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Q u o t e:


So your arguing its better to take 8K instead of a dodge or parry?

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No my argument is that its better to take 8k damage and maximize your damage reduction than have avoidance levels that will end up being diminished significantly from 25% and up.

You said block is bad I want to be an avoidance tank, blizzard is telling you block is good, you need to not be so spikey so we're putting in DR and lowering overall avoidance.

Ya im pretty aware I'll take unblock hits, I tank my content with complete ignorance. /sarcasm therefore I should stack it instead of dodge/parry to accomodate that.

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Q u o t e:
The only thing that annoys me a little about the defense stat is that it does double duty as a tanking stat and as the mechanic that prevents you from fighting mobs much higher level than you are. There is a small voice in the back of my head saying that having one stat pull double duty might eventually be a problem.

I also suspect we might have an easier time making balance work across the board if defense provided mitigation (more like block) and not avoidance. That may be something we look at eventually.

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Well GC isnt that what the crush is now for? To prevent going after things much higher? I mean sure, at a certain point, you might be able to just heal n tank through the damage but, crush after crush would add up fast

I only focused on defense for the most part when getting my gear together. In 2 days, I managed to get the defense cap, have dodge/parry levels just like pre-kara numbers in BC, and a ton of expertise, hit, and AP. And over 21k health to boot. And I still need to replace my trinkets. Frankly, the melee stats surprised me a lot when I looked at it yesterday.

Block is pretty low, not sure what to do about that, but as a pally, Holy Shield should be up all the time anyway. =P

Point is, as you gear up for defense, the other avoidance stats follow suit. the numbers you need seem staggering, but it really isn't so bad. Well, not too bad for me because I did not really think about the RATING value. Just gathered stuff as I went.

Also, remember that this point in the game is pretty much like Kara/Gruul in BC. As you gear up in the raids, you will start seeing avoidance stats similar to what it was back then.

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Q u o t e:
Ya im pretty aware I'll take unblock hits, I tank my content with complete ignorance. /sarcasm therefore I should stack it instead of dodge/parry to accomodate that.

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You're missing the point in that you are making a minimal sacrifice to get yourself a great amount of damage reduction.

Hell, the better geared warriors and paladins get, the higher warriors' advantage jumps into, because you'll take less and less unblocked hits, and both block values will scale similarly.

Well, your reply delves exactly into the part of where if you don't get the good in 5% avoidance 3% block in comparison to 6% avoidance, the discussion won't go anywhere.

Also I've found it still to be incredibly easy reaching defense cap with quest rewards/crafted/rep gear. As we get tier and raid gear avoidance levels will slowly shoot back up to levels closer to where we were at in BC.

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Q u o t e:
As we get tier and raid gear avoidance levels will slowly shoot back up to levels closer to where we were at in BC.

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That is what I am hoping as well, as far as raw avoidance numbers go. Feels awkward to only have 20%ish dodge but shrug.

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Q u o t e:


Now you just have to wear PVP gear to get your best mitigation gear. What an improvement.

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Meh, the green armor on it isn't going to multiply soon, so its not an issue.

Though PvP Gear has more Stamina and Agility on it than our Tier Gear, but I'd still take the Expertise and Hit that's on the PvE gear. >.>

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Q u o t e:
The only thing that annoys me a little about the defense stat is that it does double duty as a tanking stat and as the mechanic that prevents you from fighting mobs much higher level than you are. There is a small voice in the back of my head saying that having one stat pull double duty might eventually be a problem.

I also suspect we might have an easier time making balance work across the board if defense provided mitigation (more like block) and not avoidance. That may be something we look at eventually.

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I don't see how it would be a problem. Most of these stats pulling double duty that have caused problems have been changed already, things like +weapon skill for example. That proved to be too powerful when stacked too high early pre-bc, where a world epic BoE was more powerful than T3. Defense has survived without being a problem at all through all of the changes in WoW, BC and WotLK thusfar and all of the gear level differences between those expansions.

The fact that it has survived this long without needing any real changes I think states how good it proves to be. If anything needs to be changed with Defense it would be cheapen it a bit and allow more itemization for dodge and parry and have those scale better than they do currently. Right now, the rating conversion with both of those tend to be more of a problem which makes defense more important than those individual stats.

Please don't make tanking any more simplified and easy mode then it is now. I like complicated mechanics that weed out the scrubs.

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Q u o t e:
Oh noes, we must enchant all +def instead of all +stam.

Honestly, it's not that big of a deal. Yeah, there are a few things I've come across that are nice pieces with no def on them, but I can wait to use those until I can make that gear change out. I like having to balance my stats more. Honestly for tanks before this change, there wasn't much thought into defense rating at all, not like being a dps and balancing my crit rating along with hit and expertise (or haste/spell power as a caster).

Having to put some thought into gearing, enchanting and gemming your toon isn't too much to expect when you're the most important position in the party.

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^^ this

i've been switching out stamina gems for defense gems and i haven't fallen from 20k hp. The gear is fine. I just gotta fine other high lvl players to run heroics and gear up.

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Q u o t e:


That is what I am hoping as well, as far as raw avoidance numbers go. Feels awkward to only have 20%ish dodge but shrug.

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Why? How much Dodge did you have when you JUST hit 70?

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Q u o t e:
The only thing that annoys me a little about the defense stat is that it does double duty as a tanking stat and as the mechanic that prevents you from fighting mobs much higher level than you are. There is a small voice in the back of my head saying that having one stat pull double duty might eventually be a problem.

I also suspect we might have an easier time making balance work across the board if defense provided mitigation (more like block) and not avoidance. That may be something we look at eventually.

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GC i have deep respect for the majority of the changes but defense is fine.

There are more issues asside from crushing blows when fighting higher lvl mobs. One big example is the lower damage, higher miss rate, increased parry/dodged chance. It is outright unnecessary to be worrying about this.

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Q u o t e:


That is what I am hoping as well, as far as raw avoidance numbers go. Feels awkward to only have 20%ish dodge but shrug.

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Same as what you had at lvl 70 when you first got there. The avoidance is fine. It'll increases we get better gear.

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Q u o t e:
Why? How much Dodge did you have when you JUST hit 70?

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My warrior floated between 18 - 20% dodge and 15-17% parry for much of BC. It was until ZA that his avoidance numbers really went up a bunch. I stopped raiding 25-mans on him before my guild at the time broke into BT.

Guess what? My pally is close to 19% dodge and ~15.5% parry. I just wish block rating was a bit more common place outside of a few pieces. But that would make our DK friends cry.

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Q u o t e:
The only thing that annoys me a little about the defense stat is that it does double duty as a tanking stat and as the mechanic that prevents you from fighting mobs much higher level than you are. There is a small voice in the back of my head saying that having one stat pull double duty might eventually be a problem.

I also suspect we might have an easier time making balance work across the board if defense provided mitigation (more like block) and not avoidance. That may be something we look at eventually.

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What about the role of defense for druids and DKs. You don't like it as a stat that does double duty for paladins and warriors, but what about how is is less effective for DKs and much less effective for druids. If there are going to be changes to defense in the future, are there any plans to normalize it so that everybody gets equal (or if not equal, then at least similar) benefit from it?

This would also fix many of the qualms that druids currently have about the current changes in itemization by opening up a much, much broader selection of 'good' items to use.

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Q u o t e:


Meh, the green armor on it isn't going to multiply soon, so its not an issue.

Though PvP Gear has more Stamina and Agility on it than our Tier Gear, but I'd still take the Expertise and Hit that's on the PvE gear. >.>

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There is no hit on the either 10 or 25 man Dreamwalker Battlegear. The expertise is nice, but it's only on 2 pieces.

It's worth pointing out that, for Warriors, Paladins, and Death Knights, Defense rating gives more raw avoidance per point of item value than Parry and only slightly less than Dodge.

Assuming level 80:
40 Dodge rating = 1.02% avoidance
40 Parry rating = 0.81% avoidance
40 Defense rating = 8 Defense skill = 0.96% avoidance (0.32% each of miss, dodge, and parry)

Basically I'm just saying don't look at all the defense rating on your gear and go "Man, what a waste." You need 689 defense rating for 140 defense skill (the number required for uncrittable). You get a combined total of 16.8% raw avoidance from all of that. 689 dodge rating gives 17.51% dodge. So, swapping all of that Defense rating to Dodge rating would only net you another 0.71% avoidance.

This is to speak nothing of the extra block chance you get from Defense as well, nor the fact that Miss and Parry are both superior to Dodge in their own ways.