World of Warcraft → Tanks?

Ok so I've been wanting to start a new tank toon i have played dps all my days of wow until recently i respec'd my pali to a healer and loved it the change up was so much fun!

that got me thinking what is the most fun tanking class and why?

Ps. sorry if there is another thread like this already i couldn't find one!

Konradd

I love being a warrior. I never been a DK tank and Paladin tanking is boring and not fun. Plus, physical > holy. I heard DK's can be somewhat hard or complicated but once you know your class it becomes easy.

Warriors are not an easy class and it takes skill to master it. We have more tanking tools than any other class I know (button pressing).

druids are pretty borning lol. swipe swipe, Faire fire to pull, not much more than that :P

as a new healer i love good warrior tanks above all! but on the same note they seem to fail the most too sad that the class is my favorite and my least favorite in a group. are they really that complicated to play or are most players used to the pali style of just dropping consecrate?

Depends on what you like. Warriors are the most challenging to play of all tanking classes. If you take satisfaction in doing the job the hard way, roll one. If you want easy mode, go with a pally. Druid is in between but closer to warriors in tanking mechanics. DKs are closer to paladins.

What's your definition of fun? Ez mode or you have to work for it?

I love my drood tank because I'm running around heroics with 53k and it's super ez mode tanking. Charge in, mangle/maul macro, swipe/maul macro.

Pally tanks are fairly easy too, except my macros don't seem to work perfectly so the cooldowns of the various 969 abilities don't match up with the macro cooldown. Very powerful tanks with a lot of options.

Warrior tanks I think takes a little more work. You have to thunderclap then group/turn the mobs to set up the shockwave.

No idea about DK tanks.

BTW, think about what you want to do besides tanking. If say you might want to range dps one day then drood is better since you can go boomkin, if u offspec healing one day which type of healing do you like, etc.

tell that to the enhancement shaman that loves stormstriking before i even get a chance to swipe :P

right now i have a mage (range dps) and a pali (healer) i know my mage is easy mode always tops the dmg in every group I'm in. but the pali took me a bit to learn seemed like they were the more complex healers but now that i have it down its a blast. i think i would lean more towards a complex and rewarding tanking class rather than an ez mode tank!

Im lvling my DK as a tank, lvl 72, trash I do D n D, howling blast Plauge Strike and Pestillence. Repeat AOE's when they come up. Single target is easy mode. Just find that DK tanks are fairly squishy and I really hate melee and starting to not play him as much, another reason I have waited so long to make a DK.

What he just said about warriors. We have a lot of tools and I just love tanking as a warrior. We have charge and intercept you can use both (and also at the same time, which is not a good idea). We also have intervene. Mobility anyone?!

Retaliation, Recklessness and Shield Wall. I macro'd all those three in one macro and called it "Big 3" and it shows tooltips for each stance I'm in. God, there's just a lot of things you can do with a warrior. Oh yea, plus you can get some serious threat if you follow the rotation right (the one I made for the most part). Shockwave is freaking awesome, it's, in my honest opinion, one of the best tanking tools in the game.

If you go look at my warrior she's on Kirin Tor, her name is Mie. I glyph'd her for fury (they needed me for 10 man icc heroics as a tank) and her spec is more based for little PvPing and PvEing.

Just three things you have to understand if you roll a warrior. We're complicated, not easy to master (keybind everything you have, macro abilities to master this class is a plus). We don't have healing tools other than Last Stand, Shield Wall and most notably the Enrage Regeneration (which can be glyph'd, too). And lastly... warriors take the most nerf-punishement from Blizzard.

I played a DPS class when I started but also got bored of it, so I dusted off an alt..Currently tanking ICC10/25 on my DK and loving it. Went back and leveled a prot warrior (64 now)through LFD tool, and its awesome. Its definitely an awesome experience. We do have -a lot- of tools at our disposal, more so than a DK. Once he hits 80, I'm not sure which I will consider my main...

so warrior sounds fun just for that fact that everyone says they are so complicated!

as far as keybinds go that the only way i play! seems like a good fit! is it best to lvl in dungeons as a tank or just quest and then switch to tanking at lvl 70 or 80?

Prot is actually a very viable spec to quest with now. Very safe with good killing speed. I personally didn't like to pug dungeons, especially the old ones where I had no clue what to do

I'd say do dungeons so you learn warr tanking from the ground up. Very few things are worse than a dps'er who specs prot for the first time only to get insta ques.

Hit level 15, do dungeons till I think 70 and quest from there. Almost everything pre-Wrath is not worth questing for. Get blacksmithing and minning since your going to be PvE content. Once your 80 and you decide you want to focus majorly on PvE, then drop minning and get JC. If you want to PvP, drop minning and get Engineering. If you want to do both then that's your choice. Blacksmithing is a must-have for warriors thou'. Come next expansion, we'll be heavily relaying on BSing for our gear.

I have had by far the most fun tanking on my warrior. I have tanked on all the classes in current content

Ok so my plan is roll a Orc Warrior and starting at lvl 15 I'll group with my sis who is lvling a priest and get insta que's!!!

totally forgot I had a priest to lvl with!! lol

anyone else with any helpful tanking advice let me know you've all been great so far thanks!!!

Not sure that it's an issue so much below 60, but you will want to make sure you get defense capped if you are running dungeons for any kind of tank. That and hit cap are you top two priorities gearwise.

Also, make sure you have your taunt abilities in places where they are easy to use as you will have dps that let loose early and draw aggro.

I have played a Druid tank, warrior tank (only to 72), and DK tank and so far I have enjoyed the DK tank the most (tanking ICC 10/25 with him now). The Druid tank is boring (though I do enjoy druid healing) and the warrior is complicated and can be tougher to hold aggro in heroics when everything in WotLK seems to be bunch up the mobs and AOE them down as most groups won't give the warrior the few seconds he needs to build enough aggro on multiple mobs. The DK is a nice balance between the two. Makes me miss the days of magisters terrace where you had to CC things or you died.

so my gear priority is gonna be ......

def cap > hit cap > stam > armor ? .......

Since your low level, thunderclap like hell on more than one enemy. When tanking an enemy, make sure you include heroic strikes in your rotation.

Shield Slam is your highest single-target threat ability. You can increase it's output damage with talents inside Protection tree and also Impale which is in Arms. Also, if you Shield Block it will give you 10% Block Value which increases your Shield Slam damage (very nice way to start boss fights with Retaliation or Recklessness!). Revenge is your second highest single (double target with talents) abilities! Use it wisely and after Shield Slam. Devastate is your "last" attack on your list and should be only used when Shield Slam and Revenge are on cool down. Thunder Clap on trash everytime cooldown is up and round the enemies up and Shockwave them thoroughly. Missing one is not okay in most parts (play smart). Shield Wall + Last Stand when your in danger, they're your "oh shit" buttons. Disarming an enemy can also reduce damage. Keep Commanding up and Demo your enemies. On boss fights, Thunder Claps are nice to have only before the effect wears off. It increases time attacks by 10% (20% with talents and 30% increase damage). Note that when you Devastate and you have 3 points in Sword and Board then you have 30% chance (with 3 talents in the talent) to get a free Shield Slam that costs no rage.

Since your starting new. Go deep in protection before anything else! After you get Shockwave, flip back and start working in Arms to get Impale (20% increase damage to all critical strike abilities). You can also get Deep Wounds which helps hold threat.

Just important, when your on a boss, never wait on a next round to hit Shield Slam when you know it's up and you can hit that keystroke. Shield Slam against single-target bosses is incredible, specially when you do Shield Block then Shield Slam right off the bat. It causes high threat!

For mob-control. Thunder-clap every-time it's up. Thunder Clap > Shockwave (or you can use on emergency control) > Shield Slam/Revenge, then Devastate lastly. You can also que-up Cleave which hits 2 targets (3 targets with glyph).

Complicated yet? Hehe. I'm at work so I don't have my Warrior abilities around. I'm trying to remember what I do. I may make a tutorial about tanking.

Stam is more important than hit. You have to get Defense-cap first.

It's as follows:

Defense (540 @ 80), Stamina (stack as much as you can, re-gem for socket bonuses once your around 43K+ health), Hit/Experitise and Avoidence (Parry and Dodge, Block is also a plus) usually come from your bonuses on your equipment. And that's it. Remember to put 3 points in Armored to the Teeth when your around 77-80. Don't get it in the beginning. It doesn't help very much as trying to get Impale in Arms.

That is a ton of info i love it!

I didn't realize warriors had so many abilities for once I'll get to use all 18 keys on my g15 keyboard lol and then some from the sounds of it!!!

I would say that it is easier to macro heroic strike to a couple of your attacks. I have it macro'd to shield slam and revenge personally. It just takes 1 button off the bars that you don't have to click.

Other than that, shield slam is definitely #1 priority, keep your eyes open for S&B procs.

The only button I still click on is Heroic Strike and I don't like that. Can you tell me the macro that your using?

#showtooltip Shield Slam
/cast Shield Slam
/cast Heroic Strike

this is the one that I use for Shield Slam. Just replace "Shield Slam" with the appropriate attack name.

you don't need def till 80(or level 70 heroics). hit is decent but stam is king.

I see. I'm trying to think what other nice abilities I should macro Heroic Strike with otehr than Shield Slam and Revenge. Devastate would be a bad idea but we can have a separate macro for it (if your off tanking, not a good idea to have Devastate + Heroic Strike macro'd). Possibly Thunder Clap and Shockwave would be nice as well. I'm gonna go make a new thread about Macros.

def cap > armor > stam > expertise > hit cap would be more reasonable I suppose. Although I suppose stam is just as good as armor since it will help you get your raid spot in a pug more than armor. expertise is at least twice as good as hit rating until you get 26 and even after that 26 it's still slightly better than hit rating until the cap (which is around 56? more than I've ever had).

to the OP: warrior is the most fun/interactive but it's also easiest to be bad. Paladin/Druid are probably the easiest to play which can be fun in their own way - plus the bonus that they're TRUE hybrid classes.

I would say start with those 2. If you find that you have an excess of rage then add it to another ability. You definitely do not want to macro it to everything and find that you are always out of rage. Best to start with 1 or 2 and add as you see fit.