Need some help with threat

[Seid]

To start things off:

I. Gear

General Armor:
- Valorous Dreadnaught Greathelm (Arcanum of the Stalwart Defender)
- Valorous Dreadnaught Pauldrons (Greater Pinnacle)
- Valorous Dreadnaught Breastplate (+22 Def)
- Valorous Dreadnaught Handguards (Armsman)
- Dragon Brood Legguards (Frosthide Leg Armor)
- Kyzoc's Ground Stompers (Tuskar's Vitality)
- Bracers of the Herald (Expertise)
- Cloak of the Shadowed Sun (+16 Def Enchant)

Accessories:
- Heritage
- Deflection Band
- Signet of the Impregnable Fortress

Trinkets:
- Repelling Charge / Rune of Repulsion / Essence of Gossamer / Mirror of Truth

Weapon Slots:
- Slayer of the Lifeless (Accuracy)
- Wall of Terror / Hero's Surrender (+Defense)
- Armored Combat Shotgun

Also, I gemmed most of these for expertise or expertise/sta gems. My primary profession is blacksmithing so I get to slot my bracers and gloves also.

Stats:
264 hit
28 expertise

Major Glyphs:
- Glyph of Blocking
- Glyph of Revenge
- Glyph of Devastate

Minor Glyphs:
- Glyph of Thunderclap (+2 yard range)
- Glyph of Bloodrage (-50% Bloodrage damage)
- Glyph of Charge (+5 Charge range)

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II. Latency

My lat usually averages around 500, I know that this may be a major factor, but my ISP has been uncooperative so far and I don't have any other choices in my area.

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III. Tanking
Trash tanking:

The usual sequence that I would do when tanking trash is:

- Charge in (activating Shield Block and Blood Fury beforehand)
- Thunderclap to make sure that I get threat on everything
- Shockwave to stun the mob (if mob is unstunnable, I think it makes for good threat on everyone)
- Proceed with usual tanking

My usual tanking rotation is:

This is assuming that it is a no rage at start situation

Devastate (Opener) > Shield Slam / Revenge (whichever is active) > Heroic Strike (Optional if I have rage, or Glyph is up)

If I have a lot of rage, I make sure to insert Heroic Strikes in between.

Is there anything wrong with my rotation?

Boss tanking:
I use my usual tanking rotation (read above). I usually generate around 3k to 6k TPS, averaging at 4.5k TPS depending on the boss fight.

For example, on high-threat non-moving fights like Patchwerk and Loatheb, I manage to output around 5k TPS.

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My problem is that I think DPS's TPS still catch up to around 70% of my threat. I know that this may not be a big deal, but I know that there is still a lot of room for improvement.

I would appreciate any comments and/or suggestions you guys can give me.

[Cheskagarcia]

wws would help tons.

you've got the right hit, and are probably using expertise food / elixirs (which isn't as important as hit)...

so it might be raid composition and/or your spec.. 15/5/51?

melee ap buff (shaman)
melee windfury haste totem (shaman)
melee 5% crit from druids/fury warriors
mangle buff / trauma (for deep wounds)
retribution aura (2% damage/6% haste)
paladin 3% crit judge
2% physical damage increase from savage combat rogue / arms warrior

threat is made up for in damage usually after you have the innate threat rotations down from your basic abilities.

[Seid]

I'm using a 5/10/56.

Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft

(Don't look at my armory, I'm Arms at the moment. )

I'll check out WoW Web Stats later. Thanks!

[Cheskagarcia]

try deepwounds/impale for one reset and see how it goes. otherwise even without it in terms of naxxramas bosses that are almost ALL taunt-able you should push the threat meter table up every time by just taunting.

[Xav]

try deepwounds/impale for one reset and see how it goes. otherwise even without it in terms of naxxramas bosses that are almost ALL taunt-able you should push the threat meter table up every time by just taunting.

What are you implying here?

[supergp17]

I would definitely re-spec to deep wounds. It will shoot your dps and threat up greatly.

Switch out Glyph of Devastate with Glyph of Cleave.

Whenever fighting multiple mobs, don't even bother with heroic strike and concentrate on queing up cleave.

Obviously taunt when you need to also.

[Torm]

I haven't noticed much of a threat issue since the tanking changes dropped. If you're finding people riding your TPS too much, maybe you should use Vigilance on a higher DPS'er. Bear in mind that it can differ from fight to fight. In situations where ranged can't stay outside the threat buffer zone(Gothic, Noth, etc.), it's better to throw it on one of them as the threat that most ranged can put out beats melee, hands down. If you're finding yourself with plenty of rage, keep heroic strike constantly queued.

[Misko]

Something to note also for your rotation, is that Conc blow doesn't trigger the GCD when used. You can use this alongside another ability such as shield slam to give yourself a nice bit of burst threat.

[jlafleur]

I would prioritize shockwave over devastate after you stack 5 sunders (or you need to refresh it). Use concussion blow as often as you can especially since it doesn't trigger GCD and can be used at the same time as another ability.

I wouldn't switch out cleave for devastate, especially not if you are the MT. Cleave is maybe for OTing or heroics. I can't see how it would be useful for tanking a boss. As for trash, stack AP and use TC, SW and something until TC is available again.

[Cheskagarcia]

What are you implying here?

im not 100% sure but i believe there are 2 threat meters that work in wow.

one threat meter is whoever is on top and has the boss aggro (omen/ktm/ the in-game).
- meaning misdirections / taunts / vigilance are calculated into finding out which actual player will be aggro'ed by the boss

and the second threat meter is... well your innate wws/wowmeteronline.com meter. that just calculates your innate threat skills and damage (including damage increase buffs like tricks and melee buffs/thorns/auras etc...

to pull aggro on a boss that is especially tauntable one doesn't even have to be completely reliant on how much threat he already had applied on the boss (eg. 2nd tank taunting gluth) on the actually threat meter he becomes #1 and must sustain threat above everyone else (there is probably a percentage based buffer for how much threat he numerically has above everyone else after a taunt and if he can sustain it or lose threat again).

eg. tank 1 has 10k threat on gluth
tank 2 has 3k threat and taunts gluth

tank 2 has about 10k+ threat on gluth and must sustain threat in terms
tps above anyone behind him including tank 1.

so in-relation to this thread, he shouldn't have to worry about most bosses that are tauntable as long as he can sustain threat every 8 second taunt bursts above whoever is 2nd on threat. but obviously for non-tauntable bosses like patchwerk and sapphiron it's all about sustained threat if dps is catching up to him.

[Cheskagarcia]

i tried taunting and md rotations and vigilance just to haxxorz the wowmeteronline.com tps meters about a month back. didn't really matter that i was taunting every cooldown because it wasn't really calculated at all as actual threat produced (at least for the sake of those meters =)

for this matter i don't even think 2% threat to gloves does much for wowmeteronline/wws parses either

[Niian]

As a tank (especially main tank) you shouldn't be relying on taunt to keep your threat up, unless it's for fights such as Vault where it's a complete threat wipe for the MT.

That's just bad.
If a DPS has second highest threat then there goes your idea because it will get them killed.
Initial burst threat is very important IMO, being a pally it's hell easy (out with warriors imo). If you don't feel like you're getting that initial burst, either ask the DPS to hold off for a second or get a hunter/rogue to MD to you.
You have to remember as well, alot of melee DPS classes can put out high burst DPS right at the start, but then level off once they get into their normal rotation. This can be the catching up you will see, but should then level off after a bit. I find as a 10man Naxx geared prot pally tanking either 5man heroics or 10mans with people who are geared from 25mans the closest threat people normally get is around 70%. I've had some mages almost pull agro, but then I just salv them or pop trinkets and hope for a crit (om nom nom Shield of Righteousness crits make me happy).

FYI - Melee need to do 110% of your threat to pull the boss off you, ranged need 130%.
If you are running with a paladin you can also call for them to salv the second highest threat if it's a DPS class.

[Seid]

Thanks for the suggestions guys, I'll try to use the Deep Wounds spec this time and see how it works out.

From what I read here, I guess I need to clean out my hotkey bar also to prioritize some skills. Some questions though:

- On (Thunderclap > Devastate), wouldn't Devastate be a better choice just for the proc for Sword and Board?

- On Deep Wounds, how much does it proc off for you guys, since crits don't happen
that much on a tanking warrior, I'm just thinking how about how it all goes in the end. Would Rend also help in keeping DPS up or would that be a total waste of a GCD?

- On the removal of Concussion Blow from GCD, would that mean that I can simultaneously queue it up with Shield Slam? One attack, 2 hits?

- Is my lat a really big factor for TPS? I have a short delay before my attacks are out, maybe it's a big deal TPS wise?

I'm thinking of creating several Vigilance macros up and stack them on my 2nd right hotkey bar so I can just switch Vigilance whenever the need arises. Just for those "Oh noes" moments.

[Cheskagarcia]

Thanks for the suggestions guys, I'll try to use the Deep Wounds spec this time and see how it works out.

From what I read here, I guess I need to clean out my hotkey bar also to prioritize some skills. Some questions though:

- On (Thunderclap > Devastate), wouldn't Devastate be a better choice just for the proc for Sword and Board?

- On Deep Wounds, how much does it proc off for you guys, since crits don't happen
that much on a tanking warrior, I'm just thinking how about how it all goes in the end. Would Rend also help in keeping DPS up or would that be a total waste of a GCD?

- On the removal of Concussion Blow from GCD, would that mean that I can simultaneously queue it up with Shield Slam? One attack, 2 hits?

- Is my lat a really big factor for TPS? I have a short delay before my attacks are out, maybe it's a big deal TPS wise?

I'm thinking of creating several Vigilance macros up and stack them on my 2nd right hotkey bar so I can just switch Vigilance whenever the need arises. Just for those "Oh noes" moments.

-single target boss threat doesn't require thunderclap nor would it be efficient at all for dps/threat (unless you need the damage reduction/which is usually done by offtanks anyway)

-crits happen a lot because of incite and raid buffs

-rend is good and i have been making 4-6% of my dps that way on single target only bosses

-no it's not like that. you can use it without incurring (causing) a global cooldown (meaning you can use a skill right after it), but you need a global cooldown to actually use it

-it's a factor for sure if you miss out on heroic strikes, but usually if you are min/maxing anyway you should usually be on top on threat given most tanking situations (unless your dps is extremely baller then you have work for zero mistakes)

-don't know what that means by vigilance macros but you can usually just bind it to something and click on someones raid frame, still needs a global cooldown to use so it really won't be that important to use on the fly nor will it be detrimental to aggro tanking well

[Cheskagarcia]

As a tank (especially main tank) you shouldn't be relying on taunt to keep your threat up, unless it's for fights such as Vault where it's a complete threat wipe for the MT.

That's just bad.
If a DPS has second highest threat then there goes your idea because it will get them killed.
Initial burst threat is very important IMO, being a pally it's hell easy (out with warriors imo). If you don't feel like you're getting that initial burst, either ask the DPS to hold off for a second or get a hunter/rogue to MD to you.
You have to remember as well, alot of melee DPS classes can put out high burst DPS right at the start, but then level off once they get into their normal rotation. This can be the catching up you will see, but should then level off after a bit. I find as a 10man Naxx geared prot pally tanking either 5man heroics or 10mans with people who are geared from 25mans the closest threat people normally get is around 70%. I've had some mages almost pull agro, but then I just salv them or pop trinkets and hope for a crit (om nom nom Shield of Righteousness crits make me happy).

FYI - Melee need to do 110% of your threat to pull the boss off you, ranged need 130%.
If you are running with a paladin you can also call for them to salv the second highest threat if it's a DPS class.

it's not reliance on taunt but it's just a fact that you can taunt a boss (taunt-able boss only) every 8 seconds and do shitty tps to an extent and still hold aggro.

and it's not bad either. if you've done say brutallus you'd be in your best mitigation gear possible for progression and even most farm kills because he can literally 2 shot the sunwell-ish geared tanks (non-druid tanks lol)

taunting these certain bosses obviously puts you on top of anyones threat pushing the threat table up further as required because your lack of 'threat gear' on a heavy avoidance fight.

[Junkyard]

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III. Tanking
Trash tanking:

The usual sequence that I would do when tanking trash is:

- Charge in (activating Shield Block and Blood Fury beforehand)
- Thunderclap to make sure that I get threat on everything
- Shockwave to stun the mob (if mob is unstunnable, I think it makes for good threat on everyone)
- Proceed with usual tanking


.

If you are using Shockwave right after activating shield block you are wasting it. I would charge in Thunderclap, Shockwave use either shield slam, Revenge HS or Devestate until shockwave wears off then hit shield block. If the mobs are stunned while shield block is active thats a big no no.

[Seid]

If you are using Shockwave right after activating shield block you are wasting it. I would charge in Thunderclap, Shockwave use either shield slam, Revenge HS or Devestate until shockwave wears off then hit shield block. If the mobs are stunned while shield block is active thats a big no no.

Let me rephrase, what I do is that I gather the mob, then use Thunderclap then Shockwave afterwards so that all of them get stunned, at around this time it will already be a few seconds after activation of Shield Block.