As you have stated, between effective health and avoidance one is not strictly superior to the other. However I think the effective health versus avoidance argument can be better illustrated in terms of types of damage taken, and the particular scenarios where one has been used over the other.
Avoidance
Because stamina stacking has been the staple for so long, many people have forgotten why and when avoidance tanking becomes superior. This mainly dependent on the type of damage intake you are facing. Some examples of when avoidance tanking was used in top-end raiding scenarios are:
- on
M'uru in Sunwell, the
Shadowsword Berserker adds hit very hard and extremely fast. This occurred over a relatively long period of time, which resulted in healer mana issues from the sheer Damage Taken per Second (DTPS) on the tank, as well as unpredictable rapid burst damage from up to 5+ melee hits. These factors made your avoidance set preferable to your stamina set.
- on
Brutallus in Sunwell, who also hit very hard and very fast, because he hit so hard that within the gear levels available at the time stacking stamina would not help the tank survive an additional hit.
- for
Anub'arak(25H) add tanking, as warriors and paladins could use a specially made avoidance set to reach 'unhittable' (or close enough to it) to take very little damage from the burrowers.
At the end of the day, avoidance sets have been used where damage intake consisted of fast and numerous melee hits. The extra avoidance both decreased the possibility of multi-hit burst combos and reduced healer mana consumption from the tank's overall DTPS.
(
NB: Just because a boss or adds hit(s) you quickly and often, does not automatically mean that avoidance is best. You must take into account all of the sources and types of damage in the encounter; and gear first and foremost to prevent burst damage from killing you, and then move away from that if the encounter requires. For instance,
Algalon does hit quickly, but much of the burst is unavoidable damage either from the magic AOE damage in the encounter or
Quantum Strike/
Phase Punch. An encounter such as that favored a balanced tanking set rather than an overly stamina biased or avoidance biased set. This is also why many people advise new tanks to gear for effective health over avoidance because more often then not the danger of being bursted down at low gear levels is much higher than the danger of the healer going oom)
Effective Health
Effective health stacking is, on the other hand, currently the staple for gearing for most raiding tanks because of the risk that every new boss or encounter we face will have more burst damage than the last. In addition, effective health stacking can actually be a preferable option for reducing healer mana consumption if you can pass a threshold where a healer can safely reactively heal and conserve mana instead of being required to constantly use less efficient faster heals in anticipation of spike damage (already covered). Against slower hitting bosses the difference becomes very apparent.
Stamina improves your survivability against damage which isn't avoidable such as magical or damage over time effects, or special unavoidable melee hits such as Algalon's
Quantum Strike; whereas extra avoidance will not help. Stamina-biased gearing improves your survivability in the largest number of scenarios, and other types of gearing are seen as more or less for niche encounters, which is why most tanks are proponents of stam-stacking.
Armor is somewhere between the two, as it mitigates melee hits and certain spells which deal physical damage but not other types of damage. The benefit of armor (and spell resistance) is that it both makes you a better tank (reducing DTPS) and increases your Effective Health, whereas Stamina only increases your Effective Health, and Avoidance only reduces your DTPS. Typically stamina will be preferred on bosses which have combined magic and physical damage combos on the tank; however armor trinkets have been used in the past against high physical damage bosses where healer mana is a concern and/or the armor trinket simply gave you more EH. Items which have both high stamina and bonus armor are usually considered Best-in-Slot for their gear level (reflected in the current 3.3 BiS list;
Suno's Fireside Chat - DK Endgame Tanking).
Spell Resistance is used in niche scenarios where spell damage is a large part of the encounter, either in overall damage taken or in bursts. Most recently, tanks on Anub'arak(25H) have used
[Recipe: Flask of Chromatic Resistance],
[Arcanum of Toxic Warding],
[Scroll of Enchant Cloak - Superior Nature Resistance], and
[Fur Lining - Nature Resist] to mitigate
Leeching Swarm due to its extremely high damage. Due to the new wotlk resistance mechanics, spell resistance increases your effective health against magic damage because there is a reliable minimum % you can resist based on your current resistance levels, and actual amount resisted varies above that level (Source:
WotLK Resistance Thread). Spell Resistance is also the best form of mitigation against elemental melee strikes (those which deal magic instead of physical damage). These types of attacks are both avoidable and resistable but bypass armor. Examples of when this occurs include Lava Blazes on Sartharion, and Hodir under the effect of
Frozen Blows.
Spell resistance should not be overlooked when making gearing choices, but is generally geared for in highly niche scenarios such as the example given above. An exception to this is
Signified Ring of Binding which is one of the best tanking rings in the game because of its combined stamina, high armor, and +30 spell resistance.
(
NB: Many boss spells have been designed to bypass spell resistance, entirely dependent on the specific encounters/spells themselves. Most notably in current raiding are those which are mixed spell-types such as Mimiron's
Plasma Blast which is classed as 'Spellfire' damage, and Anub'arak's
Freezing Slash spell which is classed as 'Froststrike' damage and cannot be mitigated by frost resistance nor armor.)
Other factors
Other factors to take into account are how tanking stats interact with the particular class and spec, such as health increasing the effectiveness of AMS/VB, Defense increasing the effectiveness of IBF, Avoidance increasing the effectiveness of Bone Shield, and so on. Blood Deathknights for instance gain more auxiliary benefits from stamina than the other specs.
Keep in mind also that a correct analysis of damage taken in an encounter is also dependent on the usage of tanking cooldowns, buffs and debuffs, and parts of the encounter itself. For instance
Gormok the Impaler(H) is balanced around tanks rotating mitigation cooldowns to survive impale/melee combos in the latter half of the fight.
Thorim(H) is dependent on tanks using mitigation cooldowns to survive the initial
Unbalancing Strike hit as well as an immediate taunt from the other tank to avoid him taking hits under its -defense skill debuff.
Almost all bosses which deal high melee damage are balanced around the raid having a fully talented Attack Power debuff(
Demoralizing Shout, Attack Speed Debuff (
Judgements of the Just), and a physical% reduction buff (
Inspiration). These are the main ones but there are many others. A quick tank death in many circumstances can be related to one of or a combination of these or other needed buffs/debuffs dropping off.
The point is that the fact of a tank's death is not necessarily dependent on his gear choices (although it often is). Much of avoiding unnecessary damage is about executing the encounter correctly.
08/24/09, 2:22 PM
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