Protection Warrior Leveling Guide From 1 to 80 for WotLK Classic
Welcome to our Wrath of the Lich King Protection Warrior leveling guide. Here we will help guide you through your Protection Warrior's leveling journey toward Level 80. Make sure to use the sliders shown down below to have the guide update as you level up.
Protection Warrior Level-by-Level Rotation, Talents, and Trainer Skills
Move the slider below to make the guide update to your level!
Protection Warrior Leveling Talents in Wrath of the Lich King
Your first talent unlocks at Level 10.
- Levels 10 to 12 — 3 points in
Improved Thunder Clap.
- Levels 13 & 14 — 2 points in
Shield Specialization.
- Levels 15 to 17 — 3 points in
Incite.
- Levels 18 & 19 — 2 points in
Shield Specialization.
Improved Thunder Clap gives you a nice
damage boost early on, along with
Incite.
- Levels 20 & 21 — 2 points in
Improved Revenge.
- Levels 22 & 23 — 2 points in
Shield Mastery.
- Levels 24 — 1 point in
Shield Specialization.
- Levels 25 & 26 — 2 points in
Improved Bloodrage.
- Levels 27 to 29 — 3 points in
Anticipation.
Improved Revenge is the main focus of
this build, greatly increasing
Revenge damage as well as making it hit
a second target.
Shield Mastery is good for the reduced cooldown
on
Shield Block.
Improved Berserker Rage is good for additional
rage.
- Level 30 — 1 point in
Concussion Blow.
- Levels 31 & 32 — 2 points in
Anticipation.
- Levels 33 & 34 — 2 points in
Improved Disciplines.
- Levels 35 to 39 — 5 points in
One-Handed Weapon Specialization.
Concussion Blow does decent damage and
stuns the target.
Improved Disciplines is decent to reduce the cooldown
on
Retaliation for big AoE pulls.
One-Handed Weapon Specialization is a nice overall damage boost.
- Levels 40 & 41 — 2 points in
Improved Defensive Stance.
- Levels 42 to 44 — 3 points in
Focused Rage.
- Levels 45 to 47 — 3 points in
Vitality.
- Levels 48 & 49 — 2 points in
Gag Order.
Improved Defensive Stance is another
big damage boost.
Focused Rage helps with Rage issues, while
Vitality gives a great stat increase. Lastly,
Gag Order is
good for the extra damage on
Shield Slam.
- Level 50 — 1 point in
Devastate.
- Level 51 — 1 point in
Warbringer.
- Levels 52 to 54 — 3 points in
Critical Block.
- Levels 55 to 57 — 3 points in
Sword and Board.
Devastate is a good, spammable spell
for single-target damage.
Warbringer is good utility, and
Critical Block is some decent mitigation and more crit chance on
Shield Slam. Finally,
Sword and Board is even more damage with
Devastate and can proc free
Shield Slams.
- Level 58 — Make sure to respec before continuing.
- Level 58 — 1 point in
Improved Revenge.
- Levels 59 & 60 — 2 points in
Shield Mastery.
- Level 61 — 1 point in
Shield Specialization.
- Levels 62 & 63 — 2 points in
Improved Bloodrage.
- Levels 64 to 66 — 3 points in
Anticipation.
- Level 67 — 1 point in
Concussion Blow.
- Levels 68 & 69 — 2 points in
Gag Order.
- Level 70 — 1 point in
Anticipation.
Here we are retaking most of the Protection
talents we had previously. Improved Revenge pairs up greatly with
Unrelenting Assault for absurd
Revenge damage.
- Level 71 — 1 point in
Anticipation.
- Levels 72 to 76 — 5 points in
One-Handed Weapon Specialization.
- Levels 77 & 78 — 2 points in
Improved Defensive Stance.
- Levels 79 & 80 — 2 points in
Armored to the Teeth.
One-Handed Weapon Specialization,
Improved Defensive Stance, and
Armored to the Teeth all give you
a big damage boost.
Protection Warrior Leveling Glyphs in Wrath of the Lich King
Your leveling glyphs will differ from your endgame glyphs. Glyphs can be a huge boost to your leveling speed as some greatly improve the baseline power of your key abilities. Be sure to check the price of these glyphs on your server to vastly improve your leveling experience.
Major Glyphs
Minor Glyphs
Protection Warrior Leveling Rotation in Wrath of the Lich King
- Keep
Battle Shout's buff up.
Heroic Strike all Rage.
Bloodrage to prevent your Rage from decaying between mobs.
Charge your enemy.
Charge your enemy and switch to
Defensive Stance.
Charge your enemy.
Taunt far away enemies and proximity nearby ones; gather around 2-6 mobs.
- Aggro as many nearby enemies as you can without moving too far.
Sweeping Strikes and swap to
Defensive Stance.
Shield Block for damage reduction and guaranteed
Revenge procs.
Revenge every possible time it is available.
Thunder Clap if no
Revenge proc or if it is on cooldown.
Thunder Clap if no
Revenge proc.
Shield Slam singular mobs.
Mortal Strike singular mobs.
Cleave when AoEing if you have at least 45 Rage.
Rend anything that will live for most of the bleed duration.
Thunder Clap does great damage early on and starts to fall off in the later levels.
Victory Rush make sure to use this before the proc expires.
Overpower if any of your attacks are dodged.
Heroic Strike rest of Rage.
Heroic Strike single targets only if you have a large surplus of Rage.
Protection does not differ much from other
specs in the early levels. Utilize Victory Rush and
Thunder Clap
as your main damage sources to quickly move from mob to mob.
With Improved Revenge, they way you
play will change drastically. You will want to aggro ideally 4-6 melee-attacking
mobs at a time, gather them up, use
Shield Block, and spam
Revenge
to destroy them all thanks to the 60% damage boost and cleave component. Use
Thunder Clap as a filler between Revenge uses. Swap back and forth
between
Defensive Stance and
Battle Stance to use
Victory Rush when
Revenge is on cooldown.
Shield Slam is a
good Rage dump to use before swapping stances, or if fighting a single mob.
Make sure to respec here for the even higher
Revenge damage spec through
Unrelenting Assault. This removes the
cooldown from Revenge, allowing you to use it every global cooldown. Gather as
many mobs as you can without taking too much damage, use
Sweeping Strikes,
use
Shield Block, and spam
Revenge to melt everything. Throw in
some
Cleaves if you have enough Rage and you will melt large packs of
mobs at a time.
List of Protection Warrior Trainer Skills to Buy
Training spells can be rather expensive, especially if you try to learn every spell available to you. Here we will give you a list of your top-priority spells that you will want to train so you know which ones you can avoid and save some money.
- Be sure to keep these spells at max rank —
Battle Shout,
Thunder Clap,
Revenge,
Cleave,
Shield Slam,
Mortal Strike.
Rend — You can stop training this spell after Rank 3 as you will stop using it shortly after.
Heroic Strike — This skill gets a very minor damage increase with each rank. You can hold off on training this skill if you are low on gold.
Charge — The only benefit of increasing the rank of this spell is the increased Rage it generates. Only train this when you have excess gold as the few extra Rage points are generally not game changing.
- These spells only have 1 rank and should be trained as soon as
possible —
Victory Rush,
Hamstring,
Overpower,
Shield Bash,
Shield Block,
Disarm,
Retaliation,
Intimidating Shout,
Shield Wall,
Berserker Rage,
Recklessness,
Spell Reflection,
Shattering Throw,
Enraged Regeneration.
- Save your gold instead of training these spells —
Demoralizing Shout,
Mocking Blow,
Execute,
Challenging Shout,
Slam,
Whirlwind,
Pummel,
Commanding Shout,
Intervene.
Continue Improving at Level 80
Congratulations on hitting Level 80 in Wrath of the Lich King! Now that your leveling process is over, you can learn more about Level-80 Protection Warrior gameplay by reading our Protection Warrior Guide, which covers everything you need to know to properly play your Protection Warrior.
Changelog
- 06 Sep. 2022: Guide added.
This guide has been written by Abide, TBC and WotLK veteran for nearly a decade. Abide is a Warrior tank and multi-class expert currently playing on Faerlina Horde. You can find him in the Icy Veins Discord if you have any questions or concerns.
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