Protection Warrior Tank Spec, Builds, and Talents — Dragonflight 10.0.7

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!

There are also some talents that are good in certain environments, while lacking in others. For more information regarding talents that are good in Mythic+ or Raiding respectively you can take a look at the guides below.

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!

Before digging into the details it is important to mention that you no longer need any special item in order to swap around your Talents! This is a great quality of life change.

Under this section you can find 2 different example builds. One of them is optimised for Raiding, while the other one for Mythic.

The above build is a great example of a balanced build used for Raiding. You can import it with the string below.

• Raid talent build: BkEAoonA2h02U1PVo4204nicFIEBAAAASSikkg0SKJJp1QEIUEElkEgISSQDJJAHgDECAAAAAAAEBAoUaAgA

The below build is a solid example of a overall good Mythic+ build. It should provide you with more than enough Shield Block, interrupt tools and damage output.

You can import it with the string below.

• Mythic+ talent build: BkEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAIEBAAAASSSkkg0SKJJpUQEIUkIRJJBgQSQDJJIARCAAAAAAAEBAoUaAgA

Class Talents are available for all Warriors, regardless of their specialization. These consist of various abilities and passives which define how the Warrior class plays.

In the following sections you can find the most influential talents that you can pick up. For a full list of Talents and what they do, take a look at our Spell Summary page linked below.

While there are a lot of options to choose from, you can find the main and most important choices outlined in the list below. The importance of these nodes is just not due to what they do, but also which other talent nodes they open up.

Ability	Description / Effect
Impending Victory	Strong self heal on a fairly short cooldown. This is a must have pick in any scenario as it helps us recover from spike damage.
War Machine	As our whole kit revolves around generating as much Rage as possible, the extra gains from this talent go a long way.
Spell Reflection	Will either reflect the magic damage cast that is targeted at you back to the caster, or act as a magic damage reduction ability. This has so much potential in almost any encounter that it would be criminal not to take it.
Leeching Strikes	Provides a flat 5% Leech. Might seem underwhelming but it does add up over the course of the encounter.
Heroic Leap	One of our few movement abilities, letting you leap through the air. Should be taken in every scenario as it can help you get out of sticky situations or reposition the boss quickly.
Thunder Clap	One of our core rotational abilities, which also provides us with Rage. There are so many talents that work together with this ability that this should be picked 100% of the time.
Furious Blows	A very slight auto-attack speed buff. Free damage increase, which also leads to other solid talents.
Fast Footwork	Just a plain movement speed buff, still worth it as it also opens up various other beneficial nodes.
Rallying Cry	One of our more impactful utility cooldowns. This is almost always good, as it can help save an ally from dying.
Frothing Berserker	Chance to get a 50% refund on the Rage spent on Revenge. Nothing significant but it does open up additional nodes.

The talents in the list below are situational and should be taken only if you are doing content where they provide some value.

Ability	Description / Effect
Intimidating Shout	Fears all enemies around you. A very solid additional interrupt. Especially useful in Mythic+.
Intervene	Intervenes to an ally, causing attacks to be re-directed to you instead. This is a very strong tool in the right situation, it can save your co-tank during a Raid encounter for example.
Berserker Rage	Situationally very strong when the encounter requires a Fear immunity.
Berserker Shout	Much like Berserker Rage, this has the potential to be strong if there is a mechanic that lines up with the 1-minute cooldown of the ability. Otherwise, this is a wasted point.
Inspiring Presence	Useful if the extra 5% maximum health it provides over the base Rallying Cry would save an ally.

You can find a lot of utility and damage choices for various situations in this section. The most useful and important of them are listed below.

Ability	Description / Effect
Crushing Force	Increases the damage of one of our core abilities in Shield Slam. Always worth a pick.
Overwhelming Rage	Increases our maximum Rage capacity. Can be useful to avoid over-capping Rage during cooldowns and also provides value during Execute windows. Solid filler point.
Reinforced Plates	Passive armor increase, definitely worth the point as armor significantly reduces our damage taken.
Blood and Thunder	Increases the damage of Thunder Clap and if you also have Rend talented, it causes Thunder Clap to automatically apply Rend. Saving a global cooldown and the Rage cost by not having to apply Rend manually in addition to the damage increase make it a mandatory pick in every scenario.
Honed Reflexes	Reduces the cooldown of Shield Slam and Pummel by 1 second. While the reduced cooldown on Shield Slam sounds exciting, the truth is that this ability rarely manages to finish its cooldown properly due to various reset mechanics. This is still a solid option as a filler point.

The talents in the following list are up for grabs as optional and filler nodes depending on the content you are doing.

Ability	Description / Effect
Pain and Gain	Small passive heal when ever you take damage. It is another tiny addition to further increase our sustainability.
Seismic Reverberation	Makes Revenge hit for an additional time for reduced damage as long as it initially hit at least 3 targets. This is a great damage boost in any AoE encounter, like Mythic+, where you constantly have 3+ targets present.
Barbaric Training	increases the damage and Rage cost of Revenge. A great option to increase your damage output in Mythic+. Just be vary of your Rage usage when using this talent.
Storm Bolt	Single-target stun on a short cooldown. Must have in Mythic+, situational in Raids.
Double Time	Provides us with 1 more charge of Charge, while also reducing the cooldown of it by 3 seconds. While the talent itself is mediocre, the thing that makes it a solid pick is what it leads to.
Sidearm	A very lackluster passive damage increase. If damage is all you are looking for, then this will serve some value, otherwise it can be ignored.

The last rows allow us to define our gameplay even further and provides a good mix of active abilities and passive buffs. As previously, the most noteworthy are in the first list.

Ability	Description / Effect
Armored to the Teeth	Increases our Strength by a % of our Armor. This is a solid increase as we are by default a very high armor tank.
Wild Strikes	Provides us with a small amount of Haste and some auto-attack speed. Both of these effects are a fine passive increase.
One-Handed Weapon Specialization	Provides us with 5% Leech and also increases our damage by 5%. This is a lot of value for just one point, a must have.
Avatar	Increases our damage dealt by 20% and removes all snares and roots when cast. One of our strongest offensive cooldowns. The 1.5 minute cooldown might seem daunting at first but it gets greatly reduced by Anger Management, making it a more or less 45 second cooldown instead. Definitely a mandatory pick in every scenario.
Unstoppable Force	Causes Avatar to increase the damage of Shockwave and Thunder Clap, while also reducing the cooldown of the latter by 50%. Great option for higher damage output. It makes Thunder Clap be usable every other global cooldown during Avatar windows and pairs well with another talent, Thunderlord.
Thunderous Roar	Deals damage and puts a bleed on the enemies hit. The ability by itself is already fine, but it has great nodes underneath, which make it even more appealing. Useful in every scenario.
Thunderous Words	Increases the duration of Thunderous Roar's Bleed effect and also increases the damage of all your other bleed effects by 15% at all times. This node is amazing as we have a minimum of 2 bleed effects up at all times ( Deep Wounds and Rend).

There really are no horrible talents in this area, just a lot of situational ones. Pick from the following depending on the content you are doing and your current needs.

Ability	Description / Effect
Endurance Training	Increases our Stamina while also reducing our time being crowd controlled. This point should be taken only in scenario where you would like to go down to Shockwave, such as Mythic+ dungeons, otherwise it can be ignored for better options.
Shockwave	AoE stun on a fairly short cooldown. Must have in Mythic+, where it can be used to interrupt casts or provide some breathing room. Usually not as useful in raids.
Immovable Object	Casting Avatar or Shield Wall also casts the other at reduced effectiveness. It has some potential from a defensive point of view, but as of now it is lacking behind Unstoppable Force.
Uproar	Reduces the cooldown of Thunderous Roar by 30 seconds. It provides more frequent burst windows, but nothing else.

These talents include abilities and passives only available for Protection Warriors. You can find a lot of our main defensive and offensive abilities under this tree.

As with the Class Talents, you will only find the best choices down below. For a full list, take a look at the Spell Summary page.

While there are not a lot of choices on the first 4 rows, we do find some really good options here together with some spec defining abilities.

Ability	Description / Effect
Ignore Pain	Apartial absorb, mainly used as a way to dump excessive Rage due to it being off the global cooldown. Can also be stacked in order to reduce a big incoming damage spike.
Revenge	Deals damage in an arc infront of you. One of your main rotational damage dealing tools.
Demoralizing Shout	Reduces the damage enemies hit deal to you by 25%. The effects of this talent are further enhanced by pairing it with Thunderlord, Booming Voice and Unstoppable Force, especially in AoE scenarios.
Devastator	Replaces Devastate with a passive ability that is tied to your auto-attacks. This is a must have since it frees up a much needed global cooldown.
Last Stand	Increases your maximum health by 30% and also heals you for the same amount. While the cooldown is a lengthy 3 minutes, it is still worth the point spent in it.
Best Served Cold	Causes Revenge to deal even more damage. While the damage addition is not huge, it does add up, as Revenge is used rotationally.
Strategist	Execute, Devastate, Thunder Clap and Revenge can now reset the cooldown of Shield Slam. This is a mandatory talent in all scenarios due to how strong it is.
Brace For Impact	Casting Shield Slam increases the damage of Shield Slam by 3% while also increasing the amount of damage you block by the same percentage. Stacks up to 5 times. Another mandatory pick due to how heavily we rely on blocking and Shield Slam damage.

These rows include some of our most powerful defensive abilities and open up various synergies with other talents! A lot of great options, if only we had more points..

Ability	Description / Effect
Challenging Shout	An AoE taunt. Great addition to our toolkit, especially in Mythic+. It also leads to other great talent nodes, making it a mandatory pick.
Rend	An additional bleed. Deals significant amounts of damage and is further enhanced by other bleed talents like Thunderous Words, Bloodsurge and Bloodborne. Greatest part is that if you also have Blood and Thunder talented, which you should, you do not even have to separately cast it, as Thunder Clap applies it automatically. Must have in all situations.
Brutal Vitality	Damage dealt adds to your active Ignore Pain. We will be using Ignore Pain a lot so having our damage further feed into the absorb is a great passive addition to our survivability.
Shield Wall	Reduces your damage taken by 40% for 8 seconds. One of your strongest defensive tools which synergises well with other talents like Anger Management and Impenetrable Wall. Must have in all situations.
Heavy Repercussions	Shield Slam generates more Rage and also extends the duration of Shield Block. Provides us with everything we want, more Rage and more Shield Block uptime. Gets even better when paired with Enduring Defenses. Great choice in any situation.
Into the Fray	Gain Haste for each enemy or ally nearby, up to 10%. Haste is one of our best secondary stats, so this is another great option. Should be taken instead of Heavy Repercussions if you do not need the extra Shield Block up-time.
Enduring Defenses	Shield Block lasts 2 seconds longer. 2 seconds feels like such a short time, but in reality it adds up to a lot of extra Shield Block uptime. This pairs well with Heavy Repercussions since it lets you potentially sneak in a extra Shield Slam in every Shield Block window. Must have talent in any scenario where extra Shield Block uptime is needed.
Massacre	Execute is now usable on targets below 35% health, instead of 20%. Purely offensive option for priority target damage. If Shield Block uptime is not a concern then this can be taken to make the last 35% of the boss go faster.
Anger Management	Reduces the cooldown of Avatar and Shield Wall by 1 second per every 10 Rage spent. Bread and butter of Protection Warriors. Amazing talent in every situation that pairs well with a lot of our other talents. Mandatory pick.
Impenetrable Wall	Shield Slam generates extra Rage and reduces the cooldown of Shield Wall by 5 seconds. Paired together with Anger Management this results in your Shield Wall having a ~1.5-minute cooldown instead of the base 3.5-minutes. Amazing choice in any situation.
Punish	Stacking buff which increases your Shield Slam damage and also reduces the damage the target deals to you. More Shield Slam damage is always great, so this is another solid pick in every encounter.

There are some amazing talents that are still left out of the list above, Thunderlord, Sudden Death, Tough as Nails and even Show of Force are all great choices. Read through the info below to see when to pick which!

Ability	Description / Effect
Bloodsurge	your bleed effects have a chance to grant you extra Rage. Considering we have 3 bleeds, Deep Wounds, Rend and Thunderous Roar. Unfortunately the proc chance of this is so low that it would mostly make sense to take it in Mythic+ and to avoid it in single target situations.
Thunderlord	Increases the radius of Demoralizing Shout and causes each enemy hit by Thunder Clap to reduce the cooldown of Demoralizing Shout by 1 second, up to 3 seconds per cast. Unstoppable Force, Thunderlord and Booming Voice make a great trio in any AoE scenario. This is a must have talent in any situation where you can constantly hit 3+ targets.
Sudden Death	Provides a chance for your attacks to cause Execute to be usable for free, regardless of the targets health. Great offensive option for single-target situations. Should definitely be picked for Raids.
Tough as Nails	Blocking attacks deals damage to the attackers. As our whole mitigation is centered around blocking, it only makes sense to pick this up when aiming for additional free damage.
Spell Block	Allows you to block spells. This can be really powerful in the right situation when magic damage is a issue. The damage reduction it provides for the 20 seconds it lasts is significant and you can rotate this together with Shield Wall to greatly reduce the threat of magic damage.
Show of Force	Further increases your Revenge damage and casting Revenge also increases the damage of your next Thunder Clap. As both of these abilities are rotationally used you will be more or less passively be gaining the benefits from this talent. If you are looking to min-max, then you would need to ensure that you are casting a Thunder Clap after every Revenge. Should be picked mainly in Mythic+.
Instigate	Enhances either Devastate or Devastator to deal more damage and provide some extra Rage. Nothing special, should be taken instead of Bloodsurge in single target encounters.

The last part of the tree is more or less cut in stone for us since there are clear winners and losers.

Ability	Description / Effect
Focused Vigor	Flat buff to our Strength, Armor and Critical Strike chance. All of these are great stats for us.
Shield Specialization	Increases your Block chance and Block value. As our main mitigation kit revolves around Blocking attacks this is a mandatory pick.
Shield Charge	Charges at your target, dealing damage to all the targets within 10 yards, stunning the primary target and also generating 20 Rage. Great initiation tool and the nodes it leads to enhance this even further. Must have in any situation.
Champion's Bulwark	Shield Charge deals 20% increased damage, grants you Shield Block, a free Revenge and additional 20 Rage. Solid pick in every scenario, giving us everything we want, and more!
Ravager	throws a weapon, dealing damage in a area overtime, while also granting 10 Rage each time it deals damage. While the cooldown might seem long, the damage it deals paired with the Rage, is worth it.
Booming Voice	Demoralizing Shout now generates 30 Rage and increases your damage dealt to targets hit by 20%. Another must have talent for increasing your damage output and general Rage generation.
Indomitable	Increases your maximum health by 10% and heals you for 1% of your maximum health per every 10 Rage spent. Amazing option in every situation, adding up to a lot of healing done throughout the encounter.
Violent Outburst	Consuming 30 Rage grants a stack of Seeing Red, at 8 stacks it causes your next Shield Slam or Thunder Clap to deal 200% more damage and generate 100% more Rage, while also granting a free Ignore Pain. It does take some time to get used to the tracking necessity of this talent but it does come with great benefits once mastered.

Of the remaining talents, the two most noteworthy would be Battering Ram and Battle-Scarred Veteran. Both of which are great additions.

Ability	Description / Effect
Battering Ram	Increases the Critical Strike damage and Critical Strike chance of Shield Charge by 15%. Also causes it to buff your auto-attack damage and speed by 20% for 20 seconds. If used on cooldown, it would mean a constant ~50% uptime on the attack speed buff, which is huge. Definitely a mandatory pick in single-target situations.
Battle-Scarred Veteran	When your health drops below 30%, you take 80% less damage for 8 seconds, and healing you receive is increased by 100%. If you need a safety net, this is definitely worthy of a point. This would be great when still progressing on Raid bosses or when doing Mythic+ high enough where survivability becomes a concern.
Enduring Alacrity	Increases our Stamina, Armor and Haste by a percentage. While all of these stats are great, this node just slightly lacks behind other options available.

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 to be "ganked" while leveling or doing World Quests exists.

Below are the recommended PvP talents for leveling and PvE content. You are able to choose 1 general PvP talent and 3 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 reduces 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. For a more in-depth guide about Warrior Warrior take a look at our dedicated PvP guide.

While PvPing as Protection Warrior can certainly be fun you might also want to try out PvPing as either Fury or Arms Warrior. Both of these specs will deal a lot more damage while being squishier.