Shadowlands Tank Rankings: A Sepulcher of the First Ones Tier List (Patch 9.2.5)
World of Warcraft has never been perfectly balanced, and Shadowlands is no exception. Some classes are better than others at the high end for raiding, and inevitably, a meta will exist. This ranking is based on the viability and strength of the various tank specializations for the new raid in Patch 9.2, Sepulcher of the First Ones.
About the Tier List
June 23 update: Just a check-in to ensure everything still looks accurate. No rankings have been changed at this time.
This RAIDING tier list is CONSTANTLY EVOLVING — It CHANGES and IS UPDATED as often as necessary to account for tuning and balance changes.
Hello! I am Impakt, the raid leader of the North American guild "BDGG", or Big Dumb Golden Guardians. We finished Sanctum of Domination as the second-best guild in North America, and at World 4th. We are prepping hard for the new raid tiers in Shadowlands, and this list reflects how we are currently feeling about the various classes and specializations for progressing the new raid tier in Patch 9.2, Sepulcher of the First Ones. In addition to our own experience, this list was created and will continue to be update in consultation with raiders of other top guilds.
This tier list is entirely based on tank viability for the raid in Patch 9.2 of Shadowlands, Sepulcher of the First Ones. The main things you want to look for in tank choice are damage dealt, ability to handle or recover from incoming damage of all types, cooldowns, and utility.
In Patch 9.2.5, class balance is going to be incredibly dependent on the state of your characters. For this tier list, we will assume that you have 2 Legendary items and 4 pieces of your tier set equipped. Even though it will take at least two weeks to unlock the pieces, the vast majority of guilds will be progressing the most difficult raid encounters with this setup.
A Final Warning
It is incredibly important to emphasize that just because a tank is low in the tier list, it does not mean that you should ignore it completely. For the vast majority of cases, you should choose to bring the better player, not the better class. That does not mean you never need to think about your raid composition, just that most of the time player skill will be more important than the difference between classes, assuming you already have the required raid buffs. All being lower tier means is that, all else being equal, those specs will be less desirable for the raid based on current tuning.
Shadowlands Tank Tier List for Sepulcher of the First Ones
Below is a quick summary of the full rankings that we have detailed on this page. While this gives a good outline of the standings of specializations in comparison to one another, we recommend reading the full rankings to understand why certain specializations are ranked as they are.
Work in progress Last update on Jun 23, 2022
- Blood Death Knight (S-Tier)
- Brewmaster Monk (S-Tier)
- Protection Paladin (A-Tier)
- Guardian Druid (A-Tier)
- Vengeance Demon Hunter (A-Tier)
- Protection Warrior (A-Tier)
DPS and Healer Class Rankings
If you are interested in our other rankings for Sepulcher of the First Ones in Shadowlands, please click the links below.
Full Tank Class Rankings
Tanks are much closer together when it comes to defensive power than earlier in Shadowlands— every tank is perfectly viable in terms of defensive power for clearing the raid on Mythic. The major differences between the tanks are damage output, utility, and unique buffs that they bring to the raid. In other words, most raids could go in with any combination of tanks and do just fine in Sepulcher of the First Ones.
S-Tier
Blood Death Knight
April 25 update: Thanks to a late buff to their 4-set, DKs now do exceptional damage, and are overall the best tank for Mythic progression.
Blood Death Knight has a large toolkit to make use of,
including Vampiric Blood,
Dancing Rune Weapon,
Anti-Magic Shell,
Icebound Fortitude,
Rune Tap, and more. Defensively they are
quite strong, particularly when it comes to magic damage compared to other tanks.
For utility, DKs most notably have
Death Grip and
Gorefiend's Grasp.
Grips are the signature, unique Death Knight ability that can be vital for any
raid encounter with adds that need to be grouped or controlled.
There are two reasons that DK is in the S-tier. The first is damage: DKs were doing
the least damage. but after a major buff to their tier set they now have
the highest damage output out of any tank. The second reason is utility. Grips are an
extremely hit or miss type of utility, where it is either completely useless or
vital to the encounter. Most encounters in Sepulcher of the First Ones will
not require grips at all in Patch 9.2, but there are a couple of key
places where having a Blood DK at your disposal to group adds could be extremely
important in early Mythic progression.
Finally, Blood DK still has Anti-Magic Zone, which is one of the strongest
possible raid cooldowns that a non-healer can bring.
Brewmaster Monk
Thanks to a particularly potent tier set,
Brewmaster Monk is looking to be an excellent choice going
into Patch 9.2. Their high health pool, incredible self-healing, and
ability to mitigate large amounts of damage through Stagger and their
other cooldowns actually make them the strongest choice defensively going into
9.2. They do not do quite as much damage as
Protection Paladins, but they are still one of the
strongest picks in terms of damage output out of any other tank. As a Monk,
Brewmasters also bring a 5% Physical damage buff to the raid. Other Monk specs
can provide this as well, but if you do not have a Mistweaver right now then
Brewmaster is going to be your best choice for getting the debuff in the
Sepulcher of the First Ones.
A-Tier
Protection Paladin
April 25 update: After a late nerf to their 4-set tier bonus, Protection Paladins are no longer doing the most damage, which reduces their appeal a bit. They are still an excellent choice, but have fallen from the S-tier.
Protection Paladins have two primary reasons for
being at the top of the A-tier: damage output and utility, specifically with
immunities. Ashen Hallow is still exceptionally strong, and will still
have exceptional use-cases in the new Sepulcher of the First Ones raid.
The on-demand healing and damage boost helps carry you through difficult parts
of encounters, and Paladins specifically are doing excellent damage compared
to most tanks. Additionally,
Blessing of Spellwarding should once
again prove to be incredibly valuable on several encounters.
Protection Paladins have solid damage mitigation actives with many powerful
cooldowns, making them decently durable and one of the best scaling tanks in at the moment.
Shield of the Righteous has quite a high uptime, and they still
have cooldowns such as
Ardent Defender or
Guardian of Ancient Kings
available during downtime. However, Paladin's main strengths come from their
damage output and utility. Paladins are still one of the best tanks to bring for
damage and utility, which is a very real need on some encounters. Paladins
have a personal immunity, an immunity they can place on a raid member, high
single-target damage comparatively, and access to
Ashen Hallow
as an exceptional raid healing and damage cooldown.
Guardian Druid
Guardian Druids are still one of the tankiest of
tanks going into Patch 9.2. Thanks to their damage mitigation passives,
talents, and the high uptime on Ironfur, Guardian is still one of the
best choices defensively.
Survival Instincts is still one of the highest
damage reductions for any tank, but is only 6 seconds and more for targeted
used. Bears also have
Barkskin and
Frenzied Regeneration, but
their primary active mitigation comes from Ironfur. Currently their main
problem is that they lack any real raid utility apart from a 1-minute
Stampeding Roar, and they do not bring any required raid buff.
If you do need the extra movement spell, however, Guardian is an exceptional
tanking choice.
Vengeance Demon Hunter
Vengeance Demon Hunters have a strong all-around
toolkit that combines top-tier damage mitigation with strong self-healing. Demon
Hunters offer a very strong passive reduction against magic damage when combining
Demonic Wards with the
Viscous Ink Conduit.
Metamorphosis is still an incredibly powerful defensive
cooldown, which along with
Fiery Brand and
Fel Devastation gives
them decent options for dealing with high-damage periods. Vengeance is
specifically looking to be incredibly strong for AoE tanking in Patch 9.2
thanks to their new
tier set bonuses, but
unfortunately it will not be nearly as useful in the
Sepulcher of the First Ones raid as it will be in
Mythic+. Vengeance is by no means a weak
tank, but while it is a solid all-around tank there are generally better options
for either offensive, defensive, or utility roles depending on what your raid
needs.
It is also worth mentioning that similar to Monks, Demon Hunters have a 5% magic buff that they bring to the raid. However, Havoc Demon Hunters are actually one of the more common DPS found in raids, making it likely most raids will have one anyway. At least one Vengeance Demon Hunter is almost required if your raid does not have a Havoc Demon Hunter.
Protection Warrior
Protection Warriors bring several important
abilities that provide some solid utility to the group. Battle Shout
gives 5% Attack Power to the raid,
Rallying Cry is an exceptional
raid cooldown, and Necrolord Warriors also bring
Conqueror's Banner.
Banner provides a huge boost in damage for some classes during their burst windows.
Protection Warriors are decent defensively, but their utility becomes a bit more lacking when you account for how strong Fury Warriors are looking going into Patch 9.2. If a raid already has multiple DPS Warriors at their disposal, Protection does not bring all the much to the raid. There are better defensive tank options, there are better utility options, and there are better offensive options if you do not need the Warrior buff.
Changelog
- 23 Jun. 2022: Check-in since last update.
- 25 Apr. 2022: Updated after first few weeks of Mythic.
- 18 Feb. 2022: Updated for patch 9.2.
- 06 Nov. 2021: Updated for patch 9.1.5.
- 04 Aug. 2021: Updated for first couple of Mythic weeks.
- 13 Jul. 2021: Updated after Heroic week.
- 24 Jun. 2021: Page added.
This guide has been written by Impakt, an Officer in BDGG, the #2 North American guild on retail. In addition to live WoW, he has also been a classic theorycrafter and enthusiast for many years. You can watch him stream on Twitch, or follow him on Twitter.
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