Picking a tanking alt

[Anyndra]

I know you get lots of “which class” questions, so I have never posted one despite having continuous problems picking between all the interesting options. Now I’ve given up trying to decide, and since my holy priest fulfilled his final goal of getting epic flyer I’ve retired him to daily quests and fishing. I intend to set up a rotation to level hunter, mage, rogue and a tanking class to experience the different sides of the game, but I’ve come to the conclusion that I lack knowledge to pick the tanking class.

My choices are warrior and paladin, both of which are 20+ and I’ve tried tanking with both of them. Neither was something really special and both have different strengths and drawbacks for me. I suspect warrior might get dull with only possibility being tanking (I’m not going to be one of those “Sorry, I don’t tank” warriors) and I’d end up with another handicapped 70 when the time to spec protection came. However, levelling would be easy while paladin is slow to solo. Paladin AoE protection grinding seems really fun, and even though I’d have to heal every now and then I don’t really mind that. Druid might be interesting, but I don’t like the tauren forms, and levelling something that makes me hope I was alliance doesn’t seem like wise choice.

The things I’d like to know more about are as follows:
Rage is infinite, mana is not. I’ve played only once with tankadin and he was less than convincing, so I have no experience of how limiting factor this really is. How real is the threat of running out of mana mid pull/boss fight? Something that happens very rarely or do you need to watch it closely?

As I understand it, most tanking plate is for warriors and biggest problem for druids and paladins is getting gear to support them. So how hard would it be to get tankadin gear for normal 5-mans, questing and very rare heroics? I’m not going to Karazhan with this character, so top notch gear isn’t a concern, but if even basic quality gear requires lots of extra effort warrior would seem more appealing. By lots of extra effort I mean heroic drops, exalted rewards or expensive BoEs, I don’t mind running instances multiple times for specific drops.

Multi-mob tanking should be way easier with paladin, and being somewhat lacking with finger dexterity and hot keying that would seem like right choice for me. While playing my priest, I off tanked about half of the levelling dungeons and even in some bigger pulls in places like SH or SL I see warriors really struggling with the mobs. I don’t want to be hindrance to my group, and I doubt I would be capable of the harder warrior multi-mob tanking, which really points me towards paladin. Am I overestimating the difficulty of warrior tanking?

Any and all help with deciding would be really appreciated, and thanks for reading this long rambling. Hopefully I can finally settle my last alt debate with this. Also, I considered posting this in class forums, but that would have given me biased views so I decided this would be a better place.

[Aerath]

As things stand at the moment...

Go Warrior. Failing that, go Druid. Steer well clear from Paladins.

Problem with Paladins is that even if they -are- geared up, they still fall short in the health department and their overall gear just isn't as available as for Warriors.

And, Warriors make great DPS when respecced. Paladins make great Healers when respecced... that's a massive difference when trying to quest.

That said, Paladins will do fine up to Heroics and even Karazhan (most bosses at least), so if you really don't intend to take things any further, you'll just suffer through a lack of gear really.

[Toxicshadow]

Levelling: I never actually got past lvl 25 on my paladin, so all I know is hear-say. From what I have heard a retri-paladin gives about the same DPS as a grinding-specced warrior and they're even getting a boost. Add to that that you can heal urself if you got more water than food (or if you get a few adds) and I'd think the Paladin would be faster.
Oh and if you're a hordie you'll get a bit of mana-regen through racials. Very little, true, but some.

Rage/Mana: Not an issue. Rage is limited by how much damage you take, and likewise a tankadin will regenerate mana based on how much the healer heals him. Sure, you'll probably be oom by the end of each fight, but the stuff that gives the most (although slowest) threat is fairly low-cost so you should have mana for it throughout a fight. As much as I hate to admit this (having a lvl 70 warrior) my most smooth runs have all been with tankadins..

Gear: Not a clue. My Warrior got most of his from PvPing so I don't even know what a paladin can't get.

Actually tanking:
Now this is where it gets good. Lets list the pros and cons..

Warrior, Pros:
Can tank mana-burning mobs without any issues
Is immune to crits/crushing from low-speed enemies due to shield abilities
Will boost all physical damage sources - while getting loads of threat - with Sunder Armor
Been boosted quite a lot for multi-mob tanking since the last time I tanked, supposed to be great now

Paladin, Pros:
Threat generation - even on a "per mob" basis - boosted when attacked by multiple mobs
'Taunt' affects multiple mobs
In extreme situations he can shield a member of his party to reset that member's threat. Wont work very well if not 2nd on threat-list.

Warrior, Cons:
Tanking more than 4 mobs will require rather a lot of skill with a keyboard
No panic-buttons for targets out of melee range, if what they're chasing is more than 25 yards away
If something bad happens, you die. Get one add too many while soloing = you die, healer dies while grouping = you die.

Paladins, Cons:
Threat generation drops if mana drops, mana drops if you're not taking enough damage. Unlike a Warrior this isn't a gradual drop which lets DPSers slow down their DPS, but a wall where it more or less stops.
Ineffective in boss-fights. You don't get hit enough to make full use of threat-generating abilties. You can't get block+dodge+parry+miss to a total 100% which leaves you vulnerable to heavy spikes of dmg from slow attacking bosses. You're absolutely worthless if what you're fighting has got a mana-burn (well you are).
No way to regain aggro of a taunt-immune mob, should you loose it (especially in fights where threat is randomly reset).

[Anyndra]

Thanks for answers, they're really appreciated :)
Based on them it's as I kind of thought it would be, paladin has just a bit too many drawbacks. And if warrior has been boosted for multi-mob tanking, that's negating my main reason for favoring paladin.
Coupled with general attitude that paladins should heal, I'll try out warrior. Maybe if I find some extra time I'll casually level the paladin too to try it out.

[Aerath]

Just want to stress something though - each of the three tanking classes can do regular 5mans/heroics just fine. Some fights favour druids (Underbog Bog Lords anyone ?), some favour Paladins (Arcatraz first boss room before it was nerfed) and others favour Warriors. Paladins do run into slightly more issues than Warriors/Druids - dispelling Bosses or Mana Burning/Draining mobs are a major pain, but they have their unique advantages to make up for it.

Just when you go beyond that level, Paladins start to suffer. Missing out on 1k health vs Warriors when equally geared is just a huge pain when someone like the Prince in Kara can basically chew through 12k health on Plate in 3 seconds.

[Dhoum]

It's worth pointing out that Paladins can drop a seal/judgement combination (from level 38) that regenerates mana based on how often you hit the mob you're fighting. Given that even moderately Holy specced Paladins can cast spells without risk of interruption (combination of Aura and Talent), this can give a Paladin a huge amount of survivability whilst levelling. Against end-game bosses, of course, this doesn't mean a great deal ... depends if that's where you're aspiring to get to.

[moopy]

Just when you go beyond that level, Paladins start to suffer. Missing out on 1k health vs Warriors when equally geared is just a huge pain when someone like the Prince in Kara can basically chew through 12k health on Plate in 3 seconds.

Takes that long? :) The Thrash attack in phase 2 seems to chew that in two shakes of a murloc's tail. You'd certainly want a tank with 15k or so there, just to give you breathing space.

My guild used to have trouble on the Prince, until I pointed out that the healers had to keep the tank well over 12k in phase 2, rather than being parsimonious with mana. Amazing what a difference that made- everything else was basically sound and slotted into place after (we use the "raid in the doorway" technique which makes the infernals a lot easier).

Oh, another pro/con. Druids and warriors can (with some gear/spec tweaking) do very decent DPS too. Paladin DPS is something of a running joke, as it's only barely mediocre in amazing gear. Druids can spec for tanking/healing/caster dps/physical dps (they are pretty amazing like that), warriors can be ubertanks or nasty dps machines.

Pallies can be passable tanks or storming healers- but were primarily designed to be an easy to learn (by blizzard's own admission) support class. This means they are at their best when healing, cleansing, buffing, judging and using all their tricks- where they are a real boost to those around them. This is where the retri tree fits in, too- support DPS while cleansing/judging/blessing- and why retri pallies who only whack things are treated with contempt, while the versatile ones are loved for their utility. Yes, even retri-dins, though prot and holy are more common/liked.

Prot pallies can be blindingly good tanks for five man content, and for Karazhan level stuff. However, they aren't really viable beyond that at present, other than as (very handy) offtanks in some spots. The itemisation just isn't there compared to warriors.. yet.

[Kugan]

You can't get block+dodge+parry+miss to a total 100% which leaves you vulnerable to heavy spikes of dmg from slow attacking bosses. You're absolutely worthless if what you're fighting has got a mana-burn (well you are).


Paladins can reach uncrushable with gear (pretty easily actually). Because we have more “charges” on Holy Shield than warriors do on Shield Block, we will almost always be uncrushable (think Prince phase 2). However, this does come at stamina cost, which places us at a disadvantage.

Protection paladins also do amazing damage while they are tanking. A protection warrior can never do any damage.

All of your other points are valid though :D.

I would say: Go with the class you like the best. All three tanking classes are viable (end game as well), they are just a bit different :D.

[swaldman]

Re the "gear for tankadins" issue, there seems to be a bit of confusion:

Blizzard have got the itemisation wrong for tankadins, and the pieces that are obviously "designed for" paladins have too much int, mp5 and +spell damage and not enough stamina or mitigation.

However, up to and including kara, paladins can just wear warrior gear. If you're not intending to raid with this character, it's not a big deal. The problem comes after that when the nice gear all has "Class: Warrior" written into it.

Yes, paladins do have less health than warriors, and I suspect there's a sticky moment or three when you've hit 70 but haven't really geared up yet. But I don't think anything is insurmountable there.

I guess it comes down to playstyles, and whether you want to be able to respec to dps or to general hybrid usefulness (or healbotting). FWIW, if you're thinking of levelling as prot, prot paladins do have surprisingly high dps as long as they're getting hit.

[Anyndra]

My biggest problem when picking characters is that I can honestly say I like every one of them. If I had time, I would play them all, but as it is I try to read up on them and play them for some time. If even after that I cant decide, I'll just pick one and that's it.
However, tanking is such an important part of group play that I feel I shouldnt just randomly pick one or the other. No one cares if they have mage instead of lock as DPS, but they do care if their tank just cant do her job.
From the research I have done, I found out that paladins can tank, but have some issues mostly with gear and mana. I couldnt quite find out how large these issues really were, just encouragement that you can overcome them. The post from toxic clearly listing pros and cons was really helpful and the kind of info I was looking for.
The encouragement from later posts makes me hesitate though, because I really am not going to Kara and beyond with this character. My guild is short on healers and I love healing, so of course I'll bring my priest to raids. Another questionable plus to paladins is excatly being strong healers, so if I find tanking not to my taste I can easily respec and get back to playing. I think I'll do some more playing around with them and see if I can determine my favorite, but I doubt that. :P

[Renata]

My choices are warrior and paladin, both of which are 20+ and I’ve tried tanking with both of them. Neither was something really special and both have different strengths and drawbacks for me.

Your characters are far too low level at this point, I suspect, to make any really informed decisions about their tanking ability. My warrior didn't really start doing serious tanking until Scarlet Monastery, which for a warrior is a good place in the late 30s/early 40s if you're going to be MTing. A lot of your best tools aren't available to you until then, and the options just grow over time. I played my warrior at 60 for quite a long time and switched her to a Protection spec, and she was a very good tank. Now she's level 66 and arms for levelling, and she'll probably stay arms as we have plenty of protection warriors in our group and having a DPS offtank is more useful. But she's still a good tank for regular instancing at her level.

I suspect warrior might get dull with only possibility being tanking (I’m not going to be one of those “Sorry, I don’t tank” warriors) and I’d end up with another handicapped 70 when the time to spec protection came.

Tanking, far from being boring, is extremely active work (and sometimes quite taxing). I made a warlock to relax in instances. Tanking is far from boring.

However, levelling would be easy while paladin is slow to solo. Paladin AoE protection grinding seems really fun, and even though I’d have to heal every now and then I don’t really mind that.

My retribution paladin is almost level 43 and she's not slow at all. She was slow in her early 30s, but once you're over that into your mid to late 30s, things pick up again. It's an awkward "age" for a paladin. However, my plan is to level her up to 70 as a retribution paladin and then switch her over later, not as a tank, but to be a healadin, as an other healer for my extended group.

Rage is infinite, mana is not. I’ve played only once with tankadin and he was less than convincing, so I have no experience of how limiting factor this really is. How real is the threat of running out of mana mid pull/boss fight? Something that happens very rarely or do you need to watch it closely?

As a retribution pally (which is a great levelling spec, BTW -- please don't confuse a levelling spec with an end-game spec -- what you want to end up with in the end is not necessarily the most efficient build for levelling up), I do run low on mana sometimes, but there are a few tricks here. First, taking a tip from another retribution pally, I run with Blessing of Wisdom rather than Blessing of Might. This may seem counterintuitive, but I am shoring up my weakness rather than playing up my strength. I gear for attack power, not for my mana pool, so the added MP5 makes a huge difference in my ability to keep mana. The other thing is just to keep a close eye on your mana bar and be careful when you pull.

Now, you do get unexpected adds, but you do have another trick as a blood elf paladin (I assume from your statements about Tauren that you play Horde) and that's to use your mana tap/arcane torrent ability. Arcane torrent's not just for silence -- it also gives you a boost to your mana pool. Keep that in your back pocket for emergencies.

As I understand it, most tanking plate is for warriors and biggest problem for druids and paladins is getting gear to support them.

Tankadins can wear warrior plate. There's nothing that says they can't. Just like warriors can wear "paladin" plate (and one of the frustrating parts of quest rewards as a warrior in TBC is that many of the plate rewards carry Mp5 and +healing and are STILL better than the plate you have on your back), paladins can wear "warrior" plate. You just may gem them up a little differently than a warrior does.

As far as druids go, most feral druids have multiple sets of gear depending on whether they are in bear form (for tanking) or cat form (for DPS). We make heavy use of bear tanks in our extended group. The nice thing about gear for bear druids is that there is little competition from other classes in regards to defensive leather. The only leather classes after level 40 are rogues and druids, so where they tend to run into competition is getting cat form gear, which will also appeal to the rogues. Of course, they are also going to be competing with warriors and tankadins for the tanky rings, necklaces, and cloaks, but then you guys just get a taste of what it's like to be a damage caster and having to compete with three or four others in your party for the same gear.

So how hard would it be to get tankadin gear for normal 5-mans, questing and very rare heroics? I’m not going to Karazhan with this character, so top notch gear isn’t a concern, but if even basic quality gear requires lots of extra effort warrior would seem more appealing. By lots of extra effort I mean heroic drops, exalted rewards or expensive BoEs, I don’t mind running instances multiple times for specific drops.

No harder than it is to gear up a warrior. And never say never. :D

Multi-mob tanking should be way easier with paladin, and being somewhat lacking with finger dexterity and hot keying that would seem like right choice for me . . . Am I overestimating the difficulty of warrior tanking?

Yes, you are. You learn the tricks of dealing with multiple mobs. They actually have more tools for dealing with multiple mobs, not fewer. However, the entire group has responsibility for controlling aggro and dealing with multiple-mob situations, not just you. A good group helps their tank keep aggro, or at least doesn't make his or her life more difficult on purpose.

...Ren

[Anyndra]

Your characters are far too low level at this point, I suspect, to make any really informed decisions about their tanking ability. My warrior didn't really start doing serious tanking until Scarlet Monastery, which for a warrior is a good place in the late 30s/early 40s if you're going to be MTing. A lot of your best tools aren't available to you until then, and the options just grow over time. I played my warrior at 60 for quite a long time and switched her to a Protection spec, and she was a very good tank. Now she's level 66 and arms for levelling, and she'll probably stay arms as we have plenty of protection warriors in our group and having a DPS offtank is more useful. But she's still a good tank for regular instancing at her level.

I know they are too low, but since usual advice on these questions seems to be "level both to 20+ and see for yourself" I thought I should mention I had already done that.

Tanking, far from being boring, is extremely active work (and sometimes quite taxing). I made a warlock to relax in instances. Tanking is far from boring.

I meant that only being able to do one thing, tank, might eventually get boring. As I play almost always with PUGs, speccing DPS with warrior to have a change just wouldnt be viable because my server has serious lack of tanks. And this might sound a bit strange, but if I want to relax I can just jump on my priest and go heal something. Many people seem to think healing hard or unpleasant thing to do, but for me it's really the best thing in online games.


My retribution paladin is almost level 43 and she's not slow at all. She was slow in her early 30s, but once you're over that into your mid to late 30s, things pick up again. It's an awkward "age" for a paladin. However, my plan is to level her up to 70 as a retribution paladin and then switch her over later, not as a tank, but to be a healadin, as an other healer for my extended group.

Right now I'm actually considering levelling paladin as prot, seeing if I like tanking and speccing healadin for end game. Then if I still feel like playing a tank, I'll level warrior or druid. That way I get best of both worlds, new healing style to play around with and chance to try out tanking.


Tankadins can wear warrior plate. There's nothing that says they can't. Just like warriors can wear "paladin" plate (and one of the frustrating parts of quest rewards as a warrior in TBC is that many of the plate rewards carry Mp5 and +healing and are STILL better than the plate you have on your back), paladins can wear "warrior" plate. You just may gem them up a little differently than a warrior does.

As far as my understanding of paladin tanking goes, you need also things like spell dmg, int and mp5, which arent found on warrior gear. I did research before posting my OP, and saw it mentioned many times that getting approppriate gear as tankadin would be harder than for warrior, because you need to balance everything while still keeping up mitigation and health. There also supposedly isnt as much gear designed for tankadins than there is for warriors.

No harder than it is to gear up a warrior. And never say never. :D

The reason I'm saying this character wont go to Kara is, that I love healing and my main is quite well geared holy priest. My guild is lacking healers and has plenty of tanks, so I cant see myself entering raids with anything else than that priest.

Yes, you are. You learn the tricks of dealing with multiple mobs. They actually have more tools for dealing with multiple mobs, not fewer. However, the entire group has responsibility for controlling aggro and dealing with multiple-mob situations, not just you. A good group helps their tank keep aggro, or at least doesn't make his or her life more difficult on purpose.

As I said, I'll be pugging so "good group" might help me or try their best to pull aggro on every mobs in sight. I'm also seriously lacking with hand dexterity, so easier option might be the better choice for me :P

Thanks for advice, this seems to be my hardest choice of alts. I'm also giving druids another look and deciding if I could stand staring at bear's behind, so maybe a combination of tanking healadin-to-be and feral druid might be what I'm looking for.