As a tank, I'd rather people /don't/ assist me. I will be switching targets pretty rapidly to make sure I have sufficient threat on all of them, and spending a little extra time on the one I've marked with a skull. ALL HAIL THE MIGHTY MARKS.

That said, Army of the Dead is #1 on my list of hated mechanics. Why yes, do indeed please completely remove my control of the situation and ability to generate rage and threat Mr. Idiot DK Who Is Making A Hopeless Bid To Top Meters. I'm sure the healer will thank you as well when they're done running back after getting cleaved/breathed/deathbeamed from a boss that's out of control.

yes yes and yes, I cannot stress how much of a difference this makes. Even if it's an AoE pull, I'm gonna be getting higher threat on my target then I will on the others.

THIS so much! Whenever I have say halls of lightning (because I've ran it so much) I always run in and make sure I have aggro on 2 of the mobs but the other 1/2 are on mainly aoe alone, and theres always a ranged dps like "IMMA ATTACK THAT ONE!!!1!!"

And another time on 1st boss of HoL, he was charged up, the 2 dk dps's didnt wait for me to get aggro, they died straight away, so me the healer and a mage managed to go it alone, has really made me insecure about DK's in general.

For all the hunters that I run with (as I have one as well), I suggest setting the tank as the focus. That way you can have a misdirect macro that prioritizes them as well as replacing the default "assist" key with a macro that assists your focus first.

Yes, you do have to watch how you use it when the tank is target switching, but overall it's the best way I've found to handle stuff.

This is also incredibly helpful when doing target switching fights as you can set your focus to the tank you need to switch to or from to speed up target switching.

However, especially for hunters, make sure you have the attack on assist option turned off in the options. That's a good way to piss off tanks.

I keep the tank on focus and place target of focus right in the middle of my screen, far from anything else, where I can always see it. This generally keeps me from going after the wrong thing, but I do have to pay attention to make sure the tank isn't switching around to keep group aggro. What would really really help? Marks. Mark what you want focused fired, and even idiot dps might get the point. Maybe.

Assisting is all very well and fine but i wish people would still mark, reason being that a tank can often be switching targets in a multi target pull, so while you start out on a target the tank is building a nice amount of threat on you'll suddenly look down and realise that you're actually rapidly catching up because the tank has moved on.
Honestly, if tanks would just still mark i guarantee 99.99% of the time i'll be on the marked target.

Although not skilled enough to make full use of it, as a tank I use Pitbull to see what the DPSers are targetting (and to allow me to quickly throw a taunt using a mouseover macro); the addon can be configured to light up their targets if they match yours.

(It's also great to see who is still going at Nadox when the Guardian hatches, or at Paletress after the memory has been summmoned :)

As for marks, I would mark more if not for the almost universal "skull dies last" effect I see in pugs. It does have the effect of lowering repair bills for DPSers that stay on the mark, since (except in the case of DPSers that insanely outgear me and go full out, or those that start attacking before the mob reaches me) I've yet to see a DPS pull threat from whatever I've marked.