I am the guild leader of Fallen Tears and we have recently come upon some problems on a few bosses in SSC. We have had many discussions amongst ourselves, and I have spent an hour or two looking over some of the stuff located here and can't find anything set in stone. The most I have found was that after maxing your defense, stacking stamina is the way to go.
Now my question is two fold.
1. At what point when looking at an item should you be happy with more mitigation via parry/block/dodge etc as opposed to stamina?
2. Of the two tanks listed, give me an opinion on each's gear selection. One of our tanks focused mostly on stamina, while the other tried to find balance between mitigation and stamina. The difference between them is about 500 hps and some dodge for the higher stam tank, the lower stam tank has 500 hps less, more block/parry etc.
Any feedback would be greatly appreciated as I have people at eachothers throats over this, and EJ is our usual solution to find out what is actually better.
In general, avoidance saves mana while straight mitigation/stam prevents burst deaths. Once you have enough lifespan (incoming damage vs. armor/stam) to not die, you can stack avoidance till you're blue in the face. As item levels go up, simply getting as much of everything as you can works well. Higher level gear will simply have more.
Couple points:
Block percentage is not very valuable in my book. When tanking anything that could reasonably kill you, shield block already puts you up over 100% block. The only time that extra block helps at all is in PVP, grinding, and on trash you don't shield block for. None of these times are really life threatening. In essence, 31% block is 6% more to block 2% of the time. Some bosses prone to quick attacks this might help on a percent of the time. Additional dodge and parry are effective all the time and extend your shield block charges. I didn't stack block when I was prot for raid tanking.
I generally gem for bonuses other than block rating and block value. Block value is a nice stat for shield slam aggro, but the amount achievable through socket bonuses is little. If you go with 6 stam/4 agil gems instead of 12 stam, the pick up of the set bonus is usually worth it. You get more stats overall - not always, but usually. In this way, your gear socket color determines your gems a lot.
Stacking stam improves your survival rate against magic like KT pyros. No amount of dodge, parry, or armor will help your there so there is some credence to stam stacking. 500 hp is something like 32 itemization points which is about 1.5% parry or under 2% dodge. In a straight up choice, I'd take the life but I wouldn't take it over 3% parry.
There are a number of threads on this but it generally does not come to a finite conclusion. If you survive the fight, your gear is sufficient. If you do not (healers oom or you get burst killed) it is not.
Uez: In general, str is an inferior tanking stat. 15 agil to gloves or +threat, 12 stam to bracers would generally be more inline. Devastate is very poorly correlated to AP and shield slam/revenge are not. HS has a pile of built in aggro. Of course, any stam you have above and beyond what you need is a waste. If he gets the job done, 50 more AP is not a bad thing.
Sunder: Ignores the socket bonus of his shield (3 stam) to put full stam in there. So, instead of having 4 Xstat + 9 stam, he has 12 stam. 10 stat points versus 8. I wouldn't buy another gem though. If you add up Sunder's avoidance, (parry + dodge) he is virtually identical to Uez. If Uez fixed his belt gems and wrist enchant, he'd pick up some ground. Sunder is Tauren so he will always have that 5% edge which is 750 hp at 15k
Tank gearing is a topic people are passionate about, and discussions can get heated. You will probably find that most people here fall onside with your stamina enamoured warrior. That said its worth keeping in mind is that having two *different* tanks in the guild/raid, be it different classes, or different approaches to gear selection, is a good thing, as it means more flexibility, less fights over drops, and - if people accept it - less drama.
Last edited by Braque : 09/18/07 at 3:40 PM.
Reason: flow
Defenitly go for Sunders. Uez his gem choices are pretty dissapointing sometimes (str/sta gems while he could just as well socket 12 sta, loosing out on a big amount of hp just to get more worthless block rating) and in most cases, Sunders actually has more avoidance aswell.
Ask yourself, do you want the tank that can guaranteed survive an unlucky crush on Tidewalker/.. or do you want the tank that reduces the chance for that to happen by ~5% but with alot more chance to die when it actually does happen.
Stamina reduces the chances that a tank will die to a flurry of hits all in a row, like the shaman on Karathress is known to do.
Mitigation is armor, I think you meant to say avoidance which is dodge, parry, block.
Current warrior theorycrafting I've read says that stacking stamina and armor is the way to go. +12 stam gems in every slot, stam enchants everywhere. Dodge, parry, block comes with the gear and while it's nice to have, avoidance isn't going to be as reliable as armor and stamina at keeping the tank alive.
It's not about taking less damage, it's about being able to absorb the most damage possible without dying. Only stamina and armor do that for you. Avoidance just means it takes less mana to keep you alive since they'll be able to cancel more heals being cast on you.
To be honest, the hitpoint difference between the two tanks you linked above is not nearly as gear dependent as you may think. You're comparing an Undead warrior to a Tauren one and, quite frankly, Tauren have it much easier when it comes to hitpoints; we get a 5% bonus from a racial talent called Endurance, which I'd say accounts for at least 500 hit-points at that gear level.
As for my perspective, I'm squarely in the camp that I'd rather take more hits and survive them (translation: stack Armor and Stamina) than base my survival and rage generation on the random number generator. Stack avoidance and you'll inevitably run into streaks where you don't take any damage. That leads to rage starvation (less threat output) and if your healers are reactive rather than proactive with canceling heals, you'll likely die when your luck runs out. In my book, stamina wins out on avoidance unless you're shooting for crushing immunity.
Both of them need both sets of gear, depending on the fight (and a high block-value set as well). But the stamina gear gets used much more often, from my experience. 1800hp is a lot -- I have 400 more hp than Uez and he's a few trips through SSC/Eye ahead of me.
Some happy medium could be achieved simply by swapping out some of the hybrid gems on Uez's gear -- the 4str/6sta pair on the belt, the 4hit/4agi on the T4 helm, the 4agi/6sta on T5 shoulders, etc. That's 300 health right there, and another 120 from the bracer enchant (+12str for a tank is very, very marginal) and 180 from the shield enchant.
Does help to have a wide variety of gear to choose from, but you still have to be able to take the hits. When bosses start hitting for 6-8k you really need to have the stamina to survive 2-3 hits in a row. High avoidance just leads to rage starvation and is only really good for OT'ing mobs.
I can hit 30+% dodge, with 20% parry and 18% block with fury spec, and I basically use the gear I use just to tank something off to the side till the rest are dead and the raid can get to me, so have plenty of time to generate threat.
My suggested stats are 20-25% dodge/parry/block, 490 defense, then stam. Armor you can't do too much about since only a few pieces really offer a large enough difference to be considerable. Really no point in stacking mass mitigation/avoidance unless ou are aiming for uncrushable.
Till there is a Patchwerk 2.0, where you simply can't heal incoming damage without a shitload of avoidance, just go for armor and stamina. If you absolutely want some socket bonus, try to not gem for parry or defense rating (unless you're still critable of course), the conversion to avoidance is way too low.
Till there is a Patchwerk 2.0, where you simply can't heal incoming damage without a shitload of avoidance, just go for armor and stamina. If you absolutely want some socket bonus, try to not gem for parry or defense rating (unless you're still critable of course), the conversion to avoidance is way too low.
Mother Shahraz is similar, but as for her or patch, high avoidance is still a bad thing since a string of dodge/parry drops you from their set list of targets. In patchwerk's case, he can HS the MT, while in Shahraz's case she can port the Saber lash tanks. So even in these cases you have to keep avoidance low. While dodging one of these timed "big hits" is amazing for healers, as blizzard programmed them, too much avoidance leads to wipes.
Only real use for massive avoidance is multimob tanking, such as an aoe taunt. Or doomguard tanking during Azgalor. Although thats not a great example due to chain stun. But any situation where a tank is given the duty of tanking a mob away from the raid, with no danger of losing aggro, is a great place for mass avoidance.
Too much avoidance leads to long periods of time where the tank takes no damage, this is when healers take it easy, they stop healing pre-emptively (aka spamming) and often fall asleep. What can happen then is the tank gets an unlucky string of hits in a row and dies due to his low total hp and the fact that healers weren't casting any heals.
You also have to deal with less rage due to not being hit much, which means you may generate lower TPS in general.
It's common to see this with a druid tank who's stacked dodge too high
eg: miss miss miss miss miss <healer starts watching tv>, hit, hit, hit, heal, hit DEAD.
As a healer I prefer a massive hp pool and a steady stream of damage by far.
Sunders gear looks fine, change the shield gem for 12stm, 5 parry rating is crap.
When I checked just now Uez logged in dps gear, so I can't comment on his choices.
Last edited by Ragnor : 09/18/07 at 10:00 PM.
The universe is run by the complex interweaving of three elements. Energy, matter, and enlightened self-interest.
1. At what point when looking at an item should you be happy with more mitigation via parry/block/dodge etc as opposed to stamina?
Miss, Dodge, Parry and Block are avoidance, it's armor and block value that's considered mitigation.
My viewpoint on tank gearing is to meet the minimum avoidance requirements to become uncrushable, then move on to stacking STA and mitigation as high as you can.
Since Warriors are uncrushable right out of the box thanks to Shield Block's +75% block, you should really focus on maximizing on your HP, armor and block value. It's those three values that will keep you alive when the Brad Pitt hits the fan.
Miss, Dodge and Parry does not save on healer mana. That's a myth. A raiding healer is going to be spamming heals on you no matter what. The harder you're getting hit, the bigger his heals are going to be.
It's mitigation that saves on healer mana. If your block value and armor reduction is high enough, the healer can afford to spam rank 1 Greater Heal/Flash of Light on you, instead of max rank Greater Heals/Holy Lights.
As for sunders choices I'd consider 4def / 6sta for the bracers and the gun, the rest looks nice (and familiar *G*) to me.
But he hopefully didn't exchange the curators leggings with t4. They are the better choice and the T4 Set Bonus isn't something to really go for.
And for the STA vs Dodge myth.. I wrote a simulation tool for Gruul/Magtheridon fight and will post it in a new thread as soon as I got my ten posts (and yes.. Stamina wins)
Mother Shahraz is similar, but as for her or patch, high avoidance is still a bad thing since a string of dodge/parry drops you from their set list of targets.
You can just turn back, I don't think "too high avoidance" is really an issue. At least for Patchwerk, I never set a foot in BT.
As long as you don't get bursted down and can hold aggro, mitigation is definitively the way to go.
Stacking stam means you are less likely to get bursted; but so long as you're already impossible to burst, helping the healers out by taking less damage is a plus. A while ago, while I was still in T4 equivalent gear, we did Magtheridon with 4 healers (we brought five, but one of them lagged out and was killed by random stuff during the beginning). I don't believe that with a stam stacking tank you'd be able to do Magtheridon with 4 healers.
Stacking stamina buys ONLY the burst protection. Stacking mitigation, once you already can't be burst, means that you can bring fewer healers to fights. My healers love my tanking style, and are very used to me chain dodging or parrying several times in a row and able to stay awake through it.
Obviously stamina stacking is successful, since a majority of the well-known end-game guilds have stamina stacking tanks, but since my guild is becoming successful rather quickly - and any reason we're NOT already one of the top guilds is not a result of my dying in fights, either through burst or healers running out of mana, but rather a problem of raid coordination - my claim is that both strategies are viable. Mitigation stacking is preferred, in my opinion, so long as your healers are capable. Stacking stamina requires more raw healing, but less skilled healers.
--Vorsgald
These will all generally mix and match with each other so your gear load won't be significantly higher then previous. Some sets are better for some encounters over others. A massively stam heavy set on Mother wins out over some of the bigger burst potentials (lolparry) whereas with an avoidance set Gurtogg is less of a stacking issue.
However, if you are set on one set. A stam heavy set will take you all the way through to Illidan, and with some good playing and shield block timing, can carry you through there too probably.
Two things: I checked your armory and I am pretty sure you meant to say "avoidance" instead of "mitigation". Mitigation means actually taking the hit and reducing it via armor. Avoidance, as the name says, is to completely avoid it.
The other thing is, I am really surprised how your healers can keep you alive at Morogrim with only 13k HP unbuffed or other burst damage mobs really.
While I am more a fan of mitigation than avoidance, here is a tip if you really want to improve your avoidance:
Replace the 12 stamina on your bracers with 12 defense rating. Replace 12 agility enchant on your boots with 12 stamina if you do not want to lose the stamina and you will gain 0.16% more avoidance (not counting the +0.2% to block).
Here is why:
12 agility gives you 0.44% dodge (BoK included) and 12 defense rating is 5 defense which is 0.2% dodge, 0.2% parry and 0.2% chance to be missed (and 0.2% block).
Miss, Dodge, Parry and Block are avoidance, it's armor and block value that's considered mitigation.
Mitigation: to lessen in force or intensity, as wrath, grief, harshness, or pain; moderate
Avoidance: the act of avoiding or keeping away from
Block determines if you partialy block some of the incoming dmg, so unless you are classifying it as avoidance for say crushing blows then its more a mitigation stat mate.
Mitigation: to lessen in force or intensity, as wrath, grief, harshness, or pain; moderate
Avoidance: the act of avoiding or keeping away from
Block determines if you partialy block some of the incoming dmg, so unless you are classifying it as avoidance for say crushing blows then its more a mitigation stat mate.
There is a difference between Block RATING and Block VALUE
Block Rating will modify your chance (%) to block an attack, this is avoidance.
Block Value will modify how much your block reduces the damage, this is mitigation.
The tendency by many Tanks is to stack stamina and armor for progression, since a high HP tank will not only provide a buffer to healers, but the consistant hits will help with rage irregularity.
Once progression has ended (ie. Illidan dead), you can tweak gear specially to cater to whatever your needs be.
Well, to make the Stamina VS Mitigation/Avoidance issue a bit clearer...
Let's look at an example tank with excellent gear, Kungen of Nihilum: The Armory
As you quickly see, he has full stamina. +15 stamina gems in every slot, except for only the Meta and a +5 agi/+7 stam gem to collect the +6 stamina socket bonus. Every enchant is maximized for stamina, including a Knothide Armor Kit on the gloves, except for giving up 3 stamina on the boot's enchant for minor speed, which is probably a decision based on various personal reasonings. He has even picked up Enchanting for +4 stats to rings, for that extra 80 hit points and a few other helpful stats. A final stamina boost, the old Presence of Might enchant is used instead of the modern Glyph of the Defender, due to the +10 stamina bonus.
If we trust Kungen's judgment in gear choices, as he is often considered one of the best tanks in the game, it is clear that Stamina is an important focus, as long as other minimum requirements are met, as stated previously in this thread. Becoming un-crushable and un-crittable are a couple of these, and possibly a chart/graph could be made to plot value of mitigation/avoidance/health and at what amount of the first two items does stamina surpass them as the primary need.
It is likely that stamina is weaker in value than avoidance and mitigation due to the fact that we are only looking at Kungen's enchantments and gem choices. Logically, the reason he is allowed to use full stamina in those two areas is because his gear is of high enough iLvl that it already provides him with the necessary avoidance/mitigation without any outside enchants or gems. Therefore, simply looking at gear, we can't quite decide at which point stamina is more important, but we can at least assume that eventually it will be the most valuable asset.
On a final note, to be able to focus on health, not only should you have the required other stats, but you need to have zero trouble keeping good threat. Obviously tanks geared this well know how to tank properly, and generate enough threat that all threat-increasing stats and bonuses can be ignored because they aren't needed to keep an acceptable aggro level, allowing the focus once again to stay on stamina.
I'm not really much of a theorycrafter, more of a logicrafter, but hopefully the conclusions I drew from this example aren't too far off, and with further calculations a strong decision could be reached.
There is always a danger in attempting to draw a conclusion based on the profile of someone like Kungen.
For a maximum stamina set, you could choose the following in place of the ones shown on the Armory:
All with +15 Stamina Gems are superior choices for a Stamina focused tank.
The result of this discussion is one which is present in the Graphing Tank Damage Thread.
Tanks should collect a range of items which offer both Stamina and avoidance to use on different encounters depending on what is demanded for optimum performance.
I take my "job" as a tank as being "To hold aggro, while taking as little damage as possible". This means switching between items which offer Stamina and Mitigation, or Avoidance, or improved Threat depending on the dynamics of that encounter.
In reference to the OP, both tanks having both sets of gear is the best way forward, however when forced to choose one or the other, in general terms the Stamina/Mitigation set will be most suitable overall.
If we trust Kungen's judgment in gear choices, as he is often considered one of the best tanks in the game.
Even the "best" players may not know everything. For examples, Kungen does not have any extra weapon skill past 350. Now maybe the axe never dropped for him, or the 10% extra shield slam damage makes up for not using them, I don't think so.
While I don't know how much the extra 5 weapon skill reduces dodge and misses, I do know it reduces your miss rate by 3%, which is very nice for just 20 weapon skill, which otherwise would take 48 hit rating.
The answer, is it depends on the encounter, but many more favor stamina than avoidance.
The real question of tank itemization (well, pre-BT/hyjall where threat isn't a concern) is how to survive spike damage.
Many tanks solve this solely via stamina. In my book this is a mistake. A warrior requires *some* avoidance to prevent spike damage via crushings. So the question becomes 'how much avoidance do I need to keep my shield block always up?' Some bosses this is very low, others it is high. On fights which have a fast attack speed you will require more avoidance to keep your shield block up than on bosses with a slower attack speed.
I still believe that stam is the best stat hands down for a warrior, and should be prioritized. Avoidance should not be fully ignored, however - if you strip all avoidance off your gear you will run into issues with taking more spike damage. That 1K extra health isn't worth it if you're eating crushings. It is also worth noting that avoidance scales better with cross buffs. It's fairly easy to shoot up 5,000 health from raid buffs, whereas your avoidance moves much less.
Many tanks solve this solely via stamina. In my book this is a mistake. A warrior requires *some* avoidance to prevent spike damage via crushings. So the question becomes 'how much avoidance do I need to keep my shield block always up?' Some bosses this is very low, others it is high. On fights which have a fast attack speed you will require more avoidance to keep your shield block up than on bosses with a slower attack speed.
I think you are making a mistake to assume that tanks are going purely for stamina, most would tend to be going for stamina and armour to reduce the size of the attacks they do take and giving a buffer to reduce the impact of those attack, based on their judgement that they are getting sufficient levels of avoidance from their gear anyway.
Personally, for my default tanking kit I will tend to look for enough armour and stamina as possible and when I feel comfortable to reduce either of those then I will look for ways to increase my threat via block value or even some +hit before I would look to increase my avoidance. A notable exception would be something like the trinket from Moroes that also doubles as an extra 'oh shit' button on top of the avoidance it provides.
09/18/07, 3:15 PM
(and yes.. Stamina wins)
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