[Xenophase]

I enjoyed reading your post. The information was insightful and enjoyable to review. It is exciting that we have reached an era where Paladin tanks can become true viable MTs. However, the one principle I would like to better address is a use of the Holy Talent tree as a MT protection Paladin as well as some discussion on paladin tanking gear.

As a hybrid class Paladins are one of, if not the most, gear dependent characters. As a Paladin tank especially I am sure most of us are used to carrying around a number gear sets. I myself have 3 tanking sets, a healing set, a damage set (although Damage for a prot pally is an oxymoron), and the pvp set. These sets usually take up 3 20 slot bags during raids (excluding the damage set which is useless). Part of being a good protection Paladin is understanding when to use what gear because we are so gear dependent. For example, stamina gear should always be used during trash pull fights since crushing blows cannot occur. The same reasoning can be used in fights where crushing blows are disabled such as Nalorakk or Jan'alai. The question then is what gear makes Paladins the best tanks they can be in different situations. Here is where the Holy Talent tree can come into play.

Once a protection Paladin is well geared meaning avoidance = 102.4% and defense = at least 490 (with a good stat being 512 for TK and Beyond) stamina and aggro gain become the primary stats a Paladin should search for. Sadly, protection Paladin gear does not include stamina (such as the tier 5 legs). Warrior gear does. Spell damage can be found with any of the three endgame maces (the new Cudgel from MgT, the Punisher from ZA, or the Hammer of Atonement), the new shield from the SSO (which includes a nice bit of avoidance, badge pants and legs from the new vendor, the old 75 badge chest (although tier 5 is ok), and all available enchants (including rings if you are an enchanter. Depending on what you have you can easily get around 400 spell damage with that gear. You can benefit with everything else being warrior tank equipment (for the increased stamina and mitigation). What you loose is more spell damage and intellect.

The Holy Talent tree can compensate for both of those. Once a prot Pally reaches 102.4% avoidance by gear alone Deflection in the ret talent tree becomes unnecessary. The 49/12 spec is by far the best beginning Paladin tank spec. However, once deflection is not needed the ret talent tree becomes a waste of points. Specing into the holy side can significantly benefit a Paladin main tank and the tanks raid. Here is why:

15 points in the Holy Talent tree will allow for these increase upgrades.

A. 5 points in Divine Intellect increases your intellect by 10% allowing you to don warrior tank gear that does not include intellect (hence more stamina).

B. On the second tier you can go one of two ways. You can put 5 talents into Improved seal of Righteousness for 15% increased damage which is a large amount of aggro gain. Or you can place 5 talents into spiritual focus (which is what I prefer to do) to allow you to cast while tanking. Yes I said cast while main tanking. This benefit can be the most significant contribution a prot pally can make to a raid. I will say while in C.

C. On the third tier 3 points in Healing light increase the amount of heals you will give by 12%. While main tanking in any 25 man raid a prot Paladin MT should not and will not run out of mana due to spiritual attunment. This spec allows a Paladin main tank to be able to heal themselves when the healers need help and heal others in the raid. Typically, a Prot Paladin MT mana bar is full during 25 man raids. This is wasted mana that could be used to help out your healers. Conserving their mana and keeping you alive longer. The most important thing to notice is that while Righteous Fury is active (and it always is while tanking) healing spells significantly increase your aggro gain. If a mage or moonkin druid is going crit happy pop some heals and you will see Omen resettle again. Healing yourself can also be a good emergency savior. In a slow fight like Gruul especially, if he gets a good hit on you and your healers are moving from a cave in healing yourself will save the raid. In a fight like Alar where the raid is moving around a lot or like the second boss in ZA where healers have to stack onto the tank; being able to heal yourself alleviates a lot of stress on your healers.

D. The other great thing about the holy tree is that 2 points in unyielding faith will increase your resistance to fear and disorient effects by 10%. This greatly helps fight a prot Paladin's weakness against fear (particularly because it decreases the amount of time you get feared when you do get feared.)

On another note, ardent defender can be a great contribution to one's spec particularly with the introduction of the Commendation of Kael'thas. Having the greatly increased dodge and 30% damage reduction WILL save your raid from a wipe. No matter how well geared you and your healers are, things will happen and you will get to 35%.

With that, I enjoyed reading your post. I hope th information I have given here can be helpful to other Protection Paladins. I would like to note that there is no superior tanking class. The same way that there is no superior class for any of primary roles a raid will encounter. Each class has its benefits and will tank a particular situation better than another. For example, I will always step aside against a boss that is primarily casting spells (for a warriors spell reflect ability) such as maiden (even though at this point her spells do not touch me). Every protection Paladin needs to work to be a good tank. We are still stuck in a world where the prot pally is still scene inferior to the warrior. It is our job to show Azeroth that a Righteous Defender is not as squishy as most people think. So far we have been doing a pretty good job. keep it up.

If you needed to know for comfort I have tanked everything up to BT. I am the raid leader for my guild and I believe myself to be fairly knowledgeable about most classes in the WOW. I do a steady amount of research to prepare each class in my guild and knowing each fight in the game helps make a good tank. I currently tend to sport a 15/46 spec that includes reckoning (because I like reckoning too much :O). Best of luck to you tanks out there in the World of Warcraft.

Xenophase
Raid Leader
Dark Side of the Moon

[darque]

thank you Currently working on my pally tank, and your guide contains some invaluable advice

[Muggs]

Re: Xeno

I saw a pally with a holy/prot hybrid, they healed during bosses, tanked during trash. I think this was a t6 geared belf, she used the following build:

WorldofWarcraft.com -> Info -> Classes -> Paladin -> Talent Calculator

[Holyknightii]

does the guy that started this thread still play? cause i tried looking him up on Armory and it didn't work unless he got a name change...

[Helgi]

Source: Holyknightii does the guy that started this thread still play? cause i tried looking him up on Armory and it didn't work unless he got a name change...

I know his guild disbanded, whether he plays still or not is another question.

[Joshwa]

Source: Xenophase The Holy Talent tree can compensate for both of those. Once a prot Pally reaches 102.4% avoidance by gear alone Deflection in the ret talent tree becomes unnecessary. The 49/12 spec is by far the best beginning Paladin tank spec. However, once deflection is not needed the ret talent tree becomes a waste of points. Specing into the holy side can significantly benefit a Paladin main tank and the tanks raid. Here is why: ...Yes I said cast while main tanking. This benefit can be the most significant contribution a prot pally can make to a raid. I will say while in C. C. On the third tier 3 points in Healing light increase the amount of heals you will give by 12%. While main tanking in any 25 man raid a prot Paladin MT should not and will not run out of mana due to spiritual attunment. This spec allows a Paladin main tank to be able to heal themselves when the healers need help and heal others in the raid. Typically, a Prot Paladin MT mana bar is full during 25 man raids. This is wasted mana that could be used to help out your healers. Conserving their mana and keeping you alive longer. The most important thing to notice is that while Righteous Fury is active (and it always is while tanking) healing spells significantly increase your aggro gain. If a mage or moonkin druid is going crit happy pop some heals and you will see Omen resettle again. Healing yourself can also be a good emergency savior. In a slow fight like Gruul especially, if he gets a good hit on you and your healers are moving from a cave in healing yourself will save the raid. In a fight like Alar where the raid is moving around a lot or like the second boss in ZA where healers have to stack onto the tank; being able to heal yourself alleviates a lot of stress on your healers.

Casting requires you to shoulder your shield, hence Holy Shield cannot be used to add to avoidance. Are you saying that with more warrior type gear, you can gain this avoidance without using Holy Shield?

[Melven]

There is a post from him a couple of pages ago saying that his account was hacked. He had to reroll and the new name is CAONI.

[Analasolar]

You have a point there Joshwa he did mention using war gear for his stam and all, but also much think that he's using flash of Light which is only a 1.5sec cast and most bosses only get like one hit in during that cast unless you are aoe tanking. I think he's speaking on one on one tanking which a quick flash heal with fury on does generate a ton of aggro. I accedentally healed one time with fury on. War had like 3 sunders on and I did flash like 3 times and I pulled and it took me bubbling to get it off me and enough for the war to get abit built back up ^.^ Taught him to make a prot pally heal. *evil smirk*

[omaga]

putting any talents in holy while prot spec is a waste of points and does nothing for your threat...your a tank...not a mt not an off tank but need to be viable for both or your a waste of a raid spot...and 12% increase to your heals is crap...come on get a healing weapon with 400+ healing and swap when u want and while your at it y not swap an off hand because u cant block anyway...but if that’s what u want to do it. But it will gimp u significantly on threat… also I run 41/20 prot ret build but that’s because I am a threat whore the more the better. And that’s wut I would hope from all paladin tanks but if u want to heal just go holy because that 10k crush is just around the corner…

[Boltsandnuts]

Gratz on the article. It was spot on.

I have been a pally tank for 18 months now, I lvl'd a charactr from base... went into a fun guild to help start kara, and then moved on to a more serious guild for raiding.

Stats r stats, u can look me up on WOWarmory... I am the only one there. Boltsandnuts

I have tanked all of Kara, all of ZA, Grulls and we are moving through TK and SSC in lightening speed.

Here is a challenge to some warriors and druids out there. I recon I could pull more threat than u on most fights... (yes thats right)... Base SPL dmg for raids in my spec is 550... add my wiz oil, my surpent figurine, then pop Wings and u have a crazy 964 spl dmg for 20 seconds... that gets me past 30k threat in that time. In AOE fights... I am often in the top 8 in the dmg metre (in a 25 man raid).

If you doubt the threat... heres a recount... I had a electrical brown out in my area while in the middle of a nightbane fight... Nightbane was at 72% when I DC'd and my net connection went down for 2 mins... I expected to reconnect, be in ghost form and get a ribbing from the raid... That wasnt the case... I had stayed alive... I had soo much threat that the DPS hadnt slackened off (some didnt even notice that I had DC'd) and was just intime for Nightbane to fly off at 50% and me to tank the adds.. I was still 20k over 2nd on the threat metre when nightbane decended once again. We downed nightbane... (the healers did an uber job of healing me through the DC)

The guild I am in Convenant of Fire (Convenant Of Fire - Home) has 8 MT's (3 pallys, 3 warriors and 2 druids). All can tank the above I have mentioned, although often the Pally or Warriors win out on the threat... We also have 5 OT's... The guilds preference is for druids and warriors to OT if the Pally is geared... Means that if nething goes wrong, u still have an effective tank at the top of the metre.

Gearing is essential.... The GM and me have created a bit of a following in the guild for Pally tanks... All the DPS have decided to roll a pally as an alt, and now that some r getting ready for kara, I jump in as MT and take on everything... while the new tank gets his/her gear. I am doing for the guild... plus I need someone to MT instead of me... I have a lock, mage and rogue at 70, but since I am often asked to do tanking duty... I dont often get to raid with them...

If ur looking for a new alt to roll, do a pally..