Protection Warrior Tank Easy Mode — Shadowlands 9.0.2
On this page, we explain how to easily play Protection Warrior in World of Warcraft — Shadowlands 9.0.2, using the simplest rotation, talent tree, stat priority, gear setup, etc., without sacrificing performance.
Foreword
This page is intended for players who are new to the game or class, have no intentions of raiding Mythic difficulty, or simply want a more straightforward way to play their specialisation without being overwhelmed by the numerous subtleties and active abilities that need to be taken into consideration for optimal play.
The Basics of Protection Warriors
Protection Warriors have great mobility and a diverse toolkit, both in terms of utility and defensive options. Due to their ability to block attacks, Protection Warriors have a predictable and smooth damage intake, making them relatively easy to heal.
Your primary goal throughout fights will be to maximise your Rage generation, and then use this Rage on your active mitigation abilities in order to keep yourself alive. Making good use of your defensive cooldowns and utility is also an integral part of proper play.
Talent Choice for Protection Warriors
Recommended Build for All Content
This build provides a familiar playstyle and is capable of doing most of the content out there — it lacks behind the Bolster / Ravager build in Mythic+ and other places where increased defensive value is needed.
- Level 15:
Devastator
- Level 25:
Double Time
- Level 30:
Booming Voice
- Level 35:
Crackling Thunder
- Level 40:
Indomitable
- Level 45:
Ravager
- Level 50:
Anger Management
There are times where you would need more defensive options, like higher Mythic+ where enemies live longer. In such cases you should use the following build.
- Level 15:
Devastator
- Level 25:
Double Time
- Level 30:
Booming Voice
- Level 35:
Crackling Thunder
- Level 40:
Indomitable
- Level 45:
Ravager
- Level 50:
Bolster
By taking Bolster you will be gaining a lot of extra
Shield Block uptime which makes your damage intake a lot smoother.
To get a better understanding of how the talents work together and when to pick which one, you should take a look at the Talents guide linked below. This will give an in-depth explanation as to why certain talents are better than others, as well as going over the various benefits and drawbacks of each.
Stat Priority for Protection Warriors
Currently, you want to prioritise secondary stats as follows:
- Haste
- Versatility
- Critical Strike
- Mastery
Another important thing to note when choosing what gear to wear is item level. Generally speaking, the stat priority should only be followed when comparing gear of the same item level. A piece of gear with a higher item level than what you currently have should be equipped regardless of its secondary stats.
While the stat priority mentioned here will work well everywhere, you can still optimize your stats depending on the content you are doing. To understand the value of each stat in specific content, take a look at our Stats page.
Covenants and Soulbinds for Protection Warriors
In general, any of the 4 Covenants are usable but we suggest using
Kyrian together with Pelagos. Spear of Bastion
and
Phial of Serenity are both extremely powerful abilities that find
use in any type of content.
Soulbinds and Conduits
The following Pelagos tree is the safest bet for overall performance.
While not all of our Conduits are powerful, we do have some from each category that stand out more than others. Below you can find 2 Conduits of each type: Potency, Endurance, and Finesse, that you should look to use.
Piercing Verdict — Potency
Show of Force — Potency
Brutal Vitality — Endurance
Stalwart Guardian (with
Anger Management and
The Wall) — Endurance
Inspiring Presence — Finesse
Safeguard — Finesse
If you wish to get more in depth information about all the Covenants and Soulbinds/Conduits take a look at our Covenants guide where everything is covered thoroughly.
Legendaries for Protection Warriors
Thunderlord — best in AoE situations paired together with
Booming Voice
The Wall — best in single target situations
Thunderlord and
The Wall are 2 best legendaries that
we can get our hands on. These provide us with reduced cooldowns on
Demoralizing Shout and
Shield Wall. They also increase our
Rage generation by a significant amount. Both of them are further enhanced by
talents like
Anger Management and
Unstoppable Force.
All the other Legendaries and their explanations can be found on our Legendary guide.
Basic Ability Priority for Protection Warriors
To understand the ability priority listed below, you first need to understand what all the abilities do. For in-depth information regarding all the abilities mentioned here, as well as many more, you can look into the Spells Summary guide linked below.
The basic rotation as a Protection Warrior is based on the following priority. As said, this is a priority. It is not the exact sequence in which abilities should be cast, but rather for each time you are able to cast an ability, you should start at the top of the list and cast the first available ability.
The ability priority is the same for both of the above talent builds.
- Cast
Avatar on cooldown.
- Cast
Demoralizing Shout on cooldown (with
Booming Voice talented).
Spear of Bastion,
Ancient Aftershock,
Conqueror's Banner when available.
- Cast
Shield Slam on cooldown. Watch out for resets from Devastate, Thunder Clap, Revenge, and Execute.
- Cast
Thunder Clap on cooldown.
- Cast
Execute (
Condemn) if the enemy is below 20% HP.
- Cast
Revenge only if it is free.
- Cast
Devastate — you will not have this if you picked
Devastator.
Against multiple targets, using the above priority will still generate the
most Rage, thus allowing for the most active mitigation usage and best
survivability. If you are interested in simply dealing more damage against
multiple targets, then you should use Revenge even when you do not
have a proc.
Covenant abilities like Spear of Bastion,
Ancient Aftershock,
and
Conqueror's Banner should be paired together with
Demoralizing Shout (if running
Booming Voice) and
Avatar for increased effectiveness. Do not delay them for too long,
as you might lose a cast over the course of the fight. Since
Condemn just replaces
Execute, the priority
of this ability does not change.
If you picked Ravager and/or
Dragon Roar, then
these abilities should be placed in the priority list right above
Shield Slam.
While not part of the ability priority, make sure you are buffing yourself or
your group with Battle Shout before entering combat.
Active Mitigation Abilities for Protection Warriors
Your rotation is only there to generate Rage for you, which you should then
invest into your active mitigation abilities, Shield Block and
Ignore Pain.
Shield Block is your primary active mitigation ability. It should
be used anytime you are actively tanking an enemy and should be kept up as much
as possible. Using this takes priority over using
Ignore Pain. While
you are not tanking, you should generally spend a charge if you are about to be
at 2 charges (which is the max). Even when not tanking, Shield Block increases
Shield Slam's damage by 30%.
Ignore Pain should be used in addition to
Shield Block. While Shield Block is limited by its cooldown, Ignore
Pain is simply limited by the amount of Rage you have available. As such, once
you have Shield Block up and on cooldown, spend your remaining Rage on Ignore
Pain, making sure you save enough Rage to use Shield Block once it comes off
cooldown. If you know a large amount of damage is incoming, it is worth pooling
your Rage in order to cast Ignore Pain right before the damage goes out,
increasing the likelihood that you survive.
While the above briefly explains how and when to use each ability, there are a lot more specific things and interactions going on between various spells. Understanding all of these is crucial as a Protection Warrior. All of the interactions are explained in the Rotation guide below.
Cooldown Usage for Protection Warriors
As a Protection Warrior, you have a number of defensive cooldowns at your disposal.
Last Stand can and should be used in two different ways, depending on the situation. With
Bolster, Last Stand gives you
Shield Block for its duration. As such, if you do not have Shield Block available but are actively tanking and need to block for survivability purposes, then Last Stand should be used in this situation. If there are many high-damage mechanics or if you are able to have Shield Block up for the majority of your active tanking time, then Last Stand should instead be used if your health drops to a dangerously low level, or in preparation for receiving a large amount of damage.
Shield Wall should be used before you receive a large amount of damage. It decreases all the damage you take by 40% for its duration. Since it lasts for a reasonably long time, you should try to use it for longer periods of high damage intake.
Demoralizing Shout should be used as many times as possible during the encounter for Rage generation purposes as stated in the ability priority. However, it is absolutely worth not using it in that way and saving it instead if you need another cooldown for a period of high-damage.
Spell Reflection reflects the next spell cast against you back to the attacker, and reduces magic damage taken by 20% for 5 seconds (or until a spell is reflected). Most magic damage boss abilities cannot be reflected. As such, the primary use of Spell Reflection is for mitigating magical damage rather than reflecting spells. It is important to know beforehand where that magic damage is and use Spell Reflection accordingly.
Offensive Cooldowns
- Cast
Avatar on cooldown. With
Unstoppable Force,
Thunder Clap is available every other global cooldown. Just be aware of this and make sure to continue to follow the ability priority. You may have streaks where you constantly rotate between
Shield Slam and Thunder Clap due to Thunder Clap resetting Shield Slam. In such cases you should pay more attention to your Rage bar to avoid going over the maximum and using
Ignore Pain or
Revenge to spend some of that Rage.
Changelog
- 07 Jan. 2021: Clarified talent builds.
- 24 Nov. 2020: Added Covenant abilities to Rotation list.
- 23 Nov. 2020: Removed Azerites, Essences and added Legendary, Covenant and Soulbind information.
- 12 Oct. 2020: Page updated for the Shadowlands pre-patch.
More Warrior Guides
Guides from Other Classes
This guide has been written by Mwahi, a Protection Warrior theorycrafter and moderator of the Skyhold Warrior Discord.
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