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Leveling a warrior, looking at the trees.
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Post by
Maelwys
So in wishing to level a warrior, I noticed that guides say that Fury is the "hand-down best" option, though I wonder at that. If you look at leveling, what do you need/want?
1) Damage output
2) Survivability (Mitigation and Avoidance)
3) Regen (Rage and Health)
These, in my opinion, are the prime factors. However, in looking at the Fury tree, there isn't a whole lot of the second. Warriors typically rely on bandages for the third, as far as I can see until you hit Lv40 and get Bloodthirst. Until then, you get Blood Craze and Improved Demoralizing Shout. If you look at Arms, you get Deflection. At this point, I looked to Protection. Honestly, I think Protection might be the best leveling tree. The amount of survivability is astounding, and the damage isn't bad, truth be told.
At Level 30:
http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=LZZVIzrMbz
Use the Glyphs of Revenge and Resonating Power or Rapid Charge. You'll take very little damage having excellent mitigation and avoidance, with powerful Revenge hits and stuns, Concussion Blow to help, and have an 11 rage AoE attack that scales well, crits rather often (+15% from talents), and slows attack speed by 20%. Rage generation will be high with blocks, and even Improved Bloodrage if you decide to take it. In addition, no need to look for a decent DPS-spec tank for instances.
At Lv43:
http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=LZZVIzrMfzi0h
Glyph of Blocking is a decent choice. Shield Slam and plate mail by this point. With Shield Slam, you've got another (in addition to Revenge) high damage ability to use and rage reduction on all abilities. Thunder Clap (glyphed) is now at 8 rage.
At Lv60:
http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=LZZVIkrMfzibIzsGo
Things just keep getting better and better. Mitigation and avoidance are awesome, everything below Vitality is simply amazing. Warbringer for overall speed and rage. Devastate gives you another damaging attack. Critical Block is a great passive ability. Sword and Board lets you use your second most damaging ability more often, and for free (lolwut?). Damage Control gives reflected damage from your shield.
My conclusion? Protection will level you faster. I plan on testing this as soon as my internet comes back (lolcomputerlab)
Post by
Sakkura
You seem to forget that in a levelling situation, increasing damage output is one of the best ways to increase survivability. If mobs die faster, they have less time to hit you. This is why prot is definitely not the best levelling spec, particularly before you get to the deeper part of the tree (devastate, sword & board etc.).
Post by
Maelwys
The only problem I see with that theory is that when leveling previous characters (two of them), multi-mob pulls often turn into corpse runs if you don't have a particularly worthy defense or cooldown available. My rogue was the epitome of this, though my druid was easy to level, and found that even with Blind, Evasion, Gouging, and the like, multi-mob pulls were quite the problem.
Don't get me wrong, I see what you're saying. However, if you made a formula like , I'm saying that while damage is lower, the survivability and control are so much higher that it makes up for it and increases overall speed. My best bud, a warrior, said that warrior leveling for him was slow because all he had for healing was bandages and food. This build idea would make eating a thing of the past, completely self-sufficient as long as you're getting enough cloth (usually not a problem). Even then, you'll probably not need to bandage often.
In either case, I'm going to try it from the get-go (when I get a chance) and post back here. I just have to decide on a warrior race for the Horde. All of them seem quite decent in their own way and from what I've heard, none have a game-breaking advantage in pve or pvp at end game.
Post by
235201
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
Sakkura
I levelled my warrior as protection most of the way from 70 to 80, and it's not that I regret it. Just that I know I was going somewhat slower in general. Particularly when quests send you indoor or against caster mobs. If it's outside, you can mount up and gather a crowd of mobs quickly, then AoE them down. That's where prot has its strength, but it just isn't enough to match fury (even at high levels, where prot gets a lot better).
But nobody says you can't level prot if you want to. It's certainly much better now than it has ever been before.
Post by
Lorkin
You gotta remember that you are still wearing mail up until level 40 when you can wear plate. The talents you selected don't really raise your damage output much at all. I've leveled 3 warriors (on 3 different servers) and have gone all 3 ways in terms of leveling specs. Fury wins hands down, especially now that you can get TG.
The early Fury talents boost your damage more so than the other trees. Once you get into your 40's, you get an ability to heals you while you do damage. It just gets better and better as you level. Definately DW and you won't regret it.
As Sakkura said, the best way to avoid damage from mobs is if they are dead. The best way to make them dead is to raise your damage.
Post by
Maelwys
@Khalid: Blood Craze only works when you are critically hit, which doesn't happen often against mobs. Whirlwind and Cleave are good AoE abilities, but to get the effect of AoE damage you need to attack multiple mobs and survive long enough to kill them. Bloodthirst is amazing I imagine, but there's problems with it. 6% of max hp every 5 seconds assumes you use it every cooldown and that you have 3 successful attacks in that window. Now, Whirlwind and Cleave can make that happen, but my above comment still rings true and if you're dual wielding, your hit chance is low to begin with, even with the Precision talent.
Even with Bloodthirst though, it seems like you'd need time to eat to regain health which is one of the keys of leveling as Protection in my eyes, you don't need to eat and save a large amount of time by doing so. I just don't see the speed of leveling as Fury. Even Arms seems faster if you're talking about damage output with the third and fourth tier talents. Improved Overpower, Impale, Deep Wounds, 2H Spec, Taste for Blood are all really powerful damage output talents for that low in the talent tree.
I might just not get warriors x.x
Post by
Victarious
Well, I am a warrior n00b, but I thought I'd weigh in. My first toon was an arms warrior, but I deleted him after level 25 or so. Now that I have actually L2P'd a bit, I wanted to try a warrior tank. So I've been leveling in the Prot tree. I've actually found it to be pretty good. I'm currently sitting at a measly level 18, but taking Imp Thunder Clap, Incite, and 3/5 Shield Spec has given me great survivability. Coupled with the awesome
Glyph of Resonating Power
, Thunder Clap has become a great offensive AND defensive weapon for me. Along with Demoralizing Shout and Rend, I can do some AoE stuff. I have to bandage/potion once in a while, but not often.
One thing is, I'm actually going around in Battle Stance, even with my talents, so I can Charge and Overpower. The nice thing is that if I do want to tank some instances, I can switch to Defensive, and my shield spec will help proc Revenge.
I'm nowhere near as experienced or wise as some, but I've really enjoyed the first few levels, and am very optimistic about the next few. I would definitely recommend prot leveling to anyone. Whatever you decide, have fun with it!
Level 18 build FTW~!
Post by
294128
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
denton
Generally, the verdict on levelling with prot seems to be that you should wailt until lvl. 40 when Shield Slam becomes available - quite frankly, I have to disagree.
Inspired by a video on youtube I started levelling another warrior and chose to put all of my points in prot from the start - with Shield Spec and Anticipation you should be able to use Revenge pretty often, which is a high damage skill that costs extremely little rage.
Also, with Imp. TC you can do some respectable damage on single targets, not to mention multiple mobs - take this and Incite + Glyph of Cleaving and you'll be able to aoe-farm mobs with little downtime.
Right now, my warrior is lvl. 30 and I can blast through instances like I've never seen before - just pulled another 2 packs of mobs ? No problem, just TC and keep up Cleave and watch those insane crits fly around. Healer oom or otherwise unable to heal ? Just pop Shield Block and reduce incoming damage significantly.
Threat is hardly ever an issue, only at the beginning of a fight when you are low on rage - but that's something every warrior has known for years ;)
When fighting single mobs, just use Heroic Strike (especially effective with Incite and Glyph of Heroic Strike) and Revenge when available (btw. you have to love that 50% stun chance with Imp. Rev. - it can really save the day when some caster is causing trouble and Shield Bash is on cooldown).
So, my advice: forget about fury (whiff, whiff, whiff, HS, whiff, whiff ... ;) ) and arms (though this spec should be pretty nice once you get Taste for Blood and Imp. Slam - maybe levelling a 3rd warrior would be a good idea =) ).
Regards
Post by
235201
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
hermeska
I leveled to 59 Pre 3.0 as Fury, and although the damage output was nice, having to eat or heal all the time was annoying. If I had more than a couple of mobs on me, I'd be panicking and hitting my oh s**t buttons or just running for it, hoping to survive.
I respecced as prot after 3.0 and started leveling again, and my gosh, its quite awesome. Having a rotation of Shield Slam, Revenge, Devastate and Shockwave, throw in a bit of thunderclap, keep up Shield Block (I also have a trinket that increased dodge rating that is always on CD) and mobs are easy as pie. I can actually solo most group quests now, and Last Stand always exists for any oh s**t moments.
I chain pull now and only bandage/eat every 10-15 mobs, along with Lifeblood (herbs spell) I rarely have to eat or bandage these days.
The survivability of a prot warrior whilst leveling is fantastic, and now the DPS output on them is not far behind arms or fury, so IMO its the best leveling spec out there at this point in time.
I'd say from my own testing that prot leveling is about 10% slower than Fury or Arms, but the fact that you don't have to wait around for group quests and less time making bandages or spending money (or cooking) food accounts makes up for it.
Post by
321046
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
designationzero
post 70 i would say prot hands down, with either arms or fury i am losing 10% health per mob having to eat every 5-7 mobs. i play on a pvp server so it's important to stay 50% or higher health at all times.
as prot i am losing 3% health per mob and unlike arms and fury an incredibly stupid pull i won't die with a 10+ mob pull
Post by
cosmicguen
So, my advice: forget about fury (whiff, whiff, whiff, HS, whiff, whiff ... ;) )
In my experience (levelled 1-75 as fury, 75-80 as prot, back to fury again at 80) that is
exactly
how it goes. The BC equipment is sadly lacking in hit, which is what you need to make dual wielding work for you. And now in WotLK I cry every time I see hit on items, but that's another story...
I do agree with the more damage = faster mob splat argument, completely, because it's true. Problem is (or always has been for me) BC and BT just don't heal enough damage to make them viable abilities to stop you dying when you pull a couple too many. Especially as dual-wielding using BT really requires you to make sure your hit is high enough for your current level at all times, or you're just watching those charges decay without really getting the (tiny) benefit.
So...why not just make sure you're not taking that damage in the first place? You'll mitigate more damage with prot than you'll heal yourself with fury.
If you don't want to go prot from the first point, start out by speccing DW and armoured to the teeth. Shove some points in cruelty if you want. That'll take up your first 23 points (I think), which gets you to level 32 with dps talents, so you've got your 'squash mob fast', and then start and end with prot. It
should
work out nicely, and is doing so far for my second warrior (levelling in more or less the way outlined here - I don't have AttT, cruelty or DW yet, I have some prot talents because I've been instancing a bit). At lvl 36, still in mail gear, some of it blue stuff up to ten levels lower than me, I managed (just) to solo the lvl 40 elite for the warrior quest (Cyclonian). Can't remember what level my fury warrior did it at, but I know it was past 40, and I think I had some help.
I'd say from my own testing that prot leveling is about 10% slower than Fury or Arms, but the fact that you don't have to wait around for group quests and less time making bandages or spending money (or cooking) food accounts makes up for it.
And this. I say this a lot. The cooking is really handy for food buffs, though. I never go anywhere without my food buffs, but my main Furrior does the cooking, so I chuck mats at him for all my alts and he has a big cookup - a preference, not a necessity.
Not saying prot is more viable than fury as a levelling spec (or vice versa), but I can honestly say I wish I'd levelled prot. I think of all that time I wasted waiting for people to 'halp me plx' with group quests...I could have been giggling my way through them solo.
So, from a dedicated fury warrior...I suggest prot :)
(Wall of text..my bad)
Post by
122776
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
260019
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
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