Literally my experience trying to tank +10 in BFA 
cant run dungeons so cant learn the routes because when i told them i’m new to routes they would leave haha
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- Its boring gameplay unless you really enjoy just smashing couple DPS buttons and properly time mitigation abilities. You do the same thing all the time 24/7.
- Its the higher responsibility since you have to lead or expected to do so.
- The only reward besides gameplay enjoyment (see point 1) is that you will never be jobless -> get more loot per hour.
- Besides point 3, the rest of tank’s life is an extremely unsatisfying and unrewarding due to:
a) Players behavior;
b) Game design, that implies that regardless of how good are you, your team will be hurt anyway with some unavoidable or hardly avoidable damage. Back in Classic - TBC tanks took damage and felt like they kept their team protected. This is no longer the case last decade because Blizzard want healers to share the task of keeping the whole team alive. You are no longer the defender of your team, you are just more effective sponge that takes like 50-60% of group damage. - Game design require less players in tank roles. Single tank in dungeon, two tanks in raids, on BG they are optional.
Thats why there are so little tanks.
I couldn’t complete a single dungeon because of tanks leaving so I decided to play Prot myself to beat dungeons. Except I couldn’t cause I had no gear.
So not true.
Prot pala is miles better than bfa, and way more fun.
The reality is in those two quotes, aggravated by the loot scarsicity that makes mantain a double role even more difficult:
Many people have already presented some good answers, and I shall echo them in my own way:
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Tank is a role with a lot of responsibility. In raids they need to position the boss well to enable the DPS to stick to it as long as possible, which means they need to move it when necessary, to avoid the mechanics and free up space for the DPS, especially the melee.
Tank in dungeons has an even greater responsibility. They lead the way, dictate the pulls, gather the mobs and position them in a safest and most efficient way. Also, they need to utilize their toolkit well, and know the mechanics of the dungeon in order to optimize the pulls and stay alive.
In short, tank role requires knowledge, experience and responsibility, which is not for everyone. Failing as a tank is far more punishing than failing as a DPS.
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A lot of tank mains prefer to play in an organized group. Pugs are often a jungle, a hostile and unforgiving environment, and it is far more relaxing to play with friends, guildmates or fellow community members, as coordination is better and the runs are almost always more successful than in a pug.
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Tanks need a thick skin and a lot of patience. As said before, pugs are a hostile environment, and people there usually lack patience and want fast and efficient clears, so making mistakes will often end up in the tank getting flamed (sometimes the healer as well). A lot of people see either incapable or unwilling to go through that.
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Tank does a lot les damage than a DPS, which makes it unappealing for most players.
Just my two cents.
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I tanked on my paladin since vanilla, but sort of stopped around cataclysm, the dungeons were getting more and more complex, with mechanics on every pack, and noone willing to cc or talk tactics for a few minutes here and there.
Nowadays dps will pull the boss if I take 2 seconds to check the boss abilities in dungeons i’ve not run before…so “no thanks” once again.
Funny thing is, the game doesn’t enforce this AT ALL.
Players choose it. Players choose to make the tank pick the route, mark a primary target, and throw the spear at Devos.
And then if a tank dares say “hello, I’m new to tanking” the group will actually voice their displeasure at this, or one person leaves immediately rather than let that tank learn their role.
I mean, some of us do our best to be encouraging and give a brief summary of boss fights before we hit them, and I hope the new tanks I’ve tried to help have kept at it and gone on to gain experience and confidence in that role. But there’s so much negative reaction to a tank who is any way less than perfect that it must be deeply demoralising.
Erm, it does. The tank dictates the pace of the entire dungeons. We do not have aoe taunts, so the tank more or less has to pull first and build some aggro early on to avoid mobs running all over the place.
And by the way - it’s fine that tanks are the most responsible role. They’re also one of the easiest roles to play, but the ease is offset by the responsibility.
I think the main reason why most people don’t play tanks is that everyone picks the best gear for damage, and wants to do top damage to feel good about themselves, but tanks… rarely do top damage.
People sim their gear and simming gives you the best damage output and tanks’ main concern is damage intake. Unless I missed something, you can’t really sim tank gear. Basically, tanks demand you to actually play the game and that’s a problem.
On the flip side, tanks are by far the role that gets to play the game the most. DPS and healers can sit in a dungeon queue for upwards of 20 minutes. For a tank, a minute is a long queue.
It isnt pvp viable, it has very limited use in raids, you have to know every single strat of the fight unlike rest of the roles, you have to have a clear plan and study all m+ routes and yea, if you route doesnt fit to what certain individuals in your group are used to, they cant resist the urge to tell you that.
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I used to play tank, quite a lot.
I see a lot of people saying that they don’t tank for pugs/tanks just go with a guild group and/or friends. I just quit playing tanks because they got a bit boring really…
That’s just me though!
What I mean is, it’s not necessarily the tank’s job to know the optimal route for M+ %, but players assume they will.
Anyone in the party could take charge and mark a skull on the focus mob of the next pack when there’s a choice of multiple, but nobody ever wants to.
My conclusion is most players aren’t trying to be as good as they can be, but rather, to be as lazy as possible and move as much responsibility off to someone else as they can.
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What can we say, some even think that it’s the tank’s responsibility to fix the Mists maze. In other words: it is simply frustrating to tank for lazy, cocky or bad pug dpses. Simple.
Lol, then try to play a healer.
The last part 100% is it.
The issue is the growth of the tank playerbase is very slow compared to the demand. This is because the reaction to “tanks in training” in pugs is generally negative. People generally tolerate tanks only who know what they’re doing, which means only those who are knowledgeable in tanking already are accepted, whereas those looking to move into the role are not.
Often these tanks move into guild or community groups and thus never run a pug again.
A new DPS is capable of flying under the radar In a group, hiding under the wings of capable DPS in the group, following everyone else, generally they will draw little attention to themselves and “learn the run” as they go. Case in point my first SD run was a +6 SD. I had no idea beyond DJ or strata at all.
A new tank sticks out like a sore thumb. They dictate the pace and speed and generally speaking a lot of pug players can’t think to spare 2-3 minutes to explain stuff to a tank who declares they’re new, theyd rather not explain, wipe and then harass the tank and wait for a new one.
I mean many new tanks are afraid to ask for help with routes, or strats, because the expectation is they know it, or should have spent time watching videos prior or reading up on it.
How many videos did I watch as DPS before each dungeon? Zero.
I will say as a tank Mainer in BFA I miss the group availability though so my next char is probably going to be a tank but I will stick to community as before, because why on earth should I tank for a bunch of mouthy backseat drivers when learning when I could tank for people who explain, put me at ease and generally help me nail it first time? Absolute no brainer.
It’s not about treating tanks like they’re god’s gift. But rather if people are whinging there are no tanks, then encourage new ones and help teach them rather than slap them down.
“ain’t my job” true. But if you aren’t going to contribute to the solution then don’t be surprised if everyone else concludes the same and nothing changes.
DR Seuss put it best “unless someone like you cares an awful lot, things are not going to get better, they’re not.”
Sometimes things would get infinitely better if just one person takes one minute to “be the nice guy” rather than default to the lazy gamer trope of “not my job to lecture newbs”.
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Wełl, same rules apply pretty much 
only luck is that there is usually not an extreme shortage of healers.
- Less raid spots. While 5mans require 20% tank players, raid comps require a lot less. So there are fewer tanks for 5mans than any other role.
- More responsibility. Being a tank in a 5man requires the most knowledge of the dungeon. And also unlike damage dealers if you perform poorly it will not go unnoticed.
I tank, however I don’t have many effs to give.
People expect tanks to lead the dungeon group, at the same time they don’t like that.
The reverse is some tanks are entitled and when people try suggesting one thing or another they get all snarly.
It’s a case of people being crap for both tanks and the group.
because most are bad and cant take criticism. the good tanks are with guilds/premades
another reason that players dont play tanks is due to poor solo performance. takes 2x time to kill a mob than dps spec
I would argue that there are plenty of tanks, the absolute majority just refuses to PuG
When out in the open world I often see a tank at most rare or WQ fights
Personally I would rather not do a dungeon if I only had enough friends to fill 4 out of 5 dungeon slots, there is 0 incentive Blizzard can offer me to change that mindset because it’s not a mindset that is to blame on the mechanics of the game (which means it cannot be fixed by changing mechanics of the game)
Because people scare the crap out of me. Yet I’ll happily pick up tanking if someone leaves because I feel like there is less pressure on me to do well. If I had just friends to do groups with I’d consider tanking or healing but with Pugs NOPE
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