[Vistigoth]

GOD I LOVE PROT PVP!!!

Since I have that out of my system now, I have a couple of questions..

Since 3.0 Im 48-61 in duels as PvE geared prot and 4-6 my first week ever in arenas (2's with a PvE T6geared/specced survival hunter, neither of us having arena experience and yes, there may have been late night alcohol consumption involved). Our basic strategy was me charging in off the bat, getting everyone's attention, and letting the unnoticed hunter go batshit crazy on the squishier of the two.

Okay, what should I be trinketting out of. Cyclone, kidney shot and HoJ are obvious, but what about the other classes? Trinketting a snare/frost nova/trap seems a waste since charge/intercept/intervene are almost always availible. Zerker rage/spell reflect and interrupts counter a locks fear really well. When should I be trinketting and when should I just wait it out.

Next question is what classes should I look for for 2's partner-wise? Do I want a healer that can DPS or a DPS with some form of MS capability or a control class that compliments a prots annoyance factor?

What can I do about limiting the amount of time I spend with stuns on DR? Between charge. intercept, shockwave, conc blow and warstomp, 30 secs into any duel, my opponents are close to, if not already immune

And lastly, for anyone with beta experience, how well does warbringer and piercing howl mesh? I was looking at this combo at 80 for arenas.

And thanks to everyone here on the forums for what I've learned the past two years about tanking. This really is the best class forum I've seen.

Vist

[Saturday]

I personally wouldn't trinket a kidney shot unless I was dismantled at the time simply because a good rogue will Blind you and reset the fight if you waste it then. If Dismantled, totally different story because a rogue will burn you down fast and living through it is more important than the reset.

Piercing Howl gives you the "hamstring" in defensive stance option which means you don't have to worry so much about the rage loss from stance dancing to hamstring which in turn means you don't really 'need' tactical mastery.

There's not much you can do about the DR's, it's the only other real drawback to prot pvp other than the lack of a MS debuff. I believe the DR reset time is 15 seconds? That is, from the last stun that produced an effect to the time you will be able to stun them again is 15 seconds regardless of whether you use a stun on them during that time that doesn't actually stun them (I'm so articulate :P).

I would say if you can avoid it, don't Charge your focus. If there are two people beside each other, charge the one you won't be focusing. This includes pets. It means you have the full duration of either Shockwave or Concussion Blow on your focus.

I would personally group with a ret paladin. Seal of Command on your stuns + Emergency Heals + BoP on yourself or the paladin's bubbling will annoy the hell out of anybody. Not to mention Blessing of Freedom

[PrimeTime]

Just a question on TM for prot pvp, rekn its worth it to put in at least 1 pt into it for the 15rage spell reflect while stance dancing?

Although, it is perfectly possible to have bloodrage available while stance dancing... 10 rage from stance dance + 10 rage from bloodrage.

[Kazeyonoma]

yes, 1 point in TM is pretty good move, I did it during one of my ProtPvp Arena weeks and it proved fairly useful.

[Pizzashark]

Maybe things are different now, but I prefer not to be reliant on Bloodrage, so I'd say at least 1 point of TM, if not the full three. It's not like getting improved rend and 3/5 along the way are gonna hurt you, anyway, right?

EDIT: Some elaboration:

This is the talent build I'll be running at 80. Explanation:

Arms

I hear Rend is quite good now, especially as an opener. We'll use Savage Gladiator's Pummeler as a weapon (because everyone knows hammers own) and arbitrarily give our hypothetical warrior 2500 AP self-buffed. The pummeler has an average damage of 338 rounded down, and our AP gives us another 464 damage on top of that rounded down. With Rend 10 doing 380 base, this gives us (380 + 338 + 464) * 1.20 / 5 = 283 damage per tick. If the target's above 75%, you'll do 439 a tick. Not bad for 10 Rage.

Deflection is a no-brainer, and 1/3 TM gives you 15 Rage for spell reflection on stance dance.


Fury

Cruelty and Armored to the Teeth are about as simple as they come. It's more DPS, pure and plain.

Piercing Howl gives you a snare that doesn't require stancedancing and the 10 yd range is longer than Hamstring's. It can also be used while disarmed.

Booming Voice is purely personal choice, but you need 2 trash points to reach PH.



Protection

I don't get Incite because I don't use HS or Cleave in PvP, and Tclap will never be a damage skill. Anticipation is tanking trash.

The next two tiers are self-explanatory. If you plan on doing only 3's or 2's, you only need 1/2 Improved Spell Reflection. Puncture is a VERY strong ability. 9 Rage Devatates are very efficient.

I took Vigilance because I had a point left over. It's an undispellable bonus 3% DR for whoever, and perma-Taunt will make Hunters cry when their Devilsaur continually tries to pound on you instead of the clothie, regardless of what they tell it to do.

I do not know if I will be keeping Damage Shield. It's very powerful, but no one with a brain will try to mix it up with a Prot warrior over literally anyone else but perhaps a Prot pally. If I dump it, I'll probably pick up 2/3 Critical Block.

[cdweller0]

I really like that build, it is really similar to what I wanted. For Tactical Mastery, you plan on being in berserker stance a lot? I don't arena, so I can see dancing to berserker being really useful if you're not focused. Just curious as to how you use that stance mostly.

Source: Pizzashark If the target's above 75%, you'll do 439 a tick. Not bad for 10 Rage.

Just a heads-up: there was a lot of good discussion today on Rend at elitist jerks and one of the things that came up is that with improved rend, the rend tooltip currently reads 90%, not 75%. It's being tested. It's obviously the wrong behavior, but it could be malfunctioning currently if it's not a typo.

It does not really take much to get a target below 75%, heals tend to happen after that, but what is really getting me excited is a mouseover macro for opponents I am not currently focusing on.

[Pizzashark]

I'm not sure if there's much reason for Berserker Stance anymore, beyond Intercept. I saw 3.0 brought Berserker Rage to any stance, so I finally won't have to stay in zerker to break out of psychic scream on priests and gouge on rogues. I just don't see taking 10% more damage as a good reason to ever be in zerker outside of quick flips to intercept.

I take the one point in TM so that I've got the freedom to dance, even if I don't expect I'll leave defensive very often. I've never been keen on relying on Bloodrage for spell reflection; I prefer to pop it for a shield slam against a priest/mage bubble.

[Falcon213]

My build.

I've been using this build lately and it has been quite good. Melee is no problem, of course, but even casters can be dealt with pretty simply. Imp Charge is very useful, as rage generation vs. casters is the biggest problem with any prot build. Also piercing howl is quite good as it means the only time you ever have to change stance is for the rare Intercept - which is important as once again rage generation is the largest caveat.

I've messed around with the 2 points in Iron Will a lot, and they can be put in other places, such as Imp SR or even 3/3 Puncture (if you really want).


Gear-wise, just go for Strength/AP and Stam. Gem for Strength and Stam. Crit is not going to help you anywhere near as much as raw AP is. For weapon, go for Titansteel Bonecrusher unless you can get better from Naxx (probably not if you're tanking it). As for a shield, your best tanking shield will have to make due until the new PvP gear comes out.

[Pizzashark]

I can't see any build without Last Stand. Was that a mistake?

I just don't think I want to spend points into Improved Charge; not unless they remove the stun. While I'm sure it's a handy source of Rage, I've never had Rage issues as long as I'm taking some hits, and the issues with diminishing returns give me headaches :P

Incite is a personal choice, I guess; I never, ever use Heroic Strike in PvP since it's so inefficient. Taking Incite without Improved Heroic Strike seems pretty silly, since Incite is worthless unless you use HS a lot; and if you're gonna be using it a lot, doesn't it make the most sense to increase its efficiency as much as possible?

Lack of Improved Thunder Clap seems strange; 20% melee slow isn't something to scoff at.

I can't see any reason for not taking at least 1/2 Improved Spell Reflection, unless you're adamant on totally ignoring arenas. The ability to protect teammates from directed spells without burning an interrupt cannot be overstated.

I also see that you don't have any TM; while stancedancing is less important now (not a good thing, IMO!), I still feel it's important to be able to spell reflect on demand regardless of stance, so I'd recommend at least 1/3.

I can't see Iron Will be worth a damn unless you're an Orc. 20% off a small amount of time still results in a short amount of time. Of course, 45% off is pretty noticeable.

I also see literally no reason to socket for stamina over crit or strength. By your very nature, you are already hard to kill, and anyone with a brain is going to ignore you over virtually any other target. PROTECTION IS ALREADY HARD TO KILL. SOCKETING AND ENCHANTING FOR ANYTHING OTHER THAN DPS IS IDIOCY. Sorry, but I'm very firm about that point, because I saw people running around in tank gear for years and then complaining about having problems killing people. Duh?

[Brainwreck]

Are you guys experiencing better survivability in pure tank gear or actual arena gear with resil?

[PrimeTime]

Funny enough, lately I've been pvping in FULL tank gear and been having really good success defeating all classes.

For shi*ts and giggles, the OT and I done some 2v2 skirmish together both as prot and it was major lols cos we were winning the majority of matches especially where other melee was involved. The biggest difficulty was against classes that could heal each other. The biggest lol was against a priest and mage combo where we kept chain spell reflecting as we went to town on the priest while intervening each other when we got feared off.

[Brainwreck]

Source: PrimeTime Funny enough, lately I've been pvping in FULL tank gear and been having really good success defeating all classes. For shi*ts and giggles, the OT and I done some 2v2 skirmish together both as prot and it was major lols cos we were winning the majority of matches especially where other melee was involved. The biggest difficulty was against classes that could heal each other. The biggest lol was against a priest and mage combo where we kept chain spell reflecting as we went to town on the priest while intervening each other when we got feared off.

Yeah, i mean in theory i would think you would have the most survivability in a full tank set. The high avoidance means melee classes would have a real hard time against you, while you could effectively reflect/interrupt/stun a caster.

[Kathvely2]

Source: Brainwreck Are you guys experiencing better survivability in pure tank gear or actual arena gear with resil?

Pizzaguy touched on this a little and I agree/disagree with him.

Depending on how far you are pve progressed I think pure tanking gear even with stam/avoidance gems is >> then the craftable/pvp gear pre arena patch. It’s even better then some of the mid level PvP gear. But, eventually a switch will have to be made. I mainly only 2v2 and I see myself using my main tanking gear with a few dps plate items for around a month.

Resilience >> then defense for PvP. The pure tanking gear PvP band-aid will not last forever. Eventually you will have people running around with stupid amounts of resilience and our tanking gear will not suffice in damage.

[PrimeTime]

Well without the Resilience DoTs did hurt a bit!

In any case, we had very little crit anyway or DoTs, so it wasn't something we were relying on. I'm planning to pvp in pvp gear when I get it anyway but pure tank gear just seemed to outperform the crafted pvp gear that we did have anyway.

The simple fact last night was that 30k hp each with last stand, enraged regen, shield wall, safeguard, endless health pots, lifeblood, etc is tough to burn through. DPS was pretty avg tho.

[Pizzashark]

It's like it was before S2 in TBC, when folks weren't rocking much HP or Resil. When people start gearing up, tanking gear won't get you anywhere, except laughing at melee when they can't even land a hit.

Of course, you won't be able to kill them, but at least you can make them waste ten minutes trying to kill you.

[Kathvely2]

I listen to a lot of bs from my raid leader and get laughed at..... but I can duel palys, dks, druids, and even mages. I have yet to have a winning percentage on prot palys. Where is the prot war feedback in arenas?

I am pve'r at heart but love to pvp. In 2's I have played with a DK(1620), a tank druid (1590), a prot war (1650), and a ret paly (1630). I am not good. I try, but I understand that pvp and pve is not the same and I jump teams because I love the fact that prot is now viable. I hit all of the scores above by playing around or with guildies in 10 - 15 games. Duel wise I have won 269 lost 173. Can anyone post some solid success and not theory?

I dont agree with the prot war dps dps block value kill ideals in the arenas but i am very open to anyone that post some solid success.

If you can catch me as pvp:
The World of Warcraft Armory

Our ability to survive, silence, and stun while dpsing is key. If you catch me in full prot gear i normally pvp in "honor gear". Meaning non set items... neck, trink, ring, cloak, bracers...

[Kazeyonoma]

running with a healer is actually not a bad idea, especially a healer who rarely runs oom. I ran with a druid and myself as prot at the end of season 4 and we broke 1850. without MS fights take longer but most of the time, once a big burst is put on my druid and we survive it, it's just a waiting game for me to kill them and get stun drs ready.

[Therotos]

So I've been trying some protection pvp and things have been going really well overall. But I do have some questions.

1. How do you kill a healer, even if i time my stuns and silences perfectly, i still can't get through their heals during that time. I am able to kill pretty much any dps spec in 1v1, but healers are my undoing. Protection Specs are 50/50, even though they're rare.

2. I'm trying to decide on a spec for when dual specs come out, and this seems close to what I'm settling on. I usually don't stance dance very much other than for intercept, so tactical mastery doesn't seem that worth it.

3. What gear do you think would be best for a protection pvp spec, would it be block value/str gear to maximize shield slam's burst? or the pvp set pieces for the extra crit, or tank gear for added survivablity, or a combination of all of these to a balance that seems right?

4. Lastly, what abilities would be the best to use, I'm sticking to shield slam at every cooldown, revenge when i'm getting whacked on, and devastate in between, stunning/silencing/snaring when needed.

Any tips or criticisms are welcome.

Thanks

[Kazeyonoma]

1) whittle them down don't blow your cds too early, get em fully sundered up via devastate, and keep spell reflect up to scare em, save shield slam for priest shields, but otherwise just unload on him, heroic strike, you might not be able to revenge since they won't melee you, but you'll be able to take em down eventually, priests once fully sundered become easy to kill, put the hurt on em till about 80-60% (you need to get a feel for your burstability) then unload. just absolutely unload on them, shockwave, shield slam, devastate/heroic strike, conc blow, shield slam, devastate, and pray that they die.

2) I haven't really thought about what pvp spec i'd get, chances are i'd go with a variation of the DW spec taking out parry for TM, grabbing piercing howl in fury tree is almost a must, getting improved spell reflect and improved disarm are really good choices, and dropping anticipation might be worth it.

3)pvp set, as much as having high sbv is nice, that's only 1 move out of your entire repertoire of moves, boosting your crit and str will be your top priority, not to mention all that pve gear does nothing against spell casters, so having resilience will be your friend, craft the BS pvp gear if you don't have s4, fill in for realy good best in slots for other pieces from PvE, if you have badges buy the new pvp blues, and try to run just whatever arenas you can (even if you have to lose 10 a week) to buy the starting set, once you are fully decked out in pvp gear even if it's the blue set you'll notice your games take a turn for the better. Warriors are the most gear dependent class in the game, that doesn't change because we're protection.

4) there isn't really a rotation in pvp, it's about situational awareness but what you're doing is right, save stuns for burst moments, the stuns not only cc your target, in pvp they are probably your biggest damage dealer too (i shockwave for over 6k when it crits)

[Kathvely2]

WALL OF TEXT
1)I sometimes go full out no strats on holy palys and priests.

Don’t concussion blow or shockwave that much at the start of the fight. Shield Slam every chance unless you are going against a priest in which case be a little frugal and save for shields. Build up a full rage bar. USE rend!!. Use regeneration right when you are close to 65%. Don’t stance dance. Buff yourself. Have all of your CD’s ready even shield block. You will usually see a little opening due to laziness or cockiness. Try to consider everything in a 3 second rotation (4-5 max). Every rotation requires a stun, silence, or some form of CC. Bloodrage to keep up the dps spaming as well. I try to use stuns first on palys and then stack my 2 sliences with a fear at the end in order to force a premature panic BOP. If you have free rage, make sure you are randomly reflecting. Healers will run... no surprise. I actually consider it a 3 second rotation in which I don’t chase, heroic throw, charge, then stun while thanking them for the free rage. If heroic throw is down I fear. If they are immune to fear I shockwave. Constant pressure and a perfect juggle of silences and stuns is required. If you fail… you will have enough life left to try a few more times. You should know if you have a chance after your first burst cc/cd rotation.

2) I normally use either a (2/2)Impale (3/3) Deep Wounds or a Piercing Howl Build. You should rethink picking up LastStand. I have won a lot of duels because of it. I havn’t tested it but Regeneration used directly after a last stand should heal you for 39%. As a personal pref I would pick up imp rend aswell. I recommend to everyone to play around with it.

3) I use full pvp gear or highest strength then stam pve gear. When running with another prot war we found that full pve gear was best. You should switch depending on your role and pve progression/gear level. Don’t go out of your way to stack SBV. Consider pvp gear then strength your priority.

4) Practice on the dummies. Build a full rage bar. Try to maximize stun durations. Learn to burst all of your abilities while silencing and stunning but limiting needless overlapping. I started by counting the duration of my silences and watching the stun animations. Repeat about 40+ times.

Random thoughts:
I like to use a slow 1 hander. Use the double sunder per devastate glyph. Get a shield for pvping and put a spike on it. If you use pvp gear try to max strength but try to also get something with +hit or expertise on it. Weapon chain is a very cheep date but HOT. Disarm DKs as soon and as often as you can and thunderclap. Heroic throw palys at the start of duels and spam stuns/silences. Don’t sit in a stun against a paly ever. If you are randomly blowing survival cd’s use them at 50% health. I can take a rogue down to 50% by standing still and taking his attacks. If hexed you can still reflect (possible bug). Spam tab and heroic thrown on rogues.. you can pop them sometimes. Rend on a rogue is certain death. Start in zerk form on mages bloodrage intercept/attack/dance/charge/fear/attack.. the only reason you should die is if you didn’t manage your reflects/stuns and survivability cd’s. In areans 1 point in imp reflect is a very very powerful buff.