I just wanted to share a tip for new tanks during their trash pulls. I've been noticing a very common mistake as I level the last of my healers to 90, sometimes I even seen done by battle mentors. The mistake is opening up with their ranged GCD when grabbing trash packs.

I know the line of thought is that by aggroing them early, they'll funnel into your AOE when you two meet. However, the 2.5 GCD timer is horrendously long and you usually have to stall your forward sprint to catch them.

Additionally, this is very dangerous for the party. If your party is sticking with you and AOEing as you're going, which in an optimal situation most non casters will be, they're getting aggro. If your healer is a scholar, they're getting smashed by just being in the vicinity because of their fairy.

Ideally you'd just run forward and open up with your GCD AOE and voke/range whatever you miss using the aggro list. The monster will usually funnel just from detection range or a ranged allies attacks anyways and it's usually easier to catch 1 or two mobs missed over an entire pack rushing past you.

It's not always necessary, especially in a few dungeons where mob density tends to be low. Unfortunately, it's a mistake that can put your party in needless danger in high density dungeons, like the packed room in Sirensong Sea that'll aggro at once off the ranged skill. Sure, you'll have aggro back by your next GCD. However, In the end, it's a lot of extra damage you could be preventing and would save your healers a lot of resources they shouldn't need to use. Running out of healing resources is usually what ends up getting a party to wipe during W2W pulls and the bulk of it is usually needed when the tank stops and the mobs finally crash.

I know that the tanks that need to hear this advice the most wont care. However, for those who do, this easy adjustment would make things easier on your party and make runs a lot smoother