Another stupidly false statement.
Carrying a shield and a one hander in your bags is part of the vanilla warrior experience. While you don’t have to be prot specced to tank most of the lower lever content, you DO need a shield to use most of the stuff in defensive stance.
If you plan on tanking you should be on the lookout for quest rewards that give you shields and one handers. Its not hard to save 2 bag slots for them.
No surprise people were praising my warrior and asking if levelling as prot was too slow, just to be shocked when I say i was fully specced into arms and was just tanking with an old quest green shield.
If you have no wish to to carry a shield, you have no business being a tank and should just stay DPS.
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sorry for the rogues,hunters,warlock who are fresh out of luck on this but no your not farming up more xp per hour than 3 war 2 heal group or spell cleave group. and spell cleave can be run with a hunter/lock puller as well
And you will cry because you are bored in what another week?
That’s… not really true. In the 30’s range (where dungeon cleave takes off due to Windfury), the ONLY skills that require a shield are Shield Block, and Shield Bash. Shield Bash is a clutch interrupt, because you don’t get pummel until after 40, fine.
But a quick macro (/equipslot 17 [Shield Name]; /cast Shield Bash /equipslot 16 [2-Hander Name]) solves that–I don’t even bother equipping a onehand because it’s unnecessary for the shield bash itself–and then its back to 2-hand for me.
Shield block is a huge rage drain, for minimal damage mitigation, and frankly, with a 2-hander, you’re effectively running 4 DPS and things are dying too fast to matter anyway.
The other core threat skills, Sunder/HS/Revenge? All can be done with 2 hander equipped, no sword and board required.
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Couldn’t really get more wrong. Blocking prevents the ability to be crit or crushed entirely, which is huge for mitigation, its one of the major strengths of warrior tanking.
Shield block costs 10 range, revenge (which will proc off you blocking) costs 5 rage. heroic strike costs 15. Do the math as a tank. You can reliably keep up mitigation AND contribute threat and damage.
a shield also strait up adds 10% mitigation to the tank before plate, and between 5-15% depending on gearing from then on, and it has its own stats usually meaning much higher total stamina for the tank to buffer for healer mana regen. You can also enchant the shield with a spike to add damage, or with additional stamina.
you also can’t use your mitigation cooldown, shield wall, without one.
So really, if you like taking 5-15% more physical damage per attack outright, having no benefit of block pushing crush and crit off the hit table, and have less total stamina, and be locked out of reliably procking revenge, sure - 2h tank as a warrior.
Its beyond suboptimal, and requires overgearing/overleveling the content to be safe.
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Revenge must follow a block, dodge or parry.
It is indeed possible to use a 2H and switch to Defensive stance to Taunt/Revenge. Just having a shield equip does not push crush or crit off the table. That has a lot to do with defense (having a tank equal higher level to the monsters your fighting with help more) , but if you running low level dungeons everyone can be crit or crushed so I don’t believe that is the issue you are having.
Warrior is a versatile class.
You can do a lot with your tool-set that most don’t realize. . . especially when your playing a completely different class.
This is absolutely true. For end game content.
Why would you be tanking something that’s high enough level to crushing blow you in the first place while dungeon leveling?
As for crits, that is true. But again, refer to my point where things are dying too quickly for that to matter–unless you’re literally getting crit back to back to back to back–in which case, that sucks I guess, but an outlier.
FYI, I used to 2-hand off-tank raids in vanilla running a 0/33/18 build. This was more than sufficient to both keep threat, and stay alive, all the way through AQ40, when trash just started hitting like trains on steroids. I stopped playing before Naxx, but I presume that wouldn’t fly on 4 Horseman either.
Having 75% added block chance to the next 2 attacks absolutely does for those 2 attacks, and shield block comes off cooldown fast enough that on bosses its “always up” if you want.
blocking removes crit and crush from the total hit table, something you cant do without a shield. Even when you aren’t using shield block, your chance to eat devastating damage is reduced.
Blocking reduces how much damage you take when you block. This is on top of dodge and parry. This increases your proc chance of revenge, even without using shield block ability.
Between block chance, block value, and armor of shield, the passive mitigation is enormous over a dungeon.
pretending that using a 2 hander and hoping for parries and dodges with zero gear quality to tank is even withing 2 tiers of the same quality as using a shield is again laughable.
I don’t know what kind of modded private server data you’re relying on, but the healers and tanks of vanilla didn’t settle on shields and not letting the DPS tank for “no good reason”.
Why would you be tanking something that’s high enough level to crushing blow you in the first place while dungeon leveling?
Because as a tank, if you are sub-max level for the dungeon, you can and will be crushed. If you plan to finish a dungeon with a tank that isn’t over-leveled for the content, having a shield is pretty important.
It sounds like your entire opinion is based on AOE farming dungeons lower level than you, which is NOT what the op is talking about.
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Thank all the twitch streamers for that.
What level are you in classic? It really sounds to me like you haven’t done too much dungeon running just yet. It is absolutely possible for DPS to tank for the short period mobs are alive before they get cleaved into the ground.
Do I recommend a mage or a rogue tank a boss, or a pack of 5 elites? No. But I’ve had an Enhancement shaman tank the entirety of Cathedral with Rockbiter and Earth Shocks, so there’s that.
I’m a little confused about where you’re getting “what the op is talking about”. Are you OP? Do you know his intentions? Because his gripe was this verbatim:
Seems to me that encapsulates AoE dungeon runs as well. And beyond that, no, you don’t have to massiely over level/outgear dungeons to AoE farm them. I’ve been running Armory for the mail/ravager since level 34, where Herod is level 40. 4 DPS and a Healer. That’s all it takes.
You’re massively overestimating how hard content is, and the requirements needed for clearing them quickly and efficiently.
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On my priest I primarily heal with renew and spend most of my time wanding. Unless things go sideways and we end up with a pat or someone face pulls I rarely have to sit down to drink.
I too have run dungeons that the tank and healer are overgeared/leveled for using sub obtimal comps. That doesn’t mean that its not possible, but you’re again trying to make this arguement about fringe cases and extreme outcomes.
instead of just admitting that tanking with a shield at low levels is an extreme advantage for the group when it comes to approaching it at levels lower than max? Yeah, doing deadmines with a group of level 20-22s is stupid easy and doesn’t really require any skill of tanking. Doing deadmines with a group of 18-19s is a lot harder to pull off, and when you get to cleef swinging wildly at your non-blocking 2h warrior, hes going to drop fast.
TLDR/ELI5 - You’re entire argument relies on over-qualified healers and tanks grouped with skilled/geared/leveled DPS. In a perfect world, it would be great.
For the rest of the people who pug with folks who think mages get summon, and ask why druids aren’t rezzing, shields for warrior and palading tanking are important.
I assumed we are talking about low level dungeons ( SM and under) because the op is lv.40ish ? He is not currently running BRD/UBRS is he?
You only get 2 Blocks from Improved Shield block if you spec into protection. But don’t get me wrong, I fully support 55-58+ is the best time for a Warrior to go Protection.
If you’re talking about dungeons under level 40 it’s because a shield isn’t gonna make a whole ton of difference in how much damage they take.
Also rage generation is based off of damage. At low levels, rage generation is miserable with a 1h, which makes it harder to hold aggro because we can’t do anything.
No Warriors level up as Prot. They level up usually as Arms Warrior. Arms Warriors were tanking on defensive stance… can use 2H sword and swap to shield-1H when overwhelmed. Rage is a problem. But a very good Warrior knows how to STANCE-DANCE. Stance-dancing can be done at higher levels not on low level.
Warrior tanking in BFA is VERY different from Warrior tanking in Classic.
FYI, I used to 2-hand off-tank raids in vanilla running a 0/33/18 build. This was more than sufficient to both keep threat, and stay alive, all the way through AQ40, when trash just started hitting like trains on steroids. I stopped playing before Naxx, but I presume that wouldn’t fly on 4 Horseman either.
Did you miss this bit? Or are you suggesting I was overgeared for end-game content as well during progression runs?
The point I’m trying to get across is that 2 hand tanking is nothing new. It just seems new, because it’s out of the norm from our years in Retail, where a tank throws on a sword and board and spams 1 button to hold threat on the whole room.
In vanilla, 2 hand tanking was a very viable answer to threat management while simultaneously boosting group damage and lowering clear times.
2 hand tanking even end-game content is well documented, with viability falling off only in the very late end-game due to power creep on the part of the mobs.
Can we just stop and chuckle at how far back the goal post is getting here?
- 5-15% less passive physical mitigation (before blocked attacks are considered)
- No blocked attack mitigation at all (~5% increase with no block talents/abilities in hit table space for crit/crush/hits)
- reliance on gear swapping macros to perform your job
- unreliable ability to proc 5 rage threat/damage ability
- Increase reliance on healer mana efficiency
- No ability to mitigate crushing blows or crits (as gear doesn’t have reliable defense until near endgame)
- No stamina boost or shield spike for free AOE damage/threat
- Increase reliance on AOE capable dps coordination
- Only useful for repeatedly doing content most people only want to experience and move past
- Not reliable in pugs
- Causes toxicity
- Healers constantly complain about it on the forums
“but its basically the same”
Did you miss this bit? Or are you suggesting I was overgeared for end-game content as well during progression runs?
Not at all, its just basically you saying you relied on your raids mana pool more, but they could handle it. Not tanking bosses (the ones that are 3 levels higher than you by default and crush) but tanking trash is also a major consideration here, but I mean, “did you miss this bit?”
I was my guilds MT for vanilla. I tanked in a lot of specs, from full prot, and 31/5/15, and others. want to flex your ancient memories some more?
The point I’m trying to get across is that 2 hand tanking is nothing new. It just seems new
It doens’t seem new at all. Scrubs who were undergeared/leveled thought they could do it 15 years ago, and they do again today. People like you who have done things In a cordinated raid environment that are weird and try to apply that to pug dungeons is kinda silly. The law of averages applies here, and telling people to play sub-optimal so that “it works sometimes, but most of the time your healers are leaving your party” is bad advice.
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maybe you dont see it Alliance side but on horde all day its
“LFM SM WAR Cleave Lib have WF”
“LFM SM WAR Cleave ARM have WF”
“LFM SM WAR Cleave Cath have WF”
“LFM ZF WAR Cleave have WF Graves run”
“LFM Mara WAR Cleave have WF”
this is virtually all you will see Horde side and nobody in that group will be traditional sword and board tanking, now this maybe more unique to horde because of shamans making Warrior the 2nd best dps beside mages espeiclly when threat is not an issue. But this is the norm horde side.
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