Thread: How to most effectively throttle DPS so I don't pull aggro?

I ran Filikul today(my first raid) as a Champ and I never pulled aggro off our tanks because I slowed my skill rotations down but I feel like I wasn't contributing enough to the group.

As a Champion, assuming you are in the correct stance use Ebbing Ire every time it is up.

Thankyouthankyouthankyouthanky outhankyou for being one of the dismally small percentage of champs in the game (on any server) that has figured out that threat and aggro management is not the sole domain of the tank! The vast majority have a concept of playing a champ that basically involves "so you make shingshing as fast as you can and the big thing falls down right?" and it makes it an absolute nightmare on some runs, regardless if you're a guard or a warden, when you spend all your time pulling aggro back off the champ that is dpsing full bore (often on the wrong target) and wondering why he's dying all the time.

That being said... ebbing ire (in the correct stance) will lower your threat.. as well running in specific stances as well. One trick I've seen champs in my kinship do is stance swap during a fight. We've tried this during dargnakh unleashed and fangorn, and dropping all stances when you want enemies to ignore you (torches and dargnakh) is actually very effective in reducing overall threat, and therefore reduces the amount of aggro you gain. Wait for the tank to grab a nice solid lock on aggro, then get in there and deal some damage. If you think you're going to pull aggro, drop out of your stances (or to one specifically made to reduce threat) for 10 seconds, then switch back and crank up the damage again. Once it's properly locked, it should be very, very hard for a dps class to pull aggro off a decent tank.

Originally Posted by Able_Seacat_Simon

I ran Filikul today(my first raid) as a Champ and I never pulled aggro off our tanks because I slowed my skill rotations down but I feel like I wasn't contributing enough to the group.

Allowing the tank(s) to control the fight, and by extension allowing the healer(s) to focus on keeping everyone alive with a clear expectation of where the damage is going to go, is a huge contribution to the group. Way more than a little bit more DPS contributes.

But as others have said this really should only be a problem if your tank is below your level - perhaps if you're running Filikul with a L60 Tank and a few L75 DPS. If your tank is the same level as you they shouldn't have a problem holding threat, provided you start off a little slower and build up. If it's a Warden tanking give them a little more time than a Guard, Guard's are better in those initial seconds of threat generation since they just have to press buttons and not worry about building gambits. Once the boss hits 2/3 health being on maximum DPS should cause no problems for an on-level tank. Especially if you're sending Ebbing Ire over regularly.

There are 3 situations you have to prefer for as a champ:

1. Good warden tank - just go nuts, use every skill and buff you have and you won't pull aggro anyway.

2. Good guardian tank - don't use seeking blade or CB right away, you should also hold off on remorseless in case you get a random dev or crit. Guards rely on block and parry responses to really build their threat, so use your pip builders, get rend up and ticking, get power regen going, once the guard has been hit a few times, you go seeking into remorseless, build pips and then ebbing ire. This should put the guard so far ahead you can just go nuts for the rest of the fight.

3. Bad guardian, warden or champ or cappy tank - you really need to start slow, don't waste ebbing until you have done some damage and build up some threat. Seeking blade and remorseless are finishers only unless you are dealing with a champ tank and you are the rising ire target in which case just go nuts, the tank will use your threat to build their own.

There is 1 really big exception, in any boss fight where the tank needs to run away from the boss, you need to scale down DPS when the tank is away - for instance in T2 lightning wing when the tank is about to explode.

What everyone has said holds generally true.

To be safe its always a good idea to start DPS slow for several seconds for most tanks - wardens may need a little more time than Guards. For any good tank this will 95% of the time be enough to keep aggro from you but you will still need to throw on Ebbing when you can for long fights to ensure you don't pull it but also to allow the huntards and RK's to go strong as well. Champs used to have more aggro management ability (we still have it but have to jump in and out of stances). Once you know the tanks you are working with you will get a better sense of what you need to do. Some tanks you will be able to start strong from the start. Most importantly it will always harm the party if you pull aggro at a time you are not supposed to so missing out on 2000 dps versus wiping the group is not worthwhile.

Also if you do pull aggro - notice it and if the tank does not immediately grab aggro back then you are now the tank and need to respond accordingly until he does take aggro back. Rotate to where the tank was so the boss does not attack the group with frontal AOE - pull off your dps - ebb if you have it off cool down etc...

For Filikful though - go crazy pull aggro - its the Turtle. Ebb when you can and the tanks will then take aggro back.

Originally Posted by garetjax8

What everyone has said holds generally true.

To be safe its always a good idea to start DPS slow for several seconds for most tanks - wardens may need a little more time than Guards. For any good tank this will 95% of the time be enough to keep aggro from you but you will still need to throw on Ebbing when you can for long fights to ensure you don't pull it but also to allow the huntards and RK's to go strong as well. Champs used to have more aggro management ability (we still have it but have to jump in and out of stances). Once you know the tanks you are working with you will get a better sense of what you need to do. Some tanks you will be able to start strong from the start. Most importantly it will always harm the party if you pull aggro at a time you are not supposed to so missing out on 2000 dps versus wiping the group is not worthwhile.

Also if you do pull aggro - notice it and if the tank does not immediately grab aggro back then you are now the tank and need to respond accordingly until he does take aggro back. Rotate to where the tank was so the boss does not attack the group with frontal AOE - pull off your dps - ebb if you have it off cool down etc...

For Filikful though - go crazy pull aggro - its the Turtle. Ebb when you can and the tanks will then take aggro back.

I agree with this - you need to know where you keep glory because if you get aggro and the tank doesn't have a taunt ready you have to pop glory and true heroics right away to give the healer a chance to catch up with a new tank. I have tanked the troll boss in foundry a number of times because a guardian was shy with his shield, just go in glory, get in position so the entire group doesn't get wiped out by his aoe and have your back free so you don't get fried.

For easier bosses like foundry, turtles etc, just go nuts any decent healer can keep you alive. It is really when you get to ToO and RoF you need to worry a bit, but by then you should be running with tanks who know how to keep aggro.

You should never have to "throttle" your dps. If you need to do that, there is a serious problem. However, you should do whatever you class can to reduce threat -- in your case, ebb is very important, as are any traits and legacies that improve it. You may also consider that other things should be eating into your dps for a long fight: hit your second wind every time it is up, and if you are not doing the raid over-level (you are level 60?). Doing the raid over-level means more crits, and fewer misses. In an on-level raid, you will miss the boss a fair amount, crit less often, do less damage (armor ratings and level -- magic formulae that I do not understand) and other factors naturally reduce your dps to a level the tank should be able to handle.


I assume by dps throttle, you mean all the time, throughout the boss fight. I recommend, and do not consider it to be a throttle, to start slowly. Frenzy - megacrit RS - other fervor gain skill - swift - megacrit RS resulting in 6k+++ damage in the first 5 seconds of the pull is not the best way to help your tank out. Instead, try a more relaxed approach to the first moments of battle: fire off second wind, build some fervor, rend its armor, work up to a RS or BS or whatever you use, save frenzy after you have done some low damage things and the tank has had some quality time with the enemy. In other fights (turtle is timed) that are not timed, you can just do nothing at all for 30 seconds and that is often enough for the tank to lead your aggro (assuming you used ebb when you could) for the rest of the fight.

I assume by dps throttle, you mean all the time, throughout the boss fight.

The term ''throttle'' says nothing about ''all the time'' - it merely means to control, to limit. Maybe for a moment, maybe for the whole fight - that is a separate thought.

Originally Posted by forusrname

You should never have to "throttle" your dps. If you need to do that, there is a serious problem...

I'd disagree with this, at least in part. The ''serious problem'' could simply be that the character is higher level than the Tank, and able to do more dps than the tank can account for. Hardly ''serious''.

And even with all their Threat-grabbing skills, tanks sometimes cannot hold aggro from max-gear/virtue dps classes - the only ''problem'', then, is how those toons can throttle their aggro-grabbing dps. And so here we are.


Fellowships that work together often use the following basic approach - nickel and dime the Boss until you get it down to about 1/2 or 1/3 Morale, and then cut loose, dogpile the mother, max dps mode. If someone pulls aggro off it's no problem, too late for the boss, done deal. (This requires a competent Healer, and doesn't work with every Instance, depending on the exact situation presented - but it's a basic approach that works.)

You do not necessarily need to throttle or reduce damage all the time. Especially in something like Filikul because that fight is essentially timed and you need to have high damage. Given that you're a champion you can take the damage long enough for the tanks to regain aggro. In fact, a champion with heavy armor should not necessarily panic about stealing aggro except in cases where it would ruin the fight. If the main tank is competent you will have a tough time stealing aggro anyway to be fair.

This game is not like some other MMOs I've been in where any mistake of this sort guarantees a wipe, where even healers have to carefully ration their heals to avoid stealing threat from the tank. This game is a lot more relaxed most of the time and people can make mistakes and the other players won't notice or care (for the most part).

Basically use your ebbing ire when you can. If there are multiple enemies than follow the main target assist, and if that's you burn down the weaker enemies first, then when you move on to the main boss the tank will have so much threat you won't be able to take it (and if you do the tank can get it right back with some skills). In some fights you may need to take on some enemies and have them target you, if the tank does not have enough mitigation to handle all enemies simultaneously. As a champion you should also try to get some initial threat on any new adds that appear before they go after the healer, then the main tank can pull them off you when ready and able.

If you're higher level than the main tank, then maybe you should be the main tank instead.

Here's another good point: you want to have higher threat than most other characters except the main tank! Then if the main tank is defeated the enemies come after you instead of the squishier classes. Sometimes a tank is just stunned, sometimes the boss is defined to attack #2 on the threat list, and so on. So as a heavy armor wearer you do not want to be last on the threat list.

that is a good point, I was thinking endgame raids / on-level content, not mixed groups where one person is much more powerful than the rest. In such cases, the high level person would have to cut back, of course.

Originally Posted by C-Hound

I'd disagree with this, at least in part. The ''serious problem'' could simply be that the character is higher level than the Tank, and able to do more dps than the tank can account for. Hardly ''serious''.

And even with all their Threat-grabbing skills, tanks sometimes cannot hold aggro from max-gear/virtue dps classes - the only ''problem'', then, is how those toons can throttle their aggro-grabbing dps. And so here we are.


Fellowships that work together often use the following basic approach - nickel and dime the Boss until you get it down to about 1/2 or 1/3 Morale, and then cut loose, dogpile the mother, max dps mode. If someone pulls aggro off it's no problem, too late for the boss, done deal. (This requires a competent Healer, and doesn't work with every Instance, depending on the exact situation presented - but it's a basic approach that works.)

I can pretty reliably get aggro off of Guardians if I go full on dps - with a warden not so much, once they get their leach up and going they really get ahead.

It all comes down to who is tanking. You should get a good idea of your server's tanks after running a few instances but even with someone you've never seen before you can judge if he is a competent tank or not pretty fast.
If the tank knows what he's doing - you can't pull aggro no matter what. Of course we assume that you do not start the fight with your hardest skill (Heart seeker, Remorseless strike etc) but after a few seconds you should be able to go nuts. Any threat "throttling" you will need to do will be in the very beginning of a fight (as a champ you should be using ebb through the entire fight anyways).
If the tank is mediocre then you will have to judge by his ability and if you pull aggro just ebb and slow down.