Conquering my tanking fears, one small step at a time

Before Mists came, I said I was going to try Guardian. Then Mists came and I levelled as Guardian, but I raided, dungeoned and PvPed as resto.

I tried reading up. I looked at Sunnier's site, but realised she is a tank who WAY outclasses me - I need more like a dummies guide to tanking, tanking for the tanking noob.

However, my Guardian spec didn't go to waste. There were no people needing agility leather gear so when we had 2 groups, I picked up all the offspec loots. And there were a lot. I went from crappy greens to 489 purples without much effort, and it made doing my dailies a whole lot easier. In fact, doing my dailies, especially Golden Lotus and Klaxxi, made me start thinking like a tank.

A week or two ago, I decided to start trying to queue random heroics as a tank. I told everyone as I entered that I hadn't tanked this before, and had to push thoughts of "Never tanked but wearing epic gear? Did she eBay her toon?" and "OMG they are going to kick me for being an idiot" because I realised I did vaguely know the bosses from a resto point of view, but Dungeon Journal is helpful. And I managed to survive to the end without too many wipes.

Now when I go and do dungeons with my friends, I no longer balk at being the tank. It's easy tanking with your friends. I can even tank for achievements!  However, tanking with people who are more acquaintances than friends can still be stressful, PuGs are easier.

So I feel like I have gotten to my first tanking milestone! However, I am yet to gather the courage to queue as a tank for LFR. What I would really like to be able to do is to tank Dogs and Feng and not look like a complete idiot. I want to practice in LFR but you know how that is - nobody does it properly and I want to practice before I try it for a real deal, just for fun. But hey, I'll leave that for a little while yet. Gotta leave some goals for the new year.

Comments

  1. Yay for you, you big bear! There was a time years ago when a friend used to try to get groups together(pre-LFD) so I could learn to be a tank but by the time we assembled a group I was out of time. Now I'm too chicken to try on my own. I will bear tank vicariously through you!

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    1. Lol you will be seeing all my failures there too!

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  2. Great work Navi! I'll come along for any LFD that you tank, it is always better to have at least one friend in the group imo.

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  3. Congrats! I have not dipped my toes into the world of bear tanking, running as a healer in groups of non-guildies took me a while to get comfortable.

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    1. I hope it all goes well! Especially with your DK. And thank you so much for visiting :)

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  4. Congrats. I learned this week that I'm not quite ready to foray into tanking yet lol. If I were horde I'd heal for you.

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    1. TY Malkshake :) Supportive friends make the learning curve that much easier :)

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