Legion S1 - FR - IP weaving build, while fun to play, it was "fine"
Legion S2-4 - After redesign it was Good when you had Shield Block up, garbage when it dropped down
BFA pre patch - My defensives were literally cut in half, I struggled to survive on any boss in Antorus
BFA S1 - it was a nightmare... not only my nerfed defensives got worse by leveling up, I lost all the bandaid traits from artifact that fixed some issues and every god damn thing was on GCD... I completed dungeon hero achievement early on with guildies (it was a real struggle) leveled my brewmaster, went into the mythics with him with leveling greens on and I felt like a nuclear bunker vs broken umbrella on warrior
BFA S2 - 1 new trait that gave avatar a mastery bonus and a new talent that made TC do more damage on lower CD... on top of that m+ affix was a huge trash wave that did next to nothing so you could just cleave them with boss. This was the "peak" in bfa not for defensives, utility or CC, It was for damage during Avatar... then it got nerfed hard
BFA S3 - pretty much the same.. but after the nerfed damage and new affix prot warrs were in the middle of the pack. Defensive CDs in betweem Shield Block uptime was a part of a rotation...
BFA S4 - Whichever tank rolled better Twilight Devastation won... all that mattered was class toolkit which warrs were lacking
SL - lol
Dragonflight - most of the things we were asking for to fix Prot warrs were given to us (with Shield block to 100% uptime being the most significant one), Now Prot warrs have their full potential. What people should be asking for is bringing up other tanks to a BDK/Prot warr level, not making yet another expansion a struggle to get a group
You talk about Final Fantasy and then you talk about holy trinity being removed. You are aware that Final Fantasy is even harder stuck in the holy trinity than WoW is? Your suggestion of "let every class be able to do everything" also isn't what FF14 does, unless you can give me an example of a White Mage tanking?
LOL yup literally in BFA all every MDI season every team is literally running a port warrior, 2 DK with a WW monk or BM hunter. LOL saying Port warrior is crap for several expansion is such a lie.
Right now the issue with Prot warrior is they have too much mitigation with 100% uptime. They have shield block, IP and def stance. In fact most prot warrior don't even use def stance till they are doing a +16 and above. Then there is all the passive leech and also there is a ton of armour and also in their talent tree they have. Also their rage generation is off the charts. They no longer have to chose to spend it on Shield block or IP or revenge. On top of that they also dodge, and parry attack they can have spell reflect. A ton of gap closer, good CC.
That's why they are miles ahead of everyone. Look at poor bear tanks and brew. Both suffering and no buff. The 110.0.5 talent tree changes to bear only made it so the left side of the tree can actually keep up with right side but doesn't address surivabilty at all. Bear doesn't block, we don't parry, we only dodge and reduce damage via bear form to increase armour and use Ironfur which is nothing compare to warrior IP or shield block.
As a Healer can confirm this. Each time our group get DK tank I feel uncomfortable because of the spiky nature of their incoming damage and restoring health I have no way to tell if they are okay or gonna die in a second. Also can confirm that Protection Warriors are the best for me. The pattern of incoming damage is so smooth I can comfortably plan their healing and the healing of the rest of the party.
Fact (because I say so): TBC > Cata > Legion > ShaLa > MoP > BfA > WoD = WotLK
My pet collection --> http://www.warcraftpets.com/collection/FuxieDK/
While it may be the case that the meta does tend to shift heavily for the slightest imbalance, every tank I know (myself included) who plays multiple tanks finds Prot Warriors grossly overpowered.
I am also a bear main, but my nearly as geared alt is a prot pally. I'm only about +- 400-405 iLevel atm, but my 372 prot warrior can compete on the same keys and feel safer than either of those tanks.
It all comes down to what they did to prot warriors with the talent changes. Compared to previous seasons, they gave them easy 100% uptime on shield block, and an incredibly rage income. This combined with easier ways to use Ignore Pain, that heals them for % health on use, and Prot Warriors have the most mitigation by FAR of any tank while having healing that is only beaten by Blood DKs.
Generally tank balance is between survivability and self healing, either you have alot of one and less of the other, or you have a balanced amount of both. Brews and Warriors tended to be on the survivable end (they die slow), but didn't heal that much. DH and DKs were the opposite. Self healed alot, but could go splat easy. Bears and Pallies sat in the middle, and normally only excelled when a set bonus or balancing issues pushed them into crazyland (think S4 Incarn bears)
Right now, Warriors have the best and the 2nd best of survivability and self healing. That is impossible to beat and it shows.
If you made bears as good as warriors right now, you'd have to give them a 10-15% flat DR and remove the cooldown from Frezied Regen. That's how strong Warriors are right now.