Warrior tanking mechanics

vorda · 02/26/07, 11:13 PM

Ok, so I was talking with this tank of my guild who claimed that he was going to get 'more defense so he can't be crushed'. I told him the actual defense didnt lower the crushing chance, but the avoidance he got from it, thus it would be better in most cases to focus more on avoidance once he was crit immune. He then told me he had 539 defense under his skill tab, yet is being crit often anyway, and even told me that warriors never could be crit immune.

Am I (as a non warrior) completely mistaken about tanking mechanics? Or did something massivly change over the last few months or so?

I tried searching here abit for the topics with big combat log purges in, but failed to find them with the forum change. Since he's asking for test evidence aswell, would it be possible to direct me to such a topic?

Solensean · 02/26/07, 11:22 PM

Two things :

A tank is effectively crit-immune at 490 defense against a "??" boss and everything lower level.
If he wants to be crushing blow-immune, he has to higher his avoidance to a score equal or superior to 100% (that's dodge, parry and block added together). Usually, that's done with Shield Block (for warriors) and Holy Shield (for paladins).

vorda · 02/26/07, 11:26 PM

Originally Posted by Solensean

Two things :

A tank is effectively crit-immune at 490 defense against a "??" boss and everything lower level.
If he wants to be crushing blow-immune, he has to higher his avoidance to a score equal or superior to 100% (that's dodge, parry and block added together). Usually, that's done with Shield Block (for warriors) and Holy Shield (for paladins).

I know, thats what I told him, but he made it come down to a 'my opinion against yours' thing, and the argrument pretty much ended with 'I'm a warrior, I know better then you'.

So all I can do right now is forward him to this topic (so please keep it nice

) and find some topic with combat log parses or so I suppose.

edit: you forgot 'miss' (in the dodge, parry, block list)

diospadre · 02/27/07, 1:11 AM

Your tank is too stubborn to realize that he has switched crushing and crits in his mind.

Regrets · 02/27/07, 1:12 AM

Imo.. Dont ever engage a debate with a tank. IF he insist his case, let him be. The only thing I will ever want from a tank is (Tank in the right position, hold aggro, Know when to use trinket to assist, know when to use Last stand & shield wall @ the right time, never ever let ur teammate die earlier than you)

Any decent tanks who realised his own flaws while tanking (i.e stam too low, die too easily ETC.) will try to improve & tune up his own gear. So dont worry, but bring him down if he ever fail his duty as tank

Morsexy · 02/27/07, 1:38 AM

The easiest thing to do is point him or her in the direction of one of the comprehensive guides, like Kenco's, or the that was on evilempire.com.

Of course now that I look, I cant find one myself.

Edit: Giddy up WoWikki http://www.wowwiki.com/Formulas

efense

Bloodtear · 02/27/07, 7:12 AM

Try http://evilempireguild.org/guides/formulas.php. Even thou it's outdated, the mechanics are still valid.

zork · 02/27/07, 9:47 AM

If you want to get a closer look into defense mechanics you can take a look at this thread (from page 2) too:
Beat the 85

you cannot be crushed if "enemy miss", parry, dodge and block rise over 100.

the base crit chance is 5.6, the base chance to get crushings is 15 (from lvl 73mob against lvl 70 player)

melee crit = damage * 2, spell crit = damage * 1.5, crushing = damage * 1.5

to deny crits you must reach 490 defense skill, thats +140 defense skill which is 336 defense rating or with anticipation talent you need +120 defense skill which is 288 defense rating.

crushing blows can not be lowered that way but they can get pushed out of the attack table. to do that "enemy miss", parry, dodge and block must be > 85. which is easily done by activating shield block.

at the moment lvl 70 tanks can get some very sick dodge values while still obtaining a high block and some base parry.

its possible to get 35% block, 30% dodge, 16% parry and 11% enemy miss which lead to a very sick avoidance of 92 leaving only 8% of unchanged hits that will be always crushing blows.

sp00n · 02/28/07, 4:28 AM

to deny crits you must reach 490 defense skill, thats +140 defense skill which is 336 defense rating or with anticipation talent you need +120 defense skill which is 288 defense rating.

crushing blows can not be lowered that way but they can get pushed out of the attack table. to do that "enemy miss", parry, dodge and block must be > 85. which is easily done by activating shield block.

Actually defense does help a bit against crushing blows, as it increases your chance to parry and dodge an attack by 0.04% and increases your chance to get missed by an additional 0.04%, therefore you are looking at 0.12% per point of defense that brings nearer to the 85 mark.

Of course until you reach that mark crushing blows won't be negated but normal hits will.

vorda · 02/28/07, 4:35 AM

His response (on guild forum):

The numbers presented seem to assume all mobs and bosses have the same base value in their hit and crit ratings.
While this makes for a very solid theorycraft post, the hit/crit rating from mobs, (dungeon)bosses and raidbosses varies greatly.

Ive had over a full minute of avoidance (I remember the healer asking me if I was bugged) on the boss that quad-wields in the arcatraz, for example. While I cant back this up with math, it stands to reason this bosses hit rating is lower than regular, due to the increase in attack speed. Vice versa, some bosses with a slow but powerfull attack, I rarely avoid (last nights heroic mechanar with arcane destroyers springs to mind).

The same is true for crit rating. Regular mobs and regular elites rarely if ever crit me. Others, like Prince whatshisface (Kharazan) and (ouch) Blackheart the Inciter on heroic crit me in about 10% of the hits I take.

I think the flaw in the posts youve linked is their assumption of equal stats for mobs.

mine:

I'd call this just a streak of good/bad luck.
A boss who starts 'dualwielding' (increased attack speed) will also change the dmg of his hits to adjust his DPS (or just dont change it and increase his DPS)

(I'd like to state that he indeed is a very good tank and I have the feeling he just confused crushings for crits, but he turned it into an agrument, and what if he's right...)

Anyway, I asked for a screenshot of him being crit by an npc.

suicuique · 02/28/07, 5:40 AM

He is right concerning crushing blows, hit, parry, dodge.

My experience tells me that these stats are varying and depending on the mob type. Some are linked to special events. Take e.g. Crushing chance on Stalagg's enrage before Thaddius, Gluth, .... And to this day I swear to god, that Thaddius got some serious dodge+parry skills (could be bad luck though ^^).

But I've yet to see a mob with an increased crit chance.
Just insist on your screenshot request of an incoming crit (when he is +490def), and you've basically won your quarrel.

Kink · 02/28/07, 7:26 AM

Originally Posted by vorda

His response (on guild forum):

mine:

(I'd like to state that he indeed is a very good tank and I have the feeling he just confused crushings for crits, but he turned it into an agrument, and what if he's right...)

Anyway, I asked for a screenshot of him being crit by an npc.

Make sure the screenshot includes his gear and him still in combat with the mob =)

Hoonboof · 02/28/07, 7:33 AM

Originally Posted by Kink

Make sure the screenshot includes his gear and him still in combat with the mob =)

There's no way of completely removing your chance to be crit regardless of how much defence you're packing.

I got crit yesterday for the first time in ages and I'm packing 515 defence.

[edit]
What I mean is that there is always a tiny tiny chance you'll be crit even beyond the cap.

Juno · 02/28/07, 7:36 AM

People try to find patterns in everything. The crushing chance is set, the same for their dodge, miss, parry and crit chance. If he's at 490 def he probably didn't get crit by Prince, he most likely saw a crushing show up as a big number (SCT or the likes) and thought it was a crit. We've all had streaks of parries, misses and dodges, it doesn't mean that the boss has extra chance for it, unless they got some skill such as evasion. I've had 10 attacks in a row be avoided, it can happen. What is true though is that mobs get increased miss rate when dw'ing. Which can be devastating aswell, just ask Prince

No specific numbers but I'm guessing the regular penalty DW apply since mobs are in general naked without stat modifiers.

Hoonboof · 02/28/07, 7:42 AM

Originally Posted by Juno

What is true though is that mobs get increased miss rate when dw'ing.

Is this confirmed or just anecdotal? It could be the fact he's swinging more often therefore missing more often.

I pop my trinket from Moroes at 60% when he starts DWing so he misses a whole shitload anyway, so I can neither confirm nor deny.