World of Warcraft®

Every time i queue up on my hunter or enhance shammy and see a tank completely fail at a simple 5 man mechanic (fire = bad, mmmkay?) or go into LFR and watch us go through 8 tanks on ultraxion before we get a single one that can do fading light, i remember why i queue as a tank (side note: half of every LFR kill i've ever had on ultraxion i've ended up solo tanking... go fig...).

So now i have a prot pally, blood dk (current project), feral druid and prot warrior all at the 370+ ilvl range and simply can't bring myself to do much else. I heal occasionally (if a heal satchel is up) and i'll still dabble on my dps alts but...

Yea... boils down to what has been said above.

I simply don't trust anyone else in the pug pool to do the job.

It's kind of a complex to me.

Everytime I play somethin', I am the one that goes in front.
If there's someone to be hit, it would be me. Should be me. HAVE to be me.

When I ride my bike with other friends and there are dogs in the road, they slow down and I rage against the dogs. And they chase me.
Busy with me, my friends can get to safety. And I have to deal with the danger of being bitten by several street dogs that may be sick.

When I go trekking with friends or even strangers, I go first.
If there's a snake, I will see it and take it off the way. If there's any danger, slidding paths or so, I will be the first to notice and I will lead everybody to security.

When someone dies, I'm the only one that don't cry.

I had the duty to be the strong arm and the mighty wall between fear and salvation.
For friends, and for everyone that know me.

Tanking is a natural talent, a duty aand a pleasure.
Also it is our doom.

This is why I like to be a tank.
Because I am one, and I'm proud of it.

03/09/2012 11:41 AMPosted by Lynera

Mainly, what I'm asking is what made you start tanking and why do you stick with it?

I rolled this baby tank not that long ago, but I'm having a blast so far.

Truthfully, I've been DPSing as ranged classes (a lock in Vanilla and TBC, boomkin in Wrath and Cata) for years. Boomkins are fun, but I wanted to do something other than DPS.

Originally, I was going to roll a holy pally. I changed my mind after witnessing the sheer amount of terribad tanks in super-lowbie dungeons and went tankadin instead. I've never really tanked before, but I decided to give it a shot—at the very least, maybe a tanks' perspective would help me empathize with PuG tanks.

So far, I'm having more fun on my baby tank than any other character I've played since Cata went live. I like being the default leader, directing the pulls and charging through the dungeons. Even without heirlooms, I can take damage and keep mobs stuck on me. It's fun!

I'm a little apprehensive about being a new 85 so late in the expansion, but ah well. I enjoy this role, and I want to keep at it and get better.

Because my guild would have potentially been in a slump this xpac if I didn't main/role swap :/

But now that I've 'found' Blood tanking, I guess I'm hooked.

Well, I *started* tanking mostly because I wanted to make a holy pally for end-game, but it seemed silly to get heirlooms that no other toon could possibly use. Plus, healers can be kinda squishy, take a while (even for disc priest) to kill stuff for quests, etc.

I'm having a *blast* with tanking, and it's turned out to be a great change of pace from healing, though I do that occasionally as well. It was a bit tricky at first figuring out how to move the mobs where I wanted them to go, but the thread on tank movement and the responses I got to my thread really helped. I feel like I have lots of tools for when pulls get bigger than intended (either because mobs play recruit-a-friend or a DPS facepulls), I can give the healer a hand if things go wonky, and it's a new view of the dungeons rather than playing follow-the-leader.

Mix of being a control freak, knowing that I can do it better than the other guy the vast majority of the time, and I'm a bear.

I like the gift bags

Tanking is fun. It's a challenge (sometimes). Every talented player in a raid group is valuable, but I firmly believe good tanks, and good healers, make or break the group.

My main was a Holy/Disc Priest - but I had a warrior that I had setup as a bank toon since TBC. It turns out our tanks wanted to go for dps during Cataclysm and we needed a tank. The problem is I was the third tank, so I ended up tanking for another guild's progression - still love my guild.

It's hard to have alot of the fight focused on you knowing the fight and it is exhilarating to get first kills.

Keeps you focused and watching how others play to increase dps and avoid unncecessary damage.

Not only do you get fast queues - if you become a good tank - ppl will come to you and ask you for advice. My healer still has the same ilevel I have - but tanking is where I am.

Tanking brings certain implied duties with it. You can't be an effective tank in raids without being aware of everything that's going on, you can't be carried through progression, and you play a pivotal role in any guild. I like all the responsibility because after raiding for so long it sort of comes naturally.

Listen,

-TANK-

Who doesn't want to be the tank?

TANK........................... Think about it

Started out dpsing (bc, mage), then figured out that healing (wrath, priest) was much more fun (more random elements, more ability to make or break the group). Midway through wrath I got annoyed with people complaining about tanking and figured it couldn't be that hard. Leveled my first bear and tanked alt runs for the remainder of the expansion. At this point while I dps or heal here and there I have four tanks and prefer it to anything else.

Tanking has the randomness that makes healing challenging (oh look, some featherhead pulled adds) but is more immersion since you are less focused on health bars and more focused on what is going on around you. Plus - blowing every cooldown, battle rezzing the healer, and going on to kill the boss just feels amazing.

And no, no I don't trust others to do it right.

I played a mage back in vanilla and I got to the point where I was running uldaman, back when uldaman was a 40+ instance (before the infamous pre-BC nerf).

I used to run the hell out of that thing on my mage. Loved it to death because so many groups just couldn't finish it, and the ones that were able to finish did so by playing strategically (using CC properly, pulling properly, etc).

I never thought too much about the tank until I got into uldaman with this warrior tank. Hands down the smoothest run I had ever seen through Uldaman. It was obvious to me how much the tank affected the success of the group, and that the tanks I had seen before had nothing on this guy.

So I rolled a warrior with the intent of tanking. Never looked back. If not for tanking, I would've gotten bored of this game long ago.

I tank because the gear comes easier. This is also why I run alongside a bear tank.

I also think tanking is the easiest thing you can do. As a DPS, I would get frustrated whenever I see my name drop below first place on recount. Also, as a melee character, soooo much of your damage depends on weapon upgrades. Just yesterday, I got my Gurthalak from LFR. After running it every week. My DPS shot up like 3k now with just this one upgrade. It is annoying when so much of your character's value depends on a slot that is often so hard to fill. Healing is also annoying to me, because of the fact that the game becomes nothing but trying to time it so that you use as much of your mana as possible by the end of the fight, without using it too quickly.

Tanking gear is much more forgiving and I also think it is interesting that certain gearing choices will change depending on the encounter. I like having 4 or 5 trinkets that I swap out during the course of a raid.

03/09/2012 01:29 PMPosted by Druimeister

I rolled a tank because I was tired of waiting in the damned que.

faster ques, better goodies, everything is on your shoulders if you don't do your job.. exciting stuff

It's the only thing I really know know how to do well.
I'm decent enough on my first toon - a Spriest - but I really feel like I could be doing more dps with half the effort. I tried out both Disc and Holy, as well as a Resto Sham and Druid, and Holy on this guy. None of it seemed very intuitive to me. Then I picked up a Prot Pally, Blood DK, and Bear Druid. And I accomplished my moment of zen.

I wanted to try something new.

It's pretty fun, though there are moments that pop up now and then that make me wanna flip my desk in frustration: (DPS pulling before I can thunderclap, people running AWAY from me when an add/mob attacks them, etc etc.) I have a new found level of respect for every tank out there.

Plus, I admit, Im getting spoiled by the insta queues. >> <3

its my first toon, my first mmo, I am only a noob at about 8 months of play time. I play a tank because I like to be first in the fight. I like the feeling of getting the the mobs face. I like being relied upon by the raid (though I feel like !@#$ when I make a wipe happen). For me it really is an extension of my personality.

The fact that I don't wait in ques as long is nice, but I actually don't know any different.

gronc

My reasoning changes a lot, but one that usually sticks is:

I tank because I feel I should be playing all aspects of my class. If I just wanted to DPS, I'd be better off playing a rogue.