Tuesday, January 26, 2010

Low and behold, the birth of a tank

Last night, I stayed up way too late running my first instance as a tank. My tanking gear is not good enough—not even close. I'm going to have to run non-stop instances for the next couple of weeks to start getting the equipment needed to run any dungeon over lvl 75 (I figure that is where my GS lands me currently). The experience, however, was exhilarating.
I started out on Nexus. I warned the group right off, "You are my guinea pigs. This is my first instance as bear tank. Normally I'm tree ." I was met with encouragement, and optimism—mostly, I'm sure, because I was lvl 80, and at max, they were all 72 or less. So, I crept into the starting area—hit my "x" button, and charged. I followed the rotations I had read about, the Faerie Fire Feral, followed by swipe, followed by maul, lacerate, etc. One thing I suggest, is pick up the Swipe macro which Big Bear Butt suggests—it was invaluable, as the Barkskin talent is one that I so often forget.
The entire instance went really well. It was easy for me to out-threat them, keeping agro on myself. The healer didn't have to do much (he was a druid healer, swiping at the mobs occasionally with his leafy hands). The DPS, on the other hand, actually did quite a bit, and sadly—despite the 10 lvl difference—one of the DPS actually surpassed me. The entire time, I asked the PuG if I was doing ok—was I holding the agro, was the healer secretly hating me? Fortunately, I was high enough that of course, the instance wasn't doing much damage to me. My low self-esteem was stemming from the fact that my armor was so poor.
So, went from that instance to another one, this time running some of my guildies and a few other Pickups. Again, another smooth run—no deaths, though came really close due to one stray mob. Overall, I'd have to say that my first Bear run was amazing—a ritual of rights if you will—and I look forward to doing it again.

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