PvE Guide for the Arms Warrior

[Namso]

PvE Guide for the Arms Warrior

*This guide is currently updated for patch 4.3*

Table of Contents

1. Introduction to the Arms Specialization
2. Stat Prioritization
3. Optimal Enchantments
4. Optimal Gems
5. Optimal Glyphs
6. Talent Specializations
7. The Arms Rotation
8. Introducing Stance-dancing to the Rotations
9. Tips for Increased Damage per Second
10. Closing Statements

1. Introduction to the Arms Specialization

Hello, welcome to the PvE Guide for the Arms Warrior. My name is Adam, a die-hard Arms fan for as long as I can remember, and this particular guide displays all of the information you need to easily get into and succeed in the Arms spec, as well as more advanced details for current Arms Warriors striving to be the best they can be when it comes to topping those damage charts.

Arms has been historically known as the one and only PvP spec; Arms and PvP basically go hand-in-hand, which is essentially true due to how the spec works. Now, because of this label the Arms spec generally has, it is often completely overlooked in terms of its incredible potential in the PvE environment. Warriors typically select the alternative dps spec, Fury, because it, on the other hand, has been historically known as the one and only PvE spec. However, Arms has been proven time and time again to be almost identical to Fury in terms of damage output, possibly even surpassing it if the particular Warrior is very skilled. Therefore, this guide is dedicated to putting Arms in the spotlight and demonstrating the sheer power and potential it boasts in the raiding atmosphere. Enjoy!

*Some of the material covered in the previous guide by Loto Bordeaux has been included with minor adjustments.*

2. Stat Prioritization

The overall stat prioritization of the Arms Warrior is strictly as follows and is explained below:

8% Hit Rating -> Strength -> 26 Expertise Rating -> Critical Strike Rating -> Mastery -> Haste

8% Hit Rating: The hit rating for the Arms Warrior is capped at 8.00%, which is equivalent to exactly 961 hit rating. Therefore, in order to achieve an additional 1% hit chance, you would need approximately 120.125 hit rating. Hit rating takes highest priority when specializing your gear due to the fact that once you reach the hit cap, your melee swings will never miss on skull level targets, which essentially means you won’t, for example, miss important Mortal Strikes or be prone to rage starving because of missed white swings that generate your rage.

Strength: Strength is by far the best stat for any kind of dps Warrior. It’s the main factor of our damage output, and so your gear needs to reflect that to the utmost potential. It’s basically self-explanatory. Strength equates to harder hitting attacks.

26 Expertise Rating: The expertise cap at level 85 is 26, which approximates to 781 expertise rating. Therefore, in order to achieve an additional point in expertise, you would need around 30.038 expertise rating. Expertise is great in that it will reduce the chance for your attacks to be parried or dodged the higher it is. The cap of 26 means that your attacks will no longer be dodged, but the parry chance will remain at 8.00% (it’s virtually impossible to bring it to 0.00%).

Critical Strike Rating: Critical strikes are a Warrior’s best friend, especially for an Arms Warrior. If you take a look at the Arms spec as a whole, many of its talents benefit substantially from additional critical strike rating. To put this into perspective, consider all of these talents: Deep Wounds, which adds an additional bleed effect on your target(s) following a critical strike; Impale, which increases the damage output of critical strikes on a few moves; Tastes for Blood, which increases Overpower’s critical strike chance by 60%; Juggernaut, which increases the critical strike chance of your next Mortal Strike or Slam following a Charge by 25%; Wrecking Crew, which increases your physical damage done by 10% following a Mortal Strike critical hit; Cruelty, which increases the critical strike chance of Mortal Strike by 10%; and finally, Incite, which increases Heroic Strike’s critical strike chance to proc its effect of automatically making the next Heroic Strike a critical hit. As you can see, Arms Warriors are very reliant on critical hits for overall damage since a whole load of their talents require and rely on additional critical strike rating to make them even more effective than what they already are. Therefore, every piece of gear needs to have critical strike rating on it.

Mastery Rating: Despite the fact that critical strike rating is an incredibly important attribute for an Arms warrior, mastery does not fall too terribly behind it in terms of raw dps increase. For every point of mastery earned, you receive an additional 2.2% chance to activate the Arms mastery, Strikes of Opportunity (procced from your melee attacks), which is an instantaneous melee strike dealing 100% normal weapon damage. This is further valued because that additional swing can be a critical strike and, since you will be throwing out more hits in a rotation, the Sudden Death talent will, thus, have a higher proc rate for your Colossus Smash ability, resulting in a significant dps increase.

Haste: In contrast to Fury Warriors, Arms Warriors do not scale well with haste and is more or less an empty stat. The white damage count is such a small overall percentage of the damage output that haste does nearly nothing in terms of weapon hit damage. In essence, the amount of haste that is required to give any noticeable dps increase is so unrealistically high that it would result in a dps loss due to the amount of other higher priority stats suffering at that expense. Try to avoid gear with haste on it as much as possible, and if you do end up using one, reforge the haste to whichever stat you need the most.

3. Optimal Enchantments

Head: Arcanum of the Wildhammer (Alliance) / Arcanum of the Dragonmaw (Horde) (+60 Strength, + 35 Mastery Rating)

Shoulder: Greater Inscription of Jagged Stone (+50 Strength, +25 Critical Strike Rating)

Cloak: Enchant Cloak - Greater Critical Strike (+65 Critical Strike Rating)

Chest: Enchant Chest - Peerless Stats (+20 All Stats)

Bracer: Enchant Bracer - Major Strength (+50 Strength)

Gloves: Enchant Gloves - Mighty Strength (+50 Strength)

Legs: Dragonscale Leg Armor (+190 Attack Power, +55 Critical Strike Rating)

Boots: Enchant Boots - Mastery (+50 Mastery Rating) or Enchant Boots - Lavawalker (+35 mastery, +8% movement increase)

Two-handed Weapon: Enchant Weapon - Landslide (chance for +1000 Attack Power for 12 seconds when striking in melee)

4. Optimal Gems

The way to socket your gems is similar to that of the Fury specialization. You should use the Bold Inferno Ruby in all of your sockets. However, if you encounter a yellow or blue socket and the socket bonus provides a +10 strength or greater, use the appropriate gem to achieve that bonus, as it is mathematically superior to gemming full strength. If it does not provide a +10 strength or greater, use the aforementioned Bold Inferno Ruby. Here is the list of the optimal gems (remember the yellow and blue socket gems are only used if the bonus provides +10 strength or greater):

Meta Socket: Reverberating Shadowspirit Diamond (+54 Strength, +3% Increased Critical Damage)

Red Socket: Bold Inferno Ruby (+40 Strength)

Yellow Socket: Inscribed Ember Topaz (+20 Strength, +20 Critical Strike Rating)

Blue Socket: Etched Demonseye (+20 Strength, +20 Hit Rating)

Note: Since we generally reach the hit cap passively through gear attainment, it is not always mandatory to use a blue gem in a socket that provides a +10 strength bonus. In this case, use the Bold Inferno Ruby for the additional strength it provides.

5. Optimal Glyphs

Prime Glyphs

Glyph of Mortal Strike: Increases the damage of Mortal Strike by 10%.

This glyph is mandatory.

Glyph of Overpower: Increases the damage of Overpower by 10%.

This glyph is mandatory.

Glyph of Slam: Increases the critical strike chance of Slam by 5%.

This glyph is mandatory.

Major Glyphs

Glyph of Sweeping Strikes: Reduces the rage cost of your Sweeping Strikes ability by 100%.

This glyph is mandatory.

Glyph of Colossus Smash: Your Colossus Smash also applies the Sunder Armor effect to your target.

An excellent major glyph to select as it allows you to passively debuff your target's armor for increased physical damage by you and your raid. This is a highly recommended glyph to use.

Glyph of Cleaving: Increases the number of targets your Cleave hits by 1.

This is a great glyph for AoE purposes. It allows your Cleave to strike an additional target, meaning it results in a direct dps increase in groups of three or more mobs. This is a highly recommended glyph to use.

Glyph of Resonating Power: Reduces the rage cost of Thunder Clap by 5.

If you are using the multi-target dps spec, this glyph is quite useful for Thunder Clap, effectively making it cost 15 rage instead of 20. So, essentially, this glyph helps keep your rage at sufficient levels when it comes to executing your rotation as well as throwing in Thunder Clap when necessary. This is a highly recommended glyph to use over Glyph of Colossus Smash for multi-target dps specs.

Glyph of Long Charge: Increases the range of your Charge ability by 5 yards.

The use of this glyph is merely based on personal preference, as it doesn't necessarily provide you with substantial benefits like the glyphs above do. However, it has the ability to make your travel from point A to point B a lot faster since you can Charge from a greater distance, which can be useful in certain situations. This is a situational glyph to use.

Minor Glyphs

Glyph of Berserker Rage: Berserker Rage generates 5 rage when used.

This glyph is mandatory.

Glyph of Battle Shout: Increases the duration by 2 minutes and area of effect by 50% of your Battle Shout.

This glyph is mandatory.

Glyph of Commanding Shout: Increases the duration by 2 minutes and area of effect by 50% of your Commanding Shout.

This glyph is mandatory.

6. Talent Specializations

There are two main type of talent trees that an Arms Warrior would use. There is the single-target dps tree and the multi-target dps tree. The kind of tree you want to use is dependent entirely on what is required of you by your raid. Listed below will be the talents that are absolutely necessary and the talents that are up to personal preference.

Required Talents

War Academy: Mortal Strike, Slam, and Victory Rush are 15% stronger.

Tactical Mastery: As an Arms Warrior, it is required to use the stance-dance mechanic. This talent is necessary to perform such rotation.

Deep Wounds: Critical strikes cause the opponent to bleed for 48% of your melee’s average damage over 6 seconds.

Taste for Blood: Overpower has a 60% critical strike chance, and your Rend now procs Overpower once every 5 seconds.

Sweeping Strikes: When used, your melee attacks strike an additional nearby opponent.

Impale: Increases the critical strike damage of Mortal Strike, Slam, and Overpower by 20%.

Improved Slam: Decreases the swing time of Slam by 1 second and increases its damage by 20%.

Deadly Calm: Once used, none of your abilities cost rage for the next 10 seconds, but you still continue to generate rage. However, it can’t be used during Inner Rage or Recklessness.

Blood Frenzy: Your bleed effects cause the target to take an extra 4% damage and increases bleed damage taken by the target by 30% for one minute. You also have a 10% chance to generate 20 additional rage with your autoattacks.

Lambs to the Slaughter: Your Mortal Strike refreshes the duration of Rend on the target and increases the damage of Execute, Overpower, Slam, and Mortal Strike by 10% for each stack, stacking up to 3 times. Lasts 15 seconds.

Juggernaut: Charge is now usable in combat and in all stances, and the cooldown reduced by 2 seconds. Following a Charge, your next Slam or Mortal Strike has an additional 25% chance to critically hit.

Sudden Death: Your melee hits have a 6% chance of resetting the cooldown of Colossus Smash and your Execute leaves you with 10 rage.

Wrecking Crew: Your Mortal Strike critical hits Enrage you, increasing your physical damage caused by 10% for 12 seconds.

Bladestorm: A powerful 6 second AoE attack.

Battle Trance: Mortal Strike has a 15% chance to make your next special attack consume no rage.

Cruelty: Mortal Strike has a 10% increase critical strike chance.

Executioner: Execute increases your melee attack speed by 5% for 9 seconds. Stacks up to 5 times.

Incite: Increases the critical strike chance of Heroic Strike by 15% and gives your Heroic Strike criticals a 100% chance to cause the next one to also be a critical strike. Single-target spec only.

Blood and Thunder: Thunder Clapping a target afflicted by Rend causes all other targets hit by Thunder Clap to be afflicted with Rend as well. Multi-target spec only.

Filler Talents

Field Dressing: Increases healing received by 3% and the effectiveness of self-healing abilities by an additional 10%.

This talent does not award you with any kind of dps increase, but is geared to giving you a higher survivability rate by increasing effectiveness of your own heals and your healers’ heals. It is often not used, however, since the increase in survivability is so minimal that it won’t necessarily make a huge difference.

Blitz: Charge generations 10 additional rage and stuns an additional two nearby targets.

An additional 10 rage can help you begin your rotation effectively after that initial Charge. Furthermore, the fact that it stuns an additional two targets can help in certain situations. All in all, it’s a situational talent but could be great for starting off strong.

Throwdown: Stuns target for 5 seconds.

Another one of those situational abilities, only useful for trash pulls or encounters where adds need to be stunned.

Rude Interruption: Interrupting a spell with Pummel increases your damage by 5% for 15 seconds (30 seconds if maxed out).

Yet again, another situational ability. This talent is only useful for encounters where there is an interruptable NPC. Unfortunately, most boss fights don’t have an opportunity to interrupt any spell cast and the talent, in general view, is deemed a waste.

Note: Talents not mentioned in the above lists are not listed for a reason; do not use them.

7. The Arms Rotation

The Arms rotation is generally based on a priority system. The attack you use next depends on current cooldowns and procs, since almost all of an Arms Warrior’s attacks consist of the aforementioned details. Furthermore, your priority rotation is reliant on your current rage, but should you follow the rotation correctly, you should never have a problem with rage-starving and will be able to continue the rotation to the utmost effectiveness.

Opening Rotation

Battle/Commanding Shout + Charge
Rend
Colossus Smash
Begin Single-target Rotation

The opening rotation is self-explanatory. Begin by using Battle Shout or Commanding Shout, depending on what your raid needs you to use, and follow up with Charge (both moves can be used simultaneously, thanks to Charge being off the GCD) for quick rage generation right off the bat to effectively begin your rotation. Next on the list is Rend, which you want to afflict your target with as soon as you can for the bleed damage over time, the increased bleed debuff, and the increased physical damage debuff, as well as causing your Overpower to begin proccing. You finally finish off the opening rotation with a Colossus Smash to buffer the beginning of your single-target rotation.

Advanced Opening Rotation

Battle/Commanding Shout + Charge
Rend
Colossus Smash + Heroic Strike
Deadly Calm + Mortal Strike
Continue Single-target Rotation
Deadly Calm wears off -> Inner Rage (if you have the 2-piece)

This is a slightly more advanced opening rotation one could use to pump out absurd amounts of dps during the initial engagement of the encounter. The difference here is the use of Deadly Calm's ability to make none of your moves cost any rage and Inner Rage to reduce the rage cost of Heroic Strike should you have the 2-piece bonus. This is why after the Rend, you immediately proceed to dump as much rage as you possibly can through Colossus Smash and Heroic Strike. As soon as you come off the global cooldown, pop Deadly Calm which would allow you to cast Mortal Strike and continue on with the single-target rotation. When your Deadly Calm buff wears off, you'd likely be at near maxed out rage, which is why Inner Rage is used directly afterwards along with the t13 2-piece bonus to throw out cheap Heroic Strikes while maintaining a decent rage pool. Should you have executed this correctly, your damage output right off the bat would be outstanding. However, another addition can be made to the opening rotation to cause even more major damage: Recklessness.

Battle/Commanding Shout + Charge
Rend
Colossus Smash + Heroic Strike
Deadly Calm + Mortal Strike
Continue Single-target Rotation
Deadly Calm wears off -> Inner Rage (if you have the 2-piece) + Recklessness (try to time these during a Colossus Smash)
Begin Recklessness Rotation

The use of Recklessness along with Inner Rage will cause you to literally explode on damage output. Due to the fact that you'd be near maximum rage during Recklessness and Inner Rage because of Deadly Calm, you'd be able to throw out cheap Heroic Strikes that are almost guaranteed to be criticals. A massive string of critical hits right near the beginning of the encounter will surely put you in at a great start.

Note: Use good judgement when using your Deadly Calm and Recklessness. For example, don't open with Deadly Calm when it would be better used a minute or so later depending on the fight (don't delay it longer than two minutes otherwise you would waste a use of Deadly Calm since it's cooldown is two minutes). With Recklessness, if the particular encounter is shorter than five minutes long, save it for when the boss drops below 20% for Execute, since Recklessness is stronger there. If the fight is longer than five minutes, still be aware of what is about to happen during the initial 20 seconds of the fight. For example, on a fight like Yor'sahj where he transitions during the first 15 seconds or so, it's probably better to save Recklessness for later, but don't delay it to the point where you end up getting one use out of it.

Single-target Rotation

Mortal Strike
Colossus Smash
Overpower
Slam during cooldowns

The main rotation the Arms spec uses isn't necessarily A-B-C-esque, as the majority of it involves ability prioritization. The main thing you should note is that the rotation revolves around Mortal Strike and its cooldown. The second move of priority is Colossus Smash, meaning you should use that after Mortal Strike if it's available. Overpower comes third on the list of priority following Colossus Smash. Slam is only ever used when Mortal Strike, Colossus Smash, and Overpower are all on cooldown, which happens often in your typical rotation if performed correctly. Here is an example of this rotation being used:

Mortal Strike
Colossus Smash
Overpower
Mortal Strike (at this point, all three attacks are on cooldown)
Slam (Overpower comes off cooldown while Mortal Strike and Colossus Smash are still on it)
Overpower
Mortal Strike (Colossus Smash procs and can be used)
Colossus Smash
Slam
Mortal Strike

All you really need to remember is to use Mortal Strike off cooldown and only Slam when all three of your abilities are on cooldown. If Colossus Smash and Overpower are both off cooldown at the same time, Colossus Smash takes priority.

Recklessness Rotation

Mortal Strike
Colossus Smash
Overpower
Slam during cooldowns
Heroic Strike when rage permits

The Recklessness rotation is almost identical to the standard single-rotation described above with a few changes. Mortal Strike is still used on cooldown as well as Colossus Smash if it's available. Overpower is now used in conjunction with Heroic Strike (even better when used with Inner Rage as well) when rage permits and Slam is still used when Mortal Strike, Colossus Smash, and Overpower are on cooldown. You may think that using Overpower during Recklessness is a waste of a potential critical strike on a Slam instead, but using Overpower and Heroic Strike are mathematically superior to a single Slam. Below are the calculations demonstrating this.

Note: This sim was run with an additional 9000 critical strike rating (about equal to the Recklessness buff).

These are the unmodified damage per execution numbers for each ability:

Slam: 57 765 (78% crit)
OP: 51 062 (100% crit)
HS: 37 934 (93% crit)

This doesn't take into consideration that Slam makes you lose ~14% of a melee swing nor does it include Deep Wounds (both of which favor Overpower, though). A weapon with 3.6 attacking speed gives ~29 rage (3.6 x 6.5 x 1.25) per swing and has a 10% chance for 20 extra rage from the Blood Frenzy talent, which equates to ~33 rage in total. Since Slam pauses the swing timer, you lose ~14% of a melee swing which means Slam costs and additional ~5 rage per use for a total rage cost of approximately ~20.

When we put the choices against one another that means you pick between either:

Overpower + ~15 rage OR Slam (both options cost 20 rage)

That ~15 rage translates into 49% of a Heroic Strike outside Inner Rage or 73% of a Heroic Strike with it.

Total damage for each situation:

Slam: 57 765
Overpower + partial Heroic Strike (without Inner Rage): 69 650
Overpower + partial Heroic Strike (with Inner Rage): 85 457

So what this essentially means is during Recklessness, you still want to use Overpower and Heroic Strike as rage permits. However, if you're consistently rage-capping even though you're using Heroic Strike on cooldown, replace Overpower with Slam due to it's higher damage per execution value.

*Special thanks to Lohe for providing the calculations.*

Multi-target Rotation

When dealing with multiple targets, there are many different tools you can use in order to deal as much damage as possible. If the encounter is only a group of two NPCs, using your single-target rotation along with Sweeping Strikes is the most efficient use of AoE available to you. During encounters with three NPCs, using your single-target rotation with Sweeping Strikes is still optimal, but Cleave now replaces Heroic Strike if you have glyphed into it. If not, continue using Heroic Strike as it causes higher overall dps. Furthermore, if you’ve specialized into Blood and Thunder, using Thunder Clap after your initial Rend is suggested and should only be used again to refresh Rend (use it at the second Rend is about to fall off). In a group of four or more NPCs, if you’ve specialized into Blood an Thunder, follow the same steps said above. Activate Bladestorm as soon as you can with cooldowns for some massive AoE damage output. Once over, using Sweeping Strikes after is required for additional AoE damage, and again, if glyphed into Cleave, use it instead of Heroic Strike. Also, Heroic Leap is a great AoE attack to use against these groups, and is off the global cooldown to boot. Thunder Clap will only ever replace Slam in the rotation when the amount of mobs is at least six or more; if it's lower than that, Thunder Clap is only used to refresh Rend and Slam is continued to be used in the rotation due to its higher damage output.

Execute (Sub-20%) Rotation

During the phase where the target’s HP percentage is below 20%, Execute becomes available to use and will result in a visible dps increase due to the haste buff you receive after every use of it, thanks to the Executioner talent. During this scenario, Execute will replace Slam in your typical rotation, nothing more, nothing less. Continue using Mortal Strike off cooldown, Colossus Smash when possible, and Overpower for the almost-guaranteed critical strike. Once all three are on cooldown, use Execute. However, the only exception to this rule is to only use Execute when your rage is at about 30 or more otherwise it becomes weaker than Slam.

Note: If your Executioner stacks are about to fall off for whatever reason, Execute takes immediate priority no matter what rage level you are at.

8. Introducing Stance-dancing to the Rotations

Stance-dancing is one of the key unique features Warriors have and the Arms Warrior takes full advantage of this mechanic. Although it is not entirely mandatory to use, it is required if you plan to maximize your character to perform the best it possibly can. The idea of stance-dancing is basically just macroing abilities to a specific stance and letting them do their job on their own. You still follow your normal rotation while your new macros will passively switch you between the stances you've set. Below is a list of moves that need to be macroed to the mentioned stance.

In your Battle Stance action bar, macro these moves into Berserker Stance:

Mortal Strike
Colossus Smash
Slam
Execute
Bladestorm
Heroic Throw

Note: Do not macro Heroic Strike or Cleave, as they are off the global cooldown. You do not want to use either when your Overpower is about to proc, causing a delay in your rotation and loss of dps.

Example:

#showtooltip Mortal Strike
/cast Berserker Stance
/cast Mortal Strike

In your Berserker Stance action bar, macro these moves into Battle Stance:

Rend
Overpower
Thunder Clap
Shattering Throw
Throwdown (if talented)

Example:

#showtooltip Rend
/cast Battle Stance
/cast Rend

Note: Macroing Overpower will cause it to lose its glow when it procs. To fix this issue, use the standard Overpower ability and place it somewhere visible on your screen for the purpose of knowing when it procs. It is also highly recommended to make your Battle Stance and Berserker Stance action bars perfectly identical to avoid confusion between stance-dancing.

9. Tips for Increased Damage per Second

1. Never delay Mortal Strike, even if Colossus Smash is off cooldown.

2. Never override existing Colossus Smash debuffs.

3. Never spam Execute right when it’s available for the 5/5 Executioner stacks. Delaying Mortal Strike or Colossus Smash results in a dps loss.

4. Bear in mind that as long as Overpower is used in the 5 second timeframe of the Taste for Blood proc, it is not a dps loss.

5. Only use Heroic Strike or Cleave at about 65 or more rage.

6. Use Heroic Leap and Berserker Rage on cooldown, as they are off the global cooldown and will result in more damage and rage, respectively. However, only use Heroic Leap during Colossus Smash for the extra damage it'd gain.

Note: If the particular encounter requires you at some point to get from Point A to Point B as fast as possible, don't bother with using Heroic Leap for increased dps (unless you're able to land right into the target(s)). In terms of Berserker Rage, obviously don't use it during times where it will go to waste. For example, don't use it during Deadly Calm or above 75 rage (since your effective rage-cap is 75 due to stance-dancing).

7. It is preferred to reach three stacks of Lambs to the Slaughter before using Recklessness and any other on-use trinket that boosts your strength or critical strike rating. Deadly Calm can still be used at any period of the fight since it doesn't get any benefit from having three Lambs to the Slaughter stacks; the move only affects Heroic Strike usage.

8. If you are about to use any cooldowns you may have, always use them with a Colossus Smash for increased burst damage.

9. Use Recklessness near the beginning of the boss encounter so it will be available near the end for Execute phase. Unless the specific encounter is shorter than five minutes, save it for the Execute phase.

10. Only use cooldowns when you know you can take full advantage of them. For example, don't pop any cooldowns when the boss is being kited or if a transition phase is about to occur.

11. Stance-dancing will net you approximately 3-4% more dps if performed correctly. Do it.

12. Try to pool your rage as much as you can. As in, instead of being at the bare minimum for your attacks, try to hover around the 50+ rage mark. This will help with Slam usage since using it causes your swing timer to pause, delaying your rage generation.

13. Try to pop your cooldowns simultaneously/consecutively. For instance, use Deadly Calm and any on-use trinkets together and finish off with Recklessness and Inner Rage once your Deadly Calm is over, since they can't be paired together, unfortunately. If you delay your cooldowns for too long, you may end up losing out on an extra use of them during the fight.

14. If you've reached the pool of rage where Heroic Strike can be used, try to use it during a Colossus Smash for the extra damage it'd gain, as Heroic Strike on its own is a rather weak attack.

15. Always be sure to pre-pot with your Golemblood Potion a second before the encounter is engaged to ensure a high initial dps burst. When your potion comes off of it's cooldown, save it for when the boss is below 20% health, when Execute and Recklessness is ready for use. Don't pop it at any other moment unless there is something that needs to be burned down as quickly as possible and you feel that it's necessary to use it.

16. Study, study, and study the fights. There is no better way to increase your dps than by pointing out moments such as knowing when a certain cooldown is optimal at a specific time, when heroism is going to be used, where excessive rage income happens, and when low rage income happens, among many others. The more you study and realize what needs to be done, the better you will manage your rotation and cooldowns and the way you need to execute your character in specific events.

10. Closing Statements

That's all it is, folks. As you can see, an Arms Warrior is pretty simplistic in what it needs to achieve the peak of its greatness. Easy-to-follow stat priorities, obvious enchantments and glyphs, simple talent trees, and a pretty basic rotation. However, don't expect yourself to immediately get the hang of this specialization and predict huge numbers. Like with any other class and spec in the game, it will take some time to fully understand how to perform to perfection and it only takes practice to become the best you can possibly be. Nonetheless, it's time for them Fury and Protection Warriors to dust off their Arms spec and current Arms Warriors to seek their maximum potential to make the Arms specialization a spec nobody wants to contend with. Let us wreak havoc!

*This guide is subject to change and will be frequently updated as new information arrives.*

[RuffwarWoW]

Nicely written guide. +1

[Deleted]

Good job!

*approves*

[Deleted]

This just needs to be mentioned: Not ever should you open with Heroic Throw as that resets your swing timer. If you heroic throw/Charge the same second you'll end up having to wait around 2-2.5seconds until you recieve rage from a whiteswing. The preferable option is to open with Battleshout on account of the setbonus just before you charge.

Even if you need to sunder you shouldn't open with Heroic Throw, you need to get the essential shit going asap and the first 3 globals cost 50 rage to do and you want the additional rage from the BS/Charge for Heroic Strike during Colossus. Not to mention you lack the globals to do it as you want to get the Battleshout buff up without wasting a combat GCD.

Sorry for zeroing in on one issue, otherwise a fantastic job

And one more thing; You won't actually get any LttS benefit from Deadly Calm, as enough rage for the regular rotation will be available especially after the charge/BS opener, so I personally open with it as soon as I use my first Colossus smash, the additional HS usage during DC gives me a good chance of getting Sudden Death for the Recklessness that follows the DC as three slaughter will be up at that point.

More things!

You don't want to give up Lavawalker for +50 mastery as the tradeoff is a modest 15 mastery for 8% increased runspeed. While it's true that warriors have excellent mobility, runspeed still helps increase combat uptime especially when things are being moved, because it is very likely your tanks will have movement speed increasing effects.

Don't macro abilities like Cleave and Heroic Strike, they're off the global cooldown and used as rather random fillers, you don't wanna go Berserker when you're 0.5seconds away from being able to use Overpower.

[Namso]

Hello! Thank you for your response!

This just needs to be mentioned: Not ever should you open with Heroic Throw as that resets your swing timer. If you heroic throw/Charge the same second you'll end up having to wait around 2-2.5seconds until you recieve rage from a whiteswing. The preferable option is to open with Battleshout on account of the setbonus just before you charge.

Even if you need to sunder you shouldn't open with Heroic Throw, you need to get the essential shit going asap and the first 3 globals cost 50 rage to do and you want the additional rage from the BS/Charge for Heroic Strike during Colossus. Not to mention you lack the globals to do it as you want to get the Battleshout buff up without wasting a combat GCD.

I haven't actually noticed this being an issue when I open up, as I still have the right amount of rage to progress through my rotation without any setbacks. I didn't include Battle Shout as an opener because you don't want to waste the bonus you get from the tier set because a) you don't have your LttS stacks up and b) you should pair Battle Shout with some sort of cooldown, such as Deadly Calm or Recklessness. However, it'd likely be included when 4.3 arrives. I will, however, make note that you should wait a few seconds before using Charge to come off the global cooldown (and allow the tanks to hold aggro, even, before you blow up). It's highly recommended to open up with Heroic Throw and Colossus Smash because that means the target gets affected with the debuff faster so you and part of your raid would do more damage right off the bat.

And one more thing; You won't actually get any LttS benefit from Deadly Calm, as enough rage for the regular rotation will be available especially after the charge/BS opener, so I personally open with it as soon as I use my first Colossus smash, the additional HS usage during DC gives me a good chance of getting Sudden Death for the Recklessness that follows the DC as three slaughter will be up at that point.

That makes sense, I actually didn't realize until now that Deadly Calm only really benefits Heroic Strike and has nothing to do with other abilities. However, I tend to not use Deadly Calm without some sort of other cooldown you possess because it's generally a waste if you use it so early in isolation. Heroic Strike doesn't hit for very hard, so it needs an extra bit of oomph if you're planning to take advantage of it. I personally macro Deadly Calm and the Apparatus together to take complete advantage of my Heroic Strike spam. I guess it really ends up boiling down to personal preference on how to manage your cooldowns.

You don't want to give up Lavawalker for +50 mastery as the tradeoff is a modest 15 mastery for 8% increased runspeed. While it's true that warriors have excellent mobility, runspeed still helps increase combat uptime especially when things are being moved, because it is very likely your tanks will have movement speed increasing effects.

This is true, as there are examples where kiting is necessary and you end up falling behind (I've experienced it, and it sucks -__-). I will make note of it as a separate possible enchant. Thanks for pointing that out.

Don't macro abilities like Cleave and Heroic Strike, they're off the global cooldown and used as rather random fillers, you don't wanna go Berserker when you're 0.5seconds away from being able to use Overpower.

Again, you're right. I will remove that.

Thanks a lot for the feedback, I greatly appreciate it.

[Deleted]

In regards to your opener statement: I speak from my perspective when I say this and I haven't had aggro issues when going bananas for quite some time now, so waiting is out of the question. Two things that needs to be known about this: We raid with a feral druid and protection warrior so me using Heroic Throw for the sunder benefit is some wierd version of shooting yourself in the foot. Even if you don't, I would not recommend opening with Heroic Throw assuming you will DPS right off the bat as the additional rage will yield one additional heroic strike.

Secondly I got battleshout/Golemblood macroed that I use just as our tank throws his Heroic Throw or Avenger Shield at the boss.

I open with said macro and charge, obviously. I tend to not use Heroic Leap in the opener and rather wait until natural movement prompts the usage of it or if no such event will occur; when heart of rage procs. I activate Rend, I CS, heroic strike during the global and then I pop Deadly Calm and MS right after. At this point it's just maintaining a regular rotation with heroic strikes thrown in on cooldown due to DC. Once DC finishes I have 3 stacks of slaughter (0 > 4.5 > 9 seconds of MSing) and assuming Sudden Death Proced (which it pretty much needs to for this to be optimal) I use Recklessness.

Yeah, at that point my Battle shout buff has faded but I still have Heart of Rage and Golemblood going strong, and assuming shit goes my way I'll sit on a really high opening DPS.

Ofcourse, if anyone thinks they know a better way don't hesitate to share, I'd love to improve on the opener.

Wanna clarify alittle: It's possible that delaying Battleshout for when you have 3 slaughter is the optimal way to go, the reason I do it as I do is because I don't "waste" a combat GCD during my golemblood/HoR duration and get to use it again sooner, and it'll always line itself up nicely with DC.

And this is gonna change once I finally obtain a Firestone for my Apparatus

[Namso]

In regards to your opener statement: I speak from my perspective when I say this and I haven't had aggro issues when going bananas for quite some time now, so waiting is out of the question. Two things that needs to be known about this: We raid with a feral druid and protection warrior so me using Heroic Throw for the sunder benefit is some wierd version of shooting yourself in the foot. Even if you don't, I would not recommend opening with Heroic Throw assuming you will DPS right off the bat as the additional rage will yield one additional heroic strike.

The initial Heroic Throw isn't listed there solely because of the debuff it provides (if you even glyphed for it), but for the purpose of starting off with as much damage as you can at the beginning of a fight, as Heroic Throw's use is basically only limited to the initial engagement of the encounter and I suppose phases where you need to throw out a quick ranged attack. As for the reset of the swing timer and waiting... I don't know. I personally never waited for my swing timer to reset. My rage income was perfectly fine and my rotation was executed perfectly without any form of rage-starving, since I open up with Rend which does not require a whole lot of rage (by that time I would've swung already). Furthermore, the time it takes to even Heroic Throw + Berserker Rage -> Charge + Heroic Leap -> Rend would be enough time to land your first swing and perform the rotation suggested in the guide.

Secondly I got battleshout/Golemblood macroed that I use just as our tank throws his Heroic Throw or Avenger Shield at the boss.

I open with said macro and charge, obviously. I tend to not use Heroic Leap in the opener and rather wait until natural movement prompts the usage of it or if no such event will occur; when heart of rage procs. I activate Rend, I CS, heroic strike during the global and then I pop Deadly Calm and MS right after. At this point it's just maintaining a regular rotation with heroic strikes thrown in on cooldown due to DC. Once DC finishes I have 3 stacks of slaughter (0 > 4.5 > 9 seconds of MSing) and assuming Sudden Death Proced (which it pretty much needs to for this to be optimal) I use Recklessness.

I'm going to assume that would be your pre-pot. I don't know why you would wait until your Heart of Rage to proc before you use Rend and Colosuss Smash, if I'm reading that correctly, anyway. The best way to open up with cooldowns, in my opinion, is by using Battle Shout along with Recklessness and a Colossus Smash debuff. It doesn't take very long to achieve the three LttS stacks necessary for maximum damage output, meaning you can still take full advantage of the pre-pot with three LttS stacks, Recklessness, and a Colossus Smash debuff (it'd be highly likely for it to come off its cooldown from the initial use of it). I save Deadly Calm for when my Battle Shout would come off cooldown again, so it'd be Deadly Calm + Apparatus + Battle Shout + Colossus Smash debuff as my secondary cooldown rotation.

Wanna clarify alittle: It's possible that delaying Battleshout for when you have 3 slaughter is the optimal way to go, the reason I do it as I do is because I don't "waste" a combat GCD during my golemblood/HoR duration and get to use it again sooner, and it'll always line itself up nicely with DC.

You technically "waste" a combat GCD when you apply Rend. Again, if I understood correctly, which I have a feeling I'm not lol. Also, opening with Battle Shout + the potion is a wasting a GCD on that potion buff. You should pop Battle Shout and right as you come off GCD, you pop the potion.

[Deleted]

I think I wrote it out poorly.

I only delay Heroic Leap for Heart of Rage.

Secondly, I am gonna prepot whether or not I use Battle Shout and that timing doesn't change. Counting for traveltime I won't have my abilities delayed nor will I have Battleshout buff wasted, meaning I get full benefit of the buff without actually spending a GCD that could be spent on Slam during my Heart of Rage / Golemblood duration.

This is how my opener looks: Prepot/Shout > Charge > Rend > CS > Heroic Strike > DC/MS > OP > Slam > MS > OP > Slam > MS > Slam > CS (I save any Suddens Procced during DC for the Recklessness moment simply due to how vital it is) > MS/Reck > Slam > Slam > MS and so on with CS's thrown in if procced. Heroic Strikes are thrown in as well.

It is abit RNG dependant and I could delay both shout and DC if I so decided but on account of me still having Heart of Rage I really don't want to spend one GCD on an ability that won't actually deal direct damage. Thus I chose to pop shout in the beginning and have DC line up with it in addition to Golemblood. Heart of Rage might be delayed for a few seconds, that's true, but I'd say 8 times out of 10 it procs in the first 4 seconds.

Addition: Yeah it's a prepot, and as I mentioned the timing won't ever change on it whether I use BS or not.

[Namso]

You said you macroed Battle Shout with your pre-pot. Having said that, you use up a global cooldown when you use your Battle Shout because Battle Shout has a GCD on it and the pot is macroed to it, therefore you lose a GCD on that potion. You pretty much waste a lot of your Battle Shout when you open with it. The buff only lasts for 12 seconds, and you're using up GCDs on Rend and Colossus Smash, as well as the travel time of Charge and the GCD Battle Shout puts you in. In total, it can turn out to be a loss of as much as five seconds of the buff, which is a lot considering those five seconds can be put into an Overpower, Mortal Strike, and Slam. It's just a waste to use Battle Shout so early in the fight when you have nothing prepared to take full advantage of it. It's a whole lot more efficient to save it when you have three stacks of LttS and you do this:

Battle Shout -> Colossus Smash -> Recklessness + Mortal Strike -> Overpower -> Slam -> etc

Furthermore, your potion should still be up for several seconds by the time you pop Recklessness if you pre-pot.

Once that opening cooldown usage is over, wait until Battle Shout comes off cooldown again and blow these cooldowns:

Deadly Calm + any trinket you may have (which should be the Apparatus of Khaz'goroth) + Battle Shout

It works out perfectly. It averages out your burst. Instead of having a huge burst initially, you have a powerful one at the start of the fight, and then another powerful one a minute later. By the time you hit execution phase, Recklessness and Battle Shout would be off cooldown all over again and you'd see some ridiculous Execute crits coming your way.

[Siri]

Personally I think it's a bit weird that you'd list both Glyph of Command and Glyph of Battle as mandatory when you can only have one active at a time anyway. Not tthat the other glyphs are awesome but some benefit is better than no benefit. Unless you have to change shout in case someone dies that is.

[Namso]

Personally I think it's a bit weird that you'd list both Glyph of Command and Glyph of Battle as mandatory when you can only have one active at a time anyway. Not tthat the other glyphs are awesome but some benefit is better than no benefit. Unless you have to change shout in case someone dies that is.

You sometimes have to use Commanding Shout instead of Battle Shout if your raid composition lacks the stamina buff, which is highly possible since the only classes that provide that are priests, warriors, and hunters if they have the pet. There isn't any other viable glyph to use over Glyph of Commanding Shout, it's your best bet.

[Siri]

You sometimes have to use Commanding Shout instead of Battle Shout if your raid composition lacks the stamina buff, which is highly possible since the only classes that provide that are priests, warriors, and hunters if they have the pet. There isn't any other viable glyph to use over Glyph of Commanding Shout, it's your best bet.

But if it's a priest doing stamina and the priest dies the buff stays on.
Whether it is mandatory or not is going to depend greatly on your raid composition.
Personally I use furious sundering because saving a little rage is better to me than glyphing for something I'd never use.

[Brother]

Great guide, but don't you think Leonidas is more of a Fury than an Arms warri? Or even Prot because he is wearing a Shield?

[Deleted]

Good overall but some pretty big errors as well, will get back at it later as I need to rip faces in BF3 first

[Namso]

But if it's a priest doing stamina and the priest dies the buff stays on.
Whether it is mandatory or not is going to depend greatly on your raid composition.
Personally I use furious sundering because saving a little rage is better to me than glyphing for something I'd never use.

I understand that if the priest dies the buff stays on, but if your raid composition does not have a priest, or any class that has the stamina buff, in the first place, you need to provide that to them because you can. I will, however, make note of Furious Sundering because it can be used if you plan to forgo the use of Glyph of Heroic Throw/Colossus Smash. Thank you.

Great guide, but don't you think Leonidas is more of a Fury than an Arms warri? Or even Prot because he is wearing a Shield?

Ahaha, I knew it someone would point that out. I'll see if I can find a more fitting picture. :P

Good overall but some pretty big errors as well, will get back at it later as I need to rip faces in BF3 first

I'd like to know what these are.

[Siri]

I understand that if the priest dies the buff stays on, but if your raid composition does not have a priest, or any class that has the stamina buff, in the first place, you need to provide that to them because you can. I will, however, make note of Furious Sundering because it can be used if you plan to forgo the use of Glyph of Heroic Throw/Colossus Smash. Thank you.

Furious sundering is a minor glyph, not a major. If there's a lot of conditions where you do not need the glyphs, they're not mandatory.

[Namso]

Furious sundering is a minor glyph, not a major. If there's a lot of conditions where you do not need the glyphs, they're not mandatory.

I know it is, but if you are using the Glyph of Heroic Throw and Colossus Smash combination for your major glyphs, there is no need for Glyph of Furious Sundering. I noted that if you do not use that major glyph combination, Glyph of Furious Sundering is a viable option over Glyph of Commanding Shout.

[valenwood]

Several sources i have seen lately list reaching expertise cap as a lesser priority then str and Crit. I have to this date been very skeptical and always ensure that i am expertise capped, even at the cost of str. If I were to embrace this thinking, would I go reforge all of my EXP to CRIT and all the Crit that i have reforged to exp, return to crit? Would i then, on every piece that does not have crit, reforge the weaker stat to crit? And only on the pieces that have crit already, reforge the weaker stat to EXP? This seems like i would end up at about 12 exp rating. That cannot be good for dps, even behind the target. Is there then, some soft cap of expertise wherein it is ok to not be capped, and crit should then be prioritized?

[Deleted]

Several sources i have seen lately list reaching expertise cap as a lesser priority then str and Crit. I have to this date been very skeptical and always ensure that i am expertise capped, even at the cost of str. If I were to embrace this thinking, would I go reforge all of my EXP to CRIT and all the Crit that i have reforged to exp, return to crit? Would i then, on every piece that does not have crit, reforge the weaker stat to crit? And only on the pieces that have crit already, reforge the weaker stat to EXP? This seems like i would end up at about 12 exp rating. That cannot be good for dps, even behind the target. Is there then, some soft cap of expertise wherein it is ok to not be capped, and crit should then be prioritized?

Theoretically it's possible that with some setups of gear expertise may be worth less, but practically I can't see that happening. Capping expertise is easy, and since gear has such a wide variety of stats and amounts of stats it's rare it's difficult to be unable to get very close to the cap. You should never have to reforge crit to expertise.

Reforging expertise to crit and, say, haste to expertise can be a gain in some scenarios, but that has nothing to do with whether you want to cap expertise or not.

[Deleted]

Several sources i have seen lately list reaching expertise cap as a lesser priority then str and Crit. I have to this date been very skeptical and always ensure that i am expertise capped, even at the cost of str. If I were to embrace this thinking, would I go reforge all of my EXP to CRIT and all the Crit that i have reforged to exp, return to crit? Would i then, on every piece that does not have crit, reforge the weaker stat to crit? And only on the pieces that have crit already, reforge the weaker stat to EXP? This seems like i would end up at about 12 exp rating. That cannot be good for dps, even behind the target. Is there then, some soft cap of expertise wherein it is ok to not be capped, and crit should then be prioritized?

Everyone seems to misunderstand the meaning of those caps. It doesn't say that crit and/or stre has a higher valuel than exp. It's just more worth it to go for one of those stats when closing in on Exp cap (24 or 25) because it has a higher X-point value. That doesn't mean u can just negate expertise but if you're undercapped by a small amount it's fine to leave it like that and reforge for crit instead