Why are there no tanks?

[Yrelius]

So I know this is subjective, but after seeing the most recent census showing such a massive difference between warriors on this server vs any other class, I wonder why it is so hard to find tanks for regular dungeons.

Are most warriors going pure DPS in arms and fury? Are people just not into tanking and choosing not to tank?

Also, to my understanding, it would be easy to level a tank and get your pre-raid BIS, but once you're ready to raid do most raiding guilds have their tanks sorted out? AKA Would a raid-ready tank be able to find a raiding spot typically?

Would love the community's input on this!

[Crims0nSean]

I see a lot of this in the chats,

Q: "Should i roll prot?"

A: "Leveling prot sucks."

This might have something to do with it.

[troutblock]

There are a lot of tanks out there who enjoy tanking, but the general consensus among them is that tanking for pugs is not fun. When tanking in a pug it often feels like you are fighting the players in your party more than the actual mobs.

For this reason a lot of tanks will only group up with guildies or people on their friends list who they trust, which can lead to a shortage for dps / healers that want to pug.

[Yrelius]

I see a lot of this in the chats,

Q: "Should i roll prot?"

A: "Leveling prot sucks."

This might have something to do with it.

I've heard its possible to tank in arms/fury, especially at lower levels, is this true?

[Aggronaught]

I see a lot of this in the chats,

Q: "Should i roll prot?"

A: "Leveling prot sucks."

This might have something to do with it.

I've heard its possible to tank in arms/fury, especially at lower levels, is this true?

You can tank anything as arms/fury even at 60 but should you?

Everyone needs a tank for 5 mans..but most raid guilds already have established tanks (besides..you need 1 tank for every 5 player in 5 mans..but only need 1-4 for 40 men in raids). Its hard to get a raid spot as a tank, most would be asked to have a working off-spec gear.

[Cairune]

Leveling as protection does suck. However warriors can just level as a normal DPS and then respec to protection at 60.

Personally, I only tank guild runs. I used to tank pug groups as well, but after experiencing some horrible runs and encountering some people ninja'ing things I just group with guildies at this point. Generally much smoother and more reliable.

I don't mean to come off as conceited as I know there are still good players and friendly players looking for groups, but the chance of having a horrible run and wasting time just puts me off from pugging altogether.

[Dr. Doom]

There's no need for tanks at 60, as every guild already has the 3-5 they need and raid pugs will often start with the tank slots covered and just needing dps (specially ranged) and some healers; you get mocked constantly if you try to PvP with a shield wearing spec (even after I went protection pvp route I get the occasional bitching), it's more difficult levelling so most people will shy away from it (I personally levelled protection 10-60 but I know I'm a tiny minority). On top of tanking requiring you to pay more attention, this makes it quite the ungrateful experience.

Tank absence is only an issue levelling so be reassured about that. Once you reach 60, it's the position where there are more people compared to the slots required. I personally was also collecting fury pieces to respec.

[Battlepug]

I tanked everything up to MC DPS specced, only getting a shield on. Leveling prot specced is retardedly slow and not fun. It is beyond me, why would you do it.

The only trouble in non-prot tanking are taunt-immune mobs and the absence of shield slam so the tank must be competent and the group should not nuke mindlesly.

Now the totaly other thing is that you have to be present to tank and people like to chill and brainafk. Every warrior should be ready to tank, people are just lazy as fuck. I dislike warriors gathering groups and looking for tanks. Honestly, so easy to just put on a shield and tank - saves tonns of time

[zmandude24]

These are a few of the reasons why there are is a tank shortage for 5 mans:

1. Raids only take roughly 3 full time tanks to raids. This means if there was a proportionate amount of tanks for each 5 man, over half will be forced to go fury.
2. You are almost guaranteed to have at least one dps that doesn't know to wait for aggro. For a new player, tanking is not easy to learn to begin with and tard dps make this much worse.
3. Druid and Pally tanks will have trouble getting into a group that lets them roll on the preBiS healing gear they will need in raids.

[Ashergi]

Why put that many points into prot at all? Seriously though. Sunder Armor does more threat than any other ability in the game. I thought that prot warriors only needed to use that, endless rage, and last stand or whatever other survival cooldowns. All you really need to get in that tree is last stand, and maybe imp. sunder and imp. taunt.

All any sissy "no, but I'm a DPS warrior, and a special snowflake" needs is a shield, to pop defensive stance, and quit being a wuss.