Yes, in Kara days in BC it was a different story. And just like you say, Holly, things are now drastically different in terms of how tanks work. I can realistically expect to hold unlimited numbers of simple melee trash mobs… easily. I can expect to be able to grab and hold all sorts of targets, and CC is now optional to forgotten.

So… why do I need to do so much DPS, too?

And yes, Briiseis, I agree that the attitudes are exacerbated by the LFD gear balancing tool. If a raiding ICC tank in top gear were prevented from ever grouping in Violet Hold with brand new 80s in blues and iLevel 200s, it would be less apparent.

But the core issue is still that the paradigm of roles has changed. As was said, right now, all three DPS can die and it’s “Keep the tank alive to finish the kill of the group”.

To play off of Gnomers’ DPS in .2 milliseconds issue, I get numerous people asking me, “How the hell do I generate enough aggro in the first .2 seconds of a pull to counteract all these damn idiots who unload all out AOE as soon as they see me head towads the mobs? I’m tired of laser chickens pulling something off of me on every run.”

And my answer is usually, “Find yourself some friends who aren’t morons and know what a threat meter is, and who stop thinking that they can unload all out AoE dps before you even reach the mobs. Find people who know how to paly the game.”

If the game is meant to be enjoyed equally, then finding ways to remove unneccesary stress is good, right? And finding ways of highlighting the value people feel they bring to the group is good, right?

So why not give the tank greater threat generation, enough to grab things and hold them easily no matter what DPS is put out by that boomkin… but the tank just doesn’t do DPS.

Make it a switch. Much like Paladins have their Righteous Fury… give all tanks the “boost threat x 100%, reduce DPS x100%” button, and if you want to go solo an isntance as a tank, well, if you’re alone or with a low level buddy, just leave the button off. If yo’re tanking the serious shit, then you put it on, and hold threat like Samson, but you’ve got no freaking DPS. You NEED your DPS buddies to be solid to win through the day.

I’d be FINE with it.

And now I’m gonna make this comment a blog post, scuse me.

Yep, the extra dps was necessary back then and people dreamed of more than one tank class that could AoE tank.

Now the Tanks AoE clears the trash befor the dps has caught up to the tank.

It used to be one of the measures of a DPS…

Is the DPS below the tanks?

Now it’s a reason for a party or raid /kick

THB I don’t mind tanks beating me on the meters… I do mind when it’s because I am taking dirt baths.

I died on the 1st few pulls of a heroic the other day.

Mr. Offspec (a mate of mine) asks:

“Were you using AoE?”

“just living bomb” I replied.

“Theres your problem right there!”

ummm, I don’t think it’s my problem if I living bomb one mob put of 3 (it has low damage until the 12th second), scorch the skull and cast 1/2 a frostfire bolt before the tank loses control of. Mob that 2 shots me.

Tanks can DPS to their hearts content – as long as they tank 1st.
Same as Healers… DPS away – so long as no one dies from your neglect

The way I see it, tanks aren’t overpowered but simple overgeared for heroics. The reason we even go into heroics is to get gear to prepapre us for raids. Am I right? So if a tank goes in there who is mostly prepared for these raids and he simply wants his daily frost emblems then of course he is going to be doing a lot of damage. I’m sure if you throw him in there with equally geared DPSers he probably won’t be doing the same amount of DPS as them (and that place will be cleared in record time). But the situation with this new random dungeon group thingie makes it so that this overgeared tank gets thrown in there with a bunch of fresh 80 DPSers and like Holly said, the difference between ilvl 200 and ilvl 251 gear is immense.

So the problem here isn’t an overpowered tank but an unbalanced LFG system where you mix overgeared people with undergeared people.

I can’t speak from experience since I haven’t been in a raid yet (I’m a fresh 80) but I’m sure that a raid-ready tank won’t be doing the same DPS as the DPSers in his raid.

I could go on about this but I don’t wanna make my comment too long.

But in BC it was a different game, unless you were a very overgeared pally doing an easier heroic (shattered halls anyone?) Tanks generally could only pull and hold 2-3 things at once, things were meanner, and the dps and heallers were doing their jobs -and- doing crowd control because the tank just wasn’t able to survive without them. So tanks didn’t feel like real tanks, couldn’t make every mob look at him at once and survive, etc… so they gave tanks a little more utility, a little damage.

These days where it’s not unheard of for tanks to hold 20+ mobs and not die, CC is a thing of the past, and the sheer difference in ilevel 251 gear and ilevel 200 is so ridiculous that a fresh 80 struggling to pull 2k dps is nearly doubled by the tank. It encourages dps to not learn their class, andn feel entirely undervalued.

The other attitude it creates is that tank dps is important. I know a warrior who is part of a fairly serious raiding guild, and they decided after 4 years of service to them, the warrior tank would be benched for a deathknight tank. Not because the warrior couldn’t create threat, in fact it had the highest tps in their guild, no the warrior didn’t lack survivability, sitting at nearly 44khp unbuffed and roughly 40% mitigation even in icecrown. No the warrior got benched because the DK could do 2k more dps, which eased the timer on festergut.

….the tank was tanking, and wasn’t good enough because his dps was lower?

…this sort of issue should never happen, but apparently it’s becoming more regular.

So the easiest way to make dps feel more important while keeping the ‘If I apply enough force, I don’t have to think’ bodybuilder moto, is to make it so dps are the only ones who can dps, that keeping a tank alive is not going to win a run, that if all the dps die, you might as just wipe it up because the trees .9 dps, and the tanks .1 dps just aren’t going to take loken from 50% to 0

Dont worry about it. Even the Heroic bosses die quicker then a single rotation on my lock, just make sure you keep trying.