Gear/Tierpiece/Playstyle advice

Good day!

My name is Tonkedin and here is my armory link:

http://eu.battle.net/wow/en/character/r ... n/advanced

My guild is starting 10man normal SoO this week and I would love if some of the pallytanking gurus could give me some advice regarding a few things with my gear and my playstyle. I just started trying to use Simcraft, but I still need to read ALOT of guides to even know what I am doing.

I have cleared normal 10man and I am using the control/haste build. I have a few dodge/parry pieces I want to replace with haste-plate as soon as I get them, these pieces were upgrades to inferior hasteplate LFR or flex items. I normally run with a flex Rook's talisman in the spot of juggernaughts focusing crystal, rocking 2x stam trinkets allows me to hit 44% haste raidbuffed and slightly over 1mil hp.
I am trying to get 4 piece together but have been very unlucky with tier piece drops.

My first question is:
How much of an upgrade should an item be for me to replace the a tierpiece and break my current 2 piece bonus? (keeping the replaced tier piece for when 4 piece is fully assembled and I can rock the set)

My second question is:
Thok is a real bastard, but one day one he drops me his tail tip(even the LFR version would be nice), would pairing it with a 10HC version of spark of the zandalari(Horridon is a bastard too) be preferable to Vial of living corruption(flex) paired with either of the previously mentioned trinkets? It's nice having 1mil hp, but I feel comfortable with a lot less in the easier 10man normal SoO encounters. I am also of the opinion that tank dps can make make a difference and if I have more survivability than an encounter requires, I should be able to take some of that and put it elsewhere, like into my dps or healing( Upon tankswapping I also HoS and 3-5 stack EF my co-tank if I can, always trying to adapt my playstyle to boost the raid's performance)

My third question is:
If I get a normal 553 Thranok's helm, would it be a upgrade in respect to my build as haste/control to replace my current helm which is warforged dodge/parry helm with it?
This leads me to the following follow up question: If I get that helm I will be socketing it with DPS legendary meta if it does not replace my current helm, and using it for Ret. Would I see any substantial dps gain in Prot to use the dps meta on farm-encounters, like flex and HC ToT fights?

And my last question is regarding weapon enchants. From what I have read so far the difference between dancing steel and windsong is marginal but at higher haste levels windsong starts pulling ahead? I would just like that someone confirms this for me ^^. I am hopefully getting a decent weapon drop this week and want to put windsong on it.

Any constructive tips regarding my gearing, enchanting and gemming will be appreciated !

Thanks

Sorry I somehow managed to double post a thread >.<

Hi Tonkedin, awesome name!

1. There's a new post up on Sacred Duty that answers this one.

2. Don't vendor any of them. Right now the DPS trinkets may work best for you, but 1 heroic boss just might send you running right back to stamina. At least that's my experience. Either way, Vial's cooldown reduction is very, very powerful, so I suggest using that full time, and picking your second trinket based on stam vs. DPS.

3. 553 well itemized is better than 559 not well itemized. The extra stamina, armor, and strength isn't worth it at only a 6 ilevel jump.

4. I use Dancing Steel myself. I think this is largely a matter of personal preference.

Wow thanks a lot, don't know how I missed that article! It is extremely informative. I will now be resuming LFR grinding to maximize chances of getting tier pieces.
I didn't think that LFR tier pieces could outperform 553+ just because of the 4 piece bonus. I greatly appreciate the feedback but what I actually meant was if the 2 piece that I currently have is worth breaking in favor of better itemized legs(specifically the WF magmaplates from Ordos that I currently have, or for flex Legplates of unthinking strife. The magmaplates has Crit on it but the reforge value is a little higher). I use divine protection on cooldown mostly, depending on the fight I save it for periods of high damage intake. The heal is applied after divine protection wears off, which could be wasted healing in a lot of situations.

As far as the stamina question goes -- I barely break 1M HP with buffs and we're pushing latter half heroic progression. This is something to work with your healer corps with, but I'd argue you could swap stam itemization for more haste -- you can always swap gems first and see if anyone even notices.

The primary use of the Vial is the CD reduction; the stamina is an afterthought tbqh.

Looking at your armory your other trinket is (at the moment) the Jugg trinket, which is an absolute pile of shit. If you've got the ToT Haste trinket, I'd definitely wear that in lieu.

The 2pc isn't a huge deal, but I wouldn't stress out about keeping or breaking it. The 4pc you'll definitely want ASAP. Good luck on tokens.

Thanks for the advice. I'm going to continue farming ToT and Thok for those 2 damn trinkets. Got lucky with a flex drop for tier shoulders last night which is awesome, so will hopefully have 4pc soon Feedback has been awesome!

Thecks' post is about the 4set bonus, not the 2set bonus. The 2 set bonus ain't that good, but it's about difference in ilvl and quality of stats on the other piece.

If the other piece is dodge/parry, just stick to your tier set. If the other piece is perfectly itemized and a difficulty higher in ilvl (so not normal vs warforged), use the other piece.

Once you have 4 piece, stick to tier no matter what. Preferably without the legs.

For trinkets: Thok and Spark for DPS, Vial if you need more stamina or faster cooldowns, and perhaps Rook's Talisman if you really need the extra stamina (mostly for magic heavy fights). Just keep them around and swap them as required.

Always use the tanking meta in your best tanking helm. It really is awesome, and the DPS meta ain't worth it on any serious encounter. For solo/scenarios/dungeons/lfr/old content, go ahead and use a DPS meta. The same can be said for the cloak.

There are no raid buffs for haste! Raid buffs increase attack speed and spell speed, neither of which is actual Haste (though they're based on Haste). Neither of them affects SoB, so you should not consider them. Your Haste is at 35.50%.