More Tanking QuestionsFollow

Im slowly getting gear. ever so slowly. Up to 460 and change def. 48% and change avoidance.

My question relates to the purpose of Defense. Why are we getting 490 defense? to become uncrittable? I realise defense also impacts your avoidance but the gear that focuses on avoidance is better for that obviously.

Does resilience work against PvE targets?

Basically my situation is that i have several pieces of gear, some focusing on def, some on avoidance, and lately i have been banking my avoidance gear until i can get my def higher then swap out. I also have about 100 resilience still and that covers 2.46% crits. My Def covers 4.48% totalling 6.94%. Is this accurate? and if so should i start swapping in my avoidance focused gear for my def gear for the time being? I realize that as i get gear, this wont be an issue, but i want to be at the top of my game while im gearing up.

490 defense is for uncrittability. If that's a real word. /shrug.

102.4% avoidance is for uncrushability.

Resilience works on crits, so would count towards your uncrittability. Druids take resilience items because they get more result per rating from resilience, but warriors and paladins get much more benefit towards reaching uncrit status from defense items, so that's a better option for us. That's because the defense raises our block and parry, which druids do not have. Druids only have dodge, so a flat decrease in crit rate from resilience is more useful to them.

Edit: uncrittability should only be spelled 1 way, even if it's not a real word. =P

Edited, Feb 8th 2008 6:38pm by Khal

That's the usual way... first take crits off the table, then play around to bring the avoid + block up to push crushing blows off (as a goal) -- then keep going to taste. Lots of people try to swap out block for avoidance after they reach uncrushable, less MP and threat, more staying power.

+Def items not only contribute to avoidance as well as taking crits off the table, but they tend to be itemized with other stats that are more useful to a tank than +Res items. It can be useful to use +Res to take out crits early, but as you progress further that's likely going to shift over to entirely +Def just from upgrades.

My plans currently are main focus on heroics and the occasional OT in kara farm runs with the guild. That leads me to another question i had that i forgot to ask about. What is the normal requirement for OTing in kara?

ok not to steal the thread. but a guildie warrior over 513 deff. told me taht even with 490 deff mobs in kara and gruuls still crit ya. he also said that warriors need 500+deff to be uncrushable. i'm asumeing thats with sheild block up. but he said he was still getting crushed also. now i know could be inbetween shield block being up but i was wondering with 490 and 102.4 knock them completely off the table like no chance in hell or just kock it so far to the edge that it's few and far inbetween. i always thought since uncritable and uncrushable you couldnt be hit with eather. yet he claims he still does. btw i checked armory he does have 513+deff at the time so shouldnt be crit but could just be a moron.

The above post (punk's)....

Okie. You're mixing up crits and crushing blows. No class needs more than 490 Def to be entirely immune to crits (except from a couple of old-world mobs that have abilities that throw off the table that no one will fight anymore anyway). At 490, a Warrior or Paladin or Druid or etc can not be crit.

102.4 combined avoidance and block will knock crushing blows off the table as well. You can get close to this passively with HUGE gear that very few will ever obtain, but Warriors and Paladins have a secret weapon. Warrior Shield Block adds 75% block (meaning they hardly need any other stats and can focus on getting other important things up) and a Paladin's Holy Shield adds 30% block (meaning we need to stack more than a Warrior does to get there). Holy Shield is more reliable with 8 charges over 10s than Shield Block, and has the trusty backup, Redoubt, which sometimes bridges over the "lag period". With 490 Def, you are passively immune to crits, meaning they WILL NOT happen regardless of circumstances (with the above noted exception that you will never encounter). You can still be crushed when:

1 - HS/SB are down because you didn't re-cast (naughty) or because of the slight bit of lag between when it goes down and you re-cast it.

2 - You get stunned, knocked back, or otherwise incapacitated.

3 - You get hit from behind (where you can't block or parry, effectivly leaving only the mob's Miss% and your Dodge)

4 - You sit down.... (Okay.. technically you get crit if you sit, despite your defense, not crushed -- another exception that shouldn't matter)

Many tanks (esp. Warriors, see further) will say that these stats will not ENTIRELY push crits and crushing blows off the table and cling to the idea that there is a hard-fixed "base chance" that can't be reduced. This is bunk. They may produce a combat log to say otherwise... good. The combat log WILL show one of first 3 above causes of eating one of these hits. Sitting down is hard to show... but jeez, like they couldn't tell. This is a very common thought with Warriors because it's not always easy to keep Shield Block up. It's especially hard against fast attacking bosses (Prince...) Also, they have to re-cast twice as often, giving more chances for a hit during a lag-period. Payoff for being able to stack more STA and other useful starts while we're still working on avoidance+block.

Edited, Feb 9th 2008 12:50am by Losie

Maiden takes good timing, that's all really. Gotta be really careful not to have your GCD up as Holy Shield runs out so you can reapply it right as it's ending or you'll have to wait through the next silence. I haven't quite gotten the hang of it yet, but tanked her a number of times now will little issue. I would advise slightly better gear for her then what the other "first half" bosses require only because of the possibility of being silenced and not having Holy Shield up, but she's really not that bad if you discipline yourself :)

Nope, I generally tank heroics with 4.8k mana.

thanks for all the info guys i just got 70 and i'm curently 496 deff. i need to work on gear alot though wrist is just a lvl 68 of defence to bump me over 490. also only 10k hp 12k armor like 180 or so spell damage.

Rather have it and not need it than need it and not have it. Kara is pugged almost nightly on my server, and you might as well just grab the extra avoidance and defense now then not have it later. If you tell people it's fine to have less, then they will stay there and not build it higher and when that person wants to do kara finally or tank something that has a skull they won't have the stats for it.

It's not a huge jump from 485 to 490 or from 101.6 to 102.4% avoidance, so it's better to just tell people to shoot for that so that they are prepared against ANYthing.

heh, thread is moot now. helped me when i posted it though. almost all my res is gone. i think i got like .91% from it still?

This is very true. While KT said that he was about occasional forays as OT into Kara (which would make the uncrush a necessity) some posters have no interest in raiding.

For those people that would only be interested in heroics, pushing uncrush above all is a disservice. It would actually be better for them, rather than trying to simply achieve uncrush (which is a moot point outside of raids), to maintain uncrit and focus on stats/gear/enchants/gems that would boost stamina and avoidance.

Yes, the latter would probably eventually result in uncrushability as they got more gear but to pursue uncrush for uncrush's sake for someone who's only going to be running heroics is counter-productive.

/snicker