Originally Posted by
Psyy
I truly feel that in this tier Shield Block reigns supreme on most heroic content. The majority of bosses hit like a truck, and tank deaths are coming from spikes in damage. If you health is slowly withering away because your healers can't keep up, something is wrong with your healers.
You want to be able to reduce spikiness of dmg intake as much as possible so you healers can use efficient rotations. Spikes lead to expensive heals lead to healers OOMing. On most fights I will make sure I have as much shield block uptime as I can, using barrier for the ime I can't keep it up or to mitigate extra incoming damage (Blade Lord's Unbalancing Strike for example).
This seems to be the absolute preference of my healers, and I prefer the playstyle as well, what happens with barrier is there's moments where you are completely exposed. If you drop a 60 rage barrier for Blade Lord's Unbalancing Strike, the barrier is gone straight after and you will have nothing up. This is a boss that hits for 220k before block on my current gear (493-ish). This moment in between barriers is a shitstorm, as Heroic bosses will absolutely crush you. Warriors are amazing on melee heavy fight BECAUSE we have shield block. Steady mitigation on every hit makes life easy for both you and your healing team.
Although Shield Block is less total damage reduction on this fight, the fact that my healers know exactly when I will need a little more than a standard heal renders the entire mechanic pretty much irrelevant. If I have enough rage to do so, I'll drop a 30 rage barrier on top of the block for the unbalancing strike, sure, but block comes first for me.