Assistance for AOE threat Prot warrior.

[Vadik]

First off my link. http://eu.battle.net/wow/en/characte...vadik/advanced

I have been having a horrible time keeping the threat on 4 or 5 enemies and I cannot figure out why. Should I have more expertise since that generates a lot of threat (or so I am told). The one other thing I could think of to help with multiple targets is to Shockwave-Berserk/whirlwind- defensive stance.

I know my tanking trinket suck, they suck as much as the RNG that decides that I do NOT get the drops. I am working on the TB and Valor trinkets, but neither of those help with threat.

I wish prot warriors had the threat generation beartanks have. I am put to shame when I see them tanking.

[Raiju]

Spread rend with tclap, inner rage+cleave spam, tclap and shockwave on cd, keep tabing and using revenge. Not bad aoe at all. Just before you pull put a skull on your 1st target, and you should be fine. Another option is to be aggresive and get there first, with charge, leap etc. A couple of gcds advantage on the dps makes all the difference.

You dont need exp, hit, or zerker stance btw.

[Tengenstein]

Consider dropping Cruelty for Thunderstruck.

[Fayre]

I strongly suspect you're not using Cleave enough. Remember that Inner Rage allows you to spam it fairly heavily every 30s.

[Loganisis]

AoE warrior tanking is: Mark Skull, Mark X. Charge Skull -> Rend -> TC, use cleave and revenge as much as you can on skull with some SS throw in. Use SW when possible. When skull dies, move to X. Depending on your gear and their gear, X may not be necessary. B+T will give you enough of a threat lead that they don't catch up.

The biggest mistake developing WarTanks makes is assuming that they can AoE and hold threat. I've seen some incredible WarTanks that can do that, but I've seen some incredible AoE DPS as well. Mark, mark, mark and things go smoothly. And that way if DPS pulls anything but skull and then X it's their own fault.

[Xirek]

From experience, especially now in the later days of Cataclysm Heroics, you're going to see that more and more people are not doing the cautious CC pulls and it's back to business as usual. Spam AOE, power heal through and tank has to hold threat on multiple targets without fail.

The idea that DPS will focus on Skull and Cross is nice (no disrespect to Loganisis), but the reality is that since 4.1 DPS has gotten a ridiculous boost in output and yet tanks threat generation (especially Warrior) has stayed the same. If you're raiding, Vengeance takes care of that within seconds due to the amount of damage hitting you, but Heroics can be a little trickier. All you need to do is go into Zul'Aman to really watch the chaos unfold.

Two things I'd recommend. One if you're actual threat gen is weak consider soft-capping your Expertise if survival isn't an issue. Second, you may want to look into glyphs that will help your AOE control. Glyph of Shockwave & Cleave are great for that. You may also want to consider using Retaliation before the pull to get even more snap aggro.

Simple tools like Rend, Thunderclap (to spread rend), Shockwave and followed by Cleave will help you. Also, learn to tab target, it was our bread and butter back in Wrath and still serves for those who know how to use it. Good luck out there!

[Vadik]

I strongly suspect you're not using Cleave enough. Remember that Inner Rage allows you to spam it fairly heavily every 30s.

Tried yesterday in Vortex. much more manageable but still had some pulling away. I also noticed I was rage starved most of the time with pack but that could be because I macro'd cleave and inner rage together.

I have seen many people say that hit/expertise is not as important as avoidance but I did notice that I had a lot of miss/dodge/parries popping up and my dps never went over 7k with 4-5 pack groups.
Sorry for the wrong equipment in armory right now, had to log out in a hurry last night. Hit is at 1% and Exp @14.

[Vadik]

From experience, especially now in the later days of Cataclysm Heroics, you're going to see that more and more people are not doing the cautious CC pulls and it's back to business as usual. Spam AOE, power heal through and tank has to hold threat on multiple targets without fail.

The idea that DPS will focus on Skull and Cross is nice (no disrespect to Loganisis), but the reality is that since 4.1 DPS has gotten a ridiculous boost in output and yet tanks threat generation (especially Warrior) has stayed the same. If you're raiding, Vengeance takes care of that within seconds due to the amount of damage hitting you, but Heroics can be a little trickier. All you need to do is go into Zul'Aman to really watch the chaos unfold.

Two things I'd recommend. One if you're actual threat gen is weak consider soft-capping your Expertise if survival isn't an issue. Second, you may want to look into glyphs that will help your AOE control. Glyph of Shockwave & Cleave are great for that. You may also want to consider using Retaliation before the pull to get even more snap aggro.

Simple tools like Rend, Thunderclap (to spread rend), Shockwave and followed by Cleave will help you. Also, learn to tab target, it was our bread and butter back in Wrath and still serves for those who know how to use it. Good luck out there!

This is what I am seeing, no CC even when asked but even then the groups hardly ever wipe. I was going to try out softcapping my Expertise tonight and see how that works. I figured that I would only loose 1-2% of dodge to hit it, at least until I finally get the better trinkets to make up the gap.

[Muffin Man]

Tried yesterday in Vortex. much more manageable but still had some pulling away. I also noticed I was rage starved most of the time with pack but that could be because I macro'd cleave and inner rage together.

I have seen many people say that hit/expertise is not as important as avoidance but I did notice that I had a lot of miss/dodge/parries popping up and my dps never went over 7k with 4-5 pack groups.
Sorry for the wrong equipment in armory right now, had to log out in a hurry last night. Hit is at 1% and Exp @14.

This might sound stupid, but are you tabbing through the mobs in the pull?

When I AoE tank, I always tab around after SS-ing skull. I want to get a Rev or Dev off on each mob every so often.

That and keeping TC on cooldown help a lot.

Also, as an experiment after an AoE pull, look at recount to see how long it lasted, then look how many individual attacks you made (minus HS / Cleave). I suspect you aren't using all of your GCDs.

I run really low hit / exp (my survivability set up is 2% hit and 5 expertise) and I don't have problems really, so I strongly suspect it's not maximizing your abilities.

[Jaq]

Vadik,
(This is my opinion)
Are you in PUGs or a group of people who you can trust are doing their part to play correctly? I find that the hardest part about holding 4-5 enemies is that one or two of the DPS are having a pissing match with total disregard of the tank in order to try and top the Recount/Skada charts. If the DPS are focused on your PRIMARY target, then cleave and thunderclap SHOULD be enough to hold the secondary targets.
If all this is going well and the problem is you are missing your target with special attacks then it is possible that you may need to boost your hit rating without sacrificing TOO MUCH of secondary tanking stats. I would use the reforging tool and avoid gemming or enchanting for hit. I would not suggest getting to the melee hit cap, but sometimes just an extra 1-2% make a big difference.
When it comes to Expertise, the stats main focus is to avoid the enemy from dodge/parrying your attacks. More landed attacks = more damage = more threat so expertise IS important for tanks and you really won’t lose a lot of secondary tanking stats by hitting close to the cap (but not a single point paste because it is wasted). I am sorry that I can’t access your characters profile from my computer at the moment, but make sure to check your weapon skills because if you are using a weapon that your race is an expert with you will gain extra expertise (i.e. Orcs/Axes, Mace/Dwarf, Sword/Human).
As far as I have seen (on both my Druid and Warrior) rage regeneration is pretty close if you’re pooling correctly. Early on I was getting rage-starved because I was spamming special abilities to try and take back agro when it was ripped from me, but doing that often leads to continued rage starvation and falling further behind… I know, it’s like a lose-lose situation at that point.
What I like about displaying aggro percentages ABOVE 100% is that I can white hit while my numbers are high and only use my more extreme damaging abilities when the number hits around 130%, thus allowing me to pool more agro to have on reserve when it is needed. It seems like 80 is the magic number in my experience.
I hope this helps.

[Vadik]

Thanks Jaq, these are mostly pugs since my guild is quite small and most are running the Zul's for disenchants and eq. I can get some to run some of the time but usually have some randoms. My race is Orc so I have the axe spec (which there are very few good ones for tanking.) but I am using a sword so I have no benefit.
I am going to try swapping out for a few more points in hit/exp and try not to drop par/dodge before 12%.

[Tengenstein]

One thing to keep in mind is that while more expertise is more threat, Neither Thunderclap nor Shockwave can be dodged or parried. and a big part of your AoE threat will be those two abilites. Secondly remember how Hold the Line works; In an AoE situation it has alot of uptime. On Magmaw last night i had close to 74% up time on it, thats averages 7.4% extra crit, which with deep wounds is >7.4% extra damage. So dropping parry rating for Expertise rating is not neccasarily as great as it sounds.

Again Thunderstruck. My top abilities in an AoE fight are Rend, Cleave, Thunderclap and Shockwave and that talent improves all of them. Thunderstruck improves them all. If you're struggling in AoE but single target is fine Cruelty is a good place to take the talents from to fill it.

I do think you're biting up the wrong tree with this threat stat stacking, akin to treating the symptom rather than the problem. no amount of expertise or hitis going to make up DPS stupidity or the the incorrect use of abilities

EDIT: I run with 1 expertise and +0.64% hit and aslong as get to hit each mob before the DPS do i don't have AoE trouble. And if DPS hit stuff before the tank does, well, they have AoE trouble then.

[Reev]

Don't take hit/expertise. It would be like having a pain in your arm and cutting off your leg to deal with it. It won't do anything to help your arm, and it would certainly make it more difficult to walk. Similarly, reforging to expertise won't help you at all on AoE threat, but it'll sure make you less survivable.

Work on establishing threat instead. Put up a raid mark (skull) on your first target, Charge>Rend/Cleave>TClap>Shockwave/Cleave>Shield Slam>TClap/Cleave, etc. always keeping Thunderclap, Shockwave, Revenge, and Cleave on cooldown. Put most of your emphasis on the skull, but occasionally tab through to slap a shield slam or a revenge, or a devastate on the other mobs. The mobs should stick to you. If they don't, it's probably more a question of dumb AoE than a problem with you.

And stop suggesting that Warrior AoE threat generation isn't good. I usually end up with most of the mobs when my deathknight offtank and I both work on AoE pulls together. Warrior AoE threat is quite good.

[Rystrave]

I was having this issue as well, and just macroed Rend/TC/Cleave together, then hit Shockwave as it was off CD, as well as Revenge. I usually pull 20k DPS on mob pulls that are 4-5.

[Prae]

Ignore hit/expertise. You don't want to gimp your avoidance. Choose to either balance dodge/parry to minimize diminishing returns or stick all of it into Parry. (I stick all of it into Parry because the mechanic decreases spike damage. 50% mitigation on the current hit and the same % for the next hit.)

As far as talents and builds go, put 2/2 into Thunderstruck, but don't do the Rend thing. Mobs die too fast in 5 mans.

1. Charge in and round up the mobs. Thunderclap.
2. When the mobs are in front of you, Shockwave.
3. Cleave (hits 3 w/ glyph) and use Inner Rage. Shield Slam or Revenge after.
4. Cleave again. SS>Rev>Dev depending on which is up.

Do not macro 2-3 abilities into one button. Don't be lazy and inefficient. You have to play smart and get used to doing it the proper way.

If you continually lose threat after what I listed before, it could be (a) your gear or (b) DPS going bonkers with AOE.

[Tengenstein]

Ignore hit/expertise. You don't want to gimp your avoidance. Choose to either balance dodge/parry to minimize diminishing returns or stick all of it into Parry. (I stick all of it into Parry because the mechanic decreases spike damage. 50% mitigation on the current hit and the same % for the next hit.)

That's not correct, Parry being 50% reduction on the next two hits was scrapped back when cata was still in beta, parry works exactly the same as dodge now. Ideally you want 2-3% more parry than dodge, though it depends on how much parry, dodge and mastery you have.

As far as talents and builds go, put 2/2 into Thunderstruck, but don't do the Rend thing. Mobs die too fast in 5 mans.

1. Charge in and round up the mobs. Thunderclap.
2. When the mobs are in front of you, Shockwave.
3. Cleave (hits 3 w/ glyph) and use Inner Rage. Shield Slam or Revenge after.
4. Cleave again. SS>Rev>Dev depending on which is up.

Do not macro 2-3 abilities into one button. Don't be lazy and inefficient. You have to play smart and get used to doing it the proper way.

If you continually lose threat after what I listed before, it could be (a) your gear or (b) DPS going bonkers with AOE.

take thunderstruck but don't do the rend thing? thats kinda strange, at that point TS becomes 2 talent points for 6% more cleave and TC damage....

[Prae]

take thunderstruck but don't do the rend thing? thats kinda strange, at that point TS becomes 2 talent points for 6% more cleave and TC damage....

I should have adjusted my mindset more for 5-mans than raiding. With the available (i.e. leftover) points, he would max. Blood and Thunder + Thunderstruck, while keeping Incite to 1/3. 8/2/31 build remains.

[Tengenstein]

okay.......but still "don't do the rend thing"?