[Link]

Avoidance is nice as a sugar coating. As you upgrade your gear, avoidance will come prepackaged. I was never a big fan of gearing specifically for avoidance because no matter how much you get, you cannot RELY on it.

I tank 25 man bosses and my healers spam me non stop, avoidance doesn't do much but cause overhealing.

Think of a tank that sacrifices damage reduction for avoidance. Eventually you'll get to the point where you are an absolute nightmare to heal. You either avoid the damage completely or take a nice big chunk of damage quickly. Healers hate healing tanks when they see this happening. They don't really get the option of canceling heals. They pretty much have to spam. So all that avoidance you've built up isn't doing anything.

What a main tank should strive to do is not only funnel as much incoming damage through him as he can, but gear himself so that this damage happens in a consistent manner. Spike damage sucks. The best tanks in the game have found ways to manage almost all forms of spike damage save one.. and blizzard recently introduced weapon expertise in order to help them solve the one last source of spike damage.

[Narshe]

Source: Kalahad 120 Armor is the superior choice here. I really don't understand the arguments people are making here against it. No matter how much armor you have, more isn't going to really hurt. The whole "But I have 18000 armor, whats 120 more?" is no different from "But I have 300 armor, whats 120 more?" as it gives the same benefit

It's not the same. 120 armor increase for a 1k armor guy provides, how much? 3-4% of damage reduction? At 18k, increasing 120 armor is less than 0.1% or likely.

[Brucimus]

I understand that some of you are devout EH fanatics ...but come on!...120 out of 17K is such a small number

[Razmo]

yeah when you are in kara the 120 armor is nice (got it aswell on my badge cloak) but when you are raiding MH and BT i'd rather take dodge or agi.

[Syana]

120 Armor on [item]Slikk's Cloak of Placation[/item] and 12 dodge rating on [item]Phoenix-Wing Cloak[/item].

Now shut up and go tank shit.

[Horgar]

The Mathematics of Armour and Diminishing ReturnsTitle

+120 armor gives about the same benefit when you are sitting at 18000 armor as it does when you're at 15000. It's *slightly* less. Adding +120 to 18000 reduces incoming dmg by around 0.43%. Adding it to 15000 armor reduces incoming dmg by around 0.47%. This is vs .63% dodge. So if you'd pick it when in kara I don't see why you wouldn't still pick it later on. Most avoidance shows a bigger "in the long run" mitigation but if you stack avoidance over armor/stam you risk dying to spike dmg.

Avoidance is a fluff benefit for most fights. If your healers are running OOM cuz the MT is draining them find ways to increase raid dps first, put on more avoidance second. Exceptions to this would be fights where a stacking or nasty melee applied debuff is used that can be dodged or parried.

[Naka]

I'll never understand why people tend to speak in absolutes. It depends. It always depends.
It depends on your gear, your playing style, your team, and, of course, it depends particularly on the opponents you're about to fight. Plus maybe other factors i forgot.

So,

- if your healers complain: "you take too much spike damage!" - take armor
- if they complain: "you suck too much mana!" - take dodge
- if your DDlers complain:"we need to hold back!" - take agility
- if you're a progressive raider, and are about to fight new bosses soon which you don't know how hard they hit - take armor
- or you already know how hard they hit, but you feel your Effective Health is sufficient - take dodge
- if you're rather a casual gamer and think you'lll get geared right soon enough for new fights either way - take the one that makes you feel best, or that best fits your character

... and so on


PS: My first post on this great forum, though i'm reading it for a while. Hello all, it's good to be here.
Hope my english is understandable.

[Narshe]

Your first post is indeed a great post. Talking in absolutes 120 armor would always be better than dodge or agi but as you say, it always depend on the rest of gear and raid setup.

I have Dodge rating in all my cloaks because:
- I already have enough EH for my fights.
- My agro is perfectly fine, I've never heard of any guild member holding back his dps.
- I'm aiming for a uncrushable gear.

Btw, armor is the cheapest of all enchants, so if I were you, I would take armor xDDD

[Dots]

Indeed it depends, and since OP is obviously at tier 6 gear level, he should use 12 dodge on a tanking cloak. For Pepe's, 12 agility would still be better for the added crit.

[Stiffypants]

I agree with Naka. There are too many inconsistent variables to say this is what it is, has been, and will be. The way they broke it down is perfect.

And veneretio, right on! I get fed up with the randomness of avoidance. I HAD close to 550 def (30%+ block, 25%+ dodge, 20%+ parry) and I always managed to get a quick hit for 15k dmg! That is all it takes is 1 hit to kill when your luck is off. But, if you reduce the incoming damage accordingly then the spike hits hit for a lot less. Not to mention, when you dodge, block and parry...you do not gain rage. To gain rage you must be hit. To survive the hit you must reduce incoming damage. I have to tank heroics in 1/2 prot 1/2 dps gear just to build rage. Otherwise I lose aggro and ppl die. I am sure most of you would understand the feeling of utter failure to wipe in a heroic 5-man when you stomping SSC and TK.
If you are somehow low on dodge (less than 20%), then I would get dodge.
Otherwise, I am with the crowd saying armor because every little bit less damage taken is our friend. We may be meat shields, but we are not invincible nor masters of luck. =)
Just my opinion based on information I have gathered over time...