Every time you heal a rogue*

While it's potentially blasphemous or irreverent, the title is pretty descriptive of how I feel. Especially when I'm healing a Karazhan or a Heroic, the rogues (and other DPS classes) don't get as much of my attention. My primary goal is to keep the tank(s) in a fully upright and locked position.

What this means to the DPS classes out there is this -- if you draw aggro, you're probably not going to be getting much of a healer's attention. You might; you might not. It really all sort of depends on what kind of shape the tank is in at the moment.

A good rule of thumb, perfectly summed up by my good friend Neith is "If it weren't for shadow priests, rogues would never get healed." And this goes perfectly well with other DPS classes (as noted in the footnote). You have a job to do, keep your aggro below the tank's aggro. That way the healer can more better focus his or her attention on the tank. It's less frenetic and more mana efficient.

Now, this isn't to say a healer expects you as a DPS class to take zero damage. There are area attacks. The monsters are going to try to give you chin music. But if you keep your aggro down, then all the hate can be focused on the tank. That makes it easy to focus all the healing on him or her as well.

* Insert the favorite DPS class here. They all apply.

Threat, Hate, Aggro

Over the weekend in our Karazhan raid I heard comments from a number of people about threat and specifically about the threat meters. I'm going to use fictitious names so as to not embarass anyone.

Single largest comment I heard was "I was 10K under the tank, why is he hitting me?" The answer is, there may be a number of reasons.

The first reason the mob may be hitting you when you're under the tank's threat is he may be programmed to do that. For instance, Attumen randomly charges a member of the raid after he mounts up. The skeletal chargers also do a random charge. It doesn't matter if you have zero threat. If you're in combat, you're a potential target. Another way mobs are programmed are being immune to taunt effects. When a tank loses the mob's focus, taunt is likely to be the first thing he tries (or growl or whatever) to get it back. If the mob is immune to taunt, you've got big problems.

Another reason for why the mob is hitting you may have to do with your meters. A couple of things may be going on. Threat meters are at best approximations. They collect a lot of data from your group, share it around through synching channels and graphically put the approximation of the mob's threat onto your screen. If you're cutting the line close you may actually be significantly higher than you think. Also, depending on the mod you're using it may be tracking actual threat against your targetted mob or residual threat over the whole fight. That's a question you'll have to find the answer to and then adjust your playstyle.

The third reason you may be drawing unwarranted threat? The hunter (or warlock or priest or...) Several classes have built in threat reducers. They use them and the mob pops right back onto the tank right? Well, not always. Let me explain.

If you're not in melee range of the primary threat (hopefully the tank), you must accumulate 130% threat to pull the mob's attention onto you. If you are in melee range, you need only 110% threat to pull aggro. Rogues, Feral Druids and DPS Warriors aren't the only ones who need know the 110% number though. Let me give you an example.

Example: You're in a run with my hunter, Bremagorn. He's providing sustained DPS on the monster while the tank is doing the meat-shielding. If I don't notice my threat creeping ever closer to the tanks and do something about it, I may land a lucky crit and BAM I'm at 131% of the tank's threat. The mob comes running for me, is about to poke me in the eye and I feign. The mob pops back to the tank right? Well, maybe. The tank is now probably OUTSIDE of melee range. The healer (or mage or warlock or..), however is probably INSIDE melee range. The mob probably is NOT going to run for the warrior. He's probably going to decide he'd like barbecued healer leg for dinner and pop the squishy priest.

You can also draw too much threat in other ways. Doing a full burn of your mana to do the most DPS you can is almost always going to get you dead. Especially if you lay into the mob when the mob isn't under the tank's control.

So, what's our object lessons here?

• Know how the threat meter you use (You DO use one right?) displays threat
• Slow down. Dead players contribute almost no DPS
• Before using your aggro dumping abilities, have a good idea WHO will take the aggro.
• Know that some mobs are programmed to do random things, be immune to taunt, or have no conventional aggro list.

Good luck out there.