On the fourth episode of the Molsan Method podcast, I talk about the expectations today’s players have on tanks in heroics (4:53).

 Molsan Method Podcast - Episode 4 [4:53m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (140)

So I’ve learned that I don’t tank fast enough. I know I’m probably more of a conservative player, but even I know when I’m pulling packs of mobs at a decent pace… especially since the “Molsan Method” was named after yours truly. However, what I didn’t know was that PUGs formed by the glorious “Looking for Dungeon” tool expect an even more rapid pace. Chain pulling, zerging, and engaging bosses without mana are now standard.

Halls of Lightning – I Don’t Have All Day

In my last two random heroics, I was called out for my slow and lazy approach. In Halls of Lightning, I pulled the first group with Avenger’s Shield. While that was on cooldown, I pulled a stray mob with Exorcism. My tanking abilities were immediately questioned: “Why are we killing unnecessary mobs and pulling with Exorcism?” I stopped to think about this. Am I doing it wrong? While contemplating justifying my skills and approach to tanking to this complete stranger, the person decided to quit the group, leaving us with a “lol I don’t have all day. thanks. bye” parting shot.

Since they were DPS, they were replaced by my friend, LFD, in a matter of seconds with a new person. After we buffed the new guy up, I went ahead and pulled the next pack of mobs, General Bjarngrim, and his adds. We then continued on, skipping the other three corners of the platform, and breezed through the rest of the instance. We stacked up on Loken, took him down with no trouble, and disenchanted all of his loots. I apologized to the group for taking too long.

The Nexus – I Have a Raid Starting in a Minute

I figured that these kinds of people are few and far between… right? Wrong. In The Nexus, we were moving right along, having taken down the first three bosses with little effort. We had a great pace going; there were no deaths and lots of shards passed around (not by me, but by the aforementioned LFD). As I headed down the hallway towards Ormorok the Tree-Shaper, a player asked, “Can we please hurry it up?” I asked, “Why?” and the player responded with, “I have a raid starting in a minute.” Now, me being the literal person that I am figured, “Gee, no way we can finish this thing in under a minute. I hope he doesn’t bail on us… oh wait, he’s DPS, and there are probably fifty DPS players in line for a random.” I confidently told the group, “Ok, I’ll pick up the pace. Let’s go.”

I skipped a few Crystalline Frayers and let the rest of the party deal with them while I headed for the boss. I patiently stopped to tank the elites, and then moved right in on Ormorok. Without any trouble, he went down; we then proceeded into the tunnel, hopped down, and headed towards Keristrasza. We decided to stack up in front of Keristrasza, and we smacked her around regardless of how intense her Intense Cold was (it really wasn’t that intense). Before I could finish typing, “Sorry I took so long” for the second time, the hardcore raider rolled greed on everything, and quickly left the party. I’m going to setup a macro for my apology… I wonder what the macro syntax is for targeting the top whiner of the party? “/target QQ?”

My second Paladin just hit level 80 over the weekend, so it’s time to start itemizing for a fresh level 80 Holy Paladin. As with my Death Knight gear checklists, I will be targeting pre-raid gear sources in this series. You could also classify these as “non-raid” or even (gasp!) “casual” upgrade lists. I didn’t say “welfare” though.

Like most players these days, you’ll find very significant upgrades in the regular and heroic version of the Trial of the Champion dungeons. For your head slot, you’re in luck as the best pre-raid helm is available in the regular version of ToC. If you prefer to farm Battlegrounds rather than instances, the Deadly Gladiator helm is a nice pickup, even for PvE.

1. Helm of the Bested Gallant
   Trial of the Champion - Champion’s Cache
2. Deadly Gladiator’s Ornamented Headcover
   PvP - 49,600 Honor
3. Helm of Purified Thoughts
   Argent Crusade - Exalted
4. Brilliant Titansteel Helm
   Blacksmith - 540 Gold
5. Titan-Forged Plate Headcover of Salvation
   PvP - 40 Wintergrasp Marks of Honor
6. Helmet of the Constructor
   Heroic Utgarde Keep - Skarvald the Constructor
7. Faceguard of the Hammer Clan
   Heroic Ahn’kahet: The Old Kingdom – Jedoga Shadowseeker

Current prices obtained from Wowecon as of this post.

Our second night of 25-man Ulduar didn’t start out quite how I expected. I was asked to tank because one of the main tanks no-showed, but I declined. I’ve been a Retribution Paladin with this group for about a month now, filling in as a tank on certain fights when needed. We had three Protection Warriors in the raid so we were covered anyway.

I used to be one of the main tanks back when we started our 10 and 25-man Naxxramas raids, but was eventually squeezed out after the raid leaders recruited additional tanks. I don’t know if I was doing a poor job for them as a tank, wasn’t vocal enough on Vent, or just smelled funny. I probably will never know, but don’t really care at this point anyway since I’m enjoying playing with this spec.

Ignis the Furnace Master

We started out with Ignis since we had cleared the other three Siege of Ulduar bosses on the previous night. The path down to Ignis is huge! It definitely felt epic, and the homage to Molten Core with the two Molten Colossus giants was a nice touch. Dancing around the whirlwinds cast by the fire revenants was pretty fun. After our raid leader performed the thankless job of explaining the fight to everyone, and from their perspective (how he knows all this I’ll never understand), we engaged Ignis and began the fight.

The attempts — all seven of them — were chaotic with the tank dying early and often. We had some difficulties with aggro management, mainly because there is no aggro reset (sorry, old joke). I was tasked with slapping Ignis in the leg with my mace and staying alive when I was put “on the pot.”

I Out-heal Priests

What was most surprising was the amount of passive healing I was doing with Judgement of Light. I was showing up third on Recount under “Healing Done.” Come to find out, this is getting nerfed in 3.2:

Judgement of Light: Now heals for 2% of the attacker’s maximum health instead of a variable amount based on the spell power and attack power of the judging paladin.

Although I got a kick out of the Priests whispering me and wondering if I had changed specs again, this really doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. I’ll enjoy being able to simultaneously DPS and heal until this gets changed in the upcoming patch. Who needs a combat medic hero class anyway?

Raid Reassurance Time

We were reminded again that we wouldn’t be one-shotting bosses, even though all of us already knew that. Although I don’t think anyone is concerned that we’re not doing well and learning on each attempt, plenty of reassurances of how many attempts and wipes it will take us to defeat a boss were given out.

After the sixth attempt, the raid leader put out a vote to stay for another attempt, or move on to Kologarn. The majority voted to stay on Ignis, so we tried again. The main tank and off-tank switched, and the attempt was our best yet. We had Ignis down to 70% before any deaths occurred. We ended up wiping, and the raid leader put up another vote. This time, the majority voted to move on to Kologarn. This was strange to me because the last attempt on Ignis was clearly one where we had made some serious strides towards learning the fight.

Kologarn

We hit the trash hard on our way to Kologarn. When I say hard, I mean hard like you ran as fast as you could right into a brick wall. We attempted to sheep two of the mobs, but those were quickly broken by AoE. An exasperated voice on Vent pleaded for players to not break crowd controlled mobs, but this is probably some of our raiders first experience with a 25-man dungeon with crowd control. In Naxxramas, AoE was used on everything, so I don’t blame them for using AoE in their rotations.

We eventually made our way to Kologarn and had some decent attempts, four in total. We basically re-spawned the right arm once on each attempt, but called it there due to time constraints. I didn’t feel like everyone (including me) knew exactly what they were supposed to be doing on this fight, but hopefully we’ll be able to build on our experiences for next week. All in all another night full of learning experiences and several servings of humble pie.

The Blog Azeroth “Shared Topic” for this week deals with situational awareness:

As a raid healer, a common thing these days is trying to balance keeping everyone in your raid alive, while still being able to move when you need to (ie. having the right amount of situational awareness to your surroundings during raids).

I thought it would be neat to see how all the classes (even tanks and DPS) handle the multi-tasking that is required during raids. Do tanks and DPS sometimes have tunnel vision and forget to watch for the AOE effects or whatever they need to move out of? How do other healers deal with avoiding the tunnel vision problem?

My role in a raid is more often that of the off-tank. What’s an off-tank? It’s the backup quarterback of the raid. You need to be just as geared and just as prepared as the main tank, but relegated to “tanking” trash mobs and waiting for the main tank to die on boss fights. You’re designated as the off-tank by the raid leader by “losing a coin flip,” or because your total hit points is a few shy of the main tank’s. I’ll let the slight bitterness and sarcasm end here and will move on to the topic at hand.

As an off-tank, there are three duties to be aware of:

1. Assist with trash pulls
2. Be a situational tank for an encounter
3. Generate threat just beneath the main tank(s)

Trash Pull Assistance

The off-tank (or “trash tank”) is relied upon to help keep the raid moving forward. As an off-tank, I play the role of the “in-between tank” (I have a lot of different ways of describing an off-tank… Let me know if you need more), which allows me to bounce around the raid.

I always keep an eye on loose mobs (no, not that kind of loose mob, come on now) that are chasing after healers. I also watch the target’s target to see if one of the DPS has aggro’d a mob away from the tanking/AoE spot. I’ll then taunt the mob back to the AoE zone.

I don’t have to worry about the pulls or fret about the pacing of the raid. I do have to be ready when the main tank engages the next set of mobs in order to help round them up in the appropriate spot.

Situational Situational Awareness

Some fights require more than one tank to take care of a particular piece of the encounter. More often than not, this is more crucial than the job of actually main tanking the fight. Some examples are: distracting and keeping the chow away from Gluth and picking up Kel’thuzad’s Guardians of Icecrown.

Positioning is key here, ensuring that the mobs are faced away from the rest of the raid. Taunting crazed mobs off of the rest of the raid is also typically required, so you have one eye on the mobs in front of you, and your camera spun around appropriately so you can watch the healers and DPS.

For these fights, I’m certainly focused on the task at-hand and observing the rest of the raid, but also keeping an eye on the main tanks as well. In some cases when things go horribly wrong, I’ll need to be an off-tank and main tank simultaneously. I have to quickly taunt the boss and maintain threat until the main tank can be resurrected, or do everything I possibly can to save a wipe late in the fight. In the Naxxramas example, the right sequence of bubbling, laying on some hands, and trinket popping, one could tank the guardians and KT himself during those last few moments, ensuring victory.

Almost Pulling Aggro

This one is fairly straight-forward and requires very little awareness of the situation other than maintaining a steady diet of threat generation. Certain boss fights such as The Curator in Karazhan, Gruul from Gruul’s Lair, and Patchwerk in Naxxramas require the off-tank to maintain a secondary (or tertiary in Patch’s case) threat level.

With no adds for an off-tank to attend to, this is actually very simple. You basically keep an eye on Omen, and tuning your rotation accordingly in order to maintain your position on the threat meters. You’ll typically want to toss in one or two additional spells or abilities (such as Avenger’s Shield) when your threat dips, but the healers and DPS are pretty much on their own. These fights often provide off-tanks a much-needed break and a chance to give the main tanks a run for their threat-generating money.

Our first night of heroic Naxxramas went well this week, even though we fell one boss short of our normal three-quarter clear. We decided to call the raid fifteen minutes early and leave the Four Horseman for night two. I had two goals for the night: obtain five Emblems of Valor for my next upgrade and not embarrass myself again. I definitely achieved one of those two goals.

Five Emblems of Valor and I’d have myself a nice cloak upgrade: the Hammerhead Sharkskin Cloak. I was a little worried when we arrived at the fifth boss, Heigan the Unclean. Our tank lost track of the phase eruptions on the second and third phase-one sequences. We lost half the raid during the second sequence, but I survived by not following the tank, and we were able to DPS him down. Our healers saved the day by healing the tank, me, and several others through the mess.

Earlier in the raid, I picked up Ruthlessness, upgrading my Ring of Indignant Rage, which is second only to the Inscribed Band of the Kirin Tor on my gear list. I outbid the main tank for the Libram of Resurgence for my last drop (I’m not sure what a main tank with a Holy off-spec would do with that anyway).

A quick look at WoW Web Stats from last night showed that I was at the bottom of the DPS list yet again. Although my DPS rose about 150 points from the start of the raid, it showed my swing (physical) miss percentage at 15.6%, Divine Storm miss at 18.6%, and Crusader Strike at 18.9%. My melee hit is very low (5.22%) so I’ll be switching out my glove enchant for Precision, and gobbling up as much Snapper Extreme as my stomach can handle.

Dual spec has given me something unexpected: a new alt. Not an “alt” in the traditional WoW-sense. You know, a new character. A re-roll on a different server. An Alliance toon to “experiment” with, and so forth. This time, it’s an alternative build for my main. When dual spec was finally released, I imagined all of the potential — especially for hybrid classes — that this would bring about. It wasn’t until last night, though, that I realized how much fun it really is.

LFM DPS

I’ve always challenged folks who claim that there is a shortage of tanks and healers in the game. My main spec will always be Protection, but I chose Holy for my second spec when the ability to dual spec was introduced to the game. I figured I’d be able to fill one of those two roles that there is an apparent shortage of. Boredom quickly set in as I sat in Dalran with a second “raid spec,” and couldn’t find a group. You would think that in a guild with over 4,600 characters, you’d be able to find an all-guild heroic that needs a healer.

Along Came Retribution

In one night, I ran more heroics as Retribution than I ever did as Holy. So much for that healer shortage. With most of my tanking gear on, I hovered around third on the damage meters for the night. This was partially because the shadow priest in our group disconnected for a bit in Violet Hold. All the mechanics of the class were working, and all those nifty spells and abilities were present on my action bars. The output was lacking, though, and my expectations for high burst damage were failing.

Gearing Up My Alt… Err, Second Spec

In these heroics, I really felt counted on, much more so than in heroic Naxxramas. After successfully completing heroic Violet Hold, Utgarde Pinnacle, and Utgarde Keep, I owed it to myself to start itemizing properly for this spec. The first place I started at was my weapon. I had been using a polearm and, for whatever reason, this really embarrassed me. A trip to the auction house and 1,100 gold quickly took care of that as I became the proud owner of one Titansteel Destroyer. I slapped Greater Savagery on that bad boy and I was off to find me some quests.

I located a nice cave in the Storm Peaks filled with worms that were eager to see me with my new weapon. With Seal of Command refreshed, I ran in, reared back with the mace, and swung as hard as I could… and missed! What happened? What is this “skill in two-handed maces has increased to 2″ all about?

Thirty worms and a few dozen worgs later, my two-handed mace skill was up over 350, and I finally got a taste of what the spec can do when itemized correctly. I hearthed back to Dalaran and turned in some leftover Emblems of Heroism for the Mirror of Truth and the Pendant of the Outcast Hero.  I also added a Jormungar Leg Armor kit to my pants for an additional stamina and agility boost.

Although I made the Kal’uak sad when I vendored their polearm, I now feel like a real Ret Paladin.

June 11, 2009
My first night in Naxxramas as a Retribution Paladin came to an end with Gluth. I’m certain my glowing Whale-Stick Harpoon had something to do with it.

In last night’s Naxxramas 25-man raid I changed specs to Retribution. This was the very first time I had gone Retribution on my main. My second spec had been Holy since the dual spec feature was introduced to the game. I had healed Naxx 25 once and ran a handful of heroics, but never made the most of having the Holy spec.

Now, while I’ve never gone Retribution on Molsan, my other Paladin has always been Retribution. Yes, I have two Paladins. Yes, they are both Horde and both on Earthen Ring.

DPS is DPS

So I was at least familiar with the abilities of the spec, the DPS rotation, etc. What I didn’t realize is I had none of the gear! I could have sworn that I had picked up several pieces of DPS plate prior to them being disenchanted, but I was wrong. So, I equipped my tanking gear, a couple of rare rings, and a polearm from the Kalu’ak; I was off and running.

Thankfully, the group I play with out-gears the instance now, so my bottom-of-Recount DPS (1721) went unnoticed. We one-shotted most of the bosses except for Razuvious (we lost him at less than 1%!) and Patchwerk. No loot for me, but I did add a few Emblems of Valor to my collection. I have over 50 Emblems of Heroism collecting dust, so the Mirror of Truth might be a good pickup if I want to get serious about my Ret set.

Going with a different spec gave me a new perspective on the raid. I believe this will help me be a better tank in the long run. I was also more motivated and excited to raid a dungeon that we’ve been working on for a couple months now. Old is now new again… at least for one night.