A decent low level shield - for future reference - is the poison quest right outside of orgrimmar. Its a white item but itll last you till you get some other quest item or instance drop.
I feel here most arguments for 2h tanking is in the mindset of tanks needing to dps. Tha’ts not your role, less dps than the healer or top dps in the group. As long as you hold aggro on the mobs, that’s your 1 main role.
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To be honest this shouldn’t really be an issue. With a good group and a good tank, I don’t have threat issues with my healing at all. The occasional Fade sure, but more often than not I only have to use Fade if the run is going really well and I start throwing out a few Smite’s and get a crit, or forget about Mind Blast’s threat issues and use it. But my healing rarely gets aggro and I usually try to wait until the tank has taken a bit more damage before healing so I can use bigger, more efficient heals. The only exceptions is if they’re just not taking a ton of damage in general I may throw out a smaller heal at 70-75% to get them to full so I can start wanding and not worry about them for a bit. In those situations mana is less of an issue so a lower rank Heal is totally fine.
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It sounds like the OP is overhealing to be ooming so fast.
I prefer 2hander tanks to 1h shield tanks so far at level 38 through sm cath. As long as the war doesn’t use execute, threat is 10 times better and the dungeon goes twice as fast. If he’s using execute outside of boss fights then he’s bad and you’re in trouble.
You are either casting aoe heals because people get tired of waiting on threat or attack too soon or you use an extra heal on the 2h tank doing twice the damage and having all threat due to high damage cleave spam.
My last sm cath run I think I drank 4 times the whole instance on a 2h war tank.
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Looks like healers don’t know about down ranking
Down-ranking doesn’t normally make sense pre-60 because you don’t have enough spellpower to make it worthwhile - your top rank heal is almost invariably your most efficient heal until you’re kitted out at level 60.
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They do when it’s a speed leveling meta. Also the primary threat moves have flat non-scaling threat, so DPS is the only way to bump it up.
Of course, the real problem is that we’re seeing a speed leveling meta developed by pserver pros with years of experience being attempted by newbie tanks who think they’re still playing unfailable dungeons on a retail game where the first tclap will pin it for the whole pull.
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I haven’t tried 2H tanking yet, but I haven’t had any problems holding aggro with sword and board. The one thing that’s I’ve found is I will be rage started if I just spam Sunder Armor. What I’ve done is switch to alternating between Shield Block and Revenge and really only use Sunder on bosses. Those to combined cost 15 rage = the cost of one Sunder. It keeps the same amount of threat, while also prevention tons of damage with block. For big pulls, I still keep block up but spam Demo shout until the number of mobs decreases a bit.
As for PW:S, all I have to say about that is /cancelaura Power Word: Shield is macroed into just about every ability I have since I encountered a priest who insisted on spamming the thing. (And then complain he was OOM after every pull)
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My strategy has been to sword and board everything with non huge pulls. As I approach SM it’ll remain the same. I’ll probably take along classes that can’t do the cleave meta so well. Rogues, druids etc.
I’m here to tank 5 mans in a way that I feel is “proper”. It’s slower sure, but feels more homey and if people complain I’ll just ditch and instantly form another group.
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Never saw a poison quest. 
In fact I don’t think I’ve had any quests that rewarded a shield yet, although I have been doing some low lvl questing in TB to level my 1h and practice using a shield.
My threat has been awesome with a sword and board but this thread made me give 2h tanking a go - just tanked SM cath with the ravager (15 or so mob pulls) and its a whole other level boys. Dont knock it until you try it
Change the groups you go with, or go one step further and just politely excuse yourself from the group.
There is a group of people out there from refail with a completely different mentality about tanking that is so far detached from reality it’s not funny…They will learn in due time but there will be a section of them that get carried forever and a day by epic healers, perpetuating the myths that fuel the stupidity.
Best thing you can do is find a good guild or group to run with regularly.
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you must be new. play a warrior and find out. using a 2h is the best way to generate rage which is vital for maintaining threat. a good tank will switch to a shield when need be, but on trash, by all means when i heal (main healing in classic btw) i 110% endorse my tanks using 2handers and dpsing trash mobs. it makes the dungeon go by faster…
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Tank without aggro = average dps holding a shield.
Sword and board = slowww aggro in an age of impatience
2H = Tank
Really Mr. Forum Genius? Because every time I shield bash a mob casting anything, it interrupts them. It literally does something against casters and prevents the damage entirely. Its also the primary way you get them to move. Secondary is LOS if you can’t run up and bash them on the head with your shield.
Goes to shield bash
Miss
Also, imagine not just using a weapon swap macro for shield bash.
To be brutally honest, if tank holds aggro, i really dont care what he uses.
I have rarely, if ever, seen a shield bash miss. Its so rare its not something I sit around sweating.
Well that makes you a lucky boy. Shield Bash can miss, dodged, or parried. Same with Kick.
Tanks shouldn’t be using 2h weapons IMO. Their defensive stance skills require a 1h/shield for the most part. Plus they get hit so much harder without.
Though I can imagine a warrior weapon swapping mid combat for extra rage…that could be great. Nobody seems to be doing that though.
I am rarely running into 2h tanks even at low levels tbh. 1 dungeon out of like 20 had 1. And it was a distinctly rough run.
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And your point? That it can? So what. I didn’t realize your ego got crushed so easily. All it took was shield block missing apparently.