Considering Prot Warrior

Hi everyone!

I accomplished KSM a few days ago and have been considering picking up an alt. Notably one that can tank, as I kinda have both my favorite healer and DPS spec together on my shaman.

So I wanted to hear from everyone about their thoughts about protection warrior. It’s one I don’t see very often as a healer, but I ran a Mist 17 a few days ago with one that was an absolute monster.

Towards the end of 9.0.5 I started dabbling in a few of the tanks. As Vengeance I felt very squishy and struggled with AoE threat. As Prot Pally again I felt like tissue paper, though AoE threat was no issue whatsoever. Bear druid felt like an actual tank, albeit extremely boring (and the shapeshifting and action bar changing really irks me).

So how does Prot Warrior stack up?

And then as a side note, is Kyrian near-mandatory for Prot warrior in keys? I kind of wanted to go Night Fae, since I didn’t have that plate armor collected. And my main is also Kyrian already. I don’t know if any of the covenant legendaries have drastically changed how prot warriors approach keys, as the statistics in subcreation haven’t shifted much (yet).

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The general consensus from top m+ tanks is the following (so far) in S2 for M+:

Guardian Druid>Prot Warrior/DH>Monk>Pala>DK

What sets Guardian druid apart is that has 30 seconds of invulnerability via their leggo which allows pulls no other tank can do… they are also extremely tanky. If playing NF they can call for trees, go into Boomy form and convoke for massive damage. Their downside is that they are boring AF to play and have low Single target dps outside of convoke.

Warrior, on the contrary, is super fun to play. It’s high paced, has a lot of buttons, and is really satisfying to play. The new reprisal legendary has enabled nearly 100% uptime on shield block, which is the best physical mitigation in the game (make sure you craft if on feet). Warrior threat gen and aoe is great, but they lack single target dps (but they’re on par with bear).

Warriors downfall is they have minimal self healing and are weak(er) to magic damage then other tanks. They specialize in mitigating damage vs self healing. As a result, you need to know the types of damage you’re going to take in each scenario and have a strategy planned to cover your weak spots. However, once you understand what mobbs are going to wreck you you can cover with other defensives and healer externals. For this reason, warrior has a higher skill ceiling then other classes.

Spell reflection is a 20% magic DR + reflect on a 25second CD. There are many abilities that are completely nullifyed by spell reflect. For example, Peircing barb from hakkar, Reaping sycthe from the last boss of TOP, and the slam from the last boss of DoS. You can literally mitigate 100% of nearly half of these abilities - and then cover the others with demo shout (20% dr on 45 sec cd), trinket, or wall. You can also reflect tons of mob abilities for big dps. In spires, you can reflect etherdiver casts. Pull -> shockwave -> spell reflect all their casts at once -> enjoy 30k dps on the meters.

So to answer your question, yes, I’d definitely recommend prot warrior. Warrior was the king tank in S4 BfA and lost all the things that made them OP coming into SL. Community perception was they are a trashcan (and they were at the start of SL). Since then, they’ve had multiple tuning passes and have had the introduction of the reprisal leggo which has thrusted them up the M+ tank hierarchy quickly. But they’re still flying under the radar because they were in such a bad spot at the start of SL.

Edit: About the kyrian/NF question.

I play kyrian and the 1 min on spear means it’s up every pull. It accounts for about 10% of my overall damage and is excellent for threat gen.

NF does more damage (if played correctly)) and is on a 1.5min CD, so it’s up for every-other pull or so usually.

Personally, I prefer kyrian because of the shorter CD, comparable dps, and most importantly, phail. Phail is huge and allows you to remove all sorts of nasty dots in m+. Warrior has ton’s of mobility so soulshape is not needed at all.

I’d recommend Kyrian, but NF is a strong alternate. Neither are going to make or break you.

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I appreciate all of this feedback, this is some great information. I’m sure there is a learning curve associated with tanking and learning physical vs magical damage breakdowns, but that actually sounds kind of fun and exciting to learn. In S1 I was hesitant to get into tanking mostly due to the pride affix being so punishing for messed up pulls. I was mostly tanking on my DH, but the AoE threat on it was such a headache for me to figure out and deal with that it kind of put me off to continue playing the class. I’ve never had a max level warrior before, so that’s another fun learning experience to throw into the mix. A lot of the other classes I’ve tried have become a little stale.

Prot is good but boring, that’s the best way to explain it. You sit there face tanking with shield block up and spam revenge/shield slam, if that’s what you want then go for it.

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After playing Vengeance actually face tanking something sounds kind of relaxing and refreshing, simultaneously lol.

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To each their own I guess… but at least you’re face tanking and not running away like half the other tanks…

Playing any class can be boring, but playing it to it’s potential is not. A lot of it will come down to the type of content and difficulty of that content. Warrior excels in many areas and lacks in others, but utilizing all of your utility, intervene +safeguard, etc. is a challange but very rewarding to do correctly.

Bear on the other hand, is boring AF. Thrash, IF, thrash, IF, thash IF.

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Great post!

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Not really. Kyrian’s spear is just somewhat better at tethering mobs than Night Fae’s shock, helping you kite better. If you want to min-max and climb to high keys fast, then Kyrian. If you are just playing for fun, Fae is fine.

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Hateclap makes fantastic points. I’ve been a prot tank for…well I guess forever. I love it obviously.

If you take the time to learn the ins and outs it can be a rewarding experience that holds up to almost all situations. We’re actually very mobile and the amount of things you can spell reflect is very handy, not even including the 20% magic DR. We have a decent dps output as well.

The difference between Kyrian and NF for a prot warrior is small. I went kyrian because it’s handy in keys and has more dps output and rage gen in raids than NF does, but having a stunning effect can be awesome on trash pull in M+.

I’ve found I do a good bit of moving since Reprisal became the go to leggo. Lots of intervenes, leaps and charges. It’s not the spite and kite playstyle of a DH by any means, but it’s definitely more than sit and face tank.

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I prefer Prot Warr. It is just how I am. They do well enough. They can reasonably control mobs and they also have a few defensive CDs.

You can be successful with any covenant and legendary.

I like the Kyrian Spear and the phial in combination with Kleia’s soulbinds is really nice, especially in certain situations.

I am an outlier in terms of using The Wall over Reprisal. I have tried it and just don’t like it. I just have stuck with The Wall for more rage off of Shield Slam and more Shield Wall usage

It is just based on my personal experience and play style.

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Not really, charging in gives you a shield block, then you can sit there for 3 more shield blocks, and usually there is at least 1 more melee in the group because warrior gives the attack power so you don’t have to move for intervene, and as for leap you don’t really have to use that unless you run out of all the other shield block charges you get.

I appreciate the feedback. I’m almost 60, and have been experimenting with all the abilities as I level through Shadowlands. I can definitely see the appeal of Kyrian (and phial is huge for tanks). It’ll be tough to decide between Kyrian and Nightfae, since I like the NF main ability a smidge more.

I just got the Venthyr ability, and I hate how much I enjoy it because it’s SUCH an off-meta choice LOL.

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Thanks for the insight. I have been on the fence about tanking for my raid since we have had one of your tanks sporadically showing up lately, but didn’t want to make the leap to switch from Venthyr just yet.

I’ve wanted to go NF just because I don’t really want to tank M+ just yet until I learn how to efficiently pull mobs and learn routes. That way I could still rank our raids (we are only a norm/heroic guild) and still enjoy M+ as fury.

As a long time main tank, prot is a mess right now.

I play bear, prot pally, prot warrior, and dabble with veng and blood when im bored.

Bear feels really good, lots of counter play and answers. (If you think its boring, youre sitting in bear too much). Pally feels soft, but is fun to play and has answers and lots of interrupts always feels good. Warrior… feels awful. Its clunky and lots of times sitting there with nothing to push. Reprisal is pretty much required (which i admit is half the reason im not enjoying it). But it just doesnt have any answers when things go wrong. Avatar feels underwhelming, thuderclap does too. Rage staved for days with no buttons to push due to devastator play which is by far the less interesting talent in the tree.

Bring back the days for IP and Rev weaving. That was fun. Bring back the days of Unstoppable Force. That was fun. What ever this currently is… is not fun.

(this is all in reference to M+)

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I love saving someone, who should have died, with an intervene. It just makes me feel like I really epitomize prot warrior in those moments. And a well timed rally can also be pretty epic.

I mean i dont disagree that those things can happen… but with how the spec feels right now… you have to use rally for yourself as a cd, and can really afford taking the extra damage from intervene. I mean, i enjoy playing prot, its fun. But the currently iteration is just sub par on most levels.

Although I do disagree with your opinion on how engaging prot is, I do strongly agree that we need to bring back some old talents or spice it up/modify existing ones.

We are going on three expansions now where prot has pretty much been talent locked in all rows except two, and that is pushing it.

I want to see talents like punish, never surrender and heavy repercussions either re worked or replaced to give us some more versatility and choice in our talent tree

Don’t be too quick to give away passive abilities

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Dropping bear form to convoke is fun, but then it’s either continue to kite (which is lame) or get back into bear form and proceed to thrash and IF. It’s really not engaging at all - but to each their own I guess.

I do agree that Avatar feels underwhelming, same with thunderclap - although revenge feels really satifying to press now. We essentially swapped the two. In BfA, thunderclap was the damage and Revenge was supplemental at best. Now, it’s the opposite. If you liked pressing thunderclap then, just put revenge on that button. It feels ever better with BSC and Reprisal, because you absolutely crush damage in AoE pulls.

And if you’re rage starved for days with no buttons to press you’re playing the class wrong, either that or you’re specced/geared and playing wrong. It’s hard to say without seeing your character but I bet there’s some underlying reasons you’re experiencing this. I’m button capped 99% of the time, there’s rarely moments when I don’t have something to press or do.

I do agree that BfA S4 prot was super fun, but it was also completely overpowered and frankly, broken. To say the class feels bad now because it doesn’t stack up to previous iterations that were head and shoulders above the competition at the time isn’t a comparison to lean on. The way the class played - maybe, but it was/would be difficult to continue to tune talent synergy in the state it was.

What types of things does warrior not have an answer for that bear does?

What do they not have what a bear does?

Viability in PVP