WoW Guides - AoE Tanking

Since the introduction of World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King, its no secret that AoE (area of effect) damage has taken president over single target DPS. With the addition of some form of AoE damage abilities for every class, and the introduction of the new Gods of AoE - the Deathknight - the way people run both dungeons as well as raids has changed. This has introduced a new challenge for tanking classes, since rather than fighting for aggro on one mob they’ve got to stay high on multiple threat tables. Here are a few tips to help all those that have issues with AoE tanking -
Initial Threat

The initial “hi I’m here, hit me” is the most important thing for tanks. If you wait too long before using a damaging ability that hits each mob in the particular pull, the mobs that aren’t ’tagged’ in this way will run straight for the first party/raid member that heals or uses a damaging spell, making it hard for you to control them. The best way to grab aggro on multiple mobs is to use some form of AoE ability, even if it dishes out small amounts of damage. A good example for such an ability is Death and Decay in the case of Deathknights, Shockwave (or Thunderclap) in the case of Warriors or Consecrate in the case of Paladins. This is easy in the case of Deathknights and Paladins, since they start off with a full pool of Runic Power/ Runes, or Mana, but Warriors and Druids have to build Rage so it becomes a little tough on them; then again there are always abilities like Enrage and Charge to help build enough rage for that first AoE damage ability.
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Positioning**

There’s nothing more depressing than seeing a tank charge into a group of mobs, just to be pummeled into the ground within seconds. Along with threat generation, it’s also important for tanks to ensure that they survive (else what good are they, right?). Most tanks die quickly because they mess up with positioning mobs - they let mobs pound on them from the sides and their back, which are areas that cannot dodge, parry or block incoming blows, making them a complete punching bag. The first thing you do after grabbing aggro is move about a bit so that all the mobs you need to tank are positioned in front of you.

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Know your mobs

Mob positioning is rather easy with melee mobs, but when caster or ranged mobs come into play its a whole different ball game. Unlike melee mobs they don’t have to move to hit you, making it incredibly hard to position them. What generally happens with inexperienced tanks is that they move mobs around to position them pretending all mobs are melee. The caster mobs in the group generally stay back in such cases, making it hard for the tank’s AoE abilities to hit them, because of which the tank goes below DPS and healing classes on the threat table, setting the mobs loose to pound away at everything but the tank. To ensure this doesn’t happen, it’s always better to check which mobs have a mana pool, and to target the rest of the mobs with the caster as your primary point of focus. It’s a little tougher to identify which mobs are ranged, and the only way to be really sure comes from experience. It’s also a good idea to read the name of the mob, and look for keywords such as ‘Caster’ or ‘Ranger’ (eg. Runecaster, Dark Ranger) to get a general idea of what the mobs do.

Marking mobs

The downside of having so many high damage AoE abilities introduced in WotLK, is that tanks have grown incredibly lazy and refuse to mark mobs. The old Skull and ‘X’ have been left behind with the Burning Crusade, leaving the DPS to pick random targets to pick off, making focused DPS a thing of the past. Agreed that most classes have high AoE DPS, but many classes still need a single target to focus their single target abilities on. Expecting them to click on the tank and then hitting the “F” key to assist is a too much; instead, as a tank you should just assign a key on your keyboard to mark the target as “Skull”. The option to assign a key to the same is available in the keybinding settings. if you have a mouse with extra buttons, it’s a good idea to assign one of them to set the current target as ‘Skull’.

The only real way of getting better at AoE tanking is getting your rotations right and practicing loads. If you’re new, its a good idea to read loads and tank every possible instance you can with your gear.