Hit/exp for tanks worth it?

[critterkiller]

Greetins fellow warriors.

I come to you to ask about something that i think many wonder about.
For the past 2 expantions iv had tanking as a offspecc for when the guild needs it or when i want a fast heroic done.

My question is, is it worth to cap yourself with hit/exp in this expantion? as i have never done it before because i felt like it was better to have the reforging spent on avoidance instead.

Tnx in advance

[Raxxed]

Yes.
If you have the gear for it, hardcap expertise aswell.

Reasoning:
Less dodge/parry/misses = higher rage generation = higher active mitigation uptime.

[critterkiller]

so do i 7,5% hit and hardcap expertise? i mean i cant really stop at 7,5% on exp because of the fact that i stand infront all the time

[soterya]

Yes its 7.50% hit and 15% exp that is about 2550 hit rating and 5100 exp rating, then go for whatever prot wars go for for pally its mast or haste.

[critterkiller]

Okay, got a long way to go then.....

[Raxxed]

Okay, got a long way to go then.....

7.5%/7.5% is fine until you don't have to sacrifice everything to finally break hardcap expertise.

[Senen]

7.5%/7.5% is fine until you don't have to sacrifice everything to finally break hardcap expertise.

There's no really good reason to stop stacking Expertise after 7.5%.

It's not really a cap as tank, especially as war tank.
While you're off-tanking, the useful defensive stats are stamina and strength (since SBar vaguely scales with strength via the pa buff).
While you're off-tanking, the useful offensive stats are strength, crit and haste.

You have to know that, on most fights, Hit/Expertise are NOT our best defensive stats.
There's two reason why most war tanks go for Hit/Expertise:
1) You want you rage generation to be as reliable as possible.
2) You want to increase your dps as long as it doesn't imply that the boss will kill you.

So, yeah, 7.5% Expertise is a cap as long as dps is concerned. Above 7.5% Expertise, you sacrifice as much survival for less dps.
But the difference isn't really that big and I don't really understand why war tanks focus so much on this "softcap".

P.S.: Note that Hit/Exp are not necessarily the best stat neither to maximize your rage generation nor have the more reliable rage generation (again, depends on the fight). But it prevents the bad scenario "The boss did parry/dodge three Shield Slam in a row, I have no rage. " that is likely to kill you.

[Anuibus]

P.S.: Note that Hit/Exp are not necessarily the best stat neither to maximize your rage generation nor have the more reliable rage generation (again, depends on the fight)

Fight is irrelevent, unless you are sitting in battle or zerker stance, hit/expertise are the only stats that will in any way improve either of those.

And for a tank, expertise above 7.5% does not give a smaller dps increase than it did before, as expertise now only removes one stat at a time, so it takes 7.5% to remove all of a bosses dodge, then any after that removes parry. Hit/expertise are reliable defensive stats and powerful ones on fights with lots of magic damage as dodge/parry/mastery are not going help you avoid any damage.

[Raugnaut]

There's no really good reason to stop stacking Expertise after 7.5%.

It's not really a cap as tank, especially as war tank.
While you're off-tanking, the useful defensive stats are stamina and strength (since SBar vaguely scales with strength via the pa buff).
While you're off-tanking, the useful offensive stats are strength, crit and haste.

You have to know that, on most fights, Hit/Expertise are NOT our best defensive stats.
There's two reason why most war tanks go for Hit/Expertise:
1) You want you rage generation to be as reliable as possible.
2) You want to increase your dps as long as it doesn't imply that the boss will kill you.

So, yeah, 7.5% Expertise is a cap as long as dps is concerned. Above 7.5% Expertise, you sacrifice as much survival for less dps.
But the difference isn't really that big and I don't really understand why war tanks focus so much on this "softcap".

P.S.: Note that Hit/Exp are not necessarily the best stat neither to maximize your rage generation nor have the more reliable rage generation (again, depends on the fight). But it prevents the bad scenario "The boss did parry/dodge three Shield Slam in a row, I have no rage. " that is likely to kill you.

Haste, for a prot paladin, only increases our attack speed, which is useless unless you are in battle stance. Of course, even if you ARE in battle stance while offtanking, Hit/EXpertise are still the useful offensive stats, up to the 7.5% cap for both, AND useful defensive stats, as more moves hitting=more rage gained=more HS/SBr. Remember that, while in defensive stats, auto-attacks generate NO rage.

Thus, Hit/Expertise are the BEST rage generation stats there are. Mastery, and then (barely) Crit come after Hit/Expertise in terms of rage gen, and all prot warriors, if they need more rage gen, should go the mastery route. Crit is nearly useless for rage generation, as it only affects Shield Slam. 1% crit is equivalent to about .03 rage per second, assuming BEST possible Shield Slam usage (Every other global). Mastery is worth much more- Every time you crit block, you enrage, generating 10 rage (Same as critting with Shield Slam), and it has a 3 sec ICD, thus allowing for more rage generation then crit (Since Shield Slam will most likely only proc every 4-5 Devastates on average), AND it decreases the overall damage you take at the same time, unlike crit. Sure, Crit is def superior for damage, but on any fight where the tank damage MATTERS is also a fight where the tank has HUGE amounts of vengeance because the tank is taking HUGE amounts of damage so tanks will want to mitigate damage as best they can while maximizing dps.


So, For Rage generation, Hit=Expertise>Mastery>Crit. For damage, Str>Hit=Expertise>Crit>>>>>>>>>>>haste>Mastery. For damage mitigation, I think its something like Mastery>Hit=Expertise>Parry=Dodge>Str>Crit.

[Deleted]

I do hit=exp>mastery>parry>dodge>crit>haste as far as reforging goes for my offspec, and it works pretty good in my opinion.

[Deleted]

Haste, for a prot paladin, only increases our attack speed, which is useless unless you are in battle stance. Of course, even if you ARE in battle stance while offtanking, Hit/EXpertise are still the useful offensive stats, up to the 7.5% cap for both, AND useful defensive stats, as more moves hitting=more rage gained=more HS/SBr. Remember that, while in defensive stats, auto-attacks generate NO rage.

Thus, Hit/Expertise are the BEST rage generation stats there are. Mastery, and then (barely) Crit come after Hit/Expertise in terms of rage gen, and all prot warriors, if they need more rage gen, should go the mastery route. Crit is nearly useless for rage generation, as it only affects Shield Slam. 1% crit is equivalent to about .03 rage per second, assuming BEST possible Shield Slam usage (Every other global). Mastery is worth much more- Every time you crit block, you enrage, generating 10 rage (Same as critting with Shield Slam), and it has a 3 sec ICD, thus allowing for more rage generation then crit (Since Shield Slam will most likely only proc every 4-5 Devastates on average), AND it decreases the overall damage you take at the same time, unlike crit. Sure, Crit is def superior for damage, but on any fight where the tank damage MATTERS is also a fight where the tank has HUGE amounts of vengeance because the tank is taking HUGE amounts of damage so tanks will want to mitigate damage as best they can while maximizing dps.


So, For Rage generation, Hit=Expertise>Mastery>Crit. For damage, Str>Hit=Expertise>Crit>>>>>>>>>>>haste>Mastery. For damage mitigation, I think its something like Mastery>Hit=Expertise>Parry=Dodge>Str>Crit.

Crit doesn't give any Rage for the Protection Warrior. Crit has 0 defensive property for the Protection Warrior.

Our Rage generating stats are Hit/Expertise > Mastery, then Dodge/Parry through Revenge. I'm not taking Haste into account as its benefit is close to null.

---------- Post added 2013-01-13 at 12:53 PM ----------

@ Critterkiller :

Yes, Hit and Expertise are very important for Prot Warriors in MoP.

Here's a TL;DR version of what you should aim for :

1* Hit till 7.5%
2* Expertise till 7.5%
3* Any remaining points into Mastery

If you want an ''ultimate'' control over your Rage generation, then :
4* Expertise till 15%

Feel free to read the sticky guide on the front page for more. Have fun, : )

[Deleted]

So, yeah, 7.5% Expertise is a cap as long as dps is concerned. Above 7.5% Expertise, you sacrifice as much survival for less dps.
But the difference isn't really that big and I don't really understand why war tanks focus so much on this "softcap".

A mix of old habits and the very minor point of hitting in the back while offtanking. And it's more or less a compromise between falling too much and not falling anything. Your casual warrior will read 7.5% everywhere and would think that there is a softcap there still. As you, I think I don't think is a good recommendation, go hard cap or don't give a shit about expertise, and stay at 5%, 8% or 10%, whatever you fall in. No need to treat 7.5% as a magic number.

[kangamooster]

Getting more hit/exp is for damage smoothing, not necessarily more total damage reduction. If you want more TDR, go for mastery and avoidance (in that order); however, keep in mind that spikes are what kill tanks, and if you are good at managing your AM you will spike less. More hit/exp = more reliable AM.

[Senen]

Fight is irrelevent, unless you are sitting in battle or zerker stance, hit/expertise are the only stats that will in any way improve either of those.

The fight IS relevent.
Against Lei Shi, Hit/Exp are the only good stats (with stamina). Against Mel'jarak, you could probaly play with 0% Hit/0% Exp and generate more rage that you can dump.
The more hits you take, the les rng-dependant mastery/parry/dodge are. While hit/exp rng doesn't change (but exists, because of Sword and Board).
Other things in the fight may be relevant too.

[Warriorsarri]

So, For Rage generation, Hit=Expertise>Mastery>Crit. For damage, Str>Hit=Expertise>Crit>>>>>>>>>>>haste>Mastery. For damage mitigation, I think its something like Mastery>Hit=Expertise>Parry=Dodge>Str>Crit.

If one is looking to maximize his rage generation he would go for Expertise(7.5%) / Hit (7.5%) / Expertise(15%) > Mastery
If one is looking to maximize his Damage output he would go for Hit (7.5%) > Expertise(7.5%) > Expertise(15%) > Crit > Str > Mastery / Parry => Dodge > Haste

Regarding damage output: First off, the reason that hit is better then Expertise is due to a few of our attacks can miss, but can't be dodged /Parried (Thunderclap to name one).
Crit is above str due to the amount of vengence one can get while tanking ( http://elitistjerks.com/f81/t131083-...on_warrior/p7/ Post #95 ).

then there is Mastery VS Parry VS Dodge. As far as I know there has been no math regarding this, so this is just educated guesses. On a single target figth one should go for Mastery for the extra rage regeneration from Crit Block and have the Shield Slam glyph. On an AoE figth one should go for Parry > Dodge and have the Revenge glyph.

Haste is good for one thing, and one thing only, more white hits. While tanking this is a close to no + to damage. The only time it would be better then useless is if you are sitting in Battle Stance for the majority of the figth. But if you are sitting in Battle stance you can't get any Vengence, so one should never be in BS anyhow.

I know this is a little Offtopic, but as I see quite a few people writing upp stat lists whitout backing them upp with facts I felt the need to write it down.

[Senen]

Haste, for a prot paladin, only increases our attack speed, which is useless unless you are in battle stance. Of course, even if you ARE in battle stance while offtanking, Hit/EXpertise are still the useful offensive stats, up to the 7.5% cap for both, AND useful defensive stats, as more moves hitting=more rage gained=more HS/SBr. Remember that, while in defensive stats, auto-attacks generate NO rage.

I meant "Above 7.5% Expertise, while offtanking". In this condition, only stats that increase your dps are Strength, Haste and Crit. And ofc, Haste and Crit are terrible as war prot.
The fact is that many people go for 7.5% Expertise because "it's a loss of stat when you offtank", but no, it's not, there's no interisting stat when offtanking. And when you are actually tanking, 7.5% Expertise is not a cap in any way.

---------- Post added 2013-01-13 at 03:54 PM ----------

If one is looking to maximize his rage generation he would go for Expertise(7.5%) > Hit (7.5%) / Expertise(15%) > Mastery
If one is looking to maximize his Damage output he would go for Expertise(7.5%) > Hit (7.5%) > Expertise(15%) > Crit >> Str > Mastery / Parry => Dodge > Haste

First, you didn't mention "if one is looking to minimize his damage input".
Second, the first order is not true for all fights.
Third, how in the world can Expertise (7.5%) be better thant Hit (7.5%)?

---------- Post added 2013-01-13 at 03:56 PM ----------

A mix of old habits and the very minor point of hitting in the back while offtanking. And it's more or less a compromise between falling too much and not falling anything. Your casual warrior will read 7.5% everywhere and would think that there is a softcap there still. As you, I think I don't think is a good recommendation, go hard cap or don't give a shit about expertise, and stay at 5%, 8% or 10%, whatever you fall in. No need to treat 7.5% as a magic number.

Yeah, I guess it's mainly because of old habits. But still, I'm surprise there's still so many people considering 7.5% as a magic number. Either they don't understand how Expertise works at MoP or they just follow anyone saying "this stat order is better" without thinking.

[kangamooster]

Hit is only marginally important than Expertise this expansion, and expertise has the same value from 7.5%-15% that it does from 0%-7.5%. So if anything it is hit cap>expertise hardcap>other stats. The only two attacks we use while tanking that can only miss are Shockwave/Dragon Roar and Thunder Clap; Heroic Throw happens pre-pull and afaik can also be avoided since it's a ranged attack.

Additionally, Theck has done MANY tests of Mastery Vs avoidance on his blog. Like, seriously, a good 6+ posts about it.
http://sacredduty.net/2012/09/18/l90...tion-followup/
http://sacredduty.net/2013/01/04/5-1...t-1-the-model/

TL;DR - If you are eliminating spikes, mastery (hit/exp to comfort, but not necessary). If you want more TDR, avoidance (hit/exp to comfort; pretty necessary here though). Most smart tanks will be taking the former approach.

[Warriorsarri]

First, you didn't mention "if one is looking to minimize his damage input".
Second, the first order is not true for all fights.
Third, how in the world can Expertise (7.5%) be better thant Hit (7.5%)?

You are correct that I didn't mention "If one is looking to minimize his damage input", but that is not the topic discussed, so I skipped that one. One also have to remember that it will depend alot on what figth you are on (Heavy meele / Heavy spell / Mixed / High, Low vengence etc.)

Example: Empress Heroic, the majority of the damage you take is from Meele swings. You take alot of damage giving you a very high vengence. with that in mind you'll have to decide what spell you would benefit from the most, shield block or Shield Barrier. If you decide that Shield block would be the best, then you gear for Mastery. If you decide that the 500k-1mil Shield barriers would be better then you go for Expertise / Hit.

On this perticular figth the damage difference between the two is about 5-10% (With Shield Barrier being the better one), but you will do more damage if you go for Shield Block istead (Due to higher enrage upptime).

The less damage you take from meeleswings / Unblockabble attacks the less value block has, and the higher value Expertise / hit gets. so if one looks at a pure spell figth as Lei Shi you would go full out on those two stats and only use Shield Barrier.

[Senen]

The reason as to why expertise is valued higher then hit untill the 7.5% softcap is due to upp untill that point 1 rating of expertsie lowers the chance that your attacks will be Dodged or Parried, while 1rating of Hit only reduce the chance your attacked can miss.

As I said, you don't understand how Expertise works since MoP.

[Warriorsarri]

As I said, you don't understand how Expertise works since MoP.

You are quite correct, was a while sence I checked my expertise. I'll edit my old post.