I think that's exactly right r.e. responsibility, actually. I was tanking last night in Blood Furnace (my current warrior is only 62) when, about halfway through, one of our dps people had to leave and the only person we could find was a prot pally. So, we invited him and I switched to dps/offtank mode (I'm arms specced). Anyway, I've never really just dpsed in an instance before and I was amazed at how much less intense it was. I was still marking all the targets (pally didn't want to), but suddenly my responsibility was just to "beat the crap out of the skull" and not really worry about anything else (though, I couldn't help myself and pulled some stuff off the healer a few times--the pally wasn't the most "mobile" of tanks...).
I don't mean to belittle dps types since I'm sure that doing it *well* is pretty hard, but I found it to be a lot less responsibility than tanking (and focusing on one target is a lot easier than having to try to control 3 or 4). Fwiw, I was topping the damage meter most fights... MS, slam, slam, slam, execute. :D
Akkatha Mar 6th 2008 10:33PM
The problem is too many warrior speccing for DPS. Thats's not to say they CANT DPS, we all know they can.
The problem comes when you think of how many classes CAN tank. Warriors, Druids and Pallies. A priest, lock, rogue, mage or hunter cant tank in general aside from very very specific encounters. Their job is to heal/dps.
So really the question is "Why don't tanking-capable classes want to spec and play a tanking role?"
Theres plenty of DPS classes out there fighting for spots. How come the warriors have a sudden aversion to tanking? Is it hugely different playing warrior dps compared to other dps classes? I'm afraid I dont know, I've never played warrior.
Common-sense says if you want to DPS, you roll a DPS class surely? Maybe its Blizz's fault for 'balancing' all the classes so everyone can get impressive numbers.
Jacobins Mar 6th 2008 10:53PM
What bothers me is that people seems to think it is a travesty to want to play as DPS on a class that can tank (or heal). Just because there is a shortage doesn't mean I should tank an instance for you on my Paladin. Same goes for healing.
Each dps class has its own flavor, and some people like the Fury warrior or Ret pally variety. Its the kind of thinking that says "Your class can tank, therefore you SHOULD tank" that most likely drives a lot of people away from that role.
When I play WoW, its to get away from the pressures of daily life for a short time, not worry about keeping another group of people happy, and being blamed for anything that goes wrong.
Izbay Mar 6th 2008 11:41PM
You have no idea how fun charging is. Until you know, you'll never understand.