Horde Tankadins

Hi Folks

I recently transfered to Horde after a long time as a Human Paladin Tank. It was all done in a bit of a hurry and so the only research I did in terms of Tauren vs Blood Elf was a quick google search (which didn't yield any up to date results) and then checking Paragons Pally Tank on the armoury.

I went Blood Elf, as per Lazil (sp?), but now I have more time to reflect as to whether that was the optimum choice or whether it just doesn't matter.

The BE racial does seem to have some modest advantage at time of low mana (rare) or times when I'm desperate for a silence (just as rare with the rebuke changes), but I can't help thinking that the Tauren hp increase outweighs this.

Does anyone have any insight? If the truth is that the differences are largely irrelevant then I think I'll switch anyway, Taurens are just cooler.

Thanks in advance.

I don't believe the minor increase to base HP makes all that much difference when you're 85 and have over 150k hp from gear unaffected by the racial. Honestly, for Paladin tanks the Horde racials are nothing in comparison to what the Alliance get (Stoneform, Gift of the Naaru, or PvP trinket, and the free hit or expertise), and it's largely irrelevant.

The Tauren racial is about 2000 hp, the Belf racial is an extra AoE silence that I use nearly every time I tank. As Kysen said, neither are anything too spectacular. If I were you I would just pick whichever race you find the most aesthetically pleasing.*

*Personally, I love my cow brethren, but I hate playing them. They're big so they appear to move slow and it bugs me.

The tauren racial is better "overall", that means its always going to be good (or atleast usefull, its not very strong)
While the Belf racials are more situational, and maybe not all that usefull everywhere.

But the differance when your tauren is very small and in most cases not noticable.
However, WHEN the belf racials are good, they are really really good.
So, tauren racial is always usefull, and Belf racial is very good, sometimes.

So its more about if you wanna have an ok racial all the time, or a really good sometimes.

It is a quality of life thing. Some extra stam is nice, but you're never going to notice it since it is completely passive.

Arcane Torrent is an active ability, and when you use it when you need it, it is the bee's knees. If you don't want to think about your racials at all, then you're better off being a dumb cow.

PS. I am not racist against Tauren. Some of my best raiders are cows.

it really comes down to if you use your racials
as a human did you use every man for himself?
if yes, go belf and you will love arcane torrent
if no go tauren and enjoy your slightly boosted health

Belfs just look better in armour.

One of my raiders changes whatever tank he is playing (druid or dk) to a tauren for the extra hp but I think Treck has summed it up. Belfs racials are very good some of the time. Taurens are ok all of the time.

The main reason I went Tauren is actually because of War Stomp. An AOE stun is more useful than you'd think (Ragnaros adds, any trash/dungeon mobs that are stunnable, Maloriak adds, etc.) It's not like we don't have enough interrupts now with AS and Rebuke.

Also, Tauren are just plain awesome.