Now that you understand the basics of working in a group, its time to look at some of the finer points. What I detail in this section is all the little things that help groups work. Whether it is what a tank needs to understand about his task, or what the other players need to remember about the tanks task so that it is easier for him to do it successfully. Much of this section is simply point form items to remember.

What to when you are the:

Leader

• Make sure everyone knows what part of the instance or what bosses you are doing before going in, be clear.
• Make sure everyone knows that you are leading the group
• Make sure roles are clear. Everyone should know what their role is and what everyone else's roles are.
• Loot creates more arguments than anything else, make sure everyone knows the loot rules and be fair.
• Listen to what others want out of the group and try to accommodate within reason, but in the end make sure that the whole group stays on track, the final goal is really to complete the instance.

Tank

• Your important stat bonuses from equipment are stamina, defense, block, dodge and parry. Try to increase them as much as you can.
• Keep aggro on more than one target so that multi target or AOE abilities don't pull all the MOBs except one from you.
• Be ready to taunt any mob that goes to attack another target (unless your off tank just pulled him away)

Off-Tank

• Manages aggro in much the same way as the tank, but also picks out the next target to be killed.
• Calls out and or marks the new target that is to be killed.

Healer

• Don't waste mana on anything but healing spells or cleansing (decursing) spells
• Keep yourself alive
• Keep your tank alive
• Watch other cloth wearers life closely as they take damage as fast as you do!
• Conserve mana whenever you can, wait and cast a big heal instead of spamming small heals
• Remember the 5 second mana rule (you don't start regenerating mana for 5 seconds after a cast) and wait as long as possible in between casting spells.
• Announce when you are low on mana and out of mana (oom).
• If there are multiple healers, break up the healing chores, or set rotations for mana regeneration.
• If you have more than one healer in your group, make sure you all watch the health bars and cancel heals when someone else gets there first. It will save lots of mana in long fights.

Puller

• Handle all pulls as if you were the only person affected. Protect the group by pulling to you instead of to them, unless of course it is a super easy pull.
• The best methods to get out of bad pulls are to feign death or vanish, hence the reason a hunter or rogue should always pull.
• It is called "Pulling" for a reason! "Pull" or bring the MOBs back to you, don't rush into them.

Damage Dealers (DPS'ers)

• Manage your DPS and threat so that you do not pull aggro from the tanks
• Use an assist macro (as above)
• Make sure you have bandages and pots in case the healers have to save the tank instead of you!

AOE

• Make sure you are aware of what is around you when you AOE
• Preserve some mana to either escape, heal, shield or whatever else you may need to do to survive

Crowd Control

• Make sure you keep your target sheeped, shackled or banished until the group is ready for it. It may help to mark the target with a group mark on it so you don't loose track of it.
• Generally you should crowd control weak targets. That way when they are released and you have already taken damage, they are not going to overpower you.
• Generally you should crowd control caster or ranged MOBs over combat MOBs as they will stay at the rear of the fight and cause issues if left alone.

What to do to help the:

Leader

• If you are unclear on something, ask! If it still doesn't make sense ask again.
• Remember the leader is in charge, in the end it's their say. If you don't like it, finish the group and remember what they did that you didn't like and make sure you don't do that to anyone. You can discuss with them after as well if you want, but don't make a big deal about things in the middle of an instance, its a good way for a group to fold.

Tank

• Don't attack right away, give the tanks time to generate aggro.
• Do not run away from the tank or off-tank! move towards them when you accidentally get aggro
• If you draw aggro due to a big crit or too much steady damage, stop attacking until the tank has control again. If you have aggro management abilities, use them.
• Manage your attacks, and try not to pull aggro away from the tank.

Off-Tank

• You should always have a macro made to assist the off-tank so that you can easily pick out his target and help kill it. The macro is as simple to do as creating this one line in the macro area:
  

  /assist [player name]

Healer

• Keep aggro off of your healers! Target anything that attacks them and get it off of them.
• Do not run off around corners or even far away from your healer, they cant cast while running nor can they heal what they can't see.

Puller

• Stay where the Leader told you to, and let the puller do their job.

Damage Dealers (DPS'ers)

• Ensure there is a valid target and point in out or call it out in some way

AOE

• Make sure that in a fight that requires AOE that you try to bunch all the MOBs up so that the AOE'ers get as many as possible in the affected area.

Crowd Control

• Others should make sure that they don't DOT (damage over time) any of the MOBs marked for crowd control as it will break the control.
• Be very careful of using any AOE of multiple target ability when there are MOBs around under crowd control, it is very easy to break it.

Class Specific Strategies

Paladin

• Since you can do so many different things, ensure you know your role in the group and follow it.
• In general you will become a healer end game, remember though that in the undead instances you can provide very solid DPS.
• Remember that Divine Intervention can save the group from a wipe at the expense of a little repair bill. Keep the reagents on hand and be ready to use it if needed. Warn the person that you are doing it to so that they can get to a safe location first.

Mage

• Be careful with your AOE around crowd controlled MOBS
• Be careful with your flock. Sheep tend to wander and if you polymorph a MOB at distance they may wander into another group. This can get really messy when they pop, so try to pull them away from surrounding MOBs before you sheep them.
• You know people are going to bug you for water, so be ready for it. Always go to a group with a stock of water ready and just drop a stack or 2 in a trade window with them as you meet up. Yeah, being the group water fountain can be annoying, but if you give it out automatically then you don't have to listen for calls for it all the time.
• Control your DPS, and if you crit often, slow down. A healer can waste a ton of mana very quickly keeping you alive. Sometimes less is more, after all you can't cast when your dead.

Warlock

• Use your soul stone on one of the Rezzers, I know your used to using it on yourself while grinding, but in a group you cant save the rest, a rezzer can.
• Find out what pet is required or requested by the group, it may not be the one you want, but go with the group consensus.
• Control your DPS, and if you crit often, slow down. A healer can waste a ton of mana very quickly keeping you alive. Sometimes less is more, after all you can't cast when your dead.
• Ensure that your healers know that you can convert health to mana (yeah, they should by now, but you know some don't pay attention, and you are not a common class), so they can through you a heal when / if they have spare mana to bump your mana supply late in the fight.

Druid

• Since you can do so many different things, ensure you know your role in the group and follow it. Most of the time you will be invited to a group for healing, but if there is already a healer, check your role with the leader.
• Save your combat rez for when it is really needed, if unsure ask the group leader.

Shaman

• Since you can do so many different things, ensure you know your role in the group and follow it.
• Make sure you have reagents for rezzing and popping!
• Ask which totems are most wanted, sometimes it's not what you expect. Feel free to question it and explain which would be better, they may not know.

Priest

• Try to use your big heals only occasionally as they draw a ton of aggro, if your tank can control the aggro then go for it as they are more mana efficient, just be careful.
• Conversly to draw as little aggro as possible, HOT (heal over times) and small heals are better at not gaining the enemies attention. You must balance this with the above point.
• Shadow Word: Pain is a great spell and does good damage, that's why we all love it, just make sure you keep enough mana for healing, that's why your here (usually).
• Only use your AOE as a last resort or if you know the fight is fast, it eats you mana!

Hunter

• Use your tracking in the instance to keep track of MOBs around you.
• Pull away from the group and have feign death ready if things go wrong.
• Keep your pet away unless needed, it generally causes more problems than it solves.
• Remember to put out traps before a pull.
• Engineering is a great group friendly profession for Hunters, since if a fight goes bad you can feign death and then attempt to resurrect the group with jumper cables.
• Use Feign Death as a method to ensure you don't pull aggro. If you ever pull aggro, FD immediately and slow down a bit or FD more regularly.

Rogue

• When pulling in an instance never waste vanish to get extra damage, save it for pulls that go bad.
• Learn the amount of damage that you can do without pulling aggro and do about 90% of it so that you don't accidentally pull it when you string together a few crits in a row.
• Pull out of combat and use bandages when you need to, the healers will generally be busy on the tanks.
• Engineering is a great group friendly profession for Rogues, since if a fight goes bad you can vanish and then attempt to resurrect the group with jumper cables.

Warrior

• When pulling, don't Charge! Pull the MOBs back to you, so that you are not in an uncleared area.
• Don't worry about the damage that you inflict. Many tanks do less damage than the dedicated healers! You are there to control the fight, not actually win it by yourself.
• Maximize your ability to take damage
• If you are the tank, never leave defensive stance, the bonuses are just to good when you are tanking. I know that some fury warriors can hold aggro just by the amount of damage they put out, but that just makes the healers work even harder.

Have comments or suggestions? Thought of something that has been missed? Found an error? We would love to hear from you! Please email me at [email protected].