I agree in practice with the idea of engaging every mob with a caveat. As a warrior when a bad pull such as what you described happens it is my job to tag each mob and taunt them to get their attention. I will then switch back to the most deadly opponent and focus on him only switching to the other two to keep the taunt up. There is no reason, if I'm doing my job correctly as the tank, to have a priest die on my watch.
Things become harder when you are playing a paladin as your main tank in a group. Again, it is the paladin's main job to maintain aggro in a situation like that. The main ways to do this is through the free cast crusader strike and to HEAL the Priest/druid or mage. There are also a couple of seals that assist the paladin in maintaining aggro and should be used in dire cases such as the Hamhock pull.
A rogue shouldn't be required to tank but can also be used to pull aggro away from a priest with their superior DPS.
It sounds like you've had some bad players in your party TD. I should also point out that in higher level instances the plan of dividing to conquer (ie each player try to solo an elite mob so the priest, etc can heal) is the quick route to a dirt nap. Once the priest and druid run outta mana before the mobs are killed the whole party is going south in a hurry.
Edit: As far as last night with engaging different mobs that worked better in our case because of the number of levels we all had on our opponents. I think Bolty was the smallest and he was 2 to 3 levels higher than the mobs we faced. I concentrated on Smite after pulling the stealthed mobs because I knew they would stay on me with Taunt.
Edit 2: I see where you're going to with this TheDragoon - just wanted to clarify that I think the problem has more to do with people not knowing how their classes can maintian aggro and how to work as a team in keeping the cloth/leather wearers safe.
Things become harder when you are playing a paladin as your main tank in a group. Again, it is the paladin's main job to maintain aggro in a situation like that. The main ways to do this is through the free cast crusader strike and to HEAL the Priest/druid or mage. There are also a couple of seals that assist the paladin in maintaining aggro and should be used in dire cases such as the Hamhock pull.
A rogue shouldn't be required to tank but can also be used to pull aggro away from a priest with their superior DPS.
It sounds like you've had some bad players in your party TD. I should also point out that in higher level instances the plan of dividing to conquer (ie each player try to solo an elite mob so the priest, etc can heal) is the quick route to a dirt nap. Once the priest and druid run outta mana before the mobs are killed the whole party is going south in a hurry.
Edit: As far as last night with engaging different mobs that worked better in our case because of the number of levels we all had on our opponents. I think Bolty was the smallest and he was 2 to 3 levels higher than the mobs we faced. I concentrated on Smite after pulling the stealthed mobs because I knew they would stay on me with Taunt.
Edit 2: I see where you're going to with this TheDragoon - just wanted to clarify that I think the problem has more to do with people not knowing how their classes can maintian aggro and how to work as a team in keeping the cloth/leather wearers safe.