I’ve been learning to tank. I know, scary thought. I decided to create a warrior and team up with two guild mates, one is playing a shaman healer and the other is playing a mage (or a warlock depending on what levels we need). Over the last few days we managed to complete 7 guild achievements, dungeon runs. We started with Ragefire since we were level 15, and then before I could blink my warrior had hit level 24. I’m brand new at tanking, I’ve done two instances on my paladin, but I’ve never played a warrior. I wanted something new and since I pride myself on knowing my characters it’s been quite an experience. A few things I’ve learned from my dungeon runs.
- 90% of people will never ever assist you. The majority in fact will specifically target the mob that you are not targeting, just so they can get smacked around a bit. Letting them die a few times by not taking aggro back will (in most cases) remedy this.
- All hunters want to be tanks. They like to let loose their arrows (or bullets) just as you’re about to pull something, and pull for you. Sending polite tells to remedy this is a bad idea that results in the hunter doing something else aggravating like calling you a ‘carebear’ or training your group.
- New paladins rarely know what any of their spells do and quite frequently enter battle with their threat increasing buff on while they’re dpsing. If you’re grouped with a paladin who keeps taking aggro from you try checking their buffs, it’s a yellow symbol and pretty easy to spot.
- It only takes running Shadowfang Keep 4 times to become an absolute expert at it and to be able to run it with your eyes closed.
I do have to admit, playing with a guild group makes tanking far more tolerable. Even though two people are still a part of a PUG via the LFD tool, I know that two members will have patience while I fumble my way through the dungeon. The results yesterday were pretty good. I had fun (gasp) and I’m looking forward to future dungeons!
Happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself.