Friday 14 October 2011

Tanking at max level no longer fun

Since well geared max level characters have been able to get useful gear out of dungeons (i.e. from badge gear), tanking them has stopped being fun. The simple reason being impatience - at least some of the group just want to kill the boss asap and get out.

As a healer as long as I have enough mana I'm ready for the pull.

As a tank the process is more like -
  • Assess the kill order and mark
  • Chose a good time (i.e. are the mobs moving, is there a patrol nearby?)
  • Pull
  • Get to melee range
  • Get off an AoE move

Half way through step 1 a modern PUG is bored. If someone's not started dps before step 4 has started it's a miracle. And of course any deaths are the tank's fault.

Before max level the impatience isn't there. And in the original game well geared max level characters didn't go into dungeons, except perhaps to help a friend.

But this has now changed, and the fun has gone with it.