Hit after 540?Follow

To make a long story short, my guilds MT is getting married in a couple of weeks and is planning on being out of the loop for at least a few weeks. So I decided to make my secondary spec for my Healadin Deborah, Protection.

I've already had a fair amount of experience with prot as I leveled from 70-80 on my horde paly as prot and she's decently geared for an alt. Well Deb has been collecting some tanking gear over the last 6 months and also is exalted with nearly every faction. So when I was done collecting her gear I had about 25k hp. Not bad for an offset I thought. Crit immune at 540.

I've been running heroics like a mad man attempting to gear her up to fill the roll of MT. Our OT doesn't particularly want the job and I don't blame him. Its hectic especially with a fledgling guild new to raiding.


Well my MT and another member who MTs for a big raiding guild on the server both play warriors. I know there are similarities, but only similarities. Both of them are telling me that after hitting defense cap my next goal should be hit cap. I'm a Draenai so that's something like 228 I believe. But still that seems like a lot of hit to pour into my heroic gear.


My question is this...do I REALLY need to make hit my priority now or should I be focusing more on mitigation and avoidance? I have absolutely NO problems with threat generation. I can pump out a good 4-6k threat and I'm still stuck with the blue Infantry Assault Blade.


So my question is this... is hit really the next goal I'm looking at? As a tank I always saw it as helpful but not a focus. Again I'll be tanking for a group of mostly brand new raiders in a strictly casual raiding guild. We're not looking at high end DPS downing 25 man ulduar. Simply 10 man naxx/os.


What should I be aiming for with my current gear and stats?

http://www.wowarmory.com/character-sheet.xml?r=Nordrassil&n=deborah


~ unbuffed 27.3k hp, 18 expertise (28 /w vengeance glyph), 168 hit (+1% heroic presence), 2214ap

# Dodge: 19.11%
# Parry: 16.27%
# Block: 13.83%

You don't need to really ever consider other stats than this:

1. Get "Def Cap" (The term is a misnomer but it means having a def >540)
2. Stack HP till you are in the range of 27-29k
3. Stack Block Cap'ing stats (Block, Block Value, STR, Parry, Dodge, etc...)
4. Stack Expertise and Hit OR Stack dodge/parry (Depending on what you want)


You have 1 & 2. Block Cap is your goal now. Keep stacking avoidance stuff until, with your Shield up - you have 102+ total avoidance. (The real number is like 102.4 but I don't know/care)

Really threat should never be an issue. As you claim to be in a casual guild, no one is throwing up massive (5 - 6k) DPS. So don't worry about it.

I'm going to have to disagree on the build. From everything I read divine sacrifice is really not meant for a tank. Conviction is also a minimal damage increase. I'd rather take increased seal damage over crit. the 6% increase from crusade would be nice, but again, threat isn't an issue.

Improved hammer of justice for raiding? Why? 5 mans its useful. PvP its useful. Raiding its all but mediocre. I'd rather go for 5% in divinity to make healers lives easier.

As for the holy slanted build why would a tank pick up Healing Light? When are we going to be using holy light or flash of light in a raid?

Last but not least just about every person I've asked or heard has said 1 point in improved judgements is all you need. Anymore is overkill.

Edited, May 15th 2009 3:17pm by ekaterinodar


Not to completely debunk the builds, but I think its inaccurate to say my build is "poor" or "bad". A good percentage of the top paly tanks on my server are using a build similar. Simply because you dislike the style doesnt equate to poor/bad.

Edited, May 15th 2009 3:52pm by ekaterinodar

iHoJ is useful for raiding, especially in 10 mans, because it works as an interrupt as well as a stun. While not entirely reliable, I can rattle off about 12 encounters where a tank, be it MT or OT, could use the ability. Although less of a Naxx utility spell, if you ever start doing Ulduar10 it takes HoJ from a "never use" to an "always on cooldown" level of ability.

D-Sac is useful in a number of OT situations and for 10 mans, even as an MT. Specifically I've used it on XT, which would already be enough to justify 1 point, imo. I also use it on Razorscale P1, Thorim P2, Hodir during Frozen Blows, Saphiron, Malygos, Sarth, 4HM, Heigan, etc., although not always while main tanking.

Divinity, however, is almost a complete waste of talents. For it to "function" it means NOT being topped off, which is a rare occassion in the tanking world. It is only useful in saving your life when the margin by which you survive an attack is the 5% extra healing from any SINGLE heal that did not overheal by the same margin. In other words, if you have 5k HP, receive a (non-Div) heal for 10k, and are immediately hit for 10k, Divinity would have no effect. If you are hit for 14k, Divinity has had no effect. Same when you're hit for 16k. Only when you are hit for between 15 and 15.5k will Divinity matter. If you are ever healed to full it pretty much negates the chance for Divinity to be useful. It's a highly discussed talent, but it's a ret pally talent. Not prot.


On 2/2 iJudg: Yes, 2/2 is a waste. Do you have someplace you would rather put the point? Benediction for it's laughable bonus? Or imp. Might? If you're taking might, you take 2/2 and drop a point from HotC. The fact of the matter is that 1/2 is the minimum you can perform with, but 2/2 provides a serious benefit in a raid setting. No, it doesn't increase your threat while spamming your 969, but it definitely helps with picking up adds in multiple fights across current content. Since the 0/53/18 requires the points into Ret, getting iJudg is not necessarily a bad decision.

As for Healing Light? What would you prefer? None of the other places to put the points provide any tangible benefit. The possible exception is Divine Int, but given our low Int values in the first place, it doesn't produce much at all.

SotP is better than conviction alone. Conviction + Crusade is better than SotP.

And if you have 2/2 SA, chances are you're doing it wrong. It's completely unnecessary. Even Vezax is done with 1/2.

Go to Maintankadin.com and read. There are not many substantial counter arguments to anything loki has pointed out.

-iHoJ is great for anything that can be interupted, more useful in 10mans, but still applicable in 25mans.

-D-Sac is also useful, although can't think of too many spots in naxx where its necessary. If you're doing any 10man Ulduar its extremely beneficial.

-Divinity is useless for prot.

-2/2 judgements doesn't matter as Loki pointed out, the only other place to put it is in benediction, which when running with 1/2 SA seems fine, even tho it really amounts to a minuscule mana savings.

-As to SA, 1/2 is more than enough, especially at your current gear level where you will be taking a lot of damage as your avoidance isn't great.

-Conviction alone is flat better than SotP for tps and dps once you reach naxx25 gear lvls. However, at your gear lvl SotP should be better threat.

As to being hitcapped, its a goal once you have alot more gear. Try to stay around 150 and you'll be fine as you upgrade. Next weapon you get put a titanium wpn chain(+28hit) on it and swap your glove enchant to either +20agi/lw +18stam kit/armsman(+2%threat and +10parry). Also unless a socket bonus is +def or stam it can be ignored imo, socket stam or def/stam gems.

Also try something like this, its basically the same build you had, but without divinity and with 2/2 impBoM, 2/2 PoJ, 2/2 impHoJ, and DS. If you wanted to try 1/2 SA just toss the extra pt into SotP to fill it out.

**fixed link


Edited, May 15th 2009 7:06pm by mahlerite

Just a few questions/comments:

I know it was discussed earlier, but seriously, Divinity is useless? In my, albeit somewhat limited, experience in Ulduar, there's a lot of damage being thrown around. Wouldn't anything that increases the healing you receive and do be beneficial? Maybe it's just cause I'm usually in charge of running around picking up all the adds, and have mostly done 10 man Ulduar, but I don't find myself topped off as much as is being claimed. Now, I wouldn't go out of my way to go 5/5 for this talent, but if you've got points, I don't see why it's not a viable alternative.

I also want to challenge the build that dips into Holy. As has been my experience thus far, there's also a lot of movement in much, if not all, the encounters in Ulduar. Just a few trash pulls and when I was MT for Deconstructor are the only times I can think of where I wasn't moving around. I would think PoJ would be far more appealing to more tanks. Yea, you could use Tuskarr's Vitality, but as I understand it, the speed enchants are only 8%. PoJ is a 15% speed increase, and lets you throw on an extra 7 stamina on your boots. Plus it has the side effect of disarm reduction for ... well ... idk but it's there :P

Lastly I want to ask about Divine Sacrifice: why should a predominately MT pick up this ability? With the high amount of damage going out in Ulduar, when would it be "ok" or a "good thing" for the MT to be increasing the damage they take? Do you tanks with this ability only use it in conjunction with Divine Protection, or do you sometimes use it without? I picked it up in my Ret off spec, but I really have only used it when I could bubble at the same time: in PvP during a big brawl and a couple times in the Hodir fight. Not really trying to be argumentative on this one, or really challenge it, just hoping someone can explain a little better why this ability is so popular for Prots and not just for other specs.

Edited, May 15th 2009 7:38pm by Maulgak

I'm a little partial to using Divine Sacrifice.

From my limited testing of it in Naxx and Ulduar 10 I have come to these conclusions about Divine Sacrifice:

- It's undoubtably a great tool for reducing aoe raid damage
- Using it when your healers aren't expecting it and without Divine Shield will most likely kill you
- Using it as the MT with one of your bubbles will leave you with one less tool for if things go pearshaped in the next two minutes of tanking the encounter (your naked to the next situation that arises unless you have the HoSalv glyph, a quick LoH button or crazy amount of incoming heals)
- Cloth dpsers are usually at max range to the boss. Bosses are usally tanked facing away from the raid meaning that the clothies that will indeed benefit most from Divine Sacrifice's ability may in fact be out of its range
- Using it as the offtank in a situation like those described by Loki can be very beneficial to the raid possibly saving an enrage, wipe or both in the process


Just my 2 copper

Edited: Because I called Loki Losi by mistake >_<

Edited, May 16th 2009 3:55pm by arthoriuss

I've found there are very few spots where i can't use Glyph of HoSalv. I'm almost always waaaayyy out in front of the dps on threat, especially in a Tank&Spank encounter. And most bosses are tauntable if you do end up losing threat for a sec. If you think you might have an issue, I'd suggest a macro that lets your raid know you're using that cd as it really can be beneficial especially when used with an avoidance or mitigation trinket.

If you do decide to use Glyph of HoSalv, replace the judgement one with it as that's the weakest of the 3 you have currently. Exorcism glyph is better threat if you have decent hit rating and boomkin or sp in the raid. But until your dps gets geared you really won't have any threat issues.

As a MT who does run Ulduar 10 and has run Naxx 10/25 etc... Devinity is not useless.

I have a Paly healer on me - that equates to >10% bonus to heals aimed at me. Also - it's shown to be very helpful with other healers.

I see no reason to pass it over. My goal is to Mitigate damage, make my self able to take more damage, and hold threat. Until I am able to get better gear (Out gear) Ulduar - I'll take the increase to being able to take more damage.

A lot of people think of effective health as how much damaged you can take/mitigate adding in all your defenses and cooldowns and stuff - This talent doesn't directly impact that calculation... But it does change your effecitive health. Considering a fixed mana pool and healer - this directly increases what they can heal... I like it.

This is the problem I see with your argument. If the +5% healing received is insignificant than just about every healer talent that increases healing by a small percentage is insignificant. Because obviously the extra healing will only benefit those people dying.


5% healing builds up over time. That's 5% healing the healer didn't have to pour into you. Giving them longer longevity. I don't know about you, but I don't know of many tanks whose health is constantly stuck at full.

Maybe if you're talking about uber geared super raiding guilds sure. But for the average raider I think you're argument doesn't hold much weight.


The point isn't that it'll save you in the nick of time, which seems to be your only consideration. But rather prolong the life of your healer and help them out in high damage encounters.

Edited, May 19th 2009 1:58am by ekaterinodar

The point is not that the 5% healing is "insignificant." The point is that the 5% healing's significance is not worth 5 talent points. Literally, healers get double the effect, along with other talent bonuses to make it even more significant. Currently the most common limit on content is TTL, followed by Enrage timers, and finally, healer mana. Divinity only addresses the least significant of problems, and even then, it's arguable. 5% is not enough to allow healers to "heal less often." You're talking about, at it's largest, hundreds of HP when the scale you're dealing with is into the ten thousands. It is essentially the same reason why Kings is almost universally better than Sanc.

Crit trumps divinity for Holy paladins because it will provide, over the course of a fights, slightly more healing done and ridiculously more mana returns.

If these concepts don't make sense to you, go read up and do more than just napkin math. This isn't "find the area of a circle" anymore. You're looking for the area under the curve.

Something else to consider is that we're not necessarily comparing 51/5/15 against 51/0/18(+2). A 51/17/0(+3) DS/DG build gets Divinity "for free" since those points would be spent on something in that tier to get further down in Prot. My main spec is 51/20/0 right now for Ulduar and OS/25+drake(s), and while all the arguments that have been raised about e.g. overheal are true, and it's probably not "worth" the talent points in terms of its actual return, it's also not a total waste like Divine Strength or Anticipation would be for Holy.