Number Of Tanks in Naxx-25

By Boss, These are the predicted number of tanks that are needed. 

(According to my understanding)

Anub'Rekhan  -Three Tanks 

Faerlina - Three Tanks 

Maexxna - One Tank 

Noth - Three Tanks 

Heigan - One Tank 

Loatheb - One Tank 

Razuvious - One-Two Tanks 

Gothik - Two-Four Tanks 

4HM - Two Tanks 

Patchwerk - Three Tanks 

Grobbulus - Two Tanks

Gluth - Two-Three Tanks 

Thaddius - Two Tanks 

Sapphiron - One Tank 

Kel'Thuzad - Three-Four Tanks 

Five One Tank Fights

Five Two Tank Fights

Five Three Tank Fights

What is a raid leader (or tank officer) to do? Switching members between each boss, with so many bosses, just isn't an option if Naxx is going to get done in any sort of timely fashion. And even if you do, you have to have enough tanks at the ready to perform on the three tank fights, while not having so many that it could take a month to get a tank in for a single tank fight.

I think LOKI's plan will be to run with three tanks - Two being more pure Protection, and a third being a more offensive/threat/OT type. We currently have three protection warriors, one protection paladin that's out with computer issues, and another protection paladin who is swapping over from holy.

I issued the following note to our tanks earlier today... 

I'd just like to put it out there, that decisions regarding what Protection tanks are brought, may be influenced by their ability to DPS when not tanking, in order to justify a full three spots.

That's really what it comes to. It wouldn't be such a big issue if Dual-Spec's had been released yet, but they have not been. 

Regardless, I would suggest that all tanks stay current on their DPS gear/rotations. Cozy up to a friendly neighborhood DPS warrior and pick their brain, gem and enchant your DPS gear as if your raid spot depended on it, and know what buttons to press when - because as long as there are bosses that only need one tank, you may find yourself scrambling to justify getting to stand behind the boss instead of outside the instance. 

How Many Tanks ?

This question has plagued me for some time. How many full tanks do you need in a guild? Lets look at the various fights, and how many protection / feral tanks you may want.

Kara: Two for some fights, One for others. 

Gruul: Two for Gruul, as many as four for Maulgar

Magtheridon: As many as Five (depending on pre or post nerf).

T4 Summary: 2-5

SSC: 2-5 (Vashj is 2, Fathomlord is 4).

TK: 1-4 (Solarian is one, Kael/Alar is 4).

T5 Summary: 1-4

Hyjal: 1-2

BT: 1-3

T6 Summary: 1-3

Trend: The number of full tanks needed shrinks as you go up in Tiers (and I'm going with the assumption that you want a full time tank for progression fights) . On top of this, you assume that your going to recruit over the minimum, so that there are backups. Then there are considerations of tank types: you most certainly want a protection paladin for Hyjal, but you can't (without significant effort) have them tank Archimonde. Add a backup to each, and your looking at four tanks. Add another Protection warrior as a backup for Kael (where you may want two warriors, in addition to a protection paladin and a feral druid) - and now you have potential for five full time tanks logged on for a one tank fight (ie, Solarian, Archimonde, Najentus,  Teron, RoS). 

I'm curious to see how many tanks new 25 Man Raids will want. I'm excited that warriors and paladins will be generally interchangable, but concerned that it will put a squeeze on LOKI's fairly large tanking base (Three Protection Warriors, One Protection Paladins ((with a Holy that wants to Tank in Wrath)), and two Feral Druids). Worse off, I did the recruiting all in good faith, but now am not leading the tanking scene - leaving our new Tank Officer to deal with sorting it all out.

All of our tanks are great, and I don't want to leave any out - which is why I'm hoping for some generally higher number-of-tank requirements in Wrath. Hopefully, with the addition of the psudo-tanking Death Knight class (none of which we have players indicating strong desire to switch to) - encounters will be designed to better fit more tanks.