Need help balancing Agro increasing AA's and defensive AA's..

[Quincent]

Ok, I've recently been noticing that it is sometimes very difficult to keep agro in groups. Especially from classes like monks and rogues in situations like an LDoN/GoD group. From my experience, Taunt seems to fail a lot, more than I'd like it to, even tho it's been figured to be 60% or so on successes.
Anyways, I've finished working on my CA and LR AA's and have CS1, knowing it is priority to finish defensive AA's before anything else... asap.

Having that said about my agro keeping troubles, does anyone have any suggestions and opinions on ways to balance out Agro supporting AA's and Defensive stuff that I could use to go by? I cant tell what really to go for when it comes to agro supporting AA's besides WA.. or should I go for something else while, at the same time, getting the rest of my defensive AA's.
Thanks for any help.

PS: In groups such as an LDoN, I normally wait for the puller to pull the mob(s) in to the group.. then I shoot at least 1 arrow if I have the distance to time in one, then I use Incite while the mob is still otw in - and it's obvious the mob hates me. After it reaches me, I let it beat on me as I beat on it, while waiting til it is slowed and if the slower gets agro, I use the Taunt button to gain agro back (same goes if anyone else gets agro). So, basically the usual stuff I suppose. During the last bit of the fight it gets increasingly difficult to keep agro off others.. even when I do proc my weapons (sometimes).
Now, most of the time when I am having the hardest time keeping agro, is when it's a very well equipped DPS class (such as a monk from a guild like Arch Overseers for instance).

Withought rambling on and on, I'll stop there, lol... thanks for any feedback
Long post, sorry

[Ernie]

Just a few tips.

I would main hand your Sword of the Bloodsworn, given that it has an anger aug in it. Sure a slightly lesser ratio than your SoD but more procs = better agro.

You are already bow tagging on inc (it does help, at least IMHO).

Incite everything... but do it smartly. If the slower grabs agro, don't always just throw your incite on - hope for a successful taunt and THEN put incite on. The taunt will get you on top of the slower's agro and the incite (done AFTER a successful taunt) will put you 400 hate over that!

Other thing to look at is adding a anger or yak stun aug to the SoD. With augs soon to be able to be removed and reused, don't feel like this is a waste.

Happy tanking!

[ibithor]

considering both those classes have a means to ditch aggro and you are doing the proper things and have decent aggro tools, i would say its their fault /shrugs

when i played my necro i did as much damage as the tanks aggro allowed, if i did more, i either expected to tank the mob myself or if that was a bad idea i would fd thereby ditching my aggro. i didnt mind if i pulled aggro much in normal ldons because my necro could tank them easily and i let the tank know that so he wouldnt freak out. that might be the case if you are in normal ldon and these guys are well geared. they might not worry about their aggro so much since they know the mobs arent going to kill them anyway. if thats the case it would be nice if they communicated it to you
if they are pulling aggro on mobs they cant tank, they need to use their aggro control devices more often

that being said, i would toss an anger2 or 3 aug on the SoD since there is no such thing as too mcuh aggro when tanking

[Fitemore]

WA is pretty much the only AA that will noticably increase your aggro. Offensive AAs are a pretty small increase in aggro, just a few extra swings. If you're having trouble with aggro, definitely get both weapons augmented, and get a level or two in WA. The return on WA 1 and 2 is simply amazing. Remember, your defensive AAs don't matter for squat if the mob isn't attacking you.

[Quincent]

Cool.. thanks guys

[Cimmar]

I would look into getting Anger 3 augs on the two weaps you plan on keeping sotb, chos, or sod. I think that you will find with anger 3 on both weaps you will have a much easier time with aggro control. I would finish with defensive AA before getting more into WA, or if u must get to WA 2 or 3 tops and then go full defensive.

[jakazzx]

just getting WA 2 helps tremendously, i got it weeks ago and i'm still absolutely loving it, heh never gets old seeing a rain of white lights coming down on a mob from all ur procs

get WA 2 and anger 2 or 3 on both weapons and you will be fine : )

WA 2 is totally worth getting long before u finish all ur defensive AAs, and it's all you should need aggro increasing AA-wise until ur done with the defensives

[Northerner]

Keep in mind also that some dps classes can and will simply take aggro off you from time to time intentionally. I'm far from an uber rogue but if I'm working with a tank that's still fleshing out his AAs and such, I like to snag a little aggro now and again just to spread the damage a little. I can cheerfully regen or proc back the damage and frankly I don't tank badly at all in an easy LDoN or the like. That monk from AO most likely figures he can tank better than you period and hey, he might well be right. Don't take it personally if he chooses not to FD off his aggro everytime in settings where it isn't exactly crucial.

The warriors above though do have some excellent suggestions for increasing your overall aggro level though. I'd certainly echo the sentiment of grabbing WA1 ASAP and likely WA2 prior to the third levels of the basic defensive AAs.

[Azaza]

WA2, Fero2, Tactical Mastery 1.... on the offensive side (and on the cheaper aa costs)

CA3 before LR defensively, i would think

[rysingsun1]

Originally Posted by Ernie

Just a few tips.

I would main hand your Sword of the Bloodsworn, given that it has an anger aug in it.

it does? i cant see that on the magelo. hmm

the part about you losing agro late in the fight is telling. it is the difference between 2 procs and 4 procs. your incite on inbound is good. now is the time to get 2 anger III augs. dont be cheap and get anger II. go all the way. incite gains you agro. anger will help you keep it. not every time. not against people determined to grab it off you. but it will help more than noticeably.

[Brabble]

It's quite possible I'm imagining these two things, but I have found what seem to me to be a couple of small aggro patterns in my tanking:
1. If I can get a round of melee in on an incoming mob before using incite, I think my initial aggro is better. This is particularly true if the puller is not using melee to pull with.

2. /shield the necro or other caster who draws aggro. I keep meaning to run some tests on this and never get around to it, but it's long appeared to me that /shield has some sort of hate or taunt attached to it. I normally don't /shield other melee unless I think their incoming heal will be a bit late.

Anyway, those are possible things to try; wish I had proof they actually worked as I'm suggesting, but I don't yet.

Sometimes in situations like normal LDoNs when you have a high dps group, it almost doesn't matter if you lose aggro toward the end of the fight because the mob will die so quickly anyway. Of course, not all fights are like that, and your group will have to have the discipline to adjust if it suddenly becomes a really bad idea for the rogue to tank.

If other members of the group are taking heavy damage, you can also ask the healer how things are going. If healing mana is not a bottleneck and no one is dying and the healer is fine with healing the others as needed, and you are splatting the mobs fast, then don't worry about it. If the healer is not happy and the MT is not happy that aggro is getting ganked, then the group should modify its behavior.

edit: stupid typos.

[Kohatchu]

Dis be Kohatchu callin at ya!

I think a pair of Anger 3 augments would be the best for a dual wield setup, but I found it was hard saving the points. I got a pair of Anger 2 augments and I find that I don't need anything more.

With WA 2 I find they proc really nice and I always have Incite to fall back on if I loose aggro. In my opinion don't let anyone tell you that you absolutely have to have Anger 3 to do a good job.

I have noticed the aggro concept of the /shield ability too, but I can't confirm it. I save the /shield for emergencies though. I have saved the lives of my healers or pullers several times with it, and I like to have it available when I need it.

[Cuthbadth]

I'm in a somewhat similar situation. I have the droga combo w/ cheap proc's, CA3, CS3, WA1. I think my agro is 800% better than before the warrior revamp...if the casters have SCS3 and it is not a necro, I can typically hold agro fairly well. But if the ranger has snare resisted 3+ times in a row, or the shaman has no SCS, I lose agro and the mob...I hate having to fetch a mob more than once. Considering I've recently been tanking Sewers (Plant) once a week and trying to ramp up for some Hard LDoN runs ... what should I spend my aa on?

I had anticpated doing PoP HP (PD3?), LR5, ID5 in that order (since I recently traded over 100 hp for more than 50 ac) and really want to get the 760 EF pants before getting anger 3 since my weapons aren't that great (yes, I know aug removal is otw, but it takes me awhile to earn over 1,000 points in LDoN and I feel pants are not something I can easily upgrade otherwise...and I was really eyeballing a 10 ac augment for my backslot after that before saving up for the 1k+ ldon items, just so I'd be over 1.4k ac w/o buffs and pretty close to 1.6k ac w/buffs+tribute).

With the above advice, I'm wondering if I should either go:
PD3, WA2 (I have WA1), LR5, ID5

or

WA2, PD3, LR5, ID5 (or possibly scale LR/ID like LR1/ID1, LR2/ID2)

any feedback would be appreciated.