"Wait guys. Gotta drink."

Hey,

first of all, I have to admit I'm totally new to the prot spec. I've started my tankadin with 2 friends (shaman healer, hunter) as retri and went to the prot spec at lvl 35. We are running through most of the Kalimdor instances so I get used to the mechanism of tanking. But the higher I get the more I have to put up time for drinking and it keeps getting worse. Currently I'm able to tank 3-4 mob groups or even only 2 big groups before I'm totally out of mana.

So I've started to think about the future with my tankadin. How do you guys handle this problem? Well, I know mobs in outland are way stronger so I have more time to seal wisdom and get more heal at the sime time but does this really solve the problem? To be honest I never paid attention on this matter while having a prot pally tanking on heoics/raids. But what I know for sure is that the flow of a run never got delayed because the tankadin had to drink.. ^^ Only if others had to, I guess.

Is this only a deal before outland or is there something I'm doing terribly wrong?

Try sitting down during the fight just once, you'll more than likely take a bit hit get a big and get a big heal. I can usually make it through 3-4 pulls before needing to stop.
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Everytime I've pulled enough mobs to take the required amount of damage the healers and rest of the group have a cry because they have to work.


It's not until healers catch up and learn how to heal (in most instances - even at 64 It's fairly easy - especially if you got hots) and understand the way paladins work that we lowbies will be able to do what we need to regardless of whatever wussy dps there are.
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A strategy I use, depending on the threat output from the DPS, is to do the normal routine on the first mob, when he's about to die, I switch to the last mob and Jow, SoW and just spam downranked consecrates for the rest of the fight. Its normally enough to keep them sticking, while finishing with full mana. I've also got manna biscs keybound and I hit that while I'm marking or waiting for the group to get in place, even if it's just for a single tick. Come to think of it, maybe I should add that to my marking macro

However, the times I've been teaming a sub-par healer and amazing DPS that cuts through stuff like crazy, I normally end up nearly empty at the end of the fight because I'm relying a wee bit on CC to not get raped and need to pour whatever threat i can to keep aggro. Those fights also involves using HoJ and RD on close to every CD as well.

Just get a feeling on how much you can take on and then pull more. Quite often i end up pulling 2-3 groups in heroics just because that will mean i will end up with atleast 50% mana to go for the next pack, and the healer/dps will be at sameish.
As long as you have a solid threat lead on main target, and got atleast 1 or 2 Cons7 out, start using cons4 (half mana needed) and tell the dps to follow your target (f2 f). The more you pull, the more you can aoe down, the faster the run will be. As long as you feel comfortable (and the healer also) then pull as much as you need not to go oom. Quite often it ends up with both me+healer being almost out of mana after a few pulls.
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It takes a lot of work to convince group members that the problem with the pull size is that it's too small...

I usually get back things like "you're just showing off."

But press the point, break CC if you can. Not if you have to, but if you can - better for your threat and mana if you do most of the time. There are only a few CCs that you're going to want to be there, and you probably won't see any of them until you hit Kara at the earliest (and even those are up for debate on these forums from what I've been reading).

My biggest frustration these days in solo leveling is that often the mobs are spaced conveniently far enough apart to prevent aggro so my other toons will have an easier time in those zones... If the pull size on my paladin is under 6, I often keep searching through the zone for a better pull.

The reasoning for that mentality continues in an instance, where the pull is all elites. The bigger pull gives you time to work up a good rotation of seals and judgments.

And like the post above noted, don't kill them and then switch. I try to switch what mob I'm targeting in such a way that at the end I can spam a consecrate and watch the whole stack die at once. Rarely get it that smooth, but the closer I get to that, the better my mana is at the end.

And yeah, after working the first and sometimes second mob, I can SoW the fight and keep aggro, even when I'm tanking for higher level DPS and healers.
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Coming to think of it, my pulls until now really included only a few mobs, like 3 (5 max.) or something. Plus my hunter friend kept (and keeps!) tanking one mob with his pet. <.< lol

But since I can only bodypull (when not tanking undeads) atm I should be able to pull bigger groups and I will

Thank you. ^^

Treat your healer's manabar as an extension of your own. If not enough mana is flowing in, make the healer work harder - pull more or CC less. You can also skip Holy Shield, especially if you have a threat lead and just want to SoW/JoW the last mob or two. Double AE pulls in heroics actually make things interesting, and you don't have to downgear!
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