Protection Warrior Tank Spec, Builds, and Talents — 12.0.5

This page will go over all the talents, explaining each and every one of them in detail. Regardless of whether the talents are passive or active, they can change how we play the class entirely. To get to know if any of the talents influences Protection Warrior's rotation, you can look into our Rotation guide!

It is crucial to mention that our talent trees are very well put together and we have various choices to be made depending on the content and personal preference!

FAQ Colossus or Mountain Thane?

Mountain Thane is currently ahead of Colossus in Raiding and Mythic+. The difference is not very big, so if you enjoy the Colossus gameplay more, you can still use it without hindering your groups performance too much.

Under the next section, you can find different example builds. Your talent choices depend on the content you are doing and which gameplay you prefer.

2.

Best Talents for Protection Warrior

Mountain Thane Raid Colossus Raid Mountain Thane Mythic+/Delve Colossus Mythic+/Delve

2.1.

Mountain Thane Raid Talents

This build is a decent combination of offensive and defensive talents, making it a good all-around raid build.

Bloodsurge, Enduring Alacrity and Thunderlord can be treated as flex points and placed elsewhere for a more defensive approach. Tough as Nails is worth the point on bosses which auto-attack you a lot, otherwise place the point elsewhere.

Into the Fray or Heavy Repercussions?

For Raiding, you can default into Into the Fray. While Heavy Repercussions is better on lower Haste levels, it does not matter as much in Raiding due to you not actively tanking 100% of the time. If you do feel you need more Shield Block up-time, Heavy Repercussions should still be picked.

For a more offensive build, try the export below. This build sacrifices a lot of defensive value for just pure offensive output.

Offensive Raid Build Show Copy

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Be sure to make use of the 'Export Talents' button to import the best build directly into your game!

2.2.

Colossus Raid Talents

Solid all-around Colossus raiding build, which offers an alternative gameplay to Mountain Thane while being just as competitive.

Bloodborne, Enduring Alacrity, and Thunderlord can be treated as flex points and placed elsewhere for a more defensive approach. Tough as Nails is worth the point on bosses which auto-attack you a lot, otherwise place the point elsewhere.

Into the Fray or Heavy Repercussions?

For Raiding, you can default into Into the Fray. While Heavy Repercussions is better on lower Haste levels, it does not matter as much in Raiding due to you not actively tanking 100% of the time. If you do feel you need more Shield Block up-time, Heavy Repercussions should still be picked.

For a more offensive build, try the export below. This build sacrifices a lot of defensive value for just pure offensive output.

Offensive Raid Build Show Copy

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Be sure to make use of the 'Export Talents' button to import the best build directly into your game!

2.4.

Mountain Thane AoE Talents

The below build should be the basis of a standard Mythic+ and Delves build as Mountain Thane.

From the Specialization tree, Tough as Nails and Bloodborne can both be moved around freely.

Into the Fray or Heavy Repercussions?

For AoE content like dungeons, we advise to pick Heavy Repercussions early on with lower haste levels, as you will want the extra Shield Block up-time. As your Haste increases, the cooldown of your Shield Block decreases, as such, you should swap into Into the Fray for its offensive capabilities.

For higher keys, make use of the defensive build below. Tough as Nails can be swapped for Indomitable, Bloodsurge or any other point.

Higher Key Defensive Build Show Copy

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Be sure to make use of the 'Export Talents' button to import the best build directly into your game!

2.5.

Colossus AoE Talents for Protection Warrior

From the Specialization tree, Tough as Nails and Bloodborne can both be moved around freely. Heavy Repercussions can be swapped for Into the Fray for more damage output as soon as you feel comfortable with the Shield Block uptime.

Into the Fray or Heavy Repercussions?

For AoE content like dungeons, we advise to pick Heavy Repercussions early on with lower haste levels, as you will want the extra Shield Block up-time. As your Haste increases, the cooldown of your Shield Block decreases, as such, you should swap into Into the Fray for its offensive capabilities.

For higher keys, make use of the defensive build below. Tough as Nails can be swapped for Indomitable, Bloodsurge or any other point.

Higher Key Defensive Build Show Copy

CkEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAkBAAGzwMzMzMmFzMLzYMGNmxwyMzMzYGmZAAAAwyYAmxAAbmxwCMwMsQjZWwYmZGMLDAwMDAYAG

Be sure to make use of the 'Export Talents' button to import the best build directly into your game!

Phalanx enhances our core rotational abilities, Thunder Clap and Shield Slam, increasing their damage done. It also causes your next Shield Slam that is cast after Thunder Clap to deal additional damage in a frontal cone.

While the Apex talents enhance our core rotational abilities, they do not provide any meaningful gameplay changes. Just by playing the rotation correctly, you will gain the full benefit of the Apex talents, leading to a overall damage increase.

One thing to note is that our Apex talent are pretty much fully offensive oriented. The Phalanx does reduce the enemies damage dealt to you by a small amount, but outside of this, its all offensive.

Protection Warrior, upon reaching Level 71, will gain access to one of two extra talent trees called Hero Talents. These two Hero Talents are Mountain Thane and Colossus, both offering different playstyles and strengths depending on which you pick.

Mountain Thane Hero Talents focus on amplifying your already existing abilities. The core of the tree is turning Thunder Clap into a much more powerful Thunder Blast. The design of the talents themselves gives us a fun feedback loop that is described below.

• Burst of Power allows Lightning Strikes to proc Shield Slam
• Strategist can proc Shield Slam
• Shield Slam can proc Thunder Blast
• Thunder Blast can proc Lightning Strikes through Flashing Skies

As shown in the list above, the whole tree creates a positive Rage feedback loop while maintaining our rotational fluidness. The better Rage economy is what mainly sets Mountain Thane and Colossus apart.

Colossus tree revolves around Demolish and amplifying the damage of your bleeds, Revenge and Shield Slam. While Demolish does not provide any Rage generation, it hits like a truck and enhances our other abilities. It has a different, more methodical flow than the spam heavy Mountain Thane. You need to put slightly more thought into where to spend the Rage you generate while also trying to maximize each and every cast of Demolish.

Opting into War Mode makes you eligible for open-world PvP but also grants you the following benefits:

• World Quests at maximum level have 10% increased rewards.
• You gain 10% increased experience while leveling.
• Grants you the use of PvP talents in the open-world.

With the benefits of enabling War Mode for leveling and PvE content, it is recommended that you enable the feature to maximize your leveling and rewards at maximum level. However, you will make yourself eligible for open-world PvP, and the possibility of being "ganked" while leveling or doing World Quests exists.

Below are the recommended PvP talents for leveling and PvE content. You are able to choose one general PvP talent and three spec-specific talents.

• Morale Killer reduces the cooldown of Demoralizing Shout by 15 seconds, bringing its cooldown to 30 seconds, and causes enemies to deal reduced damage to all targets, not just you. This allows for extremely high uptime on Demoralizing Shout.
• Dragon Charge causes you to charge a long distance at high speed in the targeted direction. It does not require a target. It deals damage and knocks back any enemies that are hit by the charge. The movement that this talent provides is extremely useful for questing or getting out of dangerous situations. It is almost like having another Heroic Leap in terms of movement.
• Bodyguard is a great tool to help you reduce the Physical damage dealt to your allies.
• Disarm is another extremely strong option you can take. This allows you to significantly reduce the damage output of classes that rely on weapon damage.

These are simply recommendations. You may find other PvP talents more useful depending on your playstyle.