Forum Settings
       
Reply To Thread

Aggro ProblemsFollow

#1 Oct 02 2008 at 4:11 AM Rating: Good
*
229 posts
I recently got into a Heroic UB as a MT and instantly had problems with Aggro. the Party was; Druid heals, Rouge, Mage, DPS Warr and me tanking. We did 3 pulls and wiped or nearly wiped on 2/3 of them.

The pull(s) went like this: Mark 1st Kill/2nd Kill, Fairy fire skull, mangle, swipe, lacerate, and the other 2 mobs barely paused as they screamed past me straight for the healer. as the healer is getting punded I'm spaming everything I got and pounding growl to rip agro from him but it was never fast enough to save him.

Any Ideas? was I doing anything horibly wrong? I wasn't getting smashed by the blows or anything. I've OT'ed Kara and the like with no real problem but this was a total disaster.
#2 Oct 02 2008 at 6:56 AM Rating: Excellent
Hi there,

I would recommend trying this:

mark 1st, 2nd, then starfire 2nd to pull them, flip target back to 1st and hit it right away. tell your group to not start dps until at least 3 lacerates are stacked on the mob.

should be fine for from there.

Cheers,
#3 Oct 02 2008 at 7:07 AM Rating: Decent
37 posts
From the healer side I have noticed that for bear tanks I have to start off healing much slower then I would for a Pally or War. As long as they are not getting pounded too hard I try to wait ~5 sec until I cast my first heal. This may mean they get to ~75% health before I start. Next tiem tell the healer to start off a little slower.

If you heal for a Pally or War you get used to watching out for the spike damage. Bear tanks take a little less spike damage it seems so they go down smoother which means you can change yuor healing routine a little bit. They are less likely to go from 75% to 25% in a sec so you don't have to keep them topped off as early into the fight most times.
#4 Oct 02 2008 at 7:35 AM Rating: Good
*
229 posts
frazamagorf: I'll try that next time thank you.

Scholar ArcherDae: Another friend sujested that he was over healing too much too early too so I'm wondering if that was why the kept pulling off me... hmm maybe. I will keep your comments in mind if I'm forced to heal later.
#5 Oct 02 2008 at 10:13 AM Rating: Good
**
280 posts
When pulling, I usually Starfire 2nd target then moonfire the 1st one. That generates some aggro right away. You have time to moonfire a 2nd time if you had 3 targets to tank. I usually pay attention at what is hit and if I notice a DPS hitting the wrong target, I'll mention it. And same thing for a dps going all out from the beginning, not a great idea. I already saw a POM pyro mage doing that at the very beginning of a fight. I let the mob hit him once or twice before growling =)

For the druid healer, something I learned and it works quite well, if you have to be healed from the beginning, ask the healer to hot you BEFORE you start casting (or pulling). When healing I may put Regrowth on the tank before the pull, that threat is not even calculated! So regrowth + rej before the fight can heal you for the few seconds you need to build aggro and the healer can always Swiftmend if needed.
#6 Oct 02 2008 at 10:34 AM Rating: Excellent
****
7,732 posts
frazamagorf wrote:
Hi there,

I would recommend trying this:

mark 1st, 2nd, then starfire 2nd to pull them, flip target back to 1st and hit it right away. tell your group to not start dps until at least 3 lacerates are stacked on the mob.

should be fine for from there.

Cheers,


QFT

Try and get the Moonfire on the main target, or if you are being forced to tank 3 you would Starfire the third, Moonfire the second and Mangle the skull.

Your scenario sounds strange TBH. If the DPS was attacking targets in order and you weren't taking crazy near one shot levels of damage your scenario sounds off. I just checked your armory link and you are uncrittable and your armor/health seems fine for H UB.

I would have to guess that your DPS were soloing mobs or some pats got involved. The first few pulls in H UB are the elemental Bog-dudes so they can't be sheeped if I remember. Sap would have been ok. But they are only in packs of 3-4 so unless you were not using any CC or sheeping immnue mobs, the healer might have pulled due to healing to many people.

Not sure as assuming a 3 pull and 1 CC your actions should have been fine to hold aggro over the healer.

Anyway, other posters have summed up how to gain a solid lead on aggro to start a pull. Good luck.
____________________________
Hellbanned

idiggory wrote:
Drinking at home. But I could probably stand to get laid.
#7 Oct 02 2008 at 11:30 AM Rating: Good
***
1,622 posts
I always pull with hurricane. It starts the fight with a few ticks of AoE on everything. I don't know anyone else who does that though. After that, for multiple mobs, swipe swipe swipe and mangle/lacerates only when I'm confident that the offtargets won't be pulled by healing aggro. And tell the healer to let die anyone who pulls aggro on the main target.
____________________________

Nuit Midril - White Mage/Scholar on Ultros
Nuit the Insane! - Retired Druid on Sentinels.
Ombre - Retired Dragoon/bard on Phoenix.
#8 Oct 02 2008 at 1:00 PM Rating: Good
I've never had much success trying to get 2 casts off on a pull, even if the second cast is instant, and still get into bear before I get smacked. You're basically forcing a 3 second delay from pull -> bear (2 x GCD). I'm not saying it's impossible, just saying it's tricky. My guild's druid MT does it all the time but he still gets tagged on a fairly regular basis before he can get into bear and it just means he needs that much more healing right off the hop to stay in the safe zone. It's 6 of one, half dozen of the other.

Bears are pretty resilient (no pun intended) and we can usually afford to lose 1/3 of our HP at the beginning of a fight without forcing the healer to panic and start spamming big heals. Whether you lose that HP taking hits in bear while swipe spamming to build initial aggro, or you lose it getting smacked on your way into bear after a couple of casts for the same initial aggro isn't really a huge issue. The point is, you can afford to lose the HP and still survive the encounter quite handily.

What is concern for a lot of healers is that bears will most often have considerably more HP than their other tank class counterparts. A warrior with 10k HP who loses 30% of his health at the start of a fight only needs to be healed for 3k to bring him back up to full. A bear with 15k HP who loses 30% needs 5k worth of heals to accomlish the same thing, and that makes healers nervous.

Best bet if you see that happening in your PUGs is to let the healer know that it's OK if your HP takes a bit of a dip at the start. The pull will go just fine as long as the healer doesn't overreact and start loading up the heal bombs to compensate.
#9 Oct 02 2008 at 3:33 PM Rating: Good
To me it sounds like the healer just need to hold off on the heals for another couple of seconds. This allows you to get at least a swipe or two in before the healers starts generating hate from heals.

This should be doable unless you are getting hit too hard in which case you are probably a little undergeared for the instance.
#10 Oct 03 2008 at 4:29 AM Rating: Good
*
229 posts
Thanks for the advice, I've never had problems getting aggro before but as I'm just getting back into the game and haven't had THAT much experiance in Heroics...

Any way the starfire/moonfire pull combo id one I haven't used since.... SM Cath? yeah looks like I'll be dusting THAT off lol.

All of you have more or less confermed my suspicions about the healer dropping bombs right off.

Thank you all for the advice.
#11 Oct 03 2008 at 10:40 PM Rating: Good
***
3,761 posts
I try to have a little CC going into an instance, more so if you don't feel totally geared for it (close, but not totally).

Example 2 pull where I'd take huge damage:

Starfire off target
Bear form, Enrage while backing up, cancel buff
Mangle, Lacerate main target
Lacerate off target
Swipe once (if no CC is place right on your feet, otherwise lacerate main target)
Back to mangle + maul spam on main target

Work in a demo roar and FFF if you feel you need them, depends on the length of a fight and how trigger happy your DPS are.

Then I fall into a 2 lacerate MT, 1 lacerate OT while always putting my mangles on main target, swapping the occasional maul around.

I usually have incompetent DPS who put a sheep right on my feet. If I try to slowly move the mobs back to reposition so I can swipe, I lose aggro half the time so I just don't bother. Lacerate works fine enough for me that I don't bother with swipe in a 2 pull situation, but in 3 pulls I tell the DPS not to suck and I swipe a little more.


I can be a little less chaotic in a guild run, people watch Omen and give me more time to build aggro. But in a PUG I'm frantically trying to build massive aggro on the main target while keeping just enough on the off target(s) to avoid the healers pulling aggro.

I know its easy to say "just kick the DPS", but you probably won't believe this....finding DPS is actually a huge deal on my server! It's ridiculous, and I think it's definately PVP server related (DPS would rather just PVP for epics instead of grinding badges), but it's the truth. So I usually end up taking what I can get after a very long search, then I try to politely whip them into shape over the course of the run. But I won't lie, most of them are all aggro junkies, and you just can't convince them not to unload at full speed from the instant you first touch a mob.

I do find PUGing with these people makes you a better tank though lol... but it can be frustrating if you don't have fast reactions, or if you click the wrong target or something.

Edited, Oct 4th 2008 2:35am by mikelolol

Edited, Oct 4th 2008 2:36am by mikelolol
#12 Oct 04 2008 at 1:12 PM Rating: Decent
some good ideas in this thread. and i think i've tryed most of them.

to the person who said they always get hit before going bear when doing starfire/moonfire. i normaly do max range and have that starfire the furthest from the group since they move first they have the furtest to run. while casting target your next mob then spam MF since it wont break your cast of sf and will go off right away then take a step back or two if you can and just change to bear at ease.

another thing you can go before doing all that is hit barkskin before the pull so that even if you do get hit it will me alittle less.And when you go to bear thats even less you do take so the healer can catch up.

i do this with barkskin and hurracain all the time in heroic ramps. the pull where you have all the caster and 1 single guy in middle. i mark single guy as skull and tell the group take out casters only marked skull for myself. then i hit barksking then huracain so the back edge of it is barlyon the back mob. as skull runs to me i wait till he's right on me then go bear and los pull the whole group around the coror to the left. then i go to a swipe spam on skull and the others as they come to me normaly i can tank all them. also if rage is ok i'll toss out the rage to health heal there to help out healer some.

remember you have a rogue they can distract the pats so you can hurracain them if you want so you will have threat on all of them. i know alot of rogues who hate distracting pats for somereason or dont know how to.
#13 Oct 05 2008 at 1:55 PM Rating: Good
**
280 posts
AureliusSir wrote:
I've never had much success trying to get 2 casts off on a pull, even if the second cast is instant, and still get into bear before I get smacked. You're basically forcing a 3 second delay from pull -> bear (2 x GCD). I'm not saying it's impossible, just saying it's tricky. My guild's druid MT does it all the time but he still gets tagged on a fairly regular basis before he can get into bear and it just means he needs that much more healing right off the hop to stay in the safe zone. It's 6 of one, half dozen of the other.


Hehe I get tagged from time to time when going for starfire + 2x moonfire. I usually walk back when casting the moonfires, that let me some time to get back to bear form. Actually, yesterday I tanked heroic bot and I lagged AFTER my 2nd starfire, before I knew it, half my hp was gone :D

I may even not mind with casting a 2nd moonfire, I'll use the hint for the other poster, Starfire the 3rd target, moonfire the 2nd and mangle on the 1st. By the time I'm in bear form, the GCD done, I'll be hit at least once and mangle will be up! It's all a question of timing!
#14 Oct 06 2008 at 4:16 AM Rating: Good
*
229 posts
Thank you all for the hint/tricks they have helped a trememndus amount. I've been working my rusty tank skills OTing Kara pugs and normal instances. I'm currently wondering if I'm (still) under geared for heroics since I have been having trouble with some ove the heroics and normal doungons(sp?) or if it's just the rust showing.

I'm currently in full clefthoof, T4 gloves, S2 shoulders, stylin purple hat, and the violet signet and the sherminar great ring,and Braxxis staff (I forget what the wrists and waist are but they are decent blues). Does that sound right for Heroics? I'm sittin around 23k armor and like 13k health with uncrittable satus and 22% dodge.

All in all I must say that all of teh advice has been more than helpfull and I have been using it to the fullest extent. Thank you.
#15 Oct 06 2008 at 4:41 AM Rating: Decent
**
280 posts
Sloniah wrote:
I'm currently in full clefthoof, T4 gloves, S2 shoulders, stylin purple hat, and the violet signet and the sherminar great ring,and Braxxis staff (I forget what the wrists and waist are but they are decent blues). Does that sound right for Heroics? I'm sittin around 23k armor and like 13k health with uncrittable satus and 22% dodge.


That seems short a bit for heroics, but, with a good group, you could try your hand at easier heroics like underbog or slave pen. Are you fully enchanted / gem ? Work on your Cenarion Expedition rep to get the Earthwarden. I think I started my heroics with those stats, but I was always running with a really good group (always the same people!)

If you can, try to put your hand on a badge of tenacity, there is a cool stamina bonus and the use bonus is really good (something like 200 agility, I don't remember exactly tho). Do you have the mangle idol from badges? That thing is really nice since it procs pretty much always and gives a boost to your agility, thus to your dodge. When I use the badge and the idol proc, that's a few percent of dodge for few seconds, that will help your healer to keep up.

If I have the rage and I know the healer may pull aggro at the start of a fight, I will use my badge, hope a proc with the first few mangles and the healer won't have to throw too much heal on me.

Keep asking questions and keep tanking either normal or heroics just to get use to different kind of pull. I know for myself, I still struggle with the 6 pulls from normal shattered halls =)
#16 Oct 06 2008 at 5:44 AM Rating: Good
*
229 posts
I have a shamefull secret to admit my Idol and trinkets are teribly, terribly low lvl (like the dodge trinket form BFD low lvl) I just can't win a roll on a trinket. That and the instances that I run don't drop that many trinkets/idols.

This puts me in a bit of a bind as I can't get the badges to get the good trinks beacause I can't get to/beat the bosses in the heroics because I don't have good trinkets.
#17 Oct 06 2008 at 12:16 PM Rating: Good
**
861 posts
You can get some easy upgrades, as soon as tonight.

Do the quest line in SMV for Umberhowl's Collar (sorry for lack of links). Way better than your wrist, and you will also get Manimal's Cinch, a huge belt upgrade. Buy a necklace of the deep off the AH and put two stars of elune in its sockets (or two agi gems to help your dodge). The PvP helm is better than the purple hat, too, if you have the honor you may want to splurge.

Enchants are what will put you over the edge: +6 stats to chest, +dodge to back, +12 sta to wrist, boar's/cat speed to boots (or +12 sta or agi if you feel cheap). Finally, get +35 agi to that staff. It will help your dodge, which is currently your weakest stat. And thread your pants for 40 extra sta and 12 extra agi.

Also, I didnt do the math, but do you need all those +def gems for uncrittable? If you can, replace them with pure sta or agi.

On trinkets, you can either farm Slabs for the tanking trinket Blackheart drops, hope Moroes drops his watch, or soldier on (I wouldn't worry too much). The good news is the Black Stalker in Heroic UB drops a terrific tanking trinket. And you'll be in there a lot because you really, really want earthwarden....
#18 Oct 06 2008 at 1:03 PM Rating: Good
*
229 posts
Quote:
Do the quest line in SMV for Umberhowl's Collar (sorry for lack of links). Way better than your wrist, and you will also get Manimal's Cinch, a huge belt upgrade.

Working on that.

Quote:
The PvP helm is better than the purple hat, too, if you have the honor you may want to splurge.

Part of my nightly routine is BG grind.

Quote:
+6 stats to chest,

have it...


Quote:
+dodge to back,

wouldn't AGi be better?...

Quote:
+12 sta to wrist,

have it...
Quote:
boar's/cat speed to boots (or +12 sta or agi if you feel cheap).

totally forgot about all of those lol thank you...

Quote:
Finally, get +35 agi to that staff. It will help your dodge, which is currently your weakest stat.

Trust me I know that it is my weakest stat but is it worth dropping onto Braxxis?...

Quote:
And thread your pants for 40 extra sta and 12 extra agi.

Again totally forgot will fix that quickly, it's the Clefthoof armor attachment isn't it?

Quote:
Also, I didnt do the math, but do you need all those +def gems for uncrittable? If you can, replace them with pure sta or agi.

I'm sitting at 420 Def so unfortunetly I doo need the +def gem for right now.

Quote:
Black Stalker in Heroic UB drops a terrific tanking trinket.

I. HATE. UB/HUB. WITH A PASSION.

Quote:
And you'll be in there a lot because you really, really want earthwarden....

Yes, yes I do.

#19 Oct 06 2008 at 1:04 PM Rating: Good
*
229 posts
Quote:
Do the quest line in SMV for Umberhowl's Collar (sorry for lack of links). Way better than your wrist, and you will also get Manimal's Cinch, a huge belt upgrade.

Working on that.
Quote:
The PvP helm is better than the purple hat, too, if you have the honor you may want to splurge.

Part of my nightly routine is BG grind.
Quote:
+6 stats to chest,

have it...
Quote:
+dodge to back,

wouldn't AGi be better?...
Quote:
+12 sta to wrist,

have it...
Quote:
boar's/cat speed to boots (or +12 sta or agi if you feel cheap).

totally forgot about all of those lol thank you...
Quote:
Finally, get +35 agi to that staff. It will help your dodge, which is currently your weakest stat.

Trust me, I know that it is my weakest stat but is it worth dropping onto Braxxis?...
Quote:
And thread your pants for 40 extra sta and 12 extra agi.

Again totally forgot will fix that quickly, it's the Clefthoof armor attachment isn't it?
Quote:
Also, I didnt do the math, but do you need all those +def gems for uncrittable? If you can, replace them with pure sta or agi.

I'm sitting at 420 Def so unfortunetly I doo need the +def gem for right now.
Quote:
Black Stalker in Heroic UB drops a terrific tanking trinket.

I. HATE. UB/HUB. WITH A PASSION.
Quote:
And you'll be in there a lot because you really, really want earthwarden....

Yes, yes I do.

#20 Oct 07 2008 at 5:09 AM Rating: Good
**
280 posts
Sloniah wrote:

Quote:
+dodge to back,

wouldn't AGi be better?...


Personnaly, I would go with the AGI.. I mean, I WENT with the agi enchants. You need less agi to get 1% dodge than dodge rating. The agi will increase your armor and your crit chance at the same time.

For the +35agi on weapon, are you planning on changing your staff really quickly? Are you close to exalted with cenarion expedition? I'm trying to remember the name, but there's a BOE staff with stats similar to earthwarden, but slightly less, you could buy it if you have the money, I paid mine 1000g. I think it was Staff Of Natural Fury. I never used the earthwarden (seriously!).

If you don't plan on having a new staff in the next week, I would put a 35 agi on your and do daily/farm to get the mats for the next 35agi you'll need :)

For your def "problem", Shattered Sun Offensive has an inscription for your helm that could help. I think it's called the gladiator one (with resilience). So you could put that on your helm, maybe free a gem to put agi or stam depending on what you need.



Edited, Oct 7th 2008 9:07am by nbouchard
#21 Oct 07 2008 at 7:32 AM Rating: Excellent
**
676 posts
Sloniah wrote:

Quote:
Also, I didnt do the math, but do you need all those +def gems for uncrittable? If you can, replace them with pure sta or agi.

I'm sitting at 420 Def so unfortunetly I doo need the +def gem for right now.



You actually don't need to have 415 or higher defense rating if you have resil to add to it. Mouse over your Def rating, note the percent reduction to crit chance( yours is 2.72% from def), then mouse over resilience, and note the percent reduction to crit chance there as well ( yours is 0.53% from resil)

Those two added together makes 3.25% reduced chance for crit. Since we only need 2.6% + 3/3 Survival of the Fittest, you can afford to drop some of the +def gems and replace with stam or agil until the combined percentage of the two is as close to 2.6% without going under as you can.

Also to answer some of your other questions:

Agility is better to cloak

I prefer + 12 stam to boots just because speed is nice, but that's why we have charge :P

+35 Agil is a huge difference and dropping it on Braxxis is what most of us did until we got Earthwarden (especially since you still need 18k rep to get it, it'll be a little while)

The +40 stam + 12 agil is Nethercleft leg armor, the lesser Clefhide is lower stats, same theory.

You don't have to tank UB to get the trinket. Go as dps and make sure your tank doesn't need that trinket. :P
#22 Oct 08 2008 at 6:34 AM Rating: Good
*
229 posts
Thank all of you for your input. this weekend i shuould be able to nock most of this stuff out. I think that I've made (Hopefully) enough friends to find the mats/crafters to make/enchant/gem most of this stuff (Isle dalies are nice :D) and continue(sp?) my PvP grind for my helm. Hopefully with all that stuff it will push me over for
    heroic maybe
to heroic soilid.
#23 Oct 08 2008 at 5:04 PM Rating: Good
VERY IMPORTANT to remember guys!


As of next Tuesday (3.0.2 patch goes live), we will be crit immune from talents and all this changes drastically. No crushing blows (removed from game) or crits (talents) for us regardless of our gear. Also, swipe doesn't just hit 3 targets, it hits ALL targets in front of you and for a LOT more threat than current.

Just don't go spending a lot of money or time to get stuff that is not of as much use in a weeks time.



Reply To Thread

Colors Smileys Quote OriginalQuote Checked Help

 

Recent Visitors: 164 All times are in CST
Anonymous Guests (164)