Good stuff. I'll reference it when I update the guide.

I think I was just repeating something Knaughty said here a few months back, but didn't bother checking it myself. Looking over your results, it appears this is a case of depending on other gear/stats(?) I'll update that in the guide to reflect and reference your work.

Yeah, I think I just referenced food as a way to cap out any stat you still needed to cap (e.g., hit, expertise). I'll say something about strength and the Dragonfin Fillet.

Probably going to leave out plots as a general rule unless they illustrate something really fundamental and/or important. The guide's pretty bulky as is and I don't want to burden the page with more data to retrieve than necessary.

His reportings were accurate for the time. The gear used at the time was a heroics/naxx 10 set which results in a superior SotP threat but once you have full naxx 25 gear conviction pulls ahead.

This is pretty much right. Tank gear is generally too situational for a BiS list to be compiled that would have any real relevance. What you wear for Hodir hard mode will be very different to what you wear for Thorim arena, for instance. That is, at least, in theory.

With hard modes giving access to another 'tier' of loot though, these decisions become much more cut and dry. The extra iLvL on a lot of the hard mode loot just pushes it too far ahead of easy mode stuff. Furthermore, with the relatively lackluster 4T8 bonus (at least compared to say, warriors), there's not much reason to really bother considering it, freeing up more slots for hard mode loot. Back in T7, you had multiple bits of gear to choose from. Like you could take Sabatons of Endurance for some extra expertise threat, or Kyzoric's Stompers for the extra avoidance. Even if you prefered the itemisation on the Stompers though, dropping down a tier to say, Plague-Impervious Boots, with the same def/dodge/parry stat range, the Sabatons would still likely prove superior, simply due to the higher iLvL. Same with cloaks. You could choose Cloak of the Shadowed Sun for the bonus armour or Platinum Mesh for the hit and extra avoidance. Even if you were a huge fan of the bonus armour, it'd be very difficult to justify wearing say, Cloak of Armed Strife over Platinum Mesh. Ultimately, I'd say that for those with access to hard mode loot, that just throwing as much as that as possible on could quite easily constitute a highly viable "BiS" setup.

On a slightly related note, I'd almost recommend ditching 'block' sets altogether. There's just nothing in the instance which really warrants choosing block over dodge/parry. A few high armour rings / trinkets / cloaks / whatever, some hit / BV / exp gear, maybe a second helm with a different meta, is really all I can see being necessary for spare gear.

How else am I going to get my 15k Shor crits?!

I have a absolute no holds barred max BV set, mainly for PVP, but its nice being able to throw it on when someone asks me to run VH or something, it can put out some really nice numbers. Its also really nice sometimes, because in my avoidance set, I still need ~1-2% more to hit the "hit cap", so I can toss on a BV piece for an almost always guaranteed 3-4% block rating, plus its a little threat to boot. I agree though, its pretty useless when it comes to a boss like Vezax.

what do you think about upcoming jewelcrafting nerf? Removing prismatic gems and introducing color only gems; they are not gonna help us get gem bonuses or get meta working. It's practically 34,17 itemization points. If you consider epic gems are gonna be introduced its even lower. 18,09 points. ( considering you use 3x41 stam gems) I am thinking of dropping it for blacksmithing or enchanting.

It'd equal to the other professions (Actually, 1 to 3 stamina better) without epic gems. With epic gems, assuming those are ever introduced and the profession is not changed because it's benefit just got diminished, it is the weakest profession yes.

However, notice the double assumption you have to make here. I wouldn't change away from it until it turns out both those assumption are correct, as it currently looks there is no reason to change unless your gear has less than 4 or 5 sockets (depending on which meta gem you want to use).

This is the case if all you care about is stam. Tanking Sartharion with 3 drakes, for example. The extra 12-24 stamina 'gained' comes at a loss of avoidance through dodge / defense though, which are still quite useful stats in many encounters. DPS generally has the luxury of having a single 'best' stat that will always be best (very roughly hit to cap > SP / Str / AP / whatever), so increasing that stat in exchange for an equal item budget worth of another stat, especially one such as stam or spirit on blue gems, is always going to be a gain. For tanks, although stamina is never bad and never wasted, it's not necessarily our best stat in every situation. Trading 8 defense for 12 stamina without losing a socket bonus or meta-activation requirement may be great in some situations, but potentially detrimental in others.

In any event, the JC nerf IS irritating, but it's still without question the best tradeskill for a tank, simply due to its versatility. Alongside BS it's the only prof that allows complete freedom in stats chosen. Whereas mining may give a great amount of stamina, that'll be useless (well, less useful) on fights where you're trying to maximise TPS or raise avoidance as high as possible. You can use it to hit the def cap in high resistance gear, you can use it to hit cap yourself and free up a glyph slot, you can use it to stack Str or Int instead of AP or SP for your ret / holy offspec, etc etc.

What concerns me most about the nerf is its effect on Dragon Eyes, since I was quite enjoying making ~100g off the JC daily for 5 minutes' work.

I can confirm that the Divinity talent does affect healthstones (and other similar items) and that self heals are affected twice by this talent (including healthstones).

A few tests I did:

Test 1: Simply using a few Healthstones
Without talent they healed a steady 5136 and with the talent 5663. That is a 10.26% increase (which is about the same as a 5% increase twice).

Test 2: A sample of 100 Flash of Light's (ignoring crits)
Without talent they averaged at 1589.04 and with talent 1732.62. That is a 9% increase, so it can be assumed that the talent affects it twice.

Test 3: Lay on hands
A simple test. My health is 31674, and my LoH heals me for 34921. That is the magic 10.25% increase which shows it affects self heals twice.

Test 4: First aid
A heavy frostweave bandage heals for 5800 without the talent, and 6394 with the talent. Again this is a 10.25% increase

Test 5: Seal/Judgement of Light
Without the talent, SoL heals me for 523 and JoL for 349, and with the talent is heals me for 577 and 384 respectively. Again this shows the double increased healing affect.

I have not yet tested to check that SoL and JoL are affected by the talent when healing other people, however I suspect that a 5% bonus is present.
Also, I did not check healing potions, however going by the healthstones and bandages, I would assume it is also affected twice by this talent.
I can also confirm that divinity and improved devotion aura stack multiplicity (healthstones heal for 6002 when affected by both).

The 5% divinity bonus affects the JoL heal on others and affects the heal from healing potions.

Anyone mind posting actual popular Protadin Tank builds? The OP simply breaks down each ability, and I was looking more for straight up build examples to take a look at.

Clicking the armory links for some of the more prolific authors in this thread is a pretty solid way to sample what is being used.

Since the Holy thread has pretty much proven that Sacred Shields stack (therefore making self-Sacred Shielding some definite active mitigation), doesn't that make Divine Guardian a de facto part of every build? Even if you write off the 20% increased absorb amount, making it one minute goes a long way towards its usability.

They stack, but only one will proc at a time.

Not true. One hit can easily proc all SS's on the tank.

Is there proof of that? Last I heard, only one was able to proc at a time.

THIS POST

The final combat log sample has the following events (correct me if I'm reading it wrong):
1. Ungulant the Paladin is hit for 837 damage by Tzep the Hunter's auto-shot
2. Ungulant gains a Sacred Shield buff from Ungulant as triggered by the auto-shot damage
3. Ungulant gains a second Sacred Shield buff from Alighieri the Paladin as triggered by the auto-shot damage
4. Tzep's 863 damage auto-shot is absorbed
5. Tzep's 635 damage Serpent Sting tick is absorbed
6. Ungulant's Sacred Shield buff fades (presumably it was this Shield that was doing the absorbing in steps 4-5)
7. Ungulant gains a Sacred Shield refresh from Alighieri
8. Tzep's 521 damage auto-shot is partially absorbed
9. Tzep's 635 damage Serpent Sting tick is absorbed
10. Tzep's 855 damage auto-shot is absorbed
11. Ungulant gains a Sacred Shield buff from Ungulant
12 - 13. Ungulant gains a Sacred Shield refresh from Alighieri

Steps 4, 5 and 8 represent 2019 damage absorbed, which is consistent with Ungulant's 2021 spell power.

Steps 9 and 10 represent 1490 damage absorbed, which is presumably from Alighieri. In the post, it was not elaborated how much spell power Alighieri had, but in any case steps 12-13 indicate that the Sacred Shields were refreshed by then anyway as 6 seconds had already passed since step 1.

As Ungulant summarizes at the end: So, it seems that even though two shields cannot absorb the same damage, they do stack in that if one gets removed, the second still absorbs _AND_ gets refreshed 6 seconds after proccing (i.e. no shared CD. Or, rather, shared CD, but triggers both shields). I have no idea which order the shields are used in, one attempt it was mine first, the other it was the ret paladin's.

Personally I consider Divine Guardian mandatory at this point, as it's the only "optional" talent that increases our survival. And they do stack (I had 4 procs up at the same time when tanking Runemaster).
I am not sure anymore but Divinity might affect Sacred Shield too, I'll have to test that tough, as I can't seem to find that info anymore in this thread.

This is the base build I'd recommend for Ulduar, but even this is already a variation and assumes a Holy or Ret Paladin for improved Might. (The 2/2 Improved Judgments - I prefer 2 points because not every situation allows spreadsheet rotations)
Note that getting 3/5 Conviction and 2/3 Crusade is a higher TPS gain than 5/5 Seals of the Pure.

In the end there's not really much anyone can do wrong with their spec at this point and not much variation really.

It's really worth it to use sacred shield in your rotation? I'm a bit wary of this.

I'm also a bit curious as to 4pcT8. While a lot of the pieces are somewhat questionable (esp. shoulders), isn't threat a fairly big concern for hard modes? The legs are obviously very good. The gloves/chest are also fairly good. So, from my standpoint, I would be sacking the T7 shoulders (which can be argued to be better). But, how much TPS would one gain? Has anybody done the math on it?

With the 836 spell power in your Armory, Sacred Shield is going to shave off 1127 damage every 6 seconds. To put it in perspective, think of that as a Warrior's Critical Block on a 6 second internal cooldown.

Divine Guardian would increase that by 225 absorb to 1352 total absorb per 6 seconds. I'm writing off the 6 second extra proc duration since you're lucky to have your proc survive one hit.

Even if you write off 225 extra absorb, the primary benefit of Divine Guardian is that you only need to interrupt your rotation once every minute instead of once every 30 seconds.

Myself, I don't write off the 225 extra absorb because its still *some* mitigation, as opposed to any other talent point investment that would yield *no* mitigation.

I haven't considered threat an issue yet so far (hodir hard mode, thorim hard mode, XT/ignis speedkills, council kill with runemaster first and every dps in the runes.. sigh). On the rare cases where I do consider my initial lead vital, I equip the XT shoulders (insane amount of hit). Not a hair on my head that would ever equip the prot head above the alternatives (faceless/ironbark head).

I suppose I could see myself using the 4pc with chest/legs/gloves/shoulders if for some reason I had to push 8k TPS or so, but I'd be more likely to swap trinkets at that point (greatness/90+hit trinket).

This will probably all change when they change blocking mechanics though.

Since we are on the topic of Divine Guardian and Sacred Shield, I would like to get some input on the following:

Given the choice between placing 3/5 points into Divinity or taking Divine Sacrifice and 2/2 Divine Guardian, which do you prefer? Does the extra mitigated damage from the improved SS make up for the extra 3% healing received? Is this more about personal preference, or is there a clear-cut winner between these two talents?

Speaking of changing the block mechanics, I'm curious to know what they're planning. In blue posts they described the change as "big", but then pretty much gave examples of of Critical Block.

I don't understand what's wrong with block. Paladins who gear right will block all attacks making it pretty much armor that adds threat, and while that may be boring it doesn't seem bad or in need of a change. Is it just warriors that have a problem with block?