Nervous about Heroics

[DirtyMetis]

Took a break from my pally for awhile to level up some other toons and just started working on him again with the patch. Seems to be an abundance of healers and DPS around on my server and a severe lack of tanks so I thought I might give it a shot again. I'd like to run a bunch of heroics/ToC (I'm in very small guild of RL friends so raiding isn't an option, we're lucky to have 5 on at any given time, so I'm stuck PUGing mostly) to work towards getting some better gear but I'm nervous about my current entry-level gear set and measly 26k HPs - seems every tank I see these days has 30k+! Can anyone offer any sort of advice on where I should start? Sounds like dodge took a bit of a hit in effectiveness, should I be regemming at this point? Different spec specifically for heroics? Any sort of guidance would be greatly appreciated. Armory linked below:

http://www.wowarmory.com/character-shee ... =Azraphael

Many thanks!

[PessimiStick]

You'll be fine in everything except maybe ToC. If the rest of your group is competent you should be ok there, but ToC has a bit more damage/raid damage and a weak healer or poor DPS can be a problem.

[ulushnar]

By the time I had 26k HP, I was pretty much done with Heroics! You'll be fine, those 30k+ tanks have at least full Naxx and probably Ulduar gear.

[Nikachelle]

This game is so absorbed with tanks having massive amounts of health for content they don't even need it for. Naxx 10 can be tanked with 20k health unbuffed. You don't need more than that. I did Naxx 10 last night on my priest with two tanks that had between 21k-23k unbuffed health. It was fine.

Lazy healers are the ones demanding that tanks have 30k+ hp.

[ulushnar]

Lazy healers are the ones demanding that tanks have 30k+ hp.

This. It's not Burning Crusade, you don't need a raid-geared tank to faceroll heroics!

[Nikachelle]

Lazy healers are the ones demanding that tanks have 30k+ hp.

This. It's not Burning Crusade, you don't need a raid-geared tank to faceroll heroics!

I should also add that one of the tanks, although they hit the defense floor, still had mostly level 70 raiding epics with upgraded Wrath gems. Frankly, for *once* it was fun to go through Naxx 10 as more than just a badge faceroll because people actually needed the gear. Was a pleasant change from sharding everything.

[Auroris]

Lazy healers are the ones demanding that tanks have 30k+ hp.

This. It's not Burning Crusade, you don't need a raid-geared tank to faceroll heroics!

I should also add that one of the tanks, although they hit the defense floor, still had mostly level 70 raiding epics with upgraded Wrath gems. Frankly, for *once* it was fun to go through Naxx 10 as more than just a badge faceroll because people actually needed the gear. Was a pleasant change from sharding everything.

>_> Abyss crystals > newly geared people.

[DirtyMetis]

Thanks for the encouragement all, I'll just suck it up and throw myself into LFG and see what happens - with the shortages of tanks out there on my server I guess maybe I shouldn't worry about them being too picky

[Arcand]

...I'm nervous about my current entry-level gear set and measly 26k HPs - seems every tank I see these days has 30k+! Can anyone offer any sort of advice on where I should start?

Six hours ago I was doing a Naxx-10 PuG for jollies, emblems and ret gear. It happens the warrior tank had almost exactly 26,000 health. He did the Four Horsemen and Grobbulous, and soaked hateful strikes on Patchwerk, without any trouble that I noticed. (He died on 4H but I think that was that he didn't understand the mark mechanics completely - he went down shortly after I stopped micromanaging him.)

...and warriors get a head start of about 1100 health, so if he was at 26k his gear was worse than yours.

Watch for block value pieces.
State up front that you haven't done a ton of heroics yet. (Tossers will say 'lolnub' and kick you. True professionals will make it work.)
Run heroics you've gotten familiar with on normal. You can help out some lowbies while doing this, and knowing what the f- you're doing is worth it.
Use CC on the ugly pulls. Having it, needing it and not using it is stupid.
If you've got the money, show up with food, potions and scrolls. You can give yourself the survivability of a 28k tank by spending a few sovereigns.
Use Hammer of Justice and Holy Wrath as defensive stuns. Use Avenger's Shield as a defensive interrupt. (Especially in Old Kingdom. Spell Flingers, holy crap.)

[Jasari]

>_> Abyss crystals > newly geared people.

Those things have plummeted in value now that people are actually running heroics and getting zillions of sharded epics. Pre-patch they were selling for 90-100g each. Yesterday they were under 40g each.

[Auroris]

>_> Abyss crystals > newly geared people.

Those things have plummeted in value now that people are actually running heroics and getting zillions of sharded epics. Pre-patch they were selling for 90-100g each. Yesterday they were under 40g each.

No no.

Normal ToC happened <---- FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFUUUUUUUUU

[Nikachelle]

Either way, the market on Abyss Crystals has certainly plummeted. I used to enjoy my daily 100 gold for no effort. Now they don't even sell for enough to be worth putting on the AH.

[DanimalEQ]

...I'm nervous about my current entry-level gear set and measly 26k HPs - seems every tank I see these days has 30k+! Can anyone offer any sort of advice on where I should start?

Lots of very accurate stuff

When WotLK first came out, the 'min' stats for some of the easier heroics were 18-19k health, 535 def.

Once I started hitting 77, I picked up some of the crafted saronite pieces, daunting legs and gloves, titansteel shieldwall at 80, and headed in to Heroic VH. I never did many heroics at 70, so I was a bit nervous like you.

As I was leveling up, I also grouped for instances with a handful of friends whenever we could (helped break the monotony of questing).

So, we all hit 80, I was geared up enough, our healer was geared up enough, and we walked into Violet Hold. First portal opened up and we got CREAMED. One of the sorcerers that do their arcane stream hit our healer and we got decimated. We had run a couple of instances already that day so decided to call it a night, so we could regroup a bit. Next day, we went in there and one shot the place.

Shortly after that, we started running Naxx10 without much issue as well. It wasn't until after I had some Naxx10/25 gear that I hit 26k health.

At this point, you are a touch overgeared (or at least over healthed) for heroics, so shouldn't have problems with stats. I'd do like Arcand said, and just run the instances you aren't familiar with on regular once or twice to get a feel for the encounters, and just let your groups know that you haven't done them on heroic yet (if that is the case).

I've since switched to healing for guild needs, but when I pug a heroic, and we have to pick up a tank, I appreciate if they tell me if they've not run it before in advance. Helps me prepare mentally for a slightly rockier run, and I can give advice as we go. If they mess up after saying they haven't done it before, they are just new. If they go in there swords blazing, failing left and right, but don't say it's just because they haven't done the instance before, they appear to be just another fail nub.

So, your gear is fine, if your experience is a touch lacking, just let your groups know in advance. Some may care and leave. These people just did you a favor, making room for players who can actually do their job, and not just plan on getting waltzed through content.

[Isetnefret]

If you play well, you'll be outperforming warriors in better gear.

Paladins have a lot of underrated tools, IMO. Paladin with Sanctuary + Divine Plea(glyphed) > Warrior with Kings.
You also have sacred shield, and they don't (unless you have a holy paladin healer).

[bub64882]

The question isn't really "can you do heroics" at that health/gear level, but "can you get a group". Depending on your server, you should be okay at 26K. at 22K and under, it can be very hard to find a group on my server.

Then again, if they are hurting for tanks, you should have no issues!