Phalnaxx Posted February 10, 2012 Share Posted February 10, 2012 Hey guys! I am looking for advice on how to tank in this game. In most mmo's I've played, I have always been a healer. When I played that role, in almost every instance, I gave the tank between 2-5 seconds to build up threat, hate, aggro, whatever you wanna call it, before I started attacking or healing. Now... Here's my problem. I was in Heroic: Firestar and the party makeup was me tanking lvl 23, a healer lvl 32, and two dps at about 20-21. Now Usually in most mmo's, i see tanks use an AoE first then hit every target individually BEFORE the healer and dps start in on the mobs. The healer was going nuts. Yelling at me "HOLD THREAT BRO!!" I was like "I'm trying... gimmie a few seconds b4 you come running in!" In the instance there was one death... My own. Here's my question. What was I doing wrong.... Is this game different some how that I can totally pull aggro and hold it while the rest of the team is spaming attacks, running in at the same time as me? Was I being so noob that I should make a healer and stick to what I know? Do I need to switch up my rotation? 1. Start in by dark ward/discharging 2. thrash each target 3. saber strike get up force 4 shock individual target 5. and when they start running toward the group i grab their attention with the move that makes them attack you for 6 seconds ( if forget the name ) This is how I usually go in to every battle... however I didn't really have the time in this group to cc mobs first. I know that there are many sp left to get, and some abilities I don't have yet.. .but I really don't want to get yelled at again. Any advice/input/poems are welcome and encourged! Make me better please. Thanks Phal Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sasheria Posted February 10, 2012 Share Posted February 10, 2012 http://www.swtor.com/community/forumdisplay.php?f=48 You should go to this link. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Phalnaxx Posted February 10, 2012 Author Share Posted February 10, 2012 I've read alot of those threads.... very helpful... as far as rotation goes.. but nothing talks about healers being to big for their britches Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sasheria Posted February 10, 2012 Share Posted February 10, 2012 I am starting out an assassin tank (level 17 now) so I feel you. There are some taunts we can use but AoE taunt is kinda limiting. You do have AoE discharge which hits multiples. I think you may want to mark kill order and DPS should ONLY attack the kill order. If you are using darkness (which you are)you shouldn't have problem losing threat. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mshea Posted February 10, 2012 Share Posted February 10, 2012 The main thing I would say is make sure your marking the targets and your dps is following the kill order. On my assassin tank I move in and use discharge to hit all the mobs then I focus on the first kill target. The only person that will pull threat off the other targets you only hit with your AOE will be the healer unless the dps are also AOEing. If something moves towards the healer then hit your taunt. If a dps pulls agro on something other than the kill target I personnaly would ask them to not aoe the first time then let them die any subsequent times. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sasheria Posted February 10, 2012 Share Posted February 10, 2012 The main thing I would say is make sure your marking the targets and your dps is following the kill order. On my assassin tank I move in and use discharge to hit all the mobs then I focus on the first kill target. The only person that will pull threat off the other targets you only hit with your AOE will be the healer unless the dps are also AOEing. If something moves towards the healer then hit your taunt. If a dps pulls agro on something other than the kill target I personnaly would ask them to not aoe the first time then let them die any subsequent times. This. We do get a single taunt (usable once every 15 seconds) so if a healer DOES pull aggro, then you can use that. At higher level, you do get some aoe taunts which you should use all the time whenever you can so you won't lose aggro, but at lower levels, the team should concentrate first on kill order Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Darthshnooky Posted February 11, 2012 Share Posted February 11, 2012 If that's not a typo, then your healer was 10 levels over you. If he was DPSing, there's just no way you'll be able to maintain solid threat against that. Assuming he was strictly healing, it could still be an issue but should be less of one. First rule of tanking: if you die, it's the healer's fault. Since you said the only death in the place was you, sounds like the healer was terrible -- especially if he was 9 levels higher than you and you STILL died. If the group was unloading full DPS the moment you rush in, of course they're going to pull off of you. Sounds like a really bad group, to be honest. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dunewarr Posted February 11, 2012 Share Posted February 11, 2012 Hi,seems my character is unable to use my lightsaber for attack only parry. Why? and how do I fix that. Thanks Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LagunaD Posted February 11, 2012 Share Posted February 11, 2012 (edited) Also, Level 23 is about as bad as it gets, as far as tanking multiple mobs. You still only have one multi-target attack at that level, which doesn't do a lot of damage and has a moderately long cooldown. Lacerate, which you get at Level 26, starts to improve the situation a little, but until Level 40 it will be challenging to hold aggro on groups of enemies if your group uses heavy AoE or doesn't focus on a single target. When confronted by more targets than you can tank, be sure to hold the biggest one, and then worry about the rest, from strongest to weakest. Normal and strong (silver) mobs generally don't need to be tanked when there is something bigger around, as long as the DPS do their job and kill the weakest enemies first. Edited February 11, 2012 by LagunaD Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Baelish Posted February 11, 2012 Share Posted February 11, 2012 There's also most of the time no need to tank every single mob in a pack. Trash packs usually have a number of "Weak" and "Normal" members which should be burnt down first within seconds by the DPS, with priority given to any that happen to latch on to the healer. With this in mind, strict marking of every mob could be more hindrance than help; the DPS have to be able to react. Especially at lower levels with very spread-out packs, it can be effectively impossible to stop the healer getting aggro, if they have to heal at all. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Phalnaxx Posted February 11, 2012 Author Share Posted February 11, 2012 I am starting out an assassin tank (level 17 now) so I feel you. There are some taunts we can use but AoE taunt is kinda limiting. You do have AoE discharge which hits multiples. I think you may want to mark kill order and DPS should ONLY attack the kill order. If you are using darkness (which you are)you shouldn't have problem losing threat. Yeah I run in with DW/Discharge, but the marking of targets... I haven't really tried that. Awesome idea. I messed around with that in this game... seems I may have to start leading these groups myself. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Phalnaxx Posted February 11, 2012 Author Share Posted February 11, 2012 The main thing I would say is make sure your marking the targets and your dps is following the kill order. On my assassin tank I move in and use discharge to hit all the mobs then I focus on the first kill target. The only person that will pull threat off the other targets you only hit with your AOE will be the healer unless the dps are also AOEing. If something moves towards the healer then hit your taunt. If a dps pulls agro on something other than the kill target I personnaly would ask them to not aoe the first time then let them die any subsequent times. Thanks for the reply !! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Phalnaxx Posted February 11, 2012 Author Share Posted February 11, 2012 If that's not a typo, then your healer was 10 levels over you. If he was DPSing, there's just no way you'll be able to maintain solid threat against that. Assuming he was strictly healing, it could still be an issue but should be less of one. First rule of tanking: if you die, it's the healer's fault. Since you said the only death in the place was you, sounds like the healer was terrible -- especially if he was 9 levels higher than you and you STILL died. If the group was unloading full DPS the moment you rush in, of course they're going to pull off of you. Sounds like a really bad group, to be honest. HAHAHA. This made me feel better because it's true! It wasn't a typo! He was a higher lvl and I thought it was gonna be easy no death run. I did have a much better group yesterday trying to earn some cash for my mount, which I got! Thanks for the reply mang! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Phalnaxx Posted February 11, 2012 Author Share Posted February 11, 2012 Also, Level 23 is about as bad as it gets, as far as tanking multiple mobs. You still only have one multi-target attack at that level, which doesn't do a lot of damage and has a moderately long cooldown. Lacerate, which you get at Level 26, starts to improve the situation a little, but until Level 40 it will be challenging to hold aggro on groups of enemies if your group uses heavy AoE or doesn't focus on a single target. When confronted by more targets than you can tank, be sure to hold the biggest one, and then worry about the rest, from strongest to weakest. Normal and strong (silver) mobs generally don't need to be tanked when there is something bigger around, as long as the DPS do their job and kill the weakest enemies first. I'm lvl 25 now and half way into 26. Lacerate? Awesome. Are there hotkeys for marking targets? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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