Loading ...Your Role: Maximizing DPS and Minimizing Damage Taken
In case you missed my last post, it illustrated that the threat game is dead. It really is and as a result, we’ve found our way into a whole new world where one of the most defining qualities of a strong tank is gone. How do we approach this brave new world?
Maximizing DPS
In Single Target situations, the need for TPS has been replaced with the need to maximize DPS. In the past, we sported the following rotation:
- SS > Rev > Dev > Dev
Now as a result of our new talent, Sword and Board, instead we have the following Priority System:
- Shield Slam
- Revenge
- Devastate
Which is to say that Shield Slam always takes priority over Revenge and Revenge always takes priority over Devastate.
…or Does it?
Our new found ability to maximize our DPS is all fine and dandy, but it’s important that we don’t forgot our roots. Our personal DPS is important, but it’s still not as important as the Party/Raid’s overall DPS. I’m talking about 5 sunders and this especially applies to bosses. When walking into new bosses come WotLK, you’re going to want to throw the priority system out the window when starting a fight. Don’t use Shield Slam. Don’t use Revenge. 5 Devastates in a row is where you start. I don’t care if Sword and Board procs. Ignore it. Get to 5 sunders then you can be all happy and giddy maximizing your Personal DPS with the priority system.
Which isn’t to say that you should ignore Thunderclap, Demoralizing Shout, Commanding Shout and Shield Block (…or Disarm for that matter) early in a fight. The above represents how to handle the initial use of DPS abilities. As to prioritizing getting to 5 sunders along side your survival abilities that is going to be a judgment call you’re going to have to make based on how hard you feel the boss hits.
The New AOE game
Welcome to the show Warriors, you actually get to play. While you can just /faceroll your way through AOE tanking now, you’ll be doing your healer a grave disservice and may just get yourself killed in the process if you aren’t careful. The proper way to AOE tank is defined by the first 15 seconds of the fight and your approach to it should be minimizing the amount of damage you take while AOE tanking.
How to AOE tank
- Thunder Clap
- Shockwave
- Demoralizing Shout
- Thunder Clap
- Shield Block
You’ll need to use Thunder Clap to ensure that you collect all the mobs around you. It’s simply not worth leading with Shockwave when you could potentially miss a target.
Once you’ve got the gang happily hitting you, take a step back and let Shockwave fire. This will ensure that you hit them all with the cone effect. You’ve also just stunned them all for a few seconds, so no slacking, the clock is ticking.
…takes priority over Thunder Clap not so much because Thunder Clap should in theory still be on cooldown if you’re quick, but more to the point because Thunder Clap can cause Shockwave’s stun to wear off sooner. Ultimately, you need Demo on the mobs to minimize the damage you’ll be taking once the AOE stun wears off.
It’s going to be lit up again and we’ll want to keep using it whenever it is in order to ensure the 20% attack speed reduction debuff never falls off as well as to ensure that our AOEers have no fear of pulling aggro.
Shockwave’s stun should have finally wore off now and you’ll be starting to take the brunt of multiple mobs swinging at you. In order to mitigate this, it’s time to blow Shield Block. It’ll not only reduce the damage you take significantly, but also greatly improve how much damage your Damaging Shield reflects back.
While Shield Block is up, focus on single target DPS with special attention being pain to using Revenge as much as possible if you’ve got points in Improved Revenge. Make sure to spam Thunderclap whenever it’s up and maintain the Demoralizing Shout debuff on all the mobs too.
Once Shield Block has worn off, it’s back to a game of tabbing around that you remember and love from the old days. Utilize Concussion Blow and Disarm to help further reduce the incoming damage of any mobs you identify as especially high damage. Should the pack feature some casters, be sure to pay special attention to them so that you can reflect any spells with Spell Reflect or interrupt any heals with Shield Bash.
Overall, just keep in mind that AOE tanking is about minimizing damage taken. Your threat should be more than adequate as long as your AOErs are actually AOEing. Be sure to cater to any non-AOEers in your party/raid by marking a single target DPS target to focus on. When you aren’t spamming Thunderclap, the marked mob will be the one that your Priority System will be directed at.
Wrap Up
Basically, just remember your role. Yes, you can do a lot more damage now than you could before, but that doesn’t make you a DPSer. You are the tank. So always remember that in any situation, you’re better off maximizing the party/raid’s DPS and minimizing your own damage taken before worrying about anything else like how you sit on the damage meters.
October 24th, 2008 at 8:55 am
Excellent, Vene. I was just pondering earlier at what point one should weave in Demo Shout, and right while they’re all still stunned is a great time to do it.
[Reply]
Arideni reply on October 26, 2008 1:31 pm:
It’s not so much about having the creatures stunned, in my opinion, but having the top two AOE tanking abilities (Thunder Clap & Shockwave) both on cooldown.
Demoralizing Shout has a history of being a pretty low threat ability so it’s good to Clap & Wave beforehand.
[Reply]
October 24th, 2008 at 9:05 am
Really helpful post. I was wondering about high-damage single target situations (i.e. bosses) though. This isn’t really a new problem but, as you well know, threat output and damage taken pull against one another (i.e. if I’m pushing out a lot of threat, I’m not mitigating much damage and vice versa). You seem to suggest starting a boss with 5 devastates, but it seems to me that it would be efficient to have a thunderclap and demo shout up as soon as possible for mitigation. So maybe this is a question for another article (I didn’t see anything about this on the site though, in my cursory investigation), but should a boss rotation be something like devastate x5, tc, demo, dps, or something that weaves in mitigation skills sooner (or something else)?
[Reply]
admin reply on October 24, 2008 9:32 am:
Against especially hard hitting bosses, you’ll want to weave in TC and Demo probably after a Devastate or two. As most times, you’ll be leading a boss with a Misdirect from a Hunter, you can usually go Devastate > TC > Demo > Devastate x4 without fear of anyone pulling aggro.
[Reply]
knagh reply on October 24, 2008 9:34 am:
in the “old” days we used to always have another warrior apply at least the initial thunderclap and demo shout. this allows the main tank to focus on threat (rofl) and survival at the beginning of the pull when things are the most hairy.
[Reply]
knagh reply on October 24, 2008 9:38 am:
also, with the Glyph of Devastate available in the xpac you will only need 3 devastates to get 5 sunder effects!
http://wotlk.wowhead.com/?spell=57155
[Reply]
admin reply on October 24, 2008 9:56 am:
I can’t say that I’m a very huge fan of that as in any long fight, it doesn’t do anything after the first 2 devastates. (same reason, I’m not a fan of the Glyph of Sunder Armor either)
[Reply]
Arideni reply on October 26, 2008 1:34 pm:
I agree. It is a wonderful Glyph to help speed up the application of Sunder Armor, but I unless you run with primarily physical DPS 99% of the time, presuming abundant trash pulls in all dungeons, it really seems like a waste.
I personally wish there were more Glyph choices for the majors. Perhaps we shall see.
Smaken reply on October 24, 2008 2:37 pm:
Better to go with the revenge glyph and stack a free heroic strike on top of every revenge instead of not having to devistate an extra time.
Vs Hard hitting bosses, match gear & moves to the boss. Not every boss hits so hard that you need to drop TC after a dev, some hit hard enough it needs to be your very first move.
Personally, I approach it thusly:
The first time I ever tank a boss, my first concern is putting up the healers-aren’t-good-enough barriers. As in TC, Demo, popping the pocketwatch or whatever.
If my healers didn’t have any problems, I’ll drop TC/Demo to 2nd or third priority.
Given that dps is threat however, keep in mind that armor penitration ups our personal dps and of course, our threat as well. Think of Devistate not as a rogue buff that we apply to the mob but rather as a threat buff that benefits us.
To quote the last paragraph before the AoE stuff:
“As to prioritizing getting to 5 sunders along side your survival abilities that is going to be a judgment call you’re going to have to make based on how hard you feel the boss hits.”
[Reply]
Stormcore reply on October 29, 2008 12:51 pm:
I don’t know about you guys. but now a days i have an abundance of rage when i am fighting a boss. having a free heroic strike to me is a waste of a glyph spot.
I have the increased range on my TC, the Sunder that applies a sunder to a second target, and the cleave that reduces rage cost. i aoe tank great. i spam at the cleave button and the devistate (Devistate is on global cooldown, Cleave is on weapon cooldown) while tab targeting. both are doing agro on two targets at once when i am not using my TC or Shockwave.
October 24th, 2008 at 9:46 am
Great post, I’ve been thinking about that too, The game has changed with the proc’s and i find myself worrying to much about stuff that shouldn’t take priority like dps. Devastate and all our abilities are still threat abilities there is just different scaling now so dps is in the mix for us as well. This does help me to decide how to go about it with another point of view or a supporting one anyway.
[Reply]
October 24th, 2008 at 9:47 am
I was curious if you used the revenge glyph at all and whether you have your macros set so that whenever revenge pops, your free heroic strike is used. It would seem that this would greatly increase threat output. Did you not include it because you considered it as part of the revenge step of the priority system?
otherwise great post as always
[Reply]
October 24th, 2008 at 9:54 am
As I mentioned in this post a while ago:
http://www.tankingtips.com/2008/10/17/level-70-glyphs-making-bad-macros-good/
I do use the Revenge glyph, but I didn’t include the use of Heroic Strike in this article because it is not on the global cooldown. I find that effective HS has always been something to consider outside of our standard threat system for that reason. The standard rule of using HS still applies, if you’ve got over 50 rage (which seems to be constantly now) then use it and keep using it, but it should never take priority over any of Shield Slam, Revenge and Devastate.
[Reply]
October 24th, 2008 at 9:58 am
I have been zipping around with Warbringer for a good 2 weeks now and I find the common trend that Charge+Shield Slam doesn’t always work the way I would expect on a single-mob pull. Most of time it misses or I end up becoming disoriented. I found the best way to start off right on single-mob pulls is with a Thunder Clap just as you approach the target. This lays down the initial threat/debuff and allows you to then follow with your rotation while maintaining a good amount of rage.
Works well in a group of mobs as well. Glyph of Thunder Clap helps, even though 2 yards more doesnt seem like too much, it can make a difference when you are Thunder Clapping mid charge. I always aim for the casters if possible so I know they are in range for the following Shockwave+Demoshout.
[Reply]
Eamo reply on November 3, 2008 10:19 pm:
When you charge you always end up facing the mob, so if you restrain the urge to turn to face them you are facing them anyway. Just rotate your camera around manually (hold down left button). If you hold right to rotate your character too it will first trun them to be facing away from your character.
Also my personal favourite new trick is to pull with shoot, then charge the mob / pack once they get a bit closer. With warbringer that works perfectly and is great when you just want to move a mob away a bit before charging. The mobs will also tend to clump up a little better as they move towards you making it easier to catch them all in that first thunderclap.
[Reply]
October 24th, 2008 at 11:43 am
I don’t understand why you are saying threat is dead. It has become harder for me to stay ahead on the threat meter after the patch. I am using your priorty system above and barely staying ahead. Maybe I generate more threat but so do our dps’ers. The top guys in my guild went from around 950 dps to around 1600 dps. Last night in TK I ended up wearing my Lucky Coin and Autoblocker much of the time to help hold aggro.
I am also a little frustrated that I have to focus my eyes on my tool bar to see when SS and Revenge become available instead of seeing what else is going on.
[Reply]
Meatgazer reply on October 24, 2008 12:29 pm:
I have found that looking at my floating combat text is the best way to pick the next skill that I’m going to use. If I see pop up, I immediately shield slam. If I don’t see it, I revert to pre-3.0.2 tanking, and hit SS every 4th GCD.
Combat text works for revenge and also , for those times where the HS goes off before the revenge (you don’t see ” Fades” right after it).
[Reply]
Meatgazer reply on October 24, 2008 12:31 pm:
Bah HTML tags…
I have found that looking at my floating combat text is the best way to pick the next skill that I’m going to use. If I see “Sword and Board” pop up, I immediately shield slam. If I don’t see it, I revert to pre-3.0.2 tanking, and hit SS every 4th GCD.
Combat text works for revenge and also “Glyph of Revenge”, for those times where the HS goes off before the revenge (you don’t see ”Glyph of Revenge Fades” right after it).
[Reply]
Psy reply on October 26, 2008 10:35 pm:
I usually push 800 to 1000 DPS while tanking, generally. Certain T6 things require a little more discretion, and if I’m worried on a boss I’ll put on more avoidance gear than threat gear, but in a full threat suit chain pulling trash I can easily reach 1000 DPS. I haven’t looked at what that means in terms of TPS, but no one has ever come remotely close to pulling off that, so I figure it’s fine.
What’s your threat set looking like?
[Reply]
Jerova reply on December 23, 2008 12:06 pm:
I agree with meatgazer, turn on your floating text and watch it for what you need to do, I also use dominos or similar rearanging addons to put all of my buttons above my character instead of on the bottom two rows.
[Reply]
October 24th, 2008 at 12:03 pm
Isn’t a revenge or a shield slam more threat than a sunder armor application? While threat really isn’t the same problem it was before, I find that it still is relevant in the opening moments of a fight. Would it not be better to open with a SS instead of 5 devastates to open up the floor for the DPS?
[Reply]
October 24th, 2008 at 12:16 pm
I’ll also argue that threat’s demise may be exaggerated. I haven’t tanked seriously yet in 3.0 to have a firm opinion, but Sunwell geared DPS with out threat dumps (ret pallys, arms warriors) can force tanks to be on top of their game. It’s certainly a lot better than it was, but I think aggressive DPS and slacking or unlucky tanks can still be a serious problem.
[Reply]
October 24th, 2008 at 12:40 pm
On the topic of proper use of abilities, I think you need to come up with a “ten commandments” sort of thing for shockwave. I have the first two:
-Thou shalt not use Shockwave while Shield Block is active. (This one is obvious, stunned mobs can’t hit you so you’re losing out on the mitigation and the increased threat caused by Damage Shield.)
-Thou shalt not use Shockwave (or Conc Blow) on bosses, or really really large single “mini-boss” (generally robots of some fashion) type characters. (The basis for this one is Shockwave and Conc Blow only do damage threat and have no +threat modifer, so rage/threat falls way short of the Three Kings (Dev, Rev, SS).)
You’re much more creative at I am with coming up with these things so I’ll leave the rest up to you Vene. =P
[Reply]
Veneretio reply on October 24, 2008 1:10 pm:
Newest Post: The 2 Commandments of Shockwave… lewl.
Excellent points, Ridlyblade
[Reply]
Sumendis reply on October 24, 2008 3:36 pm:
Can’t say I agree with that 2nd commandment idea there, the threat/rage ratio of conc.blow and shockwave is actually higher than devastate, and they do more of their threat from damage (which we wanna maximise nowadays, right ?). On live wearing t6 tank gear, my devastate hits for maybe 300 max, conc.blow and shockwave both can easily reach 1000, and last time I checked the innate threat of devastate wasn’t 700 not even with 5 sunders.
Obviously devastate can proc SnB, and I’ve seen a discussion about this over at tankspot.com forums, the conclusion being: if your SS is about to come off cooldown anyway, i.e. last global cooldown before SS, then the only benefit of using devastate would be to get your SS at 0 rage cost. But you would use SS anyway, so if rage is plentiful might as well use conc.blow or shockwave and deal more damage. (hope that was somewhat clearly explained :P)
So I wouldn’t see this is as an absolute commandment, it depends on the situation, if you’re rage starved by all means use devastate instead and hope for that SnB proc. But to maximise your dps, concblow and shockwave should be used regularly too, replacing devastates at that specific point in time (just before SS becomes available again).
[Reply]
Ridlyblade reply on October 24, 2008 4:57 pm:
It’s all about procing S&B if even just to make your SS that’s just coming off c/d to be free, that way you can dump all that rage into more Heroic Strikes. Shield Slam is by far our hardest hitting ability (obviously that’s based on gear, but that statement should prove true at least by the time you’re fully T4 geared) so it would stand to reason that our priority to maximize dps would be to prioritize the use of playing whack a mole with our SS button. I’ve had no problems so far with S&B procing damn near constantly and using a combat log mod like Parrot, MSBT, or SCT you can see when you get S&B procs with out hawking your SS hotkey to see when it lights up with a GCD.
Again the line between good and amazing warrior tanks is going to come down to HS management.
[Reply]
Andenthal reply on October 29, 2008 12:24 pm:
There are scenarios when single target tanking where you will get more bang for the buck using Conc Blow (or Shockwave) over Devastate. Here is one such example:
Shield Slam
Revenge (does not proc S&B)
Devastate (does not proc S&B)
At this point Shield Slam will be off cooldown in 1.5 secs regardless of the next Devastate procing S&B. At this point I see you have 5 options; Thunderclap, Demo Shout, Dev, Shockwave, Conc Blow. Obviously if TC or Demo was close to wearing off, you would reapply one or the other. If neither are close to wearing off, that leaves you with Dev, SW, or CB. CB does more threat AND damage than Dev (SW is in the middle - less than CB, but more than Dev). Your next ability after this will be Shield Slam - regardless of any procs or ability usage.
Usage of Heroic Strike should not matter in your primary skill selection. If you can use HS, that means you have tons of rage - therefore does not matter if you use a 17 rage ability or a 9 rage ability. If you can not use HS due to low rage, you will be spamming Dev anyway to hopefully get a free SS.
The only reason to use Devastate in this example would be if there are fewer than 5 Sunders up, or you are hurting for rage. Devastate could proc S&B, and although the cooldown would not matter, the rage saved would be big, plus it’s cheaper than both CB and SW.
If you have plentiful rage, all buffs and debuffs are accounted for - go for the most damage. And sometimes that’s going to be Conc Blow, or Shockwave, even on single targets.
October 24th, 2008 at 3:48 pm
For anyone having threat problems at the start off a boss fight, I recommend using the auto blocker with the lucky coin. Below is a marco I put together (although I’m sure someone somewhere has already done this and posted it) that cast auto blocker, lucky coin, shield block, followed by a shield slam, in one cast. I’ve seen it crit for 8k at times. Also, if you only have one, or none of the trinkets equiped, then it will simply cast shield block if its up followed by shield slam, and if everything is on cooldown or not equipped then it will simply sheild slam. This one is for mouse over use, but it can easily be modified for non mouseover for those that don’t want that. In any case, it’s a great way to get a quick boost of treat regardless of the mob, and it happens so quickly that there’s really no loss in starting your devistates right afterwards.
#show Shield Slam
/use [harm,nodead,equipped:Shields] Gnomeregan Auto-Blocker 600
/use [harm,nodead,equipped:Shields] Coren’s Lucky Coin
/stopcasting
/cast Shield Block
/cast [target=mouseover,exists,harm] Shield Slam; Shield Slam
[Reply]
Tankette reply on October 26, 2008 3:12 pm:
I tried the macro and it works pretty well. It won’t ever trigger the lucky coin though.
[Reply]
October 24th, 2008 at 4:26 pm
I don’t think that 5 straight devastates is an optimal way to start a boss fight (talking from a pure dmg/threat point of view now, obviously in most real situations you’d interweave at least a thunderclap very early on).
I have my doubts that 5 devs would produce enough threat early on, especially if you want your dps to unload early and hard (and if that’s not the goal, then why would you need to fasttrack the 5 sunders anyway…).
I think the reason why our threat is so sky-high now is because SS been buffed a lot, Revenge been buffed insanely, our auto-attacks and thus rage-gen been buffed, but Devastate remains pretty much as before, a bit more damage due to higher AP, but it seems rather underwhelming compared to the other abilities now. I don’t think it needs a buff, it’s a great utility/filler ability that we need, but if I had a SnB proc on a boss fight early on, I would certainly not ignore it.
The old train of thought (before 3.0) was something like this: the earlier you use SS, the sooner it comes off cd and you can use it again. but the later you use it, the more sunders will be on the target and your SS hits harder. I think there was a recommendation over at tankspot.com saying that 2-3 devastates before your first SS as a compromise produces the best lead-in threat.
Nowadays it’s a bit harder to tell imo due to the random element of SnB, so feel free to prove me wrong. Can’t say I have hard facts here, more of a gut feeling really. It also depends on the situation, melee dps aren’t always able to start immediately anyway, they gotta get behind the boss first. Ofc the sunder stack benefits hunters too and they can usually shoot straight away.
[Reply]
Bosephus reply on October 30, 2008 6:51 am:
I agree with the first thing you said. 5 Devastates isn’t the way to start, in my opinion. If revenge procs, hit it. If S&B procs, hit it. 5 devastates is nearly 8 seconds of time where you’re not revenging or slamming. Threat isn’t as much of an issue as pre-3.0, but if you don’t have much threat of a threat lead at all, as in the beginning of the encounter, you can still lose it.
[Reply]
October 24th, 2008 at 6:26 pm
Kinda off topic but if you have a hard time knowing when a ability is up I recommend a mod called “Ghost: Pulse” when a ability is ready right in the middle of your screen you will see a pulse of ability icon telling you it is ready. At first it seem odd but as time goes on you just know its time to hit SB.
[Reply]
October 25th, 2008 at 6:05 pm
Shockwave is less useful than you think for AOE threat, due to the effect of Damage Shield.
It’s significantly more TPS to go Thunder Clap+Shield Block, Demo Shout, gain threat on the primary target (Priority system) until Shield Block fades, then shockwave.
Also, if you SW early you’re getting low rage.
[Reply]
Pullio reply on January 20, 2009 11:34 am:
I agree. This also has the added benefit of giving your healer a chance to catch up if the mobs are stunnable by shockwave. If you blow it at the beginning of a fight when you’re at full health, the healer’s doing nothing for a couple seconds. If however you use the rotation above, and the mobs hit hard but are stunnable, it gives your healer a chance to top off your health and realize you’re going to need some serious healing.
Maybe not such a huge deal once you’re geared to the tits and raiding hard core, but I’ve found it useful in pugs especially where healing’s iffier than a guild run.
I also think you’ll generate more threat with damage shield plus the revenge procs (and therefore SS procs) you get from shield block.
[Reply]
October 26th, 2008 at 6:06 am
Since we’re now looking at a priority situation instead of a rotation, would it make sense to have a macro like:
#showtooltip
/cast Shield Slam, Revenge, Devastate
That would always use the first one it found that was available, no? Maybe add a modifier to specify devastate. Would be a bit of a spam button, but it seems to fit the situation, and would address, to a degree, Tankette’s concern about always watching her bar to see what’s on CD. Anything else could be thrown in as needed, but you could always come back to this and use the best ability that was ready.
I haven’t actually used this yet, btw, but I was thinking about it the other day and this post has got me wanting to try it out.
[Reply]
Arideni reply on October 26, 2008 1:38 pm:
That macro will not work since all three abilities are on the global cooldown.
[Reply]
October 26th, 2008 at 8:36 pm
After reading all this, im seeing the wonderful debates of a new system, im loving it
Charge can miss and leave you behind the target, however it still does it’s job, you have the initial threat, as long as your charge isnt followed by a destro locks SB or mage pyroblast immediately, your still the threat target. use your mouse to spin and SS immediately. For single target, SS to get the threat boost of the top, then i like to start hitting all my dev’s, this part should be treated with care. Useing only Dev, strong dps can pull from you at this point, Dev isnt as high of threat as back to back shadow bolts from a strong warlock. Have taunt ready. One the sunder effects are applied, SS and start dmg mitigation, ThunderClap, DemoShout, Disarm and ConcusiveBlow.
For AOE, TC is AP based, use your BattleShout. Or have another warr use it. It greatly helps TC for aoe Tanking. Once its up, charge, TC, then i take a couple steps back to lead the mobs and Shockwave them. Step back forward and Demoshout, TC again. As they come out ShieldBlock, Trink, or even SheildWall if its a particularly tough pull. (more than 5 mobs) Keep on TC’ing, it has much better dmg than before, and hits all mobs.(more than 5 mobs) The sunder armor glyph is nice here, but if you dont have it, no bid deal really, TC comes up enough to hold multiple mobs as long as your dps is following the dps order. More than enough to hold aggro off healers on the off order mobs. I like to swap off the focus a tad early and start aggro on the second dps order, get a ss or 2 in before the dps even starts it, theres no real need to stay on the focus target till its hp are gone, you either have or you dont. If you have it, its not going any where in the next 3s, so swap and start getting aggro built on mob#2. This is a fav method of mine for staying ahead of these new buffed up dps classes. I could care less about personal DPS, if i do well, fun times, if not, FUN TIMES. As long as your doing your JOB first. I let my dps fall where it will w/o paying any special attention to it. Im a tank, its not a concearn of mine. Build your tank to do dmg and threat, and you’ll be close to the top anyway. High block values on a shield are a particular new focus. This block value adds to your SS dmg, and SS can hit damn hard, and damn often. Dev can refresh your SS, so i focus on SS and Dev. Revenge is still usefull, but it shouldnt outweigh SS procs. Once I have more than enough Boss threat, i like to spam HS and SS together. This is the only time im focusing on dps, and not for my own stats, but to make boss’s die faster. Warriors are now AOE tanks as well, remeber TC isnt what it used to be, use it everytime it comes up, mixed with SS, then Dev.
To be perfectly honest, i dont use Revenge nearly as much as I once did. Dev procs SS refesh enough that I take SS over everything but TC. (if an aoe situation.) I use revenge more on bosses or single target tanking, as spaming dev to get the SS procs isnt as vital. I know this is alot, so sorry for taking so much space. But i’ve found thse methods to never lose a mob, or lets them run to healers. I can honestly say, It’s VERY rare for me to lose threat to dps or heals these days. “All Hail the Warrior.”
[Reply]
mavfin reply on October 26, 2008 9:22 pm:
Don’t forget that revenge can now proc S&B, last I knew, so it’s more important than devastate. I got this driven home to me when I figured out out I could do more DPS soloing in def stance! Took me a bit to figure out why. It was revenge proccing more free shield slams!
[Reply]
megagrogan reply on October 26, 2008 10:14 pm:
not to mention that revenge does a lot more dmg then a devastate too
[Reply]
Madtanker reply on October 27, 2008 2:28 am:
Revenge does do more than dev, and the free SS are nice, but i find that rage isnt an issue for me anymore. And with Dev, i get to SS more often. Also After writing that post, i tanked BM and SH back to back as a 67 tank, and actually got a voice chat applause from the group after SH. No wipes, no deaths, and no level 70’s. I was a little stunned myself. Even witht the scaling tankin 72E bosses as a 67 tank with a 68 healer was just amazing group effort. We did it, but it wasnt easy by no means. And we did have several “very close” calls.
[Reply]
Meatgazer reply on October 27, 2008 9:17 am:
If you’re seeing a difference in the percentage of Sword and Board procs from revenges to devistates, it’s a anomoly. There is no reason not to use revenge before a devistate, unless you don’t have 5 sunders or the sunders are about to fall off.
And if you have the revenge glpyh, your revenge will have even higher threat/DPS, because of the follow up heroic strike.
[Reply]
October 27th, 2008 at 2:24 am
Thats a very usefull macro, Desmurick. Im using almost the same macro, but with added berserker rage (remember u can pop it in any stance now).. comes in handy for pvp. I dont have the SS inside the makro though, i like to trigger it manually after powering up. also there is this trinket that heals 120 hp for every hit your block, if im questing/farming or doing lots of trash mobs on my way to the boss fight, i use that one instead of the autoblocker / corens coin.
Another macro i made is /cast taunt /cast charge / cast taunt. This can be used in either fashion… it will taunt when you are close to a mob or it will charge (and then taunt) if you are not. works like a charm
on another note i noticed huge (and i mean HUGE) differences in threat output depending on the build. to make it short: block value is your friend. be it the damage off your blocked hits or the damage output of your main skills.. i have block value on nearly all my parts and i consider it officially impossible for anyone to steal my agro.
[Reply]
Madtanker reply on October 27, 2008 2:32 am:
Yeah SS is modified by the block value of your shield, so Block value is definatly worth seeking now, makes for MASSIVE shield slams and huge amounts of threat.
[Reply]
October 27th, 2008 at 6:36 am
At the moment on raidbosses this is my starter if I can:
Bloodrage, commanding shout, charge, thunderclap and as soon as possible a demoshout. Also a shieldblock at the start of the fight so you get a less damage and your healers can position themselves better.
I am actually counting on charge to get me behind the boss, and do a quick 180 with my mouse. While in the charge the boss will hit me and then I have 1 swing time to make sure I’m not facing the boss with my back.
This way I have a bit of range on melee. Threat doesn’t seem to be a problem. If a boss is hitting me I see omen on a consistent 1800-2000 tps. Yesterday it was on 3k tps even for a prolonged period of time but I think that had to do with misdirects.
Let your healers know exactly what your’re doing though. Or else you’ll be out of healing range.
[Reply]
October 27th, 2008 at 10:46 am
If I need to push max aoe tps, I perform the following which gives me roughly 1300 tps on each mob.
charge in, gain initial aggro with demo shout
back up, pop thunderclap and shield block
pop recklessness
thunderclap
thunderclap
shockwave when reck is about to fade followed by another thunderclap
damage shield procs will only crit if reck is up so only using aoe threat abilities maximizes this.
napkin math on 1000 sbv. (will be full of errors but logically correct)
shield block, 1700 sbv. d-shield damage per hit = 340
constant crit from reck = 680
x2.07 threat mod = 1408
assume attack speed of 2.0 thats 700 tps from just damage shield!
[Reply]
Yggdrasil reply on October 29, 2008 9:23 am:
While I find the math here very interesting, I have to disagree on Damage Shield only critting with the use of Recklessness. I have yet to use Reck since the patch (bad me!) and I have observed critical damage from damage shield on numerous occassions, in floating combat text, in-game combat logs, and Recount DPS breakdowns.
In fact, from what I have observed, it seems to follow the normal melee crit rate. Of course, I could be mistaken, or I could be misunderstanding what is essentially a minor point in your post.
[Reply]
Meatgazer reply on October 29, 2008 12:29 pm:
While I have not tested it myself, I think he means that all damage shield procs will be crits. This is epic if it’s true.
I wouldn’t focus on that, though. It seems like it’s counter-intuitive for how it works (since Recklessness now makes the next 3 special attacks 100% crit), so it seems to change the way recklessness is ment to work, and makes recklessness more valuable for tanks than for dps. I expect this might be “fixed” in the near future.
[Reply]
October 27th, 2008 at 1:31 pm
In the AOE game, does Cleave have a role, or just not worth the effort?
Also, anyone have a good taunt/mocking blow macro?
[Reply]
Veneretio reply on October 27, 2008 2:12 pm:
What are you looking for the macro to do?
I’d say Cleave does play a factor. I find myself using it to burn off excess rage whenever I’m tanking 2 mobs. That being said, I recommend using it after Devastates and Shield Slams and still opting for free Heroic Strikes after Revenge.
It’s still very possible to rage starve yourself albeit it much more challenging that before.
[Reply]
Agua reply on October 28, 2008 5:45 am:
Just looking for the macro to taunt if available and mocking blow if not. My purpose is simply to have a way to save putting MB in another button somewhere but still take advantage of the fact that it’s available in def stance.
btw, nice video tutorial of AOE tanking on Tankspot. It’s like a whole new game:
http://www.tankspot.com/forums/f64/40972-darksend-s-scourge-farming-aoe-tanking-tutorial.html
[Reply]
October 29th, 2008 at 12:58 pm
As for AOE tanking i personaly think that starting with Shield Block should be the beginning of a rotation. It starts you with the best melee dmg mitigation you have besides shield wall for 10 seconds. this will give you time to get your two other melee dmg reduction abilitys up. TC and Demo shout.
Starting with Shield block doesn’t effect your Global cooldown, so you can start with this and a TC if you have the rage. The new ability for warriors to deal dmg based off of their shield block value when they get hit will help you to deal agro much greater from the start. The Shield block value doubbles when you use this ability and so will the dmg you do to the melee attacking you in the first 10 seconds.
[Reply]
October 30th, 2008 at 10:56 am
Vene> any plan on discussing weapon speed soon? it seems to me that
[Reply]
Veneretio reply on October 30, 2008 11:01 am:
Looks like what you said got cut off, but if you were about to ask about Slow weapons… Now more than ever Fast is far better. In high rage situations, fast is far, far superior. We’re dealing with a lot of high rage situations now making fast the absolute obvious choice.
[Reply]
October 30th, 2008 at 10:59 am
../.. well o.O
with threat being less of an issue, we will probably not need to do as much HS as before. a slower weapon could increase our DPS with higher damage from devastate/revenge. I’ve seen a weapon with tank stats with a speed of 2.50s. it might be designated to another class, I don’t know.
[Reply]
Veneretio reply on October 30, 2008 11:02 am:
Slower won’t increase Revenge damage and in High Rage situations, additional Heroic Strikes will result in more damage than higher damage Devastates.
[Reply]
October 30th, 2008 at 1:46 pm
It’s true that I find myself using HS now more often than defore, thanks to the greater rage generation with this new patch. Thanks for the answer
I guess it wasn’t that obvious for me just yet 
Then I suppose this weapon would be more of a paladin tank weapon, or even a DK if they happen to DW while tanking [which I am not sure].
[Reply]
October 30th, 2008 at 1:50 pm
here is the sword I was talking about: [item]Broken Promise[/item]
[Reply]
Veneretio reply on October 30, 2008 2:12 pm:
Ya, many have been puzzling over that. The reality is that paladins don’t want to have slow tanking weapons either and DKs really want to be tanking with a 2 hander… so the item makes little sense. Different tanks like different flavours though and it may be Blizz wanted to add it for the peeps that enjoy big Devastates… even if it’s an inferior way to play.
p.s. Wowhead links are what work for hovers.
[Reply]
Psy reply on November 5, 2008 11:57 am:
Got proof on “inferior way to play”? My back-of-napkin numbers put the difference low enough that it’d get lost in the noise
[Reply]
Meatgazer reply on November 5, 2008 12:36 pm:
I feel like slow weapons should be better for when you have to keep second on threat. In those situations, you don’t normally get the revenge/HS combo, and you’re relying on devastates for the low rage cost/chance to proc SnB.
November 5th, 2008 at 10:23 am
Considering a group quite equally geared [tanks, dps, healers with same level of gear], where decent warrior tanks should be ranked at in recount charts?
[Reply]
November 5th, 2008 at 11:55 am
If your DPS is all skilled and knows what they’re doing, they should all still be above the tank on boss fights. Trash is variable based on how fast you’re moving, whether you can AOE or single-target, how far ahead of the group the tank is moving, etc.
[Reply]
November 10th, 2008 at 1:09 am
In terms of starting a boss fight, I’ve found it more useful to lead with shield slam and then start dropping devastates instead of starting with a full stack of devastates. While the reduced armor does increase raid dps, leading with SS means dps can get started right away without worrying about a lucky crit getting agro off of me from better geared players. It goes without saying though that the armor reduction needs to be up quick.
[Reply]
December 9th, 2008 at 6:02 pm
May I suggest printer-friendly versions for all of these tips (especially the longer ones), as well as links to tips closely related to each other (such as parts 1,2,3 on maintaining threat for boss-fights)?
[Reply]
admin reply on December 10, 2008 10:03 am:
One day, I do hope to do that, but only 1 massive project am I capable of managing at a time. What massive project am I working on atm? Well you’ll just have to wait and see
[Reply]
rochelle reply on December 10, 2008 10:18 am:
I hope its a giant laser on the moon *crosses fingers*
[Reply]