Game-Changing New Powers

[Thawwing Light]

Don't expect to do well against skillful players in 1v1, unless they're melee or at least largely physical (Rogues, Hunters, Retrinoobs, other Warriors.) Protection is a heavily group-centric spec for PvP (and Warriors are already group-centric as a class, according to Blizzard), though in my experience it becomes stronger faster than Arms or Fury builds when you have others with you. Last Stand combined with potions and even bandages means you can stay up for quite some time, even without healers.

In general, I focus on Warlocks and Priests before most others, since my disruption potential is greatest against them, and they're less able to keep me away than Mages or Hunters might be able to. While Disarm priority generally went to other Warriors in the past, I find it's now on Rogues, especially since every Arms Warrior and their grandmother has built-in Disarm immunity through talents (strange that Improved Disarm does nothing to counter that.) Disarming Hunters can also be effective, in that it prevents them from using Wing Clip and Counterattack, meaning it's going to be much more difficult for them to keep you or anyone else out of range.

Unless Fear is a problem, I prefer to stay in Battle Stance to have access to my most useful abilities (Overpower, Shield Bash, and Thunder Clap), though I'll turtle in Defensive Stance and spam Revenge (Stun) against melee opponents or Hunters whose pets proc it. You can also stancedance for Revenges on Warlocks using melee pets.

Against Priests and Frost Mages, ideally save Rage for a Shield Slam for a chance to counter Power Word: Shield and Ice Barrier. Any Frost Mage worth a damn won't let you get close, so that's somewhat meaningless, but the point remains:)

Sunder everything. Two or three Sunders for cloth and leather, four or five for mail or plate. This is especially important in groups; a cloth class with a couple Sunders on them crumples instantly when a Rogue or Hunter targets them, and even teddytanks can feel some serious pain from the armor reduction. This also sets you up for Devastate spamming. Because Devastate is CTRL+1 for me, I don't often use it in PvP (since I usually don't have the Rage for spamming, and I need to conserve Rage for Shield Slam and Shield Bash), but it can do some pretty nice damage. Addtionally, because it's normalized, weapon speed is less of an issue than most people think it is.

Take up Engineering. The addition of bombs, shrink rays, a rocket launcher or sheep machine, nets, potion injectors, and other nifty tricks significantly enhances your disruption potential as well as your battlefield longevity.

Hmmm... thanks for the advice. You've confirmed a lot of what I already suspected - Warrior is not for solo PvP, but the ability to tie people up in group PvP is valuable.

I've been using Disarm and Shield Bash in roughly the same manner as you, though I haven't been picking my battles quite as well. I've been going after all targets, with a preference for other warriors and rogues. I'll concentrate on Priests and Warlocks now - I actually managed to take down a warlock in a duel once, so i agree with you that our interrupts give us a fair shot against them. Well, I always concentrated on priests...

One thing I haven't really done is use sunder in PvP. I find it tends to empty my rage bar for little effect - I never get to use Devastate on almost anyone, even though it's my easily accessible T key. I also haven't been using Thunderclap, although that wasn't improved until very recently, and as such was only minorly useful against casters. I'll try out Thunderclap and Sunder, though I'm a bit wary of its usefulness.

One thing I'm a little curious about is that you don't seem to use Shield Slam for its damage. I found it to be the best source of damage in my arsenal, and use it as such. Perhaps this is the cause of a number of my rage issues?

Engineering is something I'd like to pick up on my main warrior, but he's got 330 blacksmithing and 375 mining, both of which I would not care to level again. Maybe on my alt Warrior... he's 44 now, so I could twink him a while in the 49 bracket with it.

I'll be sure to pick my battles a little more now, and stick to 10-15 man BGs. That ought to help a bit. Even with that advice, though, World PvP is tempting, even with the 4:1 Alliance to Horde ratio Feathermoon sports.

edit: Oh yeah, and I tried Spell Reflect out a bit in duels - it's very situational and prohibitively costly, but even still, having a Mage Pyroblast crit himself for 2k proccing Ignite and Impact is still awesome.