I think, come Cataclysm, Blizz sort of expects you to have Dual Spec. Now, this hurts folk who dual spec into Prot and Holy, that's a given, but I just wanted to point that out before someone else did.

That said, Blizz has ALSO said they want to increase the amount of damage that tanks do, because over the course of this expansion, the amount of damage for DPS grew a LOT, while the amount of damage for Tanks didn't. They'll likely lower the amount of AOE damage for all tanks, and increase single-target damage quite a bit. This will bring a higher level of difficulty to Heroics, since DPS will have to burn down targets one at a time rather than the AOEfest we have now, which they're clearly trying to avoid a second time.

So, yeah. As tanks, hopefully we'll see a significant improvement in our single target DPS that'll make soloing and questing not as much of a worry as you seem to think it will be.

@mattimus

What happens when a new player rolls a paladin and tries to level them as a tank? How are they supposed to know about dual specs? Come to think of it, where are they supposed to get 1000g to purchase the dual spec ability?

I leveled my paladin all the way to 80 as protection. I eventually got a second spec, holy, so I could help off-heal on single tank fights. I have no desire to spec as DPS. Heck, I don't even like to heal, so I guess dual specs was a waste for me.

It would be stupid for Blizzard to "expect" that everyone would have dual specs or will level as DPS. I mean, what's the point in having a dungeon finder at lower levels when there aren't any healers or tanks?

...
Krick
http://www.tankadin.com

If they wanted the focus to be on single-target instead of AoE-fest, I find it silly that they are expanding the AoE capability of classes.

The simple way to handle it would be to nerf AoE to the point that it is only effective with 5 or more targets.

Reducing tank AoE threat while giving more AoE abilities to DPS just means more people being idiots and blaming the tanks, which leads to fewer tanks wanting to do instances, which leads to longer queues, and a less-fun game.

People won't stop AoE just because the tank can't hold threat as well. They AoE because it makes their recount look pretty, which strokes their e-peen. Until single-target damage strokes their e-peen better than AoE, DPS will continue to do as they have.

Heck, I had a former raid leader who refused to stop spreading diseases all over the faction champs fight because he did lots of damage spreading diseases. Never mind that because of his selfishness the guild didn't pass FC for a long time because nothing could be CCd effectively. His own e-peen was more important than a successful encounter.

Mechanics will change, but I sincerely doubt people will. The people who did their jobs instead of going for higher numbers have mostly quit playing as Wrath became more faceroll-oriented. It simply lost the challenge for them.

Make the game harder, and they'll risk losing the audience they won via the ease of Wrath. Hi rock, meet hard place.

It's not quite as bad as one would think.

I leveled as a protadin from the very beginning of BC, and I hit 80 about three months in. The leveling was a tad bit slow, but not miserable. I really did enjoyed learning how to control my mana and health as well as damage (as much as you could do at the time). Then 3.0 came out.

I gained a 200% boost to my damage. I remember on the PTR running through Heroic Ramps loving how well I could hold my own. It was wonderful, and it wasn't because of block rating. (I also secretly loved my Sun Eater. It was awesome using it the first time ^_^)

Because of the way paladins work now days; I'm positive the leveling experience will not be as bad. The damage your shield absorbed while leveling was low anyway.

Remember though, Parry will still negate about the same amount of damage overall, just spread over 2 attacks. Obviously, every time the second attack was for less damage than the first, then yeah, you essentially got screwed, but it should average out.