Tanking Classes: Intended Balance, Pros & Cons

[Rytz]

I wanted to pick the brains of some vanilla veterans and tank experts. I've only ever tanked as a Warrior, so my knowledge of Druid, Paladin, and Shaman tanking is limited.

What was the original intent for these classes when in comes to tanking? Strengths vs Weaknesses?

From what I've gathered, it seems:

[Warrior]
Threat Focus: Single Target (w/o TF)
Hitpoints:CON
Armor: CON
Defense: PRO
+Resist Gear: PRO
Tank Utilities: PRO (Shield Abilities, Last Stand, etc)
Class Utilities: CON

[Druid]
Threat Focus: Single Target
Hitpoints: PRO
Armor: PRO
Defense: CON
+Resist Gear: CON
Tank Utilities: CON
Class Utilities: PRO

[Paladin]
Threat Focus: AoE
Hitpoints: ?
Armor: ?
Defense: ?
+Resist Gear: ?
Tank Utilities: ?
Class Utilities: PRO

[Shaman]
Threat Focus: ?
Hitpoints: ?
Armor: ?
Defense: ?
+Resist Gear: ?
Tank Utilities: ?
Class Utilities: PRO

[Lindzei]

Not an expert but the recent events (classic) showed that Warrior = Pro at nearly everything >>>> rest of the tanks. (Also give a taunt to prot paladin thx)

[Pfwg]

It's weird that you've posted 4 tanking classes when there are only two.

For future reference, you can tell if a class is a tank or not because they can taunt.

[Markuis]

I'm not an expert and I'm not a tank player, but before choosing what to play I've checked a few class rankings for vanilla, and prot warrior was always top tier.

One flaw some pservers have is they have way too much dps players and not enough healers/tanks, making it difficult to play dungeons and instances. Balancing the tank classes can bring a lot to turtle wow, specially manking those tank specs more appealing to the players.

I don't have any specific suggestions tho.

[Rytz]

It's weird that you've posted 4 tanking classes when there are only two.

For future reference, you can tell if a class is a tank or not because they can taunt.

If you're going strictly by taunt abilities, then you can include Shaman in your list (Stoneclaw Totem).

If you go by overall talents, you can include Paladin because they have a literal protection tree with armor boosting talents. Shaman has Toughness in Enhancement.

I'm not well versed in WoW development history and lore but, from a design view, it seems all four of these classes were structured to have tanking as an option with strengths and weaknesses. Paladin and Shaman just appear to be unfinished. I was curious if the original dev intent was for Paladin and Shaman to be viable tanks in vanilla.

[Lahire]

Yes paladin and shaman were originally supposed to have a tank spec, as the original design intent for these "special" classes was to be able to do the 3 roles (like druid).

This said, though the idea is here, it is undevelopped or unfinished (because of time constraint during alpha/beta). You can clearly see this intent in the alpha patch notes. What is interesting is they are not unfinished in the same way :
- Paladin is a tiny damage dealer, partly because it needs to be attacked to retribute (which is impossible as there is a tank). But paladin, correctly played, is actually a viable tank for at least half the end game content.
- Shaman is an average damage dealer (or high dps notably in pvp), but its "tank" spec (enhanc) is so bad it has been read by players as a kind of melee dps with high threat. Though I've seen shamans tank dungeons and even MC (as a challenge, it was interesting). It is not viable out of the box and requires a lot of stuff, conso and knowledge. It demands a lot of effort for a bad result, but is a nice challenge.

Another niche tank option is druid moonkin ("panzerkin"). It is the only one not intended by the developper but invented by the playerbase. It's half a meme and half viable. Like shaman tank, it requires a lot of effort to achieve little, but you can tank dungeons or MC as a panzerkin.

The last one, also invented by players, is the rogue tank. Like the bear druid, it relies on dodge and "steals" bear stuff to function. It's half a meme and half a thing.

Most players who want to tank just go warrior or bear, as you need a massive respect capital to be accepted as something else (people will not want to play with you if you are not war or bear, except if you are known as the best (though excentric) tank on the server).

[Pfwg]

It's weird that you've posted 4 tanking classes when there are only two.

For future reference, you can tell if a class is a tank or not because they can taunt.

If you're going strictly by taunt abilities, then you can include Shaman in your list (Stoneclaw Totem).

If you go by overall talents, you can include Paladin because they have a literal protection tree with armor boosting talents. Shaman has Toughness in Enhancement.

I'm not well versed in WoW development history and lore but, from a design view, it seems all four of these classes were structured to have tanking as an option with strengths and weaknesses. Paladin and Shaman just appear to be unfinished. I was curious if the original dev intent was for Paladin and Shaman to be viable tanks in vanilla.

I completely agree with you that a stoneclaw totem is indeed a more viable tank than both shamans and paladins.

Sadly, since stoneclaw totem isn't a playable class I will have leave it out of my list of viable tanking classes.

[Balake]

Classes that count as tanks are classes with a talent tree that buffs survivability and a way to generate more threat than their damage normally allows. Warlocks are tanks.

runs to hiding

[Velite]

Thing is, with everything in the game, paladins are able to tank on the level of warriors/druids except when a taunt is required. Classic and I proved that, but your average player will not reach that point, and even if they do, the lack of taunt is a deal-breaker to most. That being said, paladins do have the tools to tank the damage that raid bosses deal in all content and get healed, they will just be the weaker link of the group, and as such, they will be replaced with warrior or druid since in all aspects necessary, assuming equal skill and gear the druids and warriors are better.

Shamans on the other hand are not able to physically endure all bosses in the game, there are going to be some bosses (notably patchwerk hateful tank) that will one shot a shaman no matter what.

The aoe tanking benefit of a paladin in vanilla is largely negated by the fact that in many circumstances they won't actually be able to survive aoe tanking raid trash, which was designed to be tanked by separate tanks, especially since they lack a shield wall type ability, OR they can be substituted by a mage who the content was designed for (since mages were on both factions), therefore you don't hard need a protection paladin, much less an enhancement shaman who's aoe totem aggro doesn't contribute to the shaman.

There is also the last point, that the bulk of the power of a protection paladin is in the early part of the talent tree (redoubt/imp rf/kings), paired with consecration which is 11 point holy, and a holy-prot paladin hybrid can perform overall much better since they have more healing utility. They will be a better flex option as they are able to switch between roles, so a full time protection paladin is mostly invalidated, it's like a last choice option. Holy shield is rubbish for tanking anything past 3 mobs, and the fact that blessing of sanctuary doesn't scale means a 24 damage reduction when a mob hits for 900 won't count for much (on this note, the reduction of sanctuary is actually based on armor/coefficients so in reality it's -10-12 damage at most).

To summarize, protection paladin isn't really viable in the tank role due to the lack of a taunt AND the lack of any real benefit in vanilla, the same with shaman, you can't fully replace warriors/druids with paladins or shamans since some fights require a taunt to beat the boss. There is no benefit to bringing a full time protection paladin over a holy/holy-prot paladin. This was changed in TBC since paladins had the power to actually aoe tank best in raids due to better gear/talents and mana sustain, had a taunt spell, and they brought paladin utility exclusively as a protection paladin. The spec isn't bad in vanilla, it's incomplete.

[Velite]

It's weird that you've posted 4 tanking classes when there are only two.

For future reference, you can tell if a class is a tank or not because they can taunt.

If you're going strictly by taunt abilities, then you can include Shaman in your list (Stoneclaw Totem).

If you go by overall talents, you can include Paladin because they have a literal protection tree with armor boosting talents. Shaman has Toughness in Enhancement.

I'm not well versed in WoW development history and lore but, from a design view, it seems all four of these classes were structured to have tanking as an option with strengths and weaknesses. Paladin and Shaman just appear to be unfinished. I was curious if the original dev intent was for Paladin and Shaman to be viable tanks in vanilla.

I completely agree with you that a stoneclaw totem is indeed a more viable tank than both shamans and paladins.

Sadly, since stoneclaw totem isn't a playable class I will have leave it out of my list of viable tanking classes.

Stoneclaw totem doesn't taunt, it only generates aoe aggro. The original version was an actual aoe fixate similar to a target dummy, which on that note, paladins can give blessing of protection to a target dummy so that it can aoe fixate while not dying. Hence engineering paladins can aoe taunt at most every 3 minutes.

[Rytz]

Thanks for the responses. As you said Velite, Shaman and Paladin feel incomplete when it comes to tanking.

Regarding Shamans, without plate armor, how were they ever intended to be full-on tanks? Or were they supposed to have more extra talent-based armor and mitigation to compensate? Like was mentioned, I can only see them getting one-shotted by end-game raid bosses.

While I don't want and would never ask for TBC (that's not the goal of Turtle WoW, anyway), if vanilla had intended for Paladin and Shaman to be more viable tanks (including end-game raids), it would be awesome to see Turtle WoW do it's own take on making that happen.

I have never played a Paladin but I do hear good things about Holy Strike. Does that make them viable for end-game raids? If so, can something similar be done for Shaman?

[Velite]

Thanks for the responses. As you said Velite, Shaman and Paladin feel incomplete when it comes to tanking.

Regarding Shamans, without plate armor, how were they ever intended to be full-on tanks? Or were they supposed to have more extra talent-based armor and mitigation to compensate? Like was mentioned, I can only see them getting one-shotted by end-game raid bosses.

While I don't want and would never ask for TBC (that's not the goal of Turtle WoW, anyway), if vanilla had intended for Paladin and Shaman to be more viable tanks (including end-game raids), it would be awesome to see Turtle WoW do it's own take on making that happen.

I have never played a Paladin but I do hear good things about Holy Strike. Does that make them viable for end-game raids? If so, can something similar be done for Shaman?

Holy strike didn't really change anything in raids, it was cross faction.

Shamans were never intended to be raid tanks, just group (3-5 man) content tanks, as for paladins they of course intended them to tank in raids since they had an entire tree just devoted to tanking, unlike shaman's which is dps/tanking