Paladin just about 80...need help.

[Nebilim]

Ok so here is my dilema. I am just about to hit 80 with my paladin. What I really want to do, is spec prot and tank stuff. However, this most likely wont be happening the minute I hit 80. I have some decent tank gear, but its all blues. Nobody wants anyone with that kind of gear to tank, and I accept that. I'm the same way, if on my hunter I join a group and the tank has around 23-24k life...I worry a little...and hey usually it works out...but thats not the point here.

My alternate spec right now is ret. My ret gear is about the same level as my prot gear...quest/crafted blues with the heirloom items. DPSing in heroics is a little more leniant than tanking. Even now, I can pull about 2k dps in the 5 mans I do...which is more than I have seen some dps do at 80 with some decent gear. My question is...

Should I gear up myself as ret for a while and pick up some prot gear along the way? I have a few options obviously...I have 19k gold on which I can buy stuff from the AH ...but I am unsure which to go for. Should I go to buy some of the prot boe epics...or just get some ret gear so I can dps a little better and roll that way? Any suggestions on must buy items?

Someone will probably recommend Darkmoon Greatness...and while it is a good trinket.. on my server they are going for at least 8k for the str and agi ones (int and spirit ones for 1.5k...go figure). And ret is something that while its enjoyable...I want to get away from dpsing for a while...so I dont want to blow almost half my gold on one item. Just looking for some stuff that would make me adequette in heroics.

[anaalius]

this may sound stupid but how much are the nobles deck's going for ? because thats the deck which gives your the strength darkmoon cards.

also your probably best just going to heroics as much as possible dpsing and picking up tank gear.

make sure you try go to voa everyweek aswell

[Soulbender]

the greatness trinket is one of the best ingame, and you can use it in both specs at start. Currently going for 6k in my server. Check the cards, check if you have an inscriber in guild, but get it

Best advice imo is keeping dual spec, running 5mans as prot and raids as ret. Except VoA, tanking raids would be too hard in blue gear unless you have godlike healers. But start to gather avoidance / stam gear now.

I can't think of anything i'd buy apart from the card, but it depends if you craft or have access to crafters. Pieces of gear that can be bought / crafted are the bracers, belt, perhaps the feet, the rest you better drop imo.

Get valiance libram asap, because i think it could be used as prot too (at start), since you put up SoCorr afaik.

[dragonspawn]

I feel, that if u wanna go tank, o tank... Especialy since it seems u have nothing against heroics.

Nowadays the Heroics and toc normal is pretty easy, and u dont realy need epic tank gear to do them...
+, there is a shortage of tanks ( at least on my server ) so a blu geared one is WAY better then a dps DK "trying to tank" because we didn´t find tank for 2 hours

And ofc, skill is always moore important then gear! if u feel that you have a problem with for example aggo, just let the group know.

I geared up my Druid as healer, and when we were going in to a hard fight, i just asked the people to be extra carefull ... no biggie

[Soulbender]

that reminds me, you can also try to tank ToC5, it's not that hard, and multi target aoe will help.

ToC drops quite a few nice tank/dps pieces!

[Vlorlesh]

When my mate dinged 80 on his paladin and wanted to tank. we were a group of 3, me a hunter at the time, a holy paladin newly dinged aswell and him, newly dinged prot paladin.
We farmed normal instances for the gear the tank needed for about 2 weeks so he was defence capped and had somewhat decent blue gear, then just jumped right into heroics without trouble.

[Deleted]

UPhc, good epic sword
VHhc, good epic legs
AN, the trinket and something from anub (cant recall right now)
CoS, the epic shield

and then we have toc5norm and hc. Xant really say wich items drop, well trinket there aswell.

Crafted things, titansteel ring and neck perhaps. Those things are not so expensive.

And <b>tbh its not the gear its the skill</b>, really, i suck at tanking so i keep as far away from it as possible, but i have healed tanks with 24k unbuffed through toc5hc, cause they are skilled tanks, know the fights, when to pop dmg reduction mechanics etc. (Well its not only the tank, its every person in the group)

However, make a <b>list</b>, look at you worst items, you really wanna replace them first. The go to wowhead.com look through all the instances, mostly for the epic drops. See which one you want. add them to your list. And soon you got a little spreadsheet of items. I know its boring as hell to do that, but it is really worth it. Havent really done this since toc was released, but that instance is the bomb of epic loot. I'd go there. but make you spreadsheet.

Do tank or dps, i think it depends on the group/instance/ etc. hard to explain, and its a rare situation to have the benefit of choosing. But i mean if you feel comfortable tanking do that. If no, get a geard tank who wont mind you grabbing those eoics from him or her.

<b>Just do all the heroics you can do and farm badges, aim for the ones with epic loot for you.</b>

[Terall]

ToC 5 in normal mode for gear + the "easy" heroics such as Nexus or Utgarde Keep for Badges should do nicely for you. The best thing about ToC 5 in normal mode (which is as hard as some heroics) is that you can run it over and over again and there are usually enough people wanting exactly the same.
I did the same to gear my Rogue and after getting all the gear in normal mode, heroic was doable (don't know about tank gear though, my Pala tank has mostly Emblem of Conquest equip).
And you should try finding some patient people in the guild to do the daily heroic dungeon as often as possible.
Also, for heroic dungeons, the def cap is slightly lower than the 540 required for raids. The bosses are level 82 maximum and you only need 535 def rating.
Hope that helps

[Elessa]

I would not buy the str card if you are going to tank.
Get the Crusader orb chest, titansteel helmet, boots and shield. You can also get the Crusader orb bracers if you like.
The rest of your set should be tempered saronite and the daunting set.
With tempered saronite/daunting/titansteel stuff, you are ready for 10 man naxx and OS.

Take a look here for easy gear: http://www.wowhead.com/?items&filter...rs=1:1;crv=0:0

Im going to be nice and make you a list of easy to get items!

[Elessa]

I'm not gonna post conquest emblem stuff, check for yourself there are a few nice pieces (avoid the conquest legs though!)

Chest:
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=47591 (alliance)
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=47592 (horde)

Trinket:
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=36993 This will get you def capped easy (HoL normal)
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=37220 Nice amount of stamina, and a really good mitigation proc if you are tanking adds! (AN Heroic)
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=47216 Alot of stam and a VERY NICE armor proc! You will keep this a long time!

Ring:
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=47315 (horde)
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=47149 (ally)
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=40426
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=45247
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=42643
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=47243

Belt:
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=45551
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=37241 (AN Heroic)

Shield:
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=45450
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=42508
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=43085 (CoS heroic)

Bracers:
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=47571 (horde)
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=47570 (ally)
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=37620 (OK hc)
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=40734 (valor emblems)

Helm:
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=41387
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=47497 /totc hc)


I dont have more time right now so im just going to link the rest of the stuff i had in mind

http://www.wowhead.com/?item=47500
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=47514
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=47566
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=47201
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=47227
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=47171
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=47212
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=47243
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=47497
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=41392
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=42646
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=44312

[Sabrescene]

I went through the same sort of thing when my pally hit 80 (although I was ret/holy, not prot)
If you really want to tank and aren't that interested in being ret, then my advice would be try to tank whenever you can, 23-24k hp is really enough for heroics, although you will run into problems sometimes as people who are new 80's and see ulduar/ToC geared tanks, think you need to be that good to tank and won't let you (my tank offspec has around 27k and I got told I was way to undergeared for ToC 5-man....)

Alternatively, an easy way to get gear is run heroics as ret, but try to pick up as much prot gear as you can, some groups will be happy for you to roll on prot gear if you pass on ret gear, otherwise you can just take the drops noone needs (this is how I geared up for healing)

Badge gear is obviously really helpful, try to run the daily heroic every day for truimph emblems (t9, woo). Also as for stuff worth buying, there are some crafted plate stuff from Ulduar/ToC i think, but they can cost a lot, especially as you will need to buy the orbs (assuming you will be spending badges on tier pieces, etc), but as for more realistic gear, the tempered titansteel can be a good start along with daunting gear (tempered saronite is also not bad, but only level 78 gear, so it should be replaced pretty quick).

There are also a bunch of things worth getting from rep factions, the best order to go in is probably wyrmrest>Argent Crusade>Ebon Blade>Kirin Tor

Other then that, jst run heroics (or if you're lucky raids) as much as possible, as either ret or prot and just get all the epics you can, lol
ps: red sword of courage (H UP) and crest of lordearan (not sure of spelling sorry - H CoS) are a great sword and board to start with

[Kenjji]

If i where you i'd run as much Hc's as possible, with priority to ToC5man.

As far as crafted items go, i wouldn't buy those crusader orbs crafted ones yet, 3.3 will hit live soon, and they will drop prices hard.

There are probs some BoE items that go around for 2-3k, but i wouldn't go any higher.
Just Farm the daily, VoA, Ony, and you can get the ilvl245 libram, and beside that just turn in your conquest emblems, might even buy valor stuff at one point once conquest offers you nothing anymore.