3.0 Frequently *Answered* Questions - Tankadin basics.

[Zironic]

If these latest numbers are true, and I have no real reason to doubt it. Then Spellpower weapons are now completely obsolete as tanking weapons.

[honorshammer]

Suggested Questions:

How much Hit due you to need to reach the Hit cap and avoid Righteous Defense resists?

How much expertise do you need to hit the Expertise Cap?

[mirkodeluxe]

I actually think that 1 point in Reckoning isnt totally wasted.
2% chance to get extra threat/regen for just one point isnt bad, and certainly better than 1% crit imho. But better fill out JotP first.

[knaughty]

I'm just arguing that the FAQ could use a note that says if you're using a spellpower weapon for tanking it might be better to enchant it with more spellpower.

Why are you tanking with your healing weapon?

...

Get a Red Sword of Courage. Use it. Do Ragemane's Flipper quest in Zul'Drak in mid-70s to get the weapon you'll be using until then.

There's no excuse to be using a spell-power weapon to tank.

[amh]

Q: Why not Inscription of Consecration?
A: Breaks your rotation. Search 969.

Glyph* of Consecration :)

[knaughty]

Suggested Questions:

How much Hit due you to need to reach the Hit cap and avoid Righteous Defense resists?

How much expertise do you need to hit the Expertise Cap?

In both cases, I believe the answer is "Too much to be sensible to aim for".

The problem with hit cap is that it probably isn't worth sacrificing tanking stats for, so you end up living with however much +hit your "best" tanking gear has.

The problem with the "Expertise cap" is which one? And again, are you going to sacrifice stats to hit it?

Expertise and hit rating certainly weren't things you stacked to the cap in 2.X as a pally tank.

I don't really have a feel for this stuff yet for level 80 - dinged 80 on the weekend, have 30-something badges and 7 Naxx bosses down on Sat. Doing Naxx-25 this week, hoping that gives me a feel for some updates to cover "Entry raiding". Meanwhile, anyone else who's raiding Naxx - post your thoughts?

[Arcand]

Suggested Questions:

How much Hit due you to need to reach the Hit cap and avoid Righteous Defense resists?

How much expertise do you need to hit the Expertise Cap?

In both cases, I believe the answer is "Too much to be sensible to aim for".

The best way to drive that point home might be to work out the numbers. Let them see how daunting the prospect is and how much they'd have to give up.

(And if it starts raining expertise gear later on, we'll already have the cap numbers ready and we'll look like visionaries.)

Edit: Damn, I didn't think you'd put that much work into it. But thank you.

[knaughty]

Suggested Questions:

How much Hit due you to need to reach the Hit cap and avoid Righteous Defense resists?

How much expertise do you need to hit the Expertise Cap?

In both cases, I believe the answer is "Too much to be sensible to aim for".

The best way to drive that point home might be to work out the numbers. Let them see how daunting the prospect is and how much they'd have to give up.

(And if it starts raining expertise gear later on, we'll already have the cap numbers ready and we'll look like visionaries.)

Hit and Expertise

So.. is it worth aiming for the hit/expertise caps?

32.79 rating per percent for both expertise and hit. Hit reduces "miss". Expertise reduces "dodge" and "parry". Thus, for tanks who attack from the front, expertise is twice as valuable as +hit. They're equivalent for DPS.


Hit rating
Assuming a 9% miss rate for both melee and RD (you have the Glyph, right?)

@80: 9% + hit = 295 rating.

Defence & +hit gear

The +hit cap is just barely reachable with a "perfect" set.

Expertise

We get 6 expertise points from talents, which is 1.5%

Which cap?

Dodge rate is assumed to be 6.5%, which requires 5% expertise to cap, which is ~164 rating.

Past the dodge cap, expertise has the same TPS value as +hit (but provides a little mitigation, which +hit doesn't).

Parry can be as high as 12-15% which is ~440 rating after talents.

On gear
• Valorous Redemption Plate has 37 +hit and 35 expertise rating.
• Broken Promise from 4-H 25 has 16 +hit and 20 expertise rating. No other tanking weapon has both.

Full list of defence+expertise gear

Collect the entire set (which requires you to be an engineer) and you have 324 expertise rating. Non-engineers can get to 316.

Interestingly, most of the expertise gear drops from the dragons - Satharion / Malygos / Sapphiron. Neck is from KT.
Only Broken Promise and the badge-25 tanking ring have all 3 stats.

Analysis

• You can't reach the parry cap. Dodge cap is reachable with some work and focus.
• You need good tanking gear to tank the mobs that drop the Expertise gear anyway.
• The Expertise/+hit gear is all-round nice gear. The Malygos stuff is half a tier up anyway, you'd wear it regardless of the expertise.
• Expertise or +hit - pick one. Very little gear has both, and you need to have pretty much a full set to reach either cap. It might be possible to get close the dodge cap and the hit cap at the same time with an utterly perfect set.
• There just isn't that much in the way of choices. It isn't worth dropping a tier to stack expertise/hit in my opinion.

Heroic Raids only

If we restrict ourselves to 25-man gear only (IE, not dropping to 10-man gear to collect expertise/+hit).

• Max +hit is 263
• Max +expertise is 270

Summary

• +hit cap is not reachable without equipping lower tier items, and even then is ridiculously hard to reach.
• Dodge cap is easy enough - you'll hit it by collecting tanking gear. Worth it for a threat set.
• Parry cap is unreachable
• Expertise & hit caps at the same time are impossible.

Ignore all of them other than "164 expertise is nice" and just collect tanking gear.

[majiben]

I would add in the dreanei racial aura, human and dwarf racials, hit and expertise enchants, and hit/expertiseelixirs and foods.

[knaughty]

I would add in the dreanei racial aura, human and dwarf racials, hit and expertise enchants, and hit/expertiseelixirs and foods.

Meh, stinky Alliance abilities, not interested.

[knaughty]

Updated based on 80 + Naxx-10 experience.

Running Naxx-25 this week, maybe more updates on the weekend based on that.

And level 70 stuff deleted.

[Soranthalas]

Expertise

We get 6 expertise points from talents, which is 1.5%

Which cap?

Dodge rate is assumed to be 6.5%, which requires 5% expertise to cap, which is ~164 rating.

Past the dodge cap, expertise has the same TPS value as +hit (but provides a little mitigation, which +hit doesn't).

Parry can be as high as 12-15% which is ~440 rating after talents.


Summary

• +hit cap is not reachable without equipping lower tier items, and even then is ridiculously hard to reach.
• Dodge cap is easy enough - you'll hit it by collecting tanking gear. Worth it for a threat set.
• Parry cap is unreachable
• Expertise & hit caps at the same time are impossible.

Ignore all of them other than "164 expertise is nice" and just collect tanking gear.

Check through these numbers and see if I missed something.

6 points from talents, fine.
We get another 10 expertise from Glyph of Seal of Vengeance. Everything I've seen indicates this is the best seal for threat, so that raises us up to 16 expertise or 4.00% less dodge/parry.

Another 10 expertise (2.50%) is needed to hit the dodge cap for paladins without a racial bonus. 7 (1.75%) if you are human or 5 (1.25%) for a dwarf with an appropriate weapon. 1%, or 4 expertise, requires 32.79 expertise rating.

Expertise Rating Needed for Hit Cap
•81.98 rating base
•57.38 rating for Humans with swords/maces
•40.99 rating for Dwarves with maces

So now we're talking a very reasonable amount of expertise rating to get the dodge cap. I don't have any delusions that you can hit the parry cap without giving up a lot in exchange, but the dodge cap should not be a major hurdle.

With a quick search I found 5 blues you can get without a heroic than have defense and expertise. If you get the chest or helm, you could dodge cap a blood elf or draenei with 3 items; 2 if you use the chest and helm.

[Spotnick]

Maybe it's just me, but to put 2 points in divine guardian scares me a little.

I know this is situational, and that i will probably use divine shield only when a boss will enrage or like in MgT when Kael was spamming a pyroblast, but 30% of the melee damage to myself, isn't that looking for trouble?

I've used divine shield at some point in dungeons (5 men only) when I felt like the healer was about to let me down to make sure I'd survive, but for some reason I believe that if I get an extra 30% damage from all the others it won't help.

Of course, nobody else should take as much damage as the tank, but in a case like the lynx boss in ZA where both tanks are stacked, I would get 30% of the damage of the off-tank? that doesn't look that good to me.

Not that I have a place to put those 2 points, I'm just trying to get the right arguments... since I'll ding and respec tonight... not that reckoning is more attractive, but for me, the 20 secs less cooldown on Hammer of Justice seems more attractive since I will use this in many situations.

[knaughty]

Maybe it's just me, but to put 2 points in divine guardian scares me a little.

I know this is situational, and that i will probably use divine shield only when a boss will enrage or like in MgT when Kael was spamming a pyroblast, but 30% of the melee damage to myself, isn't that looking for trouble?

Re-read the FAQ.

You take no damage.

The two points in DG are "Raid damage reduced by 30% for 12 seconds" - this can be very powerful.

Not "30% of raid damage gibs pally".

[Drobent]

I would be nice to do an index with the abbreviations used, I think.

Specially for that begin in this international forums (like me) and our mother language is not the English.