Starting tanking as Warrior - Need Guidance

[predujizzes]

Heilow. As EJ is a little to hardcore for me, I thought I would give Tankspot a shoot

I got tired of DPSing and decided to try tanking. Before I start tanking I'm going to gather up some gear. Here is a little gear plan (Items from 5-mans):
Profiler - Wowhead

Since I don't know anything about tanking I need some advice on talents, glyphs, gems, rotations and caps.

I think I'll go with this talent build and glyphs: Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft (What about Minor glyphs?)

As for Gems, I've heard that I should go with Def. gems until I get capped and then stack stamina. True?

What is the caps and which are they? (Def and Hit, any more?)

And what abilites should I use and in which situations?

[Griff]

Spec is almost good - move those points from cruelty to shield specialization.

Glyphs are okay too but you might want to try sunder or cleave until you start pushing harder content.

Yes, gem defense if (and only if) you need to, after that, you would be well-served by gemming for stam. If you want to worry about socket bonuses at all, just hit the ones that give at least a +9 stam or more. For your meta activation, use an expertise/stam gem.

Soft cap for expertise (pushes dodges off of the table) is 26 which is a pretty important target to strive for for threat while the hit cap is 264 (depending on raid makeup) and not nearly as crucial.

As for technique, try to keep your camera pulled back to be as aware of your environment as you can, keep track of your healers and always try to plan a step ahead of what's going on. Ciderhelm has produced a number of informative videos on introductory tanking topics that you would probably do well to watch.

Rotation has been discussed extensively on this forum and you should be able to find a lot of posts/flowcharts without me reiterating it.

Good luck!

[Aggathon]

Well... I can respond in 3 different ways.

1) the generic light suggestions that help if you just wanna do heroics and stuff

2) the medium version where I just talk about what to aim for and how to gear/gem/enchant/spec

3) the hardcore novel version where I can lay out exactly what you need to do to get into progression level hardmode raiding.

So basically what I'm saying is, what is it that you want to be doing and tanking. I don't really wanna right out the novel version if you're just gonna be doing heroics, but if you really want to spend the resources to get into high end tanking, I'll help ya as best I can!

[predujizzes]

@Griff:
Thanks, I've got my glyphs and talents now

@Aggathon:
ATM, I'm just thinking of Tanking HCs and maybe 10-mans to get some experience. The real goal is to get into high-end tanking when Cataclysm hits. Of course, if I manage to get into higher end raiding in 3.3 I'll try to do so but it's not the primary plan right now.

So a brief plan trough gear/gem/enchant and specs (You can see the links above what I've been thinking about). So the tactics of tanking is the more important stuff since spec and gear now won't matter in Cataclsym. But as I said a small explanation of what I need gear/gem/enchant and spec way would be nice too

EDIT: If you could explain the caps in different stats that would be lovely too. I have then people tell me I'm not enough 'cause I'm not capped in X or Y.

[Aggathon]

Do you have a link to your current armory?

[Martie]

What is the caps and which are they? (Def and Hit, any more?)

There are no caps that you should worry about as a tank. Get 535 defense skill before going into heroic 5mans. Get 540 defense skill before going into a raid. These are minimums, though, not caps.
As a warrior, I highly advice you to get 26 expertise at least. This is highly advisable, but not a cap either. (Commonly called the 'soft cap' or 'dodge cap.')

As for Gems, I've heard that I should go with Def. gems until I get capped and then stack stamina. True?

For now, yes. Get the defense minimum (train yourself to not call it a cap), then get as much stamina as you can. Once you start having a larger gear pool to choose from, you can start tinkering with it further.

And what abilites should I use and in which situations?

I don't know much about warrior abilities, so I'll leave that to the warriors here to answer.
Here are some general abilities you should use.

Mark a mob before each pull so you give dps something to focus on - if people start single-targetting different mobs, you may lose aggro on them.
Keep an eye on your healers. If they need 15% of their mana to heal you through a boss, they need a mana break if they have less then that before the pull. (This shouldn't be a common issue, but keep an eye on it.)
Know the tactics for tanking. Train yourself to face all mobs away from your healers. Them facing 180 degrees away from them is good, though I prefer 90 degrees for most mobs. Know that casters are good to burn down first, but also know that they generally don't deal the most damage. Know what a boss does so you can react to it before it happens.
Know that dps are generally an impatient bunch. They'll want you to tank nonstop, running around and killing mobs in as little time as possible. It's surprisingly fun to do, but tricky in the beginning.

[Aggathon]

As for abilities:
Shield Slam is your number one priority. It is your highest damage dealer and what you get the most threat from. Even before you get sunders up start shield slamming.

The next ability that gets priority is revenge, then devastate. However, if you have glyph of devastate,t hen devastate does more threat than revenge.

Always try to keep either heroic strike or cleave up if you are above about 40 or so rage. Heroic strike for single target, cleave for multiple targets. I actually glyph for cleave in heroics (hits another mob).

Conq blow and shockwave are also very high TPS abilities.

Thunderclap is low TPS for single target, but it is essential for tanking multiple mobs. Hit it and shockwave as soon as they come off cooldown.

When tanking bosses: always try to keep up tclap and demo shout

Put Vigilance on the highest TPS person, often times warlock or feral druid.

Charge, intercept, and intervene are your friends, especially in mobility fights. I also highly suggest the addon "Omen" if you don't already use it.

Gems/Enchants:
Martie covered Gems to an extent, but yes, first go for 535 defense for 5 mans and 540 for raids, however if you get the 30stam/15 resil to shoulder enchant then you only need 531 defense for 5 mans and 536 defense for raids. I highly recommend this enchant regardless of your currenty defense level though.

Gemming: The general rule for higher end tanking is gem stam except for a red/stam gem in a socket that matches a +9 or higher stam socket bonuse to activate your meta gem. Often times it is also acceptable to gem any socket bonus that is +9 or higher with a hybrid gem. For 5 mans I'd say if you are needing other stats, such as expertise, that even gemming a +6 stam socket bonus is more than acceptable.

But ya, for threat stats there's no better than expertise for warriors. The "dodge cap" like Martie said, is when a boss can no longer dodge your attacks, this is at 26 Expertise. However the "Parry Cap" is much higher and you need about 57 expertise to truly reach the expertise cap. The "Hit Cap" is 264 hit, so basically after 264 you really don't need any more hit. However, unless you hare having a lot of threat issues chasing these caps isn't really all that necessary, though expertise cap is very nice.

For red gems, you can choose 10agi/15 stam (max EH hybrid gem since agi gives armor), 10dodge/15stam (best for avoidance), or 10 expertise/15 stam (best for threat). There's also parry/stam, but it isn't as good until you have very high amounts of dodge.

Enchants typically go as follows:
Helm: 37stam/20 defense, glyph of the stalwart protector from argent crusade revered rep
Shoulder: 30stam/15 resil, 10,000 honor from the PvP vendors
Cloak: 225 Armor
Chest: 275 HP
Bracer: 40 stam
Weapon: either mongoose, bladeward, or blood draining. For heroics I'd probably suggest mongoose, if you're needing avoidance then bladeward, but for most raid situations blood draining is probably the way to go
Shield: 18 stam or 20 defense
Boots: Tuskarr's Vitality
Legs: 55stam/22 agi leg enchant
Gloves: 240 armor

Your spec and glyph setups look fine.

Once I get an armory link we can cover gearing.

[predujizzes]

Thanks! That's awesome

[WaRCh1eF]

I really dont know the math, but is 240 armor in gloves way better than 18 stamina?

[predujizzes]

@Warchief: Yes, he says that above.

[Aggathon]

I don't think that link worked because you only have on a couple pieces of gear. Unless you just don't have tanking gear for the other spots, that's kinda understandable.

[predujizzes]

No that is the right link, I'm missing Chest and Hand pieces for tanking. But I use my DPS gear for those spots as well as the ring spots of course.