The Tanking Shortage - From a recent HOF/Title Tank who quit

[Jessfacedown-kiljaeden]

Hope the game changes and keeps you around. I’m posting for visibility for the players who normally wouldn’t speak up about it. I’m glad my thoughts and opinions are resonating with so many people, because my experience tanking isn’t a reflection of the players we need to bring into the tanking role. The problems the game faces in bringing in new tank players aren’t necessarily the same problems that high end tanks face, but I do think some of it aligns and finding that overlap is how I came to the point of view that I have.

[Drathiel-gilneas]

One of the biggest problems is, as you’ve said, that people associate rotational simplicity with gameplay simplicity. I don’t have the degree of experience at that level to speak to it in high-end Mythic raiding or title/KSH/KSL M+, but I’ve done it at varying levels since probably WoD across the classes.

Routing is one of the least engaging parts of this game to me, and having people try to start fights over routing is even less engaging. I haven’t enjoyed it since we started down this road in Legion, and I enjoy it even less now with how much more count% on mobs changes from season to season or with adjustments. Similar issue with mob tuning from season to season. It gives me a headache.

Raid tanking, on the flip side of that, bores me to death.

I’d rather heal than tank in raids or M+ anymore, so I do.

The answer probably isn’t making tanks buff bots, but Blizzard also keeps flip-flopping between making tanks immortal and making tanks bleed. I honestly am not sure where they want to take tanks at this point.

[Jessfacedown-kiljaeden]

@Lumysol-moon-guard

Either people learn to tank properly or your precious “role identity” will be lost forever.
Oh but wait, you don’t actually care about role identity. You are actually blaming the role identity for people being to scared and lazy to fulfill said role, or do it properly.
It has role identity, the identity that literally DEFINES a tank as a tank.
You cry about lack of role identity, yet contradict yourself and say “it does have role identity just one I don’t like”. Cool, tanking isn’t for everyone or even most people. There will always be a tanking shortage just because the role itself is hard to fulfill. It is a leader role.
Welcome to the tank role. Stop trying to change it and it’s REAL identity.

Man, and you wonder why people don’t want to tank. lmao. I’ve hit the highest levels of end game content and I still don’t have the ego you do. The game will rot and the tank role will fester and die because of gatekeeping and a refusal to change.

@Zoumz-zuljin

I feel tank tuning overall is better when tanks are strong which vengeance is a way to balance it out as it makes it so you can’t stack tank while it would need to be balanced closer so it doesn’t make tanks scale more than a dps but nearly as much. Let’s say tanks do 65% baseline of a dps normally but vengeance let them scale 30% higher if they take enough damage.

I like this, but I don’t think modern WoW design likes this tbh. Most tanks like the idea of very powerful tanks offensively, but I do agree that it creeps into the DPS role territory and that maybe there are better ways to address the issue before just putting a blanket power creep on tanks to ensure they feel impactful.

@Zoumz-zuljin

I wish this was a bigger concern as I feel tank balance is often forgotten but that’s also why for me they need to have around the same amount of utility and cc as this has been a bigger issue. I feel damage is easier to balance but again they need to take the time like they do for dps and it feels often they simply forget tanks. I think it’s inevitable at high end that you’ll want to reroll if you want to min/max but as long as the difference is reasonable I think that’s fine.

My role in raid was to fill whatever was necessary class wise in the tanking roster, and while it was super rewarding and fun to play every single tank at a high level… it is definitely exhausting and it started to mentally wear on me that I felt like I had no class that truly resonated with me like others did. But it has kind of gotten to a point where not playing that role would be a huge hindrance to our progression which isn’t something I want the rest of the community to face in the future.

@Drathiel-gilneas

The answer probably isn’t making tanks buff bots, but Blizzard also keeps flip-flopping between making tanks immortal and making tanks bleed. I honestly am not sure where they want to take tanks at this point.

Thanks for pointing this out. I agree the role feels aimless from Blizzards side of things. Its part of what drove me away from the game, expecting patch after patch for a bigger change to the gameplay of the role. Since SL healers have seen a slight rework 2-3 times an expansion, and tanks have progressively only gotten worse with random patches where a single tank shines out of the darkness.

[Felfáádaern-kargath]

@Primalmatter-stormrage

Tanking just is the easy, and largely uninteresting role. Its not entirely skilless but its not comparable to the other 2.

Every role is easy at most basic level. You saying “tanking is just walking into pack and putting up minor defensive” is like saying “DPS is just following tank and mashing your buttons” or “healing is just topping off whoever is low”. Tanks do so many things that make jobs of other roles easier or harder, and 99% of that is not covered by walking into pack and using defensive.

@Primalmatter-stormrage

outside of HoA dungeons are effectively a straight line with few to any packs to skip.

Dawnbreaker, Eco-Dome, Ara-Kara, Streets, Floodgate, Priory all have meaningful pathing and pull decisions. Only linear dungeon I can think of this season is Gambit.

[Dirus-bleeding-hollow]

@Shabeesha-illidan

• tanks dont need to do tons of dmg (I said what I said) --they need the threat modifiers on their tanking abilities to be AT LEAST 3-4x higher than they currently are so that IF they are playing with very geared DPS, they really cant’ be out-threated unless a dps taunts. This might be a hot take–but threat and dmg should not be related when it comes to tanks. If a tank is doing their job, mobs should never leave them. I would argue positioning of mobs, protecting your friends and NOT dying are the core fantasies of being a tank–the tanks out there that keep pushing for us to do more dmg…I dont know what to tell you–it almost sounds like you’re not really as into it either…you still wanna be a dps?
• ALL tanks need a ranged interrupt–period. Again, I said what I said—too many dps can’t be relied on to help interrupt or otherwise bring in casters that are stuck out in Narnia and not in the pack.
• Blizzard needs to KNOCK OFF the constant prevalence of mobs that “jump out” from a pack being tanked OR they need to make said mobs unable to repeat that move if they were just gripped in, sigil of chainsed in, ring of peace…etc. The amount of mobs doing that this season is off the chain ridiculous. The key-pushing tanks work on our survivability so that we can do riskier pulls–that’s what’s fun–not wiping over and over again b/c mobs are teleporting all over the place and pulling pats.
• It’s been 22 years and mobs STILL walk into our hitbox or move to slightly behind us when tanking instead of sitting in a cone like every other MMO—why can they NOT fix this?
• The role isn’t popular because there’s a lot of responsibility tied to it. There’s also a lot of jerk players in game that back-seat tank or otherwise treat us like crap–it takes a strong personality and mindset to be able to deal with this and your average introverted sociallly awkward gamer isn’t going to want to do it . Again, I said what I said. There is really nothing they can do to fix this. The truth is that while that makes the role less popular it also has fringe benefits–i NEVER wait to get in groups and I can get MOST things done on my own in game. So in the end, it ends up being worth it.

I think they should actually lean hard into Tanks do bad damage but produce tons of threat. Add/buff all support, healing, and similar abilities that tanks have and make them brick walls that can self sustain most of the time. They help keep the team alive, route and when played correctly don’t die.

Then remove most kicks, stops, CCs and interrupts from tanks and healers. This should be a DPS job and when the DPS fail its clear who failed.

And yes the stuff jumping all over the place or absolutely refusing to move no matter how many times its kicked, line of sighted or CCed needs to go.

@Jessfacedown-kiljaeden

Man, and you wonder why people don’t want to tank. lmao. I’ve hit the highest levels of end game content and I still don’t have the ego you do. The game will rot and the tank role will fester and die because of gatekeeping and a refusal to change.

They could take 5 seconds to look up your profile/guild but nah they will pretend they know better.

[Angrystare-aegwynn]

As a (Currently) 3k M+ tank I agree with this entire statement. I would like to add the following.

There is nowhere to practice. My first Eco-dome this season was an 8, and i was flying by the seat of my pants following a route i got off of youtube. Most new players do not have this advantage. Also, a first timer trying tanking in a something like a heroic dungeon is going to have a terrible time. Everyone pulls ahead of them and is generally unhelpful. I did the weekly normal for the rep reward, i was pulling entire rooms, was the highest DPS by a factor of 5 and the dps were STILL PULLING FOR ME. Also everything hits like a noodle so no real learning happens. Overgearing content means it’s nearly impossible to die or proc cheat death.

Without outside assistance, learning routes is un-intuitive at best, obscure and downright misleading at worst. A pack of 4 groundskeepers (in HOA) that die to random cleave is worth the same as a big gargoyle that takes 45 seconds to bring down. There is no in-game interface element that tells you this other than staring at the percentage bar as stuff dies. There is no in-game route planner a beginner tank could use to see the layout of a dungeon and how it flows together. Which mobs are casters and which are not. Random casts going off aren’t even dangerous until about 11s+, so there is no feedback to avoid pulling too many of those mobs.

I’d like to reinforce the responsibility element. Most dps and healers don’t care for the route. The follow the tank and push cooldowns whenever the pack size seems big enough. They are under no obligation to do homework before the key. If a DPS dies, they either run back or get rezzed. -5(or 15) seconds. Woo. If the tank dies the entire group dies. Even if they get brezed, the odds of them regaining control of the pack without specifically an AOE taunt are slim to none, resulting in multiple deaths which can EASILY snowball into a bricked key.

[Nonesovile-proudmoore]

@Bungledork-area-52

What if spending 3 holy power empowers your allies with holy light. Causing their next 3 attacks to do X Holy/Fire Damage, or their next Heal to leave a HoT on the target over the next 6 seconds. The number of attacks and length of HoT increases, with the number of Holy Power Spent.

That’s basically Lightsmith already.

[Primalmatter-stormrage (Primalmatter)]

@Felfáádaern-kargath

Every role is easy at most basic level. You saying “tanking is just walking into pack and putting up minor defensive” is like saying “DPS is just following tank and mashing your buttons” or “healing is just topping off whoever is low”. Tanks do so many things that make jobs of other roles easier or harder, and 99% of that is not covered by walking into pack and using defensive.

Issue is tanking caps out earlier as well. One of the roles is going to be the easiest of the three and that is going to be tanking.

It isn’t a bad thing but it does lead to there being a shortage of tanks at the higher level. Not at the highest. Even now tanks are pretty plentiful in 13s.

[Akutare-fenris]

@Angrystare-aegwynn

Without outside assistance, learning routes is un-intuitive at best, obscure and downright misleading at worst.

Definitely a major cause of the issue, you can basically learn roughly what to expect doing Heroic dungeons before M+ for both Healer and DPS, but nothing in those lower dungeons prepare you for route making and what groups you can pull together and can’t.

But at the same time how do you really fix that without changing M+ as a whole really, since ultimately the issue is foundational just as much as it’s a community one. I know they polled about potentially trying out Death counter as the M+ limiter instead of a Timer, and I thought that could potentially do it since people would still be likely to want to go fast by nature of getting more dungeons in, but it’s hard to say if that would help ease people into M+ without a timer looming overhead.

[Kholin-drakthul (Kholin)]

The only time I’ve ever tanked M+ instances was in SL Season 3. I did some research online, but the biggest help was tagging along with knowledgeable guild members as a DPS while they ran me through low level keys. Then I pugged a bunch and watched tanks do their thing. Eventually getting to the point where I started to tank/heal low level keys.

Had I kept up Season after Season the learning curve probably wouldn’t seem so steep. As it is I occasionally think… hey I should try M+ again. I go look up a guide and a few minutes in… it’s nope.

The entry cost to M+ is a brick wall. (As a DPS, for the tank/heal role it would be even higher.) The time investment to get started just isn’t worth it. (For me.) I figure it is at least 15 minutes to research a guide. Then run it 2, 3 or 5 times as a DPS to get the hang of things. Figuring 15 minutes to get a group and a 30 minute run. That’s between 2 to 4 hours for each dungeon just to start getting the hang of things. Multiply by 8… Plus they mix the rotation up each season…

So… I’m checking out. lol

Would I change it? Nope. It is what it is and I think there is a pretty big collection of people that like the content as is.

---

Also - For those worrying about the timer. I pugged my way to KSM in SL Season 3. I worried a lot about the timer at the start of the journey. It just isn’t that big a deal. Don’t let that stop you from trying M+.

[Angrystare-aegwynn]

The timer is not the issue. it’s nearly impossible to fail a low key due to deaths. They removed the death penalty from 2s and i think 3s.
This is easily resolved by adding dungeon maps and percentage values to the dungeon journal. Maybe a feature with community voted maps where you set it, and it automatically marks the next target you have to pull with a skull. No reason to re-invent the wheel

[Dirusalso-aegwynn]

The TWW key squish was supposed to make it so you coukd learn in heroic and M0. They missed the mark on that one by a mile.

I could solo packs in S3 m0s with S2 gear as a tank. Nothing hits hard enough for anyone to learn. Casters tickle, dots are ignored and puddles are a dps increase.

I believe the dungeons should start much harder and scale slower up to 11s. People need to learn before one shots happen that one shots are possible and from what.

This is also ignoring how much of a massive problem people getting carried is and it gets worse the longer the season goes on. I have seen so many dps that clearly ran dozens of fsiled runs until they got lucky and had 4 people with strong backs.

This season already i had a group in priory that had 2 people last season with 3k io and 2 with 2600. They could not figure out ANY mechanics in a 7 from a dungeon they got portals to last season.

Between the 4 of them there was 4 kicks total when they left the failed key. I had 25. I also soloed the affix (last weeks)every single time.

[Crypticsdk-bleeding-hollow]

Routing is the absolute worst part of tanking imo. There is zero in game support for checking you pulled the packs you were supposed to and the count of mobs.

You have to rely on constantly looking at your second monitor or pulling mdt up while mid pull doing your rotation, doing mechanics, and stopping casts until you know the route by heart.

[Felfáádaern-kargath]

@Crypticsdk-bleeding-hollow

You have to rely on constantly looking at your second monitor or pulling mdt up while mid pull doing your rotation

I mostly get my routes memorized after a few runs. Sometimes I run the same dungeon several times in a row to get it down. Sometimes I go in to solo it on N, H, or follower mode just to learn what each pull will look like. I use MDT + ThreeChest to plan my route, then practice till it’s committed to muscle-memory.

[Gellyd-frostmourne]

Literally everything you’ve mentioned here is a skill issue as a tank.

[Sarama-firetree]

@Drathiel-gilneas

Blizzard also keeps flip-flopping between making tanks immortal and making tanks bleed. I honestly am not sure where they want to take tanks at this point

I get why they may think being immortal is bad, but the problem is, they’re so bad at tuning anything that when they try to change it, things just get terrible.

You gotta understand when a project is out of your league and know when to just let it go if you can’t get it done right.

[Ranker-winterhoof]

This right here. I quit Tanking for the same reason. Sick of other players telling me what way is faster, dps pulling, and all around idiots. Those same idiots ask why no Tanks?

Its WoW though man, its gnat brain sized nerds who just wanna beat the game so they can move onto the next to do the same.

[Darkhealers-moon-guard]

I would love to tank but what I see as a DPS or HPS in dungeons or raids make me say no way. I level as a tank and do delves as a tank. Also this game has WAY to may buttons/spells needed. They need to trim it down and maybe it will become a bit more manageable to tank.

[Eelos-whisperwind]

Another probelm with people not wanting to play tanks. Is for raids to matter the size there only 2 tanks. If your grp gets bigger u get more dps and healers. But tanks only ever 2. And with m+ being stressful on new tanks with the timer it turns them off to tanking cause they cant get in raids to learn and they have no time to learn in m+

[Wraathdh-illidan]

@Nervousia-nightslayer

Ehhhh depends on content I guess but I’d put it like this.

M+ difficulty: Tanking>Dps>healing

Raid Difficulty: Dps>Healing>Tanking.

Tanking is tough in M+ but absurdly simple in raid.

I think M+ difficulty is more like tanking=healing>dps

I’m a tank main for multiple expansions in a row and I tried healing M+ and oh my god it’s way more stressful than tanking. That could be my lack of experience but damn it feels way harder than playing a dps.