Prot Warrior, getting Impale at 80

I've been messing around with the talent calculator a bit trying to get Impale at 80 with the minimum talent pain.

My choices have been influenced by my experiences with the new talents at 70, with a primary focus on 5-man (normal+heroic) and 10-man level 70 content.

For reference, my current build is:

Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft

I ditched the parry/dodge avoidance talents (for now) as I don't need them for 70 content in my current gear. At 80 however, I'm pretty sure they will be "must have" again.

I have noticed the following over the last week or so.
1. I'm doing lots of AE tanking.
2. I use Thunder Clap alot.
3. I have lots of rage.
4. I have lots of threat.
5. I use Revenge (glyphed) / Shield Slam whenver they are up.
6. I don't use Sunder/Devestate anywhere near as much as I did.
7. I tend to use Concussive blow and Shockwave as often as possible.
8. I rage dump into Heroic / Cleave.

With this in mind I put together the following build. I thought about how I was actually playing rather than a theoretical best build (although I read all the theorycrafting I could get my hands on too :)).

Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft

The common high-value talents I have sacrificed and the reasons why are:

Puncture: It doesn't feel like the rage saving is as valuable as it was given the high rage I generate, coupled with my reduced use of Devestate.

Sword and Board :eek:: The increase to Devestate damage I feel is a minor factor. My gut feeling (not very scientific I know) is also that the extra Shield Slams are slightly less valuable than any of the other places I could free up points. I could keep Sword and Board by stealing 1 point from Improved Spell Reflect and 2 points from Cruelty (but losing crit would make me sad). This build would look like:

Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft

Improved Heroic Strike vs Iron Will: Either works, Iron Will seems good for PvP and so far rage is not a problem.

That's it for me. Comments welcome. Great job on Tankspot, it's a fantastic Tank resource (I'm a long-time lurker).

Sounds about the same way I have been using my abilities.

Some numbers :)

I used Optimoos excellent Threat Simulator (http://www.tankspot.com/forums/f14/4...simulator.html) to test a few talent variations.

I ran each simulation for 180 seconds using default settings, only changing talent choices and/or crit%. The results are interesting I think.

10% crit
Impale(2/2) = 2415 TPS
S/B(3/3) = 2517 TPS
S/B(3/3)+Punc(3/3) = 2537 TPS

20% crit
Impale(2/2) = 2662 TPS
S/B(3/3) = 2513 TPS
S/B(3/3)+Punc(3/3) = 2543 TPS

30% crit
Impale(2/2) = 2999 TPS
S/B(3/3) = 2587 TPS
S/B(3/3)+Punc(3/3) = 2808 TPS

12% crit - assuming Cruelty(2/5)
Impale(2/2)+S/B(3/3) = 2521 TPS

15% crit - assuming Cruelty(5/5)
Impale(2/2) only = 2549 TPS

Note that AE threat would be increased further by an Impale(2/2)+Cruelty(5/5) build. Also it should be noted that the threat gains from this build are all passive, and as such should be more effective in situations where player response is impaired (such as high lag).

I'm not sure how DPS would be affected, although my gut-feeling (there I go again ;) ) is that an Impale/Cruelty build would scale faster (especially with crit%).

Reaching for impale is all well and good, but not getting SnB is entirely silly. Drop damage shield and either warbringer or a point in shield specialization, and swap those points out of iron will and into HS or even TM. You're really shooting yourself in the foot by making a build whose only purpose can possibly be to maximize damage/threat and not getting SnB. Dropping the points in puncture is also specious, but I can see you getting away with it if you're extremely rage-conscientious.

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Originally Posted by Sparan

Reaching for impale is all well and good, but not getting SnB is entirely silly. Drop damage shield and either warbringer or a point in shield specialization,

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If my main purpose was single tanking raid bosses, dropping damage shield or warbringer would certainly be viable. For me though, it would suck alot of fun out of the build. Damage Shield is awesome for AE stuff and Warbringer gives us unmatched mobility in both PvP and PvE. Also, I don't think I'll want to swap points out of Shield Spec, as it is a core passive mitigation stat.

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and swap those points out of iron will and into HS or even TM.

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HS is a good alternative to Iron Will, I'd certainly swap the 2 for PvE if I needed more threat. I'm not a fan of TM however, I've rarely needed to stance dance since 3.0.

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You're really shooting yourself in the foot by making a build whose only purpose can possibly be to maximize damage/threat and not getting SnB. Dropping the points in puncture is also specious, but I can see you getting away with it if you're extremely rage-conscientious.

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This may be true, but from my experience so far and the numbers theorycrafted in the post above yours, I'm not convinced the decision is as clear-cut as this.

Remember that you have so much rage now mostly because of S&B. Shield Slam is our most expensive ability for tanking and most of the time it is free with this talent.

Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft is what I consider all the must-haves. Even though Cruelty isn't really high on that list, you would end up always getting it before Impale anyway because of the 'wasted' arms points on the way up. The last 7 points can either be spent in arms or on some combination of utility talents/maxing out Shield Spec/Puncture.

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Originally Posted by Dots

Remember that you have so much rage now mostly because of S&B. Shield Slam is our most expensive ability for tanking and most of the time it is free with this talent.

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That's a very good point. I like what you've done with that build too, certainly given me some stuff to think about.

With the new way that dodge scales, and how easy it is to stack dodge with current gear, alot of warriors had been pushing into nearly druid levels of dodge pre 3.0.

My level 80 build will be thus: Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft

Giving me all the things I need to tank VERY well, and allowing me to have AttT, full ranks in cruelty, and impale.

Dodge is the easiest and best scaling per slot mitigation that warriors have, and I've often found myself swapping out dodge for stam/block, simply to avoid damage spikes and rage issues. Taking smooth damage makes your healers work less, and more efficiently.

With the game moving toward block it seems, I would bet that warriors are gonna wanna be around 40% dodge/parry, maybe more for certain fights, but with crushing blows outta the picture this is not nearly as important. Block = rage for us, block = threat, block = survival.

I've dumped quite a bit of dodge/parry since 3.0, and headed toward the block direction, not ignoring parry/dodge, but favoring block per-se. My healers have commented that I'm easier to heal, their using less mana, and with druid healers, they are even bored. Meanwhile my threat is through the roof, my DPS is always top 5 in 10 mans, and i'm having a blast ^_^

Sorry but swapping 1% dodge for 1% block (taking Shield Spec over Anticipation) isn't going to make you easier to heal. It's strictly inferior except for AE tanking, which is already quite trivial.
Rage issues are also a thing of the past. Maybe it will be good to drop avoidance again if you are doing 5 mans in T8+ gear, but for now it's just not an issue.

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Originally Posted by Glomgore

With the new way that dodge scales, and how easy it is to stack dodge with current gear, alot of warriors had been pushing into nearly druid levels of dodge pre 3.0.

My level 80 build will be thus: Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft

Giving me all the things I need to tank VERY well, and allowing me to have AttT, full ranks in cruelty, and impale.

Dodge is the easiest and best scaling per slot mitigation that warriors have, and I've often found myself swapping out dodge for stam/block, simply to avoid damage spikes and rage issues. Taking smooth damage makes your healers work less, and more efficiently.

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That is very similar to the build i was thinking about. Except i took points out of rage saving stuff like focused rage and spent them in anticipation. I am a low level warrior comming up so i wont have the gear you guys have when i hit 70. I think i will have to spend some talent points in avoidance to help make up some ground.

Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft

I was just working on a build similar to this in which I also took deep wounds at 80 by dropping AttT. With all the crit we are getting why not spec into it and roll deep wounds on the target? Unfortunately the threat simulator does not have this talent in it to run some tests. What do you guys think?

15/5/51 via Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft

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Originally Posted by Guard_Khaz'goroth

I've been messing around with the talent calculator a bit trying to get Impale at 80 with the minimum talent pain.

My choices have been influenced by my experiences with the new talents at 70, with a primary focus on 5-man (normal+heroic) and 10-man level 70 content.

For reference, my current build is:

Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft

I ditched the parry/dodge avoidance talents (for now) as I don't need them for 70 content in my current gear. At 80 however, I'm pretty sure they will be "must have" again.

I have noticed the following over the last week or so.
1. I'm doing lots of AE tanking.
2. I use Thunder Clap alot.
3. I have lots of rage.
4. I have lots of threat.
5. I use Revenge (glyphed) / Shield Slam whenver they are up.
6. I don't use Sunder/Devestate anywhere near as much as I did.
7. I tend to use Concussive blow and Shockwave as often as possible.
8. I rage dump into Heroic / Cleave.

With this in mind I put together the following build. I thought about how I was actually playing rather than a theoretical best build (although I read all the theorycrafting I could get my hands on too :)).

Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft

The common high-value talents I have sacrificed and the reasons why are:

Puncture: It doesn't feel like the rage saving is as valuable as it was given the high rage I generate, coupled with my reduced use of Devestate.

Sword and Board :eek:: The increase to Devestate damage I feel is a minor factor. My gut feeling (not very scientific I know) is also that the extra Shield Slams are slightly less valuable than any of the other places I could free up points. I could keep Sword and Board by stealing 1 point from Improved Spell Reflect and 2 points from Cruelty (but losing crit would make me sad). This build would look like:

Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft

Improved Heroic Strike vs Iron Will: Either works, Iron Will seems good for PvP and so far rage is not a problem.

That's it for me. Comments welcome. Great job on Tankspot, it's a fantastic Tank resource (I'm a long-time lurker).

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I noticed three things
a) ur missing 10% avoidance from talents
b) no sword and board
c) no vigilance

A lot of mobs in 5 mans, especially heroics, stun and reduce armor. Thus, when u combine a 3 second stun (where u get NO avoidance thus taking all direct blows) with a couple sunders on your self, your low avoidance and 6 melee mobs beating on u.... i hope u out gear the place which u wont for a while when u hit 80

Sword and Board is a must, cause with most AOE pulls, there is always that one NPC with a lot more health than the rest that u REALLY want to stay on u, such as a champion in ramparts or the destroyers in mechnar. If for example u have a mutilate rogue in ur group (with no aoe), chances are hes going to be on that big guy, cause whats the point of mutilating 6k health mobs when the mage can take care of it in 4 seconds. Thus, while ur dropping thunderclaps and a shockwave to hold those other mobs, u may put out ~4k threat instantly, but that rogue will dish out 4k in no time also. Therefore, u are going to need to be devistating, sundering and shield slaming that mob as much as possible to keep him on you.

On a side note about Sword and Board, with every instance... there is a boss... you dont AOE tank bosses, and ull find Sword and Board can increase ur threat by @ least another 500 to 1000 tps depending on your gear level

Vigilance is the debated move. Personally, i love giving it to my arms warrior buddy and letting him go loose, especially since he has no threat reduction abilities. Moreoever, the 10% threat i get from him for those few seconds he bladestorms, gives me more than enough to over ride the mage or boomkin in the group when coupled with thunderclap, cleave and shockwave




This is the build im using

Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft

you get 1 more talent pt to do w/e with, havent really decided yet

I prefer Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft if I have to get Impale.

Devastate is still the move we default to when we have nothing else on the program, and the more rage reduction on it, the better.

while i like the idea of getting improved heroic strike, definitely usefull pre 3.0, its no longer needed. Moreoever.. with revenge being so powerfull for 2 rage... imp revenge is a must, exspecially since it destroys heroic strike and devistate in threat by miles

If u use these 2 Major glyphs - along with this spec Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft :
Glyph of Heroic Strike (when u critically hit with heroic strike u gain 10 rage)
Glyph of Revenge (when u use revenge, ur next heroic strike costs 10 less rage)

You will never see ur self rage starved from heroic strike, i find it VERY hard to run out of rage by spamming it if im tanking more than 2 mobs.

In addition, if ur going 110% AOE build.... u would not be using heroic strike ne ways since u will be spamming cleave.... so some cleave glyphs may be usefull is ur still worried about rage... though idk why a warrior would want such a build... my as well re roll paladin

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Originally Posted by Norrath

I prefer Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft if I have to get Impale.

Devastate is still the move we default to when we have nothing else on the program, and the more rage reduction on it, the better.

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I disagree, Devastate is rarely used when tanking groups. On bosses it's a bit different, but with S&B procs, Shockwave and Concussion Blow, it is still not used that often. Not to mention that you hardly ever have rage problems on bosses. Improved Revenge is much better for DPS/TPS and Vigilance is very useful for just 1 point, especially for AE threat.

About Deep Wounds, it only helps with single target DPS/TPS and your damage range while tanking will always be low. Might be worth checking the math on it though.

I wasn't taking the 5% block over the 5% dodge, it's simply that way due to tiering, imp bloodrage isn't really needed, in my boss gear I still have nearly 30% dodge, and that's without the moroes trinket. With stacking 5 dodge 7 stam gems, instead of the 12 stam gems, and going for socket bonuses, I found my stats much more rounded, with only a minor loss in HP. You don't really need more than 20-21k hp unbuffed right now, especially with 3.0, and with sunwell radiance gone, along with crushing blows, avoidance isn't as crazily needed anymore. Block is becoming more and more powerful. Even with the dropped dodge, I still find myself getting rage starved at times in 5 mans.

Anticipation becomes less and less powerful the higher your dodge is from gear, due to scaling of avoidance now. It has been stated that it starts to scale badly and other avoidance stats are preferable when dodge starts to get near the 30% mark, hence my reasoning behind dropping anticipation.

It's about personal play style, and that build works the best for me in my current gear level.

Things can always change when LK goes live ^_^

Deep wounds. Hmmm

For any 5 mans, 10 mans, I wouldn't take it. Nothing like trying to sheep a mob only to find out it has a DoT on it. Not to mention I doubt the mob is gonna live long enough for it to help. Remember, warriors are meatshields first, DPS 2nd, and that's really not something I would consider. For a solo build, it may not be a bad idea, but to spec 14/15 points into arms is gonna hurt you elsewhere, especially at 70. IMO You'd get more use outta maxing out cruelty combined with impale before deepwounds would be even worth it.

Base dodge (not including dodge from base agility) and talents are not affected from DRs and not included in the calculation. 5% from Anticipation are allways 5%.

@topic
The numbers which come from the simulator sound crazy for me. Let's take ideal impale assumptions:

-100% yellow damage
-all threat from damage
-40% average crit over all abilities

In this case the crit part of all damage (in this impale friendly calculation = threat) is 57.14% (42.86% noncrit part) this part of the damage is multiplied with 1.1 (only the Bonus Part is affected from impale!)

This looks for me like a increase of 5.71% if you compare it without impale... And I didn't taken in the calculation that there is still white damage and that there are still abilities with a threat part.

My Conclussion: Impale would be nice if you could get impale without using useless talents but you can not.

Improved Heroic Strike, Improved Charge, Deflection? None of them are useless.

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Originally Posted by Dots

I disagree, Devastate is rarely used when tanking groups. On bosses it's a bit different, but with S&B procs, Shockwave and Concussion Blow, it is still not used that often. Not to mention that you hardly ever have rage problems on bosses. Improved Revenge is much better for DPS/TPS and Vigilance is very useful for just 1 point, especially for AE threat.

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"Not used that often"? When we have nothing else to use, we switch to Devastate. Even if S&B procs push Devastate below Shield Slams, it's still used more often than Revenge.

Improved Revenge most likely is better on a pure DPS/TPS standpoint, true, but I avoid the talent because of the stun. While it doesn't affect bosses, it does affect trash, and random stuns are incredibly annoying.

Then again, I'm more likely to have a trash talent build and a boss talent build than a DPS/tanking combination, and I'd get Imp Revenge in the boss build for sure.

The true point of rage reduction doesn't lie in how much rage you save per second. It's when you're rage starved for whatever reason for a few seconds. The cheaper your Devastate, the faster you can use it.

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Originally Posted by Dots

About Deep Wounds, it only helps with single target DPS/TPS and your damage range while tanking will always be low. Might be worth checking the math on it though.

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Deep Wounds... blargh. I don't like dots; wouldn't take it. (No pun intended!)

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Originally Posted by Norrath

Improved Heroic Strike, Improved Charge, Deflection? None of them are useless.

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Not useless, but quite limited in usefulness.

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Originally Posted by Norrath

"Not used that often"? When we have nothing else to use, we switch to Devastate. Even if S&B procs push Devastate below Shield Slams, it's still used more often than Revenge.

Improved Revenge most likely is better on a pure DPS/TPS standpoint, true, but I avoid the talent because of the stun. While it doesn't affect bosses, it does affect trash, and random stuns are incredibly annoying.

Then again, I'm more likely to have a trash talent build and a boss talent build than a DPS/tanking combination, and I'd get Imp Revenge in the boss build for sure.

The true point of rage reduction doesn't lie in how much rage you save per second. It's when you're rage starved for whatever reason for a few seconds. The cheaper your Devastate, the faster you can use it.

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Like I said, rage is hardly ever an issue on bosses. For trash, you don't have many GCDs for Devastate: TC, Shockwave, Revenge, SS (or SS then Revenge), TC, Revenge, SS, now you finally have a GCD for Devastate.

I also disagree about the Revenge stun, I have no issues with it while doing heroics at 70 in full SWP gear. It only gets better at 80 when you do heroics that you don't outgear already.

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Originally Posted by Norrath

Deep Wounds... blargh. I don't like dots; wouldn't take it. (No pun intended!)

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I prefer full AttT and Cruelty too, but it would still be interesting to see how it does for single target threat/DPS.

Deep Wounds is really quite good for raid TPS and DPS, especially if you switch to a slow weapon instead of a fast one. You have a decent crit rate from talents, gain aprox. 11.5% crit if you have a full set of buffs and it's just a big boost. I need to go do some more testing to check if it procs off AE attacks (I'm pretty sure it doesn't work off Damage Shield/TClap/Shockwave crits, sadly) but it'd be worthwhile on bosses.