Protection Paladin Tank Battle of Dazar'alor Raid Guide — Dragonflight 10.2.5

This page will focus on how to best prepare as a Protection Paladin for the Battle of Dazar'alor encounters, rather than a general guide for the instance. These guides and their talent recommendations are purely for progression kills, allowing you to increase your chances of killing the bosses. Once you have killed a boss and are more familiar with the fight and feel comfortable with it, you may very well wish to change talents in order to do more damage.

Paladins are great as add tank to help interrupt the Anointed Disciple casts, to both stop them from healing, or help them to move out of zones on the ground faster.

Blessing of Spellwarding can be used to ignore Wave of Light when tanking adds, or to negate the damage from Sacred Blade when it reaches high stacks.

The big difference on Mythic is the addition of the cast called Angelic Renewal from the Anointed Disciple, which will fully heal the boss. Paladins are really good at interrupting with Avenger's Shield and, coupled with Rebuke, we can take both casts every time. It does complicate things should they be casting it while standing inside the consecrated holy ground the Darkforged Crusader casts, but you will not take too much damage when running in to interrupt.

Grong is all about surviving his combo abilities. Paladins are able to either Blessing of Protection or Divine Shield together with Reckoning to survive and immune its damage. This also removes the Rending Bite DoT. Finally, if you are running with Final Stand it can be used to soak an entire combination without you or your co-tank taking any damage.

When thrown by Bestial Throw, you should be able to use one spell or ability before you land and get stunned again, as long as the player runs far enough away, which they want to do to reduce the damage taken upon landing. If you have it ready, this is a great time to use Light of the Protector, or even Ardent Defender, should you not be topped off.

Mythic does not really change anything from the tank point of view other than increasing the damage everything does. Do not be afraid to call for externals when you are gripped and about to be thrown.

You are able to soak Magma Trap with both Blessing of Spellwarding and Divine Shield; however, you will still receive the debuff which increases damage taken from them. Be careful when using Blessing of Spellwarding while tanking Manceroy Flamefist, as he will target other players while it is up. Final Stand is recommended, as it can deal with magic abilities without the bosses targeting other players. You can also help by stunning the Spirit of Xuen with Hammer of Justice when it spawns. Once the last phase starts, Manceroy will start doing a lot of damage, and all of it is magic damage, which means Shield of the Righteous is going to be useless at that point. This is a great time to use Blessing of Spellwarding, as the boss will NOT change targets in Phoenix form.

In Mythic mode, two Spirits of Xuen spawn and you definitely want to help stunning them. Most strategies revolve around killing off Mestrah first and early, and just as in the other difficulties, Manceroy will start hitting a lot harder. Do not be surprised by the increased damage, as you will have hopefully saved cooldowns for this phase. As mentioned above, tanking him in Phoenix form can be completely negated with both Blessing of Spellwarding, as well as Divine Shield if you have take the Final Stand talent.

While Blessing of Spellwarding is a powerful tool in the first phase of this encounter, with various magic abilities that you can safely ignore with Spellwarding, for the second phase Blessing of Protection is really strong as it can be used on a player with Coin Shower and immune its damage instead of stacking with the raid. Always make sure to completely deplete the Diamond shield as it will not start the 30 second recharge until completely depleted. When very little of the shield remains, it is advised you use a cooldown, such as Ardent Defender, to make sure you do not get killed in the same hit which depletes the Shield.

Nothing really changes on Mythic for tanks, but with the increased raid damage, it is very much advised to be able to have Blessing of Protection available in Phase 2; you can use it on a person with Coin Shower, but only if it is a class who does not have his own immunity for it.

Pa'ku — Make sure to keep an eye on the stacks of Hastening Winds, so that you have Shield of the Righteous or cooldowns active when the stacks reach higher amounts before you chose to tank swap.

Kimbul — While you are NOT able to remove the stacks of Lacerating Claws with Blessing of Protection or Divine Shield, you are able to use Divine Shield if you have specced into Final Stand, to completely immune its damage while the shield is up. If you have the Engineering helm, the trait Auto-Self-Cauterizer has a chance to proc and remove one stack of the bleed, which can help a lot. The Dwarf racial Stoneform will remove all stacks of the dot as well. You will still want to swap bosses at some point, due to the high stacks on Pa'ku.

Gonk — Make sure to always have Shield of the Righteous up for his frontal ability, Wild Maul. This aspect is responsible for summoning several raptors that fixate on random players. Use Fist of Justice to stun the Ravenous Stalkers, especially if they are empowered by Hastening Winds from Pa'ku.

Akunda — Positioning Akunda's Aspect can be tricky in combination with other abilities, do not be afraid of tanking in awkward positions with an immunity to avoid having it in a bad spot.

Mythic can deal a lot of damage to the raid, and you can usually help at least a bit during the bird phases. If you are tanking the add which is not currently being killed, consider standing outside of the bird phase with Divine Shield (if the Final Stand talent is selected), or with Blessing of Spellwarding. This can give the raid a lot more space inside the circle, and is especially dangerous when Krag'wa is jumping around.

While Cavalier can be very tempting, as there will be a fair amount of tank swapping involving a lot of running with the Scorching Detonation ability, Blessing of Spellwarding is very powerful at negating Bwonsamdi's abilities. Remember that the raid takes less damage from Scorching Detonation the further away from King Rastakhan you are; it is not related to where they are compared to you. While Caress of Death does not deal a lot of damage, it makes you immune to healing for 8 seconds, so you need to make sure to always have coverage with cooldowns or active mitigation (and an instant Light of the Protector as soon as the debuff runs out, or even Lay on Hands if needed). Remember that Bwonsamdi still melee hits you, and not all of the damage is magic, so keep Shield of the Righteous active when you are unable to be healed to survive those 8 seconds.

A popular strategy involving Paladins is to have the Paladin solo tank Bwonsamdi in Phase 2. This is possible due to Divine Shield resetting the Aura of Death stacks. Doing this, Phase 2 will last long enough that you will need to survive 3 Caress of Death casts before transitioning into Phase 3. The first Caress of Death will occur almost right as Phase 2 starts. This means you have basically no stacks and should only need some minor cooldowns to survive, and while healing does not work when you have Caress of Death, shields still do work. Against the second Caress of Death, you will have a lot of stacks, and this is the perfect time to use Divine Shield to remove the stacks completely. We recommend using Final Stand, as the other options are not very impactful on this encounter, but it can be done without the talent; you will just need to make sure to reset Deathly Withering during the Caress of Death cast, with a well timed Reckoning to avoid the debuff. As for the third and last Caress of Death, you can simply use Blessing of Spellwarding against the cast to avoid taking damage from it, since it will make you not gain new stacks of Deathly Withering for its duration; it will, however, not reset. Paladins are not the greatest at crowd controlling adds on this phase, but should it be needed, we can spec into Repentance to get the job done.

Tanking Mekkatorque makes you take increased Nature damage for each consecutive hit on the same target. This damage can be completely negated for 10 seconds with Blessing of Spellwarding, should you need to tank for a prolonged period.

The small Spark Bots can be stunned with Hammer of Justice if they start moving in towards the raid.

You are still able to stun the Spark Bots with Hammer of Justice; however, you will take some damage from doing so, as the Spark Bots are shielded in Mythic. Gigavolt Charge will leave a radiation zone on the ground wherever it was placed. If stepped into, it will give you a heavy magic dot which will be applied through immunities, so save Blessing of Spellwarding for when tanking the boss and, for example, the co-tank has to jump into a Spark bot. Keep in mind that, if you get shrunk, despite dealing 99% less damage, you can STILL tank the boss just fine. This means that you can still stay out and reset the tank stacks should you want to.

As this is a frequent tank swap fight, you can make very good use out of your Shield of the Righteous charges and make sure to hopefully have it up almost all the time when you are actively tanking Laminaria. Blessing of Spellwarding can be used to negate the dot damage from Kelp-Wrapped Fists, as well as make you able to solo soak the Ire of the Deep circles. Be careful when Phase 2 starts, so as to not interrupt immediately with Avenger's Shield.

Most Mythic strategies will have you let the adds on the boats cast their channel, so be careful and do not Avenger's Shield them when they do. In Phase 2, most guilds have one tank solo-tank the boss, while the other solo-soaks the Ire of the Deep. These come in quick succession later on in the fight, but Paladins are great for solo-soaking. Having multiple Bulwark of Light can help making sure you have a bit more health against each burst, and you can also solo soak them with Divine Shield as well as Blessing of Spellwarding (it will still knock you, so be careful where you aim). You can run Consecrated Ground to ensure slowing the adds as well, however it is only a 50% slow. No matter if you are main tanking or soaking circles, Holy Shield will do a lot of work, as most of the damage is magic.

While Jaina fires Ice Shards at the current tank, they count as physical damage, and are therefore reduced by Shield of the Righteous. You can use Blessing of Spellwarding or Divine Shield after receiving the Avalanche debuff in Phase Two, and stand in one position. This allows for the smaller Hand of Frost shards, which travel towards players, to come from the same position, instead of being spread out. Note that immunities do NOT prevent you from gaining Chilling Touch stacks, so avoid getting them if you already have plenty of stacks.

Blessing of Freedom can be used at the end of the Ring of Ice cast to prevent you from getting frozen and having to step into fire.

Keep in mind, Jaina really hurts. She deals a lot of damage with her Ice Shards, but it is important to remember that she does a lot of other casts as well, meaning you have to really keep an eye out for when she will actually hit you with her Ice Shards. You need to learn to not waste Shield of the Righteous when she is casting other spells, to make sure you have it available for when she hits you. This becomes especially true on Mythic.

One of the main mythic mechanics on Jaina is the Gathering Blizzard, which periodically swaps in strength. If you are not close to any other player, you will receive a 6 second warning in the form of Freezing Blood, and if you have not gathered up with enough people by the time of that debuff, you will be frozen solid. Both Divine Shield, as well as Blessing of Spellwarding, can be used in the last second of this 6 second Freezing Blood debuff to prevent you from being frozen and reset it. This means that you can technically be on your own for 20-22 seconds should you need to.

Mythic Jaina deals a lot of raid damage at all times. A popular strategy for Protection Paladins is to stack the Grace of the Justicar to help with raid-healing, along with Judgment of Light makes Protection Paladins do a lot of healing output, as the whole raid is basically always stacked close to the boss. This is likely at the expense of a tiny bit of self survivability, but it can help the healers out a fair amount, especially in Phases 2 and 3.

In the intermission, you are able to run around freely, should you choose to use Divine Shield or Blessing of Spellwarding, without being frozen from any abilities.

While you can solo the Avalanche in Phase 2 with Divine Shield or Blessing of Spellwarding, make sure to not take unnecessary hits from anything that would apply Chilling Touch, as they go through immunities. This is especially important against Glacial Ray and Hand of Frost, since they apply 5 stacks of Chilling Touch if they hit you, which will quickly freeze you. As a tank, you can soak Hand of Frost shards going towards the raid during the safety of the Burning Explosion debuff while using Blessing of Freedom on yourself. This is mainly useful against the very first Avalanche, as they happen basically at the same time. This allows you to take the damage instead of the raid, and you avoid having players get frozen and be unable to run out of the explosion in time.

Phase 3: You can help interrupt the Water Elemental with both Rebuke and Avenger's Shield to make sure it stays interrupted, but the main goal is to tank it and simply DPS Jaina. Should you not need it in Phase 3, Blessing of Spellwarding is really strong for helping a player (DPS or healer) be immune to damage for 10 seconds at the very end. It will also make them immune to being frozen should your DPS not be high enough to kill it fast enough. Phase 3 usually calls for the tanks to sacrifice themselves so as to not turn into an Ice Block. Having a cancelaura macro, which removes Shield of the Righteous and other beneficial effects, can be useful. Remember that Guardian of Ancient Kings can NOT be removed.