/gquit-ed, sick of holy, new to prot, Questions.

[Shiver]

Hello, i just don't enjoy raid healing anymore, and my guild won't let me spec prot, so i just /gquit, raiding with them basically got me the best gear attainable before 25-mans (serious ones), except for the neck, i feel i'm quite ready to start tanking kara/gruul and above with a new guild, but i have a couple questions:

-When tanking, do you always use max rank holy shield/consecration? do you downrank it? if so, why and under what circumstances?

-I've heard about some nice spots for AoE prot grinding, the question is pretty much the same as above, do you downrank spells while tanking?

-I've MTd my old guild's karas sometimes, but they say i take a lot more damage than a warrior, and to some extent i feel it's true, how do you guys effectively deal with this?

-And last but not least, what fights are just IMPOSSIBLE to tank as a paladin so i know my limits.

Thank you very much.

And any suggestions about my gear? (besides getting it more stamina enchants/gems, already on it)

EDIT: my armory

http://armory.worldofwarcraft.com/chara ... n&n=Zhiver

[Lore]

-When tanking, do you always use max rank holy shield/consecration? do you downrank it? if so, why and under what circumstances?

I do. I've heard of people downranking it but I never saw the point and haven't done any of the math myself.

I've heard about some nice spots for AoE prot grinding, the question is pretty much the same as above, do you downrank spells while tanking?

Nah.

-I've MTd my old guild's karas sometimes, but they say i take a lot more damage than a warrior, and to some extent i feel it's true, how do you guys effectively deal with this?

We don't; there isn't much we can do about that. Have a DPS warrior keep thunderclap and demo shout up if you can, that closes the gap quite a bit.

-And last but not least, what fights are just IMPOSSIBLE to tank as a paladin so i know my limits.

I don't know of any that are completely impossible.

[Alixander]

-And last but not least, what fights are just IMPOSSIBLE to tank as a paladin so i know my limits.

I don't know of any that are completely impossible.

On the other hand there are quite a few where we are at a strong disadvantage. Not just "hey warriors are a little better, bring them" but "You can do it, but you'll be working ridiculously hard for that victory".

Just thinking about Karazhan, two come to mind:

Maiden of Virtue: Her silences make this a harder than others in Karazhan. Again, not impossible, but definitely not easy. Since a warrior or a bear's abilities are not magical they can't be silenced which is a definite boon.

Nightbane: Fear. If you're in a guild with a Draenei/Dwarven priest this is a non-issue. Otherwise, Warriors are generally the better option since they can stance dance to avoid fear. (minor note on this one: There is rumors of a short duration blessing that will work similar to Fear Ward. If/when this is implemented, Fears will likely become a non-issue for us)

On the flip side there are some fights where you are actually the better option in Karazhan than a warrior or a bear.

Attumen: Due to the accidental loss of our offtank, I tried to pick up Attumen on a fight, and my guild proceeded to essentially 5 man Attumen. The fact is that Paladins are the only tanks that can safely remain uncrushable (or at least close enough) to survive being bashed upon by both Midnight and Attumen without SSC or higher level gear.

The Prince: While I personally have not fought him, my understanding is that at some point there's a change from him using a 1H or a 2H to Dual Wielding, at which point his attack speed takes a noticable increase. This leads to the Prince being able to chew through shield blocks for a warrior and leads to being crushable. With Improved Holy Shield the advantage is for Paladins.

[SmurfZG]

I wouldn't call paladin tanks at maiden a strong disadvantage. Just spamming those buttons usually only reduces my TPS compared to any other fight by a little bit, though noone has ever complained about it.

[Leidus]

I wouldn't call paladin tanks at maiden a strong disadvantage. Just spamming those buttons usually only reduces my TPS compared to any other fight by a little bit, though noone has ever complained about it.

I agree, I don't think Maiden is even worth mentioning. That silence is pretty trivial if you know how to click a mouse button.

[Teah]

I wouldn't call paladin tanks at maiden a strong disadvantage. Just spamming those buttons usually only reduces my TPS compared to any other fight by a little bit, though noone has ever complained about it.

I agree, I don't think Maiden is even worth mentioning. That silence is pretty trivial if you know how to click a mouse button.

The first time I tanked Maiden I ate 2 crushes because of the silence. It does take a little attention to get the hang of the fight. The second time I tanked her I had it down though. She is only worth mentioning because it requires slightly more attention then normal.

-When tanking, do you always use max rank holy shield/consecration? do you downrank it? if so, why and under what circumstances?

Sometimes when I'm off-tanking something that can crush I put up holy shield rank1 to make sure when I do pull aggro I don't get rofl-stomped. Also rank1 concescration at the beginning of a fight can be used to just grab mobs attention. I've considered downranking during fights once hate has been established but usually I just switch to seal of light/wisdom for awhile if I feel the healers could use a little help or faster pulling.

[Nich]

I generally only downrank if I'm going to be running OOM soon. So rank 1 HS when offtanking, rank 1 consecration to hold mobs against healing aggro, if HS disappears too fast.

I wouldn't call paladin tanks at maiden a strong disadvantage. Just spamming those buttons usually only reduces my TPS compared to any other fight by a little bit, though noone has ever complained about it.

I agree, I don't think Maiden is even worth mentioning. That silence is pretty trivial if you know how to click a mouse button.

Maiden is a lot less trivial if you don't live on the same continent as your realm's servers.

[Spart]

I wouldn't call paladin tanks at maiden a strong disadvantage. Just spamming those buttons usually only reduces my TPS compared to any other fight by a little bit, though noone has ever complained about it.

I agree, I don't think Maiden is even worth mentioning. That silence is pretty trivial if you know how to click a mouse button.

Maiden is a lot less trivial if you don't live on the same continent as your realm's servers.

Completely agree. With about .5-1sec lag, I can cop a crush even when there aren't silences.