Recommended Minimums (Buffed)
Tier EH Avoidance Zones
3.5 _______ 26,600 35% Early Heroics such as Mechanar.
485 Defense Skill recommended.
4.0 _______ 32,100 35% Advanced Heroics, Karazhan before
Prince/Nightbane, High King
Maulgar, Doomwalker, Kazzak.
490 Defense Skill required.
4.5 _______ 37,700 40% Prince, Nightbane, Gruul,
Magtheridon.
5.0 _______ 43,200 45% Zul'aman, Tempest Keep,
Serpentshrine before Morogrim,
Vashj, Karathress.
5.5 _______ 48,800 50% Morogrim, Karathress, Vashj,
Black Temple before Gorefiend,
Mount Hyjal before Azgalor.
6.0 _______ 54,300 55% Mount Hyjal, Black Temple before
Illidan.
6.5 _______ 59,900 60% Illidan, beginning Sunwell. The above are Effective Health and Avoidance recommended minimums. This is accurate under the following conditions:
- You are a main tank or are regularly tanking the hardest physical damage encounters;
- You are with a raiding group with equivalent gear;
- You will continue to gain gear regularly as you progress through the zones.
To check your Effective Health and Avoidance, use the
TankSpot Calculator.
Additional Notes
This calculator assumes you are inputting buffed values. This was chosen to reduce overall confusion and to allow tanks to input unbuffed values to determine when they can safely stop using consumables on old content. If you meet the Effective Health recommendations unbuffed, use consumables to increase Avoidance or Threat.
It is possible to complete many encounters before reaching those minimums; in the event you do this due to rapid progression, focus more on Effective Health than Avoidance if the gear choice is available. Effective Health theory is designed to help rapidly progressing tanks who do not have gear capable of matching the content. A substantially larger Effective Health can in many -- but not all -- circumstances overcome a substantial Avoidance disparity.
If you are an off-tank or are evaluating an off-tank for guild recruitment purposes, evaluate the tank based off one tier below current progression. However, keep in mind that these are minimums and are not necessarily the sign of a skilled or ideally geared tank.
When you reach the Effective Health minimum, and so long as you are prepared for the next tier, it can be significantly more effective to stack Dodge and Defense, particularly for bosses that favor Avoidance such as Prince and Morogrim.
Please note that Avoidance recommendations are a combination of Dodge, Parry, and Chance to be Missed. Chance to be missed is determined by hovering over your Defense stat in the in-game Character pane and adding 5% to that number for your base chance.
Be aware of strategies that call for specific gearing, such as raw Health and Resistance for Hydross and Kael'thas or Shield Block Value for Essence of Souls. Magic damage encounters are not calculated through Effective Health, which strictly covers physical damage encounters. In cases where you are dealing with Resistances, 365 Resistance is the maximum effective amount.
Finally -- you may find that you reach minimums significantly beyond your current progression when fully buffed. Don't be surprised. Prior to Sunwell, Burning Crusade has relatively light Effective Health requirements and the later gearing process reflects this. You'd be surprised where T4 quality gear and T5 quality badge/10-man gear can get you. Just keep in mind that it is
highly recommended that you focus on Avoidance stats and meet those minimums as well if you're well past the Effective Health minimums for future content.
