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Table of Contents
General Information
On this page, we present the viable talent choices for Protection Warriors in World of Warcraft Legion 7.3.5. We detail what each of the talents do and in which situations they should be taken.
The other pages of our Protection Warrior guide can be accessed from the table of contents on the right.
About Our Reviewer
This guide has been reviewed and approved by Treckie, who has been a long-time leading tank who has competed for world first kills for 5 years. He is one of the casters for both last year's and this year's upcoming Mythic Dungeon invitational. You can watch his stream on Twitch and you can follow him on Twitter.
1. Talent Choices
| Level | Choices | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| 15 |
?
Shockwave
|
?
Storm Bolt
|
?
Warbringer
|
| 30 |
?
Impending Victory
|
✔
Inspiring Presence
|
?
Safeguard
|
| 45 |
✔
Renewed Fury
|
?
Best Served Cold
|
?
Avatar
|
| 60 |
?
Warlord's Challenge
|
?
Bounding Stride
|
?
Crackling Thunder
|
| 75 |
✔
Devastator
|
✘
Never Surrender
|
✔
Indomitable
|
| 90 |
✔
Vengeance
|
✘
Into the Fray
|
?
Booming Voice
|
| 100 |
✔
Anger Management
|
✔
Heavy Repercussions
|
?
Ravager
|
Talents can be freely changed when out of combat and in a rested XP area
(such as an inn or a capital city). Moreover, 
Tome of the Tranquil Mind
and 
Codex of the Tranquil Mind can be used to temporarily allow
players to change talents anywhere, as long as they are out of
combat.
2. Tier 1 (Level 15) Talents for Protection Warriors
|
?
Shockwave
|
?
Storm Bolt
|
?
Warbringer
|
Shockwave is an active ability with a 40-second cooldown. It
is a frontal cone attack that deals low Physical damage to enemies within 10
yards, and stuns them for 3 seconds. Its cooldown is reduced by 20 seconds if
it strikes at least 3 targets.
Storm Bolt is an active ability with a 20-yard range and a
30-second cooldown. It deals low Physical damage to the target, stunning them
for 4 seconds.
Warbringer modifies 
Intercept. When used against an
enemy, the target is stunned for 2.5 seconds (in addition to the normal
effects of Intercept), and all enemies within 5 yards of the target take
damage, but only if they are stunnable (note that they do not get
stunned, and note also that bosses are not stunnable). When used against an ally, the effects on the ally remain the same as for Intercept,
but any enemies within 5 yards of them will take damage if they are
stunnable.
In this tier, you have a choice between 3 damaging crowd-control abilities, and you should make your choice primarily on the requirements of your particular encounter.
Shockwave is a great choice for keeping multiple targets
locked down, and it is especially powerful if you can hit 3+ targets in order
to benefit from the cooldown reduction effect.
For stunning a single target, Storm Bolt is a great choice,
whether you are trying to interrupt the target, or just to prevent it from
attacking you for a few seconds.
Finally, Warbringer is going to provide the best damage increase,
but it only deals damage to stunnable targets (such as adds/trash). That said,
since it is annoying to keep running out of the minimum 
Intercept
range to be able to Intercept back in, Shockwave can sometimes be a
better-suited and more reliable stun. Keep in mind also that the Warbringer
stun is not affected by diminishing returns, which makes it great for adds that
chain-cast even after all other interrupts no longer work, or for adds whose
casts cannot be interrupted.
3. Tier 2 (Level 30) Talents for Protection Warriors
|
?
Impending Victory
|
✔
Inspiring Presence
|
?
Safeguard
|
Impending Victory replaces 
Victory Rush. It is usable at
any time (with a 30-second cooldown), damaging the target and healing you for
15% of your maximum health. Getting a killing blow reset its cooldown.
Inspiring Presence is a passive aura that causes all party or raid
members within
60 yards to be healed for 3% of all damage they deal. This aura does not
affect you.
Safeguard causes Intercept (when used on an ally) to
transfer 30% of the damage taken by the target to you for 6 seconds.
Inspiring Presence will provide your raid with a lot of overall
healing, which makes it the go-to choice in fights with high raid damage. Note
that you yourself do not benefit from the heal, and that other players can only benefit from one instance of Inspiring Presence at one
time, meaning that if you have multiple Protection Warriors in the raid, only
one should be using this talent.
Safeguard turns Intercept into a powerful external
cooldown with a very short duration, which could be great for your co-tank in
raids, but in the case of raids, it is difficult to argue against taking
Inspiring Presence. This talent is most useful in higher Mythic+, where
some mechanics can 1-shot other players, if you can afford not to take
Impending Victory.
The choice between these two talents depends on whether you need raid survivability or personal survivability (more precisely, for your off-tank).
Finally, Impending Victory provides you with a bit of on-demand
self-healing, however it does cost 10 Rage and is on the global cooldown, which
makes it weak for panic healing, but it can still be efficient. It does provide
a bit of personal survivability, and the heal per Rage is higher than what you
would get from 
Ignore Pain, but it is still fairly weak for raids, and
so we recommend it mainly as a Mythic+ talent, or for solo play.
4. Tier 3 (Level 45) Talents for Protection Warriors
|
✔
Renewed Fury
|
?
Best Served Cold
|
?
Avatar
|
Renewed Fury causes 
Ignore Pain to also enrage you,
increasing all damage you deal by 10% for 6 seconds.
Best Served Cold causes Revenge to deal 5% more damage for
each target it hits, up to a maximum of 5 targets.
Avatar is an active ability with a 90-second cooldown. You deal
20% increased damage for Avatar's 20-second duration, and activating Avatar
removes all roots and snares.
Renewed Fury is the go-to talent due to its high uptime, and its
uptime is higher the more Rage you are able to generate, since it means more
Ignore Pain casts. In many situations, you will find an uptime around
80% on Renewed Fury, meaning a great increase in damage overall.
Best Served Cold can be a good option for dungeons, however it will
only be useful against AoE packs. While you will need a constant 2 mobs for
Revenge itself to even do more damage than if you had
Renewed Fury, your other attacks are not increased at all; Renewed Fury
requires you to constantly use Ignore Pain to keep up. Overall, Renewed
Fury is just more consistent, even in dungeons.
Avatar is weak compared to the other choices, but it can be a
useful talent as a DPS cooldown. It pairs well with other abilities like
Battle Cry, Booming Voice, and Ravager, being able to
produce great burst DPS for burst phases or AoE packs.
5. Tier 4 (Level 60) Talents for Protection Warriors
|
?
Warlord's Challenge
|
?
Bounding Stride
|
?
Crackling Thunder
|
Warlord's Challenge reduces the cooldown of
Berserker Rage by 15 seconds, and while Berserker Rage is active, it
removes the cooldown of 
Taunt and causes enemies you taunt move 50%
faster towards you.
Bounding Stride passively reduces the cooldown of
Heroic Leap by 15 seconds, and also causes Heroic Leap to grant you a
70% movement speed increase for 3 seconds.
Crackling Thunder increases the radius of 
Thunder Clap by
50%.
The talents in this tier are mostly situational, so you should make your
choice based on the requirements of the fight and on your playstyle and
preference. However, if you are using the 2-piece Tier 20 Se Bonus, you should
use Warlord's Challenge.
In genera, Warlord's Challenge is useful in case you need to pick up
several adds spawning at the same time, or if the boss needs to be moved from
one place to another quickly. The Tier 20 Set Bonuses makes this talent
essential, as the 15-second reduction in 
Berserker Rage cooldown makes
a big difference.
Bounding Stride is great for on-demand movement, and it is generally
a nice quality of life improvement.
Crackling Thunder is a solid go-to talent for dungeons, since the
extra range on 
Thunder Clap increases ease-of-play and also makes it
easier to pick up stray adds. Since Thunder Clap will be used in your rotation,
and does quite a bit of damage, it is important to make sure it hits all
relevant targets. If the mobs are already hitting you, the extra range is made
a bit redundant, but it can help the initial pull be less messy.
6. Tier 5 (Level 75) Talents for Protection Warriors
|
✔
Devastator
|
✘
Never Surrender
|
✔
Indomitable
|
Devastator passively causes your auto attacks to deal additional
damage, generate 5 Rage, and have a 30% chance to reset the remaining
cooldown of 
Shield Slam.
Never Surrender causes Ignore Pain to ignore up to 100%
more damage, depending how much health you are missing (the more health you
are missing, the more damage is ignored).- Indomitable passively increases your maximum health by 20%, and
also causes Ignore Pain to ignore 20% more damage.
The best talent choice in this tier depends on how the encounter will be
played out, but we feel that Indomitable is a good default choice when
you are starting out. Since playing with Devastator can be
complicated, we recommend using Indomitable until you can manage to play with
Devastator correctly. Once you can play Devastator proficiently, it definitely
competes with Indomitable and in the majority of cases, it is the better
option.
Indomitable will give you a permanent 20% boost to your health, and
also make every single Ignore Pain you use about 20% stronger. This
makes Indomitable a strong choice for most raid encounters where the main focus
is just surviving rare but large hits. Once the damage intake becomes too high,
while it should not outperform Devastator in Rage generation, it might
be a safer option than using Devastator, especially if you are not yet used to
it. Once you get used to playing with Devastator, you should be able to make
the decision between the two yourself.
Devastator removes Devastate from your rotation and makes
it passively integrated in your auto attacks, so now your auto attacks have a
chance to proc 
Shield Slam, which frees up a global cooldown for you.
While it sometimes can be useful to track your swing timer, the added benefit
from doing so is very minor; it can make low-Rage situations more bearable, but
realistically there is no real benefit. For survivability purposes, Devastator
almost requires you to play with Vengeance, since you rely on casting
Revenge, and so free Revenge casts are welcome.
It is difficult to obtain much effectiveness out of Never Surrender.
The "cap" of Ignore Pain is 3x 60-Rage casts, but Never Surrender
doubles this cap no matter what your current health is. While this might seem
strong, it has no chance to outperform Devastator with Ignore Pain
shields, as the Rage generation is too valuable. And while you could
technically save up Ignore Pains worth 6-7 million before a big hit,
Indomitable plus its 3x Ignore Pains that are always 20% stronger
would do that job for you anyway. All this means that Never Surrender is just
never worth taking compared to the other talents.
Read more about how to utilise Ignore Pain to its full potential here.
7. Tier 6 (Level 90) Talents for Protection Warriors
|
✔
Vengeance
|
✘
Into the Fray
|
?
Booming Voice
|
Vengeance causes Ignore Pain to reduce the cost of your
next Revenge (used within 15 seconds) by 35%, and also causes
Revenge to reduce the cost of your next Ignore Pain (also within 15
seconds) by 35%.
Into the Fray passively grants you 3% Haste for each enemy within 15
yards, up to a maximum of 5 enemies.
Booming Voice causes 
Demoralizing Shout to also generate
60 Rage, and increase your damage to targets affected by it by 25%.
Vengeance provides a powerful boost to survivability, without
really losing any damage, through a large discount on Rage spent on
Ignore Pain. It requires you to effectively weave Revenge and
Ignore Pain; depending on your dodges/parries, you can get quite a bit of Rage
reduction on a lot of your Ignore Pains.
If you are consistently facing multiple enemies, then
Into the Fray can end up providing a sizable increase in Haste; it is
quite weak if you cannot get the full benefit from having 5 adds nearby. While
it is an easy-to-use talent for learning the
Protection specialisation, especially for dungeons, it is not recommended.
Finally, Booming Voice can provide some burst damage or
emergency survivability through the 60 Rage that it generates, and it can be
coupled with Avatar for damage. It is a great choice for Mythic+
(either bosses or for big trash pulls), but in a raid setting, it does not do
that much for you defensively; when this is not a concern, the extra DPS
cooldown is more than welcome. This talent pairs well with the
Thundergod's Vigor legendary, or the tier 7 Anger Management
talent, which allows a very high uptime on 
Demoralizing Shout for both
damage output and damage reduction.
8. Tier 7 (Level 100) Talents for Protection Warriors
|
✔
Anger Management
|
✔
Heavy Repercussions
|
?
Ravager
|
Anger Management causes every 10 Rage you spend to reduce the
remaining cooldown of 
Battle Cry, 
Last Stand,
Shield Wall, and Demoralizing Shout by 1 second.
Heavy Repercussions causes Shield Slam to extend the
duration of 
Shield Block (assuming it is active when Shield Slam is
used) by 1 second, and causes Shield Block to increase the damage of
Shield Slam by 30%.
Ravager is an active ability with a 1-minute cooldown. You throw
your weapon at the targeted location, where it will spin in place for 7
seconds, dealing damage to all enemies within 8 yards every second. Moreover,
using Ravager increases your Parry chance by 35% for 12 seconds.
All the talents in this tier improve your survivability, but the choice will depend on several factors, most importantly the type of encounter you are progressing on.
Heavy Repercussions is the best choice when you are constantly
taking melee damage that can be blocked. Using this talent and having a lot of
Haste can lead you to potentially having 100% 
Shield Block uptime,
which is very strong in encounters that threaten mainly through blockable
damage. Heavy Repercussions also boosts Shield Slam damage by 30%,
which makes it a great talent both defensively and offensively.
Anger Management is the go-to talent in this tier, as it plays well
with many other talents and abilities. It is an excellent choice for encounters
in which you find yourself wanting your main defensive abilities to be
available a lot more frequently. Anger Management is very useful on encounters
where the majority of big damage spikes are not blockable, or where most of the
damage intake is low with a few bursts here and there. Talents like
Devastator and the current tier pieces help amplify the effectiveness
of Anger Management a lot; your cooldowns will be available more
frequently due to such a hige Rage generation. You also generate 50% more Rage
during Demoralizing Shout, due to 
Might of the Vrykul, which
further increases Rage generation and decreases the recharge time on your
cooldowns.
Finally, Ravager seems like a good AoE talent, but realistically it
does less damage in total than one Thunder Clap cast; the only useful
part of this talent is the 35% parry for 12 seconds, and even that is not worth
much and can most certainly not compete with the other two talents.
9. ChangeLog
- 28 Aug. 2017: Added Lightforged Augment Rune and new 7.3 epic gems.
- 19 Aug. 2017: Updated all talent sections.
- 13 Jun. 2017: Updated Indomitable description to account for Patch 7.2.5 changes and updated the discussions of 4, 5, and 7 talents.
- 25 May 2017: Changed Into the Fray and Ravager to situational talents instead of recommended.
- 27 Mar. 2017: Updated tier 1, 3, 4, 5, and 6 talent sections.
- 19 Feb. 2017: Updated Warbringer description to further clarify things, and made a slight edit to the tier 5 talent discussion.
- 11 Jan. 2017: Updated Warbringer description to account for correct Patch 7.1.5 change (following a patch note confusion).
- 10 Jan. 2017: Updated talent descriptions to account for Patch 7.1.5 (including removing Ultimatum and adding new talent), and changed the discussion for most of the tiers.
- 25 Oct. 2016: Inspiring Presence is now only applied to party and raid members.
- 22 Oct. 2016: Made updates and improvements to tier 2, 3, 5, and 6 talent discussions.
- 24 Sep. 2016: Updated the Vengeance Rage cost reduction to account for a recent hotfix.
- 20 Sep. 2016: Updated the Vengeance discussion, and also made a small tweak to the tier 3 talent discussion.
- 29 Aug. 2016: Updated for Legion's launch.
- 21 Jul. 2016: Removed a mention that Warbringer only works if Intercept is used against an enemy, and updated the talent discussion accordingly.
- 20 Jul. 2016: Changed our opinion of Ultimatum to say that it is a good choice against a single target when used together with Vengeance and Heavy Repercussions.
- 19 Jul. 2016: Revamped tier 5 talent discussion.
- 19 Jul. 2016: Updated for the Legion pre-patch.
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