Add more what exactly?
Stuff hits harder, you’re expected to pull more stuff at once for efficiency’s sake to beat the timer, you’re in pulls for longer so you have to meter out defensive resources so you don’t end up running out before the pull ends, you have to use your disruption tools to stop deadly things from killing other members of your group, you might even have to kite.
Yep, iron fur should be up as much as possible. (You may feel this is unnecessary, but it builds good habits for harder content and really doesn’t hurt.) don’t be afraid to use frenzied regeneration as well. It’s not something you need to constantly push, but it’s cd resets fast enough that you really are just helping your healer when you use it.
If regrowth procs aka lights up it shouldn’t take you out of bear form. This I am unsure about though and could be confusing it. I know that is how it works for feral. Basically, only using it when it lights up.
If you are new to bear tanking I would like to add that moonfire should be a part of your rotation. I know some people don’t realize that moonfire doesn’t take you out of form.
Next expansion you will either choose Druid of the claw or Elune’s chosen.
Druid of the claw is the more difficult of the two. Basically for 6 sec after changing into cat form, it maintains a lot of the high defense of bear. But it is easy to stay in cat form too long
Elunes chosen is easier and the only talent you need to take is lunar beam. Lunar beam is in a very annoying area of the tree however, so it does feel like you are wasting talents. Elune’s chosen focuses on buffing those moonfire’s and your lunar beams. The overall rotation is still the same as dragonflight just adding lunar beam to the mix.
Tanks engage the pull first, hold aggro, don’t die and do as much dps as possible.
Healers heal when needed and dps when not needed
Dps dps and heal themselves when needed.
I love it when people use phrases like “interesting test of skill” when in reality its just people standing around until the tank gives the go ahead. Since we know that tanking was never a test of skill on the tanks part, it was a test of patience on the part of the group and most failed miserably.
Tanks are facilitators.
fa·cil·i·tate
/fəˈsiləˌtāt/
verb
Tanks job is to make instance easier by making efficient pulls (not too much, not too little - goldilocks zone), gathering into nice clump for cleave, facing frontals away from the group, helping to CC and kicks, and knowing when to (or not to) chain into next group. A good tank will raise the dps of his group by making their jobs easier. A good tank will reduce the strain on the healer by positioning well and pulling efficiently. A good tank makes for a smooth run.
p.s., Big bonus points for communication (if in comms) and being predictable. Healers and DPS like to plan their CDs around key moments, so if you can telegraph when those will be they will love you for it.
Are you not doing that? Because yeah, that’s pretty key. Your job as tank is to allow the dps to kill most efficiently. To do this you keep aggro on yourself and position the mobs in such a way that they can be burned down quickly. This plays into the other part of your role, which is to mitigate the damage incoming to yourself. You have your active mitigation abilities of course, but nothing mitigates damage like the mobs being killed quickly.
Last time I tanked it was as a 696 pally tank during WOTLK. The way you’re describing seems pretty much the same as it was then.