Sterny’s Completely Useless Guide to The Care and Feeding of a Tank.
I’ve never played a tank, let me absolutely clear about that. I’ve played melee DPS, but tanking…the philosophy is so incongruent with my addled personality that I’d probably be worse at tanking than healing.
I mean, seriously – a tank runs up, annoys something, and then stands there while that something tries hard to pummel the tank into mush. All the time, of course, the tank has to keep grips on the something’s attention by “taunting” it – which, somehow, defies rationality, since the tank usually is just poking the something with a stick while some half-insane wizard (me) rains asteroids down on the something’s head. Oh, of course, the tank is absorbing enough damage to melt through Manhattan Island lengthwise and kept alive by the overworked healer.
I cannot comprehend playing a character like that. So, without further ado, here are my tips and comments about the proper TREATMENT of those brave chaps in armor:
1 ) Realize that playing a tank is probably boring. Oh, it has its moments, like when Overwizard Weezle has blasted the tank down to a few bloody fragments held together with leathery scraps of armor before the healer miraculously (again) brings the tank back from the edge of the “Release Now?” screen, but that isn’t as much “fun” as it is “terror.” No, step into the plate armor shoes of our average tank and realize that any soloing he does consists of walking up to a Nameless Hideous Sponge-Breather and hitting it with his sword over and over and over and over and over again until it gives up and lies down. Wow. That’s got to be thrilling. Cut your tanks a break if they get grumbly about soloing, ok?
2 ) Never complain about the tanks getting Nifty Stuff in dungeons. That’s just tacky, right? After all, if they die, you’re next, you over-damaging psycho in a dress, and while they can stand there and be pounded into the concrete like a tent peg and still keep on swinging you’ll fall over dead in a brisk wind. Let them gear up! They need some cheese at the end of the maze or you might as well go back to fireballing noobs in their start-up town.
3 ) Face it – if you’re not a healer or a tank you’re completely disposable. Need DPS? Oh, there’s LOTS of DPS classes out there. You might be the Precious Star Child of your mother’s adoration, but if you’re a mage, rogue, hunter/archer, or melee hacker, you’re expendable. Since you can solo, there’s LOTS of your type around and you can be swapped out of a group with as much attention as changing a flashlight’s battery. Thank your goddamn tanks for letting you into a group where you might get a chance to get stuff and xp.
4 ) NEVER blame the tank for a group wipe. You’re a DPS class, it’s YOUR fault. If you yank aggro away, it’s your problem, not the tank’s. Fall over dead and just lie there like a good mage, all right? The healer will put you in the queue.
5 ) As a follow-up to the above; stop running around like someone with tummy problems from a Pepto-Bismol commercial if you get aggro. Stand there and take your hits so the tank doesn’t have to chase the monster who’s chasing you, you nitwit. If you die, see above – you’re destined to die, you’re DPS. If you stand still the tank might actually be able to use his Wheeze of Inflammation and get the damage back on his own thickly-padded skull.
6 ) Realize that PvP for a tank can be an excruciating experience. After all, if they’re a proper tank, they’re specced for defense, which means that PvP consists of them being slowly beat into mush by other players and not NPC monsters. They don’t get kills, they don’t get to lead glorious charges to victory – they step up, get stunned, stuck in magical mud, possessed by the enemy’s Make Tank River-Dance spell, or just immolated by some wizard on the other side. Sure, PvP is fun for YOU – you get to kill stuff. But them? Not so much.
7 ) Leave your damage-specced tank classes alone. Don’t fulminate about how unfair it is that YOU don’t get a tank to protect your pert little butt. After all, most damage-specced tanks don’t dish out the DPS you can, and they’re still subject to the above stunning and so forth. Sure, they don’t do all that well in dungeon crawls, but they make spectacular off-tanks and assists.
Respect your tanks, people. Tanks and healers play the classes you won’t because – and this is quite true – those two jobs are the most thankless in the game. If you can’t be nice to your loveable rusty comrades-in-arms, go sign up for the Hello Kitty Online beta. I hear it’s going to have some super PvP action. Watch out for Badtz Maru, though – he’s a griefer.
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