Ze Tankadin!

[Rowain]

We tank with mana and this is the wrots you can do, cause it usually tend to finish, especially if you don't need (or get) much healing. try to tank normal ramparts... you'll be ALWAYS oom, i do in SL now cause i can block(with 100% damage reduction)/dodge/parry/miss ALL. So OT is crap role for our mana and doing this our d3 could be quite useful.

Warriors "suffer" too from being overgeared for an instance. Gruff mentioned in one of his guides (yes, I read them even as a priest! ) that in his best gear he cannot tank normal instances because he takes too little damage and cannot generate enough rage, so he has to use some dps gear pieces.

[Rayearth]

Heh. Reading all this I am starting to think that you just need different gears for raids and instances.

So you might need intellect in 5 men as a Pala, but raids? Probably not. *shrugs*

[Llianna]

Stats
What stats you need is entirely situational.

I have four different tanking set combinations now for different encounters, and working on a fifth.

Dungeon 3 gear:  Its the only reasonable stuff before heroics, and will do for farming heroics for the better raid suited gear. However, the full set is no good for Kara, as it lacks somewhat in stamina and mitigation.

Warrior gear. I keep hearing this. I've even used the term myself, now I'm more willing to use things like "warrior suited". There are lots of items out there that appear to be for warriors, but are actually for different tanking areas.

Some armour parts focus on block rating and value, others on dodge, others on parry, and others on raw defence.

As a paladin tank, I dislike dodge. I want to be hit, I want my reflective damage to work for me, and make that aggro unpeelable. So I activly seek block and defence items, parry coming second, and dodge being more "warrior suited" in my own eyes.

But that is purley because of the way I tank. Its not a religiously followed code. Its all about scaling and balancing out what you want and need.


Intellect
A note on Intellect: I need intellect on my gear at all times unless I am main tanking Karazhan.

Intellect provides me with more mana, and as correctly stated before gives me a better boost at the beginning of a fight. This is called frontloading and is needed to keep the aggro over dps members whom cant hold of casting/attacking for 2 gorram seconds 

Because of that boosted mana pool, I still have mana to tank out encounters with lots of mobs.

Also, when my talents and trinkets are active, I take very little damage, and no damage means no heals, no heals means no spiritual attunment.

Another thing to note is overhealing does not work with spiritual attunment, nor do healthstones, potions, abilities, trinkets, passive equips, etc etc.

I gain 10% of what I am healed back. Avenger's shield is expensive. Consecration is expensive.  If I take enough damage to reduce me to 1 health, I'd regain only 1200 mana or so from heals to fill that back up. Thats not alot of mana the way I chew through it with frontloading, and multi-target threat gen with CC targets dotted everywhere.

The only place spiritual attunment works for me is in Kara. And even there I STILL have to use potions. I go through 20 or so each run.


The PTR gear is so laughable I deleted the paladin. Its almost all PVP gear...

The methods
Paladin tanking methods are entirely situational, we dont have a cycle we spam, we just use whats needed and is off GCD. Which is why I prefer it over warrior tanking, which tend to have more of a set routine.

The only way it could be described to you, is if you were to try it for yourself.

Spelldamage... So many people say you dont need it.

The weapon slot is the one place you can easily afford to not have a "warrior item", as you may notice "caster swords" conveiniently carry the array of stats to perfectly suppliment common methods of paladin tanking.

Remember our threat is through Holy damage, not Physical.
Also remember there is no resistance against Holy Damage.

Boosting that unresistable damage is essentially garunteeing a huge boost in damage, and in turn threat. So its not a bad idea to let this stat exsist on your weapon, and a couple other pieces of armour so long as its not hurting your other stats.

to quote:

Intellect: 0
Repeat: ZERO.
You don't need mana, cause you can regen it when you are healed.
If you leave intellect you can have items with more stamina (warrior stuff).

To be honest, thats a load of pap, unless you are MT in kara and beyond.

With 5.2k mana, I still have serious oom issues because of people whom think raw dps numbers and no threat consideration is the way to play the game.

I have int on my gear, and I plan to squeeze a little more in there because it helps me to tank effectivly for that while longer.


Mitigation
We do suffer from lesser mitigation, but that is only because of a warrior's passive ability to reduce 10% of ALL damage taken via Defensive stance, and a taurens's +10% stamina racial.

A small consolation is that they can never achieve the insanely high block rating a paladin can, however.

Our stamina is only lesser beccause of that racial, and being a stamina sponge is useless if you're not mitigating the hits enough. 


5 points to me for a very messy and craply laid out post of comments. 

Why should i build a tank with much effort when with my talent build i can't heal nor dps in pvp/arena and solo questing is a pain?

Tanking is for those whom want to do it.
Its a gear, tactic, method, skill and awareness critical role that is essential for any group to get anywhere in high-level instances.

I do it because I like the feeling of being of use.
I do it to prove to others Paladins can tank.


Hope I've not upset anyone there, as I've typed this up pretty fast

[Rowain]

I fully understand that in situations where you don't take enough damage, you may have mana problems because you are not healed.

My point is: you don't gear up for those situations, because do don't have to.

The situations where good tanking gear is needed are those when you do take tons of damage and you are healed for huge amounts. In those situations mitigation is king, as a dead paladin cannot hold aggro too well. Or even if staying alive, taking too much damage and not having enough damage buffer (hp) makes your healers job alot harder, effectively making the possible duration of the fight 20-30% shorter and making it much more luck based: an unfortunate damage spike and its all over.

Sure, when tanking in normal instances, not having enough mana may be a problem, just like having too much mitigation is a problem for warriors and druids. Well, you can just swap for some other kind of gear, just like warriors and druids must use some pieces of dps gear in these stituation.
This does not mean that warrior and druid tanks must gear up using dps pieces.

[Rowain]

Last night at the Prince encounter I healed for around 200k-300k. Most of it went on the tank. Thats would have been 20k+ just from me if the tank was a paladin!

Besides, when paladins tank, I never encountered aggro problems but mitigation (and hp buffer) problems were quite frequent. Even if your threat generating ability is lowered, all we need is that top dpsers hold back a bit. We will gain tons more on healers mana lasting much longer and reducing the chance of wiping because of unlucky damage spikes.

[Lnakka]

Last night at the Prince encounter I healed for around 200k-300k. Most of it went on the tank. Thats would have been 20k+ just from me if the tank was a paladin!

Besides, when paladins tank, I never encountered aggro problems but mitigation (and hp buffer) problems were quite frequent. Even if your threat generating ability is lowered, all we need is that top dpsers hold back a bit. We will gain tons more on healers mana lasting much longer and reducing the chance of wiping because of unlucky damage spikes.

means i'm crap tank? :'(
*respecs resto*

Just a note to llianna, apparently paladins have less base stats all round....

[Kivarlyn]

ah really thank you!
now, with all your blaming, i lost my tank and cannot do heroics anymore!
all of you, feel guilty!

[Archia]

ah really thank you!
now, with all your blaming, i lost my tank and cannot do heroics anymore!
all of you, feel guilty!

I jush made dis post to encourage tankadinz cause me likez dem  :'(

[Rayearth]

Shame on you Archia! Now you got "Ze tankading wraz of doom" on you!

*Uncontrolled cackle*

[Rowain]

This thread wasn't about telling "tankadins suck", it was about how to gear them up to be able to MT.

[Rayearth]

Heh...

I think Archia and Rowain don't get Italian humor too well :p Kiv was joking around

[Archia]

I know kiv was "joking" but the lack of any smilie on her last post made me wonder if she's not after all 

[Kivarlyn]

I was joking
and, most of all, archia has done a real good work in trying to show how a tankadin can do aswell as other tanks...
shame, to be a tankadin you are more equip dependant thatn other tank classes, and that's why I lost mine ( sigh).
to conclude this thread, would like to tell that imo some spec of classes are disadvantaged than others, but we need to accept all.

for example, I don't like at all when ppl say " pally are useless" and " a frost mage cannot do enough damage". I report this 2 things cause I heard them my self, referred to me or to friends. you can be a frost mage and do lot of damage, as aescwine, or you can be a pally and do good, as lieris. so pls, if you have bad ideas on a class or on a spec, take it for you. suggests are welcome, especially if they are logic. prejudices are a bad things for the correct functions of a guild.