Losing Aggro

[Gangly]

<div></div>I do a lot of adventuring with a Guardian and healer; (playing a fury myself) and nearly every fight, the guardian is losing aggro to me.  Now, being grouped with another healer, I am usually taking the nuking route and backup healer.  Do his taunts need upgrading? (i'm not exactly sure what level they're at)  Any other tips besides me just using auto attack <span>:smileyindifferent:</span>?  Personally, I don't think a priest should be able to steal aggro from a tank, ever.EDIT: I forgot to mention that I always target through him.<div></div><p>Message Edited by Gangly on <span class=date_text>07-21-2006</span> <span class=time_text>12:41 PM</span>

[Wilin]

There are alot of considerations. Is the Guardian actually using their taunts? What quality are the taunts? What quality are your nukes? Is the guard using taunts that they got 8 levels ago, but you're using a brand new shiny uber nuke that you just got? Are you nuking too early? When you're laying out dps, you have to start slow and build up after the tank has established aggro. Either the tank is too slow out of the box, or you're too fast out of the box. That's generally the case with any tank you come across though. Sometimes, you have to get a feel for how much dps you can lay down without pulling aggro. It will be different with just about each individual tank that you run across.(Until you start grouping with 70th guardians with all their skills/arts maxed, they're all about the same)<p>Message Edited by Wilin on <span class=date_text>07-21-2006</span> <span class=time_text>04:34 PM</span>

[Rorrak]

<P>He should have all of his taunts Adept III+.  That's a given for any tank.  He might have to harvest for the rares if he doesn't have the money.  He should have his single target aggro reducer/avoidance buff on you.  He probably needs to upgrade his weapon.  He may not be using his encounter taunts or AE attack.  He might be tanking in defensive stance, where offensive stance would increase his damage output and with 2 healers that's what he'd need.  If he has 16 or more AAs, I'd recommend going one hander with a damage proc and buckler with 4/4/8 down the STA line for 76% double attack.  That'll help his damage output and therefore hate generation.  </P> <P>You're probably doing it already...but start off meleeing, apply DoTs, single target nuke, group nuke.  That gives him the most time to generate AE aggro through his AE taunts, AE attack and reactive taunt proc.  Make sure you have your 10% chance to proc +DPS and +Haste buff on him, that'll help his aggro generation. </P> <P>- Rorrak</P>

[JimmyMa]

Early on, when I would be tanking for a group, I could hold agro off of wizards, monks, scouts etc... but furies would always peel off some in groups. This would happen because they were going all out aoes rather than healing or doing damage to a single target.Course agro is smooth now that I have caught up to the other 70s but is it mostly groups that you gain agro from?<div></div>

[Gangly]

<div><blockquote><hr>Rorrak wrote:<div></div> <p>He should have all of his taunts Adept III+.  That's a given for any tank.  He might have to harvest for the rares if he doesn't have the money.  He should have his single target aggro reducer/avoidance buff on you.  He probably needs to upgrade his weapon.  He may not be using his encounter taunts or AE attack.  He might be tanking in defensive stance, where offensive stance would increase his damage output and with 2 healers that's what he'd need.  If he has 16 or more AAs, I'd recommend going one hander with a damage proc and buckler with 4/4/8 down the STA line for 76% double attack.  That'll help his damage output and therefore hate generation.  </p> <p>You're probably doing it already...but start off meleeing, apply DoTs, single target nuke, group nuke.  That gives him the most time to generate AE aggro through his AE taunts, AE attack and reactive taunt proc.  Make sure you have your 10% chance to proc +DPS and +Haste buff on him, that'll help his aggro generation. </p> <p>- Rorrak</p><hr></blockquote><font color="#ccff00">Nice info, I'll let him know everything you said</font>.<span>:smileyhappy:</span><div><blockquote><hr>JimmyMach wrote:Early on, when I would be tanking for a group, I could hold agro off of wizards, monks, scouts etc... but furies would always peel off some in groups. This would happen because they were going all out aoes rather than healing or doing damage to a single target.Course agro is smooth now that I have caught up to the other 70s but is it mostly groups that you gain agro from?<hr></blockquote><font color="#ccff00">Yeah, I noticed that using my AE nuke is giving me aggro almost every single time, but also even from my one target nuke it seems to be peeling off of the tank.  This is usually my first attack sequence while fighting heroics: auto-attack, debuff, the two dots, then usually (almost always) the single target nuke (I rarely use the AE nuke on single targets because of the long cast time).  I'll check to see what his taunts are at tonight and see if they need upgrading.Another thing I've been noticing lately is as soon as he starts with a mob (depending on how hard it hits) I will throw on my heal over time and that also gives me aggro.  So, i'm leaning towards the fact that he isn't generating enough hate with the mob.Thanks for everyone's input so far.</font></div></div>

[FightGame]

<DIV>I'd be willing to bet that either he doesn't have adept 3's (or better), or he isn't using the encounter taunt (or early enough).  Make sure he uses the ENCOUNTER taunt soon, and as soon as it is available (even more so if he has aggro control problems).</DIV>

[Vormulac]

<P>buckler line nuff said, hands down best aa line we got for agro. it even overdoes the str line ( ive taken both seperatly)  take your double attack to max dont worry about buckler reversal, double attack is where its at. All my guys can all out burn on assist now and unless i go afk the mob stays on me.</P> <P> </P> <P>Vormulac Unsleep</P> <P>Guild Leader <A href="http://shatteredmoon.org" target=_blank>Shattered Moon</A></P> <P>Neriakithicor</P>

[Kinesthesia]

Fwiw, I have a relatively twinked out Guardian 36.  Every skill is at least Adept III and I have quite a few Masters as they are relatively cheap at this level.  I was in an excellent group in Runnyeye with a Fury 39 and four DPS.  As memory serves, two Necros, a Conj and a Swashbuckler.  I had my deaggro on a Necro who was parsing the highest consistantly before the Fury joined.  Once the Fury joined, he pulled off me every fight until I switched my deaggro to him, and then never had another problem.  It's probably the combination of healing aggro and dps aggro that does it.  And granted he was the highest level person in the group.<div></div>

[TuinalOfTheNexus]

<DIV>It's nothing to do with the CA quality, you sure as hell don't need adept IIIs to keep mobs off a healer. In fact before T6/7 upgrading taunts past adept I is a waste of time.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>He must be overlooking something. Possibly:</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>- He's not using the enflaming defense line. Target him and check his buffs, there should be a yellow icon one that generates hate when he's hit.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>- He's ignoring adds or not using the encounter taunt.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>- He's not spamming, or even using melee combat art attacks to increase his damage</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>- His weapon is outdated and generating very little damage</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>- Or possibly you're a fury and opening each fight with a master I of your most powerful nuke in the first few seconds.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Upgrading taunts won't do any good if he's losing aggro to a healer, he's doing something fundamentally wrong and it's unlikely down to gear.</DIV>

[digitalblasphemy]

In my previous life as a Guardian, agro was sometimes a problem, but only with certain classes.  I had a terrible time keeping agro if a Bruiser was in the group.  The same goes for Warlocks and often Swashbucklers.  One thing that helped the most was if the entire group let me taunt the mobs and get 5-10secs alone with the mobs before they unleash their nukes and so on.  Keeping agro is a group effort and not the sole responsibility of a tank.  If a Swashbuckler and other classes are not using their deagro's everytime they are up, then it becomes a problem.  People need to realize how little a tank actually has to taunt.  When a Wizard can nuke a mob for 50k (unbuffed mob of course), my little taunt that does maybe 1K of hate would have to be fired off countless times to counter that.  For raiding, we get to pick and choose the right classes for their hate buffs/transfers etc., but in groups we often get who we get.  I have a harder time keeping agro in grouped instanced runs than I do MT'ing a badass x4 epic mob.  I think the reason for that is that on raids, people are aware of their hate generation more, whereas in groups, they just mash buttons and figure the tank will take care of the agro.<div></div>

[TuinalOfTheNexus]

<P>Swashbucklers have a hate transfer line - the only way you can lose aggro to one is if they're not using it.</P> <P>When you run the actual numbers, the hardest hitting nuke a wizard has (ice nova) is approximately 8000, on a 4 second cast. If moderate is on the wizard, that would result in about 5500 hate. In the 4 seconds it casts you can use confont (~1000 hate), vehement strike (~1200 hate), protection (~1200 hate) and still have time to use flay (~1300 hate) and obliterate (~1000 hate), plus a potential few more thousand with a bow shot on the pull and autoattack.</P> <P>Without moderate, yeah, you'll still have a hard time against a wizard dumb enough to use ice nova the exact second you pull, but you can fairly easily get 5k+ hate within the first few seconds of the encounter. This scales somewhat with level; even though you're lacking big hitting abilities and additional taunts at lower level the ice nova line only starts for a wizard at 50.</P>

[digitalblasphemy]

<div></div>I'm now a Zerker and have not had the agro issues I mentioned above.  That was when I was a Guardian and at times, it was quite difficult to maintain agro.  This was in group situations and often, instaced runs.  What was frustrating was I had initial agro, kept it nicely, but then had peeps strip mobs off me.  Then it was a case of using Rescue and Reinforcement.  Then I'd hold it only so long until it was stripped again.  I'd be OOP spaming the living daylights out of every taunt that refreshed, every CA and so on.  It got so ridiculous I often didn't want a Bruiser or Warlock in the group.  I also started to question my skills as a tank.  As far as agro transfers, I've lost agro to an Assasin constantly, even with their transfer on me and mine on them, so saying the only way I can lose it (in this case a Swashy), wasn't the case for me.  They could essentially take it anytime they wanted, and that went for many classes.Since the Devs posted that agro is 1:1 for hate vs dmg, what they didn't tell us is what debuffs, regen, wards, reactives, heals and other such things do in relation to agro generation.I've seen non raid Wizard nukes for 40-50k and they are not that rare either.  Hits in the 12-15k range are very common too.  Obviously in those cases it's use Rescue and hold on until the mob is dead.  But your method to counter say Ice Nova that you posted is somewhat lacking.  For starters, the Wizard is casting other spells as well.  Seconly, to counter just one spell like Ice Nova, I have to have all my refresh timers up to be able to hit them all in succession.  And even then, it's only good for 1 round.  If I spam all my taunts and monster CA's to counter that one Ice Nova, what happens when the Wizard casts the next one?  Even my fastest taunt is still refreshing lol.  I know you posted it as a method in relation to a good pull and cementing agro.  For me that's not been a problem for many tiers (it used to be way back in the 50s when I realised using lvl 10 arrows cause they were cheap, meant dodgy pulls lol, but that's another).  The problem is classes stripping agro mid fight.  I had virtually nothing apart from Rescue and Reinforcement to get it back quickly.<div></div><p>Message Edited by digitalblasphemy on <span class=date_text>07-23-2006</span> <span class=time_text>03:44 PM</span>

[Gangly]

<div></div>Yeah, I've pretty much had to stop using my encounter nuke.  Whenever I use this area nuke, no matter when I drop it (could be end of the fight) it still peels the aggro off.  It gets kind of annoying when I always get [expletive haxx0red by Raijinn] from the tank for stealing his aggro, so i've basically stuck myself on auto-attack.  Bleh.Thanks to everyone for their input.<div></div><p>Message Edited by Gangly on <span class=date_text>07-24-2006</span> <span class=time_text>08:56 AM</span>

[Sunrayn]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Gangly wrote:<BR> <BR>EDIT: I forgot to mention that I always target through him.<BR> <P>Message Edited by Gangly on <SPAN class=date_text>07-21-2006</SPAN> <SPAN class=time_text>12:41 PM</SPAN><BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE> <P><BR>Soooo, in addition to healing your tank and building some hate, you are also switching mob targets when he does and dropping a bomb on the target he is trying to build hate with?</P> <P>ooooook</P>