Maybe the tank has never tanked before?

Some tanks want their defensive CD available for every tougher pull. Especially if healer isn't very good. Defensive CDs for tank classes are usually on 45-60 sec cooldown (so not even close to what Sentinels/Marauders/Gunslingers/Snipers have: about 6 sec).

How many lightsabers Sages and Slingers have again?

Have you seen how cool it is to healtank whole room? Have you seen how cool it is to knock everything away before 3 Flybys hit the ground? Have you seen how cool it is to bubble yourself and chain pull?

Defensive CDs for tank classes are usually on 45-60 sec cooldown (so not even close to what Sentinels/Marauders/Gunslingers/Snipers have: about 6 sec).

I feel significantly dumber after reading that comment.

If you find a 6-second defensive cooldown on Mara/Sniper, you let me know.

I feel significantly dumber after reading that comment.

 

If you find a 6-second defensive cooldown on Mara/Sniper, you let me know.

Hand of God for the Mara/Sent

I feel significantly dumber after reading that comment.

 

If you find a 6-second defensive cooldown on Mara/Sniper, you let me know.

Shield Probe has a longer cooldown than that, but if specced right it has about a 6-second downtime (12 sec buff, 18 sec CD iirc). Shield Probe is a Sniper defensive CD.

Shield Probe is a Sniper defensive CD.

I'm pretty aware of what shield probe is, I have all four cunning advanced classes at 55 and they all PvE and PvP (some more than others).

Uptime is different from cooldown though, completely different actually. It's only 'up' for that long if it doesn't get use.

I'm pretty aware of what shield probe is, I have all four cunning advanced classes at 55 and they all PvE and PvP (some more than others).

 

Uptime is different from cooldown though, completely different actually. It's only 'up' for that long if it doesn't get use.

Oh, I know it's totally different. I was trying to figure out some way to get that 6-second comment that Halinalle made to actually fit reality.

Oh, I know it's totally different. I was trying to figure out some way to get that 6-second comment that Halinalle made to actually fit reality.

I commend you for taking up the daunting task, but I would caution you that success may be outside the realm of possibility.

Have you seen how cool it is to healtank whole room? Have you seen how cool it is to knock everything away before 3 Flybys hit the ground? Have you seen how cool it is to bubble yourself and chain pull?

Go Annihilation and heal. Also, command your team mates to push the enemies and bubble you, the esteemed cornucopia of stratagems. A wise leader is not afraid to delegate.

Hammer Station HM the other night. A nice Sorc healer in decent gear and more than adequate skills, yourstruly with a DM/DF geared Madness Assassin and finally a pair with the same guild tag. The DPS was a Smash Juggie in Black Market gear and the tank was a PT in BM gear as well. Both of them around half augmented and in stock gear, so some bad stats here and there.

We load in and I see the Juggie is Guarded. Fine, they must've been running dailies together or something. I don't really mind while we clear the mobs, but before the first boss I ask for Guard and the healer recommends the tank should indeed Guard me. Juggie DPS replies with a "lol" and the tank uses /shrug and leaps in without Guarding me. I wait for a few seconds, join the fight and, well, aggrorip. No taunt is forthcoming, so I use Shroud against the laser and eventually I need to stealth out. To my horror I rip aggro again some time after coming out of stealth. Healer is confused at first, but keeps me up in spite of the laser, I drop aggro and even get Extricated, but it's not enough. We win with my Assassin facetanking 85% of the fight, because the tank never fires a single taunt.

Loot gets distributed and the healer and myself start running towards the next mob. Then I realise the DPS Juggie has left the instance without a word. I was just about to ask him why, when the PT tank writes, and I paraphrase here although it was in all Caps, "IF YOU LIKE TANKING SO F***ING MUCH, YOU DEAL WITH THE FP!" and leaves as well. I get some abuse in whispers from the duo and proceed to put them on ignore. Healer pulls out Ashara, I take out Xalek (mine is in Oriconian tank gear with a few augs) and we re-queue. A new DPS emerges soon, a wonderfully capable hybrid Sniper and we even score a tank right before the three bosses. Smooth sailing from there.

I wish people could take friendly, logical suggestions into consideration instead of meeting them with scorn or indifference.

Problem is most **** sapiens are not that intelligent, but internet access is more and more common. Oh the glorious 90's when most users were academics, IT pro's and such. That kind of means that you will only see more dumbness, incompetence, and ignorant abuse as described above.

Quite true. I am not too worried for my own sake, I am quite laidback when it comes to abuse towards me, I have no issues teaching people and I can tolerate wipes. However, a lot of people are not quite as tolerant or relaxed and I reckon quite a few newer players have developed an aversion to grouping up because of abuse and bad experiences. A pity.

Quite true. I am not too worried for my own sake, I am quite laidback when it comes to abuse towards me, I have no issues teaching people and I can tolerate wipes. However, a lot of people are not quite as tolerant or relaxed and I reckon quite a few newer players have developed an aversion to grouping up because of abuse and bad experiences. A pity.

I used to be very laid back, but with the conquest thing after doing a few PUGs and stuff I am becoming less. I think kind of "broken veteran" period I'm having. Even asked some people if they are watching their screens after tanking Kephess in TFB on DPS shadow when both tanks were doing nothing through whole fight.

I used to be very laid back, but with the conquest thing after doing a few PUGs and stuff I am becoming less. I think kind of "broken veteran" period I'm having. Even asked some people if they are watching their screens after tanking Kephess in TFB on DPS shadow when both tanks were doing nothing through whole fight.

Hopefully that's a phase that will pass, because it's impossible to avoid these people if you PUG at all. I PUG a lot, so the laidback attitude does help, but I really know what you mean. I get days when I feel like smashing my skull through my screen in frustration caused by random group members. Luckily I have managed to hold my language in the civilised spectrum. Well, apart from guild runs, where around half the time is spent mocking others. All in good humour and mutual understanding, of course.

Stupidity has no threat-table.

 

You really shouldn't waste CDs trying to taunt it off people.

...this may well become my new forum sig now. Thanks, man!

HM Czerka Core Meltdown on my op healer (because I wanted to do Directive 7 to finish the mount achievement but forgot to uncheck the other options). Zone in, first thing the tank says is, "I'm just here for the decoration." I wish him luck with that, knowing how rarely that damn thing drops.

Tank replies, "FYI, I don't care for you."

I say, "Thanks for sharing, sugarplum," and we get to clearing trash.

All is well until the last large droid before the Duneclaw. The op dps pulled aggro from the tank, and instead of being a tank and dealing with it the tank ran off towards the boss room, leaving the op to tank the droid. Apparently he thinks ops have taunts or something because he said, "You want it so much? You deal with it."

Well we get to the Duneclaw, with the op dps still laughing at the tank. Sandstorm hits, and the tank (despite being decently geared at around 42k health, indicating he has done at least something before) doesn't seem to know what to do, so he decides to do nothing. We tell him to move to the green, and he starts to, but then calls us scrubs and leaves group.

Replacement tank comes quickly, says, "I've had to ragequit this flashpoint three times this week. I hope this won't be number four." I assure him that it won't be, that our last tank was just a troll.

So he pulls the Duneclaw, and it quickly becomes apparent why he has "had to ragequit" so many flashpoints. He seems to believe he is psychic, and pulls the boss to one of the canisters immediately instead of waiting in the center. Of course he lost his wager with the rng gods, but by the time we convinced him to move to the green it was too late and we missed the stomp thingy.

I heal through it, the next stomp smashes the canister, and the tank moves immediately to another canister. Again, the wrong one. Fortunately at this point in the patch there are very few things I cannot heal through, and eventually we make it. Tank says he came close to ragequitting because we almost failed it. Sigh.

====

Later I get Directive 7 like I wanted. The tank wants a spacebar-crazy speedfest AND the bonus boss, and wastes no time insulting the spacebar skills of the rest of us.

First boss glitches because we dpsed the other ones too fast. Most groups /stuck and try again, but not this tank. "Keep dpsing, one attack in one hundred will go through." Five minutes into this charade I say, "Good thing we spacebarred, now we have time to do this." Impervious to irony, the tank says, "But you weren't spacebarring, were you?" Then calls out the level 50 sniper individually for spacebar shaming. He apologizes for having watched some of the dialogue.

So that took a good 10 minutes to wear down. Ten minutes. People need to rethink their priorities.

Oh but I won the stupid decoration, and I even used it in front of the tank, but I have no intention of putting it in my stronghold.

====

Are tanks getting worse, or am I running out of patience?

Did an entire flashpoint as a healer without getting Guard put on me once!

. . . because neither tank (one left partway through, we used a Treek until we got a new one) put Guard on ANYONE.

I can almost heal Taral V in my sleep with a 39 Scoundrel anyways. And I got the decoration, which is nice.

Hopefully that's a phase that will pass, because it's impossible to avoid these people if you PUG at all. I PUG a lot, so the laidback attitude does help.

I quite agree. Expecting everyone else to be able to do stuff correctly is rather ignorant. There are idiots out there and, if you want to complete a PUG you are going to have to work around them. However there are levels of stupidity which sometimes leave me open-mouthed. Ill give afew examples:

Depths of mannan with my sniper, the dps merc states they are new, we get to the first boss and I explain tacts for their sake. Now we all know the first boss mechanics are rather obvious (you cant miss a red floor and blue circle around the enemy), but just in case I explain it to the new person with "3 enemies, 2 shields, its self explanatory from there" - that will suffice. Well it does for the merc. However it seems the other 2 (a mara and sorc dps) seem to be new too but didn't say anything. They clearly required more than the above sentence to understand that red floor = bad, blue circle = shielded enemy.

False emperor HM with my 55 sorc healer (this is mentioned earlier in my post about a complete day of god-aweful tanks post #4853). The sin dps states they are new so at the first...boss (is it a boss? the thing on the bridge, seems too easy to be a boss). I explain its pretty much tank and spank with an aggro dump which can be cured with a taunt (I don't know if it aggro dumps, it could just be poor tanking all the groups I have run that with). However it seems I wasn't detailed enough as I never said "when he has a blatantly obvious red circle around him and you health plummets, that would be a good time to move away". I mean come on, getting to lvl 50 and not recognising such a blatant fight mechanic. I am astounded sometimes at just how little knowledge people can pick up during the hours of gameplay required to hit endgame.

Sadly these people have to be tolerated if you want to move up through the tiers of endgame gear.

I had a funny run of HM Cademimu with a touchy operative healer.

I started watching him after a while, and I noticed he never used Kolto Probes, not even to top us off when we were traveling between mobs. At one point he complained at the tank, saying "at least give me some time to heal up before chain pulling," to which I snarked "that's what kolto probes are for" and he shot back "I don't have time for that when I'm busy trying to heal all of you at once." And that was frankly confusing, because if he had been putting Kolto probes on all of us to start with the group healing would have been much easier anyway.

Some time after the wookie boss the healer spoke up again saying "guard me" at which I (a Sniper in fully auged 180 gear who had been pulling threat in almost every mob pull) could only say "lol." Luckily the tank ignored him and we kept on rolling.

Last try, the healer tells him to move out of the fire, and the tank replies "it's your job to pull me out, I'm a tank, I don't move".

 

Healer lets him die and the chat fills with profanities from the tank.

Ah, how entertaining this thread is...

Ah, how entertaining this thread is...

IKR? I was laughing so hard for a full minute when I read that part.

Ah, how entertaining this thread is...

Popcorn?? *hand you some*

Queued up for a HM55 last night on my 'sin tank.

 

Got into a Hammer Station group and immediately asked if we were doing the bonus. Nobody answered, but we did have to wait around for the healer to load in. During this time, I slapped Guard on the 'sin DPS that was with us (the other was Sorc with a bit lower HP, so I figured I'd start with the melee DPS and move it if needed).

 

Healer zones in and immediately asks for guard, with 'sin DPS piping up that it should be on the healer. I make a heavy sigh in RL and state that they can either trust that I know how to tank or I can spend a few minutes telling them how guard and agro work.

 

They refused the tutorial and the healer mentioned how he could heal me through my bad play even without guard. I suggested that they could kick me if they really thought I sucked. I was told to shut up and start killing, so I did.

 

3rd pull (you know the one with 2 elite droids), CC on left droid was broken and a couple of strongs were left standing until one of the elite droids was down. I quickly typed "DPS kill weak first, plz."

 

One DPS insisted that they had been, while the other DPS said something along the lines of "don't worry about us, at least we know how to play."

 

I couldn't resist. I said, "that's ironic, since you want me to Guard the healer." I got votekicked. Reason: RETARDED. Luckily, the votekick system gave me enough time to ignore the DPS and healer combo who had their heads stuck firmly up their nether regions.

 

Got a queue pop about a half hour later with a group with DPS who also wanted me to guard the healer, but they listened to my explanation and then the healer backed me up. Went on to finish Hammer Station smoothly and without issue.

 

I'm so tired of trying to teach morons.

I Know Your Pain.

Queued up for a HM55 last night on my 'sin tank.

 

Got into a Hammer Station group and immediately asked if we were doing the bonus. Nobody answered, but we did have to wait around for the healer to load in. During this time, I slapped Guard on the 'sin DPS that was with us (the other was Sorc with a bit lower HP, so I figured I'd start with the melee DPS and move it if needed).

 

Healer zones in and immediately asks for guard, with 'sin DPS piping up that it should be on the healer. I make a heavy sigh in RL and state that they can either trust that I know how to tank or I can spend a few minutes telling them how guard and agro work.

 

They refused the tutorial and the healer mentioned how he could heal me through my bad play even without guard. I suggested that they could kick me if they really thought I sucked. I was told to shut up and start killing, so I did.

 

3rd pull (you know the one with 2 elite droids), CC on left droid was broken and a couple of strongs were left standing until one of the elite droids was down. I quickly typed "DPS kill weak first, plz."

 

One DPS insisted that they had been, while the other DPS said something along the lines of "don't worry about us, at least we know how to play."

 

I couldn't resist. I said, "that's ironic, since you want me to Guard the healer." I got votekicked. Reason: RETARDED. Luckily, the votekick system gave me enough time to ignore the DPS and healer combo who had their heads stuck firmly up their nether regions.

 

Got a queue pop about a half hour later with a group with DPS who also wanted me to guard the healer, but they listened to my explanation and then the healer backed me up. Went on to finish Hammer Station smoothly and without issue.

 

I'm so tired of trying to teach morons.

So why is it you don't guard the healer? If the DPS aren't pulling mobs away from the healer, and therefore taking agro, then the healer is going to build agro on anything the tank hasn't hit.

So why is it you don't guard the healer? If the DPS aren't pulling mobs away from the healer, and therefore taking agro, then the healer is going to build agro on anything the tank hasn't hit.

Guard is not going to prevent a healer from getting agro on something that hasn't been hit. If the healer is the only thing on the agro table for that target, the % decrease from guard isn't going to have any effect on the situation.

That's why it is the job of the tank to try to get at least one hit on every target in a mob. Usually that one hit is enough to keep it off the healer for a long time, because healers don't generate much threat at all compared to a tank or DPS. When a healer gets agro, 9 times out of 10 it is because the tank was tunnel visioning a single target and not paying attention to the group. Guarding the healer is not a substitute for the tank doing their job.

Guard is not going to prevent a healer from getting agro on something that hasn't been hit. If the healer is the only thing on the agro table for that target, the % decrease from guard isn't going to have any effect on the situation.

 

That's why it is the job of the tank to try to get at least one hit on every target in a mob. Usually that one hit is enough to keep it off the healer for a long time, because healers don't generate much threat at all compared to a tank or DPS. When a healer gets agro, 9 times out of 10 it is because the tank was tunnel visioning a single target and not paying attention to the group. Guarding the healer is not a substitute for the tank doing their job.

Yup, that's correct.

And, in the case that was mentioned, I was holding agro on all the mobs (2 elites and 2 strongs), but the elites were dying first and if the DPS would have just followed kill order both I and the healer would have had an easier time of it.

Holding agro on multiple mobs with a sin tank is laughably easy