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Stat Breakdown: Mythic+ Tanks Before & After Recent Changes



On March 26th, Blizzard announced some pretty significant changes to tank survivability across the board. A bug had been detected that was causing Vengeance Demon Hunters to take 15% less magic damage than intended. Instead of just fixing this bug and calling it a day, the developers took this time to also address concerns about tank survivability (or rather the lack thereof) of the remaining tank classes, especially in Mythic+. They decided to implement a +10% damage reduction across the board for all non-DH tanks.

To read the Blue post discussing these changes, click here.

These changes all went live with this past reset, so we wanted to take a look at some of the Mythic+ data we collect and see if there was any noticeable impact. We were curious to see if participation numbers of non-DH tanks had changed, and also if their success rates had improved at all. We've separated the data by our team bracket system as follows:


  • Diamond: +26 and up
  • Platinum: +21 - 25
  • Gold: +16 - 20
  • Silver: +11 - 15
  • Bronze: +2 - 10



Tank Participation by Class, Week 5



Week 5 of the Mythic+ Season was the last time we saw the affixes of Fortified, Sanguine, Quaking, and Prideful together, the same affix combination of this past reset. We wanted to get a sense of the data pre-and-post tank survivability changes when the affixes were the same. Keep in mind gear levels will certainly have increased across the board since Week 5, but in terms of participation numbers, we do not believe that will have much impact.

TOTAL KEYS RUN (TIMED AND NOT TIMED)

Bracket# of KeysDHMonkDKDruidWarriorPaladin
Diamond00%0%0%0%0%0%
Platinum21587%7.4%0.9%3.3%0%1.4%
Gold67,02855.2%17.1%5.2%9%2.6%10.9%
Silver645,38138%14.7%9.2%11.5%5%21.5%
Bronze1,245,59928.5%10.7%11.2%12.4%8.4%28.8%


Tank Participation by Class, Week 16



Last week was Week 16 of the Mythic+ Season, so the last week before the tank survivability changes were implemented. When we looked at the data, this is what we found:

TOTAL KEYS RUN (TIMED AND NOT TIMED)

Bracket# of KeysDHMonkDKDruidWarriorPaladin
Diamond00%0%0%0%0%0%
Platinum65574.5%8.2%2.1%7.3%2.7%5.2%
Gold123,64242.6%11.8%7%13.4%6.7%18.5%
Silver566,20436.2%10.4%8.7%14.2%9.2%21.5%
Bronze591,71829.3%8.2%10.1%14.5%13%24.9%


Tank Participation by Class, Week 17



Now onto the data from the first week after the changes to tank survivability:

TOTAL KEYS RUN (TIMED AND NOT TIMED)

Bracket# of KeysDHMonkDKDruidWarriorPaladin
Diamond6100%0%0%0%0%0%
Platinum9,66162.2%12.4%4%10.2%3.9%7.3%
Gold221,33637.5%12.2%8.9%15.7%7.6%18%
Silver550,74430.7%10%10.5%15.7%10.5%22.8%
Bronze434,71626.6%8.4%10.6%15%13.7%25.7%


Dratnalysis
These tables do a fantastic job of telling the story of tanks in Shadowlands Season 1. Early on, Demon Hunters double jumped to the top of the ladder based on a combination of their Mythic+ tuning and their prevalence in Castle Nathria leading more of the top-end players to the spec. As time went on, several smaller buffs went out to other tank specs, and the average keystone level rose, increasing the representation of other specs across all levels.

When the tank buffs hit, they granted all non-Vengeance tanks a 10% Damage Reduction buff across the board, while Vengeance only got a 5% Physical Damage Reduction buff along with a 10% Magic Damage Reduction nerf. Immediately, we can see the population of other tank specs spiking up, especially at the mid levels of keys. This effect will likely continue for several weeks as it takes some time for nerfs and buffs to really take hold in the representation numbers since people have to gear up their new characters if they want to switch.




As previously mentioned, we are not only interested in whether or not overall participation numbers changed, but whether or not success rates of the various tank classes changed. To examine this more closely, we looked at only keys that were completed in time.


Tank Success Rate by Class, Week 5



TOTAL KEYS COMPLETED IN TIME

Bracket# of KeysDHMonkDKDruidWarriorPaladin
Diamond00%0%0%0%0%0%
Platinum13189.3%7.6%0%2.3%0%0.8%
Gold43,91557.7%17.3%4.7%8.3%2.3%9.6%
Silver410,01840.6%15.2%8.4%11.1%4.5%20.3%
Bronze932,43330.3%10.8%10.5%12.2%7.8%28.4%


Tank Success Rate by Class, Week 16



TOTAL KEYS COMPLETED IN TIME

Bracket# of KeysDHMonkDKDruidWarriorPaladin
Diamond00%0%0%0%0%0%
Platinum35876.8%9.2%7%5.3%2.2%4.5%
Gold87,78644.8%12.2%6.4%12.7%6.3%17.6%
Silver438,41338.2%10.5%8.2%13.7%8.7%20.7%
Bronze530,13529.8%8.3%10%14.5%13%24.5%


Tank Success Rate by Class, Week 17



TOTAL KEYS COMPLETED IN TIME

Bracket# of KeysDHMonkDKDruidWarriorPaladin
Diamond4100%0%0%0%0%0%
Platinum5,97864.1%12.4%3.7%9.7%3.9%6.2%
Gold143.29038.4%12.8%8.4%15.7%7.6%17.1%
Silver369,03731.8%10.5%10%15.6%10.3%21.8%
Bronze362,27327%8.6%10.5%15%13.8%25.2%


Dratnalysis
The in-time-only metric paints largely the same picture as the participation numbers, with most cells of the table landing within a percentage point or two of their counterparts. It's interesting to note that the two specs that slightly overperformed their participation numbers were Warriors and Demon Hunters, perhaps suggesting that Warriors may be situated to rise even more in the coming weeks. It's also likely that the non-Demon Hunter specs will continue to improve in this metric as their pilots and teammates both gain more experience with them.


After reviewing all of our findings, we see that participation of non-meta classes has indeed been increasing ever since the latest tank survivability hotfixes. Have you noticed a big improvement in tanking since the changes? Shoot us a Tweet and let us know what you think! Happy tanking.



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About the Author


Hulahoops has been playing WoW since Vanilla. If she’s not leading her Mythic Progression guild TBD through raids, she’s probably practicing for the MDI with her team Angry Toast. Hulahoops is a Holy Paladin in every sense of the term: she moderates the Hammer of Wrath Paladin Class Discord, and she was a practicing Lawyer for the last 7 years. Judgment isn’t just a spell! Hulahoops recently decided to put the law books away and follow her passion for esports by joining the team at RaiderIO and is now working as the Production Manager. She is also passionate about making Azeroth an inclusive, welcoming space for all gamers and is a proud co-founder of the Defias Sisterhood community.