• 1.0 - Introduction
• 2.0 - Talents
• 3.0 - Tanking Mechanics
• 4.0 - Threat Mechanics, gems, enchants
• 5.0 - Gear
• 6.0 - 1-80 Protection Warrior Leveling Guide

1.0 - The Protection Warrior

Protection warriors used to be the defnitive tanks of the World of Warcraft, representing the original meatshields from the old times as well as remaining premier tanks for almost all top raiding guilds. However warriors have been surpassed in situational circumtances by the other tanks: Paladins, Druids, and Death Knights

Still, Warriors represent to many the cutting-edge of meat-shields, and in many ways they are. So if you're looking for the required threat mechanics, gear basics, and everything required to start tanking your first raid, look no further.

PvP as a protection warrior is painful, but can work for guarding areas in the Battlegrounds. See our PvP Warrior guide for info on that game.

Note: This guide is simply intended to provide a general overview of the Protection Warrior. For a more in-depth and highly detailed Warrior resource check out the Killer Guides' Warrior guide, here.

2.0 - Talents

Either or these builds will deliver all the necessary talents and set-up to tank many raid bosses, cutomizing either one should wait until you find your own specific style or find a boss requring some sort of variation.

The first build is pretty much a standard tanking build, the second is intended to generate more threat and assumes better gear. Decide which one you like and run with it, change what you need to change. Differences are in red.

2.1 - Attack Rotation

Note: All values are those with defiance, defensive stance, and other modififers applied

Full Rotation:
Devastate - Devastate - Devastate - Shield Slam - Revenge

Burst Threat Rotation:
Shield Slam - Devastate - Devastate - Devastate - Shield Slam

3.0 - Defensive Ratings/Conversions

• Defense Rating – 2.4 = 1 Defense
• Dodge – 18.9 = 1% Increase
• Parry – 22.4 = 1%
• Block – 7.9 = 1%
• Resilience – 39.4 = 1%
  
  
• Hit – 15.8 = 1%
• Critical – 23.6 = 1%
• Haste – 10.5 = 1%
• Weapon Expertise – 3.9 = 1% lower chance for enemy to dodge/parry
  
  
• Defense – 1 Point = +0.04% Parry, Dodge, block, Miss Chance, -Critical Chance

The reason for aiming for a defense rating of at least 490 is this. Creatures have an effective 5% critical rating, meaning that to effectively remove critical strikes from a level 73 (boss level) monster you need to achieve enough defense to reduce their chance to critically hit you by 5%

490 Defense is the magic number for entirely eliminating critical strikes from the enemies attack pool, thusly making it that much more impossible to be one/two shot by a boss.

3.1 Armor

Armor follows a tricky formula of dimishing returns, eventually leading to the favoritism of dodge, parry, etc. over a straight increase of armor for a warrior. Often times warriors will gain a large amount of evasion stats by around Mount Hyjal, leading to possible miss streaks followed by what seems to be a damage spike.

The bonus of evasion over armor is that by evading you reduce the requirements on everyone healing, leading to them doing less healing and therefore building less threat while you continue to beat on the mob in question.

Druids on the other hand maximise armor due to die bear forms massive increase % and thus are still capable of stacking enough to make them better candidates for specific high-damage boss fights.

Armor Vs. Level 70:

• 10,000 = 48.64%
• 12,000 = 53.20%
• 13,000 = 55.18%
• 14,000 = 57.01%
• 15,000 = 58.69%
• 16,000 = 50.25%
• 20,000 = 65.45%
• 25,000 = 70.31%

3.1 - Avoidance

Avoidance is one of our most helpful tanking attributes due to being capable of significantly reducing healing far below that of armors capabiltiies, allowing for even chunks of time passing without the tank taking a single hit and thusly saving vast amounts of mana over time.

Dodge

Dodge allows you to evade practically frontal melee attacks, including bosses cleaves, whirlwinds, etc. Dodge also can be used to avoid some magic/elemental based attacks but cannot allow you to evade critical strikes or crushing blows. Dodger has been nerfed in 3.2 and now more dodge rating is required for each point of dodge.

Parry

Parry is yet another 100% reduction of a frontal melee attack, and functions much like dodge in the avoidance of elemental and other such special damage/attack types. Additionally, when parry is activated it reduces the attack speed of the next attack by 50%, this also applies to bosses parrying players.

Due to the frequency of boss parries it's almost always beneficial to place all DPS directly behind the boss so as to avoid triggering the capability of parrying.

Miss Chance

Miss chance is when the target misses you, allowing you to force an attacker to miss attacks from all possible directions and applies to nigh all attacks/special attack types possible. The lower your +hit the higher the chance to miss the target as well.

All creatures you encounter will have a base 5% miss chance that is effectively added to your own increase to this factor via defense, creating greater avoidance than stated on the profile menu.

Shield Block

Shield block, much like parry and dodge, is only effective on frontal attacks - yet again shield block effects all physical attacks including ranged strikes however this does not mitigate most special attack types such as elemental.

Shield block allows the player to boost avoidance levels above 100% thus effectively granting the blocking skill priority over any attacks including critical strike/crushing blows. The result is that whenever shield block is active the player can not be hit with crusing blow.

3.2 - The Combat Table, Becoming Uncrushable

Miss:
Dodge:
Parry:
Block:
Critical:
Crushing Blow
Normal Hit:

What this table does is outline the possible resutls of an attempted attack upon a player, namely us - the tank. Now, look at the second chart to get a better understanding of the attack table.

Miss: 0.1 - 5.00 (5%)
Dodge: 5.01 - 20.00 (15%)
Parry: 20.01 - 38.25 (18.25%)
Block: 38.26 - 70.25 (31.99%)
Critical: 70.26 - 80.26 (10%)
Crushing Blow: 80.27 - 90.27 (10%)
Hit: 90.28 - 100 (9.72%)

Obviously this attack table is merely an example, nevertheless it properly illustrates the RNG(Random Number Generator) method of determining attacks sucess, failure, and resulting damage if succesful.

The way that we become uncrushable, a necessary trait for beginning the job of tank in any raid dungeon such as the beginner's Karazhan, is to literally shove crushing blows off the table, removing them from the equation entirely.

How is this done you ask? well let's take a look at one final chart:

Miss: 0.01 - 10.00 (10%)
Dodge: 10.01 - 20.00 (10%)
Parry: 20.01 - 30.00 (10%)
Block: 30.01 - 100.00 (70%)
Critical: 0%
Crushing Blow: 0%
Normal Hit: 0%

How does this work exactly? Well look at the table, by massively increasing the chance to block we successively fill the attack table, forcing the values of critical, crushing blows, and even normal hits off the chart.

However, to truly factor this against level 73 Bosses, as all raid bosses are 3 levels higher than the maximum player level, we'll have to factor for reduced chance of block/parry/dodge against higher levels. An decrease of 2.4% total.

Thusly, to achieve absolute un-crushable nor crittable status we'll require a total of 102.4% mitigation when combining the values of Miss, Dodge, Block, and Parry.

For us warriors we have shield block to boost our block rating massively and thusly make it a far easier to reach mititgation number as oppose to druids who are unable to or paladins who simply have difficulty reaching the magic number.

4.0 - Threat Mechanics

Threat is a number whereby you gain a certain amount for almost every action while in combat, special abilities often have staple threat amounts attachted whereas variable numbers such as white damage/healing can generate everywhere from 1 to 100.

Another factor to holding aggro is the positioning of other players comparable to the current highest aggro holder/hopefully the tank.

Primary Target = 100%
Melee Range Targets = 110%
Ranged Targets = 130%

This means that the tank himself suffers no penalty to threat generation so long as he is target, however melee players beside/nearby him will need to generate whatever his threat value is plus 10% above. This additionally applies to ranged targets at 130% of the tanks threat value.

4.1 - Taunt

What this ability does is not pull aggro for a set duration before releasing the mob, rather it brings your threat levels to an exact equal to whoever is currently holding the mobs attention, meaning that by following up taunt with revenge, shield slam, or a sunder, you solidify your hold on its aggro so long as you continue to output more threat than the other player.

This can be used to your advantage by waiting to taunt until the offending mage, warlock, or hunter has unloaded with all cooldowns and major damage abilities, building up his threat as much as possible within the space of a few seconds.  By taunting immediately afterwards, you effectively gain all of the threat they just built up plus your own after the taunt.

However, taunt does not gain any threat beyond the initial 100% for the tank, meaning that a mage who requires 130% threat to pull aggro will not automatically grant the tank the exact value of threat he has generated, only as much is required to hold aggro.

4.2 - Threat Values

Defensive Stance = 130% (1.3) Threat Multiplier
Defiance = 115% (1.15) Threat Multiplier

Shield Slam = 307
Revenge = 200
Devastate = 176, (119, 134, 148, 162) Improves with each stack of sunder armor
Sunder Armor = 301
Mocking Blow = 290
Heroic Strike = 196
Cleave = 130

Commanding Shout = 68 (Split Between Targets)
Battleshout = 69 (Split Between Targets)
Demoralizing Shout = 56 (Split Between Targets)

Disarm = 104
Hamstring = 181
Whirlwind = 100% of Damage
Execute = 100% of Damage
Thunderclap = 175% of Damage
Spell Reflect = 100% of Damage

4.3 - Stat Goals at 70

Minimum Health = 12,000
Minimum Armor = 12,000 - 13,000
Minimum Dodge/Parry Total = 30% or 15% each
Mininmum Defense = 490

This list is not exhaustive nor does it include anything that I may have missed in my own travels/searching for viable tanking gear, feel free to pick up whatever you feel could equally replace a given piece of gear so long as you reach the numbers above.

4.4 - Gems

• Blue socket -

4.5 Enchantments

Head: Glyph of the Defender
Shoulders: Aldor/Scryer Inscription
Back: Dodge
Chest: Exceptional Health
Wrist: Fortitude
Hands: Superior Agility
Legs: Clefthide Leg Armor OR Nethercleft Leg Armor
Feet: Fortitude OR Boar's Speed
Weapon: Mongoose
Shield: Major Stamina

5.0 Gear List

This is a level 70 gear list and has not been updated for level 80 raids. The list is retained here for those who wish to do Kara level raids or who haven't upgraded to Wrath of the Lich King.

Helm:

[Tankatronic Goggles] - Crafted
[Faceguard of Determination] - (50) Badges of Justice
[Helm of the Stalwart Defender] - Crafted
[Felsteel Helm] - Crafted

Neck:

[Mark of the Ravenguard] - Quest Reward
[Strength of the Untamed] - Reputation Reward
[Steam-hinge Chain of Valor] - Steamvault

Shoulders:

[Fanblade Pauldrons] - Heroic Auchenai Crypts
[Shoulderguards of the Bold] - Shadow Laybrinth
[Warchief's Mantle] - Quest Reward

Back:

[Devilshark Cape] - Steamvault
[Cloak of Eternity] - Crafted
[Burnoose of Shifting Ages] - Black Morass

Chest:

[Vindicator's Hauberk] - Reputation Reward
[Jade-Skull Breastplate] - Mechanar
[Breastplate of the Warbringer] - Quest Reward

Wrist:

[Bracers of the Green Fortress] - Crafted
[Vambraces of Daring] - Heroic Hellfire Ramparts
[Sha'tari Wrought Armguards] - Quest Reward

Hands:

[Felsteel Gloves] - Crafted
[Gauntlets of the Bold] - Steamvault
[Thatia's Self-Correcting Gauntlets] - Arcatraz

Belt:

[Girdle of the Lost Vindicator] - Quest Reward(Aldor Only)
[Girdle of the Immovable] - Heroic Slave Pens
[Sha'tari Vindicator's Waistguard] - Quest Reward

Legs:

[Timewarden's Leggings] - Reputation Reward
[Legguards of the Resolute Defender] - Quest Reward
[Felsteel Leggings] - Crafted

Boots:

[Sha'tari Wrought Greaves] - Quest Reward
[Flesh Beast's Metal Greaves] - Quest Reward
[Bloodguard's Greaves] - Quest Reward
[Red Havoc Boots] - Crafted

Rings:

[Protector's Mark of the Redemption] - Quest Reward
[Wind Trader's Band] - Quest Reward
[Iron Band of the Unbreakable] - Old Hillsbrad

Trinkets:

[Figurine of the Colossus] - Shattered Halls
[Dabiri's Enigma] - Quest Reward
[Darkmoon Card: Vengeance] - Darkmoon Faire Deck
[Argussian Compass] - Heroic Underbog
[Adamantine Figurine] - Shadow Laybrinth
[Regal Protectorate] - Quest Reward

Weapons:

[Grom'tor's Charge] - Quest Reward
[Honor's Call] OR [Warbringer] - Reputation Reward
[The Sun Eater] - Heroic Mechanar

Shield:

[Netherwing Protector's Shield] - Quest Reward
[Aegis of the Sunbird] - Botanica
[Platinum Shield of the Valorous] - Shadow Laybrinth

Ranged Weapon:

[Zerid's Vintage Musket] - Quest Reward
[Scout's Throwing Knives] - Quest Reward

1-80 Warrior Leveling Guide

Protection is a tanking setup, not a leveling setup. You can level with a protection build, if you like pain, but it's not recommended. Now, if what you want to do is get leveled ASAP so that you can eventually become your guild's Main Uldarr Tank, then here's your guide.

Zygor's Guide practically automates the whole 1-80 leveling path, from start to finish, for your Warrior. It's like having an expert contantly looking over your shoulder, helping you every step of the way.

Pick your starting point and the guide automatically updates and advances as you complete quests, sets a waypoint arrow automatically, and includes all of the important quest info and tracks your tasks as you complete them. In addition, you will probably never need to look at your quest log again, much less browse Thottbot. Grab your copy here, or read the review.