MarithilMaster Elder Captain-General
Awarded:
Joined: 24 Jan 2008
Posts: 1146
|
re: Warden Tanking Guide- Post Great River
 by Marithil on Tue Apr 24, 2012 5:36 pm
Look for bold words to direct you to sections of importance, or specifics.
Welcome to the Warden- post Great River update! There are so many changes and additions to the warden that is is difficult to find a spot to begin from. So that everyone knows this will be a tanking guide only. Not a DPS guide, tanking guide. (Besides, if you want to ranged DPS, roll a hunter) I will not be going into every small detail, so this guide is meant to be read while you are looking at your warden. So, lets begin.
If you thought tanking with a warden was tough before, you are going to have a fun time re-learning a few things, as well as dusting off a few gambits you rarely used. So, lets talk gambit and skill changes.
First, the stances have been switched around, so please look at them closely. Determination is the tanking stance, while assailment is the ranged damage stance and Recklessness is melee damage and fist DoT. You may notice that your basic builders (Quick Thrust, Shield Bash, Wardens Taunt) will change based on what stance you are in so look closely at those as you switch stances. It is important to note that as you switch stances your gambits will have different effects. Please take the time to look at your skills tab and thoroughly examine each gambit over again. For top notch tanking you will be doing some stance dancing and it is important to know what each gambit does in the stance you are currently in. You will also note that Defiant Challenge and Never Surrender have been altered a bit. DC is now a skill, not a gambit, treat it accordingly. Also, it has been given a 30 second +40% physical/tactical buff which is beyond handy in a tough spot. Never Surrender is now usable! (celebration ensues!) Make sure it is in a handy location for quick hits. Finally, my favorite skill addition Battle Prep. When you use BP it allows you 15 seconds of cooldown free and power cost free gambit builders until you hit the gambit, which still cost power. And there is no cooldown. You can just keep using BP until you have all the gambits up you want. Note: you can only use gambits that do not require a target to use. (i.e. Shield Mastery, Conviction, Dance of War, etc.) This allows you to be a bit more prepared for entering combat. Lastly-ish, look at how The Dark Before the Dawn is now usable anytime. It got its legacy and total power restoration cut, but it now gives +2% power restore and a power over time effect. It is very important you remember this when you get to about 50% power. (Which with the changes here, you should never be at.)
Now that that is out of the way, lets get into actual tanking theory crafting. (Which is my favorite part)
Mari’s (or Thornogil’s) tanking theory.
I like to use my BP (Battle Prep) to its fullest every time I am out of combat. Sometimes I slow the group down a bit to do so, but it is always worth it, and the healers appreciate it. Before I enter combat I have at least Shield Mastery, Dance of War active, and I have Restoration or Exaltation of Battle (EoB) in the gambit panel on standby. Obviously tanking strats change depending on the situation, but as far as BP goes, this is just about unwavering. Lets go into the survivability/healing gambits I use and the changes to those gambits.
I will open with varying rotations depending on the fight, but I will always get my Impressive Flourish-Maddening Strike-Dance of War (DoW), Persevere-Safeguard-Celebration of Skill (CoS), and War Cry-Brink of Victory (BoV)-Surety of Death(SoD) up asap. Each of these line, if done in the correct order will give the warden critical buffs for tanking that mean life or death in big fights. I’ll go over the bonuses for each next.
CoS line: Along with the improved heals of each skill in this line they have new effects. when you use CoS you will receive +1500 block and 4% partial block chances (Enduring Shieldwork). Now, the buffs only last for a short time if you skip right to CoS. If you want to maximize the time for the buffs you need to work from Safeguard first. If you need the extra healing you can start with Persevere first, but I don’t find it necessary in most situations. Once you have Safeguard up, hit CoS and all the sudden you get Enduring Shieldwork for 50 seconds (if traited correctly). Also note that Restoration, the 5 gambit move, does not add to the Enduring Shieldwork buff at all. I tend to use that after my buffs are up, and my masteries are back up.
Note: The system is in place for all the gambit lines. If you work from the basic gambit up to the 4 gambit maneuver then the buff lasts longer than if you used the 4 gambit maneuver first. Start from the 3 gambit move in the line and move on to the 4th for the best results. You get the full buff this way and leave out the annoying 2 gambit move. Lets use CoS as an example. If you use CoS in your BP and then enter combat to use Safeguard+CoS you will not get the extended time on the buff. As long as any stage of the buff is active, any smaller form of the gambit line will not extend or improve the buff. Important info: Once you have a buff active from one of these gambit lines you cannot restart the buff timer until the buff has run its full time. This makes watching your buff times very important.
My preferred method of gaining these buffs quickly is to use [sh sp] sh then(-) sh [sp sh] sp (translation: sp= spear gambit builder, sh= shield gambit builder, fi= fist gambit builder [mastery gambit builder] )
This allows a very quick execution giving me heals and buffs with in 5 seconds.
DoW line: This buff line will grant Enduring Expert Armour Use buff. (+900 crit defense, +563 physical/tactical mitigation)
My prefered method is similar to the CoS. [sh fi] sh - sh [fi sh] fi.
SoD line: The buff gained here is called Enduring Advanced Evasion. (+2076 Evade)
My preferred method is a bit different here. In my free time I try to build BoV with normal gambit builders, then hit fi [sh fi] sh to finish it off when available.
When I have extra time in between gambits I try and build Wall of Steel (WoS), but evade is arguably the most important avoidance buff to get up.
So that is my buff rotation for survivability in most fights. I tend to start big fights with Restoration or EoB in cue so I get some big healing while I get my buffs up. By the time the heal is run out I have all my buffs up along with some other heals. It is important to keep Shield Mastery and DoW up as much as possible. If you don’t you will notice it and you have a chance you will fall into the age old warden trap. You’ll see a sudden increase in incoming damage and naturally start popping restoration and other self heals as much as you can, killing your buff rotation, and then die anyway. Wardens live and die by their buff rotations. Keep a close eye on your avoidance and mitigation buffs, they make a huge difference.
Time to look at threat gambit rotation. This is a bit easier to grasp than the healing rotation. The changes here are not that huge in Determination Stance.
My favorite opening single target threat move, Precise Blow, was nerfed to a great degree so it is no longer in my opening threat rotation. As an opener it is never bad to use War Cry (WC) and Goad. However, if you have Terrible Visage traited (which you should) then you need to open with EoB. It may be bugged, but it is a killer opening move. It currently gives way too much threat because Terrible Visage is a bit bugged. That isn’t to say you don’t need to keep up on threat, because you do, it is just fairly easy to do so. Turbine finally fixed Spear of Virture (SoV) so it’s single target threat is working right, so I use that to obtain and hold single target threat. War Cry and Goad are still good multi target threat holders. I use Precise Blow to manage and hold threat rather than to generate it these days. During the survivability gambit rotation your SoD should keep threat on any single target you are tanking. Just be sure to spread the love if you are in a multi target situation. They kind of hurt Aggression with this update. It doesn’t drain quite as much as it once did, but it is great for maintaining threat. Told you this part wouldn’t take long.
Now, lets move on to trait set ups. Way of the Shield is now tanking trait line. Spear line is melee DPS and Fist line is DoT and life tap traits generally. So, we will be looking mostly at the Shield line, with a few satellite traits here and there.
Way of the Shield: I will not tell you how to trait because that subject is quite, well, subjective. I will mention however that I find anything that increase my B/P/E to be a boon in tough times. And one of the most important change imo is Skillful Blocking and a Keen Response (Spear line). To get back power and morale for each parry and block respectively is simply put, amazing. As I mentioned before Terrible Visage (Fist line) is amazing to have on for its effects on threat, specifically EoB. However I recommend that you become proficient at tanking without EoB because I am sure it will be fixed with Rohan. Wow, this is going faster than I thought... lets move on. Legacies!
The big legacies you should be looking at on your melee weapon are Fist Gambit Threat Up, Shield Gambit Duration, and Life Tap Damage Increase. Those will keep your buffs up longer allowing you to actually have time for your whole rotation. Also look for anything that reduces power. I haven’t had any problems with power since the update. For the ranged weapon slot keep an eye out for the +Conviction Heal, +All healing skills total heal, and Fist buff Duration legacies. They combine for some very powerful heals, especially if you trait Shield line with the Capstone trait. I also find the DC cooldown legacy to be of help when I need that +40% physical and tactical mitigation bonus. And, as usual, keep an eye out for any B/P/E legacies.
In this last section I will just add a few tricks of the trade I have picked up on along my way in re-learning the warden. May I add that I am by no means an awesome warden who knows all. (A fact some people take pleasure in noting ;) ) Please take all this with a careful eye, because I am sure there is a better way to do some of these things.
Marithil’s tricks of the trade.
I already went over my methods for my healing and survivability gambits, so I won’t go over them again.
Conviction: This is an almost endlessly useful skill, in any stance. Outside of its ability to heal, in all stances, it has varied abilities in other stances.
Assailment- It negates 99% of threat from DPS and healing. This has natural advantages for tanking, especially in the opening of the fight. It can seriously help in gaining threat.
Recklessness- +3000 physical mastery for the fellowship. This has obvious benefits in all of those pesky DPS race fights. Especially phase 3 of Draigoch.
Aggression: Good skill
Assailment- Gives +3% tactical damage to the group.
Recklessness- Does damage.
CoS
Assailment- +3% ranged damage
Recklessness- DoT (This includes all the gambits in this line)
Now, there are many differences between skills in the different stance. I would impress the idea upon you that you need to look at all of your skills in all the different stances.
If you made it this far good on you. You can talk to me later for a treat. I hope this was informative and helpful. If you have any other questions please leave them here on this forum, or talk to me personally. I am more than happy to help in any way I can.
|
