Tank Shortage - Solution?

1.) People aren’t tanking because the tank has a lot of responsibility and
they don’t want to do it
2.) You don’t need to be in a tank spec for the leveling dungeons.
3.) Wrath had dual spec and you STILL had to wait 30 minutes for a tank

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Hands up, anyone who actually wants to run dungeons tanked by a dedicated damage warrior who thinks talents make the tank. does not raise hand

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Tanking is 50% gear, 50% ability and 100% attitude. You have to have a little crazy in you to want to tank. FWIW I have 5% gear, 5% ability and a whole lot of crazy.

In all seriousness though, too many emo pugs out there makes it not worth the hassle, so I just tank for my RL friends that play.

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I’ve enjoyed tanking the TBC dungeons so far! It would help out a lot of DPS were generally nicer and more accommodating for tanks so they actually want to tank.

No one wants to take flak from people who chose DPS because the DPS in their group try to pump down a target on their own, get threat, and fall over like a wet noodle when taunt or sunder gets resisted.

It’s also a nightmare if you want to quest on your own, pvp, or what have you while in a tanking or healing spec; you’re pidgeonholed into doing dungeons or relying on others unless you want your questing experience to take an hour per quest.

So really, just be nicer to the tanks and help them in the open world if you see them. It’s a community issue, not a Blizzard one.

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Agreed. The old saying was:
If the healer dies, it’s the tank’s fault…
If the tank dies, it’s the healer’s fault…
If the DPS dies, it’s their own dang fault!

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This is pretty false. Tank shortage is much worse in retail.

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It doesn’t budge the Tank shortage an iota because people don’t want to Tank and even plenty of people that do simply cannot effectively Tank.

It is a different kind of role and one that most people aren’t suited for.

Dual spec solves nothing, people who don’t want to tank won’t tank.

Garbage DPS who make the dungeon take an hour long are why tanks won’t tank for PUGs.

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Not as much but healers get groups much easier than dps.

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Some people would like to tank in dungeons but don’t like to quest in a tank spec. Some decide to just dps rather than pay the respec cost. Dual spec wouldn’t solve the tank or healer shortage, just make it less severe.

It’s not so much that the dps gives you grief for their own mistakes, mostly they don’t. But that they make mistakes that cause problems is why tanks and healers want to spec in tanking and healing specs. I like healing and don’t get enough dungeons with just my friends so I do pugs. I want to do it in a healing spec because pugs often aren’t great players. Sometimes even the tank isn’t great. In a healing spec I can compensate for poor pug players. I’m sure some tanks feel the same way.

Lots of tanks and healers want dual spec so they can have a dungeon spec and a questing spec

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No, it’s mostly the result of the disparity in group comp between dungeons and raids.

People don’t want to roll tanks because there are no raid spots for tanks. It’s purely a numbers problem. In raids you need 1 tank for every 12.5 people. In Dungeons you need 1 tank for every 5 people.

This has always been the issue since WoW’s release and it’s what dual spec was meant to help with.

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If dual spec was meant to solve the problem then surely it did. If I go on retail RN there is no tank shortage right?

I don’t know about tanks not wanting to put up with pugs take, but tank is certainly an undesirable roll for most people because it is by default a leadership roll and most people don’t want to be leaders.

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So then why does retail still have a tank shortage when they have free respecs(and you don’t need to farm a second gear set) and M+ Dungeons are a popular method to getting high end gear?

I’ve been a tank myself and in pretty much all the “Why aren’t there any tanks?” threads plenty of people who play tanks will tell you they don’t want to put up with pugs.

Especially when being a good tank gets you on a lot of friends lists. Even more so in the TBC era where we don’t have the LFD tool.

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It’s still an issue in retail but this is mostly because most tank specs can only respec to melee, which is also a pretty undesirable role. There’s only 1 class in the game that can fill the most desirable raid role (ranged DPS) and the most desirable dungeon role (tanking) and that is druid. If more classes were capable of doing it then it wouldn’t be as difficult to find a tank for dungeons.

I play a tank and that really isn’t the issue at all.

It’s more that there are already so many people in my guild asking me to tank that I don’t need to PUG to get all my dungeons done. Every time I log on I get people asking me to tank for them before I can even click on the LFG button.

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This is pretty much what I’ve been saying, just different wording.

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This is precisely what drove me to tanking.

I don’t agree; I fundamentally thinking that in order to be a tank and enjoy tanking you need to be somewhat of a selfless player because your gratification isn’t going to come from the damage meters and very few people want to play that way, they may play that way for a dungeon or two just to speed up the process, but they don’t want to consistently play that way.

I enjoyed raiding WAY more when I was a dps than when I’ve been a tank. When I was a dps I actively looked forward to raid because I was trying to compete on logs (retail), even got a couple of 99’s. It was an addicting feedback loop, by and large that doesn’t exist with tanks. In order to tank you have to be a more team orientated person.

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Dual spec will not get people to tank for pugs, people’s behavior is the issue and nothing will change that.

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