Beginner’s Tanking Issues

So, the reasons I’ve started my new monk were these:

• Altoholism – because there are 3 more months until Legion with nothing to do.
• Tanking – I want to dig this role a bit more. I already have a Protection Warrior which will no longer  be Gladiator in Legion, so I’ll play two tanking toons.
• Fu Zan, the Artifact Weapon – I mean, how cool is that:

An obvious choice for my Brewmaster race was a Draenei girl. Of course, I must have chosen the most beer-related race, and no race is so booze-related in World of Warcraft than Draenei… Just kidding. I like Draenei girls, and those hoofed roundhouse kicks are awesome :) Agility and grace, that’s the point.

Name’s Oluu, with Draenei trademark double vowels and hailing from the Finnish word “olut” which stands for “beer”.

Oluu (@ level 33)

So, questing and dungeons – here we go.

If you were following my blog and/or twitter for some time, you probably remember that I enjoy proper leveling a lot. I never use any heirlooms, I don’t run dungeons multiple times and I don’t use any other boosts. It’s questing and single runs for each dungeon.

Questing

Yes, questing experience is broken somehow. I’ve already mused about how it should be fixed, but anyways Oluu will undertake a questing challenge at least for levels 1-60. I’m going to do every quest in every next zone on my way through Kalimdor according to claimed zone level. So, it’s Azuremyst (1-10) -> Darkshore (10-20) -> Ashenvale (20-25) -> Stonetalon Mountains (25-30) and so on. Needless to say that I’ve already overgrown them – as I’ve just started Stonetalon and I’m already 33. But I want to see how many levels I will get through doing classic Kalimdor zones in their proper leveling order.

Dungeons

Starter’s dungeon experience is hell, and I can’t even imagine how it feels to new players. People despise their respective roles. Healers have little to do, so when things begin to get rough they just come there unprepared. Tanks (like myself) often find themselves behind some plate and mail players, who tend to aggro everything in sight and when they die, it’s you and healer to blame. But nothing tough really happens until level 30 dungeons, so that encourages them to do so. DPS burn through mobs like a hot knife through butter. Being a slow caster like a fire mage, you may not even have a chance to plant a single spell onto mobs – because when you’ve finished casting, they’re already dead.

Please add some toxic and asshole behaviour in a pile.

If a healer or a tank leaves the group in the middle of a dungeon, the group is disbanded at once because no one wants to wait for a replacement.

Many people “need” the loot they can’t use – mages need leather and mail, hunters want swords and daggers, shaman would go for Strength items. The assholes assume that everyone must have and use heirlooms by now, so they must need the items for vendor. It’s a very rare occasion that a “needja” would pass an item to another player when asked to do so. What is worse, no one would support a loot talk because it slows the group from running dungeon asap.

One perfect example of a 100% asshole was met yesterday in Gnomeregan instance. Tanking the mobs, I’ve noticed that I didn’t see any pet around me or projectiles hitting enemies, and we had a hunter among us. There could be afk reasons, or the guy could be lost, but there he was, following us. After a boss fight when his dps still equals zero, I call for kicking him out. Immediately I get his curses in CAPS in the chat – and the group votes him away from the dungeon. Then the other dps tells us it’s the second group this hunter was expelled from. It’s just hilarious. You maybe doing these dungeons for a 1000th time, but you’re with a group. You have a role to follow. What surprised me most is that he could restrain himself from shooting. Yeah, you may not play with full potential because you’re lazy, but how could you not plant a single bullet or an arrow just for fun during the whole dungeon?

I guess things get better in later levels where enemies begin to get tough. Armored DPS suddenly crouch behind a tank, healer begins to heal, and tank begins to tank. Not yet at level 33, but almost there.

Brewmastering

Can’t yet get a full grip of my defensive abilities. I’m pretty trained and confident to deliver my rotation in the field through questing, as I already have almost all DPS abilities in my sleeve. But mitigation and defence – not yet. And I had to run through Icy Veins for clues. It became better, but I need a lot more practice. I think I will master it by the time I reach Draenor raids and lay my hands on Fu Zan, the legendary keg staff in Legion :)

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