Warrior tanking at level 60

I recently saw a post on the forums about a tank who was having issues holding threat at 60 in the Outland dungeons.  When I check his build I noticed a lot of his talents were placed in trees other than prot, and he'd only gone down 32 point in the protection tree.

How's this relevant you ask?  Because today's post is about Warrior tanking at level 60!

I think the problem is that for a lot of other classes or even specs, you're required to put points into other trees than your main one.  While this is true for protection warriors as well, you need to have all 51 points in prot at level 60 to tank effectively.  That build over on the left is a pretty good start.  You have wiggle room if you don't care for one or two talents, and those two points in improved revenge are up for debate since 3.3 hit, but this is about what you should be at to tank Ramparts, Blood Furnace, and whatever else post-60.



Your basic rotation will be the same as at 80 more or less, Charge, Shockwave, Shield Slam, T-Clap, Cleave on packs, or SS, then Dev spam on single targets.  Overall, you'll get the hang of it, and while the basics are always the same, everyone has their prefered method and "rythm" to tanking from what I've seen.  I prefer mobility, charging in and out of packs, while I know others prefer  getting everything lined up and stopping movement.  Individual preference aside, as long as you're holding the threat, there's no "wrong" way to tank (although there are probably folks who will say otherwise).

While you're leveling your best bet is to glyph for revenge and devastate for the time being, and then reglyph your revenge out for blocking once you get closer to 80, or if you find you're never using revenge or getting rage starved.  Revenge is not as useful as it once was and you may be better served with a glyph of Shockwave, Sunder, or Cleave in it's place.

As an aside, a common mistake I see people making is trying to stack Defense at level 60-70, and putting points in Parry.  Don't do this (well, you can, I'm not the boss of you, but whatever).

Those points serve much better by putting 3 points in Armored to the Teeth and filling out your remaining Prot Talents (Focused Rage, Critical Block, and Damage Shield).  Don't worry about filling the points in Parry until 65 or so.  You'll want it maxed in time to tank Nexus and Utgarde Keep when you hit 70, but with all the changes that occurred in 3.0 (and who knows, possibly before), you're better served by Armored to the Teeth and then stacking stamina and Strength.

If you can get it, "... of the Champion" gear is fantastic, closely followed by "... of the Beast" and then "... of the Bear." Don't bother with Soldier gear.  Also, previously mediocre rewards, such as the plate gear you get in Zangarmarsh with the 2 or 3 sockets, is now a great thing, just stick some cheap northrend green or blue quality stamina or strength gems and you'll have a perfect piece for tanking and questing that'll be better than most, if not all quest rewards for the next 5 levels.

From here, you can pretty much follow this guide for your pulls and attack priority and you'll be all set.