Warrior Raid Tanking Help?

[Jesamine]

I have a warrior tank that seems to be having issues during our raids. His survivability and execution seem to be lacking, but as a healer I'm having a hard time addressing what the problem might be. I have a 2nd warrior tank that I could replace him with and have been trying to compare the two. My main tank is a DK, but I've been having the two warriors tank so that I could compare. Since I'm a new poster, apparently I'm not allowed to post links, but we have logs at WarcraftLogs under Wayward Enforcers, 12/28 & 1/4. Can anyone give me some help, pointers, advice?

[Tekkommo]

Alydael I am guessing?

Not getting hit by Berserking Rush would be a good start.

Both tanks appear to use Shield Barrier too much (it sucks) and hardly use Shield Block.

I'm not used to the layout with Warcraft Logs, still look at WoL as I am lazy.

[Storms81]

Aly is the tank in question. Yes, getting hit by Berserking Rush hurts, but Jes' question is more in general. He seems to be more difficult to keep up across most of the fights than our other warrior. Looking more at cooldown usage and the like for those of us who have never really touched a warrior in anything other than a purely casual role. We are just not knowledgeable enough to offer good criticism.

[Jesamine]

I have logs at WoL as well ... but again, still can't post links

Same dates, Wayward Enforcers-Aerie Peak.

[Tekkommo]

Well they both need to use Shield Block a lot more and to really say anything else I would need logs of other bosses.

Mar'Gok is more of an execution fight, I can't tell what he does wrong from logs which only contain wipes.

[Jesamine]

If you click the boss name at the top, you can change which fight. The 1/4 log has the entire instance, including the wipes on Mar'gok.

[Zyloes]

As the people above me have said, less Shield Barrier and more Shield Block, For Alydael, since they are missing quite a few Ravager uses, going for the Glad Stance talent may be a better option for the passive 5% reduction. Dropping the Unyielding Strikes talent would probably be a gain too, as Heroic Strike usage is extremely low (once on an 8 min Imperator pull), But that is more of a damage increase I suppose than just survivability.

[Cyclonus-WOW]

On Mar'gok they aren't tank swapping properly, get them to switch every 6 stacks of Accelerated Assault, it will reduce incoming tank damage. They also need to have shield block ready to go for when they're tanking, it looks like they are sometimes using it when they're not tanking. Suggesting they're using the Heavy Rep talent. I'd recommend they forgo heavy rep and use unyielding strikes to HS Spam @ 6 stacks of US instead.
https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports...ability=159515

On the Butcher kill one of them got to 4 stacks of The Cleaver. Get them to use Ravager as an avoidance CD To help parry and hopefully rinse stacks. I've gone the whole fight only getting a single stack at a time.
https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports...bility=1561475

Brackenspore looked okay. They got to 5 stacks a couple times, but that's pretty normal. Spamming shield barrier during breaths should see a lot more of the breath damage absorbed, they could do that to take less damage there.. And the add was allowed to stack to 8 at the end of the fight which would have hurt a lot. You guys obv decided to burn boss and heal through that.
https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports...ability=159972

Over the entire raid only 2 Draenic Armor Potions were used, these can be used like minor defensive CD pots, or even stacked with offensive abilities for offensive burst.

Finally take a look at wasted rage. There aren't a lot of situations where i'd waste rage, so they can definitely do better on this, Alydael did better on every fight I looked at than the other tank.
https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports...ht=7&spell=101

[eksdra]

Alydael used Shield Block 4 times on Kargath.
3 times on Butcher.
4 times on Brackenspore.
4 times on Tectus.

I could go on, but...why? I'm not completely sold that Alydael even knows the first thing about tanking, and I think your healers deserve a pay raise, because they're carrying your tanks hard. The other tank was only slightly better.

If you replaced them both, you could probably clear 5/7H that day.

[Storms81]

Thanks for the feedback so far, we obviously need to be looking to get Shield Block up a whole lot more. For those of unknowledgeable to warrior CD's is there anything else?? I'm asking because I am actually the MT for this team on my DK (been off for a few weeks, came in as DPS to get parses for the warriors head to head) and want to make our tank team as strong as possible.

[PowerGamez]

Tell them to google "How to Warrior tank WoD" and read even the most basic guide. They clearly haven't done this step.

[Brytallica]

The guide on this site for prot tanking is very good. I also like Method's current guide.

[Jesamine]

Thank you all for your feedback!

[Alydael]

Thanks for all the help. I am Alydael. I use Shield Barrier because:
1) It is up more often (at 20 rage) and my HP has dropped to a point where I feel I need a mitigation CD and am worried that waiting for shield block might cause me to die
2) also, shield block is only physical (melee damage) and quite a few of those fights have more damage types going out than melee
The general consensus is to use shield block more, but I am concerned that waiting for shield block to come up might cause me to die

[eksdra]

Kargath is all physical. Butcher is all physical. Tectus is all physical (except standing in red, but you're a tank.) Brackenspore melees for physical and so does the add. Breath is a good use of Shield Barrier. Twins do all physical damage except the fire. Koragh does a mixture. Imperator is largely physical (there's a reason top guilds brought warriors for mythic Imperator, and it wasn't their stellar dps).

Shield Barrier is capped at around 20% of your health, even with max resolve. With 300k health, you'd at best with 60 rage get a Barrier for 60k. On almost every fight in here, that same 60 rage could be spent on a flat 30% reduction in damage taken (up to 60% with a crit block) with Shield Block.

- - - Updated - - -

If you're tanking first, then pre-pot armor on the pull. The huge amount of armor will give you plenty of time to build 60 rage: 10 from pre-Berserker Rage, 20 from Charge, 20 from Shield Slam (if you crit once you're already at 60, and that's one GCD from pull), 20 from Revenge. Two GCDs at most. Then you have 6s to build another 60 rage for the 2nd Block. After that, make sure you'll always have 60 rage when Block comes off CD. If both charges are on CD and you cap Rage, then put up a Barrier, otherwise the 60k absorb is insignificant.

[Novaflare]

Thanks for all the help. I am Alydael. I use Shield Barrier because:
1) It is up more often (at 20 rage) and my HP has dropped to a point where I feel I need a mitigation CD and am worried that waiting for shield block might cause me to die
2) also, shield block is only physical (melee damage) and quite a few of those fights have more damage types going out than melee
The general consensus is to use shield block more, but I am concerned that waiting for shield block to come up might cause me to die

#1 describes what I like to call the rage spiral for prot warriors. Your overuse of shield barrier is actually feeding into you feeling like you need to use shield barrier more just to survive - this is because shield barrier is pretty awful in general.

As for the second, well, think about it for a minute. How many abilities from the bosses in Highmaul are more dangerous than 4-5 auto attacks? Can you name them? Are they so frequent as to not be able to use barrier when they come up and use shield block the rest of the time? Heck, just look at your damage taken in your logs and compare the damage you take from physical damage(hell, even just auto-attacks) versus the rest of the fight's magic damage combined.

[Zipetor]

Thanks for all the help. I am Alydael. I use Shield Barrier because:
1) It is up more often (at 20 rage) and my HP has dropped to a point where I feel I need a mitigation CD and am worried that waiting for shield block might cause me to die
2) also, shield block is only physical (melee damage) and quite a few of those fights have more damage types going out than melee
The general consensus is to use shield block more, but I am concerned that waiting for shield block to come up might cause me to die

There are only a few times when prioritizing barrier over block makes sense. Let's look at how much damage each will mitigate - On the butcher kill you use shield block three times. If I zoom in on the usage at ~2:21 I see you blocked about 60K damage for 60 rage. You also used a 40 rage shield barrier to absorb about 40k damage. It looks like they mitigate the same damage per rage, but the big difference is how the damage is mitigated. With barrier you absorb all at once and then, until you have rage to barrier again, you are taking full swings. On the other hand shield block is "absorbing" 7-15k per swing for 6 seconds so your damage intake is much smoother and therefore easier to heal. Your rage generation should be sufficient for shield block, you generated about 6.5 rage per second and it takes 180 rage every 36 seconds = 5 rage per second for optimal shield block uptime. Excess rage can be dumped into shield barriers. Feel free to use minor cooldowns like enraged regen or demoralizing shout in between shield block cooldown.

[Alydael]

Thanks, makes sense. I got some bad info on shield barrier v shield block from a site that usually gave me good information in the past. They made it seem like more of a choice instead of explaining how you should prioritize shield block. After looking at the logs a little closer, I can see how the shield barrier would lead to more spikey damage and will rely mainly on shield block in the future.

[Chookchan]

Thanks, makes sense. I got some bad info on shield barrier v shield block from a site that usually gave me good information in the past. They made it seem like more of a choice instead of explaining how you should prioritize shield block. After looking at the logs a little closer, I can see how the shield barrier would lead to more spikey damage and will rely mainly on shield block in the future.

Shield Block should be your number 1 priority for using rage as Protection, the only reasonable time to use Shield Barrier is Brackenspores breath or when you're near death with no other cooldowns up.
You're better off using that extra rage for damage, an extra 4-5k dps goes a long way.
With cooldown management I usually shield wall on pull if theres no high damage mechanics within 2 minutes, helps everyone get into position and allows you to pool some rage before you start shield blocking.
The trick to being a good tank is using all of your defensive CD's consistently, the trick to being a great tank is using them smartly (really makes a difference in Mythic).