Undocumented 1.11 Changes

[Kevin]

I'm not so sure, I know armor isn't a huge consideration, but 418 armor is a lot...

Consider my gearing choice between Draconian deflector and Immovable Object from a purely armor perspective:

DD is 2153 and with the rest of my tanking gearing and toughness is 56.81% damage reduction
TIO is 2468 (+315 armor) and with the rest of my gear and spec is 57.95% damage reduction

so with DD, 43.19% of damage that isn't avoided gets through and with TIO it's 42.05%

That's almost a 3% reduction in damage from one shield to the next just from 315 armor... 1.14 / 43.19 = 2.6%

I think armor is worth a lot more than most people give it credit for. It not only saves damage on a consistent basis, but it also smooths out spike damage by mitigation.

Plus if the speculation about the shield block skill + high natural block value pushing crushing blows off the table is true, then block% may be a pretty large overall factor in reducing the number of spikes as well.

I think the differences between these shields is larger than you suggest. I think the main reason this shield was itemized was because of the shield slam change, which comes out to be barely different from the old version for a normal blue geared tank because there are no might 3 set bonsuses or other nifty items giving +block for those people. They have the base shield slam plus a whopping high 30s block value. Blizz had to put some stuff in the game to itemize for blue tanks who want to optimize around shield slam damage/threat efficiency.

My point was though would you give up your spot on item list for it knowing that you'll now be back of the line for a Medallion of Steadfast Might or a Heavy Dark Iron ring? Or will you spend DKP on it knowing that you lost your shot at Breastplate of Might?

Drillborer is not a bad shield (I have it and love it), but in a world of DKP and lists and such I see it getting left on the side now even more than it did because of what you could get from ZG or AQ20.