Hello, while I’m not new to classic I have little experience with vanilla warriors and have been wondering about Slam.
I know slam is better for Horde and you’d normally want improved slam if you’re going to use it with the slowest weapon you can get but while leveling as arms should I bother with using slam or just use Mortal Strike and whirlwind primarily?
I’d also like to know how important as a dps using thunderclap is to support my tank, I imagine it’s appreciated but should it be a priority to keep up with 3+ mobs or should I just let a warrior tank handle it if there is one and conserve my rage for damaging abilities.
i’m just gonna come out and say it, slam is a meme 
casting time for a warrior ability? nuh uh
And I would mostly let the tank handle thunderclapping. your rage is better spent on dps
The very short version is don’t use Slam.
There is a very specific use case where at high Rage you can Intercept > Slam > MS. This is worth doing on a mob or Player that could die and you need down now.
For leveling you are basically going to Rend > Sunder to 70% HP and then only Heroic Strike if high Rage. Once you get Whirwind it becomes your top priority and once you get Mortal Strike or Bloodthirst it becomes MS/BT > Whirlwind. Your goal is to have rage to use them on CD every time without waiting or clipping. Basically never use something else if it would clip those abilities or leave you without enough rage. You CAN weave in Sunders and/or Hamstring to try and proc Overpower but never dump a half bar o rage for it, only good to use if at lower rage anyway (talking stance dancing)
Thunderclap is okay damage in cleave fights at low levels. The thing is at low levels Tanks aren’t getting enough rage and depend heavily on Revenge so the debuff isn’t really helpful for that. The damage is okay at low levels though so until you get Whirlwind it would be okay to Rend and Thunderclap.
If the Tank is having a bad time with threat on multiple mobs then don’t Thunderclap. Obviously don’t near any CC either.
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Slam is a raiding ability. It might as well not exist while you’re soloing or doing 5 man dungeons.
Don’t even waste gold training it until you’re 60.
Thank you everyone for taking the time to respond. I do appreciate it.
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The only situation slam is useful in is as 2h fury, as Horde, and youre in danger of ragecapping due to Windfury.
Slam resets your white swingtimer. Its a damage loss in almost every instance. Its only good to burn rage so you dont overcap.
In any situation where youre DW, Heroic Strike is better to use. As Arms, youre better off ragecapping.
Top parsers in SoM played fury slam builds (21/30/0, no bloodthirst) and were competitive with dual wield warriors. Look up Ytal in SoM.
Slam can be a major part of your single-target DPS if you’re not using world buffs and you also happen to have a good two hander.
If you are using world buffs (you probably are on Era, given that they’re still allowed in Era raids) then dual wield with blue weapons is better than using even the best two handers in the game…
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It is kind of curious. Mortal Strike requires 30 rage to use, Improved Slam only requires 15 rage. Meaning you can throw two Slams down for one Mortal Strike, the latter hits harder than one Slam only because of the bonus damage but two Slams? However you can move around using MS so maybe going MS is better for leveling. I’ve done the DPS comparison and they kind of come up the same especially when deep Arms also gives Sweeping Strikes but then again the Enrage 25% damage increase deep into Fury is big too.
Tanks don’t thunderclap it does terrible threat and wastes a gcd where you should be doing sunder/BT/etc, the dps warriors do it.
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Its not just moving slam resets your swing timer so you have less rage generation and fewer autos. The cast timer also gets reset if you get hit by anything, so it can screw your dps if anything hits you.
Like someone else said it can be good in a raid on a patchwerk type boss that never hits you, but there’s not many of those, and mainly only on horde with wf
Slam is good if you are able to manage swing time tech and can consistently line it up with your auto attack confirms.
I do not know why Rend was recommended, its damage is zilch even when talented.
I was curious about this, I thought I remembered reading that Rend is a useless ability for levelling yet it seems like every warrior I see is using it. Was wondering whether something had changed.
Rend is like your most efficient rage attack until you get BT or MS. Its fine until ~40, then its pretty useless at high levels outside of dueling rogues to prevent vanish or w/e
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It’s about timing it right between enemy swings. With Imp Slam it’s doable.
It’s more like until level 20-25 it’s kind of what you will be using because Warriors miss a lot in those first 20-25 levels and there isn’t a lot of green mobs to fight when you’re lower level. Therefore having Rend applied can tick in some damage and keep the damage rolling in while you’re swinging with a 2her. Lot of near death moments have to do with missing a swing or two when enemy needed a few ticks to die.
It becomes less important when your Heroic Strike/Sunder becomes more useful and stack out more damage as well as your swings hitting much harder later on. You also generate more rage the higher level you get due to more damage for more Heroic Strike/Sunder opportunities. Rend is a cheap 10 rage struggle meal plan deal.
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This.
Rend is your highest DPR (Damage Per Rage) ability until 36 or so when you get Whirlwind. Until then the first thing you should get up on mobs you are fighting is a Rend, so levels 4-35.
Beyond this point it becomes something you don’t really use expect in PVP on Rogues as already covered. MS/BT and Whirlwind are better DPR from this point.
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Rend is better damage per rage than mortal strike and whirlwind even at level 60, unless you have really good gear with lots of crit (or if enrage is active).
You just never use it in raids or dungeons because it requires battle stance.
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Yes I think that is true and it has something to do with fight length too, meaning it has to last full duration to get the DPR (obviously 
)
I think the main issue with Rend at higher levels for Arms specifically is that there is probably a better button to press every GCD once you have your full toolkit. My opinion on that anyway
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It’s practically always better to prioritize BT>WW and stay in berserker stance while dumping extra rage into heroic strikes that can’t glance (and/or hamstring if you’re horde and have WF totem; maybe that’s a use if rend procs WF for one cycle instead of hamstring, I haven’t played horde in a while and don’t remember). The damage loss from glances is going to be worse than what you’re gaining from rend, so unless you have so much rage you can heroic strike every mainhand hit and still have enough to do BT/WW on cd you shouldn’t generally be doing other stuff besides shouts and executing.
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