Last
week I mentioned us having a shortage of tanks and healers in the free
company - for those who are considering working on Paladin/Warrior, I
thought I should probably go over Provoke 101. I noticed some people
didn't know how the ability worked and were interested in tanking, so
I'll do my best.
All actions in game have a hidden hate variable
that's associated to it. A tank's job is to be able to use/combo actions
so their hate variable is higher than the others.
The purpose
of Provoke is to match you with 1 hate point higher than the person with
the highest amount of hate. For example: If Paladin A has 0 accumulated
hate points, and Paladin B has been tanking the whole fight and has,
say, 136,331 accumulated hate points, then Paladin A using Provoke will
put him instantly at 136,332 accumulated hate points. Paladin B has to
immediately stop what they're doing, or they can easily take back
attention from the monster.
A good tip (and this is what I do) is
if you know there's going to be something that you'll need to solidify
hate, and quickly. Start the combo on another monster (but don't finish
it) use Provoke to match the other tank, and then finish the combo. The
added hate from finishing the combo will put you a good amount ahead of
your fellow tank which allows him/her to continue doing what they're
doing without having to rip it off.
One last thing, say you use
Provoke on a monster to pull it, and no one has any accumulated hate on
it. That would give you a grand total of 1 hate point, and anyone can
grab it off of you. Never use Provoke to grab adds or anything without
accumulated hate. Use Shield Lob or throw a Tomahawk. Repeatedly if you
have to. (Or Flash/Overpower if there's a group)
Hopefully this helps any FC members interested in tanking.