Protection Warrior Crit build.

[Kijjani 0]

Hello!

 

I am a protection warrior, I want to ask what build are pref coz seems its so many ways to gear/gem at the moment for us.

 

http://eu.battle.net/wow/en/character/twisting-nether/Kijjani/advanced my armory.

 

At the moment i go for parry/dodge avoid build but with some crit build. Is it worth go for crit or not or should i go 100% for avoid?

 

/Hope i get some help in this questions :)

[Estarriol 167]

Greetings, Kijjani!

 

Here's a link to the gearing suggestions thread I made a while back: https://www.icy-veins.com/forums/topic/3002-54-protection-gearing-suggestions/

 

One of the things I really enjoy about warrior tanking is that we have so many options in gearing and play style. To choose which is best for you, you have to assess what you want and also have a realistic idea of your strengths and weaknesses.

 

The main benefit of the mastery build is that it is very smooth. You get very effective damage mitigation while also staying very smooth. It is weak in that it has much less rage generation than some other options and thus it doesn't do as well against magic damage, AoE, and DoT damage... which SoO has a lot of. It is a bit more forgiving for beginners, though.

 

The avoidance build is my choice for most tanking situations. The crit you gain through Riposte allows for a huge amount of rage generation and the avoidance itself allows for a high amount of damage reduction. It does have a drawback- you must be good at using your rage effectively. If you don't use all of the rage you generate, you hurt yourself and your team. It is essential to use both SBlk and SBar efficiently. See my guide for a discussion on how to use your active mitigation.

 

The crit build has similar rage generation to the avoidance build and there are many who like it. I do not. With the crit build, you'll actually end up with less crit than you would with an avoidance build and you lose the massive dodge/parry chance you have. You'll take more damage and you'll lose the benefit of Hold the Line and get fewer Revenge procs. The justification I see for this build most often is that you'll have a higher damage output when not tanking, but your zero vengeance damage is so minimal that it does not matter. Additionally, you can use Intercept to proc your Riposte.

 

Currently, you have a crit/avoidance build and I would suggest going one way or the other. Avoidance would be my recommendation, but it is your toon. Think it over and decide what you want. I also see that you have the 4p. Drop it. The 4p is useful for the mastery build, but not for the avoidance and crit builds. Its rage generation boost is minimal and it comes when you don't need it, if you've used your CD well. The stats on everything up the legs and helm are terrible for the avoidance build as well.

 

Happy tanking,

Esta

[Keimorl 3]

I used to run a mastery build, but found myself rage starved a lot.  Most of that was just my shitty play... some of which I've straightened out.  That said, I've really enjoyed the switch to an avoidance build.

 

I find from a DPS perspective that the avoidance build works fine, as long as don't expect to be at the same level as other DPSers.  Depending on the fight I range normally from 110-180K.  And it doesn't really seem to matter how many adds there are... it mostly is about vengeance management, and proper use of Sblk, SS, Revenge, and Incite.   Can get some really nice numbers if I do things correctly.

 

My gut tells me that a crit build would just be sacrificing too much, as Esta points out.  After all, our primary job is to survive and make life as easy as possible on our healers, so they can focus on not only on our survival, but the survival of themselves and others.   If a healer is having to spam the living crap on me, then I'm most likely doing something wrong since we have so many damage mitigation options.  

 

I find that focusing on DPS is very important as a tank, but it's secondary.  If I'm doing so because we don't have enough raid DPS, any effect I can have is minimal since a 25% increase in my damage may only be a 25K change for the raid, while a 25% increase in one of my DPSers damage may result in a 100K improvement for the raid.   And if I'm doing it to min/max on farm content... I need to be working on harder content.  

 

That's my $0.02.

 

P.S.  I know that I wandered a bit off topic, but it was what was on my mind.   As soon as I saw "Crit build" I thought about trying to max DPS as a tank, and wasn't really thinking about it from a rage generation perspective.

Edited December 8, 2013 by Keimorl

[Keimorl 3]

Oh... forgot to post this (as a perspective on current tank damage)... http://raidbots.com/dpsbot/Overall_DPS/10N/all/14/60/default/#0000000000000000000000011111000000

[Estarriol 167]

Keep in mind, those are 10N parses. Not to be insulting, but at this point in the tier, showing 10N parses is not really reflective of the strengths of the classes. It shows more which classes is the easiest to output good damage on. Warriors have many subtleties to their damage. If you switch it to 25H, warriors are just below monks. Either way, if you play well and focus on your survivability, your damage will be fine for the most part. Once you have a good handle on your mitigation rotation, then you should start looking at how to line up your DPS CDs for best effect and make using every Ultimatum/Incite proc a priority.

 

In regards to rage and the mastery build: with good management, you'll have what you need, but you have to have good management. If you're used to an avoidance or crit build and go to a mastery build, you will feel rage starved no matter what. Avoidance/crit have tons of rage to throw at SBar, whereas mastery relies very heavily on SBlk and you'll get extra rage through having a high uptime on SBlk... as long are you're crit blocking.

[Keimorl 3]

You weren't being insulting... but 10N is my only personal reference having just started running 10H.   I hadn't thought about the length of the tier being out... that's a valid point.

 

That being said, I would suspect the narrowing of the delta being present in 10H vs. 10N as well... and it's not.   the delta is in 10N/H vs. 25N/H.   So that raises a couple of questions for me...

 

- Is their a composition in the 25s vs. the 10s that makes monks simply the best DPSers in 10s?  That wouldn't make a lot of sense to me.

- Are all the "good tanks" running 25s?  That would mostly just make me feel bad.  :(

- Do the changes in the scaling from 10m to 25m more generally favor other tanks (i.e. higher vengeance levels in 25M).  This seems to make more sense.

 

I'm very limited on my understanding of tank mechanics between the classes.  This probably needs to be pulled into a different thread

 

http://raidbots.com/dpsbot/Overall_DPS/10H/all/14/60/default/#0000000000000000000000011111000000

 

 

Keep in mind, those are 10N parses. Not to be insulting, but at this point in the tier, showing 10N parses is not really reflective of the strengths of the classes. It shows more which classes is the easiest to output good damage on. 

[Tengenstein 11]

I ran a sizeable number of simulations at the start of 5.4 and i difn't find a particularly large disparity in RPS between the builds;

 

Parry build: 339481 dps, 57181 dtps, 7547.5 TMI, 12.5 RPS
Crit build: 340270 dps, 69603 dtps, 28391.9 TMI 12.1 RPS
Mastery Build: 297999 dps, 58934 dtps, 5346.9 TMI 12.2 RPS

 

and As I decreased the simulated player skill the RPS dropped across the board, but the mastery build dropped least, most likely because timely reacting to Rev/SnB procs is more important to the crit/parry builds, whereas the Mastery build you gain your rage pretty much passively by blocking (yeah, I realise shield block shield block's not passive) so if your rage starving due to poor performance a mastery build may be more forgiving of poor/slow reactions to procs. a full Mastery build can actually withstand not being hit/exp capped without a significant loss of rage. The mastery Build does not generate much less rage then the other builds. I think people are coloring the 5.4 mastery build with the feel of the 5.3 mastery build.

 

TBH I'd generally carry out the following thought process to decide how to gear for a progress stumbling block;

 

Getting one shot  - Yes - More Stam

|

No

|

Dying to multiple hits - Yes - Go Mastery

|

No

|

Dying to enrage timers/ or being overrun - Yes - Go Parry

|

No

|

Meterwhoring/Cheesing logs - go crit.

 

I really don't find the Tier 4pc particularity useful for the mastery build, as the Rage gen is equal to health % lost, so anything that decreases damage taken, or increase your total HP  will have a negative effect on it, if we fudge some maths  from my above figures the parry build will take 580K damage, Mastery 600K, which is about what 60% of your buffed HP? so that's around 60 rage or an extra full strength Sbar per minute. It's more powerful for the Crti build because of the increased damage taken,.but even then only ~10 rage per minute, or one or 2 more Sbars per fight compared to the other build.

Edited December 8, 2013 by Tengenstein

[Keimorl 3]

I'm pretty sure this is where I was primarily failing with my mastery build.  Given the rotation was using at the time I was dumping too much rage into other things and not focusing on my Sblk uptime.

 

whereas mastery relies very heavily on SBlk and you'll get extra rage through having a high uptime on SBlk... as long are you're crit blocking.

[Estarriol 167]

Getting killed in one hit doesn't necessarily mean more stam. It requires an assessment of logs to see if you're reacting to damage properly. If there's a bit hit coming in and you're got your butt to the wind, you'll die. Proper use of SBar has to be factored in and you have to make sure that your SBars are actually being effective.

 

Dying to multiple hits, go mastery? That's not factoring in multiple hits of what. If you're dying to melee+DoTs, mastery build will do nothing. In that case, avoidance would be the better build as the extra rage would allow for layering of SBlk and SBar.

 

You say the avoidance build doesn't gain more rage because of your sims, yet my experience dictate otherwise. Would you mind sharing your calculations?

 

To Keimorl:

 

You don't see the same huge delta from 10N to 10H, but there is still a significant difference. Particularly for 10N->10H, DKs, bears, and warriors have very similar DPS output.

 

The reason for the huge difference for 25s is due to scaling. Warriors scale very well with Vengeance, Shield Slam scales especially well. On (almost) any given fight in 25H, my SS hits harder than my Dragon Roar. I'm relatively certain that monks have the best baseline damage, so they'll dominate low-vengeance tanking.

 

Tanking 10s does not make you a bad tank, nor does tanking 25s overall make a good tank. I started tanking 25s less than a year ago and I will say that I had to make an immense improvement in my tanking to make the switch. The main thing that I was told when I switched is that in 10m, you use a CD when your life is in danger. In 25, your life is in danger whenever you don't have a CD up. The damage in 25 is shocking at first and definitely requires very good use of mitigation to be successful. However, good tank skills are good tank skills. They are independent of format.

 

This doesn't really relate to anything, but I noticed the site has no data from the last three heroic bosses. I know for a fact that I killed heroic Blackfuse a few days ago, so I don't know what's up with that.

[Tengenstein 11]

The idea of a general  thought process is that it is generalized and as such doesn't go into exact parameter by parameter contingincies.

 

for stamina  I'm assuming you're not doing something stupid, i.e you have sbar/sblock/CDs up as appropriate, aren't taking unnecessary debuff stacks, aren't standing in the shit; you're doing everything right and are still getting one shot more stamina is probably a good idea. if you're fucking up the tactics i'm not sure theirs enough anystat on gear to help you, say solotank-zeroheal dark shammies HC.

 

Your "Dying to multiple hits, go mastery? That's not factoring in multiple hits of what. If you're dying to melee+DoTs, mastery build will do nothing. In that case, avoidance would be the better build as the extra rage would allow for layering of SBlk and SBar." is based on an apriori assumption that an avoidance build has more rage to play with, it doesn't, you can layer shield blk and Sbar just  as much. This is particularly true on the fast taunt swaps (~30s) because you can have shield Block up for 24s and then cover the last 6 seconds of aggro with another CD, whilst layering sbar over as needed. with an avoidance setup you are going to be running a higher risk of getting a potential string a of normal blocks+dot  which eat through your Sbars quickly and a string og them can rather ruin your day. however with a mastery build you can ( and should) be acheiving 100% crit block, meaning the melee hit's damage are some what trivialized and you just have to deal with dot. essentially you take more damage but in easier to deal with packages. Kinda like a credit card.

 

it's not my calculations its simply just running several sims and comparing results. I suggest you plug yourself into simcraft, you'll probably need to monkey about with the APL to make it something a little more tanky, the MMO-C crowd created the default APL and it's not really taking into account cycling defensives, they've got it setup to show max DPS rotations (it's very 10 man). and you might want to make custom fluffy pillow, who'll hit you hard enough to actually be threatening.  Once you've done all that that take a toon sim it a few hundred thousand times  per setup (Parry/crit/stam/mastery/whatever). and compare the results. I was initially quite surprised at just how little difference there is between mastery and parry, but it kinda makes sense; Boss swings we parry, then we use Revenge, but because we've parried the swing, we lose a potential critical Block, and because we spend a GCD on Revenge rather than Devastate, we also lose a potential Dev cit and SnB proc, and if that SnB proc would have also shortened then CD on shield slam , we're also losing a number of shield slams and shield slam crits over the course of the fight.

 

We can all throw anecdotal eveidence around; I remember going avoidance for the first raid night in 5.4, it felt amazing compared to the previous 5.3 raid nights, rage everywhere, but then I went back Mastery when he started HCs, and i can't really feel the difference in RPS, DPS is lower, but i never felt rage starved, and now i'm back avoidance again and i don't feel like I have buckets more rage

[Estarriol 167]

I would like to see the sims you have said you ran in order to get an idea of your stance and see its benefits and drawbacks, I want to see YOUR viewpoint in order to make logical comparisons. If a scientist were to make a claim that gravity doesn't work as long as you duct tape a bagel to your head, he'd have to post numbers and good descriptions of his experimental methods and assumptions in order for others to try the same experiment. I'm asking you to back up your claim with your data, including relevant parameters. You may be right, but you aren't proving it at all. You're standing on a soap box giving questionable sermons.

 

If you'd also post your logs, I'd also like to see those to get an idea of your mitigation use. Is it possible that you didn't feel rage starved because you're not using all of the rage you gain?

 

 

with an avoidance setup you are going to be running a higher risk of getting a potential string a of normal blocks+dot  which eat through your Sbars quickly and a string og them can rather ruin your day.

 

I can't say I've had an issue with Sbars being eaten too quickly. Are you using them with full rage and at a point of appropriately high Vengeance?

 

 

however with a mastery build you can ( and should) be acheiving 100% crit block, meaning the melee hit's damage are some what trivialized and you just have to deal with dot. essentially you take more damage but in easier to deal with packages. Kinda like a credit card.

 

When layering SBar well with proper use of SBlk, you shouldn't have issues with smoothness, so the packages wouldn't be easier to deal with.

[Tengenstein 11]

I'm flying round on a donut on my head? I'm questioning you assertation that mastery builds produce less rage, you're the one sermonising based purely on anecdotal evidence. Real scientists don't go off anecdotal evidence, 

 

 

Lets use the T16HC10 standard boss profile (since its hitting poor little simulteng rather hard) and a quick and dirty  25k sims APL starring me in a Parry set, nothing fancy as far as rotations go, something a window licker should be able to do. this will be where contention is, standard SS>Rev>dev rotation, using minor CDs around the LMG proc, keep Sblk on CD and use Sbar to Burn excess rage or if we have a spike moment.

 

actions=auto_attack

actions+=/use_item,name=handguards_of_the_prehistoric_marauder,if=buff.fortitude.down

actions+=/demoralizing_shout,if=buff.fortitude.down&buff.phase_fingers.down

actions+=/berserker_rage,if=buff.enrage.down&rage<=rage.max-10

actions+=/shield_wall,if=incoming_damage_2500ms>health.max*0.6

actions+=/last_stand,if=incoming_damage_2500ms>health.max*0.6&buff.shield_wall.down

actions+=/shield_block

actions+=/shield_barrier,if=incoming_damage_1500ms>health.max*0.3|rage>115

actions+=/heroic_strike,if=buff.ultimatum.up

actions+=/shield_slam,

actions+=/revenge

actions+=/battle_shout,if=rage<80

actions+=/thunder_clap,if=target.debuff.weakened_blows.down

actions+=/devastate

 

head=rageblind_greathelm,id=105457,upgrade=2,gems=indomitable_primal_160parry_120sta_270sta

neck=anafielles_spiked_choker,id=105766,upgrade=2,reforge=mastery_parry

shoulders=pauldrons_of_violent_eruption,id=105416,upgrade=2,gems=160parry_120sta_160parry_120sta_120str,enchant=300sta_100dodge

back=qianying_fortitude_of_niuzao,id=102250,upgrade=2,gems=320parry_90sta,enchant=200sta,addon=goblin_glider,reforge=mastery_dodge

chest=chestguard_of_the_prehistoric_marauder,id=99201,upgrade=2,gems=320parry_320parry_320parry_270sta,enchant=300sta,reforge=mastery_parry

shirt=brawlers_harness,id=6125

wrists=bracers_of_sordid_sleep,id=103741,upgrade=2,gems=320parry,enchant=170dodge

hands=handguards_of_the_prehistoric_marauder,id=99202,upgrade=2,gems=320parry_320parry_320parry_120str,enchant=170mastery,addon=phase_fingers,reforge=mastery_parry

waist=protectors_trillium_waistguard,id=98615,upgrade=2,gems=320parry_320parry_320parry_120str,addon=nitro_boosts,reforge=hit_dodge

legs=legguards_of_the_prehistoric_marauder,id=99195,upgrade=2,gems=160parry_160dodge_160parry_160dodge_180sta,enchant=430sta_165dodge,reforge=hit_dodge

feet=malkoroks_giant_stompers,id=103879,upgrade=2,gems=160parry_120sta_60crit,enchant=140mastery,reforge=mastery_parry

finger1=devilfang_band,id=105362,upgrade=2,gems=320parry_60exp,reforge=mastery_parry

finger2=bloodclaw_band,id=103798,upgrade=2,gems=160parry_160dodge_60haste,reforge=hit_exp

trinket1=juggernauts_focusing_crystal,id=102297,upgrade=2,reforge=dodge_parry

trinket2=rooks_unlucky_talisman,id=102296,upgrade=2

main_hand=encapsulated_essence_of_immerseus,id=103727,upgrade=2,gems=320parry_60str,enchant=rivers_song

off_hand=shield_of_mockery,id=103870,upgrade=2,gems=320parry_60str,enchant=170parry

 

# Gear Summary

# gear_strength=22304

# gear_stamina=41149

# gear_expertise_rating=5226

# gear_hit_rating=2850

# gear_crit_rating=60

# gear_haste_rating=60

# gear_mastery_rating=4756

# gear_armor=61926

# gear_dodge_rating=8381

# gear_parry_rating=17382

# meta_gem=indomitable_primal

# tier16_2pc_tank=1

# hands=handguards_of_the_prehistoric_marauder,addon=phase_fingers

# main_hand=encapsulated_essence_of_immerseus,weapon=mace_2.60speed_10257min_19051max,enchant=rivers_song

 

 

as i'm doing this quick i won't create full new profile, for the other sets I'll just use the handy little gear overrides, not particularly accurate but will give a rough proof of concept, i'll take 10k from parry and 5k from dodge and dump it into mastery and then take the same combined 15k and dump it into crit

 

Results

Parry standard: 11.85rps

-10K parry, -5k dodge , +15k mastery: 10.97

-10K parry, -5k dodge , +15k crit: 11.85

 

 

0.9RPS that's not even a full SBar per minute, though it works out a little weird because Mastery is so much smoother  than than the other 2 setups, it ends up casting less panic Sbars so has more rage to devote to keeping Sblock on recharge.

 

SO yeah Mastery is behind in RPS, by rather a small amount  the shield block uptime of the Mastery set has a 66.54% uptime on shield block the highest off all 3 sims, I certianly wouldn't call this a low uptime and i certainly wouldn't suggest, as the IV guide does that "This will cause you to struggle to maintain high Shield Block uptimes, and it will leave you with no excess rage,"

[Estarriol 167]

The other thing real scientists do? They recognize that their data depends on the assumptions that they make. They realize that they have created an idealized case in the lab and that real situations will differ accordingly from their experimental data. Have you ever heard the spherical chicken joke? It's like that. Your sims are a spherical chicken in a vacuum, but you're presenting them as if you have made no assumptions and your data is 100% reflective of real world situations.

 

I'll run sims once I get back in later as I don't have time to do it now. However, for now, I'll go halfway with you. I'll say that, in ideal situations, avoidance and mastery have almost equal rage generation. We can see, easily, that mastery's rage generation is largely dependent on SBlk uptime and on getting hit. Thus, if the boss stops to cast for 1.5s, that's a possibility for 10 rage that we have lost. With the avoidance build, the boss can do that cast and we can still use our abilities. Yes, we lose the chance for a Revenge proc, but just because they don't use their GCD for a melee doesn't mean we can't use our GCD to crit. For every time a boss stops meleeing to cast, mastery becomes less effective at generating equal rage and the bosses in SoO tend to cast a lot.

 

Further, let's look at cases of mixed damage. Specifically, let's think about Iron Juggernaut and the final phase of Galakras. In both cases, your most dangerous source of damage is fire damage. If you have a mastery build, you only get extra (reliable) rage with SBlk up, but if you're dumping all of your rage into SBlk in order to have a higher rage gen, then you're not intelligently reacting to the damage at hand. If you do prioritize SBar, as you should, then you lose rage generation. If you're only tossing Sbars out when SBlk is on CD, you're still not reacting to the damage you're receiving. Almost every time someone asks me to look at their logs, that's what I see. I see people prioritizing SBlk until they die from the damage they should be focusing on and are not. Mastery will not help in cases of mixed damage or any source of unblockable damage. In real situations, every cast costs the mastery build a chance at rage, but the avoidance build can still get the extra 10 from critting. Ideally, you'd have a mastery gear set and an avoidance gear set in order to tailor your gear to the fight at hand, but that's not always possible. However, you can't point at sims and claim that they are totally reflective of real play. You have to think about not only what your data says, but why your data says what it does. You have to take into account that ideal situations don't happen. Sims are a great tool to get an idea but they must be taken with a very large grain of salt, particularly for tanks.

 

 

0.9RPS that's not even a full SBar per minute, though it works out a little weird because Mastery is so much smoother  than than the other 2 setups, it ends up casting less panic Sbars so has more rage to devote to keeping Sblock on recharge.

 

Would you clarify this for me? Why are there so many panic SBars? If the sim is prioritizing SBlk to the point where it has to use SBars as a tool for panic situations, then it's not using SBar well, which is what it seems like it may be doing. SBar should be used intelligently to prevent damage spikes. It's kind of like Blood Shield for blood DKs. I'm going to paraphrase Reniat here. He often tells me how much work and thought he has to put in to use his DS well in order to prevent spikes. We should be putting just as much thought and effort into our SBar rotation for the same reason.

 

 

I'm flying round on a donut on my head?

 

No, no, it only works with bagels.

[Tengenstein 11]

Can you please stop with the high horse condescension its really becoming offensive; Everyone knows a simulation is only a simulation, and this is exactly why i told you to sim it yourself because i knew you would attack the simulation for being simplistic, I know it was simplistic, I said it was a quick and dirty proof of concept,  a window licker's rotations. so I get that its not a perfect facsimile of what we actually do. 

 

The difference in RPS whist the boss is grand standing should be fairly trivial to quantify if we assume that we only use  SS and Dev during those periods since the RPS from crit should be equal  the 6.66*crit rate. Mastery build had a 22% crit rate,  41% for the parry build. so 2.74 RPS for parry builds and 1.47 rps for mastery builds a difference 1.27rps, which is quite a bit if we assume maybe 50% of our RPS comes form stuff that requires the boss to hit us, but how much time the boss spends grandstanding as a percentage of the fight time is going to be significant here; for every 47.2 seconds of grand standing we get an extra Sbar. if a bos spends an entire third of his time grand standing we talking a little over 2 extra sbars on a 5 minute fight

 

I really don't think having 2 extra Sbars per 5 minutes is important,even if we tag on the the sbar loss from the rest of the fight its only 6 sbars difference it doesn't seem like its going to make or break your tanking  because much like DK's blood shields timing is more important than quantity.

Edited December 9, 2013 by Tengenstein

[ragebarr 153]

Going to step in before this becomes too bad. Sims are not a real representation of reality, I think everybody gets that, and you've said it yourself, so I don't think that pushing those sims the way you're doing it right now is going to be the best way to convey your point to Esta. Now if you want to continue debating which build is best, go for it, that's what the forums are for, but please keep it respectful.

 

-Rage

[Estarriol 167]

If you want to continue talking about this, please make a dedicated thread. We'll talk at length if you'd like, but do know that I am going to pick at every point I see. It is not a personal attack, it is to fully explore ideas. I don't want your data in order to dismiss them as stupid, I want your data so I can compare them to my own in order to have a well-informed opinion.

[Lanista 1]

Coming back to the original question of which building is better, i would say in my own little world it really doesn't matter what build you choose. Just pick one you feel most comfortable with and stick with that one and do not try to have a hybrid build of 2 types in one set. I myself is a mastery tank, purely for the smoothness of damage intake (and the fact that i'm playing on a EU server from a different continent which means i have about 200-300ms latency). All builds have their advantages and disadvantages, it comes down to your tanking partner and how you react on your disadvantages. For myself, my disadvantage as stated by esta is magic heavy fights. My tanking partner is a blood dk, which is strong on the magic fights so he usually takes the lead on these fights. I am strong on physical fights so i take the lead on these guys. About being 'rage starved', i hardly ever have a problem with my rage. I think it comes down to managing and planning you rage usage. I can only recall twice in our SoO progression that i had a rage shortage issue and that was in the beginning during an accidental pull or tanking partner dying and i had to hold the boss longer than normal. 

 

All builds are in the end to achieve the same goal, to survive a fight with the least amount of pressure on your team. Again it comes down to what you feel most comfortable with in you team set up.

Edited December 9, 2013 by Lanista

[Estarriol 167]

Also going back to the topic at hand, I'd just like to say that your choice of gear isn't forever. If you give a build a try and don't like it for whatever reason, you are totally free to change it up. If, for example, you decide to go avoidance and you recieve a piece that would be good for a mastery set, toss it in your bank. That way, if you decide you want to try the mastery route, you can switch over more easily and give it a go. I'm working on doing something like that for myself.