When i hit 80?

[bldavis]

i agree with just about everyone and say if your not 40 yet, get dual spec at 40 and start tanking asap, just to learn some of the base skills.

my other question is will this be your first 80?
if so, well have fun!

if not i would suggest going through the dungeons with a tank friend and having them show you how to pull the mobs, where you can sepereate mobs out, los point etc.....

at least for the WotLK ones.

I went 10 - 32 as prot, got frustrated as hell (constantly being oom) ground out to 40 in sheer chain dungeon runs, and went prot/ret at 40.

the sooner you start tanking, the easier it will be at 80 to slip into that role.


AND FOR GODS SAKE! run the WotLK dungeonswhile your leveling! that way you will get a feel for what you will soon be doing in mere minutes!

[Zurrgle]

Yes it will be my first 80. I have a 60 on a different server, i quit ages ago and just recently came back.

And yeah im also running new instances as soon as they're yellow to me

And i will be switching to protection very soon

Just need some decent Lv.40 protection gear lol

[Levantine]

Of the bear. Srsly, if you've been running instances as ret chances are your gear will be fine. At that level there's no such thing as tanking gear, really.

[Zurrgle]

Tried tanking for the first time today

Kept all the agro most of the time, though some heirloom mages got targeted sometimes.. XD

Was fun though!

[Levantine]

Good to hear!

Heirloom players will occasionally pull aggro off something if they're not assisting or giving you a couple of globals to work some AoE threat, but the good thing about Heirloom geared toons are they generally have enough hp to take a hit or two. :D

[Zurrgle]

I noticed they can take a few hits

Also is this still a good guide to follow for a retadin?

http://mendpet.com/2009/07/22/pre-raid- ... -paladins/

Going to be ret for a good few heriocs.

[Gamingdevil]

It's not a bad guide, but it seems horribly outdated (looks like it was made when Valor was still the highest emblem) Look for Digren's guide on this site to get your info imo.

[Naberius]

Honorshammer gave me links to his blog when I started out. It helped me quite a lot.

Here

And

Here

Check them out a bit, it really helped me a lot.

[kysu]

To level as a Prot pallie has changed alot since I've done it.

Since they've taken out Spiritual attuemnet as a free talent being prot sub 30 requires special spec imo.

Here is the sub 30 spec
Here is the lv30 + spec

Sub 30 you are playing the conserve mana game, that is about it.

After 30 is when you get your blessing of sanctuary, more you pull less you will oom. Also please note the consecrate glyph is for sub 75 ONLY.After that point un glyph it and never use it again.

Reckoning talent is the best imo simply for the extra damage considering you have 3 moves (judgement,holy shield,Consecrate)(mitigation should not be a issue).

I've been lving a priest right now with my friend and he decided to roll a prot pallie and this is his 1st time tanking and he has been doing pretty good actually, he has really enjoyed the game alot more since he started playing this toon. I hope it will do the same for you.

[Zurrgle]

Digren advises running your first 20-30 heroics as DPS though, that's why im looking for gear for a retadin

I am going to be following his guide, but need a outline on ret gear, lol.

[econ21]

Digren advises running your first 20-30 heroics as DPS though, that's why im looking for gear for a retadin.

Have a look at Barathorn's case study in the gear forum about running your first heroics as a tank, just to see the alternative. I can see the case for going dps first but I went as a tank and overall enjoyed it. Acquiring enough gear to be decent in heroics is a struggle initially, whether dps or tank. Personally, I would prioritise getting tank gear (from emblems and serious gold), so I would not worry too much about ret gear. If you are going dps initially, just roll for whatever drops and maybe pick up some reputation and budget crafted items listed in the older guide you linked to. The exception might be the weapon, as it is so important - consider grinding Argent Tournament dailies for a weapon. Milking ToC and the ICC5 normals and heroics is going to be a smart move for both ret and tank gear.

One thing to consider is PvP gear. I think that stuff is decent for ret starter gear and also is nice to wear even when you are protection specced if you want to do battlegrounds, Wintergrasp etc. I considered getting a retribution offset for something to do with the EoT badges but came to the conclusion that most of it was not a big enough advance over my pvp gear to bother with (my 2nd spec is healing). From honour alone, you can get 4 wrathful pieces (bracers, cloak, neck, ring); relentless boots, ring and belt; shoulders for WG marks; then furious main pieces.

[Syncognition]

Armory link (if it matters since my questions are pretty general):

http://us.wowarmory.com/character-sheet ... n=tolsimir

I don't really have many questions about leveling or spec or anything...I've been basically filling in the common raid spec and tanking from the start, and it has served me well. I rarely die or lose aggro as long as I'm geared for the encounter.

Which brings me to my point of concern. Most of what I have to ask is about gear. I know there is a forum on gear advice, but I'm not really looking for specific examples of what gear to get, but rather what methods I should use to make sure I am geared for when I hit 80. This thread seemed to be relevent to my questions, so that's why I'm posting it here.

I'm a new player (only had a WOW account for about 2 months), and haven't really done much other than tanking. I'm a total tank-o-holic, and have basically been leveling by running instances non-stop. I have found though, that at each transition (from Classic to BC, then from BC to wrath), I have hit a wall. I could not hope to survive Utguarde Keep until I had a friend craft me a set of Cobalt Plate gear, which has served me very well.

What I fear is that when I hit level 80, I won't be able to tank. The thought of DPSing until I can gather enough emblems to tank again is somewhat...disturbing as I have no experience at paladin DPS. Is there good starter 80 crafted gear?

My girlfriend is gathering mats for some gear for myself and a hunter friend of hers that I am leveling with (Pillars of Might for me, and a chest for the Hunter). While I understand that these are best in slot for raid progression due to bonus armor, I have concerns as to whether they are good to start with at 80 since they have no defense unless I gem for it.

Sorry to ramble so much, my head starts spinning when I try to comprehend how gearing up at 80 even works, as I've started so late into the expansion that it almost seems futile.

[econ21]

I also reached level 80 late in the expansion, so I know where you are coming from. The minus is that PUG standards for gear are very demanding. But the plus is that you can easily get top tier gear with emblems and cash.

There is a lot of crafted items that you can have ready for you when you hit level 80 if money is no object. The best ones for heroics are probably the 245 wrists and chest. You will struggle to find a home for the 264 legs and boots due to the late of defence for a while, but still I would get them asap. There is also a 226 belt that is good, but optional as the Frost belt is soon accessible. As "fillers", you can get the titansteel helm, shield and boots. So if money is no object, you can get quite far before ever hitting 80 (you can't equip the gear till 80 but still). There are also some non-purple crafted items - tempered saronite set and daunting legs/hands - that are worth considering.

What I did, from about level 76 onwards, is target specific quests and dungeons that gave me good stuff to get prepared for level 80. There are also some nice BoE blues you could buy from the AH for a reasonable price. Older gearing guides such as Eanin's will be good for all that. You want to reach uncritablility and have a decent amount of hitpoints (opinions vary, but I would say 24k+) before doing heroics. I tried to run every instance on normal first, to know tactics, but there will come a point where you are confident enough that this may no longer be necessary - randoms are much more lucrative. Reading the wiki for boss tactics is good.

Once you hit level 80, the new 5 mans (ToC and the three ICC ones) are very useful in getting geared up - even on non-heroic mode (which allows you to run them multiple times a day). Yappo's failsafe gearing guide identifies what you can get and what you will want. You might also be interested in Barathorn's experiences of gearing up a new level 80 warrior tank (we wear basically the same gear).

Run the Argent Tournament dailies as soon as you are eligible, so you can get a good standby tank weapon. And don't forget to put on faction tabards in level 80 dungeons and heroics, as some still give you decent reputation items (Wyrmrest in particular).

Also don't dismiss PvP gear - run Wintergrasp every week. The shoulders for WG marks are good and cheap. The wrathful pieces for honour are also very strong - cloak, neck, greaves and even ring at a pinch. Using resilience to help you get uncrit so you can wear your legs would be worthwhile (you want the uncrittability from defence and resilience - mouseover the relevant stat to find out - to sum to 5.6%).

Gems and enchants will be necessary to get uncrit and decent HPs. Read Digren's guide for good advice on them. But you probably will want to save epic gems for items that are keepers (typically over item level 200) as you will quickly replace most starter gear. To be honest, it's crafted items and emblem items that you will take into raids - very few drops.

[Syncognition]

Thank you very much. That really gives me a lot of ideas to work with. I'm a member in a very helpful guild, so while money is an object, I do have a lot of support available. However, there are only a few tanks in the guild and unfortunately (rather, understandably) they don't really have the time to address these types of concerns. My previously mentioned girlfriend (who got me in to the game) runs an 80 Rogue with maxed Mining and Skinning, and there are a number of high level Blacksmiths, so I'll see what I can find out about some of that crafted gear you mentioned.

I Hadn't even thought of PVP gear. I was aware that Resiliance can work in a similar way to defense in becoming uncrittable, but I hadn't really put 2 and 2 together. XD

Have to get back to work, but I'll read through your post more thoroughly and check into some of the guides that you mentioned when I get home. Again, your help is appreciated, thank you.

[Barathorn]

Thank you very much. That really gives me a lot of ideas to work with. I'm a member in a very helpful guild, so while money is an object, I do have a lot of support available. However, there are only a few tanks in the guild and unfortunately (rather, understandably) they don't really have the time to address these types of concerns. My previously mentioned girlfriend (who got me in to the game) runs an 80 Rogue with maxed Mining and Skinning, and there are a number of high level Blacksmiths, so I'll see what I can find out about some of that crafted gear you mentioned.

I Hadn't even thought of PVP gear. I was aware that Resiliance can work in a similar way to defense in becoming uncrittable, but I hadn't really put 2 and 2 together. XD

Have to get back to work, but I'll read through your post more thoroughly and check into some of the guides that you mentioned when I get home. Again, your help is appreciated, thank you.

Let me look at this over the weekend, I think I still have all the notes about what I did from level 76 to get ready to hit the ground running at level 80 at a minimal expense. If you have gold to burn you can be in a raid within an hour I would imagine. If you don't but have say 3-5k it may take 10-15 hours. If you have 500g which was all I allowed my Warrior then it is tricky and I am still uncertain if I will reach my current goal of ICC10 in 30 hours.

I will see what notes I have and PM them to you.

Barathorn