Tank with least button bloat (beginner here)

[Nevermonk-blackmoore]

@Deadpimple-nethergarde-keep

I wanted to try out tanking for my first time but overwhelmed with the all the choices. I thought that maybe a tank with not many buttons and focused on the core elements of tanking would be the best choice.

if you want to focus on tanking and dont have so much to do with your group (offhealing/brezz/support), then it would be blood dk in my opinion.
Try to survive and cc the mobs, maybe a brezz for your mates, but thats all x)

big plus, you dont have so many buttons to press (brewmaster is the worst atm)

[Elysia-die-todeskrallen]

Going by how easy the class is to pick up any play, I’d say Warrior. Warriors already come with pretty good passive mitigation out of the box, and active mitigation mechanics are fairly easy to grasp and execute. Warriors might come with a couple extra buttons over, say, a DH, but I think a Warrior is still more forgiving to actually play in a dungeon. Also, plate does offer a wide array of cool transmog opportunities.

DK is a lot of fun too, but rune and runic power management can be a bit of a pain in the backside sometimes. Still, fun spec to play and has a couple of really great transmog options Warriors don’t get.

I’ve only really healed DHs rather than actively played one myself, but the difference between a good DH and a bad one can be felt hard as a healer. A bad DH will feel like a Mage trying to tank. I’d probably not recommend DH tanking to a beginner, but take it with a grain of salt… I don’t have first hand experience.

[Ishayo-tarren-mill]

@Moistpirate-frostmane

To avoid the bear butt just play zandalari troll druid and you can be a cool dinosaur .

Who cares about avoiding the bear. The whole spec is junk now. It’s not just weak, it’s awful to play. It’s like playing a cruel form of whack-a-mole and there’s 0 depth.

[Bregastrasz-pozzo-delleternità]

@Jìmusa-draenor

idk if I would really recommend blood dk to a beginner though given how it’s the most unforgiving tank to play. maybe something like prot warrior would be better

It become unforgiving after a certain range of keys imo, and that range is way over 20s.

The only real DK game is managing RP/ Runes, (BS above 5 isnt really something hard to do).

The mitigation is completely straightforward, even your cds are pretty simple and short, which allows a good rotation of cds for basically everything.

The unforgiveness comes from the fact that your mitigation is healing and so the class do dip low often.

Lets not forget you have a 4 min purgatory as well, which is a huge help while learning the class and dungeons.
Death grip solve postional mistakes rather easily.
Ams trivialize a lot of mechanics.

[Gráinne-earthen-ring]

@Tyssera-ravencrest

In my opinion prot pala is the easiest tank to get started with

At first I thought “Naah, no way,” but then …

Yeah. That makes sense. You just need to ignore a bunch of buttons you won’t use 98% of the time anyway.

You have a regular rotation

• Keep Consecration up
• Shield of the Righteous when available
• use Judgment for pulls and whenever available
• use Avenger’s Shield for pack pulls
• Spam Blessed Hammer/Hammer of the Righteous when standing in your Consecration
• Hammer of Wrath when available

Then you have Word of Glory when you’re low on health and need an instant heal

Those 7 keys are going to be 90% of your keystrokes.

Divine Steed ain’t the greatest speedup, but it’s there.

You may optionally take Divine Toll, which is fun.

You have Avenging Wrath/Sentinel and Guardian of Ancient Kings for powerup cooldowns every couple of minutes

You have

• Divine Shield - 8 seconds of invulnerabiliy - and
• Lay on Hands - a 100% heal

You also have an interrupt, like everyone else

• Rebuke

If you take all of those, we’re up to 14 buttons, 7 regular, and 7 when needed.

That leaves a bunch of utilities on the cutting-room floor, but it will more than get you through low keys. And you can start adding more as you feel like it when you get comfortable or have the need for it.

And as Tyssera said:

@Tyssera-ravencrest

it’s tanking at its most obvious. You do damage to get aggro and use defensives to mitigate incoming damage.

I would suggest watching YouTubes of each tank you’re interested in, not to learn the abilities, but to see whether you like that playstyle.

I would also suggest you read the “Easy Mode” page for the tanks you’re interested in on icy-veins.com - the “Easy Mode” page, not the full thing - to see what it takes to get each tank going.

[Kyoth-argent-dawn]

It depends on what you want to do with it. Brewmaster is pretty safe for lower difficulty content once you start reaching certain ilvl thresholds, where opting for less buttons does not impact your performance too much.

Otherwise for mid to high end content I would not recommend it, as the spec has a lot of buttons (I think the third most bloated specs in game). It is a really powerful tanking spec once you learn to tank on it.

Plus it is amusing to trash DPS on the meters on pulls where you have CDs/trinket up.

[Lilíith-draenor]

@Ishayo-tarren-mill

@Moistpirate-frostmane

To avoid the bear butt just play zandalari troll druid and you can be a cool dinosaur .

Who cares about avoiding the bear. The whole spec is junk now. It’s not just weak, it’s awful to play. It’s like playing a cruel form of whack-a-mole and there’s 0 depth.

and here i have a lot of fun on my bear - exactly because of how it is now

not everyone looks for super complicated stuff when playing games.

[Náia-argent-dawn (Náia)]

Bear is not as simple as some want to claim.
I consider warrior and paladin a better choice for simpleness.

I also consider the reality;
All tanks are fairly equal on the complexity scale if you care about how you play; or your surrounding cares about your performance.

The best choice for you is simple;
Play what you enjoy. Try them all more or less and see which one fits your flow.

[Ishayo-tarren-mill]

@Lilíith-draenor

and here i have a lot of fun on my bear - exactly because of how it is now

not everyone looks for super complicated stuff when playing games.

Yeah well, Blizzard has managed to permanently chase me off my main for like 15 years already with what I consider the current trash iteration of Feral/Guardian so there’s really no more damage they can do to me on that front. It’s already absolutely rock bottom.

Enjoy your RSI machine with the depth of keyboard facerolling. I don’t care anymore.