Protection Gemming questions

[Nobleshield]

I've read the protection thread here, the protection thread at Elitist Jerks, the guide at Icy Veins, and used Ask Mr. Robot and all the sites seem to have conflicting information regarding what gemming strategy to use and when to look at which strategy. For example, AMR suggests I use the following with the default "Control/Haste" build:

Yellow: Haste/Stamina
Blue: Stamina
Red: Expertise/Stamina

I've had several people say this is incorrect for the most part (outside of raiding heroic content where you need more stamina to survive) and that I should gem like this, which I recently regemmed to:

Yellow: Haste
Blue: Haste/Stamina
Red: Expertise/Stamina

Now, I am a 10-man raider and unlikely to see heroic modes any time soon; my guild just downed Tortos on normal this week and will be starting progression on Megaera tomorrow. At the moment I'm exactly at the hit cap without excessive reforging (being a Draenei helps) and very close to hard capping Expertise, so it seems like I'm at that point where I should throw everything else into Haste, but having recently returned to Paladin tanking I still get confused regarding the notion of actually wanting DPS stats instead of tank stats in most cases, and the gemming strategies seem to be entirely reliant on what content you're doing, how comfortable you are with the class, and various other things, so I'm more than a little confused still about which way I should be gemming. To make matters worse it seems I could also go for for heavy Mastery as a viable (and possibly better overall, according to the EJ thread) alternative to going Haste-heavy, wherein your SotR is less predictable but your overall damage intake is smoother and less prone to spikes due to an imperfect rotation.

[Deleted]

In 10 man you do not really need more stamina than is native on your gear unless you are severly undergeared.

Personally with me gemming, I am going mostly haste. If I break a socket I use haste/stam in blue and haste/exp in red, I would use haste/hit if possible but I am already over hitcap in a way that I cant reforge more hit away.

I take a socket bonus if...

Red:

Expertise
Haste
60+ crit
60+ str
120+ mastery
120+ stamina

Blue:

Well, I dont. No socket bonus I have found yet is attractive enough to make the switch from a 320 haste gem to a hybrid in a blue socket.
I currently got one green gem that gives me +120 str, but I am questioning that choice right now. Blue sockets are kinda lackluster

[Butler to Baby Sloths]

Unless get a really good blue socket bonus, just put 320 haste in blue and yellow, 160 haste/160 expertise in red. 120 stamina/160 haste in blue for a good socket bonus (stamina or haste).

[Deleted]

120 stamina/160 haste in blue for a good socket bonus (stamina or haste).

I am pretty much on the same mindset, but really, is there any blue socket that fits this criteria? I got 7 blue sockets, and only one green gem, and as I said in my earlier post, kinda questioning if that green socket should even be there since it is only a 120+ str enchant.

Is there any item that got a blue socket that is really worth getting?

[Butler to Baby Sloths]

Tier 15 pants if going for the 4set; 180 stamina for a yellow and a blue.

[Dastuross]

I gem full haste ( it's in every socket ) at 531 ilvl, this is 10m heroic. Doing that i'm sitting at 17k haste unbuffed, if you're not 100% good in your priority i'd go for abit less haste, same if you're undergeared. But i haven't needed to swap to any stam yet in heroics ( 2/13, Jin and Ji, working on IQ and horridon atm ). why? cuz numbers, nah, i like the extra healing/dps i get from having so much haste, it really helps out in 10s

Here's my armory incase you wanted to see http://us.battle.net/wow/en/characte...turos/advanced

[zloitima]

I just go full haste ignoring any bonus. only 3 pieces of my gear don't have haste on it, so gemming for expertise/hit will grant me less haste than going just haste.

ilvl 538(600 cloak gives +5ilvl instant!), 18586 haste, a lot of hatred from dps.

[Deleted]

I just go full haste ignoring any bonus. only 3 pieces of my gear don't have haste on it, so gemming for expertise/hit will grant me less haste than going just haste.

ilvl 538(600 cloak gives +5ilvl instant!), 18586 haste, a lot of hatred from dps.

I second this, I'm also just going full out haste as it's what I feel is best, I don't have any problems with survivability (ilvl 528, 6/13 hc)

[JasonWuzHear]

A good resource is a blog called Sacred Duty.
Here's the link!

Stamina in trinkets is way more valuable than haste in trinkets from a survivability standpoint.
Stamina is just so slightly more valuable than haste in gem sockets from a survivability standpoint.

However, Haste allows you to push out more dps and raid healing. I personally go stam for trinkets, haste for gemming (of course changing the colors to meet certain socket bonuses). If you're really undergeared, stamina is a great stat to stack to bring your survivability up. Usually, for heroics, most people try to just get a minimum amount of stamina, then go for more haste because it adds some more survivability as well as adding some dps.

Keep in mind that progression usually halts when there's not enough overall raid dps, rather than a tank continuously dying or having bad healers. Of course if you're in a more casual raiding group, you might have a worse healer that might make you want to gear for more survivability.

[zloitima]

No one doubts that stamina is better for survivability. However from a 10man raider point of view, tank's health pool is almost never a problem. If a tank with 700k health dies and causes a wipe, it means whether he or healers are doing a bad job. And in that case gearing for stamina won't do a miracle, I'm afraid.

[Dastuross]

I agree with Zlol, stam in 10mans just isn't that great, we don't take enough damage to need it. which is why i gem full haste, the healing and dps increase is amazing in 10 mans, where every bit of dps/healing helps.

[Nairobi]

Outside of weeks 2-4 when pushing HC progression on Horridon, Council, Meg, and Qon, I haven't used a stam trinket for anything. I've given up many socket bonuses, which was hard (as I was a die-hard "get ALL the bonus!" gemmer before), but now I run straight haste (~18.5k) outside of my chest, which I'm just waiting to replace if Animus ever coughs up a conq token.

This is from a 13/13 standpoint, there is just no reason to run high stam in 10s.

[rhandric]

Outside of weeks 2-4 when pushing HC progression on Horridon, Council, Meg, and Qon, I haven't used a stam trinket for anything. I've given up many socket bonuses, which was hard (as I was a die-hard "get ALL the bonus!" gemmer before), but now I run straight haste (~18.5k) outside of my chest, which I'm just waiting to replace if Animus ever coughs up a conq token.

This is from a 13/13 standpoint, there is just no reason to run high stam in 10s.

While I generally agree with this sentiment, it almost entirely depends on your raid as to whether you need to run more stam. In my raids, I know that if I were to drop some stam (I have 7 pure stam gems and 7 /stam gems), I'd likely die. Now, as I get upgrades, I'm gemming less stam (yes, this is less stam gemming than I used to have.../sigh), but upgrades are few and far between for me. On the last raid night, 41.4% of my "incoming" heals were from myself; since I know that such a large portion of my survivability rests on my shoulders, I opt for the stam.

[Nairobi]

FWIW, I usually account for ~60%+ of my healing. I'd wager that has a good bit to do with the fact that I have such high haste for more/faster SOI/SS ticks. And our healers are no slouches either (Disc/MW, and sometimes HPal).

Not saying that you should swap or are doing anything wrong, just pointing out that when you're being self sufficient, Stam isn't the only option.

[rhandric]

Agreed, but when in my experience, most (of my) tank deaths are due to lack of healing over extended periods of time, having the buffer of stam helps more than the haste would. As I said, I'm slowly transitioning to more haste gemming, but I'm gearing around my raid (well, healer) comp. Though I'm curious how much stam I actually would lose (and haste I would gain) if I were to switch to pure haste gemming, anyone want to take a gander at that? http://us.battle.net/wow/en/characte...radia/advanced

[Deja Thoris]

Agreed, but when in my experience, most (of my) tank deaths are due to lack of healing over extended periods of time, having the buffer of stam helps more than the haste would. As I said, I'm slowly transitioning to more haste gemming, but I'm gearing around my raid (well, healer) comp. Though I'm curious how much stam I actually would lose (and haste I would gain) if I were to switch to pure haste gemming, anyone want to take a gander at that? http://us.battle.net/wow/en/characte...radia/advanced

Two points:
1) The maths is maths at its most basic. Add up the sockets you have stam gemmed in and substitute with haste.
2) If you die then your deaths are due to the fault of the healers. "Not healing the tank" for extended periods of time in 10man normal is poor play and not something that should force you into a suboptimal gemming strat. If you had more haste your SS would tick faster, your SoI would heal for more and you could get to a 5 stack bastion of glory faster because of faster HP generation. All of these will help your survivability more than an extra 20k HP because you don't get heals.

[Deleted]

Well you would drop 2280 stamina by replacing all those stamina gems (Non JC gems) and gain 3040 haste.

[rhandric]

Two points:
1) The maths is maths at its most basic. Add up the sockets you have stam gemmed in and substitute with haste.
2) If you die then your deaths are due to the fault of the healers. "Not healing the tank" for extended periods of time in 10man normal is poor play and not something that should force you into a suboptimal gemming strat. If you had more haste your SS would tick faster, your SoI would heal for more and you could get to a 5 stack bastion of glory faster because of faster HP generation. All of these will help your survivability more than an extra 20k HP because you don't get heals.

1) I know the math is basic, I just don't have all the numbers I need to do the full math (ie, how much hp X amount of stam gives), and didn't feel like looking it up. There's also socket bonues that would be affected, which, again, I didn't feel like looking up.
2) I realize this, but I'd rather gem non-ideally and down bosses than gem ideally and not down bosses; I can't change what other players do, but I can change how I handle the situations that result from those players.

Well you would drop 2280 stamina by replacing all those stamina gems (Non JC gems) and gain 3040 haste.

Thanks Firefly. So that'd bring me up to ~8200 (~19.2%, from 12.3%) haste at the cost of, what, ~32k hp?

[Nairobi]

Thanks Firefly. So that'd bring me up to ~8200 (~19.2%, from 12.3%) haste at the cost of, what, ~32k hp?

Good god man. That's a 50%+ increase in your haste, for 30k HP. I mean, 30k is nothing to sneeze at, but neither is 50% more haste than what you have. At the very least, try going Forceful gems or something; I can't imagine how slow 5k haste must feel, and I think you'll be shocked at the effect that it has on your rotation and self healing.

Not sure what your current HP is, but I'd wager that you could easily give up that extra stam for your progress given what you stand to gain.

[rhandric]

Good god man. That's a 50%+ increase in your haste, for 30k HP. I mean, 30k is nothing to sneeze at, but neither is 50% more haste than what you have. At the very least, try going Forceful gems or something; I can't imagine how slow 5k haste must feel, and I think you'll be shocked at the effect that it has on your rotation and self healing.

Not sure what your current HP is, but I'd wager that you could easily give up that extra stam for your progress given what you stand to gain.

Yeah, it's probably something I should do; I just never had the raw numbers in front of me pointing it out. I currently have 682k unbuffed, which I believe translates to ~715k in raid. My current stam gems come from a while ago, when I was dying to lack of heals on Horridon and Council (getting frozen because the OT didn't want to taunt is a death sentence...).

But things have changed since then, so I should probably reevaluate those choices (I mean, if I'm counting on self-healing anyways, might as well make it stronger). I'm sure you know how it is to get into a state and then find it hard to move out of it, especially if you haven't gotten any upgrades to push that change.