Is Prot Pally a good Tank spec for begginer tanks?

[LightBR]

Hi everyone,

Our guild has only two tanks, they have a pretty solid attedance making to the vast majority of raids, but when one of them can't make we can't raid.

I have been wanting to try out tanking for some timw now and would like to ask if Prot Pally is a good class to tackle the role. WE have a Bear (main) and a Prot Warrior from what I've gathered Blood DK and BrM Monk aren't really in a good spot atm.

Thanks for any tips or advices, oh btw where is the best place to go for best guides and such?

Cheers,
Light

[CParker1987]

We have a prot pally in my raid and he is one of the easiest tanks ive ever healed (im a MW). That said I am sure it depends on the player a lot of times. Icy veins is a good sight

[Zabuzan]

I'd say that in terms of playing a tank class at a high level, Paladin is one of the more complicated ones because of the options and utility. Has (imo) the most OP active mit ability in the game, but outside of that uptime we are very squishy.

As a raid tank, Prot Paladin is a great choice, not as outright durable as Prot Warriors or Guardian Druids at this point, but the additional utility like Divine Shield, Blessing of Protection, Blessing of Spellwarding, Lay on Hands, Hand of Freedom and off heals (for example) open up more strategic options for your raid.

As a dungeon tank, Prot Paladins bring insane DPS, especially once you are geared (and well practiced enough to know optimal pulls and CD timers) to be running Seraphim. The same utility is also invaluable. However, at the very high end of MC+ the lower raw mitigation even without Seraphim starts to show a bit.

The step up to learning to min max survivability or max DPS at end game as opposed to just taking hits and popping active mit for big hits adds an additional layer of complexity to the class that I personally love, but makes the learning curve at that point steeper. This is coming from someone who has played every tank class in a raid environment with the exception of DH at some point in the last few years.

In terms of just picking a class with an easier learning curve to just survive, Prot Warrior or Guardian Druid are stronger options. Want a class for running content when overgeared with loads of aoe to dps - pick DK or DH. Want to roll all around the shop? Pick Brewmaster.

Every class is viable at the moment, so unless you are playing at the absolute cutting edge, pick whatever playstyle you enjoy the most or for whatever level of content is most suitable.

This is obviously partially an opinion piece, but hope it helps.

TLDR: Learning the basics of how a Paladin works is pretty easy, but at the min max level for relatively significant gains in either survivability, efficient self healing or outright DPS is a lot more complicated.

[Snackwiches]

Any tank is fine for beginners except Brewmaster.

[belashar]

What is your main right now? If it is a class that can already tank I suggest you try that first for a few reason. You are already familiar with the class, you have gear that while it may have the wrong stats its better than starting from scratch and with your artifact research already rolling your will get AP faster.

I would suggest you use Tidy Plates + TP Threat Plates. They will help you identify when you don't have aggro on a monster.

Things to work on include being aware of your surroundings, working well with your healer(s) being aware of their mana especially in dungeons. A good tank will mitigate damage and a great one will anticipate it in advance.

Personally, I love tanking as a Paladin. You can mitigate and heal a ton.

[Deleted]

I would say no. DK is a nice and easy one.

Paladin requires you to upkeep certain buffs correctly and heal yourself at moments and juggle skills in the right order in order to max survivability. With DK you just need to keep your marrowrend stacks up and death strike. Alot easier to start with. The grips are also very useful.

[LightBR]

What is your main right now? If it is a class that can already tank I suggest you try that first for a few reason. You are already familiar with the class, you have gear that while it may have the wrong stats its better than starting from scratch and with your artifact research already rolling your will get AP faster.

I would suggest you use Tidy Plates + TP Threat Plates. They will help you identify when you don't have aggro on a monster.

Things to work on include being aware of your surroundings, working well with your healer(s) being aware of their mana especially in dungeons. A good tank will mitigate damage and a great one will anticipate it in advance.

Personally, I love tanking as a Paladin. You can mitigate and heal a ton.

I am maining a Fire Mage this x-pac so no tankiness lol.

Thanks everyone for your replies, I will go ahead and invest on my Pally, I`ve always wanted to tank on one since WOTLK we had an insane Pally tank on our guild back then, I guess the image just stuck to my head.

DK is indeed another possibility, but I miss my Frost DK don`t think I`d tank on him..

Cheers,
Light

[Ravingmad]

With good gear and decent haste, the ProtPal works like a charm. I've been tanking Elerethe Mythic as my first raid boss (3 tank strat + Bubble/HandofProt talented (for immune to magic damage --> Avoid the Wind cleave mecanic in phase 2 for the raid as you or an other tank can take it solo) and it went very well once you get to know the fight. (She died on our 3rd attempt after a few adjustments). With the new revamp (7.1) of the Judgement talent (2 charges) if reduce significantly the downtime on shield of the righteous, increase our single target dps and during Bloodlust your uptime is 100% easy. Your self healing is very strong and have a good choice of defensive cooldown. I also play Druid as a tank and I enjoy my protpal better (mostly gameplay-wise).

But as said, without mitigation active or low gear/haste, your squishy. Light of the protector helps for that, but IMO you need to increase your Stamina to a certain point to be able to withstand high damage spike and to increase the effective healing of your Light of the Protector. Shield of the righteous combine with a Defensive CD give you a retarded amount of %DmgReduction, which can be very handy on mass attacks. (ursoc bleed or the double talon on Elerethe if for whatever reason another tank cant take the 1st or 2nd hit).

And some practice is necessary to see what is your SotR uptime and how to well manage your cds. Try to solo Elite Group WQ bosses (or HM dungeon) and see how it goes.

[CptnRockwell]

Its not overly difficult, but compared to something like warrior or druid its complex. Play what you want, they're all easy to get into!

[select20]

I have all tanks to 110 ilvl825+. My 3 mains are Warrior, Paladin and DK in that order (these three are 855+). I use the warrior for raids since that is the toon I leveled first. I use the other two for mythic +'s and just running dailies. I like variety.

My opinion as to the difficulty to play well (hardest to easiest): Brewmaster> Paladin>DH>> DK>>>>Warrior >>>>>>Druid. Again, this is my opinion on how difficult they are to play well, not just be decent.

-Brewmaster is just in a bad place so to play well with one, you really have to be on your game.
-Paladin is more forgiving, but imo if you can master a Paladin, they will do better than all the rest. However, they are hard to get that last little bit of skill out of them. Unlike the other tanks you have to really know the fights so you can prepare your CDs and be using them ahead of time. Other tanks are more reactionary and don't require as much planning imo.
-DH, as long as you know when to use your heals and not be overhealing all the time, it isn't bad. They are pretty fun to play.
-Dk imo just an easier version of a DH.
-Warrior, you just have to worry about making sure you have Shield Block up and use your spare rage for Ignore Pains. Not hard at all imo.
-Druid... wow, biggest snooze fest ever imo. I think they are the most OP tank atm because they can do so well and the person playing can be asleep. Everyone in my guild sings our Guardians' praises when we raid (we are 6/7 heroic). I brought my Guardian along one time to our raid, about 10ilvl's lower than my warrior, just to see what the fuss was about and then everyone was singing my praises lol. I couldn't get over how easy they are to play. Again, my opinion. I know other's will differ. Druid though in general are a very interesting class. I personally wish their tanking aspect was more interesting because I would definitely main one.

If I had to give advice on which tank to start with, I would say warrior. In the long run, I believe starting with them will make you a better tank overall. They have to rely on healers much more since you can't rely on yourself for heals like DH, DK and Paladin can. It forces you to learn to watch your healer and try and make life easy on them when you tank. When I play my other tanks, I tend to be more reckless because I can self heal a lot more. But again, it is your choice. All tanks CAN BE viable, you just have to learn them and play them to their strengths.

**I put "imo" in bold because I know it is my opinion and I'm not looking to argue. I'm not the best tank in the world, but having been tanking in WoW since BC in several hardcore progression guilds and many other MMO's, I feel I have a good grasp on things and different playstyles. However, I've learned so much by reading what other pro tanks have to say. Now I'm just chillin' in a semi casual guild. Getting too old to keep up with taxing raid schedules.