Daxxarri went on to talk about DK tanks
http://us.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/2973395323?page=2#28

Right now it's tough for DK tanks because they're the only ones on anything resembling an active mitigation model. The one active mitigation guy is going to look like he's working harder than the passive mitigation guys because, in a lot of ways, he is. If all tanks had worked this way from the start, it would be the norm, and nobody would be worried about jumping onto that model.

We've already established that threat isn't making for very compelling encounter design, and removing it offers us the ability to get creative with some of the mechanics that we're using; both in encounter and class design. In a world with no threat management, and no active mitigation, that doesn't leave a lot for tanks to do though. We think that making tanking more active, and focusing that activity around mitigation (which feels immediately useful) will generate some very rewarding gameplay. We want the act of tanking to be engaging, interesting and fun. We think the path forward will offer more of that for all the tanking classes.

Also, I've seen a number of references to making tanking easier in this thread and elsewhere. "Easier" isn't really the goal. The goal is to discard a mechanic which we don't think is working particularly well anymore, and replace it with something more focused and interesting. Doing so should also have the effect of allowing tanks who aren't as geared still do their job when grouped with players who outgear (or even outlevel them a bit). They'll still be responsible for doing a good job, but their absolute ability to hold the attention of the boss won't be a factor; their ability to play well and mitigate damage will be.

We're aware of player concerns about Blood tanking, and we'll work to ensure that Blood tanking will continue to be viable and effective into the future. On that note, we're interested in addressing some of the concerns that have been expressed about the spec (potentially as soon as the next major patch), though we want to accomplish that goal without sacrificing what sets the spec apart and makes it interesting.

 

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"We've
already established that threat isn't making for very compelling
encounter design, and removing it offers us the ability to get creative
with some of the mechanics that we're using; both in encounter and class
design."

or

"We have screwed threat too much and can't fix it so instead of telling you we messed up, we will just remove it."

 

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I thought tanking was supposed to be all about "managing resources"? That's what I remember from ...was it GC?.......right before cata release?


Sorry, total non-sequitur.


What I meant to say was: active mitigation is an awesome concept and could be a whale of a lot of fun if executed correctly.


Do you guys think that will seriously happen? <liptwitch>


ps: We want the act of tanking to be engaging, interesting and fun.


Didn't they say the same thing about healers?

 

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This is just too funny.

Vanilla and BC - Threat was the tanks job, survivability of the tank was the healers job.
LK - Threat much easier to handle, but still troublesome in AE pulls. Survivability really high due to high tank defenses and near-infinite healer mana.
Cata - Threat goes out the window, as does survivability in early expansion due to mana costs of heals. Now survivability increases due to higher tank interaction since threat becomes a non-issue.

So basically over the past 6 years, they took the most freaking round-about route to change a tanks job from Threat Management to Survivability Management. Which was more fun? Trying to keep threat on multiple mobs or even a boss when DPS blows CDs, or staring at your own health bar and planning when to press a button.

My God the B-Team strikes again!

The worst part is, they have the perfect tool to test these changes out before they apply them to live servers, but they only use it for debugging code. Just goes to show how totally screwed up management is in the Blizzard office.

 

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Ah, I get it!


The hard part of tanking: are you dead or not?


Ship it.

 

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I think Blizz is still thrashing here because they haven't grasped a marketing basic. Their customer base has a bunch of different kinds of people with different needs, and Blizz is making intuitive changes instead of systematically understanding who their customers (players) are, and how the decisions they make affect the different groups.


For example, people who play exclusively in guild groups vs those who exclusively run dungeon finder PUGs. The extremely competent vs those who are still learning (or never will).


About 20 years ago my employer sent the entire management team I was part of to a training called QFD, run by a consultancy which spun off Ford, in turn based on the discipline used by the Japanese automakers to trounce Detroit in the 1970's. The name QFD actually comes from "Quality Function Deployment", the literal translation of the Japanese name of the method.


The course opened with the instructor turning to us and asking, "How many of you like deep dish pizza? How many of you like regular thin crust pizza? Now how many of you would like something halfway between the two?" Think about it. Trade off the needs of two groups of customers, *without* driving everyone away.


I think Blizz should send its intact management and creative team to this class, and fire anyone who doesn't get it.


Not rocket science. Been around since most of the people working on WoW were born.

If you always play with the tank at equivalent gear levels to the DPS, you'd probably never see any issue assuming nobody was being generally stupid about assisting. If you try to run a new tank in greens in an instance with a DPS in raid/badge gear, it's a constant problem.

 

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OK, so I'm wondering what exactly they consider "fun" at Blizzard HQ. The folks I ran with pre-Cataclysm understood that instances would be tricky for the tank while undergeared, OK when adequately geared and easy when overgeared. Solution to being overgeared to prevent boredom? Pull more mobs! Pulling 3-4 packs of heroic trash at a time brought back the excitement of a pull that could go drastically wrong at any second.

So what's Blizzard's solution? Force tanks to actively work just to stay alive in what they consider "normal" pulls.

Result? People are annoyed when the mechanics are set up so they have to work almost as hard after their 50th run through the same instance. Eventually, people want to go plow an instance to complete some quests for a guild member or friend, or go farm an instance for a mount or drop or crafting materials.

The excitement of barely surviving a boss encounter is great the first few times. Eventually, you just want to blow through it and get it overwith so you can do something interesting. Grinding should eventually become easy or people just get fed up and leave in droves.

 

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And there will be even less tanks in LFD.

I wonder what bribe they will use to get people to tank after these changes.

 

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i've officially run out of walls to bang my head into and i'm pretty sure its all GC's fault.

 

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