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Maintankadin

Bloodboil Offtanking

Lansky
Mon Oct 08, 2007 8:48 am

Bloodboil Offtanking

We recently lost one of our two feral druids and I've convinced them to let me go from Holy paladin who fills the Hyjal AE tank and emergency Off-Tank roles to a full time Tank role. When they were asking me about fights that I feel I could comfortably step into currently and this is the only one that is giving me theorizing fits.

My gear is not up to snuff to take a primary threat role on Bloodboil so I'd be there simply to take it off our MT (tauren warrior) when he gets stunned, needs to let his stack tick off, etc. I've OT'd Gruul and Void Reaver (not main lead in tank) successfully with only standard buffs and whatever consumables I could dig up. Chaining mana pots, nightdragons, and every other conceivable consumable will be done. For Bloodboil I could easily get a manatide once or twice during the fight from our token MT group resto shaman as well, however I will not get a spriest. I'm thinking between a fully regened mana bar when I have to pick him up for 30-90 seconds once or twice along with the phase 2 downtime it might be possible but this is all theory and possibly self dellusion as well.

Have any of you guys succussfully OT'd this fight? If so any little tricks I could be overlooking to help me keep my place in the threat order?
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Lansky BE Paladin Mannoroth
http://www.wowarmory.com/character-sheet.xml?r=Mannoroth&n=Lansky
Lore
Mon Oct 08, 2007 9:01 am
I OT this fight most every week, how much spell damage do you have in your standard tanking gear? Mana really isn't a concern, as soon as you get it your mana bar is topped off. Threat should be rotating consistently enough to not have to worry about it.

I do it with around 450 unbuffed SD + wizard oil + JotC, and I'm comfortable enough with my aggro gen that I think I could do it with 100 or so less (or with JoW instead).
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The danger must be growing, for the rowers keep on rowing!
Lansky
Mon Oct 08, 2007 9:10 am
That's what I was hoping to hear. The gear i'm thinking about using for this fight would have me around 500 spell damage unbuffed. My threat generation is fine was worried about longevity as our MT tends to hold him for a very long time initially, but I suppose if I wanted to I could easily pass his threat (he likes using max avoidance for BB so his tps suffers a lot) and steal aggro for a quick top off as well.
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Lansky BE Paladin Mannoroth
http://www.wowarmory.com/character-sheet.xml?r=Mannoroth&n=Lansky
fiorina
Mon Oct 08, 2007 5:20 pm
well, there is no clear MT position on Bloodboil. All 3 tanks have to stay very close each other in threat and start tanking when necessary. You won't have any threat or mana issues with your gear.

I usually start as a "MT", after 3 debuffs I slow down threat generation so after ~8 debuff warrior or druid takes over. I continue building threat, once my debuffs wears off I ask warrior to auto-attack for a sec so I can get aggro back again. Repeat.
For emergency situations there is always a bubble to get rid of debuffs. Or for some nasty situations like desorient of MT when you are #2 in threat with 15 debuffs :)

Edit: grammer polyce :)
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Fiorina -retired-
Stephen Hawking of AV tanking
Lore
Mon Oct 08, 2007 5:34 pm
We use our tank with the lowest threat gen first, it starts us off in a more natural rotation as he'll hold it for a little while while we catch up. We use 3 tanks, me and two warriors.

I recommend not bubbling while he's on you, it caused some problems with us before where I'd bubble, he'd go to the 2nd tank, then immediately knockback/disorient that tank and go after someone else because the 3rd tank was still catching up from a knockback. I usually use it to clear debuffs while he's fel raging someone, and I know he's going to come back to me afterward.

Another tip: Holy Shield Rank 1. Once he's on me, unless the other tanks are far behind, that's all I hit - no consecrate, no SoR/JoR (I actually use JoL). Keeps me uncrushable but doesn't generate so much threat that the other tanks can't catch up.

If you're low on mana, use SoW/JoW during a Fel Rage. There's no threat to worry about, and you get plenty of time to swing away at him.
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The danger must be growing, for the rowers keep on rowing!
Mithos
Thu Oct 18, 2007 6:00 pm
I hated this fight (even though it's pretty fun) for a while because for the entire first night I am not exaggerating, zero knockbacks and zero disorients hit, had to manual tank swap the entire fight, became a farce at lower % because getting to 110% was so much threat it was silly. When we killed him today he was using them almost all the time, was annoying especially when I would nuke him to take over then get insta knockbacked or disoriented, gg mana ><.

I was using about 380-400 spell dmg unbuffed with oil and sta food (need sta). I would waste my entire mana bar taking over from our warrior who started, get it all back when I took aggro then use JoL and stop doing anything to allow them to catch back up in time (had a feral druid as 3rd tank so didn't take too long, although he would stack debuffs pretty quickly), the mana from SA made enough threat so that I only had to full nuke for about 10 seconds then stop and wait, even then sometimes it was a bit too much threat. I would spam FoL if I was highest agg in Fel enrage phase as mana isn't an issue, usually on the people still with Bloodboil, and keep JoL on him until ~10 secs until normal phase.
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fiorina
Sat Oct 20, 2007 6:01 pm
Yeah, that's pretty annoying. You perfectly time your threat, get the aggro as predicted and then boom instant desorient, you are working to get aggro back, bang desorient again + knockback. Mana gone, debuffs are increasing...
But all classes suffer from it. Actually for warrior is much harder to recover from such situation so paladin/druid have to be aware of it and slow down (together with DPS)
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Fiorina -retired-
Stephen Hawking of AV tanking
Worldie
Thu May 08, 2008 9:37 am
As personal suggestion, while standing in cleaves/breath is good thing for mana if you are starved, don't ever do it on Fel rage.
Dot ticking for 7k QQ
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Drak
Thu May 08, 2008 10:06 am
I pretty much end up MTing this fight if you think about it. I'm the first tank on him, I use my standard tank set aside from the trinkets, where I use two avoidance ones (pocketwatch and scarab of displacement until I got the shadowmoon insignia to replace the scarab). I pop both of my trinkets and judge wisdom (we have a ret pally for crusader) and I build threat relatively lightly, using max rank consecrate and HS but use seal of wisdom.

Before the first fel rage I've either been kicked or disoriented or otehrwise a different tank picks it up. I continue to build threat and when I get him back a second time, I go nuts until the next fel rage, bubble my stacks off, and tank him until the next fel rage. I make sure not to get TOO far ahead of the other tanks though.

It's nigh impossible to have the same tank rotation every week due to the fact that the kicks and disorients are so random. Many times i've picked up bloodboil when an OT has too many stacks and then i get immediately kicked and then lose aggro, it's pretty annoying sometimes.
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Worldie
Thu May 08, 2008 12:31 pm
My bet on BB is high spelldam + high avoidance. High spelldam is in the order of 500 unbuffed. High avoidance is in the order of 65%+ unbuffed.
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Aliguyon
Fri May 09, 2008 12:50 pm
I just did this fight last night and I was having issues catching up to the threat of the other tanks (2 Prot Warriors and 1 Prot Pally).

I start out the fight. I get MD from hunter.
Judge Crusader
SoR
HS
JoR/SoR
no consecrate

at 5 stacks
stop auto attack
Rank 1 HS
no JoR/SoR
no consecrate

transition happens at about 10-12 stacks
Prot Warrior 1 takes aggro
they call out BoP on me (i dont know why this still needs to happen)
i move to the side and wait for a few seconds
JoR/SoR
Consecrate (max rank)

at fel rage
DS
JoR/SoR
consecrate

At new P1
I am struggling to keep up aggro (I am at about 4-5 below)
I pop wings
Throw Shield
JoR/SoR
consecrate

By the time it is my turn to pick him up I am still below the threat list so the other tank grabs him instead of me.

I dont know what I need to do in order to keep up threat. Should I use SD flasks, etc. instead of Fortification, etc.?

What do you folks do during the transition to keep your aggro up?

Thanks in advance. Appreciate it.
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