Offtanking, who does it?

[Skog]

So in the High End when you find yourself needing to offtank in a raid situation, who does the offtanking (ie actually gets hit), you or your warder? I would think using myself because of pets not holding aggro when around PCs, but what do you guys do?

[Tytallia]

It depends on a lot of things, what kind of mob, how many need to be tanked and very importantly is there a healer for me? I will if there is a healer that knows I am tanking, otherwise I am the healer for my tanking warder.

[Dummkopf]

In a raid situation my pet cant offtank because mobs would own it in seconds. I can offtank pretty good way up into time, but not much in GoD. Lately i find myself tanking raidtargets since the warriors in the guild im applying cannot create enough aggro, in my old guild that wasnt a problem at all (my old guild retired after losing 70% of its memberbase due to GoD). If clerics are fast enough that is no problem whatsoever and health of target's target helps a lot there.

[Argach]

What Dumm said. I used to offtank quite a lot in Time p1-3 and trash in GoD, especially if my disc was up. I remember clerics sending me tells confused, asking if I'm assigned as a tank during p3, but the truth is we tank a slowed mob with disc better than any plate tank tanks an unslowed mob without disc. -_-

[Tastian]

Yup me all the way.  My warder only OT's if I'm doing a normal LDoN and even then it's not a lot of the time.  Pet mitigates for crap, doesn't have prot spirit, and can't hold aggro if a PC get's too close.

I used to be an assigned OT, but as guild make up changes I don't much anymore.  Usually though on bigger pulls I'll float a bit and rip a mob off any healer/caster if I see it get through the other OT's or kill or add in the back or something.  Having our own fast casting slow + fast refresh high mitigation disc makes + high aggro generation when we want (and when we don't want lol) makes us very nice OT's as long as the mob damage isn't just crazy.

[Choppin]

hmm if I happen to offtank then mostly only if I have def disc on, pet will tank for a round or 2

[Eatbugs]

I offtank raid mobs fairly often if we're short on tank classes or if we have a huge pull.

My warder is used almost exclusively for dps on raids - while he makes a great offtank in experience groups in LDoN or Sol Ro tower, he just isn't up to the damage output of elemental mobs.  (Even in VT he gets eaten up pretty quickly.)

[Kylaz]

There are 2 types of offtanking:
- Raid offtanking: In that case, thats me that do the job. Clerics are not as atttentive to warder's health as they can be of a group member, and some of those critters hit really hard - poor pet with no defensive AAs would go down in seconds..
- LDoN offtanking: In normal LDoNs, I prefer having the pet offtank one, parked in a corner of the room, while I slow all the other mobs and either assist the MT or offtank another.  In hard LDoN, it depends on the DPS of the group, and if I have Mend Companion Up. If I feel the main target will be down before my pet dies (without having to cast the 9secs heal), I'll let it offtank - possibly changing target at the end to make sure my pet does not die.

[Sempai]

While the pet is a decent off-tank in experience groups as you are gaining levels, it really has no chance to offtank in a raid situation.

As I think about my raiding experience, about 2.5 years worth of raiding, the only fight we used my pet to offtank was the ring war for the 10th ring a long time ago. We were short on tanks and the pet did ok with a dedicated healer and Aego. :lol:

In current high end raiding, Time and GoD, pets are used as what I call speedbump tanks a lot. They generate a ton of aggro and can hold a mob in position during times like tank transitions, fear and caster overaggro. However, they often get one rounded, even with adds. As we jumped from PoP to GoD, even my ability to offtank has been severly reduced. There are few raid mobs or adds that I can handle for more than a few seconds once my disc is down in GoD.

[Rasthik]

I usually OT a lot in time up to RZ and not as much in GoD

Rasthik

[Derrict]

Along with the pet getting owned in a few rounds of attacks, pet OTing isn't a viable option in smaller areas due to the NPC code to attack any PC in melee range, so the mobs end up attacking your guildmate and not the pet(s).

[Eatbugs]

Actually used my warder as an offtank in Earth a few times last night - it's doable (I thought he'd be down in seconds) but severely lowers my dps due to heal time.

On the other hand, I was tanking in that group, so my dps wasn't a huge factor.  :P

I still don't have GoD, but I can't imagine pets being anything more than a quick smear there from what I've heard about mob dps.

[Dysz]

The only exception I can think of me tanking over pet is on a mob that has a gargantuan rampage (for my guild's level, magmaton is what im talking about), and i do better by just sitting out of melee range and let the pet take it in the shorts rather than me :P