Maxing Damage & Threat As A Protection Warrior

Tanking Priorities have been discussed before - but there are some Tanking 102 lessons I've been developing, that will help you squeeze out a few hundred extra damage and threat.

1) Concussion Blow and Shockwave.

Your going to have some Decent AP with raid buffs. You need to use them, but that doesn't mean drop everything when they come off cooldown. Like when you use...

2) Shield Block.

When you have the buff up, use only Shield Slam, Revenge, and Devastate. Concussion Blow and SW are sweet, but they won't proc Sword and Board, and get you more awesome-sized shield slams. If they are up and Shield Block is coming off cooldown soon, try to get them used beforehand.

3) Concussion Blow, again.

The global cooldown activated by it is shorter then normal. When your Shield Slam -> Revenge -> Devastate order is a little off from S&B procs, you will find yourself in the situation when Revenge has 0.5 seconds left on the cooldown, and your GCD is free. (Revenge has a 5 second CD. So Revenge, Something Else, Something Else, .5 seconds before Revenge is up again). This is a sweet time to use it, since you'll cut down the time that Revenge is off cooldown without being idle. Its a matter of fractions of seconds, but there aren't a ton of seconds in some fights, and they all count. (I've actually got a chart I'm working on for these situations...)

4) Not Using Demo Shout, Thunderclap, and Commanding Shout.

Protection Paladins (or other prot warriors) can use Thunderclap/ItsEquiv. Demo Shout can be covered by another warrior, as can Commanding Shout (or if you have an imp out, that comes within a few hundred HP of CS). If your the one doing these, your going to end up using them more often then their duration - and that leads to alot of wasted cooldowns.

5) Heroic Throw

On a boss, do it before they get to you, even if you've been MD'ed - you can't do anything better during that time period. If you find yourself totally out of rage when you have a free GCD, hit it as well.

6) Seperate Button Sets for Bosses

Normally, I have HS bound to Revenge only, and Devastate with a modifier key. When your walking into a tons-of-rage-all-the-time fight (most high damage taking fights, or anytime you have BoSanc), however, your going to want to be mashing it all-the-time. I find that I miss using HS (and getting bonus damage, as well as bonus crit which turns into bonus deep wounds) when I've got Shield Slam up as the next thing I'm using (and am not mashing one of the other buttons). What I did to correct this, was make another macro that added HS in to my SS, and I pull it onto my bars when I know the upcoming fight will allow it. Don't be stuck in the mindset that you can't move buttons! (I do the same thing for Raz add tanking - move HS into Devs place, so I don't sunder them up, and don't have to think/press differently).

7) Retalliaton

Going from Defensive Stance to Zerker is dangerous, and Berserker Rage is really dangerous. Retalliation requires only a quick jaunt to Battle Stance, though, and the buff itself wont' increase damage taken - but it will get you in some bonus swings. Don't do it if your concerned about extra parry-hasted hits, though.

Are these essential to tanking? No. And some of the thought loops / skill usage will detract from survivability in minor ways. They aren't for fresh tanks (who have other, far more key habits to be learning) or on progression - but they are all good practices for you to sharpen up on if you are coasting through Naxx on a weekly basis, and want to make the lower end DPS sweat a little more as you creep closer.