Tanking In The Now.

[Marrowarrow]

I have just recently picked my warrior back up after a long and sordid love affair with my hunter. I am looking for any advice as far as gearing him up, gemming and threat generation.

http://www.wowarmory.com/character-s...&n=Greatshield

I just picked up the t9 gloves, have yet to add the BS socket to them. I am currently getting together the last 11 Titansteel bars for the Breastplate of the White Knight. Now, as long as I stay def capped, should I gem for pure stam, or should I throw in more total avoidance? And as far as threat generation goes, should I macro HS into my devastates or should I just put it in everything? I use SS as a priority, keep rend up 100% of the time and use Rev, SW, and CB everytime they are up. Also, I am wondering if my spec is currently a viable tanking spec, or should I rework my talents and my glyphs? Any advice would be helpful, and I am open to suggestions. Thanks in advance.

Greatshield

[Beace]

keep rend up 100% of the time

I haven't played a prot warrior in quite some time, but this sounds really strange. Does rend do enough TPS for a warrior to want it kept up, or am I missing something else?

[wiggletard]

Glyph Dev, Vig, and Blocking. For the love of god dont socket parry. Work on Exp/Hit rating.


Drop stun talent in arms for hs, dont bother with rend. Drop Cruelty for AttT. Drop imp spell reflect get imp revenge, also dont be an idiot spec into Incite.

[Deleted]

Rend is ok, but nothing special.

It's generally used for additional damage on the target, as the single GCD from applying rend will result in higher overall *damage* than using that GCD for say a devastate.

I'd say it's not so useful in situations where you are worried about TPS.

@OP: I suggest you go read some of the guides posted on popular sites such as tankspot.com (though check any such guides are reasonably up-to-date).

Also, get more expertise. Expertise not only increases your TPS, but it also reduces the number of times you parry-haste the boss you're tanking, so you'll take less damage too!

[pavl]

Arg, why are you gemming defense when you're over the def cap anyways, its 540 btw.

[Keh]

540 Def, 26 Expertise and ~160 Hit.

Should always have a min of 20% dodge/parry, usually SBR about 15-20% depending what talents/gear youve had luck of getting. After you get the above stack Stam.

Drop stun talent in arms for hs, dont bother with rend. Drop Cruelty for AttT. Drop imp spell reflect get imp revenge, also dont be an idiot spec into Incite.

Ignore morons like this. Spec depending on what content you aim to tank and what role.. are you going to be MTing? OTing? Are boss's more Physical or Magical etc.. and always adjust your gear to match the encounter/trash your doing if its available to you.

[badtouch1]

My general "rotation" for generating the most threat usually starts off the fight by using Recklessness in Berserker Stance (stance-dance back to Defensive obviously), immediately followed by charge to initiate the fight. The first thing you should do is use Shield Block+Shield Slam. With Recklessness up it should guarantee a good size crit and a good amount of threat. From here and for the next 5-10 seconds, use only Revenge + Devastate (Heroic Strikes too if you have the additional rage), and Shield Slam whenever it comes off CD. I say to do this to guarantee that you get enough threat to hold aggro for awhile longer. Do this until you get the 5 stacks of sunder up on the boss. Once you do this and gain a good lead on threat, start using your Thunderclap and Demoralizing Shout to start reducing some of that incoming damage.

Whenever in doubt on what to use for threat, Shield Slam takes priority over anything because it produces the most threat, as well as it gives you 10seconds of 10% block value (if glyphed...if you arent glyphed, do it).

SS>Revenge>Devastate. If Shockwave and Concussion Blow aren't on cooldown, use those over Revenge and Devastate, but during most boss fights, I tend to stick to using those 3 major attacks (Revenge and Devastate because of the Sword and Board talent) as well as keeping up Thunderclap and Demoralizing Shout. Rend is decent to use for more overall damage done, but its better for threat not to use it.

For your gear, I would recommend gemming for the socket bonuses because at this point you should go for well-rounded stats. Work on more expertise, if possible without going all out for it, try and hit the soft cap (26 or 6.5%). Hit rating you should do fine with 130-170 of it (4-5%).
It doesnt hurt to go over the defense cap being that additional defense gives you more avoidance, but if possible, i would recommend dropping the defense enchant to your shield for Titanium Plating so you have more BV (mitigation+threat gen), as well as I see it as more beneficial that some more defense. On your cloak, do 22 agility, this being that it provides more overall avoidance.

Otherwise, your spec looks pretty good. My only recommendations would be:
Instead of Iron Will, spec into Improved Heroic Strike, because more rage is always nice. Instead of Imp Spell Reflection spec into Imp Revenge. Instead of Puncture, spec into Focused Rage, being that has the exact same effect on Devastate, as well as reduces rage costs for every other ability as well.

Good luck and have fun.

Dpdough, NE Warrior, Nathrezim (US)

[badtouch1]

Also, no matter how many people tell you, please DO NOT macro HS to all of your attacks.. You shouldnt need a macro to use HS. I say this because even with alot of fights resulting in endless rage, there do come some times when you have little to no rage, and a macro using a bunch of what you have on HS cant help. This will allow you to have more control over your rage output, as well as more threat output.

[Rokomis]

Rend isnt really usefull for tanking.

As for your spec, you may consider dropping imp charge and 1 point from iron will for 3/3 imp Heroic Strike and taking the 3 points from imp sunder and putting them in focused rage as it will drop the rage cost for pretty much all abilities instead of just sunder and devestate. Easier to que HS on every swing when it only costs 9 rage. Only thing you really must change is move your 3 points in fury to Armored to the Teeth (spreadsheet, theorycraft, and in game experince all point to it being better for threat than 3% crit) and get imp revenge. Move the 2 points from imp discipline to imp rev. Youre gimping your threat without it, and with all your other "oh shit" buttons, having SW every 4 minutes instead of 5 isnt all that useful.