Prot Paladin

Protection Paladin

Introduction


So, here is my attempt at a guide for Cataclysm Paladin tanking. Please feel free to let me know if I got anything wrong, or if there is anything I need to change.

To start out - Paladin tanking is awesome! It's a ton of fun, and you have a ton of utility. Many people tend to put on blinders for a set rotation, and forget about all the utility we bring. Hopefully this guide will help you remember some of your other abilities, and that you'll use them to you best potential.

Also, there is no substitue for being prepared. Aside from everything in this guide, please make sure to read up on encounters and watch videos so you know what to expect. Every encounter is different and requires you to do different things. So the more you know, the better off you'll be. Please bug hatman to make his prot pally guide for Cataclysm dungeons

If you are new to tanking, or want a good read on what tanking is all about, please check out the Tao of Tanking. Wirtten by Sceilence. It's a long, but very good post.

Damage Reduction

Here's just a very high level blurb on what damage reduction is.

Mitigation: These are things that reduce the amount that something hits you for.

There are 2 types of mitigation. Armor and Block

• Armor - this will reduce the base damage of physical hits. The more you have, the more the hit is reduced. This is why we wear plate armor since it has the highest armor values. So something might hit a mage for 50k, however it will only hit you for 20k due to armor.
• Block - This reduces a physical hit by 30%.

Avoidance: This makes something hit you for 0 damage (i.e. the damage is completely "avoided")

There are 3 types of avoidance. Dodge, Parry, and Miss.

So, what makes a tank able to take hits is a combination of mitigation and avoidance.

For magic damage, all we have is health to absorb it. Mitigation and avoidance does nothing. This is one of the reasons all tanks get bonus Stamina for picking a tank spec.

Combat Ratings

Here is a listing of all the rating conversions to actual stats. This is for Cataclysm and lvl 85 toons. I shamelessly steal these from Elitist Jerks

1% Dodge = 176.72 Dodge Rating
1% Parry = 176.72 Parry Rating

NOTE - at ~10% Dodge or Parry, 1% = 197 Rating
at ~15% Dodge or Parry, 1% = 208 rating
- This is what Diminishing Returns (DR) does

1 Mastery = 179.28 Mastery Rating = 2.25% Block Chance
1% Block Chance = 88.36 Block Rating
1% Hit (physical) = 120.11 Hit Rating
1% Hit (spell) = 102.45 Hit Rating
1 Expertise = 30.03 Expertise Rating
4 Expertise = Target has 1% less Dodge & 1% less Parry on your attacks
1 Str = 0.27 Parry Rating
Stat priorities/strategies
Paladins have Plate Specialization at lvl 50. For Prot, this is a 5% Stamina increase. As a tank, you will always be wearing plate, so this is more of an FYI

1) Mastery - this is your #1 stat to stack because it gives you more damage reduction relative to dodge/parry once Dodge/Parry are > 10%. If you are wearing tank gear, your Dodge & Parry should be > 10% before even entering heroics. So stack Mastery!

2) Dodge/Parry. Both of these stats are pretty equal, and the 2nd most important thing to have on gear. In order to minimize diminishing returns, follow this basic rule: You want to have the total Parry % to be ~1% more than the total Dodge % on your character sheet when you are fully buffed. This should account for all buffs.

3) Stamina - we are no longer in WotLK. Stacking Stamina just turns you into a mana sponge for the healers, which makes them go oom faster. You really want to focus on reducing damage instead. That being said, Stamina is not a bad thing. So if you have 1 stamina trinket with a good proc, then that is ok. However, I would not recommend 2 stamina trinkets unless you are heading into a magic heavy fight.

4) Expertise and Hit - these stats will come on some gear. I would not recommend gemming or enchanting for it. In fact, I would recommend reforging it for more survivability (i.e. Mastery, Dodge, or Parry - depending on what stats the gear already has). If you find that you are having threat issues, there is probably something else going on that you need to review.


Enchants

Ones listed in () are cheaper alternates.

Head - Earthen Ring rep - Revered

Shoulder - Therazane rep - Exalted (Honored). If you have Inscription, then that one is best.

Back - +250 Armor. Unfortunately, there are no good back enchants. So you'll have to settle for this one.

Chest - +75 Stamina (+55 Stamina)

Bracer - +50 Dodge Rating

Gloves - +65 Mastery Rating (+50 Mastery Rating)

Belt - Get a socket and put a Mastery gem in it

Legs - Drakehide +145 Stamina/+55 Dodge (Twilight +85 Stamina/+45 Agility)

Boots - +50 Mastery Rating (you should have PoJ talent, so you won't need any speed increase enchants)

Weapon - For survivability, Windwalk (Mending). Windwalk is significantly better, but also significantly more expensive. If you want a threat enchant, Landslide or Pyrium Weapon Chain are good options.

Shield - +50 Mastery Rating. This is pretty much your only real option.

Gems

Meta - Austere Shadowpirit Diamond (+81 Stamina/2% more armor) when you are starting out. It edges out the Eternal (+81 Sta/1% Block increase) cut. Once you have approx 50% Block and 35% Avoidance, then the Eternal meta starts to be better. This is generally around when you reach avg ilvl 345 - 350.

Blue - Puissant Dream Emerald (+Mastery/+Sta)
Red - Fine Ember Topaz (+Parry/+Mastery)
Yellow - Fractured Amberjewel (+ Mastery)

As you can see, you are stacking Mastery . Of course, if you really want to stick a pure stamina gem in a blue socket, that is fine too. Neither way will make or break you.

Glyphs

Prime:

- Seal of Truth - Gives you 10 Expertise when using Seal of Truth
- Shield of the Righteous - 10% increase. Good for moar single target threat/damage
- Hammer of the Righteous - 10% increase. Good for moar AoE threat/damage
- Crusader Strike - 5% crit for CS. Decent for single target (i.e. boss) tanking.
- Word of Glory - 10% increase. Decent for your heal. Unfortunately, with patch 4.1 putting in a 20s CD on WoG, the effectiveness of this glyph is pretty much cut in half.

All others are pretty much meh

Major:

- Holy Wrath - Makes it also stun elementals and dragonkin. Very nice since there are a lot of these in Cataclysm.
- Lay on Hands - Reduces CD by 3 mins. LoH is so awesome, so anything you can do to use it more often is good. This is not a required glyph, but I like it personally
- Divine Protection - Makes DP have 0 physical damage reduction, but 40% magic reduction. You should have this ready to go for any magic intensive fights.
- Glyph of Consecration - this will increase the damage that Consecration does. This increases both AoE and single target threat.
- Focus Shield - increases AS by 30%, but removes the bounce (i.e. only hits one target). This is a rock solid glyph for boss tanking as it significantly increases the threat/damage of AS. However, your utility on multiple mobs is significantly reduced. So weigh the pros and cons per your situation. I swap this in for boss fights.
- Other options for the 3rd spot are open. Nothing major out there (yes, a bad pun). All have roughly equal pros and cons, so choose per your preference.

Minor:

- Whatever you want

What Seal to use

Seal of Truth - tons of threat. Plus, 10 Expertise when glyphed. This is your standard tank seal.

Seal of Insight - lower threat/DPS than SoT, but passive self heals are nice. Once you have a solid threat lead (i.e. no one else is above 60% of your threat), then you can swap to this seal for increased survivability. Your DPS may go down, but your survivability will increase. NOTE - this is optional. If you want to stay with SoT for an entire fight, that is fine too. People will argue endlessly one way or another. Just do whichever you feel comfortable with.

Which Blessing to Use

We only have 2 blessings now.

Blessing of Kings - 5% increase in all major stats (i.e. Str, Sta, Int, and Agi) and 65 Resistance to all schools of magic (Fire, Frost, Shadow, Nature, and Arcane). This is identical to a druid's GotW. So if you have a druid in the group, don't use this blessing. They do not stack, and a druid does not have another option. You do - look below

Blessing of Might - 10% AP increase and 326 MP5. No one else has this buff, so plan on using it whenever there is a druid around, or a healer who is having a hard time with mana.

Which Aura to use

Auras are pretty straight forward, but I'll go through them anyway:

Devotion Aura - Armor increase - your standard tank aura

Retribution Aura - Reflective damage (i.e. someone hits you, then they take damage). Only good if you are trying to kill many weak hitting mobs. Otherwise, stick to Devo Aura for more damage mitigation.

Concentration Aura - ignore it

Resistance Aura - 195 Resistance to Fire, Frost, and Shadow. This does not stack with BoK. Use this for any fight with significant Fire, Frost, or Shadow damage. Remember - you can switch auras in the middle of a fight. So if you want resistance for a certain section of a fight, you can do that.

Crusader Aura - 20% mount speed increase. Awesome for when you are mounted. Otherwise, remember to use a different aura for actual combat.

How to pull with uber threat

1) Divine Plea (gives you 3 HP)
2) Inquisition (30% Holy Damage increase - uses your 3 HP, and gets Holy Shield up)
3) Avenging Wrath (20% damage increase)
4) Exorcism (1.5s cast time, which is why it's the first damage ability)
5) Avenger's Shield
6) Judgement
7) By this time, mobs should be in melee position and you can start up your rotation. If they get to you earlier, then skip Judgment.

NOTE - This works great if you want to hit multiple mobs while DPS are CCing. All opening abilities are ranged - yay!

NOTE 2 - This may not be applicable to all pulls. It is only listed to show the maximum initial threat pull sequence. You can always just pull with whatever ability you want and probably be ok. So don't freak out if you don't use this sequence to pull. I only listed it for information.

That being said, when I pull a boss, I'll use this sequence (running to boss after Exo is cast, and without using Judgment). That will put me in melee with the boss when the GCD is up from AS, and I can start into my rotation with maximum threat potential.
Rotations
Your rotation is generally based on building Holy Power to a 3-stack, then using a finisher to consume the built Holy Power.

Holy Power Generators:

Crusader Strike - for single target
Hammer of the Righteouse - for AoE

NOTE - If your attack misses, is dodged, or is parried, then you will not generate Holy Power (as of 4.0.6). So pay attention to your HP generation, and don't blindly do a rotation.

Both of these abilities have a 3s CD, so they can not be spammed. Instead, you just need to fill with other abilities.

Example: CS->Filler->CS->Filler->CS .... now you have 3 HP, and can use a finisher. If one of the CSs miss, then just add another "Filler->CS" step to make sure you get 3 HP.

Holy Power Finishers:

Shield of the Righteous - your DPS finisher (this hits really really hard once Vengeance is stacked up)
Word of Glory - your healing finisher. Remember, this can be used on yourself, or on anyone else. Patch 4.1 put a 20s CD on WoG. So if it's still on CD, then obviously you won't be using this finisher. I highly recommend you get a CD tracking addon so that you can easily know when WoG is on or off CD.
Inquisition - this is your AoE finisher move. It increases your holy damage by 30% for up to 12 seconds. If you pop this at 3 Holy Power, then your Consecration, Hammer of the Righteous, Holy Wrath (to name a few) will hit like trucks!

So now, your "rotation" can be: CS->Filler->CS->Filler->CS->Finisher. Rinse and repeat. Substitute HotR for CS when tanking more than 1 mob.

Patch 4.1 - With this patch, when Grand Crusader procs and you use the Avenger's Shield within 6 seconds, you generate 1 charge of Holy Power. So, if you get additional Holy Power this way, you can use your finishers earlier. This change really moves Paladin tanking away from a "rotation", and more on a proc based management system.

Fillers and their uses:

Judgement - to keep Judgement of the Just up, returns mana, and can proc Sacred Duty
Avenger's Shield - hits hard, interrupts, silences, hits 3 targets (or 1 target for a LOT of damage if glyphed), and generates 1 Holy Power with a Grand Crusader proc.
Holy Wrath - AoE damage + stun to undead, demons, dragonkin and elementals for 3 seconds
Hammer of Wrath - only usable when mob is <20%, but hits like a truck!
Hammer of Justice - stun
Consecration - AoE DoT
Hand spells as appropriate
Anything else you can think of

The key is flexibility to the situation. Paladins have so much utility, and all good tanks utilize the utility as much as possible.
Cooldowns
Patch 4.2 Update - Holy Shield is now our most used CD for physical damage mitigation (useless against magic damage). Note that it increases block amount by 20%, and NOT block chance. So when you block, you will block for 50% (30% base + 20% for Holy Shield). Increase that by 1% if you use the block metagem.

Due to the short CD of 30 seconds, this is a nice ability to use when DP is on CD and you are going to pull a pack of trash mobs.

For boss fights, try to use this on CD, but not when you are using another CD. It will help level out your damage and make you easier to heal.

Holy Shield is also NOT on the GCD, so don't worry about it eating up one of your abilities.

We have 3 major tanking CDs:

1) Guardian of Ancient Kings - 50% damage reduction with 3 min CD. This is your uber CD, and should be used when you know you need a lot of mitigation. Usually used for boss special abilities, or if your healer dies.

2) Ardent Defender - 20% damage reduction with a 3 min CD + cheat death. If you see that you are about to die, pop this. It will literally save your life.

3) Divine Protection - 20% damage reduction on a 1 min CD. Use this as often as you can. The CD is short enough that you should have this up a LOT. For heavy magic damage fights, you may want to glyph this since you have Holy Shield as a nice physical damage mitigation CD.

NOTE - These 3 "major tanking CDs" do not stack additively. So when you stack them, you reduce their effectiveness. If you can avoid stacking, then you are better off. Of course, if you have DP up, and some HUGE damage is incoming...don't hesitate to use GoAK.

Taunts

Taunts no longer miss, so that is a good thing (patch 4.0.1 I think). We have 2 taunts.

Hand of Reckoning - this is a regular taunt. Target the mob you don't have aggro on, and hit this ability to get them to attack you.

Righteous Defense - this can taunt up to 3 mobs off any player. SO it is really nice when you see 3 mobs running to your healer Most tankadins link this ability to healing raid frames (like Grid, VuhDo, or Healbot), and just click on the person they see that has aggro.

One important item that can really help with identifying which mob to taunt is to ensure that you have nameplates active. There are addons that make it even easier like Tidy Plates + Threat Plates. If the name plate is green, you have solid aggro. If it's yellow, you are about to lose aggro. If it's huge and red, someone else has aggro. So click the big red nameplate, and the taunt

Other Abilities/Utility

Righteous Fury - This is the ability that boosts your threat significantly. ALWAYS have this on. You should even go so far as adding some kind of notification in case it's off (I use the Power Auras addon, but there are many options). Forgetting to use RF is the classic noobadin mistake. Don't be a noobadin! Patch 4.1 allows this to persist through death. Yay! So if you don't have it on, you either did a spec change, or manually turned it off.

Lay on Hands - This is such a powerful spell. It heals you to full. If you are about to die, pop this for a full health bar. Or, if you see someone else about to die, use it on them. If anyone ever dies in your raid/party (not including 1-shots) while this is on CD, then you failed to use it properly (or you wanted them to die for whatever reason). A good tank will be watching the health of the raid at all times, and can use this to save people or yourself.

Hand of Protection - Use this to bubble others. If your taunts are on CD, and you need to protect a healer or DPS immediately, this is awesome. However, it only prevents physical damage, so if that person is getting hammered by a caster, don't waste your GCD with this.

Hand of Salvation - If you see someone creeping up on your threat level, toss this on them. It will drop their threat by a good margin, especially if you are well into a boss fight.

Hand of Freedom - If you get stuck or slowed, pop this on yourself so you can keep moving. You can also use this on others. It's a very useful ability, although there are not many PvE situations where you actually use it.

Hand of Sacrifice - Cast this on someone, and you'll take 30% of their damage over 12 seconds (or until you take 100% of your max health). This can be useful for absorbing some tank damage when you are raiding, and not taking a ton of damage. However, you need to be careful and make sure that you don't take so much damage that you'll die

Hammer of Justice - Our 6 second stun. Asof 4.0.6, it no longer works as a spell interrupt to targets immune to stuns (i.e. bosses). Too bad the CD is friggin long. However, this is a great ability to use on trash mobs for damage reduction.

Rebuke - This is our new interrupt on a 10s CD. Finally! We get an interrupt! Yay! Oh, and it's not on the GCD. So you can use it whenever you need it instead of waiting for the GCD to finish. FINALLY!

Divine Plea - This is now an awesome HP generator. It does still return mana, but we don't really have mana issues.

Inquisition - This "Finisher" uses Holy Power, and makes it so that your holy damage is boosted 30% for 4 seconds/Holy Power. Awesome to combine with Divine Plea for opening moves. It is also very useful for boosting AoE damage (since SotR is single target).

Exorcism - This should only be used as a opening move since it has a cast time. Once you have any mobs in melee range, this should be completely ignored.

Cleanse - Removes 1 poison and 1 desease. This is very nice if you want to help out a healer who can't remove one of those. However, make sure that it is critical before you use it. If the disease or poison is not doing much damage, your GCD is better spent on other abilities.

Talents

When you select Prot, you will automatically get:

1) Avenger's Shield - This is your Captain America shield that you throw at bad guys. NOTE - It will NOT hit CC'd targets unless you directly target the CC'd mob. So if you target a mob next to a CC'd mob, then no worries. If you actually target the CC'd mob, then it will hit them. Also, AS silences/interrupts mobs, so it has HUGE utility. Patch 4.1 increases utility even more by granting 1 charge of Holy Power if used within 6 seconds of a Grand Crusader proc. yay!

2) Vengeance - This is your threat generator on raid boss fights. It gives you Attack Power when you take damage. However, on trash and 5-mans, it doesn't really stack up much. It really shines on boss fights.

3) Touched by the Light - +15% Stamina (yay), +8% spell hit (yay - no need for extra hit for spells anymore), 60% of your Str into spell power (yay for threat)

4) Judgements of the Wise - Judgments give you mana (yay, less chance to oom)

5) Mastery - 18% block + 2.25% block per Mastery. This is why you stack Mastery. For all intents and purposes, this is you best damage mitigation point for point.

ok, let's get into the actual talents. Please note that I use the term "floater talent" as something you can pick based on personal perference.

Prot:

Tier 1

Divinity - Increases all healing on you, and by you, by 6%. Yes, this means 12% increase if you Word of Glory yourself. Overall, this is a phenomenal talent and should be maxed out.

Seals of the Pure - Increases Seal damage by 12%. This is a decent threat producer. Floater talent

Eternal Glory - Word of Glory has a 30% chance to not consume HP. With Patch 4.1, this is now....meh. You can WoG yourself (or someone else), then use SotR or Inquisition. You will NOT be able to use WoG again since it will be on CD. NOTE - 15s ICD (Internal Cooldown), so it will not proc more often than every 15s. The ICD is in place so you don't get 3-4 back to back procs. Pure floater talent now.

Tier 2

Judgements of the Just - 20% target attack speed reduction. This is huge damage mitigation, and is a requirement for tanking.

Toughness - 10% armor increase - standard tank talent. Get it!

Imp Hand of Justice - Makes you HoJ CD 40s instead of 60s. This is controversial. For boss fights, this doesn't do too much. However, for trash mobs, this is actually very useful for damage reduction. A stunned target is not doing any damage. This is a floater talent.

Tier 3

Hallowed Ground - Makes your Consecration 40% more damage and 80% cheaper. This is good for AoE packs. However, Consecration is not used very often, so your mileage may vary with this one. I consider this a floater talent.

Sanctuary - Makes you uncrittable, so this is a requirement. It also gives you back some mana when you block or dodge. Helps you from going oom.

Hammer of the Righteous - Required ability. Huge AoE. Note - you have to actually be facing your target and in melee range for this to work. This is a standard of your AoE "rotation".

Wrath of the Lightbringer - Huge threat increase. Get it!

Tier 4

Reckoning - This is a solid single target threat increase. It only affects your target (i.e. does not increase your AoE even if you use AoE abilities). It's not as strong as some of your other threat increasing talents, but still pretty solid. It really shines as a single target threat increase during an AoE pull. I'd call this one a floater talent if you don't have the Windwalk weapon enchant. If you do have Windwalk, then this talent becomes a must have. Since the additional attacks from Reckoning can proc Windwalk.

Shield of the Righteous - This is your primary Holy Power dump for huge threat. Get it!

Grand Crusader - 20% chance for CS or HotR to refresh AS CD. AS is such an awesome ability with tons of utility that I highly recommend this talent. Silencing 3 casters in a group of mobs is significant damage reduction. Also, with Patch 4.1 - if you use the proc within 6 seconds, you generate 1 Holy Power. Yay!

Tier 5

Vindication - 10% damage reduction. hmmmmm. If you have to think about this one, you probably shouldn't be tanking.

Holy Shield - 10% increase Block value. This is required. Get it!

Guarded by the Light - 10% increase to WoG when used on yourself, and WoG grants Holy Shield. Any overhealing creates a bubble, so there is 0 actual over healing. This is a decent talent to boost the effectiveness of your self healing, and allows you to maintain Holy Shield when healing yourself. Of course, you can also opt to just take 1 point in this talent so that WoG grants Holy Shield, but you don't get the overhealing bubble. I'd recommend 1 point as a "must have", and the 2nd point as a floater.

Divine Guardian - 20% raid dmage reduction for 6 seconds. This effects everyone in the raid except you. It is a HUGE amount of damage reduction when used at the proper time. Get this, and use it during any AoE damage to help our your healers.

Tier 6

Sacred Duty - Judgements have a 50% chance to make your next SotR a crit. When Vengeance stacks up, this guarantees that SotR hits like a Mack truck. Very nice ability. Get it.

Shield of the Templar - This is 3 abilities rolled into 1 talent. 1 min CD reduction for wings. yay. 2 min CD reduction for GoAK. yay. DP gives you 3 HP. yay. Get it!

Tier 7

Ardent Defender - 20% damage reduction for 10 seconds. Yay, another damage reduction CD. However, this also has the added bonus that any killing blow will actually heal you for 15% of your max health. Very very powerful when used, but very difficult to time the death blow effect properly.

ok, you have now filled out the Prot tree. Your next points go into the Ret tree. There is absolutely no reason to go into the Holy tree as the talents are not worth the points put in them. Arbiter of the Light and Judgements of the Pure are dwarfed by the DPS increase from Crusade and Rule of Law .

Ret Tree

Tier 1

Eye for an Eye - Magic attacks have a 40% chance to damage the attacker for 30% of the damage. This is a decent passive threat and DPS generator against magic using mobs. It is situational due to its RNG nature and that it only works on mage (or magic-like) abilities. It's a floater talent.

Crusade - a large DPS/threat increase. Get it!

Imp Judgement - 20 ys increased range for judgements. This is decent for hitting a mob at range if your AS is on CD and there is a mob standing far away. However, it is pretty much useless for most boss fight. So, it's situational. Another floater talent. Get either this or Eye for an Eye to get to the next tier.

Tier 2

Guardian's Favor - 2 min CD reduction on HoP and 4s increase duration of HoF. meh. The other 2 talents in this tier are better.

Rule of Law - Increase crit by 15% for CS, HotR, and WoG. This is another good threat increasing talent, and heal increasing talent for when you WoG yourself. A solid talent if you have enough points to spend.

Pursuit of Justice - 15% speed increase and gain HP when Stunned, Feared, or Immobilized. The HP gain is meh. However, the 15% speed increase is the meat of this. It's almost 2x as fast as the boot enchant. With all the movement involved in encounters, I personally believe these are 2 of the best spent talent points. When I don't have this, I feel like I'm moving in slow motion.

gah.....that was long.....


This is my build, based on this article for single target tanking. This build is focused on generating as much single target threat as possible since paladins dont do much of dmg.



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