Protection Paladins guide to Proving Grounds - Endless 30 and beyond.

[Deleted]

I know the feeling queueing up after those long runs. Starting at the button, should I queue or should I not
Just take a breather! You are very close so you should have it soon.

[winterwind]

Hello, fellow prot paladins.

I just started out tanking after a ~4 year long break of holyness, and wanted to give a few tips I had to resort to due to my somewhat lacking skills and gearset to achieve decent waves (for a beginner!) in the endless section of Proving Grounds.

I was able to reach wave 28 on my fourth try, but after that I haven't been really close of reaching 30 unfortunately. I think I've started to overthink stuff, but nevermind that. I have a neat trick that I haven't seen discussed as of yet - and if it have been covered I apologise and blame my age

If you're reaching a really oh crap moment on wave 6/7 and 9 you can simply BoP Sikari, and once the mobs reach you, you bubble up and recover for a few precious seconds of free DPS and healing. BoP lasts 10 seconds, and bubble 8, which results in a pretty good control of the mobs. If bubble is still up when BoP is expiring, just cancel it. I resort to this due to my low DPS and survivability. (and the fact that I'm pretty crappy at this tanking thing still..)

Hopefully this'll help any aspiring Proven Defenders to reach their goal. Best of luck!

Edit: Somehow I got into my head that BoP was a 3 minute CD. Nevertheless, bubble+BoP is still a nice combination once the stuff hits the fan!

[Deleted]

Excellent guide. I just came back from a few month break, and not having read about some of the recent changes to Prot Paladins I tried Endless mode on my own without any research, with a different approach and talents, and got as far as wave 9. After reading this guide I changed my talents, and got to wave 25 on the first try. The reason I died there was because I forgot EF like a retard; time to install and set up WeakAuras and try again...

[corni]

Hi,

thank you for the very informing and well written guide.
I am missing just a tidbit of information.

What kind of gearing strategy do use? I think pure haste could be sub optiomal due to downscaling.
Do you use your standard raid equip or specialized tank equip for Proving Grounds (resp CM).

What trinkets do you use? DPS or stamina?

Thank you, corni

[Deleted]

Hi,

thank you for the very informing and well written guide.
I am missing just a tidbit of information.

What kind of gearing strategy do use? I think pure haste could be sub optiomal due to downscaling.
Do you use your standard raid equip or specialized tank equip for Proving Grounds (resp CM).

What trinkets do you use? DPS or stamina?

Thank you, corni

I just used my standard raid equipment. Did not change anything, if you are gonna min-max you should change your meta gem, but really it is not needed.
I used 2x dps trinkets.

In my opinion max haste with a bit of mastery is the best gearing strategy for PGs. Proving grounds is all about reliable throughput. There are two situations that you die in PGs, either you get completely stomped and overkilled because you did something wrong or you die because your throughput was not high enough, often you go from 100-0% over 15-30 seconds. In either case, stamina or avoidance is not really helpful, so imo haste and mastery is the stats to go.
Haste also helps you to pick mobs of Sikari faster.

I also used armor/haste elixir.

If you really wanna optimise go for the monster hit/exp cap instead of the boss hit/exp cap.

In anyway you look at it, the way you gear is probably the least important thing here. Proving grounds is all about execution.

- - - Updated - - -

Excellent guide. I just came back from a few month break, and not having read about some of the recent changes to Prot Paladins I tried Endless mode on my own without any research, with a different approach and talents, and got as far as wave 9. After reading this guide I changed my talents, and got to wave 25 on the first try. The reason I died there was because I forgot EF like a retard; time to install and set up WeakAuras and try again...

To be honest, most deaths are retard deaths. It gets so frustrating when you die after 20 minutes because you forgot something easy. Just keep your head up and queue again Hope you get 30 soon.

A majority of my wipes are on waves 10-26~ because you are not paying attention and you lose focus for a second and fail. I actually have a higher success rate on wave 40-50 than wave 20-30 which is kinda hillarious. Underestamating the early waves and not paying attention leads to hours wasted.

The biggest issue with PGs is imo that you have to start from the start all the time. If you get Endless 20 I think you should be able to start at Endless 10 with all your cooldowns on cooldown, or atleast letting you start at endless 10 when you got endless 30. Doing PGs just take so long time that it is sometimes hard to fit it into your day.

[pld]

Yeah, it'd be pretty great if there were checkpoints. I've gotten to the point where getting to Wave 20 is a given, but I always slip up somewhere and I start raging. Sometimes i'll fat finger my Bubble and the NPC will get wrecked as I lose all aggro (although I've lost aggro on a bunch of mobs randomly for no conceivable reason) or I'll just underestimate a Wave and get destroyed.

GAH, Proving Grounds are great but they're so aggravating. Good thing I have a stress ball here.

[Deleted]

Yeah, it'd be pretty great if there were checkpoints. I've gotten to the point where getting to Wave 20 is a given, but I always slip up somewhere and I start raging. Sometimes i'll fat finger my Bubble and the NPC will get wrecked as I lose all aggro (although I've lost aggro on a bunch of mobs randomly for no conceivable reason) or I'll just underestimate a Wave and get destroyed.

GAH, Proving Grounds are great but they're so aggravating. Good thing I have a stress ball here.

I was doing proving grounds on my hunter, the only hard waves were wave 24-28, 28 was probably the hardest. The first time I killed wave 28 I started celebrating "YES! I did it!", since wave 29 and 30 are a complete joke. Of course I do a massive fail beyond words on wave 29 and wipe with 1 mob on 10k hp left, 1 auto attack from completing the wave. Oh, the rage that ensued.

While they are really aggravating, they are also quite enjoyable in my opinion, but checkpoints of some sort would really be nice.

[pld]

I finally did it. Is it weird that I started laughing maniacally afterwards? /twitch

[Deleted]

I see three (or 13) other achievemets that you could do before sleeping!

Congratulations

[pld]

I see three (or 13) other achievemets that you could do before sleeping!

Congratulations

Thanks! Your guide was a huge help. Have you tried doing the DPS ones as prot? I was thinking of trying that for the "You're Doing it Wrong" achievement.

[Deleted]

Thanks! Your guide was a huge help. Have you tried doing the DPS ones as prot? I was thinking of trying that for the "You're Doing it Wrong" achievement.

I tried once, did bronze but silver seemed to be extremely hard, so I just decided to do the tank one on my hunter which proved to be very easy.

Doing the dps as prot could be possible, maybe the healing one could also be possible. I could do some testing later.

[TwentyTwelve]

I myself did the "you're doing it wrong" first day before raid quickly, was expecting it to be easy but as prot spec the dps challenges were very hard missing the achiv by a few seconds everytime with a 50k rabbit still up or so..

Still did it in the end but i did reforge for it though. Also went back today to finish endless, took me 4 pulls, was annoying cause i was stuck at 19 for 2 wipes xD.

[Deleted]

Yeah, I tried it now as prot, but my gear was for from optimized for it (intellect shield still), and did not bother with food and flask. It is for sure doable as prot the dps challenge. Getting requires a few well timed crits sometimes.

I also tried the healer as prot, did bronze... barely. The silver was a nono.

So if you really want that achieve on paladin, doing the dps one as tank is your best bet.

[abijax]

Tank as ret is a LOT more fun.

[Lochton]

very interesting read *nods*

[Judist]

Is there any achievement / feat of strength for making it to wave 40 or higher? I died on wave 39 but wasn't too discouraged since I didn't see one in the achievement pane.

[pld]

Is there any achievement / feat of strength for making it to wave 40 or higher? I died on wave 39 but wasn't too discouraged since I didn't see one in the achievement pane.

I think the achievements end at 30. There must be some sort of leader board somewhere though? I don't see the point of pushing endless if there's no way to verify it.

[Deleted]

I think the achievements end at 30. There must be some sort of leader board somewhere though? I don't see the point of pushing endless if there's no way to verify it.

http://www.wowprogress.com/char_stat.../class.paladin

Thinking about going back in on paladin some day trying to get higher, but really have not had the time to do 1 hour + runs in the past few days.

[Simulacrum]

http://www.wowprogress.com/char_stat.../class.paladin

Thinking about going back in on paladin some day trying to get higher, but really have not had the time to do 1 hour + runs in the past few days.

Hey, I'm #14 paladin.

Man, what's up with that druid on top of all tanks? He made it to wave 132?

[Deleted]

Hey, I'm #14 paladin.

Man, what's up with that druid on top of all tanks? He made it to wave 132?

I am gonna guess kiting. Does not matter what wave you are on if the mobs does not even hit you