Simple… You DPSs treat tanks like crap. I run times after times after times. I learn the route, I learn the interrupts, the strats, but eveytimes, the DPS or the healer screw up and we wipe. Then, who’s getting blamed ? ME ! Even when I execute the boss sequence perfectly, I get blamed if we wipe. Even when it’s not my fault at all.
Before you blame a tank, think of what happened and ask youself what you did wrong before blaming everyone else.
And we can hear people crying that the tanks are so few. Guess what… You are part of the problem…
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I’ve been in tons of PUGs and I’ve only seen a couple instances where anyone ever blamed the tank or healer for anything. In ~98% of runs no one talks period to anyone. I don’t get where this myth originates that DPS treat tanks or healer like crap because I’ve very rarely ever seen it
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Most of the crap I get comes from whispers.
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Try tanking, you’ll see it. I will say that it does not happen often, but when it does it’s a memorable experience.
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Tanks are generally highly sought-after and their treatment is very good as a result. The shortage comes more from players wanting to get “huge numbers”, which isn’t possible as a tank. Unfortunately, the shortage is ultimately a player-created problem 
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It’s the internet, some people out there are just going to rage on anyone in sight. Tank, Healer, DPS, doesn’t really matter you’re going to get rage whispers now and then. Just ignore it and do your thing
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As Arlec said, try tanking. Nothing like a few DPS that blames you for errors they made…
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Given a chance, tanks are rude af to DPS.
The reality is: tanking is BORING. There is no obvious metric that allows a tank to feel they are “kicking plass.” Even back when threat was a thing, that was the lesser challenge of tanking. And then they removed threat.
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I understand your concern. I have tanked plenty in the past as a prot warrior and typically had a great experience. The developers did a great job making tanking enjoyable and flat-out fun!
I’ve seen MUCH more of this to be honest. Almost every toxic player I’ve run into in PUGs was the tank
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The only time I find tanking fun is when I accidently pull 20+ mobs in a mythic 12 or higher and need to actually start planning every defensive, where I am going to kite and pray like crazy my dps boyz can blow these guys up. Oddly not really thinking about the healer as spam healing aint going to keep me up vs a pack that size for long.
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Its much simpler. Join a raid. You either are joining a 20 man mythic (where you need 2 tanks) or a flex raid where you probably are running 15-18 (again 2 tanks) or a 25 man raid (again 2 tanks). Next up join a dungeon. You will have 5 people (1 tank). The ratio is completely busted and thus pushes you into a tank shortage.
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I see tanks get blamed for routes but I don’t know if I’ve seen them blamed for much else. That said, the routes that tanks get blamed for are pretty nit-picky. You pull one extra mob and some wannabe MDI boomkin straight up leaves.
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I wanna learn about tanking but I’m once again feeling scared to do it lol. Leading in the front has never been my comfort zone. Quite honestly if I have gained anything from shadowlands so far it’s less care about being blamed for a wipe. If I had a nickel for every time I’ve heard “come on this content requires skill healer!” Lol
I wish so badly I was in a more active guild or a different server so I could run with the same people. It’s too late for that on this character tho. And I ain’t making another until I get flying unlocked. 
The worst dungeons I’ve ever been in were entirely because of tanks. A good tank can make bad pulls work, dps pulling the whole room can be handled with some cc and big cooldowns. Everyone makes mistakes especially tanks, but some of the most self righteous folks I’ve seen in this game have been tanks who could do no wrong while doing everything wrong.
The problem though is that tanking isn’t super fun right now. They have been super conservative on tank survivability so some tanks can’t survive massive pulls without help, and they have been super conservative on tank damage so that tanks that can can’t hold agro on a massive pull. This is a shame and people will while about m+ being unga bunga big pulls till their heads turn blue, but for a tank big pulls are your proof of cooldowns. Healers using their cooldowns well can turn a wipe into a clean pull, dps using their cooldowns well can turn a scary pull into ashes, tanks using cooldowns can turn 3 pulls into 1, or thats how it should be.
Every roll has its toxic players though, there is some truth that a lot of people are incredibly attached to their prideful route of choice.
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First: There is no shortage of tanks. There’s actually a glut of tanks. The only place where there’s a shortage is in 5-man pugs.
The biggest reason for a lack of tanks in 5-man pugs is that there are limited opportunities to tank outside of that.
Want to raid? Everybody already has 2 tanks, play another spec.
Want to arena? Blizzard nerfs tanks whenever they’re good in arena, play another spec.
Want to do rated BG’s? Only 1 tank needed, if that.
Want to do solo content? World content takes much longer for tanks, play another spec. Things like Torghast take longer, play another spec.
The answer is always: “Play another spec.”
Whenever tanks DO have decent damage in world content, DPS players complain and get it nerfed (see: Echoing Void).
And then everybody looks around and wonders why there aren’t more tanks at their beck and call.
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Not when the game is designed to place a disproportionately large amount of responsibility on the tank. And the deeper we dig the Mythic+ hole, the greater the demand.
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My first run ever as a tank was a no-talk run, got kicked for accidentally resetting that hammer guy(if you get knocked into lava he resets) because I didn’t know migitation.
This too is a player-created problem. It is the responsibility of all players to execute their own mechanics and not rely on others to make up for the shortcomings.
Maybe it’s simply because tanking is not as interesting to as many players? Or maybe because there isn’t as much variety in tanking class/specs as dps?
Your post point is valid, but the topic title is rather narrow in it’s scope of the question.