Nightbane down, but left with this empty feeling...

[Bhrimstone]

I’m just looking for some piece of mind.

This past weekend, I did Kara with some friend (as usual) however our normal warrior tank was not able to make it, which gave me a chance to finally play MT.

I had no problems with any of the bosses, I even tanked Morose with 3 adds.

We 2 shotted Nightbane, the wipe came at 8% and I noticed that I went about 5 swings from that beast of a dragon without a heal, no problems we tried again and got him without losing anyone.

I was pretty happy about this, since I know that this is a very hard boss for paladin to deal with. We lacked a priest, but had a shaman dropping Grounding Totems at my feet to eat the fears, seemed to work very well.

Afterwards, I was talking with the raid leader and was looking for some feedback on this fight in particular (I’ve MT’d everything in Kara except for prince). And the raid leader really wasn’t too quick to give me praise, and said that I really needed more health to be able to tank that better.

I have 14.3k hps unbuffed with 47% pure avoidance and uncrushable with holy shield (of course) and just about 16k AC. I was always under the impression that this was plenty good for all of kara, and I should even be able to start looking at tanking ZA. However the feedback and comments that I received were less than encouraging.

Is it me? Or have better geared tanks made this group a bit lazy?

[ulushnar]

Your stats are fine for Kara. Cba analysing your GL's motives, but I suspect it's just down the fact that the first person any non-tank looks at is the tank's health (since it's visible in the party view). If you're used to people with 15k, then 14k doesn't seem that good.

Check with your healers, they'll tell you how hard/easy they found healing you.

[Bhrimstone]

Your stats are fine for Kara. Cba analysing your GL's motives, but I suspect it's just down the fact that the first person any non-tank looks at is the tank's health (since it's visible in the party view). If you're used to people with 15k, then 14k doesn't seem that good.

Check with your healers, they'll tell you how hard/easy they found healing you.

Honestly, i think that was the issue. Both healers that day we're non-regulars and we letting us wipe to trash. I didn't get a log of the run, but I do know that one of the healers will not be playing with us again.

I think they made me look bad.

(PS, I enjoy your blog Ulu).

the comment that was made was a blow to my iEgo, I was looking to start offering to MT/OT ZA this week... now i'm hesitant.

[sweeney]

Yeah, I've had nights where I felt like I couldn't tank for squat, and every time it came down to bad pugged healers. One painful Kara run I had to swap into my avoidance set for trash pulls in lower simply because I couldn't rely on getting consistent heals. I wouldn't sweat it, not your fault.

Your gear sounds about like what mine was when I started ZA, and while I'd definately die on bear trash if the healer was not on the ball, that's true for anyone.

[Snake-Aes]

Good healers really make a huge, huge difference. I realized that as I left my first guild, still in Gruul's and ZA:

guild #1: I'd *always* die in Gruul's fight while tanking him, roughly at the last 5%.
za? pfff. bear boss gibbing me EASY. Eagle? you mean, raid healing? you crazy? I was always the last elf standing.
Halazzi? You mean the guy who killed the bad tank in 2 seconds, and whose totem would kill every time it popped?


guild #2(no gear changes on my side):
Gruul's? Easy.
ZA? Okay...Eagle, joke. Bear, joke. Lynx, Joke. Hawk, joke.


In guild one, someone wouldn't receive needed heals. In guild two, a dps would dumb out and kill someone.


I'm happy in guild 3 :p

[Questioner]

Back in my day in Karazhan we used to tank Nightbane with 12k unbuffed hps while walking uphill in the snow in both phases!

[Bhrimstone]

Back in my day in Karazhan we used to tank Nightbane with 12k unbuffed hps while walking uphill in the snow in both phases!

This might be my new sig.

[Zhalseran]

Your stats are more than sufficient for Nightbane. Your health may have seemed a little low after buffs because of no priest, but thats no fault of yours.

[ulushnar]

There is a few healers in my group I can trust to heal me through all but my most insane excesses. Whenever I'm doing five or ten man content, I always try to ninja one of them. If I can't get one, then it's a matter of upping the avoidance/mitigation.

[Erendis]

I have 13.5k unbuffed healthed and I tanked Nightbane without issue on Sunday. I've also tanked bear and eagle in ZA. To be honest I think people put too much importance on unbuffed health. You should be more than geared enough for the content your guild is doing.

[Garstone]

I first tanked Nightbane with 12.5k unbuffed hp and barely uncrushable

That was before the 10% stam buff we got.

I MT ZA with 14.4k unbuffed health, so I dunno why that guy is so against 13.5k

[Xariann]

Your issue was your healers.

You are more than fit for NB.

[Wulfhere]

I have 14.3k hps unbuffed with 47% pure avoidance and uncrushable with holy shield (of course) and just about 16k AC.

You can tank all of ZA with those stats, assuming that your healers are mostly Kara/badge geared. Halazzi is the only one that may be dicey, but keeping ironshield pots up should make it doable, add fortitude buff and warlock imp and you're golden. I started tanking the bear boss with stats quite a bit less than that (pre stam buff).

[Tekkel]

Aye stats seem generally fine. I know my first kara MT runs were with less hp
It's generally the healers that make or break u in kara. I guess at this point it's mostly alt healers going there. I tanked a kara last night with 9 alts of which about 6 were undergeared. Although there weren't any real big issues u can see the difference in your health spiking at the start of pulls and when U just grab 3 packs of mobs at a time.

Tbh if u can tank moroes + some adds u can tank anything there.
I tanked it in my hiyal trash gear. Moroes + all 4 adds was fun
Makes u stop running oom if that ret pally stuns you.

[Bhrimstone]

I tanked the zone again as a MT this past afternoon.

Thanks for the encouragement, I did my very first FULL clear as a MT, including my first attempt at tanking prince.

I brought consumables, and we had a priest, I was fully buffed to 18.1k hps (I made a comment to the RL and said "Is THAT enough hps for you?" - he laughed and said "OH yea").

Anyway, I know this is a bit celebratory but we 1-shotted all bosses, and wow Prince can spike that dmg, couple times I found my self going from 18k to 2k in less than a second.

But it was a great run, i had the confidence to handle it (from this board). And i'm now cleared to tank in 25-mans.