Warrior Tanking in 4.01?

[Arodon]

I've been in an out of the game for a while, and recently returning, I've noticed a lot of major changes in the game, especially in regards to tanking. I've come up with a list of questions that if anyone could briefly answer, it would be extremely helpful.

1) Is the tanking rotation still generally the same?
2) Do you still stack the same stats, use the same gems, same glyphs, same armor sets, etc?
3) Is the tanks role still the same? I know that a lot of people are saying the armor and stamina changes are making specific roles less defined.
4) Is there a threat based protection spec anymore? What is the new "end all be all" spec?

Any and all information would be extremely helpful.

[Lemondish]

I can't really answer all of these because I'm not quite learned in the Warrior tanking before the patch. In any case, I'll try to give general answers to at least two of your questions.

2) Right now, not much has changed as gear is concerned. Mana conservation isn't a consideration at 80 right now, though it will be at 85. Now, come Cataclysm, avoidance and mastery will be of more value once you understand the alteration in fight and healer mechanics, but until then, its ssdd.

3) I don't know what you mean by this. Maintaining threat and soaking damage is still desired, and those two jobs haven't changed much. If you're more likely to run Heroics, you will need to recognize that your purpose there isn't as defined as it once was. Many players outgear the content, healers are still able to cast most of their arsenal without fear, and should a DPS player pull off of you, he likely won't take any life threatening damage on trash. In raids, its less likely to occur thanks to a new mechanic called Vengeance. All of these issues will solve themselves once you hit 85 and ratings scale more modestly.

[klausi]

1) It's basically the same. For trash and larger group of adds you want to add a rend after grabbing your initial aggro with thunderclap/shockwave, it will be spreaded to all of them via the new talent "Blood and Thunder".
2) Go for hit cap, expertise softcap (now 23 instead of 26 for lvl 80, for 85 it's still 26) and either get a huge chunk of avoidance of massing mastery - both works quite well. I prefer mastery due to more incoming rage via shield mastery. Parry is as good if not better than dodge due to the new talent "Hold the line" (increasing %crit and %crit block). Gemming pure stamina is still the way to go and having either armor or stamina trinkets is a matter of personal preference and avaibility. For glyphs and specc see 4)
3) You stop the mobs from hitting anyone else.. like always. In 5 man (heroics) you'll end up only having aggro of the harder hitting mobs while those icc geared randoms just cleave through the casters and regular trash.
4) 3/2/31 Swapping 2/2 Blood & Thunder for Concussion Blow & Vigilance if you're offtanking anything in raids.
Prime glyphs are set, for major glyphs there are several choices and for minor you can swap one for commanding shout if there's no priest or warlock with an imp around. I personally use 2/3/31 as my allround spec and it works okayish.

[Nayre]

1)
2) Go for hit cap, expertise softcap (now 23 instead of 26 for lvl 80, for 85 it's still 26)

22, actually.

Or, specifically, if the character sheet would show it, about 22.4. Aka, 172 expertise rating (since partial-percentage now works on expertise, despite the expertise skill only updating to whole numbers).

[Nayre]

1)
2) Go for hit cap, expertise softcap (now 23 instead of 26 for lvl 80, for 85 it's still 26)

22, actually.

Or, specifically, if the character sheet would show it, about 22.4. Aka, 172 expertise rating (since partial-percentage now works on expertise, despite the expertise skill only updating to whole numbers).