I mainly pug m+ and have settled in tanking. It’s fun and nice to have lower que times. Can’t decide between prot war and prot pally, though. Both seem great. A big bonus to me is fury as an off spec since I find it very fun.
Thoughts on those two?
Prot Pally is easier.
Prot Warrior is more fun.
EDIT: I’m not implying Warrior is “hard” (it isn’t).
Both get the job just fine, look what the whole class bring you.
Since you said that you enjoy fury too, so that would anwser what class you should go with.
Both are very good right now. Paladins have more utility, but cannot soak physical hits as well, and have much less mobility.
Warriors also come with Spell Reflect, and Rallying Cry, so there’s good options. If you’re strictly Protection on a warrior, Necrolord is a good tanking covenant, though it’s worthless for DPS.
Arguably two of the most fun tanks to play.
Paladin has a lot of tools to deal with missplay from your group which makes them excellt pug tanks for casual keys. They are very squishy in higher keys which raises the skill ceiling a lot higher. They do a ton of damage, but aren’t very mobile.
Warrior is extremely mobile, and has the best physical mitigation in the game. They lack in the magic DR department which means you need to know the type of damage you’re going to take to really excel. That said, the vast majority of damage you take in keys is physical, so warriors deals with a lot of the overall damage really well. It’s the magic and bleeds you need to worry about.
I’ve played both at a decently high level and prefer warrior because it really does feel like a brick wall vs paladin in the majority of situations.
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When you say paladins are squishy in higher keys, how high is higher?
I like the mobility of warrior a lot. Fury is, to me, one of the most fun specs in the game.
I may have to go with the warrior. Having a off spec I really enjoy, fury, and a good PvP spec really counts for a lot.
paladin seems more popular and generally failsafe. warrior is cooler though imo
Currently for M+ tanking, Guardian Druids are the meta. The Druid is both tanky and strong in threat generation.
Protection Warriors are impressive in tankiness. We are about the same as tanky as the Guardian Druids. Just be sure to have WeakAura or TellMeWhen to track the 2 buffs (Shield Block and Ignore Pain) to maximize their uptime.
Our main weakness is threat generation. When advancing to the high keys, those 12k+ big duck DPS can make our lives hard. When struggling, (after Reprisal-enhanced Charge) I open with 2x Revenge on group pulls to keep the aggro on myself.
Protection Paladins are noticeably squishier than us and the Druids. They struggle a bit more than we do when climbing the M+ from +2 to +15. When they get to higher ilevel and have advanced to the high keys, they can shine as a very strong tank. This is because the squishiness becomes less of a problem when both the tank and healer have acquired high-ilevel gear.
Beside having 3 interrupts, Protection Paladins also have strong threat generation and DPS players pulling the aggro is less of a concern.
In conclusion, the majority of tank players would have an easier time climbing the M+ as a Protection Warrior. But Protection Warriors start to struggle once you pass +15 and meet those big duck DPS. Protection Paladins, in comparison, fare better in the high keys, because their strong threat generation allows the big DPS players to open hard earlier.
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