Classic - Minor Issues Kunark - Lesser Issues Velious - Some Issues Luclin - Major Issues PoP - Greater Issues Beyond - Arch Issues
Back in classic my ranger stopped being a MT in her mid 20, she became exclusively puller/rooter/snarer and damage dealer. She also could offtank since flamelick was amazing agro. Note the gear is those day was banded or a bit better than that. When POP will come out you will become a ranged class with endless quiver, archery mastery and headshot.
in classic w/ a shaman, a wet paper bag could tank group content nearly as effectively as a fully raid geared warrior (being facetious, but not really)... same in Kunark (with a few exceptions)... Rangers generally stop main tanking in Velious and beyond. I generally stopped in Kunark, just because I'm more useful as a puller and off-tank/CC. And SKs are a dime a dozen, so why not pick one up?
Depends on gear. Early into expansions, Luclin and later it won't work too well. Near the end of expansions, and assuming its a raiding char, it's possible. My shaman can tank for groups in PoFire C2 at this point, though obviously not as good as a real tank class. That being said, I'm sure an equally geared ranger could tank no problem. As far as group gear goes, with defensive AA you could probably get away with tanking BoT level content with little difficulty. As long as the mobs fully slow, it's not hard at all. Hard hitting mobs and slow mitigating mobs might be tough though. After PoP, not so sure. Hard to tell this go around due to character power increases and overall better average gear. I would hazard a guess that while it may be possible, it's going to get exponentially less efficient.
My own experience as a ranger tank up through SoD era Classic: completely fine and can hold aggro better than any other tanking class Kunark: works well but need to pay attention to gear choices Velious: group tank just fine, raid mobs are hitting too hard now though Luclin: group content fine with decent gear, with archery aa you do better staying at range PoP: doable in group content but very gear dependent, here you really have to make a choice to either start stacking that AC for tanking or looking for dps stats GoD: No, can get away with trash but stuff this era is just out of league for a ranger tank OoW: with decent gear and the right aa you can once again tank group named but plate tank mitigation really starts to make a difference Beyond: with top group gear from current expansion you can effectively tank group content 1 expansion behind
Well I'm trying to figure out how a shammy/ranger box team will fare. Always done box teams with int casters. Wanna try something different and less fragile. I know shammy/sk is good but just curious how a ranger/sham compares. Can anyone offer insight?
You didn't mention what server but assuming it's agnarr you will be able to kill anything slowable in era throughout the eras of the server outside raid mobs with motm. After you get bow aa's in luclin the shaman becomes the tank and your kill speed increases 1000%. Nike slogan.
With my crap gear i could probably tank turgur + malo is really big agro, i try to pick always high AC gear and slowed mobs don t really do anything to me, indeed even my dog can offtank a slowed mob. But hum tanking more than 2 mobs could be a problem ;-)
Like bosses. Choose an ogre to be able to cast through bashes and stack AC...choose it over any other stat. Rangers bow damage has VERY little agro so with just 1 slow + 1 cripple you can keep agro until the mob is dead, if you do happen to pull agro another cripple and you will snap agro right back. As someone mentioned above he can tank in plane of fire and I can confirm that. C2 gets a little rough if you get a couple bad rounds in a row but C1 I could tank 3 or 4 at once no problem. With a ranger you wouldn't need to tank until luclin but you could from classic to PoP no problem, cripple is your taunt. I was very geared but I'm positive I could of done the same stuff half naked.
Well mine is a bard too, i knew that troll had hp regen and a nice newbie symbol quest with a snare and that ogres are immune to stun ... But I cannot play a toon that do not look cool ...
DoDH and onward, you will want to go cultural with last blood augs as well as a.c. augs in slot7 if want to ranger tank the harder group content, but you can.
