Protection warrior: am I doing it right?

[Eigo]

http://eu.battle.net/wow/en/characte.../eigo/advanced

heya, I'm kinda new at prot warriors, not really sure if I'm gearing/gemming/enchanting it right, and wanted some experienced players to gimme a hand.

my gear is pretty much jp/heroic/quest stuff, and my guild is going to start raiding, I wanted to ask some stuff:

-how much expertise would I need?
-I'm gemming mostly dodge and parry, but I read in some threads that mastery is imba for warriors, do you recommend me changing those stats for mastery?
-how much hp (unbuffed) I'd need?
-what trinket should I get for second slot? (I'm a scribe I was working on the earthquake card, but I'm still unsure if its good)
-do you recomend any reforges?

thanks in advance, and sorry for the nabness >.< trying to get better

[Katzazi]

No you are doing it completely wrong. Sorry.

First I try to answer your questions:
- You need 0 expertise. You need 0 hit. Ok if you are the only one who can interrupt you need hit-cap (7%) but you can get there via trinkets, elexiers and food in most cases.
- Yes switch over to mastery. More baout this later on.
- For stating to raid the HP you get with your gear is enough. Maybe you need some more if you start to do heroic raids, but you don't need more than what you get automatically before this point.
- Porcelain Crab and Throngus's Finger are very good blue trinkets. The one you get from Baradin Faction is more or less something you need to have for some magic encounters. The mastery on it is good, too.
- Yes. And Regemming. And enchanting everything. And getting a glyph in every slot.


So now more on the theory:

Your first goal as a warrior tank is to get 72.4% combined parry+dodge+block. It's easy to get with your gear. And every warrior tank entering raids should have it. It's because of our Shield Block ability. It gives us 25% additional block. So when it's up we have 97.4% combined parry+dodge+block. Since the boss has a miss chance of 5% we cover 102.4% of the hit-table. Which is all. So while SB is up, we ar unhittable. Something no other tank can reach at the moment. Meaning: while SB is up you cannot get hit by a normal hit. Every hit will be at least blocked (or crit blocked or avoided). So every hit is reduced to at least 30% of it's potential dmg. That is huge. Sure you can have blocks and stuff all the time, but the important part is, that you KNOW you will not get a normal hit. You and your healer can rely on it. Shield Block is up for 10s and has a CD of 30s. So you can be unhittable 1/3 of the time, of you reach this magic number.

The easiest way to get there is to go for mastery. Because you get more combat table coverage by mastery, than you get via dodge or parry. Worse, parry and dodge get diminishing returns. Meaning that if you have much of them, every additional rating will give you less % than the last one did. So it's not the best investment of ratings if one of them is extremely high.

Even while you don't have SB up, mastery is quite good. The more you have the more crit-blocks you get (and if you are over the magic number SB will convert normal block chance over the cap into crit blocks, too). And you get easier to heal. It's not optimal from a healer perspectiv if you either get none or full hits. Static medicore healing is cheaper than some big heals.

So what should you do? Go for mastery. If you cannot do that, anymore, go for dodge+parry. Ignore stamina, hit and expertise at the moment, you just don't need it.

More precisely: Try to get items with the following stats:
1. mastery + dodge/parry
2. high mastery + hit/expertise
3. dodge + parry
4. low mastery + hit/expertise
5. dodge/parry + hit/expertise
6. everything else
7. stuff with resilience

Reforge like this:
If it has no mastery but hit/expertise/crit/haste reforge the highest of those to mastery.
If it has no dodge + parry reforge the higher one to mastery.
After that fine-tune your dodge and parry with the remaining items:
They should be "close together" but parry should be "a little bit higher" than dodge. You should consider this while buffed (battle shout + kings) and look at your ratings. At your gear level having parry about 1-3% above dodge should be fine.

Gem like this:
Either go full out on mastery or go:
blue: stam + mastery
yellow: mastery
red: parry + mastery.
At least if the bonus is a good stat it's probably better to use mixed gems at the moment.

Talents:
Move the points from Blitz and Blood Craze into War Academy and Deep Wounds. If you don't need Gag Order for 5 mans, put those points into Deep Wounds and Incite.

Glyphs:
- Don't use Sunder Armor glyph. You are not using the ability, so don't use the Glyph.
- Use Thunder Clap and or Heroic Throw. Consider where you want to use Shield Wall Glyph.
- You don't need Commanding Shout or Battle Shout Glyph. You will probably use both on CD for rage, anyway.
- Take Intimidating Shout, Demo Shout, Berserker Rage.

[Gnarly]

-how much expertise would I need?

Expertise is not important at this time. I have no expertise currently.

I'm gemming mostly dodge and parry, but I read in some threads that mastery is imba for warriors, do you recommend me changing those stats for mastery?

Mastery>Parry>Dodge. I have been matching socket bonuses gemming for mastery, mastery/stam, mastery/parry.

-how much hp (unbuffed) I'd need?

HP is not as important now as it was in the past. Mastery will increase block and help with spike damage reducing the need for lots of HP.

-what trinket should I get for second slot? (I'm a scribe I was working on the earthquake card, but I'm still unsure if its good)

Earthquake card is underwhelming imo. I would do TB dailies and get the mastery trink. It is much cheaper and better although it is a rep grind. You'll get tons of golds too!!

-do you recomend any reforges?

Reforge hit/expertise to other stats, Mastery>Parry>Dodge.

[JollyWarrior]

Also keep your parry About 2% higher than your dodge for HtL.

[Eigo]

thank you very much, this help was really apreciated, I'll get rid of my expertise and hit stuff and go for lots of mastery

one more question

is mending on weapon better than the weapon chain? I know there's a better enchant but I don't have money for it, nor a good weapon

[Tengenstein]

Both are kinda meh, go mending if your wiping becuase you are dying. go weapon chain if you're interupt duty or if the raid is wiping to enrages.

[Naka]

- You don't need Commanding Shout or Battle Shout Glyph. You will probably use both on CD for rage, anyway.

They're still useful for the range increase. If you have to maintain either buff, I'd totally take the appropriate glyph instead of Berserker Rage.

[Katzazi]

In raid's you seldom have to maintain the buff (at least the melee-buff should be no problem, to maintain on melees, anyway). Some rage at the start however can be quite helpfull. Anyway I doubt it's a good thing to pass on the other glyphs and to run around with 2 empty glyph slots.

If you really have to maintain the buff you can change glyphs, anyway. It's a good idea to go with some reglyphing-mats anyway.

[Loganisis]

Most fights the tank isn't going to be rage starved - so CS/BS won't be used a lot. More magic heavy fights where there aren't as many swings to block are different.

That being said, glyphed BS/CS doesn't give more rage. It only extends the duration an area of effect. In a 10m this could be useful for BS (should have priests covering sta or scrolls, they do the same thing more efficiently with no drop-off in the middle of the fight). But once you hit 25m, BS should be covered since hunters, shammies, and DKs all give the same buff, there should be so much overlap it's a non-issue.

So the shouts are still useful, the glyphs, well really only BS if you're concenred about that buff dropping off.

[Helgebroed]

Can someone give me all the advice that's possible for me about my Prot? cause I've searched alot but I am not sure that I am doing it correct.
this is me:
http://eu.battle.net/wow/en/characte...gebroed/simple

[swelt]

Can someone give me all the advice that's possible for me about my Prot? cause I've searched alot but I am not sure that I am doing it correct.
this is me:
http://eu.battle.net/wow/en/characte...gebroed/simple

I'm not keen on seeing the DPS belt repurposed as tank gear when the crafted one is so easily available. Your glove enchant should be mastery, your red sockets should be parry+stam or parry+mastery not expertise if you are gearing for survival, you could stick a pyrium weapon chain on your tenderizer. Your professions aren't doing much for you, skinning is the single worst profession for a tank and you haven't levelled your mining (which isn't optimal either but at least gives a relevant stat). Your factions look good except I can't see your tol barad faction on the armory (exalted trinket is good).

[Katzazi]

Can someone give me all the advice that's possible for me about my Prot?

If you are posting in a thread of someone else you can at least pick up the answers already given. Most of what I wrote can be adapted to everybody. If you have questions afterwards, ask this specific questions. I try if I can help you by then.

[Helgebroed]

I know and you info is very helpfull I just wanted someone to check out my gear cause i have probs generating threat

[Katzazi]

Well you did not log out in your prot gear. So the only thing I can address is your spec. And you get more or less the same answer as the OP of this thread:

- Remove the points from Blood Craze and Impending Victory
- Put them into War Academy and Deep Wounds.
- If you can do without Gag Order in 5mans move those points to Deep Wounds and Cruelty.

Blood Craze and Impending Victory are very weak healing talents. Blood Craze is so low that it helpy your healers more to kill the boss a little bit faster with your dps/threat-talents. One point in Impending Victory is more or less useless. It's weak with 2 points, because you cannot control it good enough. Going only for one point is more or less meaningless.

[Helgebroed]

a yeah, forgot to log out in it, now i am.
Thanks, made some changes towards talents and glyphs. Hoping this increases threat

[Katzazi]

I wrote the overall concepts above. So I will just tell you what items are not treated in the best way. However I never think that that's the best approach, since you have to do it on your own with your next upgrades. It's better to get the idea about how it works. (And I probably will not be able to hit the exactly best combination, since I'm not seeing your ratings while buffed.)

Head: gem fore mastery+parry
Neck: at the moment your dodge is a little bit high compared to parry, reforge dodge->parry
Shoulder: gem mastery+parry, since dodge was much higher than hit, maybe your reforging is ok, since it gives more mastery and your dodge is relatively high. However hit->mastery is also an option that gives you a higher combat table coverage
Chest: yellwo gem: mastery, blue gem: mastery+stamina, reforge dodge->parry (all stats enchant adds a little bit dodge and parry, but stamina is also a valid enchant)
Wrists: There is a dodge (or was it mastery?) enchant, don't use the expertise one. Again, you got a little bit more mastery by reforging dodge instead of expertise towards mastery, but you get a higher combat table coverage if you reforge the expertise to mastery
Hands: gem: stamina+mastery, reforge dodge->parry
Waist: second gem should be pure mastery, reforge dodge->parry
Legs: red: parry+mastery, blue:stam+mastery, reforge dodge->mastery
1.ring: same as above, reforging hit->mastery would give you a better combat table coverage but less mastery
2. ring: ok
1. trinket: reforge parry->mastery
2. trinket: ok but only lvl 333
mainhand: concider mending as enchant, but both are probably ok
shield: get block enchant
ranged: ok

[Helgebroed]

damn, that's what i needed, Thanks for the straight forward advice mate!!

[Eigo]

i've changed my gear and spec, agroing is a little harder but the extra dps from the new talents helped out, also I noticed I'm a lot more resistant now (20 mastery) did my first heroic with the new stuff and it was pretty easy. I'll farm some more heroics (still need upgrade for legs/neck/armor/weapon/ranged/wrist) and then I'll try out some raids

thanks! /cheer

[Loganisis]

damn, that's what i needed, Thanks for the straight forward advice mate!!

I see this and think of that saying "If you give a man a fish he eats for a day, if you teach a man to fish he eats for a lifetime" (and please don't fix it to "he never does the chores XD) -- I'd encourage you to re-read Katzazi's first post to understand why the changes are suggested.

They'll always be someone around to offer specific improvements, but it gets even better when you understand why and get responses like "looks good" ;D

[Ironfaith]

Glyphs:
- Don't use Sunder Armor glyph. You are not using the ability, so don't use the Glyph.
.

Using Devastate does stack the Sunder Armor debuff (plus threat) on a 2nd close by target. Are you maybe confusing the Sunder Armor glyph with Furious Sundering?

I have never liked the Heroic Throw glyph because I never really had much use for an on use ranged Sunder Armor application device. Maybe if Blizzard changes it to apply a ranged rend instead I would get excited about it then.