Back to prot at 77. Blizzard wins.Follow

Not to disappoint, but this isn't a "fed up with ret" post. This is all about the glee that is gearing to tank in WotLK.

For a new player on a new realm in TBC, all I ever heard about was how hard it was to gear a tank...any tank...for heroics. I know it was a bit rough for my druid. I recall many, many heroic Mech runs with my hunter trying to get a certain warrior his Sun Eater because it was a "must have". I got my paladin geared for heroics/Kara in about 4 hours (excluding SSO rep grind, of course). I didn't put much stock in the "ease" at that point...WoW was already in "get them through the content before the expansion" mode.

Lately, PUGs in Northrend have been no better than they were in Outland. I didn't have much trouble with my druid...I was well geared to be tanking and the changes to feral itemization very much worked in my favor to stay that way. How would it be for a plate wearer?

Since my guild is short on tanks...woefully so...and my druid, now at 80, is not fairing well in the "new WoW" of "CC is for nubs AY OH EE GOEZ!!" it was time to rethink my plans of holding out until 80 to go back to prot.

For starters, 80%+ of the gear you need to get crit immune for level 80 content is crafted. Tempered Sardonite gear isn't spectacular, but it fills the bill. It's blue...it's got good armor, nice strength (+block value), very decent stamina, and oodles of defense. There is better...no question about that, but for starter gear? Pfffft. Bring it.

I splurged a bit and made a shiny new set of the epic engineering tank goggles. Shoulders, chest, bracers, gloves, legs, boots, and shield are all Sardonite pieces (can't use two of the pieces (legs and gloves?) until 78, but meh). Weapon is the Tempered Sardonite Beatstick (decent damage and fast as hell). Green cloak and one ring, blue neck and second ring (all quest rewards). Trinkets are meh so far. Blacksmithing belt buckle to add a socket to my belt (one glaring omission on the Tempered Sardonite set) and my meta gem is up and running (I went with the +21 stam/+5% block value). Easy.

And the mats for all of this? Two words: Sholazar Basin. Not only did I come away with enough Sardonite and eternals to get my entire set crafted, I wound up with enough leftover Sardonite to donate extra mats to our leading guild BS so he could get to 440 and make me the Titansteel shield for 80. I also wound up with enough Titanium Ore and eternals to make all of the Titansteel I need for the shield, as well as the 8 titanium bars I needed for my goggles.

Bliss.

Ahh...but the kicker still remained. Now a entry heroic/raid tank spec, will it take me another month of grinding to get to 80 because I kill so damn slow? I was a bit concerned until I respecced, equipped my new shinies, and flew out to Dragonblight for a quick "test" (and to level my 1h mace skill...302/385 >.<). First Shield of Righteousness...crit...2864 damage.

Ya, that'll work.

So now, at 77 with defense skill of 383/385, my defense is 497, armor just over 20k, HP just shy of 16k, avoidance (using old macro) of 82% w/Holy Shield. Add 17 defense (for cap of 400/400 at 80), and easily 150+ defense rating from gear I already have in the bank but can't equip yet and I'll be crit immune as soon as my defense skill recaps. Throw in the extra stamina from said gear and base HP increase for 3 levels and I'll be showing up to 80 with a minimum of 19k HP. Not ideal for heroics, but still room to upgrade some gear between now and then.

Baseline test with badly underleveled 1h mace skill at 77 vs. 72 elites had me sitting at 2500-2800 tps (w/ RF, no AW and no Avenger's Shield spam...couldn't afford the mana vs. 1 target with no outside healing).

Blizzard said they wanted tanking to be more fun...I always assumed they were referring exclusively to the actually gameplay mechanics while tanking. I'm glad they included the preparation phase in that as well.

Well done, Blizz.

Pretty sure it's called saronite.

Other than that, I've been struggling to keep my defence rating at the levels I want it to be. I'm sitting on something like 21k health, 22k armour, and still at 492 defence. Got the titansteel shield wall and still way below the defence cap. Not sure how Blizzard really expects me to reach it.

You should not be raiding with less than 540 defense at 80. Ever. Nope, no excuses, ever. You're going to die and take the raid with you.

My tank. He's actually got a little more defense than that (got an epic plate pants drop last night that I haven't enchanted/equipped yet) but defense rating is by far and away your biggest problem. It's very hard to get up there and even harder to keep there as most other epics have less defense than the blues. You need to enchant and gem for defense AS MUCH AS POSSIBlE. This is made easier now that orange gems have defense rating values too, but still.

Your avoidance is going to take a large hit, but it won't matter too much. I can MT Naxx fine at the moment, or so it seems. Once you have the 540, worry about keeping it. Avoidance will come in time.

Edit: AND RUN HALLS OF LIGHTNING NORMAL. Loken drops a trinket with +65 defense rating, and Thaddius in Naxxramas drops a trinket with 87 defense rating. These 2 are your key to avoidance gear later on.

Edited, Dec 2nd 2008 8:56am by Galkaman

I am Prot ATM and I am level 78. My Def is 533 ATM with no Titansteel gear on and I dont have the Trinket from HOL yet. I do not see reaching my Def goal being a problem at 80. For me as well DEF is first followed by STA then everything else will fall in to place. If my Def is in place Heroics will not be an issue and I will be prepared for Naxx also.

If you're always running with the same people and they're OK with it, by all means carry on. Not being crit immune in raid content creates space for a lot of problems that you can't predict. A string of unlucky crits = wipe. That can easily be avoided by spending a couple of hours touring Sholazar Basin and sweet talking your friendly neighborhood blacksmith. I'd rather be crit immune that meet the old standards for uncrushable which for me means putting defense over avoidance until I reach 540.

I haven't been to Wintergrasp for any reason yet (though that will change soon), so thanks for the tip on farming there.

I do have to say that Sholazar Basin is indeed insane as well though. With my new epic flyer and my 20% speed boost from Crusader Aura, I was able to farm for 3 hours last night and got:

240 Saronite Ore
18 Titanium Ore
60 Crystallized Shadow
75 Crystallized Earth
8 Crystallized Water
10 Crystallized Air
15 Crystallized Fire
1 Chalcedony
1 Huge Citrine
1 Scarlet Ruby
1 Monarch Topaz

Not bad for 3 hours of work.

Edited, Dec 2nd 2008 3:37pm by jeromesimina

I hit 78 tonight which enabled me to equip the last couple of pieces of my Tempered Saronite set. I also hit Honored with Wyrmrest Accord which gave me access to the tanking cloak and a very decent 1h sword to start with. At 78 with defense skill capped at 390, my overall defense is 544. I'm still using my Dabiri's Enigma from the Netherstorm quest and a miscellaneous trinket (no tanking stats on it at all) until I get the trinket from HoL. I also still have the Titansteel Shield Wall sitting in the bank waiting for me to gain 2 more levels.

If I add no other gear between now and 80, once I recap my defense I'll be sitting at 554. That gives me a bit of room to swap out some defense for the sake of stamina/avoidance (currently at 93% avoidance w/ Holy Shield).

I ran Halls of Lightning tonight. When I started the run I was level 77 and the crits hurt. I hit 78 shortly after we downed the first boss, equipped my last two Tempered Sardonite pieces and the rest of the run was absolute cake...especially considering I was 78 vs. 81 bosses.