New Appreciation for Tanking

Myyth · August 2017

You can immediately tell when you get a group with either a fake dps tank that cheated the queue (no taunt, using 2 handed or dual wield) or a lazy tank that doesn't taunt.

Enemies running around with aggro everywhere. Healer struggling to heal himself, the dps and the tank. Dps unable to do proper dps since the enemies are not nicely grouped for AOE and they are too busy trying to stay alive.

I frequently get stuck with tanks that don't taunt or just taunt the boss and that's it. These tanks always have bad attitude and get hostile when you call them out. I just quit the group. Its not worth the hassle.

kichwas · August 2017

RizzlyBear wrote: »

"my group was wiping because tank wasnt spamming igneous" god what a bunch of bollocks... Looks like you can't heal instead.

More here: "i can dps as healer" no you don't. If you're going to spam puncturing strikes then why did you sign up as healer? Your team needs buffs, your enemies need debuffs constantly and you need to keep HoTs up at all times. Your dps only comes from burning spears and wall of shocks and you need correct positioning.

I'm leveling a warden healer right now. Also somewhat new to this game.

Do I DPS on her? Well - heavy attacks recharge my magika very fast, so I am basically near perma holding down the heavy attack key, and then my entire action bar is every heal or buff I have so far unlocked, and I spam them.

In this manner, I can spam even my big magika abilities and not run out of magika, and I charge ult so fast I can basically have healing thicket out within seconds of it falling off.

Then again when I get on my tanks (leveling warden, templar, and DK all side by side) - the same move, hitting heavy attack, keeps my stamina charged. I guess the ability to keep doing this goes away at max level? Since people keep saying tanks don't do DPS...

bhagwad wrote: »

So why were people moving around so much (including the tank)? Because they're following the boss who was following the tank. And because they were kiting ads that were not being chained in or otherwise aggroed by the tank. That included me!

Bottom line. The tank reduces the need for people to move around a lot, kite adds, or follow/evade the boss. This ups their DPS, not to mention keeping the boss and adds in a nice tight AoE circle for everyone to burn down.

I've been a tank in various MMOs since 2005. One reason I'm not aggroing that mob you're kiting is because you're kiting it - and that has it out of range of me.

Which do you want me to do? Hold all this stuff I have over here that is laying down AoE and conal cleaves on the area I am in... or drag that mess through the entire group to reach you... while you are still kiting that thing away from me, or in circles around the room away from me.

If you have aggro... why are you running AWAY from your tank?

It's been a theme since 2005... that I keep seeing people that do this... get aggro, and run... away...

Whenever I'm not on my tanks... I always run toward them when things are on me, and I try to stay relatively close to them... so that adds that pop can be pulled off of me...

Most people though... flee from their tank like the tank has cooties...

And then wonder why the tank keeps moving stuff...

kichwas · August 2017

Myyth wrote: »

You can immediately tell when you get a group with either a fake dps tank that cheated the queue (no taunt, using 2 handed or dual wield) or a lazy tank that doesn't taunt.

Enemies running around with aggro everywhere. Healer struggling to heal himself, the dps and the tank. Dps unable to do proper dps since the enemies are not nicely grouped for AOE and they are too busy trying to stay alive.

If you're in normal dungeons and this is happening check the level of your tank. Morrowind brought a lot of new people to this game (such as me). Some of us might be dedicated tanks, but tanking here is a bit different from other modern MMOs. We have no threat moves and just a single target taunt. It reminds me of how tanking was back in 'classic' WoW. But that just means I have 10 years of changes to 'unlearn' here...

Cycling through 5-10 adds and making sure I hit Ransack on each one of them once every 15 seconds - that's pretty different from any other modern MMO. The last time I had to do that regularly, the 'top progression content' on my server was the 'Zul'Farak' leveling dungeon in WoW, over a decade ago...

So if stuff is running all over the place in a 'normal'... it might one of us new folks. We're a few years behind the rest of you in this game. Having your first expansion come out 4 years into a game's lifecycle I guess can create a weird culture divide like this. For some of you the ESO way is ingrained old news. But you're now meeting a lot of people who are 'where you were 4 years ago,' trying really hard to stop playing it 'WoW-style'.

(One reason I am side by side leveling 3 tanks is I don't want to put a veteran group through me 'unlearning WoW'... better to do that in content where it's recoverable.)

That said... if you happen to get stuck with me - if you give me friendly advice or 'try this instead' - I'm all ears. And yeah I know speccing 'Ransack' is not meta... I didn't know when I did it... I'll fix that when it matters and when I am more clear on which skills are best in what combo rather than fumbling with learning it. While leveling though, the mitigation ransack is giving me makes a difference.

- for example... when I do cycle through those 5-8 adds and taunt them all, the next event can often be waiting for a rez... because while this game has 'normalized' all the levels... and while lowbies are often overpowered in the dungeons... if my newness causes me to miss a cooldown, I've just bitten more than I can chew.

I mention this because in about half the dungeons I am in, I am not the only new person. Often 3 of us are. There is an absurd number of new people in the normal dungeons right now. Either this game is suddenly taking off... or the game intentionally puts us together.

Riddari · August 2017

Love that your faith in our cause has been renewed!

I get discouraged a lot because my main is a Templar tank. Without igneous and chains, many believe tanks useless. I wish they would give us some kind of equivalent skill.

But I've had no issue tanking vet dungeons. For the glory of Stendarr I protect the squishies

Nestor · August 2017

I recently specced one of my alts to a full fledged tank as opposed to just being tanky. Big difference in what I can do both boss aggro and group support. Also I don't mind my measly 3K to 5K dps as the group does better with me in the mix than without.

DocFrost72 · August 2017

kichwas wrote: »

Myyth wrote: »

You can immediately tell when you get a group with either a fake dps tank that cheated the queue (no taunt, using 2 handed or dual wield) or a lazy tank that doesn't taunt.

Enemies running around with aggro everywhere. Healer struggling to heal himself, the dps and the tank. Dps unable to do proper dps since the enemies are not nicely grouped for AOE and they are too busy trying to stay alive.

If you're in normal dungeons and this is happening check the level of your tank. Morrowind brought a lot of new people to this game (such as me). Some of us might be dedicated tanks, but tanking here is a bit different from other modern MMOs. We have no threat moves and just a single target taunt. It reminds me of how tanking was back in 'classic' WoW. But that just means I have 10 years of changes to 'unlearn' here...

Cycling through 5-10 adds and making sure I hit Ransack on each one of them once every 15 seconds - that's pretty different from any other modern MMO. The last time I had to do that regularly, the 'top progression content' on my server was the 'Zul'Farak' leveling dungeon in WoW, over a decade ago...

So if stuff is running all over the place in a 'normal'... it might one of us new folks. We're a few years behind the rest of you in this game. Having your first expansion come out 4 years into a game's lifecycle I guess can create a weird culture divide like this. For some of you the ESO way is ingrained old news. But you're now meeting a lot of people who are 'where you were 4 years ago,' trying really hard to stop playing it 'WoW-style'.

(One reason I am side by side leveling 3 tanks is I don't want to put a veteran group through me 'unlearning WoW'... better to do that in content where it's recoverable.)

That said... if you happen to get stuck with me - if you give me friendly advice or 'try this instead' - I'm all ears. And yeah I know speccing 'Ransack' is not meta... I didn't know when I did it... I'll fix that when it matters and when I am more clear on which skills are best in what combo rather than fumbling with learning it. While leveling though, the mitigation ransack is giving me makes a difference.
- for example... when I do cycle through those 5-8 adds and taunt them all, the next event can often be waiting for a rez... because while this game has 'normalized' all the levels... and while lowbies are often overpowered in the dungeons... if my newness causes me to miss a cooldown, I've just bitten more than I can chew.

I mention this because in about half the dungeons I am in, I am not the only new person. Often 3 of us are. There is an absurd number of new people in the normal dungeons right now. Either this game is suddenly taking off... or the game intentionally puts us together.

Actually, from all I've gathered in 3 ish years now, the tank doesn't grab everything.

You're meant to take the heat off your team mates by taunting the big baddies and CCing the rest. For example: a trash pack has two elite class mobs, five normal class mobs, and two specialty mobs (two Xivkyn, five assorted daedra, and two Xivkyn healers, respectively). YOUR job as tank is to taunt the two elites (high damage, annoying CC), then the specialty mobs if you can. You absolutely want to be ready to bash interupt, stun, or do whatever to prevent sudden damage spikes from hitting your party (arrow spray, npcs throwing lines of fire or the frost storm ability).

A good tank can also handle the other adds without taunting. Maybe you use DK talons or Sorc encase to root them. That means melee can't hit your team mates, and also typically allows for people with dual wield to do more damage (ruffian passive). Maybe you throw caltrops or drop a templar cleansing ritual to slow enemies around you, making it easier for allies to circle kite and avoid damage. Maybe you have a source of major maim you can dish out.

All you'll ever do taunting ten adds to you (especially when you first start out) is run yourself fresh out of resources, and fast.

Doctordarkspawn · August 2017

bhagwad wrote: »

So many threads on this forum talk about how a tank doesn't matter. That it's all DPS, DPS. Well as a tank myself, this was discouraging, but my faith in taking is renewed.

I started tanking a month ago, with my "main" being a healer. I quickly realized that while a healer can DPS because spell damage also affects heals, my tank would never DPS. With Ebon, Hulking etc, my job was to be a rock and keep my group safe.

Today while farming an Ebon necklance in Vet Crypt of Hearts, I decided to play my main healer for one game instead of my tank. I figured that with my healer I could also contribute to DPS and make the fights go faster. Let someone else be the tank.

Wow. What a difference a good tank makes!! We wiped over and over to the spider boss because the tank didn't do his job.

The tank we got did none of the following:

1. Didn't keep the boss in one place. Kept kiting him.
2. No Igneous Shield spam
3. No chaining ads

If the tank moves around, none of my AoE damage over time spells are going to hit properly. Without protection from igneous shields, our group was wiping again and again. And I was thinking. "Wow - tanking is underappreciated!" Screw everyone who says "You don't need a tank for dungeon content". You absolutely do! Because I see now that if my groups didn't have me, we would be spending a LOT more time dying constantly and wiping over and over. As a tank, I am an enabler for the DPS to do their jobs in peace.

I feel better about my choice of role now. "Not needed", my ass!

And yet the playerbase will screech at you about how much DPS your losing, despite yelling about how DPS needs nerfed because the game needs to be harder. (Or that's what ZOS hears, reguardless of what they screech.)

And yet Tanking gets nerfed every match because Wrobel, who has nothing to justify his employment, continues to say 'tanking isn't fun' and tries his best to delete the roll despite it being needed in some content still.