Considering ProtFollow

Ever since gaming has existed in my life(be it on paper or on a screen) the Paladin is the paragon of good and the holy knight who defends the weak. Nothing says that more than a Prot Pally.

I currently have an 80 Paladin spec'd Ret. I didn't do a lot with her in PvP or rep grinding so she is a pretty average 80. I ended up lucky with a few armors before 3.0 hit (2 Valorous hands/legs, Hateful wrists, and a Sarth25 helm) Also got her a Titansteel Destroyer with Zerk... but rest are Savage Saronite. It's sad but I've run basically no Heroics with her anyhow.

My thought now is, should I dual-spec and hope I can pug as Ret to pick up enough gear to go Prot, or simply level 1-80 as Prot to learn the class and hit 80 with some actual tank gear?

I don't mind the grind too much(plus it's another char to Daily) and it would be a Human vs Draenei so I'd get the rep bonus and Every Man for Himself.

Also any advice on BoA gear(if 1-80 is best) would be awesome. I have Plate Shoulders but no weapons or anything yet.

I agree. I hit 80, grabbed tempered titansteel helm/treads, the titansteel shield, got a few defense enchants, and I was at 536 defense. I've run one heroic, picked up two upgrades, and I'm at 543 defense. Its stressful, because I'm still learning, but its a lot of fun either way! At this point, I don't even switch to ret spec, killing in prot is quicker and more fun.

If you're bound and determined to start at level 1, remember that the Midsummer event lasts until 7/5. That's enough time, possibly, to get a character to 30 and run around doing all the fires.

I think the only one you would not be able to do would be Winterspring, but even that might be doable with hostile furbolgs.

There are so many ways to get gear, I think starting from scratch is overkill. It might take an average quester about 10 days to hit 80 (off the top of my head). Say it takes on average an hour to get a heroic run built and cleared, you should be able to clear a solid 200 heroics at least in the time it would take to go 1-80. Now if you're running dungeons along the way (as prot) and questing as prot, it will be a little slower. Running 200 heroics would definately have you exalted with all factions, probably get you about 850 emblems of heroism, you'd have every useable epic drop from every heroic plus all the blues, plus everything you can buy from the badge vendor.

Starting from scratch just doesn't seem like the best idea to me, but everyone enjoys playing in their own way so it's up to you. I don't think 1-80 is necessary to learn the class though. I made a priest using recruit a friend, dual boxed on my PC and had an RAF partner. From 1-60 my priest was on /follow while I ran us through dungeons on my paladin (was prot at the time). At 60+ I just solo quested as fast as I could, quest stacked and leveled as shadow without touching an instance. At 80 I picked up 2-3 cheap BOE pieces and jumped into heroics as holy (absolutely no experience) and healed them no problem.

That is a good point, I jumped on my mage alt last night and with rested xp, the +10% exp bonus from shoudlers and the +10% exp bonus from the whirligig, and the fire-damage random proc, levelling is crazy good at the moment.

But still, I don't think its worth re-rolling from scratch.

Wanted to update on this.

I tried out real tanking for my first time the other night and it went pretty well up until the one point I told them I didn't feel I was good enough to tank.
H HoS Gauntlet

Up until gauntlet I tanked out all the adds and bosses with no deaths and finishing with full MP every time.
I admit my rotation is hard and more of just hitting what I see lol.

I open with Avenger's Shield, drop Conc, hit Righteous Hammer, Judge Wisdom, Shield Bash, re-do from Conc and repeat until fight over.

When we got to gauntlet however, we had no Priest or Holy Pally, I also Decursive off thinking I'd want as LITTLE addons as possible for less lag/ So when people were getting tagged, I was only cleanser aside Ret pally but I could only do myself and he was not on the ball. Getting aggro was tough since Ret REPEATEDLY dropped Conc immediately and Shield was not up for half the waves. I always managed to keep aggro on me and stay alive but people were getting stomped by laser :/

All in all, I LOVE PROT!!! I wish there was better guides out there(Tankspot is 99% Warrior...) as I am having a lot of trouble finding trinkets/ring... I just bought the Heroism Libram though and that is nice.
Can't wait to try a regular HoL for one trinket :)

*edit* I feel stupid not having given an Armory in case people want to poke at it.
Link Here

Edited, Jun 26th 2009 12:29pm by SarionBelmont

Have you looked at the maintankadin site yet? I haven't visited lately, but that site used to be /the/ go-to resource for paladin tanking.

Welcome to PUG tanking, it will make you bitter and cynical =)