1.) It has an equal chance of dropping as any other spec's piece

That's actually a bit of a fallacy. While there is an equal chance of any single piece of gear for a class dropping (generally, there are 3-4 options: 1-2 DPS options, 1 potential healer option, 1 potential tank option), the chance of that piece of gear being useful for the spec in question is disproportionately against tanks for a very simple reason: most healer and DPS gear is largely interchangeable.

The *only* difference between a piece of gear explicitly intended for DPS or heals is that the DPS gear will (potentially) have accuracy on it while the healer gear will (potentially) have alacrity on it. This is even *less* important for moddable gear since you can just yank out the worthless acc/alac enhancement and replace it with whatever you need/want. The only gear where you can't do this and either have to eat the worthless secondary stat or pass it over is implants and ear piece. For *everything else*, DPS and healer gear is either *entirely* interchangeable (if there isn't any acc/alac on it) or is just *mostly* interchangeable.

Tank gear, on the other hand, is the exact *opposite*. The only thing a tank can salvage out of a piece of DPS or healer gear is the armoring. Non-tank ears and implants are entirely worthless to a tank.

As such, it's not entirely true that a piece of gear useful to a tank has the same chance as something useful for a DPS or healer to drop. Assuming you actually *get* the drop to be something appropriate for your class, tanks have a 1 in 3-4 chance of getting something that is even remotely useful to them whereas DPS and healers have the same chance of *not* getting something useful. It's for *this* reason that tanks have a harder time getting geared up (of course, the fact that tank commendation gear seems to be designed to be explicitly *worse* for said tanks than DPS/healer commendation gear *also* hurts): probability is *not* in their favor.

Gearing up my VG tank, I've run at least 20 FPs, killing both the bonus boss as well as the end boss. This constitutes at least 40 chances to get gear. I've gotten all of *5* pieces of tank gear to drop for me. And, sad but true, that's *better than average*. Unless you run with groups comprised of only a single base class, you're going to normally have a 25-33% chance of getting a piece of gear to drop for you. At best, you can expect to get one tank drop out of 9 times (1/3rd chance of class drop, 1/3rd chance of spec drop). At worst, on average, you can expect closer to one out of 16 (1/4tf chance of class drop, 1/4th chance of spec drop).

So, the next time you claim that tanks have the same chance of getting a piece of useful gear as anyone else in the group they're running with, I recommend you stick it up your tailpipe and smoke it. Unless you're running with people entirely comprised of your own class, you're going to have an explicitly and substantially *worse* chance of getting a piece of gear.

I don't even know if Bastion/Bulwark enhancements drop but rather than havin such a random chance I can run ops where I know which pieces have them.

They do, but only on token and content drop gear (so you have to run content *and* get lucky with the drop table). The commendation gear never has decent enhancements.

There are a lack of tanks in the GF queue because they lowered our gear drop rate dramatically. Seriously, go play a level 50 hm then a 55. (well, you know what I mean...extensively) On all my tanks, the drop rate is so low in 55s. The only things -to- drop are generally belt and bracers.

Instead of giving us incentives to queue more, they made it worse to queue at all.

Edit: Would like to mention, as the only Inquis (and now warrior, because thanks devs for wrecking a class), I get dps loot to drop. Dps -and- healer loot. I've now started needing n it.

and in PVE the mechanics for tanking are not attractive to many.

This is my point, tanking in pve makes you a plaything for even weak mobs, and grabbing and keeping aggro is a pain in the ***.

Also there were already a lack of tanks queing for hmfp at 50.

Then devs nerfed the **** out of tanks AND buffed the crap out of dps and heals on the way to 55.

Why would i want to run on my underpowered totally dependant tank when i can be on an overpowered self sufficient healer or commando?

And to be clear i define power in tanking as the ability to resist damage and to grab and keep aggro.

They do, but only on token and content drop gear (so you have to run content *and* get lucky with the drop table). The commendation gear never has decent enhancements.

This reminds me when the game came out, of the 14 times T5 run I did to get columi gloves for my tank because half the time it was trooper gear and the other time was smuggler gear when we had none of these classes in our composition .

This is my point, tanking in pve makes you a plaything for even weak mobs, and grabbing and keeping aggro is a pain in the ***.

I'd debate both of those points.

For the first, unless you're a Shadow and dealing with the heavy spikes that some trash packs and certain bosses put you through, tanks are remarkably durable. Yes, they'll require continuous healing but that's just part of the holy trinity design. There's also the issue that, if you expect every trash pack at the early stages of an expansion to be conquered simply by running into it without any strategizing or CC, you're doing it wrong. There are some trash mobs where you're *expected* to throw out a CC or two and every FP has more than a couple of those.

Secondly, aggro in TOR is *incredibly* easy. Unless you're horribly overgeared and the DPS are using the wrong target priority or splitting their attention, no tanks should ever have to worry about threat. The threat multipliers on tank attacks (both the tank stance multiplier as well as the high threat multipliers) combined with the fact that taunts provides you with oodles of threat both mean that the threat "game" in TOR is incredibly simple. If you're complaining about threat, either you *and* your DPS have to be doing something *terribly* wrong.

5char

Isn't that proof enough, that by the long queue times waiting on tanks. It's the least desirable role to fill. Just because you play it and maybe enjoy it, doesn't speak for everyone else. Stop being self-centered.

Also as far as pulling off threat. My op DPS friend does a 4k DPS on her burst, you won't hold threat on that, I promise.

You have been debunked.

Or it proves that there is a massive abundance of DPS and healers. Tanks use a completely different set of gear from either DPS or Healers so while those roles are largely interchangeable with a simple respec, a tank requires a whole new set of gear. Further, when soloing, tanks hit like little girls so clearing stuff can take ages.

 

The funny thing about finding tanks for 55 HMs is that most tanks either run them with their guild to get their weekly or get no benefit from them. It is stupid easy to get fully geared as a tank (I was full 69's by the end of early access) and once you're past that point the only incentive you have to run 55 HMs is the 3x weekly. Personally I think it was a bad decision on BW's part to reduce the incentive for tanks to queue.

 

Your final points comes across as "ner nee ner I'm right and you're wrong *blows raspberry*". Really mature.

With the first line of you're post, aren't you just agreeing with what he said? Yes you are.

I agree there should be more rewards for desired classes in order to fix the queue problem. Like you said though, it's easy to gear up a tank and the comms are worthless after a certain point. That's only part of the tank shortage problem though. The other part is, people just don't like playing the role. Getting in tanking range and then getting knocked back....rinse repeat x10 during any FP or Op(more in an Op) and they will quickly get bored.

Ever leap to a target and..BOOM knockedback, now you lost threat. Yea, that's really fun.

And, yet, somehow, very few DPS manage to do this *very* simple thing.

 

I honestly think that misbehaving DPS are one of the big reasons why there are fewer tanks than there would be otherwise. DPS using the wrong kill order or splitting DPS on elite+ targets is *absurdly frustrating*. It probably doesn't help that tanks also have to put their trust in healers: if a healer is bad, a tank is going to faceplant, regardless of their gear. Tanking is a more complex role than healing or DPSing that is *forced* to place a lot of trust in the other players of the group not being idiots. When they *are* idiots, a tank's life is made incredibly frustrating (especially since most DPS will blame you for losing threat when the real reason is their inability to use proper focus DPS and target priority).

This post brings up very good points. The game is designed already not to be multi-target-tanking-friendly(Yea I made that up), so when a kill order is not followed or a CC is broken. Well I'm sure quite a few tanks just throw their arms up in the air and say "Rerolling DPS" to themselves.

Why wouldn't you roll a DPS? It's so much freedom to play how you want. Break a CC? Noone complains, the tank will get yelled at though for not picking it up. Not follow the kill order? That's fine, tank will be blamed for not picking it up. Pull ahead of the group? No worries, again, because the tank is moving too slow for the group!

Why would anyone want to put themselves in a lose-lose situation?

Isn't that proof enough, that by the long queue times waiting on tanks. It's the least desirable role to fill. Just because you play it and maybe enjoy it, doesn't speak for everyone else. Stop being self-centered.

 

Also as far as pulling off threat. My op DPS friend does a 4k DPS on her burst, you won't hold threat on that, I promise.

 

You have been debunked.

It is impossible to hold groups of trash together when the ship strikes and mortar volleys come raining down.

They pull every time.

Force sweep and its ilke do nothing.

Area taunt if held till after initial strikes works momentarily then not.

Any dps can pull any trash mob off you at any time.

Even guarded healers can pull trash that they are not even hitting.

TFB trash is a pita.

I shouldnt have to worry about not pulling too much trash to me.

I used to be alot tougher.

Now i will die in trash fights without liberal use of cooldowns and good heals.

The point about jumping to a mob and having his proximity fused knockback go off is very valid.

It makes me feel like a douche not a hero.

The devs decided to make fights more about great heals and fast dps than uber tough tanks.

And it just isnt as much fun for me.

And clearly im not alone.

Isn't that proof enough, that by the long queue times waiting on tanks. It's the least desirable role to fill. Just because you play it and maybe enjoy it, doesn't speak for everyone else. Stop being self-centered.

 

Also as far as pulling off threat. My op DPS friend does a 4k DPS on her burst, you won't hold threat on that, I promise.

 

You have been debunked.

You know, that's a VERY good point. In fact, I'm going to make and upload a quick parse just to prove your point!

http://www.torparse.com/a/294630/1/0/Log

See? I'm only doing 3255 TPS over the course of that (not exceptionally well done) opener! That means I could only hold threat on ... Erm... about 4231 dps. I guess I CAN hold threat on 4k dps.

So, I guess that means, well...

"You have been debunked."

You know, that's a VERY good point. In fact, I'm going to make and upload a quick parse just to prove your point!

 

http://www.torparse.com/a/294630/1/0/Log

 

See? I'm only doing 3255 TPS over the course of that (not exceptionally well done) opener! That means I could only hold threat on ... Erm... about 4231 dps. I guess I CAN hold threat on 4k dps.

 

So, I guess that means, well...

 

"You have been debunked."

Nice post!

Yea, I admit I did give a lot of leeway for the tank when I said 4k DPS. Since it's much higher than that, more around 4.5k. That only speaks for operative DPS though, I can't say for other AC's. So can you hold threat on that number as well?

Nice post!

 

Yea, I admit I did give a lot of leeway for the tank when I said 4k DPS. Since it's much higher than that, more around 4.5k. That only speaks for operative DPS though, I can't say for other AC's. So can you hold threat on that number as well?

Uhhh. Yeah.

First, it's not a start from scratch. Your operative friend either lets me start the party or I may just let him have his aggro for a bit...nothing like letting a dps have the aggro they want so desperately.

Second, there's this thing called 'guard'. It's not (usually) for the healer. So assuming I've figured out in the first 10 sec that your friend needs to be guarded, go ahead and slash that TPS number for me.

Third, there's this thing called 'taunt'.

Holding aggro against highly skilled dps is a pleasure. That's not the problem. The problem is what Kitru said - it's the neanderthal dps. Because with enough gear, any monkey can press buttons and feel like, wow, man, my damage is soooo gnarly, look at me...even if they're only scratching the surface of their potential. So they think they know what they're doing, and you start wiping because things like "kill order" and "cc" and "let the tank pull" and "when the trash are dead, hit what I'm hitting" are utterly foreign concepts, and you think the dps want to hear that it's their fault?

I don't need any more HM55 drops, as I'm full BM armor. And I don't need to take the 67.39% (super accurate number btw, i totally mathed it) chance that I'll tankpug a FP with at least one DerPS who doesn't know his job and yet doesn't want me to tell him his job.

Uhhh. Yeah.

 

First, it's not a start from scratch. Your operative friend either lets me start the party or I may just let him have his aggro for a bit...nothing like letting a dps have the aggro they want so desperately.

 

Second, there's this thing called 'guard'. It's not (usually) for the healer. So assuming I've figured out in the first 10 sec that your friend needs to be guarded, go ahead and slash that TPS number for me.

 

Third, there's this thing called 'taunt'.

 

Holding aggro against highly skilled dps is a pleasure. That's not the problem. The problem is what Kitru said - it's the neanderthal dps. Because with enough gear, any monkey can press buttons and feel like, wow, man, my damage is soooo gnarly, look at me...even if they're only scratching the surface of their potential. So they think they know what they're doing, and you start wiping because things like "kill order" and "cc" and "let the tank pull" and "when the trash are dead, hit what I'm hitting" are utterly foreign concepts, and you think the dps want to hear that it's their fault?

 

I don't need any more HM55 drops, as I'm full BM armor. And I don't need to take the 67.39% (super accurate number btw, i totally mathed it) chance that I'll tankpug a FP with at least one DerPS who doesn't know his job and yet doesn't want me to tell him his job.

Since you take Kitru's word as law, did you also know he said if you use taunt in you're rotation then you are doing it wrong as a tank?

Since you take Kitru's word as law, did you also know he said if you use taunt in you're rotation then you are doing it wrong as a tank?

Kitru said

"Secondly, aggro in TOR is *incredibly* easy. Unless you're horribly overgeared and the DPS are using the wrong target priority or splitting their attention, no tanks should ever have to worry about threat. The threat multipliers on tank attacks (both the tank stance multiplier as well as the high threat multipliers) combined with the fact that taunts provides you with oodles of threat both mean that the threat "game" in TOR is incredibly simple. If you're complaining about threat, either you *and* your DPS have to be doing something *terribly* wrong."

Taunts provide you with oodles of threat. And I never said it was in my rotation; i said it was one of several tools available to easily hold aggro against even the best of dps.

Please don't invent things that I didn't say. It only reduces the quality of the debate.

I will say, though, that Kitru has provided the community with more invaluable work and information than I ever will. I'm grateful for their work and shared knowledge on a whole range of topics. That is not 'taking their word as law'; it is recognizing when someone has invested the time and effort to receive a great benefit of the doubt.

4k on a crit?

I crit for 9k on my commando with demo round.

Now you can guard me but who will guard the others.

Anybody with any kind of gear pulls on trash.

you are spewing nonsense.

nobody can hold aggro when the big boys crit.

Thats the way devs want it.

But the purpose of this thread was to discuss what is wrong with tanking that there are not enough folks that want to do it specifically in 55 hmfps.

you are not adding to that in any way.

I say its because tanking is not as much fun and feels underpowered.

Others say its because there is no reward due to low chance of tanking specific drops.

But most seem to say they have farmed enough comms to get 69 level gear then stopped.

But there should be more and new tanks behing them looking to get gear and comms and there dont seem to be.

There seems to be a finite number of players who want to tank in this game and that is what i feel indicates that there is a problem.

It has in my opinion and clearly in others opinions very limited appeal.

So what should be done within game to make tanking appealing to a wider audience?

Since you take Kitru's word as law, did you also know he said if you use taunt in you're rotation then you are doing it wrong as a tank?

If you *have* to use Taunt as part of your rotation, you're doing it wrong. If you're going to quote me, have the decency quote me correctly.

If you *have* to use Taunt as part of your rotation, you're doing it wrong. If you're going to quote me, have the decency quote me correctly.

Sorry I'm not going to dig through so many post to find one quote. You seem to have gotten the idea though and what I said stands correct.

Kitru said

"Secondly, aggro in TOR is *incredibly* easy. Unless you're horribly overgeared and the DPS are using the wrong target priority or splitting their attention, no tanks should ever have to worry about threat. The threat multipliers on tank attacks (both the tank stance multiplier as well as the high threat multipliers) combined with the fact that taunts provides you with oodles of threat both mean that the threat "game" in TOR is incredibly simple. If you're complaining about threat, either you *and* your DPS have to be doing something *terribly* wrong."

 

Taunts provide you with oodles of threat. And I never said it was in my rotation; i said it was one of several tools available to easily hold aggro against even the best of dps.

 

Please don't invent things that I didn't say. It only reduces the quality of the debate.

 

I will say, though, that Kitru has provided the community with more invaluable work and information than I ever will. I'm grateful for their work and shared knowledge on a whole range of topics. That is not 'taking their word as law'; it is recognizing when someone has invested the time and effort to receive a great benefit of the doubt.

What Kitru later on, is what I meant. Like I said, I'm not going to dig through post to find the exact quote. You understood the meaning though, which is the point. When did I ever say Kitru didn't offer great info?

This is horrible tbh, as Kitru said, we as tanks have to place our trust to others so we can survive and yet if THE TANK fails (for a reason or the other) the whole group dies.

This is very true, but, OTOH, we as tanks need to be responsible for our own *supplemental* survival skills in the form of defensive CDs, stims, adrens, etc. I have no problem trusting my team, but at the same time, I want to be able to ease the burden by maximizing my own defenses in a timely fashion. But again, one of the many challenges tanks have that can make the class quite fun...

...if you're a glutton for punishment

So what should be done within game to make tanking appealing to a wider audience?

-Get rid of knockback so we can see a fight instead of a wall and a few polygons of the boss' face.

-Better gear drops/gear choices.

I did a few more 55HMs, looked at the time frame it would take to 69 out in a good spec (Of course, no set bonus!) lol'ed, and went back to pvping and playing other toons. That's one hell of an uninteresting grind.

To people complaining about not being able to hold aggro: I'm full B mods with all defensive specs. I've had DDs take damage/grab aggro twice on trash, never on bosses. Either its you, or it's the DDs misbehaving, nothing is wrong with the aggro mechanics.

-Get rid of knockback so we can see a fight instead of a wall and a few polygons of the boss' face.

I wouldn't say that they should get rid of knockbacks *entirely*. They force tanks to think strategically in order to avoid them. Vanguards have Hold the Line, which is a *great* way to get past the whole "wall of knockbacks at the start of the fight" problem, and Shadows have Resilience which works on a vast majority of similar effects. The only class that really gets screwed by those effects are Guardians (i.e. they have no real choice but to eat the effects), which could easily be fixed by providing Guardian tanks with a limited form of Unremitting (from Vigilance) that only provides interrupts/physics for ~3 seconds following a Force Leap while in Soresu Form. Toss it onto an existing talent like Courage, Beacon of Might, or Battlefield Command and you wouldn't even have to make space or change specs.

-Better gear drops/gear choices.

The only real fix for drops tables, without pissing off everyone *except* for tanks, would be some kind of slight increase in the weight of tank gear compared to DPS/healer gear for specific classes such that the chances of getting something useful for a tank or a healer/DPS for a class is functionally even (easy way would be to just double the entries on the drop table for tank gear).

Barring that, it would be nice to be able to spend Elite Commendations (say, 100) on a box that provides a random role and class specific HM FP gear (so that Troopers can buy a "Trooper Drop Box" that provides a random piece of Black Market Mk-2 Trooper gear). This way, after running loads of FPs, you could at least guarantee a drop for your class, even if it's not specific to role to overcome the terrible state of commendations tank gear.

I wouldn't say that they should get rid of knockbacks *entirely*.

The knockbacks just happen too often is the issue - even with the skills that cancel it. A few other games I've played tanks in it was more about timing cancels, mitigations, and positioning the boss (or moving the boss) to deal with effects, dealing with buffs and debuffs, pull strategies and add strategies, and of course aggro management. I played a tank all day in a few of these gleefully for any group.

Shoving myself in a wall with the boss on top of me and playing the finger shuffle on skills is completely lame.

Sure, there are some bosses where it's not shoving myself in a wall, but the frequency of such is really annoying. Athiss is a great example. First boss is fun. Last boss is fun. Rest were relatively annoying due to the wall and entirely forgettable. I'd enjoy it if the fights were complex, but didn't require me being in a wall seeing nothing.

Put the knockbacks on trash mobs for complexity, not bosses.

The only real fix for drops tables.

Now my first MMO (if you really wanna think about it, THE first MMO) was EQ. I'm used to, and fine with the "Rarely ever drops" loot tables. However, to get gear that NOBODY in the instance can use, that you can't trade off for something you can use, or even to someone else not there that could use it, is really super lame.

The amount of time it takes to get the coms to upgrade is also off putting due to the weekly limit. I'd rather do...anything else than that (and it takes up so little time to hit max, but weeks to gear out). Essentially their loot tables/concept at end game really removed the loot motivator from the PvE game for tanks at least. Other games you could PvE your brains out as much as you wanted till you got you gear. This one, its do your dailies/weeklies and log off unless you have an alt. And since the elite com gear is spec'ed out like crap...