Tanking in ICC - Defense Rating

[Mctankor]

You got it backwards Mctankor. Right now we get attack power from agility but in Cataclysm we more than likely wont.

The topic is "paladin tanking" and paladins dont get ap from agility now.
Ive also spoken specifically abot paladins when it comes to agility and ap.

Changing what classes get what attributs from which base stats IMO is just stupid as the gear that we now need could become useless or pretty poor unless blizz want to waste time changing all the gear stats. Id guess theill have a few items to change if they where to start that monkey job..

[Paladan]

Alright, I have another question that I need answered. I didn't want to make another thread and clutter up anymore so I thought this would be a great place.

Currently I have the 4 piece T9 set, and I was wondering if it would be worth it or if it would be an upgrade to get the 245 helm from Triumph badges? If anyone has any insight to this I would greatly appreciate it.


Thanks in advance.

[Petninja]

Changing what classes get what attributs from which base stats IMO is just stupid as the gear that we now need could become useless or pretty poor unless blizz want to waste time changing all the gear stats. Id guess theill have a few items to change if they where to start that monkey job..

When they changed the stats for Wrath they changed the stats on all the gear to compensate. Regardless, what they've stated is that AP will go away as a stat on gear, and the agility classes will pull it from agility while the strength classes will pull it from strength.

Now it will say on gear "Stam, Agi, Mastery (previously ArPen)" instead of "Stam, Agi, ArPen, Attack Power". Warriors will get no benefit from the agility other than perhaps minimal crit, but I've even heard that strength will provide that for strength classes.

[Hammerfists]

If you can get your hands on Judgement Heaume I would go with that. You cant go wrong with 75 hit to help with aggro and taunts. Not to mention 90 defense will pad out your tanking stats. 10 frost and 10 shadow isnt much but those are generally the magic attacks you will see in ICC.

[Paladan]

Ok, cool stuff, but assuming I can't get that headpiece at the current time, would it be worth it to replace my T9 i232 piece with the badge i245 piece?

[Eisen]

Ok, cool stuff, but assuming I can't get that headpiece at the current time, would it be worth it to replace my T9 i232 piece with the badge i245 piece?

Personally I think yes, presuming you have nothing better to spend triumphs on.

[Paladan]

lol no, basically all I'm doing now is spending my triumphs badges on offspec healing gear.

Thank you for the input.

[Insahnity]

"defense is not optimal". This statement is not precise. Defense gives the most raw avoidance before DR, and even after DR, you'll want, for good work around the dr, more Defense rating than parry rating(discounting the obligatory amount for 540 def skill).

This. In addition to Dodge, Block and Parry, Defense skill also gives "Chance to Miss" which cannot be gained any other way. So for one stat, you are upping 3 avoidance stats and one mitigation.

You had done strength earlier, but you swapped out for others which is fine, but be aware that grabbing strength should only be for threat, and not for any other reason, as the mitigation from SBV is pretty minimal. If you have emblems of triumph to spare, consider the Ret Libram, I tank with it permanently, although you may want to play around between it and your current libram as you see fit.

Agility dont give paladin melee ap? Thats hunter, rogue shammy and cat?

That's more than likely how cataclysm will work. Although feral druids will probably get an ability to get benefit from both stats. Agility gives us attack power, dodge, armor and crit while strength gives us just attack power granted pallies get shield block value and spell power from it but threat isnt your main concern its reducing damage intake.

Hammerfist, your posts are full of incorrect information, I think you need to read up on EJ before going further. I won't go into all the errors, but I suggest others verify your facts or disregard them altogether. Here are some clarifications.

Agi gives AP to druids, shamans and hunters only. It does not give AP to paladins, and will not do so in the future.

Currently, druids get 2 AP for 1 Strength, in Cataclysm this is expected to be fixed so that druids no longer use strength at all (or they may normalize as per other classes where they get 1 AP for stregth, along with 1 AP for agility).

AP does not affects SBV. It modifies Shield of Righteousness. Strength or SBV are the only items that affect SBV. For protection paladins, Strength gives Spell power via Touched By The Light , not AP (You are confusing it with Sheath of Light from ret paladins who get SP from AP).

For threat Paladan i would recommend moving points out of Divinity and into Crusade or Seal of the Pure. You already get 6% to healing with Improved Devo Aura having another 5% with 5 points will just create move overhealing. Vindication is a great talent as well its Improved Demo Shout and only costs us 2 points. Picking this up frees points for the other tanks to pick something else up.

Other thing too if you get Divine Sacrifice you might as well get Divine Guardian or just drop Divine Sacrifice all together. The reason i say this is because alone Divine Sacrifice will redirect 30% of party's damage to you but Divine Guardian will take 20% damage off the raid (not directed to you just mitigated off of them).

For an idea of a spec this is mine:The World of Warcraft Armory

If you're going for threat don't gem strength. You'll get more by gemming expertise up until 26 at the least.

I nabbed this from Jere's post in another topic this comes from maintankadin and deals with how Paladins interact with expertise:

Current conclusions:

* Expertise is about 73% as effective as dodge rating for reducing incoming damage (first link).
* Expertise is about 69% as effective as dodge rating for reducing the number of incoming attacks that connect (also first link).
* Expertise is actually 2x-4x better than dodge at reducing spike damage intake from boss melee attacks, with the added benefit that it preferentially reduces the largest spikes, thus smoothing out our spike damage by reducing the maximum spike size (second link).
* Each point of expertise rating also gives us about 1/3 of a point of STR.
http://maintankadin.failsafedesign.c...rb_v=viewtopic

Paladan, your spec matches my current one, stick with it. The spec listed here differs only by moving 2 points from conviction into PoJ, but frankly, I prefer giving up the 7 stamina for Tuskarr's instead of 2 talent points for PoJ, thereby gaining the 2% extra crit (which is alot of crit to gain).

Alright, I have another question that I need answered. I didn't want to make another thread and clutter up anymore so I thought this would be a great place.

Currently I have the 4 piece T9 set, and I was wondering if it would be worth it or if it would be an upgrade to get the 245 helm from Triumph badges? If anyone has any insight to this I would greatly appreciate it.


Thanks in advance.

The 245 helm should be acquired if you have expertise issues. With Seal of Vegeance up, your expertise is 29, you are not desperate for more (although if you pick up more expertise beyond this, it's not a bad thing).

It's abit late now, but frost emblems should be spent on T10 only, possibly the cloak. The trinket is nice, but the tier is much more valuable, especially since it is not wasted (t10 is needed for t10.5, t10.5 needed for t10.9 or whatever). As for tier 10, I suggest you focus on shoulders/helm/chest, as I expect pants and gloves might be made available by the new frost boss in VoA.

[Hammerfists]

AP does not affects SBV. It modifies Shield of Righteousness. Strength or SBV are the only items that affect SBV. For protection paladins, Strength gives Spell power via Touched By The Light , not AP (You are confusing it with Sheath of Light from ret paladins who get SP from AP).

I never said that i said strength gives us attack power but is boosted by that it directly affects our SBV and spell power sorry if it was worded funny for you guys but that was my point i was doing a comparison of strength to agility. I will agree that i was wrong about attack power gain from agility but you still get crit, armor and dodge.

Agility (often abbreviated AGI) has the following effects:

• Increases attack power with ranged weapons (not including wands) or melee weapons for certain classes.
  • Warriors, hunters[1] and rogues gain 1 ranged attack power for each point of agility.
  • Hunters,[2] rogues, shamans (as of 3.0.2) and druids in Cat Form[3] gain 1 melee attack power per point of agility.
• Increases armor by 2 per point.
• Increases chance to score a critical hit with a weapon.
• Increases chance to dodge attacks. This is dependent on both class and level.

pulled this from wowwiki :Attributes - WoWWiki - Your guide to the World of Warcraft

And since you want to shoot my druid comment this is what GC posted:

We talked about druids in bear form also getting AP from strength. Strength won't appear on leather and no piece should have Str and Agi together, so it's not like they would really double dip. That lets us still have tanking necks, rings and cloaks with strength on them that are attractive to all 4 tanking classes.

PS: forget everything i said about Cataclsym i now know that talking about abstract things in the future just creates a moot back and forth with no real results so lets kill that discussion now please.

[Paladan]

Awesome deal, thank you guys for all the info. I've learned a lot lol and I used to think I knew my class pretty well hahaha. Hammerfists and Inshanity thank you guys so much, I learned a lot from your posts and got plenty of feedback and I think I know where I'm going to go with this.

Just for reference, Inshanity would you mind posting your armory or your spec, I changed mine up a bit last night and just wanted to compare.

Thanks again guys, I can't say how much I appreciate all the input.

[Insahnity]

This is my current spec and glyphs.

Differences:
From talents perspective, you put 2 points in improved judgments. Most people do this to try and judge more often, but in reality, you can only judge as often as the 969 rotation allows, and putting one extra point in there doesn't change things. That's why I put that extra point elsewhere, mana reduction is good for when you get into those situations between pulls where your DP is down and you can't get it back up, but can't wait.

For glyphs:
The HotR glyph is great for trash, Glyph Judgment is more for single target. Both are valid choices.
For minors,
-we both have LoH, which is fine
-I *highly* recommend you go with sense undead, 1% extra damage is nothing to sneeze at, especially since we have confirmation that ICC is full of undead. Put another way, 1% damage is 1.8% extra threat, its basically an armsman enchant right there.
-I went with reducing Seal of Wisdom cost, because if you are running low on mana, the last thing you want to be doing is spending more mana to judge wisdom. You shouldn't be running might on yourself (BoSanc is what you need, I use it even soloing). You usually bless people before the pull, mana reduction on kings is pointless when out of combat (drink some water or eat strudels).

[Paladan]

All valid points, I have one question for you tho. Would it be worth putting 1 more point into Spiritual Attunement? I find that in heroics I'm running like hella low on mana and I find myself having to eat after/between every pull cause I'm running like 3% mana lol.

And I think I'm going to change out my glyphs as well, the Might glyph was when I did alot of dailies and solo'ing so I figured why not lol, and the Kings glyph was because there really was no other valid choice when I first did my glyphs.

Thanks again for all the help.

[Insahnity]

I used to run 2/2 SA, and I even had the glyph for a while. For me, I made the switch from 2/2 SA and then corrected my tanking tactics. If you have 1/2 SA and are having issues, going 2/2 will mollycoddle you into bad tanking habits.

Realistically, you don't need it, IF you manage your Divine Plea properly, and follow the second rule of thumb: If you need more (blue) rage, pull more.

I sometimes secretly cheat as well, by not casting or letting fall my Sacred Shield. It slightly increases damage intake, which forces slightly more healing. Realistically, if I am not getting enough mana from heals (even with unglyphed 1/2 SA), it's not a high damage situation, and healer can cope with healing me a bit more from the loss of SacS. Another option is to swap out something like Black Heart for a brewfest trinket if pulling more isn't possible, or I swap my armor rings for others.

[Hammerfists]

Also if things die fast try not to spam consecrate on packs of 4 it costs a lot for us and hammer of righteous does more threat for the time they are up. Dont forget to tab around some that way you arent blowing mana on aoe effect. The way dps act in heroics you will more than likely have to use your taunts theres no way around it so dont blow mana trying to avoid it its inevitable.

[Peanutty]

Does Divinity stack with Imp. Devo Aura? Me and my GL were discussing paly talents and I noticed Hammerfist has Divinity and Devo aura and wanted to make sure they stacked. Cause I originally had points in divine sacrifice and and my GLs' paly has 3 points in reckoning. I don't really need to have Sac and I really don't have threat issues, so I was trying to figure out where best to use the 3 points. Which would be the better choice, reckoning, or divinity?

Ok After some reading I found out they do stack but still wondering if I should go reckoning or Divinity.

[Paladan]

I've always been told that Reckoning wasn't worth the points to put in it, that there were other places better suited for using the points. The last time I saw a Pally Prot spec with reckoning in it was in BC if that tells you anything.

[Hammerfists]

Reckoning works really well if you have Seal of Command to up the proc rate. Those 3 points are really a flavor points they wont make or break your spec.

Dvinity- will give you bonus to healing but the way healing works currently in Lich King it will more than likely just add to the over healing.

Reckoning- this will help your threat and if combined with Seal of Command up your aoe threat.

Divine Sac/Guardian- Have you to see a ICC fight that would make it worth while although with a good macro you can cancel the Divine Sac portion and keep the raid wide damage buff up (Correct me if this has been fixed).

Really any way you go isnt revolutionary so choose whichever one will benefit you the most.

[Paladan]

Would you happen to have or know where I can get said macro?

[Hammerfists]

FYI, I just checked and Divine Guardian does indead remain if you right click off Divine Sacrifice.

However, my macro wasn't successfully removing DSac itself with /cancelaura.

The best I was able to come up with so far is:
Code: Select all#show
/cast Divine Sacrifice
/in 0.5 /script CancelUnitBuff("player","Divine Sacrifice")
Which cancels Divine Sac half a second after you cast it. I wasn't able to get it working for /in 0.2, so my guess is that the lower limit will be your server latency, since mine hovers around 300ms.

Posted by theckhd on maintankadin
Maintankadin • View topic - 3.3 Talent Spec Guide

[Paladan]

Sweet, ty sir