Advice for the Next Generation

Gather 'round, kids.

Have a seat on Uncle Mis's lap and let him give you some advice.

When you finally hit your 80th season and decide to start running those heroic dungeons or raids to get all that fancy gear you've seen folks in Stormwind walking around in, here's a couple of things you should know. Now, they may seem pretty obvious, but there are plenty of folks out there who didn't have an old battle-worn tank to tell them about it, or they just didn't pay attention.

I know you've learned plenty from others of your class, and I know they've been giving you good advice about how to do the most sustained damage you can. If you wanna get on your tank's good side, though, and stay alive long enough to finish the fight, listen closely:

Be Patient

You're gonna be in situations where a tank is gonna pick a fight with a bunch of big scary bad guys, and your first instinct after fighting through 80 seasons is going to be to jump in and start laying into them.

Just hold off a second.

Your tank has a couple of things he needs to do first. If it's me, I'm going to start by hitting one of them, likely a caster, with a Heroic Throw. That'll silence the caster and get them to run at me so I don't have to do anything fancy to invite them over for a tea party.

Once they get close enough, I'll Thunderclap to let 'em know I mean business, yell at them to make them feel bad about themselves, then pop off a quick Shockwave to make them forget who they are and why they were running at me in the first place.

After that, jump right in the fight. Hit 'em hard and often.

If you get a little fidgety and start doing your thing before I've gone through that little song and dance routine, there's a good chance that they'll decide you'd be a more enjoyable target and start beating the living nether out of you.

Stand Behind Them

Now I know you've spent a very long time standing toe to toe with those big, mean, scary people....or things....or whatever, but from here on in, that's gonna be my job. That means it's time for you to get to know their heels for a change.

The first reason it's a good idea to stand behind them is because these guys'll parry attacks from anybody standing in front of them. If they parry one of your attacks is just going to make their next attack come quicker. Since I've hopefully done a sufficient job insulting their mothers and they're looking to pummel me first and foremost, those quicker attacks are gonna land on Uncle Mis's pretty face. You don't want that, do you?

Secondly, some bad guys have a tendency to cleave or do something else that may affect any number of people standing in front of them. If you're behind them, you'll be safe from getting hurt by something like that.

Oh, and let's not forget about dragons. 99.9% of the time dragons are gonna breathe fire or something else that's pretty painful...that's kind of their thing. A dragon that doesn't breathe fire is pretty much just an over-sized lizard. Standing in front of dragons is very, very bad. Here's the kicker, though: dragons also have really big tails they like to swing around, so don't stand behind them, either.

When fighting a dragon, then, stand to the side. All of their vital organs are there for you to poke at and you're pretty much safe from getting fried or frozen or knocked into next week.

And there you have it. Next time you run off into a heroic or a raid keep these things in mind. It'll make your tank very happy and keep the healers from having to waste a bunch of their mana resurrecting you while muttering under their breath.

Run along now, kids. Aunt Cheesi made cookies.