MoP Protection Warrior Guide – Builds, Talents, and Glyphs

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On this page,
we present the viable talent and glyph choices forProtection Warriors in World of Warcraft MoP 5.4. We detail
what each of the talents andglyphs do and in which situations they should be taken.

The other pages
of our Protection Warrior guide can be accessedfrom the table of contents on the right.

1. Talent Choices

Level	Choices
15	Juggernaut	Double Time	Warbringer
30	Enraged Regeneration	Second Wind	Impending Victory
45	Staggering Shout	Piercing Howl	Disrupting Shout
60	Bladestorm	Shockwave	Dragon Roar
75	Mass Spell Reflection	Safeguard	Vigilance
90	Avatar	Bloodbath	Storm Bolt

• Performance-enhancing
• Survival
• Crowd Control
• Movement
• Utility
• Situational

There is no
longer such a thing as a default build. Most of the talents arenow viable. They can easily be changed, thanks
to  Dust of
Disappearance(and  Tomes of the
Clear Mind from level 86 to 90).You will frequently find yourself changing talents and
glyphs betweenencounters, in order to adapt your play style to different mechanics.Therefore, it is important to
understand what each of your talents does andhow they affect your play style.

2. Tier 1 Talents

Tier 1 talents
offer you a choice between 3 improvements to your Charge.

•  Juggernaut reduces the cooldown of  Charge by 8 seconds(down to 12 seconds).
•  Double
  Time removes  Charge‘s cooldown, instead making itoperate on a charge
  system. You can have a maximum of two charges. Each chargehas a 20 second recharge time. Note that, in this
  system, Charge only generatesrage every 12 seconds, so you cannot use two Charges in a row to get a burstof
  rage.
•  Warbringer causes  Charge to root the target for 4seconds, and to reduce
  the target’s movement speed by 50% for 8 seconds.

We believe
that  Double
Time should be your default choice for thevast majority of situations, since it
increases your mobility greatly wheneverthere is more than one active target (allowing you to charge to one
targetand then immediately to another one, covering a great distance). It also makesit easier to pick up
multiple targets, and it also grants you an extra stun,which can be beneficial.

 Warbringer has situational benefits, while  Juggernaut isgenerally inferior to Double Time.

3. Tier 2 Talents

Tier 2 talents
offer a choice between 3 self-healing talents.

•  Enraged
  Regeneration instantly heals you for 10% of your maximumhealth, and also heals you
  for another 10% of your maximum health over thenext 5 seconds. If used while enraged, the healing is
  doubled. It has a1-minute cooldown.
•  Second
  Wind causes you to heal yourself passively for 3% of yourmaximum health every
  second, while you are below 35% health.
•  Impending Victory is an improved version of  Victory
  Rush,which it replaces. Impending Victory has a 30-second cooldown and costs 10rage. It
  heals you for 20% of your maximum health, and does a bit of damageto the target. After killing an enemy that
  yields experience or honor,Impeding Victory acts just like Victory Rush, its cooldown being reset.

We feel that
the best choice is  Enraged
Regeneration. Not only doesthis talent offer the healing exactly when you need it, but it can
alsobe used while stunned, and its power can be increased by coupling it with Berserker Rage. This talent basically becomes an additional
defensivecooldown, whereas the other options are just small benefits.

 Second
Wind is a decent option, providing its benefit passively, butwe do not believe it
competes with Enraged Regeneration.

 Impending
Victory costs a global cooldown that could be used on muchmore valuable abilities, and
it costs rage, which is a much needed resourcefor your  Shield Barrier/ Shield Block uptimes. We do not advisetaking Impending
Victory.

4. Tier 3 Talents

Tier 3 talents
offer a choice between 3 crowd-control talents.

•  Staggering Shout causes all snared enemies within 20
  yards tobecome rooted for 5 seconds. It has a 40-second cooldown.
•  Piercing
  Howl snares all enemies within 15 yards, slowing them by50% for 15 seconds. It has
  no cooldown.
•  Disrupting Shout interrupts all spellcasting within 10
  yards, andlocks out interrupted players for 4 seconds. It has a 40-second cooldown.

Choosing one
talent over another here will be based on the kiting methodwhich you may have to employ in the encounter, or on
the need to have an AoEinterrupt. That said, we feel that  Disrupting Shout will almost alwaysprove to be the most
useful option.

5. Tier 4 Talents

Tier 4 offers a
choice between 3 important, damage-dealing abilities.

•  Bladestorm deals damage to all enemies within 8 yards
  for 6seconds. While Bladestorm is active, you cannot perform any actions except forusing your shouts. You
  are, however, immune to disarms, and movement-impairingand loss of control effects, and you continue to
  dodge, parry and block attacks.It has a 1-minute cooldown.
•  Shockwave deals damage to and stuns all enemies in a
  10-yard conein front of you for 4 seconds. It has a 40-second cooldown, but if it hits 3or more targets, the
  cooldown is reduced to 20 seconds.
•  Dragon
  Roar deals damage to all enemies within 8 yards, knockingthem back and knocking them
  down for 0.50 seconds. It ignores armor and it isalways a critical strike. It has a 1-minute cooldown.
  Unlike most other AoEattacks, the damage of Dragon Roar drops sharply as more targets are hit by it,so for
  single target situations, it is desirable to only hit your main targetwith it.

Only  Shockwave provides you with any kind of survivability
increase(assuming that you are facing stunnable adds), so if this is the case, andyou are interested in gaining
a small amount of survivability, this is a goodchoice.

In terms of DPS
contribution,  Dragon
Roar is ideal against a singletarget.

 Bladestorm is ideal for moments when you want to avoid
being thevictim of movement-impairing effects or effects that cause loss of control ofyour character, but its
damage is quite a bit lower than the other two.

6. Tier 5 Talents

Tier 5 talents
offer a choice between 3 abilities that help you protectraid members.

•  Mass
  Spell Reflection reflects the next spell cast on you and on allparty and raid
  members within 20 yards for 5 seconds. It has a 1-minutecooldown and, unlike its single-target counter-part
  ( Spell
  Reflection),it does not require that you have a shield equipped.
•  Safeguard is an improvement over  Intervene, which itreplaces. It allows you to intercept the
  next melee or ranged attack (notspells) made against the targeted raid member (the attack is done to
  youinstead), and it reduces the damage they take by 20% for 6 seconds. In theprocess of doing so, you charge
  the targeted raid member, also removing anymovement-impairing effects that may have been on you. Safeguard
  has a 30-secondcooldown.
•  Vigilance reduces the damage taken by the target by
  30% for 12seconds. While Vigilance is active, your  Taunthas no cooldown, andTaunt’s cooldown is reset when
  Vigilance is cast. Vigilance has a 2-minutecooldown.

While the
choice here depends somewhat on what the encounter mechanicsare,  Vigilance is the best choice in most situations. The
talent isexceptional because not only does it essentially provide an extra defensivecooldown to the other tank
(or another raid member), but the fact that iteffectively removes the cooldown of  Taunt makes it great for picking upmultiple targets. Given
the fact that using Taunt on a target of which youalready have aggro causes you to generatean additional 200%
threat against that target for 3 seconds, this can even beused to boost your threat generation (although you
will need to be mindful ofthe diminishing returns of Taunt).

 Safeguard is also quite good, but beware of the fact that
it causesyou to intercept the next attack made against the target (you take the damagefrom the attack), which
may not always be desirable.

 Mass Spell
Reflection is useful in the event that there are importantspells that can be reflected.
Since most boss abilities can not be reflected(and those that can be generally do not pose problems), this
talent will not beused very much.

7. Tier 6 Talents

Tier 6 talents
provide you with a choice between 3 powerful,gameplay-altering abilities.

•  Avatar is a DPS cooldown that increases your damage
  done by 20% for24 seconds. It also removes roots and snares when activated. It hasa 3-minute cooldown.
•  Bloodbath is a DPS cooldown that causes all your
  special attacksto place a bleed on the target, equal to 30% of the damage of the respectivespecial attack.
  The ability lasts for 12 seconds, and the bleed lasts for 6seconds. Each new special ability cast while
  Bloodbath is active will refreshthe bleed duration, and update its damage. Bloodbath has a 1-minutecooldown.
•  Storm Bolt is a 4-second single-target stun, that also
  deals amoderate amount of damage to the target. If the target cannot be stunned(as is the case with raid
  bosses), the damage it deals is much increased. Ithas a 30-second cooldown.

None of these
three talents improve your survivability. The only exceptionto this is  Storm Bolt, which can be a survivability increase if you
areable to stun the mob that is attacking you (although bosses are not stunnable,and in a raid, there should be
plenty of stuns available anyway).

In terms of DPS
and threat output, all three talents are nearlyidentical, but we find  Bloodbath to be best. It is also worth
notingthat  Avatar can be beneficial in situations where
movement-impairingeffects are involved. Choose based on your preference.

8. Major Glyphs

As a Protection
Warrior, Major Glyphs offer you various damage (and threat)improvements, but they do very little for your
survivability.

The following
glyphs improve your damage and threat.

•  Glyph of
  Heavy Repercussions causes your  Shield Slam to dealan extra 50% damage
  while  Shield
  Block is active.
•  Glyph of
  Hold the Line increases the damage of your next Revenge, following a successful parry, by 50%.
•  Glyph of
  Incite causes your  Demoralizing Shout to make your next3  Heroic
  Strike or  Cleave casts free of cost.

Several other
glyphs can, in some situations, increase your DPS andthreat.

•  Glyph of
  Death From Above reduces the cooldown of your  Heroic
  Leapby 15 seconds. If you have a chance to make use of HeroicLeap more often than its
  standard cooldown allows for, then this glyphis a solid option. That said, this glyph should pretty much
  always betaken.
•  Glyph of
  Unending Rage increases your rage pool by 20, giving you amaximum rage amount of
  120. This glyph will probably be beneficial in everypossible scenario, making it much easier for you to
  manage your rage.Additionally, it allows you to pool up rage (even if only slightly), which youcan then use
  in a time of need.

 Glyph of
Shield Wall causes  Shield
Wall to reduce an additional20% damage taken, at the expense of increasing its cooldown
by 2 minutes. Whilethis glyph is not something you would normally use, it can be very beneficialin some
situations.

Finally,  Glyph of
Enraged Speed increases your movement speed by 20%while you are enraged.

9. Minor Glyphs

Minor Glyphs do
not provide you with any worthwhile benefits. Many of themoffer cosmetic improvements that you will probably
want to check out. Twoglyphs, however, are worth mentioning.

•  Glyph of
  Bloody Healing increases the amount of healing you receivefrom bandages by 20%,
  while you have  Deep
  Wounds (passively applied aspart of your normal rotation) up on at least one target.
  Since bandages areseldom used, its benefit will probably be very minor.
•  Glyph of
  Intimidating Shout changes your  Intimidating Shoutto no longer cause the enemies to run
  around in fear. Instead, they will simplystand still for the duration of the fear. This is very useful when
  you wishto avoid the feared mobs aggroing other packs.

10. Changelog

• 25 Feb. 2014: Updated
  the description of  Glyph of
  Incite.
• 15 Oct. 2013: Revamped
  the discussions for all talent tiers, andadded  Glyph of
  Shield Wall to the list.
• 12 Sep. 2013: Patch 5.4
  update.

   

  • Updated the descriptions
    of  Warbringer,  Enraged Regeneration, Impending Victory,  Bladestorm,  Storm Bolt, and Vigilance.
  • Updated the relative value of Tier 5
    talents.
• 03 Aug. 2013: Updated
  the description of  Bladestorm to nolonger mention that the Warrior can be
  disarmed during it.
• 20 May 2013: Patch 5.3
  update.

   

  • Updated the  Enraged Regeneration and  Second Wind descriptionsto account for the
    changes.
  • Added mention that  Vigilance also resets the cooldown of Taunt.
• 24 Apr. 2013: Made
  several updates.

   

  • Reworded the Tier 2 talent
    discussion, giving top priority to Second Wind.
  • Refined some of the other talent
    discussions.
  • Removed  Glyph of Shield Wall, since it is not desirable.
• 04 Mar. 2013: Patch 5.2
  update.

   

  • Changed cooldown of  Shockwave to 40 seconds.
  • Added immunity to disarms granted
    by  Bladestorm.
  • Changed the amount of rage granted
    by  Second Wind from 20 to 15.
  • Added slowing effect of  Warbringer.
  • Removed the damage increase granted
    by  Glyph of Death From Above.
  • Changed the explanation of what
    triggers  Glyph of Incite fromDeadly
    Calm to  Demoralizing Shout.
  • Changed rage cost of  Enraged Regeneration from 60 to 30.
  • Changed the amount of health granted
    by  Impending Victory from10% to 15%.