Here are ways we could make AE tanking trivial. None of these are things we would actually do, though players have suggested some things dangerously close to them.

-- Challenging Shout has no cooldown. Everything is pretty much taunted to you the whole time.
-- You can tank everything by spamming Commanding Shout. (Back when say warriors tanked the pre-Nef adds, they could do it by spamming Battle or Demo Shout, which generated terrible threat but just enough to actually work on that encounter. Now it really won't work... but it could with the right numbers.)
-- Thunder Clap hits so freaking hard that you hit it once and never really have to again.
-- Thunder Clap puts a dot on everything (stronger than Deep Wounds) so that you hit it once and never really have to again.
-- Defensive Stance has an 8000% threat modifier.

Those ideas would all work if we wanted you to never lose threat. That's not the goal. On the other hand, the goal also is NOT:

-- Some tank classes just generate a lot more AE threat than others.
-- Some tank classes just AE tank a lot easier than others.
-- AE tanking gets harder and harder over time as dps specs gear up.
-- AE tanking is really, really challenging and you're at the constant risk of losing aggro.
-- Just for completeness, I'll add the original one above, which is that you never, ever lose threat no matter what.

What we like about the warrior AE tanking model that is worth extending to other classes without just duplicating the warrior abilities:

-- You hit more than one button.
-- You hit different buttons than you do when handling single targets.
-- You have to pay attention to crowd controlled targets.
-- You don't totally ignore your single-target abilities.
-- You might switch targets on some pulls.

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I'm not sure the answer is just to prevent Prot from using Seal of Command. We like sub-speccing to some extent. I think part of the problem is the way HoR and SoC interact, but that doesn't mean the solution has to be one of them dies in a fire.

If you're talking best possible gear, we think BM is pretty close to Survival in 3.3.3. Marks is ahead, and that's largely a function of armor pen, but again you are talking about absolute best gear. If you aren't in Icecrown 25 hard modes, then gear is likely to have just as much effect on your damage as spec. Ideally, things are balanced at all levels between level 1 and 80 with BiS gear, but there are going to be a lot of points along the way where that's probably not true. We see Survival hunters beat Marks hunters all the time in what I would categorize as average (meaning not server first guilds but capable of progressing) raids. Hopefully we'll see some BM guys up there too, but it may take higher gear levels.

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I would be pretty surprised if guilds doing hard modes w/ access to lvl 80 BiS gear have hunters raiding as BM, or would be happy with a hunter choosing a spec that isn't min/max'd.

My suspicion is that the hunters with the gear you are describing will have a propensity to go Marks, because that currently yields the highest damage and raiders tend to play whatever does the highest damage. In a world without armor pen, that might not be the case (though I haven't done the math lately).

Nonetheless, it is also true today that Marks can beat Survival, and yet there are a lot of Survival hunters raiding. Our hope is that in 3.3.3 that there will be as many BM hunters as Survival raiding, which would be a really nice bump for BM. Maybe the estimates (ours and those I've read) about the boost BM is getting are overly optimistic. We'll see.

It's possible the Survival hunters are only going Survival for Replenishment, though all 3 hunters bring some pretty solid raid benefits these days.

The focus of these interviews is on five years of play experience from random players with different perspectives within the community. We may continue doing these interviews in the future without tying them into the five-year anniversary, in which case we may dig deeper on specific subjects.

--

The idea is not to interview the people everyone knows. We didn't go to the top raiding guild in the world. We didn't go to the top Arena player in the world. We're searching around for players to share their perspectives on the last five years of World of Warcraft. We're not looking for the best of the best. Maybe we're looking for you. :)

We'd appreciate your vote!

Popular gaming website The Escapist is running their March Mayhem Developer's Showdown 2010, in which 64 of the world's games creators are pitted against each other. Readers will vote for their favorite developers in a series of head-to-heads. To show your support for Blizzard, you can head over and vote – but don't delay! Each round only lasts 48 hours, and the first started today, March 17, at 9:00 AM PDT.

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/532.179651-Poll-Round-1-West-2-Blizzard-vs-15-The-Behemoth

Obliteration
Procedure of
Eradicating
Radiation
Anomalies
Through
Ingenious
Offensive
Nullification

Or O.P.E.R.A.T.I.O.N.: Gnomeregan, for short.

FOR GNOMEREGAN!

Those leper Gnomes really did a number on you...

Today we feature some of Angra's work with a piece entitled: Rouxxeuse - Blood Elf Paladin. Take a moment to check out this portrait of one of the noble Blood Knights of Silvermoon.
http://eu.blizzard.com/en-gb/community/fanart/index.html

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OmG BliZZ u PwND lOlstO0rM LolZ WhoPsS I CaNnoT FacErOlL oN mY VVaR noW WhoPsS! NoT Go0d BliZs x//! StooPiT RogUeZzZ CaN nOW dlsArM mEh wHeN Im LOlst0OorMinG WhoPsS! BiG tReE wITh N0O LEaFfeZz x//. YoU aRe StOoPiT aNd i gO CrY nOW! Q_Q

u ArE pwNd FRoM THe ForUmS.

Am I DOinG iT rIGhT?