07-12-2005, 06:48 AM
Alright so I get to respec tomorrow. I've changed my mind a bit from the original post. Keep in mind Gnolack will be protection spec even if you can tank better with a deep arms or deep fury build. Its what he is. I'm not doing a build with less than 25 points in protection, ever with him. So here is what I'm looking at now.
Protection
Shield Specialization - 5/5
Toughness - 5/5
Iron Will - 5/5
Defiance - 5/5
Improved Sunder Armor - 3/3
Improved Taunt - 2/2
Improved Shield Bash - 2/2
Concussion Blow Rank - 1/1
Improved Shield Wall - 2/2
Shield Slam - 1/1
Protection Total: 31
Fury
Cruelty - 5/5
Improved Demoralizing Shout - 5/5
Unbridled Wrath - 4/5
Piercing Howl - 1/1
Fury Total: 15
Arms
Deflection - 5/5
Arms Total: 5
Some thoughts on things. I prefer to 5 man, and I still have a lot of things that I need to 5 man and I would always rather 5 man a place than raid it even if we are after loot for someone.
So that is why Improved Taunt and Improved Sunder armor which are mainly "oh #$%&" moment talents are staying, 2 seconds or 3 fewer rage on your main lock down skill can be the difference between a dead priest or mage or a live one. Improved Shield block stays for it's high level of utility in 5 man situations as well.
One hand spec would actually be a bit more helpful for raids and such where you can tank without a shield at all for most everything and dual wield and such, but I dropped those.
I'm still not going with Last Stand and that is not an easy choice. Improved Bloodrage isn't that helpful and it becomes even less helpful the more people you have around. Last Stand has it's uses. I actually used it 4 times in Onyxia tonight and it kept me alive two of those times. The attempt where we had a lot of deaths in phase one I got thrown into the whelp room. I drank my heal pot, and hit shield wall. The 10 seconds of shield wall wasn't long enough for help to get to me, it took the help about 12 seconds. So I hit Last Stand and survived and was then one less corpse that needed to be rezzed. The whelps still would have been contained even if I didn't have it. There was another time where there was a whelp break out that I gathered with some dem shouts. The big lizard decided that would be a good time to hit me with a couple of fireballs, potion for the first and Last Stand after the 2nd, kept the whelps that were hitting me from killing me while help arrived and I was able to bandage out of it again it just saved a rezzer for having to try and bring me up. The other two times were in phase 2 to phase 3 transitions. Both of those times it didn't really do any good.
So, the verdict is still mixed. I'm willing to let it go so that I can have 15% chance to avoid stuns and charms which just annoy the hell out of me. Last Stand has no utility in loot raids. A 10 man Baron run has zero chance for Last Stand to be of any help. It has helped in some solo situations to give me a bit more time to run, it has helped in questing with a duo when we chain fight stuff for whatever reason and we need just a few more seconds for that heal to land. It has helped me prevent wipes in 5 man runs as well. It has also been utterly pointless since the heals were coming or me staying up for 5-15 more seconds was going to do anything anyway. It is another skill that seems to get less and less useful as the character gets older. It is less useful when you have highly skilled players with you. While I'm getting better I'm still mostly playing with Lurkers and CA and they have enough skill to cover for it. If I did more public raids I think it would be harder to let last stand go.
My build is actually using improved shield wall as my replacement for last stand. 6 more seconds of 75% damage reduction trumps a heal pot type ability.
I've decided Anger Management is out. I've never actually had it and been successful. While I would like to PvP more with Gnolack, I'm not willing to spend my time doing that right now. I know it's a very handy skill and I'm going to miss tactical mastery as well. So I'm getting unbridled wrath to help with rage generation (no one hand weapon spec either and that is a the protection tree rage generation helper). I'm doing 5 in improved dem shout because I do not want to see the whole "a more powerful effect is active" when I try to use it, I don't know if that is the case but it does scare me. I want more rage so I can do more shield slams. Since I'm not getting Anger Management I have to get piercing howl.
If unbridled wrath doesn't give me good rage returns I might put 3 points into improved cleave. I still cleave a fair bit, and 1 point into 1H weapon spec, or just all 4 points in 1H spec as 8% more damage could very well be as good as 32% chance to get one more rage in the long run.
Doing some DM West runs will probably do more for my rage generation (via a better one hander) than any talents could anyway. :)
Protection
Shield Specialization - 5/5
Toughness - 5/5
Iron Will - 5/5
Defiance - 5/5
Improved Sunder Armor - 3/3
Improved Taunt - 2/2
Improved Shield Bash - 2/2
Concussion Blow Rank - 1/1
Improved Shield Wall - 2/2
Shield Slam - 1/1
Protection Total: 31
Fury
Cruelty - 5/5
Improved Demoralizing Shout - 5/5
Unbridled Wrath - 4/5
Piercing Howl - 1/1
Fury Total: 15
Arms
Deflection - 5/5
Arms Total: 5
Some thoughts on things. I prefer to 5 man, and I still have a lot of things that I need to 5 man and I would always rather 5 man a place than raid it even if we are after loot for someone.
So that is why Improved Taunt and Improved Sunder armor which are mainly "oh #$%&" moment talents are staying, 2 seconds or 3 fewer rage on your main lock down skill can be the difference between a dead priest or mage or a live one. Improved Shield block stays for it's high level of utility in 5 man situations as well.
One hand spec would actually be a bit more helpful for raids and such where you can tank without a shield at all for most everything and dual wield and such, but I dropped those.
I'm still not going with Last Stand and that is not an easy choice. Improved Bloodrage isn't that helpful and it becomes even less helpful the more people you have around. Last Stand has it's uses. I actually used it 4 times in Onyxia tonight and it kept me alive two of those times. The attempt where we had a lot of deaths in phase one I got thrown into the whelp room. I drank my heal pot, and hit shield wall. The 10 seconds of shield wall wasn't long enough for help to get to me, it took the help about 12 seconds. So I hit Last Stand and survived and was then one less corpse that needed to be rezzed. The whelps still would have been contained even if I didn't have it. There was another time where there was a whelp break out that I gathered with some dem shouts. The big lizard decided that would be a good time to hit me with a couple of fireballs, potion for the first and Last Stand after the 2nd, kept the whelps that were hitting me from killing me while help arrived and I was able to bandage out of it again it just saved a rezzer for having to try and bring me up. The other two times were in phase 2 to phase 3 transitions. Both of those times it didn't really do any good.
So, the verdict is still mixed. I'm willing to let it go so that I can have 15% chance to avoid stuns and charms which just annoy the hell out of me. Last Stand has no utility in loot raids. A 10 man Baron run has zero chance for Last Stand to be of any help. It has helped in some solo situations to give me a bit more time to run, it has helped in questing with a duo when we chain fight stuff for whatever reason and we need just a few more seconds for that heal to land. It has helped me prevent wipes in 5 man runs as well. It has also been utterly pointless since the heals were coming or me staying up for 5-15 more seconds was going to do anything anyway. It is another skill that seems to get less and less useful as the character gets older. It is less useful when you have highly skilled players with you. While I'm getting better I'm still mostly playing with Lurkers and CA and they have enough skill to cover for it. If I did more public raids I think it would be harder to let last stand go.
My build is actually using improved shield wall as my replacement for last stand. 6 more seconds of 75% damage reduction trumps a heal pot type ability.
I've decided Anger Management is out. I've never actually had it and been successful. While I would like to PvP more with Gnolack, I'm not willing to spend my time doing that right now. I know it's a very handy skill and I'm going to miss tactical mastery as well. So I'm getting unbridled wrath to help with rage generation (no one hand weapon spec either and that is a the protection tree rage generation helper). I'm doing 5 in improved dem shout because I do not want to see the whole "a more powerful effect is active" when I try to use it, I don't know if that is the case but it does scare me. I want more rage so I can do more shield slams. Since I'm not getting Anger Management I have to get piercing howl.
If unbridled wrath doesn't give me good rage returns I might put 3 points into improved cleave. I still cleave a fair bit, and 1 point into 1H weapon spec, or just all 4 points in 1H spec as 8% more damage could very well be as good as 32% chance to get one more rage in the long run.
Doing some DM West runs will probably do more for my rage generation (via a better one hander) than any talents could anyway. :)
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It's all just zeroes and ones and duct tape in the end.
It's all just zeroes and ones and duct tape in the end.