Paladin VS. Warrior tankage.

[wtfjusthitu]

As I read through here I see that there are about 57 million warrior tanks. I initially leveled a paladin for the Tank/Heals combo (yay for no que waits!) but as I read I am just curious why the craze about warrior tanks?

how are warriors superior to paladins that so many people roll them as tankage? Is it just preference or just a different play style ect ect?

[Reev]

They aren't superior nor inferior. It's like the difference between driving an automatic and manual transmission. Warriors are more like manual, they take a bit more effort to learn and drive well, but they're fun to drive. Paladins are more like automatics, they are easier to pick up, but if you want to really maximize your driving, you really have to do your best with the smaller toolset you've got.

It really depends. I think more people play warriors not because they're more or less powerful, but because the general perception (mine included) is that they're more fun.

[MellvarTank]

It really is just the different play style. Same reason why there are DK and Druid tanks, they all have different ways of accomplishing the same thing.

[MuddyPuddy]

(awaits the coming of the LORD to smite this thread)

[Scotteq]

OP - Direct class comparisons are strongly frowned upon here. Mostly because they almost universally tirn into b*tch fests.

[luv2tank]

I think the "craze" has just been from before my time and from what I read was that warriors were just the best tanks since day one. I have nothing to go by on that but its only from what ppl say in game and on some old forums I have stumbled upon. That is probably why you see such a large amount of warrior tanks. Otherwise, i could be totally wrong. Personally-i find warrior tanking to be much more fun than the rest. Paladins, dk's, druids, warriors all have their great and respectable abilities that are on par-better-or unequal at times.

[Mallok]

I think originally you had to have a warior tank in vanilla, not sure though.

[Reev]

I think originally you had to have a warior tank in vanilla, not sure though.

Pretty much, yeah. Druids could do alright in some of the lower raids, but the game was designed around a warrior tank in Vanilla, and was still pretty warrior-centric in TBC.

[IronHorse69]

level 60 druids and shammies were the healing batteries that made the raids go and warrior tanks drove the bus. Level 70 opened up a whole new world to theory crafting builds. Level 80 opened up I ain't sure yet I'll let you know when I have figured it out, lol.

[Aggathon]

ya in TBC different classes could do different things, druids came to the forefront and could be amazing avoidance tanks (70% dodge in SWP anyone?), pallies were amazing AoE tanks, and warriors were still considered (mostly, but it changed the closer to 3.0 it got) the main boss tank.

in WotLK blizzard focuses more on "bring the player, not the class" which is why all 4 tank classes now are capable of tanking almost anything (anub arak adds come to mind as something druids and DKs simply cannot single tank, but they're the better tanks for anub himself and pallies can also do the adds very effectively, not just warriors). Sure pallies might have a better time than a warrior in an AoE fight, or a DK might do better against sindragosa because of better magic mitigation through AMS, but all the classes are at least CAPABLE of doing the various different roles to the point that it is not a determent to guilds if they only have a DK and a warrior but not a pally or something like that.

[Kazeyonoma]

My guild, continues to run with DK and Warrior tanks only (not by choice mind you), and we've been doing okay, up to Sindragosa in 25 and Lich King in 10. Would we like a Feral/Pally? sure, do we have room for one now in our tanking core? No.

[Bodasafa]

Generally speaking guilds (even hard core ones) use the most established, vested, geared, skilled, and experienced tanks they have regardless of class.

[Muffin Man]

Which often is a warrior by default since as a class they've been tanking the longest.

Plus warriors in general are a popular class, it's straightforward as to what the class is. Whereas new players probably have no idea what, for example, a Druid is actually going to do in the game.

That's basically why I rolled a warrior when I started. I wanted a melee class and the only ones that I really understood was warrior (rogue to a lesser extend, I didn't even know Shamans or Druids were melee capable on the selection screen). I rolled Horde on the vanilla trial so no choice for Pally for me.

[Caric]

Warriors were THE tank in vanilla. Not the best, not the most viable, but for all intents and purposes the only real available tank. (shh I know there are those folks out there who have their raid tanking as a bear in vanilla stories but those are the exception to the rule) So while most if not all of us have alts we play around with, we tend to want to stick with the class that got us to the game in the first place.

[MuddyPuddy]

My guild, continues to run with DK and Warrior tanks only (not by choice mind you), and we've been doing okay, up to Sindragosa in 25 and Lich King in 10. Would we like a Feral/Pally? sure, do we have room for one now in our tanking core? No.

So are pally/feral tank spots in your Guild closed by choice or because inviting those classes would change the dynamic of your core raid group?


By the way could anyone fill me in on what the term vanilla means?

[Brierley]

Vanilla is the slang term for Classic WoW (before any expansions).

[cael]

I really like the standard vs automatic comparison. I have raid tanked on both pally and warrior and that is exactly how it feels. As a warrior you are constantly spamming abilities and with adds tab targeting to the point where when you play a pally you feel like your not doing right as you can almost fire and forget. Not to say pally is easy or hard it just feels more laid back.

[Belak]

So are pally/feral tank spots in your Guild closed by choice or because inviting those classes would change the dynamic of your core raid group?

I'm pretty sure he just means that their tank roster is full. Inviting a new tank of any class would involve displacing someone else who is doing a fine job already.

[Satrina]

Don't turn this into a flamewar or YOU GOT YOUR PALADIN IN MY PEANUTBUTTER thread. Carry on!

[Musclebound]

Here's my humble opinion.

Tanking is by and large a skillset that develops independent of player class. It involves situational awareness, quick reactions the ability to plan your moves ahead of time, and quickly adapt when things go wrong, all in a fast paced, rapidly changing environment are what I consider the core skills template of any good tank. Compared to that the class mechanics are fairly trivial. A good pally tank will generally be able to level a warrior and after some brief adjustments to class mechanics, be able to perform at a comparable level to his paladin. Once you have the ability to tank, doing so on a different toon largely becomes an issue of figuring out which buttons to press. A pally switching to a DK or a Warrior might find those classes to be a bit spammy and frantic, a Warrior or DK switching to a pally might find them a bit slow and boring, and I think any of them would find themselves yawning very frequently after switching to a bear. But they would still quickly be able to perform after figuring out the specifics of each class, which are far easier in any case than developing the core tanking skills i mentioned above.

If that wasn't subjective enough, here's another point.
Having ran alongisde tanks of all classes and experimented with all 4 classes at least slightly (couldn't get past the first 15 levels of judgement > lolautoattack on a pally, sorry)
Warriors and Pallies both have very good single target THREAT (dps is another matter).
Pallies and DK's pull ahead on aoe pulls but not to the extent that your average helmet wearing, mouth breathing pug raid leader would have you believe.
Druids are pretty much middle of the road in all areas
From MY experience : Death Knight single target threat lags significantly behind and needs some serious love. (waits for the cross and nails to come out)

I've run with very good tanks of all specs and some very bad ones. Ive never had a druid or DK really challenge my warrior for single target threat output. Aside from expertise enchants on my wrist and gloves and one expertise/stam gem in a red socket i don't gear for threat at all, but even the best DK tanks i've run with only put out about half my single target threat. They've nearly evaporated on my server, which I think is sad. It's nice to see them getting some love next patch because they need it.