Tankadin: Dodge v Parry v Mastery?

[Lavahon]

The general consensus among tanks seems to be that the hit cap is no longer top priority when reforging. And most of the tanks that I've inspected don't gem/enchant for hit or stam besides the obvious weapon chain and vitality to boots. Thus, hit and stam are off the table when we get around to item enhancement.

Unfortunately I'm left a little stumped as to what I should prioritize when I'm reforging or deciding whether to pick up a side-grade that's dropped, as there isn't an abundance of tankadins on my server or in my guild (compared to the booming numbers of prot warriors and blood dk's out there). So, perhaps someone here could help me out.

Given that, mastery rating seems to be a less effective mitigation stat on pallies than it is on warriors and deathknights, what should I reforge into if I want to make my tankadin raid-viable?

PS: A separate post listing the stat priorities for each of the three tanking classes along with a short explanation of specifically why favor one stat over the other would be absolutely superb.

[Fetzie]

Mastery is AWESOME for tankadins. We get 2.25% block per point of mastery. Each block reduces our damage taken from a melee swing by 40% (about 41.7% if you have the eternal shadowspirit meta gem).

My stat priority is Stamina = Mastery > Parry = Dodge > everything else. Stamina to take the inevitable non-blocks, mastery to reduce the amount of non-blocks and avoidance stats to make me sometimes take zero damage whatsoever.

My gems:
5xSolid Ocean Sapphire
3xSolid Chimera's Eye
3xPuissant Dream Emerald
2xDefender's Demonseye
1xEternal Shadowspirit Diamond

Raid buffed with mastery and armor elixirs I am at 58.37% block, 13.09% dodge, 13.24% parry and about 177k life. If I have a flask make that 56% block and 181k life (about).

In balancing my avoidance stats I have reforged 377 Parry rating, 113 hit rating and 44 expertise rating to 490 dodge rating and 44 mastery, mainly due to most of the items already having mastery on them. Basically if an item does not have mastery on it, I reforge it so that it does. I am currently using the retribution Tier 11 pants because they have a massive 228 mastery rating on them, and I don't have the tier shoulders yet to unlock the 4 set, mainly due to my truly aweful skill at winning group loot at Cho'gall, although they will only be used for fights where I need the hit rating because I have to interrupt (we are finally getting one in the next patch) or for when I need a longer shield wall; magmaw, chimaeron, maloriak, halfus come to mind. In most other fights I plan to use non-set items with mastery.

Here you should find my current gear set, if I logged out in my showing off gear apologies.

As for a weapon enchant, when I finally get the weapon from maloriak (as if it will ever drop) I will have Windwalk enchanted on it. Until that glorious day I will make do with Mending. I find the healing, while minimal, is worth so much more than a bit of hit rating from the weapon chain, which to be honest, I don't want or need when tanking stuff that is being interrupted by someone else.

Vitality on boots is another thing. It doesn't stack with pursuit of justice. Pursuit of justice, in addition to making you run 15% faster, also grants you a holy power every time you get hit by an immobilise, a fear, or a stun, meaning you have a more powerful WoG when you are out of the CC 50 mastery is a much better investment for your boots.

[KAHON]

Pyrea thanks for your post and I totally agree. However, I tried to combine avoidance and threat to push my dps a little bit higher. I sacrificed HP to get to these stats. I am having the Symbiotic Worm, but I am not using it at the moment. I would like to get ur thoughts on this. My armory link:

http://us.battle.net/wow/en/characte...kahon/advanced

In the near future, I probably change to full avoidance. My guild is currently running 2 10M groups. One with good gear and experienced players the other for new guild members who need gear and experience in fights. I am running group 2 with a resto shaman, resto druid and holy pally. That's basically the main reason why came up with this spec to delivier more dps, but not giving the healer a hard time. I am usually teamed up with the resto shaman who is healing me since 3 months. He knows straight away when I screwed up my gear.

I believe my stats are not that bad, but I am lacking in HP a little bit. As you can see we are not doin heroics which will probably change my gearing and the associated stats.

It would be great to get some feedback and thoughts on my current stats and how I have gemmed and reforged my gear.

I was also wondering about your ability to interrupt based on your 1.13% hit and 2 exp knowing my rebuke has chance (my estimation) of 80% to interrupt, but I am doing good combining it with my shield having 12 exp plus 10 from seal of truth glyph geting it 22 exp and 3.28% hit.

Cheers

KAHON

[MellvarTank]

In the near future, I probably change to full avoidance.

No, bad! You will want to keep gearing for mastery, avoidance you just pick up along the way.

Mastery = predictable damage
Avoidance = non-predictable damage

Guess which is easier to heal? The mastery tank.

As for threat/dps... run a different gear set for it. Also: You shouldn't be relied upon for all of the interrupts, it just isn't possible. What fights are you having to interrupt for? The only one I know that really requires it would be Nefarian..... (as you need 3 interrupts on 3 different platforms)

[KAHON]

Hi Mellvar,

Thank for your comments. I was probably not really clear. I meant with avoidance the reduction in exp and hit I reforged to mastery>dodge>parry. I recently changed my trinket darkmoon card earthquake to Symbiotic Worm. However, in I have the feeling I am taking more dmg than usuall, otherwise I totally agree to stack mastery.

At this stage we havent attempted Nefarian. The main interrupts are Elementium Monstrosity when tanking Feludios (Hydro Lance), i am the only interrupt, and the adds for Cho'Gal Corrupting Adherent (Depravity) where i have a rouge with me helping with interrupts. As u said i can probaly push mastery higher.

[Contravene]

Stack Mastery over Stamina too as long as you can be splitting that up for mastery/stamina gems do it and get more Mastery. Or if the socket bonus sucks drop a fractured amberjewel in there and ignore the socket bonus. Mastery!!!!!!!!!!!!! :P

[MellvarTank]

I recently changed my trinket darkmoon card earthquake to Symbiotic Worm. However, in I have the feeling I am taking more dmg than usuall, otherwise I totally agree to stack mastery.

To be honest, you likely are taking more damage. But with the larger health pool and higher mastery you will still be easy to heal.

Stacking mastery doesn't make you require less heals than avoidance, it makes you EASIER to heal. So although you will take more damage over the course of a fight, the healers will not have a hard time healing you which is far more important.

[KAHON]

Based on the feedback I get from my healer I am harder to heal after I removed my Darkmoon Card Earthquake and added the Symbotic Worm. However, it is not too critical not to down the boss or me ending up dying all the time. I believe it really depends on your raid group composition, healer skills and gear, guild and the boss you are doing. My guild is in progression and still at normal raids. In my expereince all bosses are doable with stacking mastery and avoidance and a bit of stamina plus reforging to exp and hit. (see my current gear) Not having done, heroics, I believe this will change and you have to get rid of exp and hit, stack more stamina and mastery. It will also be interesting how the change in WoG to a 20secs CD will impact the class as self healing is limited. (P.S. Due to time issues I haven't tried PTRs)

I am currently working on a short simulation to work out the exact damage I can take. The only question I have is how pary and dodge are utilised.

eg HIT -> Parry 12% chance -> Dodge 12% -> Mastery 52% chance to block 30% dmg?

I've got something running, but i am not sure if it is right. The goal is to work out if on average a certain level of avoidance (assuming you can get there with current gear) can do better than the more stamina.

[klausi]

Based on the feedback I get from my healer I am harder to heal after I removed my Darkmoon Card Earthquake and added the Symbotic Worm.

Sorry but that's bullshit, removing 2% dodge isn't gamebreaking at all and your healer will barely notice it. And thanks to holy shield it's 40% blocked damage.

You want to have the same ratings on both dodge and parry to reduce the impact of DR. My paladin in full 359 is sitting at 175k hitpoints, 63% block and 30% avoidance (including 5% miss) raidbuffed. Thanks to the symbiotic worm procc he becomes unhittable after being brought below 35% hitpoints for 10s and that's possible every 30s, it closes the gap of the missing ~ 1.000 mastery rating on high burst phases for me perfectly.

More stamina is only interesting when
a) you're likely do die during a small timeframe with no healer being able to catch up. Eg Nefarian fight in general, especially on hardmode while tanking the bone constructs and the old lady at the same time, her breath hits you unmigitated in the face while she's stunning your healers. An example more raiders might have encountered was Halfus pre nerf, getting eaten from a drake during roar with not enough (external) cooldowns avaible.. and that's why they changed him
b) you fail, eg Maloriak breathes at you while you're tanking several adherents and got consuming flames on you. 5% more block won't save the day there while 20.000 hitpoints maybe can do
c) your healer either fail (eg moving at Atramedes), get distracted (eg Crashes on Cho'gall) or simply try helping other raiders out whose did some mistakes on their own

It's really tempting stacking stamina like we did in Wrath, adding another 30k stamina (2 trinkets + stamina gemming + flask) will give you some room for fatal errors but will likely kill you on other and more likely emerging occassions.

[KAHON]

Thanks klausi! First of all, I've never said it's a gamebreaker. My healer and I simply noticed it. He is healing me since 3 months in Heroics and normal Raids. We probably have done close to or even more than 100 instances together. I can guarantee you, he knows what he is doing. Even I can see my health dropping quicker.

However, you confirmed what I thought in terms of avodiance and mastery. I am also grateful you pointed out a neet mechanic with the symbiotic Worm. (Never read this probably and add to my other stats) The only thing I am not sure about is the

Thanks to the symbiotic worm procc he becomes unhittable after being brought below 35% hitpoints for 10s and that's possible every 30s

I do not understand how u become unhittable. Dodge and Parry only gets you a chance to fully mitigate the hit. As long as they r not at 100% there is a chance to get a hit. Assuming they dont apply at the same time, adding them together, there is still a chance you get hit which will be reduced by block chance of XX% as you pointed out by 40% of the incoming damage.

I also would be interested in if you stack exp and hit? Based on your comments I assume you are around 6 exp and 1.XX% hit. Maybe you could link your armory profile here.

Many thanks!

Cheers

KAHON

[Fetzie]

Unhittable does not mean that you dodge, parry or are missed 100% of the time. It means that you cannot take a direct hit as the worst case scenario is that you block the attack.

[KAHON]

Totally agree Pyrea. I just dont like the word "unhittable". It is simply wrong in this context. (Maybe I am too pedantic about the use of "unhittable") Having read many post and only playing WoW since 5 months it was really confusing to me in the beginning.

Do you know how to apply parry and dodge? I try to calculate the best balance of stamina to avoidance + block chance.

Scenario1: Parry X% -> Dodge X% -> Block Chance
Scenario 2: Parry X% + Dodge X% -> Block Chance (this scenario would mitigate on average more damage taken)

[klausi]

Even I can see my health dropping quicker.

It's a psychological effect. There's really no option to see this like *aww this damage could have been prevented by using x instead of y* or vice versa, swapping item A for item B is barely noticable at all. If you really start stacking avoidance (two avoidance trinkets and gem for it) you will end up seeing a difference - you can increase your total avoidance by up to 10% at the cost of over 22% block and a bunch of stamina (~ 15k).

The only thing I am not sure about is the I do not understand how u become unhittable.

"Unhittable" might be a tad misleading, there's already a discussion about a better term for it on this forum. When we're talking about unhittable we're into the scenario of regular hits are being pushed from the attack table entirely.

You roll a dice, 1-100
1-12 = parry
13-25 = dodge
26-30 = miss
31-100 = block

For a paladin i can't see a reason to stack either hit* or expertise. I've 0 expertise rating on my gear but 10 expertise are already free via glyphed SoT and i'm rocking at 2% hit thanks to Atramedes necklace, the crafted shield and draenei racial. A lot of attacks aren't being affected from expertise and only rely on (spell)hit. Having to worry about up to 9% spell-miss versus almost 30% chance to not connect for physical attacks (14% parry + 6.5% dodge + 8% hit) is a world of difference. I've never encountered any aggro problems either on snap aggro thanks to several offensive cooldowns (Wings + 3 HoPo from Divine Plea) and not one but two taunts on 8s cooldown nor on keeping it thanks to vengeance.

* unless you're on interrupt duty.. at least until 4.1

[Fetzie]

Totally agree Pyrea. I just dont like the word "unhittable". It is simply wrong in this context. (Maybe I am too pedantic about the use of "unhittable") Having read many post and only playing WoW since 5 months it was really confusing to me in the beginning.

Do you know how to apply parry and dodge? I try to calculate the best balance of stamina to avoidance + block chance.

Scenario1: Parry X% -> Dodge X% -> Block Chance
Scenario 2: Parry X% + Dodge X% -> Block Chance (this scenario would mitigate on average more damage taken)

If you have 20% parry, 20% block, 5% miss, 50% block against your current target (targets higher than you in level reduce your avoidance chance with each type by 0.2% per level advantage they have over you) you have a total 95% combined block and avoidance. There is only one die roll.

imagine you are rolling a ten thousand sided die.

this is assuming you are crit immune and the target is max +3 levels higher than you:
0-500 will give a miss
501-2500 will give a parry
2501-4500 will give a dodge
4501-9500 will give a block
9501-10000 will give a normal melee hit.

rolling these numbers grants an accuracy to the second decimal point.

A lot of attacks aren't being affected from expertise and only rely on (spell)hit.

This is no longer true.
Crusader Strike, the initial application of HotR, ShoR, seal applications can all be dodged, parried and miss.

The only thing that cannot be dodged or parried that is not a spell is judgement.

the things on the spell hit table are exorcism (you shouldn't be using this anyway), Holy wrath (only really worth hitting if you have nothing else to hit due to cost and damage), Hammer of Justice (most things are immune to this and it no longer interrupts anyway) and the first damage tick of consecrate (which is a mana hog). I think Hammer of wrath also falls into this category, but it may not.

[Aggronaught]

depends on the content you are doing...

Mastery will only be better than stamina if you are fighting 100% blockable boss. For HM's stamina is better than mastery on more than half of the fights in this tier, however the difference is neglible in both cases.

[klausi]

The only thing that cannot be dodged or parried that is not a spell is judgement.

You mentioned wrath and hammer but forgot about captain america shield, it's at least a huge part of my aggro. Of course there are still a lot of physical attacks left but all all you need for snap aggro (on range) is considered a spellcast and only requires 9% spellhit.

Mastery will only be better than stamina if you are fighting 100% blockable boss. For HM's stamina is better than mastery on more than half of the fights in this tier, however the difference is neglible in both cases.

About what hardmodes we are talking here after all those nerfbats? Your healthpool raises automatically with your ilvl and especially a paladin has a TON of cooldowns to counter magical burst phases, only comes second after a DK.