V Is For Valor
I know most people won’t care, but I recently read a very nice summary of what the tanking progression should look like. More after the jump.
The nice thing about this guide is that it details what you should aim for at various points in your tanking career. I think I’m at the camp ZG stage, but unfortunately Guild3 is mad slow running ZG and the only tanking piece I have received so far is the Talisman of Protection. There are some insightful bits of wisdom that I wanted to point out.
I personally taunt mobs when running to them, and sunder them twice before taunt holds. I know it says “will not affect the target if its already targeting you”, but what it doesn’t say is “the mob will not attack the rogue who just backstab critted before you got your sunders up.”
Thank goodness. I had a priest try to explain to me once that Taunt does nothing when you are at the top of the aggro list. This is not true. Taunt still forces the mob to attack you for 3 seconds. This is especially important at the beginning of the fight, and typically at certain points near the end when you suspect you might lose aggro and you have little rage. Taunt insures that you will not lose that mob in the next few seconds, and gives you a bit more time to build rage.
Valor as a set is not a tanking set. You shouldnt aim at valor being part of your tanking set, it does not have any of our vital stats +defence and avoiding feats (dodge, parry, block). However, if you should always try to replace your green items etc. with valor.
Velius and I have a joke about how some random hunter sent me a tell saying that “We need to get you in some Valor.” Homey, please. If you’re tanking, really only the upgraded bracers and belt are any good (for the 200 armor bonus and the defense).
You’ve started getting a reputation on your server as a good tank. Priests are cheering at you, rogues bow when you pass them, warlocks are telling their pets about how much damage they can do when you tank without getting killed.
I must have skipped this step =’(.
There are 5 types of magic damage:
Fire - MC/Onyxia/Campfires
Frost - Some Scholomance/WS
Nature - ZG/AQ
Shadow - BWL/Scholo/Strat
Arcane - 1 boss in MC
LOL, campfires???
I once experienced with a dodge/parry build. I said to myself, if i can get 25% dodge and 25% parry, mobs will be insanely weak in MC, they will miss me half the time.
What i didn’t know back then is how priests think. Dodge/Parry at higher levels is not something you want. If you dodge 2-3 attacks, priests start healing everyone else and start paying less attention to you. If then suddenly you get critted twice, you’re dead. What you need is high def, high stamina, and high consistency. You need to be solid, not random.
This kinda stinks since the reason that you would take a protection warrior over a feral druid is that warriors excel in damage avoidance. While defense does push criticals off the table, defense also increases your blocking, parrying, and dodging. In this case, the additional parry and dodge increases must come at the expense of defense, otherwise the tank in question would not be getting crit very often. Damn those lazy priests!
I hope this will help you progress as a tank. It’s not easy to be one, you will need to farm for hours, you will need a good guild, you cannot pvp, our talent trees are not as sexy as arms, you will have allot of repair costs. But you can make or break a raid, you will be the centre of attention, you will have the most important role in a raid. And most of all, you will become an unkillable train that can charge through anything.
Well, so far Rozamystica has the farming, lame pvp ability, and repair costs covered, but I have yet to see any of this stuff about being the center of attention. I’ve gotten a few potions for free, and a shadow resist chest piece (that I have yet to use), but that’s about it. I’m going to make a mad push for Sariana to hit 60 so that I can get love even when I am AFK for 90% of the raid. Priests rock!
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Tags: world of warcraft
By Velius, 10/31/2006 @ 11:06 am
Pffft, all lies, we need to get you into some Valor!