The ability to hold agro is dependent on a combination of dps and tps. Lots of potency, cb, sta, and ability mod will satisfy that
You need to dig a little deeper than merely opening my DPS spec. Yes, I have over 10k pot in Offensive, and mit is irrelevant. In "Tank" spec, I have a full 70% unc block, 20kish mit and still 8k+ potency. Hp solo in tank spec are approx 6.8M, though in offensive i can still keep 3Mish. Tanks with NO significant potency value, will fail vs any reasonably geared DPS toon for aggro, so, as stated, HP + POT = winning combo at the moment. *** Also, happy to go over both my tank and dps specs with anyone interested.
I really don't understand the major issue you guys are having. I stopped gearing my tank around 3 months into the expac because I switched to a T1 for raid purposes. My Guardian has 2700ish POT with 60%ish hate mod and I hold aggro off of every single 300+ million DPSer in my guild when I tank for Ethereal dailies. I barely do more than 35 million DPS on my own. There are so many tools to hold aggro, I feel like there are a lot of people in this thread who are not using these tools. Tanks don't need help, people who are playing tanks need help learning their classes, apparently. This thread has been filled with a lot of people saying there is a problem and a lot of other people suggesting solutions. To those of you who have read the solutions and are still saying there is a problem, play a different class or stop complaining. To the guy who said that Guardians get a group threat transfer like amends, Shoulder the burden is 17%, Amends is 52%. I think there's a huge difference there. I think the real issue that I am seeing in this thread is this; I'm a semi casual player who likes to run in PUGs sometimes. I love my Shadowknight, so I love tanking in PUGs. Sometimes I get stuck in groups with guys in a top 5 WW raiding guild and I cannot hold aggro off of them when they do 500+ million DPS. Daybreak, could you give me an easy button so I can hold aggro off of them and not get frustrated? (I'm condescending, I know. Deal with it)
Shoulder of the Burden is single target 17%, and you get Improved Moderation from the same tree (The group buff). Its not a transfer per say but a hate boost for tank and dehate for the group. Essentially the same thing. Tank gets hate, dps loses it (since they won't adorn for it). To a degree I would say that people need some help learning but there is no help for those without the right group make up to hold against the top WW peeps. They will steal it and it will die in a matter of a second or two so its not a big deal really unless there is a strat involved that requires the tank to keep it. Honestly if you have trouble with aggro get the right classes in your group. Transfers make quite the difference and I would be willing to bet almost none of the troubs are speced for the transfer either.
The comments that direct the problem at group setup are spot on. 7k potency alone isn't good enough Vs 300m+ single target dps makin it rain devastation of war. Group invite hate transfer and it's night and day. Grouping is about coordinating multiple classes together. The cries to make all tanks aggro gods would further hurt utility. Build better groups, open up with rescue, get more potency.
Firstly, anybody starting off every fight with a snap is just not playing a tank right. Period. I do not care what level of content it is, it is just not right. Snaps are there for a reason and that is to re-establish yourself as the tank mid fight be it due to untimely death, memwipe, script change, loose add etc. that said, if it works for you then to each his own. Group content is beyond trivial these days, stuff dies in an instant and aggro issues are non-existent to say the least. My thoughts about this thread was that people are having issues in raids with lack of potency on tank gear these days and that is my concern (forgive my ignorance for not considering group content). Anyway, The changes are not adversely affecting every tank class but it is definitely hurting some tank classes for sure. I have tested it on my guard, low potency (<3.5k) tank gear on burn fights where people hit 1 billion dps in a few seconds. I like to see someone say they do not see rips a few seconds into a pull (mimics ftw) with that much potency. Now, swap gear in and take it past 4.5k potency and situation becomes a lot easier. So the moral of the story, increase potency on tank gear, or "improve drop rates of amazing ethereal items so we can start phasing out our Raid gear with Heroic drops" /s.
Right now that is true, but remember that a new expac is just around the corner and they better have a plan beyond "everything dies so quick a Warlock can room pull without anyone dying".
Even if tanks *can* hold aggro by stacking potency, it's still a broken system. Tanks with potency->cb conversions are at a HUGE advantage because they just get a free 800 crit bonus (Guardians, Berserkers, Bruisers). It's the same reason why mages are smashing scouts more often than not right now. But like many have stated, tanks don't even matter right now. Heroic content is so undertuned that I can solo every heroic zone except Scourge Keep (and I'm fairly certain I could solo SK except for the last boss, I've just never wanted to try), and in raids troubs just AV tanks and they don't need to worry about aggro anyway. Even IF the tanks can't hold aggro, my conjuror tanked about a 3rd of the psionists raid encounter the other night without moving below 100% hp because shaman wards are more important than any defensive stat a tank has (which they're addressing, but the way they're doing it just makes mystics worse and defilers even better than they already were). This entire expansion is an itemization/stat mess for everyone. Hopefully it's fixed next expansion (it won't be in Fabled Mara, it's just not possible). (Also neither bruiser in this thread has 10 point mantis star, arguably the best line 1 KoS AA in existence for any class. )
'Ridiculous heals' do not keep tanks alive. A 100m heal is useless if the tank only has 5, 10 or even 90m hps. Ridiculous wards, however, are another story. Tanks need to have enough mit and hps to survive hits without the expectation of having a ward of several times their max hp on them.
I think the point is that the minimum mit and health requirements for any non mouth-breather priest to keep a tank alive are easily achievable without defensive jewelry. That was even true before heroic content became trivial. As Estal pointed out, there might be problems after the xpac but currently there shouldn't be issues.
Something to always consider with tanks....it's not a one size fits all approach. What a bruiser needs is different than what a monk needs when looking at stats. The same goes for the other tanks
Nearly every single mob you can get to a range to cast it without the mob moving as you are still in range. As long as your healers don't need to be 20m behind the mob too, you are golden.
My paladin barely has 2k potency right now and has no problem holding aggro against 300mil parse warlock/ranger DPS combo. The problem I have with my tank is being randomly stunned by boss mobs (specifically MC and SK) then dying almost instantly afterwards.
Well, I actually went potency and WDB on my jewelry , kept a few mit pieces though and i can do 350-400 mil AE damage bursts to start an AE fight on my Zerk then it simmers down to just over 80 mil, i have NO agro issues now.
