Yes, it is. The points are better used elsewhere in most cases.

For trash tanking it's not, as you can mitigate a lot of damage from trash (that usually does not hit like a truck/boss) by blocking, but blocking 1.5-3k from a 15k swing is not that sexy after all.

If you wanted to do more OT / Add tanking as a warrior, you could try a cleave tank build and glyph into imp cleave to have 3 targets have your aggro, as well as the other ones by your thunder clap & shockwave.

I tried that for awhile and it's well suited for that. But for single target tanking, the deep wounds spec is better for a higher single target threat. Or an unrelenting assault arms/tank spec for a 1 second revenge.

So is it ok to go for block again? Most of our tier pieces in Ulduar seem to be very budgeted for it, as well as a lot of other drops throughout Ulduar. I'm really not sure if its worth trying to go for again, as our two piece is obtainable without getting block pieces and our 4 piece is fairly situational.

Nothing has changed. Block value is still a middling-low quality threat stat, block rating is still very low utility because it isn't useful a significant amount of the time.

The only fight I've found block mildly interesting was Freya since she hits for so little. I decided to try out my full block set against her in 25 man this last week. I'm not sure it was much of a decrease in incoming damage but I did get quite a chuckle seeing hits for 2k (7500 blocked).

WoW Web Stats - I was still getting about 50% overall miss (dodge/parry/miss) and of the hits got through about 20% was mitigated by block. I only have 2/5 in the block chance talent in my current spec but still had about 32% chance to block with 2200 block value with the block glyph up. Most of the bosses in Ulduar hit too hard to consider using a block set however.

Well, okay. It's not win freaking win, baby. The UA spec is interesting on a straight fight where the boss is pounding on you continuously, but it's not good with a significant period of time where you're not getting meleed, you'll either lose a lot of threat carrying sunders or you'll need a DPS warrior to carry them, and you'll suck as bad as a pre-3.0 warrior when it comes to picking up adds.

It's very amusing on a straight burn fight against a melee boss, but there aren't any hard straight burn fights at the moment. (I guess Vezax?)

I was thinking more for the utility than threat but yeah.

I really wish blizzard would prop up block for us somehow, having to waste 2 slots on block pieces for 4/5 sucks. I don't really expect to get 4/5 for awhile just for that, definitely not gonna roll against peoples main spec for a situational bonus (kind of)

Speaking of the situational bonus - I am still not sure when it is useful. I know a lot of fights have magic damage, but when is it best to use the 4-set as opposed to stronger offset items? It's especially difficult to figure out as you will likely be using items with block value to get the bonus, and block value is even less useful on fights where you want to counter magic damage. The 20% reduction is also not really strong enough to use as a main CD, and with Shield Wall being so often available I can't think of a single time when you would use it as a substitute which really just leaves it as a bonus for any fight with a magic damage element. It would have been great against Malygos, but in Ulduar? Maybe I am forgetting something or perhaps it is useful against some hard mode encounter I haven't tried.

The 20% magical damage reduction would be useful for quite a few abilities in Ulduar. Just to name a few: frozen blows from Hodir, shock blast from Mimiron, and the flame jets on the trash after XT.

It could be a while before the 4-piece bonus can help on Hodir, considering you're more than likely wearing some Icebane pieces as well to tank, which means you'll need everything but T8 chest (I'm talking 25man here).

For 10man, I can see it being very useful, since you don't need the ice resist gear (just a pally or shaman for the aura) and you can pop shield block for a Frozen Blows fairly often.

Other places the magic reduction would help are breath from Razorscale, most of Ignis encounter, Freya adds (and trash) to name a few more.

I don't see why not. While the class design is the starting point, it's the itemisation which will take you further on from that point.

Why would you need a "Pure" AoE tank for the Thorim arena? The adds come in predictable waves, and there's more ways of beating an encounter than simply relying on one person to tank everything.

For fights like Thorim where the adds are predictable a warrior is just fine doing imo due to having some of the best aoe snap threat. Yes our overall aoe threat lacks compared to the other tanks, but snap threat is damn good and in this encounter doesn't hurt us to the point where a better aoe tank should be taken over a warrior.

I see alot of reference to the use of rend whilst tanking but I have been unable to find anything in the forums which discusses how and when you should implement it. Is rend just used purely as an additional threat generation move and if so, is there a weapon damage range that you need to reach for it to become worth the GCD's required to stance dance and cast?

Sorry if this has already been discussed but I have been trolling for a while and couldn't see anything.

Admire? I see it as giving one tank class a huge advantage over other classes. Why would you bring a warrior tank if a druid tank will do the same job, while also providing 5% crit chance? This is nothing to admire, this is simply Blizzard favoring one class over the other.

Enough of whining. I've been a fortunate owner of 4 tier 8,5 pieces for over a week now, and I must say I do take advantage of the four-piece bonus:

1. Frozen Blows (I tank using Icebane pieces. Even after some gemming for defense + Thaddius trinket, I still have more health than in my usual tanking gear). It used to look like this:
-14865 (20000 resisted)
-17654 (20000 resisted)
Now it looks more like
-11245 (20000 resisted) etc.
If a guild wants to beat the hardmode timer, and plan to bring less healers, the set bonus is helpful.

2. Ignis. (I deal with the golems). Getting 2 golems on me, running into a scorch to melt them, popping Shield Block. Even if Scorch damage has been lowered, the reduction still takes a load off our healers' shoulders.

3. Yogg Saron. If for some reason we get 2 Guardians in the middle and they die within 2-3 seconds, popping Shield Block is hugely helpful in surviving their explosions. I do realise that we shouldn't be killing 2 of them in rapid succession, but sometimes things just happen.

Rend is usable in defensive stance so there should be no question of stance-dancing to do it.

Well warriors do bring a lot of raid buffs, sunder armor, commanding shout, thunderclap and improved/normal demo shout being some. I think a lot of people are underestimating commanding shout, it is really far superior, especially when talented compared to the warlock counterpart. Sure you can argue that a DPS warrior can bring the same buffs but then I have to point that they also do bring 5% crit. Also, shield wall is way superior to barkskin. Druids might have advantages over warriors but it's not a simple matter of 5% crit.

The set bonus is really helpful against some encounters. Firefighter and Hodir being some of them. You can combine last stand with shield block, and/or other raid cooldowns with shield block to reduce magical damage intake for a lot.

Yes a warrior is a great tank but when you only need 1 tank for the fight, then a warrior doesn't bring much to the table as an OT. Especially compared to the dps a feral druid can bring. The buffs that a warrior brings are nice, but sunder, shouts, etc can all be brought to the table for a dps warrior.

In theory, no fight that requires one tank needs an OT. Why wouldn't you dual-spec to DPS if you are so concerned about that? If your raid group is using an OT on a one tank fight, then you are bad to begin with anyway. Thus, the OT conversation is meaningless at this point.

For the sake of the argument and to maybe bring some life back to this thread, if you only have managed to get your five pieces of Naxx gear and find yourself "OT'ing" on something like Hodir, a Warrior can still provide great benefit to his raid through threat control. Vigilance on high threat targets and Intervene can enable people to continue DPS and not need to continuously drop threat. Using a Warrior MT is great on a situation like Hodir hard mode where the high casting DPS can get Intervene'd at each Flash Freeze (Aside from Vigilance as necessary. Intervene, Charge back to Hodir.. takes 2 seconds and drops a caster threat by an extra 10% for that period of time. Also, it goes without saying, but in a situation like Hodir, the 4pc really shines.

This certainly doesn't only go for Hodir, however. The problem that you and so many people have is they don't look at the big picture in terms of a warrior. They see a DK with a shorter IBF cooldown, a Druid with more health, and a Paladin with more AOE threat.. etc..etc.. You guys get caught up in the gross stereotypes of what Warriors can't do and what other classes have to offer that Warriors do not. Well, what abilities does a Warrior have that no other tanking class does? Vigilance and Intervene. Are they the staple of the warrior class? No. Are there things that could be improved about a Warrior? Sure. Do most bad Warriors not even understand the benefit of Intervene? Yes. However, no other class can help control threat of a raid group as well as a Warrior can. Thus, as your raid begins to see some extremely high DPS, especially on hard modes, these abilities can help enable you to hit your enrage timer, speed kill, or whatever the case may be. As far as those other things, a Warrior can be just as effective as the other classes if played appropriately. Some may make the "skill > gear" argument. I believe something could certainly be said for the "skill > class" argument as well when it comes to tanking.

In terms of other raid benefits, don't forget about another Shattering Throw cycling through a rotation in addition to the aforementioned Commanding Shout (especially one that is spec'd), and Imp Demo Shout (spec'd).

Also, you can't just say "Oh, a Fury/Arms Warrior can sunder so there is no benefit there." The ease and speed with which a Prot Warrior can get sunders up for maximum DPS is not even comparable to a Fury/Arms Warrior. A Fury or Arms Warriors is using 5 GCD's off the bat while the Prot Warrior gets 4x up in 2GCD's (glyphed) and a full stack in 3 GCD's. Aside from that, this is giving the Fury/Arms Warrior an additional 5 GCD's off the bat with more than 10 others over the course of the fight (300 second fight/30 second duration.. assuming five minute fight). Thus, you are talking about at least 15 GCD's that a Fury/Arms Warrior is gaining by having the Prot Warrior providing the Sunder debuff. In addition, there is an extra 5-10 seconds of uptime at the beginning of the fight with a glyphed Prot Warrior.

To put it plainly, stop reading wowinsider.com and MMO Champion forums for your class information. Even EJ and Tankspot forums can see some QQ about how other tanking classes are superior to Warriors.

Learn to play your class to its max potential and any of these "inequities" will quickly dissipate.

To be fair, I don't think he makes bad points honestly. Shouts are better handled by Fury Warriors that don't give up much to get Improved versions, Sunders are not a major issue (3 GCDs vs. 5 isn't really a particular issue--and if you have 2 DPS Warriors it will be up in 3 anyway), and Thunderclap is handled by tons of overlap nowadays.

Personally, I find Protection Warriors lose way too much in terms of both TPS from spec and from rotation to be on improved "shout duty", so if you have a Fury Warrior who can keep up shouts and Sunder, there isn't a whole lot of difference.

Vigilance is nice, sure, but Intervene is also possible for DPS Warriors to use just by stance-swapping. In fact, generally it's easier since tanks often don't have full control of being able to wander around mid-fight.

Vigilance is really the only thing particularly unique, realistically, and while nice I don't think it's particularly the deciding factor as to if X tank will be used for Y encounter, especially as the most important part of tanking is being able to survive the fight.

After all, this thread is 'finalizing the Prot Warrior design', not telling people 'l2p your class'.

I--and I would guess many others--would be a lot happier if Protection Warriors could provide more of their utility without giving up threat. The shout issues--in addition to their low duration--are especially bad IMO.

I don't think it would hurt, for instance, for at least one of the shout talents to be moved into the Protection tree. Additionally, the low base range and duration on shouts is a problem, especially as tank Warriors are not always able to refresh Commanding Shout on many members of the raid due to range and it will expire less than halfway into most fights.

In regard to dual-spec and single-tank fights, I find Arms to be a viable raid utility and DPS secondary spec, and comparing to ferals is a bit silly atm since feral DPS is, as mentioned by Blizzard, a bit higher than it should be.

My main complaint in regard to the hybrid situation is that Warriors aren't in a great position to ever swap mid-fight between DPS and tank roles like a Druid or DK can. A Druid especially and sometimes a DK can passably OT adds during a period of a fight while also managing to do resonable DPS outside of those periods. On the other hand, Warriors have a distinct division between tankability and dpsability.

(I'd never ask a DPS Warrior to OT adds at the start of Auriaya just with a shield, for instance, while we have DKs and Druids do it quite often. Nor would I ask a Warrior to go Prot just for the 45 seconds of the fight and then do no DPS the rest of the time.)

I agree, this is definitely the space to work on "Finalizing the Prot Warrior Design." I apologize if I came off with a "learn to play your class" air to it. I meant it more in the sense of learning to play your class to the max potential. There are plenty of competent Prot Warriors who do their job and do it well but neglect some of the little things that can improve their game.

I think you raise some good points. Shouts are a big thing I would like to see changed as well. The duration is poor at best and there really is no reason why this couldn't be extended or improved even if it was via minor glyph. As far as the Arms/Fury Warriors providing the sunders and intervening and whatnot, it is surely possible but in a situation where every second counts for DPS, I don't know if I would want my DPS warriors to take the time and GCD's to do this. Like I said, ~15 GCD's in a five minute fight for sunders can be a difference between a 1-2% wipe and a kill. Even if two warriors apply Sunders to begin the fight, you are still losing that same number of GCD's no matter how you cut it. That is only for a one mob fight as well. On Yogg, getting 4x sunders up in 2 quick global cooldowns can really improve the speed with which you burn through Guardians and tentacles. I can't imagine there are many DPS warriors trying to sunder Guardians on Yogg. Also, a DPS warrior stance-swapping to intervene will kill his DPS. There are plenty of times when a tank can sneak in intervenes, assuming you are quick enough to charge back to your initial target to keep him in place.

The talent tree could be changed in a number of ways. That is for sure. Dropping threat talents for utility is no fun and doesn't make things easier. However, aside from removing some of the useless talents (Puncture, for example), I am not sure what the approach would be here. Adding a shout talent into the Protection tree would be a great place to start.

Before we start griping about what we don't have or don't like, I do think there's some value in taking stock of what we do have. Saying vigilance is the only unique thing we bring to an ulduar raid is gross oversimplification. Warriors are basically the second best tank for just about every single fight in Ulduar and in a lot of cases we are the best OT. Our 4 pc bonus is a great band-aid fix for the class right now (in the future this may need to be added to shieldblock's basic functionality or else we're going to be lugging around T8 until the next expansion).

The combination of abilities that we have makes it so that if you're doing it right, you are either an optimal OT or MT for just about every encounter in Ulduar. We are easily the best add tank for Freya, the best tank for Auriaya, the best tank for Brundir, one of the best tanks for Steelbreaker hardmode, one of the best tanks for Mimiron, one of the best tanks for XT hard, etc. I'd argue that we are in a very good place right now, probably a better place than druids and paladins for most fights. At this point we really shouldn't need much aside from a few minor changes. We are not getting sat for another tanking class in 99% of the fights in Ulduar. You can't say the same for prot paladins.


I'd also add that whenever I end up on intervene duty for Vezax, I typically lose quite a bit of dps as arms. That's at least 3-4 GCDs that you lose when you dance, find the guy to intervene, intervene, charge back and you lose some of your deep wounds damage and some of your rage.