Some bosses in BT/Hyjal hit pretty hard all the time.

This was an instagib on a Mother Shahraz pull:
Wow Web Stats

No parries involved.

That was done all in 1.3 seconds, and you actually had 6 heals hit you in that time. Of course you didn't have 22k+ health to survive that. I think this is what people are trying to show. That sometimes you can be gibbed pretty much instantly. And there isn't a whole lot you can do about it sometimes other than hope avoidance carries you through.

The point is, no matter how much avoidance you have, it can still happen, while it's so much easier to keep you alive through it when you have more stamina through the "healing needed to survive that burst", which avoidance doesn't affect.
Was this burst completely unsurvivable? hard to tell. It looks like it was right the start of the fight - I would definitely look at what the healers were doing. Also 1.2s attack speed? I don't know but to me it looks like either a parry or a WWS error, although I would love to hear other possible explanations.

When you can't survive the physical damage from the best hp and mitigation alone avoidance plays an important role, I never disagreed with that, actually I said it myself.

Now before someone comes here and tells me how these kind of encounters are the norm, one has to factor in that there are raid instances beyond BT/MH and the OP was asking about gearing in SSC.

What makes the latest example nasty, is how the sabre lash hit 0.35 seconds before the killing blow. 1,3 seconds is plenty of time if you have a finger ready on your shieldwall/last stand/trinket/pot... but 0.35 seconds factoring in latency isn't.
Counting 5 Hot ticks and a PoM for 6k HP combined six heals is kind of missleading, though, and don't forget, that these examples also show how avoidance failed the tank. Additionally I can't see Nathanos tanking gear on the armory as he is currently in farming mode.

I think the point is clear, though, and we don't need additional examples like this one as Shahraz burst damage is infamous and you need resistances on that encounter as well so I think it's a very specific tanking encounter.

I have a better Shahraz gib:

Parried shield slam on the pull = death

This was a few weeks ago, so my gear wasn't quite what it presently is, but still was decent.

You keep talking about the visible worst case scenarios, but what you still don't seem to understand is how much more often they could happen, depending on your avoidance. Just because you can't easily see the effect doesn't mean it's not there.

There is really no point to those two Shahraz WWS, neither tank had Ironshields, Demo/CoW or preemptive Inspiration/AH procs going.

Since 2.3 is approaching, I'm also currently at a crossroad on where to develop my tank. Taking the new items into consideration which are available for heroic badges in the upcoming days, my way is going to be less avoidance and more stamina/block. However it is very interesting how all the different players in the game have their own take on those matters and also read about it here.

One fabulous tank I know of always stacked stam (even before TBC) and got to very good results (Naxx etc.). In contrast, one of the most successfull tanks on our realm went completely into the avoid-direction, and is currently on the way to kill Illidan. So I wonder how much of the topic we talk about here is actually a matter of taste and skill. I know that you guys are very deep into numbers, logs and analytics. But on the final day, it also boils down to the group setup (which heal classes) as well as to the skill of the whole raid. Number crunching has its place, but sometimes I'm not even sure if we're talking about an actual mistake by choosing the wrong path (stam or avoid) but perhaps also about bugs in the game.

An example from my last raid in Karazhan showed that instagibs can not only happen in BT but also fighting Nightbane although I'm already a bit overequipped for that encounter. The fight went like this: Junos touches black urn -> Nightbane approaches and lands -> Junos triggers block to counter possible deadly blows in the beginning -> Nightbane hits Junos twice in about half a second and Junos is dead. I didn't even get a flash-heal/hot - our paladin, druid and holy priest were absolutely stunned. And that with a pool of 17k of hitpoints, and a quite decent item selection for that encounter. There was no parry, I was the only one standing near Nightbane. So what happened?

Theorizing about game mechanics always has a big flaw. And that's that we're assuming that EVERYTHING in the game works as it is supposes to. Thanks to guys like you we KNOW that most things, especially in the introduction of new content, doesn't at all work as it should. I remember situations where Nihilum stated that Lady V. in SSC was nearly impossible to down because of horrible bugs in the encounter at an early stage. So how do we know if the problems you're trying to solve are actually because of bugs in the game, an unlucky day or a problems with your setup?

The conclusion that I draw from the discussion is that avoid- as well as stam-driven tanks do have their fair share of valid arguments on how and why they arrive at their goals. I think that both ways are an entry to experience high end content, since I've spoken to so many people over the year doing exactly the same encounters successfully and that with so different item-setups. If you're looking for a golden road, there isn't one. I think what's making you a better tank is not even actually getting items and choosing a setup, but to find out what works for you and your fellowship of healing minions That's 2 cents worth.

Her attack speed is ~2 seconds, ~2.4 seconds with Thunder Clap on. That can be verified with any WWS or combat log.
The WWS that Acx linked doesn't actually show a parry from anyone. It was probably just the somewhat common combat log lag that makes it look as if Shahraz had a 1.2 second attack delay. It's also possible that whoever made the log missed the parry, but that seems unlikely.

Combat log timers do seem to be extremely messed up.

I agree with this assessment -- there are not "right" answers to this. Work with your healers to figure out what they prefer, and try out different scenarios. The important thing to remember is there isn't a lot of leeway one way or the other. All the gear is pretty similar. You get to tune it out a bit. Either way will not make or break your raid (unless it was a fight like Kael where you need "X" to survive an attack)

My "standard" tank setup favors Armor, Stamina, Shield Block Value -- my opinion is that it's a great buffer, and allows me enough rage to do whatever I need. My healers tend to like that setup as well, as it gives an extra 'oh shit' buffer. A lot of times I am getting heals whether I dodge or not, might as well use them...your mileage may vary

There are no guarantees that the order of things in the combat log is the order of actual events (multithreading at the server end, network latency, other reasons). That's been stated many times by Slouken (the UI development lead). Anything that times with a precision of better than one second is an amusing affectation, and nothing more.

Wasn't sure if a new thread would be a good idea for this, but I thought it could fit in this discussion. Forgive me if it isn't the case.

Checking the loot from Zul'Aman and badges, there seem to be more and more items without defence on them, or less than other pieces than you're wearing. Anyone else afraid of not useable upgrades because you won't stay above 490 without the item you're wearing at that moment?

Here are some items (mostly Karazhan items, our guild isn't very succesful in 25 men yet) that I'm wearing at the moment but might not be upgradeable because of the defence minimum. (no more room for pure stamina socketing? )

Bulwark of the Amani Empire - Items - World of Warcraft (Zul'Aman shield) versus Shield of Impenetrable Darkness - Items - World of Warcraft (Nightbanes shield)

Battleworn Tuskguard - Items - World of Warcraft (Zul'Aman chest) versus Panzar'Thar Breastplate - Items - World of Warcraft (Nightbanes chest)

Other items, like the Ring from the Timed Event, the Axe from Zul'Jin, they all lack defence (compared to King's Defender, Rings from Shade/Reputation). Also the Necklace from the Badges of Justice lacks defence, the Gloves from Badges...

Some people were happy about this change, no more ''wasted'' itembudgets, but isn't it a bit over the top? Do we've to give up stacking Stamina gems, or stick to some blue trinket with 30 defence rating?

Possibly with the new ZA items you'll have to calculate items differently, just like DPS classes need to "reach the hit cap" and get the hit rating in a way that will gimp other stats the least, tanks might have to do the same with defense to stay above the 490 since it could actually be possible to drop below it with the new gear. This is very complicated btw as it really depends on what items you have available, but the main idea is setting a stamina:defense value, seeing if going by that value gives you enough defense or not (or too much) and adjust your value until you're just over the 490 defense. Of course when your item selection isn't so big it gets more simple

At first glance I also worried about defense. Thinking about it I worry less and less, though.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but is it not so that if I have a combined 50% miss/dodge/parry and a fixed 55% shield block then even if I sit at 350 defense, I can never be critted?

As in, the crush immune set is also crit immune, with or without defense.

Haven't done any experiments yet, and still somewhat off in gear terms to be able to.

I like the way they don't provide enough defense. As long as you're not crush immune (assuming it works as I just said) getting the best gear that still allows you to be crit immune actually becomes an interesting exercise with meaningful tradeoffs.

As long as shield block is up, yes, but when your shield block fails getting crit isntead of crushed would be a very, very bad thing, and likely negate all those extra HPs you stacked...

I think this statement is correct according to everything I've read. However, you really shouldn't be gunning for crush immune and neglecting defense.

Defense is the second most efficient stat for becoming crush immune (most efficient being block rating), and the second most efficient "pure avoidance" stat (as in, you take 0 damage regardles of the incoming total). Unless you somehow find a way to stack block rating to ridiculous levels across multiple items, you're probably sacrificing HP and AC to be crush/crit immune.

Per point of rating -
Dodge = 0.053% avoidance
Defense = 0.050% avoidance + 0.0167% chance to block = 0.067% toward "crush avoidance"
Parry Rating = 0.045% avoidance
Block Rating = 0 avoidance, 0.127% toward "crush avoidance"

2.4 defense rating = 1 defense = 0.04% to dodge, 0.04% to parry, 0.04% to miss, 0.04% to block in addition to reducing your chance to be crit by 0.04% up to 490 total defense. It's not like you get nothing for having over 490 defense.

Yes, you are crit immune when you are crush immune (102.4% dodge + parry + block + mob miss). Most warriors are only Shield Block uncrushable, though, so if you miss Shield Block for whatever reason, you will likely get crits. Even if you are passively uncrushable, if you are stunned, attacked from behind, disarmed, immobilised (e.g. karathress iceblock), you will lose some or all of those elements and will most likely be subject to critical hits again as well as crushing blows.