Do Not Engage: Warriors Vs. PALs/SHDs

[Estu]

Originally Posted by Dr4z3r [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

The extent to which the extra time matters depends 100% on how you're engaging the mob.

- If you plan to burn through it in 10 seconds and get on to the next mob/pull (exp group/trash in raids), then waiting 10 seconds for a warrior to build up aggro is obviously a very harsh impediment to your efficiency.

- If you're going to be fighting at dragon for the next 3-5 minutes (or more, depending), and losing a tank means that your entire raid wipes and you lose tons of time, or even lose your chance at the mob entirely, then waiting 10 seconds for a warrior to build aggro is barely noticeable.

Similarly, the longer you're fighting a mob, the more noticeable a 10-15% increase in unmitigated damage is going to be.

Paladins and SKs have great snap-threat generation, which makes them great for fights lasting 10 seconds, where the goal is to move to the next target ASAP: They throw down a debuff, take two or three hits and the mob's dead! But their damage-mitigation and max health are not on a level with warriors'.

That's why warriors are the premiere raid tanks: They're built to take damage.

Edit: Man, I never realized how well I learned tanking-theory raiding in classic WoW. I wasn't even a tank!

The impression I'm getting from this post in particular, but also the thread overall, is that warriors are only better tanks than SKs and PALs on raids, and comparable versus blue cons (I say comparable since the mob still gets pulled off, but you can taunt it back on before it does too much damage); otherwise, SKs/PALs are preferable. This is ignoring the 7% EXP penalty, though.