35/5/21 isn't better for the Arena metagame than Arms/Fury. It is better than 41/5/15 for any conceivable purpose, but if it was the best for Arena, people would be using it.

35/5/21 is a solo monster spec, and that's about it. Good for non-org BG's (very good for Alterac Valley if your BG still kills Vann, Drek and Galv), fantastic for world PvP or duels, better for 5-man instances than Arms/Fury.

Thanks, but how is it with the diminishing returns with the mace proc? or would the diminishings be a problem in a dps team?

With regards to the 2.3.3 Endless Rage bug I haven't spoken to anyone warrior who actually has the talent - I imagine if it affected that many people Blizzard would just hotfix it.

Personally I'm a big fan of imp execute, not for the extra damage it causes but I'm much more likely to have 10 rage than 15. Particuarly for chaining executes too, if the swing after the previous execute doesn't crit there's a good chance that you wont get 15 rage for a 2nd meaning the target has another swing timer to get a heal in. This is more specific to my team setup [3 healers, 2 melee dps] but a 2345/6 team might not see the benefit [due to the number of damage sources].

People say that maces are best for the 2s and 3s bracket but I don't play in them so I'm not really sure. For 5s it's pretty equal between swords and maces, and it really depends on your team makeup as to whic weapon you use. As for the mace proc, it does count towards DR, but the proc can never be DRed itself. That means that if you're not running a mace rogue it would be beneficial (mace stun after target get's freedomed is godly) to get the mace, otherwise the combined procs would keep DR up.

Maces let me interupt heals and mana burns etc in those desperate moments when I have no rage to pummel.

I'd rather frustrate and wear someone down with reliable stuns than hope for a sword double crit only happens 5% of the time.

And mace stun is reliable how?

Mace stun can definitely DR itself. There is no cooldown on the proc, so you can get several swings in a row with a proc and find your target immune. Its rarer than it used to be, obviously, but I see it happen every once in awhile.

Told you. It's really a bitch to make it happen. The best way I can think to make it happen is to test it on Loatheb (yeah, right). If you could get the spore buff then drag another spore over and SS it, they'd probably crit. I did the Warlord grind about the time AB came out, so I spent days in there running Critline and I maybe saw it once or twice, but it was definitely in the combat log. Critline takes screenshots of such things. I might be able to dig up one, I don't know. Grab a moonkin and get back to farm testing if you want.

Obviously you can't count on it to proc exactly when you need it, but mace spec is much more reliable than sword spec. If mace stun is only 8%, (and I've seen parses that put it closer to 9) the chances of not getting a proc in 20 attacks is 18%. The chances of not getting a sword spec proc in 20 attacks is 35%

SS used to crit with the usual spellcrit rate of ~ 5,6% - at least if you consider unbuffed warriors. It was changed (I suspect, it happened when they switched DW and SS) and does not crit any more. I powerleveled a twink through a lot of low level instances, after thousands of SS hits, recap did not report a single SS crit. Maybe I can find a screenshot.

Has anyone else been rather frustrated with the lack of +hit on the s3 gear? I'm actually debating socketing a few hit gems to get capped for arena purposes >_<, I do have some t6 level gear to switch in but losing the resilience scares the bajeezus out of me vs 2dps teams

If you use the full PVP set all you need is 1 +4 hit gem to be at the regular 2H hit cap, for example the +5str/+4hit gem from Heroic Shadow Labs.

[Brooch of Deftness] solved my hit woes. I don't use surefooted or have a weapon, and just have a 4 hit gem in my helm.

You sound like you can control the mace stun at will.

Full PvP-Gear + Archimonde-Sword + Surefooted + Runspeed-Meta + H Shadowlab-Gem + Red Belt of Battle should solve all your problems. That's at least my gear-setup now that I've got my Cataclysm's Edge. Yeah you lose resilience, but 5% hit is a must in arena-pvp in my opinion. If you don't want to lose so much res, you have to go for a S3-weapon with which you also don't have to wear the RBoB to reach the 5% cap. Fortunately I can decide what I want to wear since I've got all the possible gear options.

No, I meant reliable in relation to sword spec. The deep thunder proc helps occaisonally too.

I had to get 3 +8 hit gems to reach about 90 hit rating. I dont have the weapon but I have surefooted and 5pc arena. I guess they chose to go with -armor instead of +hit on the vindicators gear which is good considering there are no gems for it im aware of. The kara dps ring has like 25 hit and some ap/stam if you are desperate.

Reliable -- dependable.

You can't depend on mace stun to interupt anything. If anything, it causes me to waste pummels. Such as I'm in the middle of a GCD when a spell begins to be cast, a normal hit comes up, or the ability I'm using the GCD on causes a mace stun, but I don't see it quick enough to stop myself from pummeling.

Nice? Sure. But I've had sword spec warriors pretty much kick my ass up once side and down the other too because they got lucky with procs. It's definitely not reliable.

With the changes to Endless Rage in 2.4 I'd be interested to see how it performs on PTR. It's not an amazing talent by any means, but more rage, particuarly in [5s] arena where you're not begin focussed often, can be good.

Endless Rage builds have grown in popularity since 2.3, used to be 1-3%, now it's up to around 9% of top performing arena teams.

Maces = pwnage RNG wins.. mace stuns on druids after they fake your cyclone right when they come out of bear form to heal!

you have reached the pinnacle of your skill as a warrior when you can time your mace stuns...lol!

I did an endless rage build a few weeks ago and played with it above a 2k rating in 3v3. With the bug its giving about 15% more rage, rather then 25%..However, even bugged, it was surprisingly effective.

Damage dealt out when I was not being hit was a ton better..You also have the added benefit of full imp HS/5% two handed and blood frenzy. (If you do 44/13/3). I consistently did more damage with the build then I did with 35/23/3 or 33/28.

It's flaws, I found, are pretty much the kind you only find on paper..No, warriors don't constantly disarm you. Even though it is bad when you get disarmed, a warrior is still going to save his disarm for when his healer is in trouble and rogues can't disarm without you going on them, which is pretty simple to work into your strat with a proper team set up.

Also, we just did a week of me being 33/28 ( I don't like it)..we decided to count enrages that I had up while my healers were alive. In 10 games, I had enrage twice due to frost nova, thats it.

I wish they would make the disarm talent accessible to ER builds..If that happened I would not mind losing enrage at all and frankly, I would say that the ER builds would become the premier builds if that happened.

Anyway, the summary is that the talent lets you place pretty consistent pressure on any target..Where other builds, like 33/28 or 35/23/3 can often be prone to "dry" streaks where pressure is just non-existent due to rage being burned on maintaining debuffs (Sunder/Ham/MS)

You could try hotswapping a weapon chained weapon on when you see the disarm coming. Unless you're stunned, most of the time you can see a Warrior pop into def stance to disarm you. Obviously this works a little less vs Rogues, but the disarm time from their riptose is also a little easier to deal with as well.

Has anyone found the Battlemaster's trinket useful or not? Currently I use a DST for my second trinket slot and mainly play 2v2 with a druid. I havent had as much experience on my warrior up into really high levels. The haste can give a good amount of burst but is that 40ap and HP on use worth it?