Warrior Spec Q

[Tillna]

I know with a warrior it is

Arms = PVP

Fury = PVE dps

Prot = PVE Tanking, PVP being annoying as hell to kill.

Question is, I am fury on my warrior.

Arms looks interesting as I have Herods axe and the Cyclonian one sitting in my bank.

My concern with arms was the slow attacking speed for grinding and lack of true instants in Battle stance.

I was wondering if any one could give me any views on the legitnessof Fury inPVP, Arms in PVE< etc

[Lascivious]

I leveled Las pre BC as a two-handed arms warrior. It wasn't that big of a deal. The "problem" with the slow attack speed in PVE is strictly visual - DPS is up there if you have the gear of course. There are a few fast two handers out there if you look for them. The instant attacks are still there - Overpower, Whirlwind, Mortal Strike, Sweeping Strikes. Fury you'd just replace MS with BT, so same thing. Though I think the change to SS is a huge buff for you Fury guys since you can attack with both weapons now. But all that requires stance dancing. If your looking at staying Battle Stnace most of the time for some reason IMO two-hander if the way to go. Improved Overpower for the win. At one point pre-BC (not sure where I am now) my crit on Overpower was 87&#37; with the Halberd of Smiting. Pure sexy.

Post BC I leveled to 66 Fury because our rage generation has just taken a major hit and I wasn't getting much rage with the two-hander. It was intersting. I felt like I relied on too many proccing abilities, but I generated rage quickly. 66-70 I leveled a duel-wielding MS build because PVPing against healers was pissing me off!

At 70 I went back to two handers.

Arms is just as viable DPS as Fury in PVE, most people just have a problem with the longer attack speed. Eh, used to have a warrior in the Grim who used a two-hander as a Fury warrior, he was very good too. I miss him.

Fhenrir I think was a PVE Ams guy. He was always in the top five DPS in our MC runs.

[Anthek]

I leveled Las pre BC as a two-handed arms warrior. It wasn't that big of a deal. The "problem" with the slow attack speed in PVE is strictly visual - DPS is up there if you have the gear of course. There are a few fast two handers out there if you look for them. The instant attacks are still there - Overpower, Whirlwind, Mortal Strike, Sweeping Strikes. Fury you'd just replace MS with BT, so same thing. Though I think the change to SS is a huge buff for you Fury guys since you can attack with both weapons now. But all that requires stance dancing. If your looking at staying Battle Stnace most of the time for some reason IMO two-hander if the way to go. Improved Overpower for the win. At one point pre-BC (not sure where I am now) my crit on Overpower was 87% with the Halberd of Smiting. Pure sexy.

Post BC I leveled to 66 Fury because our rage generation has just taken a major hit and I wasn't getting much rage with the two-hander. It was intersting. I felt like I relied on too many proccing abilities, but I generated rage quickly. 66-70 I leveled a duel-wielding MS build because PVPing against healers was pissing me off!

At 70 I went back to two handers.

Arms is just as viable DPS as Fury in PVE, most people just have a problem with the longer attack speed. Eh, used to have a warrior in the Grim who used a two-hander as a Fury warrior, he was very good too. I miss him.

Fhenrir I think was a PVE Ams guy. He was always in the top five DPS in our MC runs.

Oh, boy. I'll just say this now, there's a lot of wrong information in this.

There's a reason why the trees are considered the way they are for their purposes, because it's mostly true. Arms is (now really the only viable, due to Mortal Strike) the PvP tree, Fury is superior for raid DPS, and Prot is for tanking.

Arms DPS is competible in raids because of Blood Frenzy and careful use of Slam, by weaving it in between melee attacks and instant ability cooldowns. It took a huge hit with the Windfury nerf, though, so it's impact has significantly lessened. It has nothing to do with attack speed. And don't primarily use Battle Stance, it sucks, Overpower has minimal use, you lose a lot of better abilities and rage than in Berserker, yadda yadda yadda. An equally geared and skilled Fury warrior will always out-DPS an Arms warrior.

Now, here's the kicker. The only reason why warriors are really excellent in PvP, mostly arenas, is because of Mortal Strike, since healers are extremely strong when they are supporting their team. The other specs obviously lack this, along with other talents like Second Wind and Imp. Hamstring, so it's hard for them to be competitive.

If you're thinking of going Arms, don't do so until you're able to get Mortal Strike. Once you do, you can stick with that until you are 70.

My Arms PvE DPS build: http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=LA0czAbog0dZVV0V0gRc

My Fury build: http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=LA0czhbZVV0VxxRVuqo

My Arms PvP build: http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=LV0xbIboghzbZVVzV0xRZc

My Prot build: http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=LV0xbIboghzbZVVzV0xRZc

[Tillna]

Yeah, i just did a respec...and big pretty numbres...I nearly got a 1k crit with Mortal strike

[Kaliera]

Leveling as fury tends to be the smart way to go, as the talents help make for a more effecient and fast grind. As far as PvP goes, with pre-60 health bars and lack of substantial +healing gear pre BC, Mortal Strike isn't as needed. You'll still do fine in PvP as a fury warrior while grinding noticeably faster, just be sure to respec back to arms at 70 if you plan to do any serious PvP.

[Lascivious]

interesting post Anthek, didn't say anywhere in your response where i was wrong and even semi-agreed with a couple things i said. *shrug* anway. the meat of his question was is Arms viable for leveling and PVE. the short answer is yes.

[Nicoleta]

I recently leveled up my warrior with an arms-swords build. Level advancement was blazing fast, so any increase in speed with fury would be marginal at best. I've also tanked, DPS'd, and PvP'd with the same build -- you don't really need to over-specialize until you hit 70 and start facing dramatic gear differences.

I'd just spec according to whatever weapons you like to use.

[Malorii]

Tal to netheryn he's a beast when it comes to arms

[Bahlmoral]

As soon as I got my WW Axe, I went arms and Axe speciality and never looked back.

Sometimes if you get swarmed it's a pain in the ass, but for the most part it worked out pretty well.

My only complaint would be fighting monsters that don't bleed. It may not seem like a lot, but the extra DoT from bleeding is nice, and before I respecced for PvP I was using Blood Frenzy, so the extra 4% damage to bleeding creatures was nice.

[Broxigan]

As soon as I got my WW Axe, I went arms and Axe speciality and never looked back.

Sometimes if you get swarmed it's a pain in the ass, but for the most part it worked out pretty well.

My only complaint would be fighting monsters that don't bleed. It may not seem like a lot, but the extra DoT from bleeding is nice, and before I respecced for PvP I was using Blood Frenzy, so the extra 4% damage to bleeding creatures was nice.

I was such a noob when I first started WoW. I had a warrior. Got my WW axe at 30 with some friends help, and I stayed effing fury well into the 50s. Looking back, I WAS DUMB AS HELL.

[EnheilRas]

I remember back in the day whe Mobs could only have so many DoTs on them and guilds used to kick out any warrior that had crit bleeding and wouldn't respec out of it.

[Fhenrir]

Going to agree with what Kaliera said here - you'll do fine as a fury warrior all the way to Outland (it's worth going arms if you get the Ring of Blood axe or somesuch at 65). Before Outland, the Mortal Strike debuff isn't enough to justify changing specs every time you get a new weapon, so it's safer to just stay fury and put out about as much (or more) damage with a two-hander or when dual wielding.


I'll forego getting into a big debate about how endgame warrior DPSing works here since it's obvious Tillna isn't anywhere near 25-mans, and there's no need to pointlessly flex my epeen with useless knowledge. :D

[Grev]

You should never really stay in battle stance anyway. Berserker will be your primary stance while soloing. I'm working on my third warrior right now with Grev and I'll be leveling Arms like just I did with the previous two.

Fury could be easier, but I can't depart with my two-hander. Arms isn't bad at all once you acquire Mortal Strike and Whirlwind.

[Tillna]

I grind in battle stance ATM, and do just fine.

The only issue is that my hit rating is crap cause my weapon skill is lacking.

I'm gonna test drive it, and if I can't stand it for grinding, I'll just get some PVP done that I need and go back to fury

[Chikt]

Actually, I have a Warrior question of my own. I'm working on a talent spec for my little warrior for when I get to 70 for PvP. Arena and battlegrounds. Would anybody suggest anything different of my currently planned spec (http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/classes/warrior/talents.html?0500502135201501000100005050104025210 05000000000000000000000000000)?

[Okhu]

If you intend to do Arena Dio. Take a look at my current warriors build....I've grown to like it very very much for face-smash. :] I'll post a link as soon as The Armory stops sucking.

[Verloran]

I leveled Ver as fury from 1 to 64. I LOVED the dps, the grinding, everything about it... except the PvP. It actually wasn't too bad in battlegrounds, but put me 1 vs 1 against any decent healer..

At 64 I went MS. I'm finding that I miss the fast attacks, the long string of crits in a row, and the insane DPS... but arms is still fairly decent. The MS does help in PvE agains the healing mobs. It helps that I don't get bugged quite as much by Horde, and when I do I seem to have a much better chance of surviving. There are parts of fury that I miss, but this is doing just fine. So.. yeah, I think arms is just fine for leveling.

Besides... MOHAWK STRIKE!

[Kaldore]

I'll throw in my .02 cents since I've levelled three warriors to 60 and Kaldore to 70.

I've switched between levelling Fury or Arms, using a two hander or dual wielding one handed weapons. It's my opinion that the best way to level as efficiently as possible was Arms spec with a slow two handed weapon with large top end damage. Which lead to a running joke in Imperium Lux "Kaldore likes his weapons like his women, big and slow."

However, with the changes to Sweeping Strikes and Whirlwind there might be even faster killing specced for Dual wield Fury, which would mean less time fighting, which would mean less damage taken, which of course means less time sitting on your ass eating food - The sole reason Arms levelling with a two hander was much better than dual wield Fury.

[Grev]

I grind in battle stance ATM, and do just fine.
You could grind in defensive stance and do just fine, this is WoW.

But you're 3&#37; more likely to land a critical strike, plus you have access to your only other instant attack, Whirlwind, while in berserker stance. All at the cost of 10% extra damage taken, it seems like a fair trade off to me.

[Kaliera]

Actually, I have a Warrior question of my own. I'm working on a talent spec for my little warrior for when I get to 70 for PvP. Arena and battlegrounds. Would anybody suggest anything different of my currently planned spec (http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/classes/warrior/talents.html?0500502135201501000100005050104025210 05000000000000000000000000000)?

If you plan to do arenas and battlegrounds, you're going to want to have 2/2 Second Wind and 2/2 Improved Intercept. CC is a warrior's worst nightmare, so getting rage/health in return for being rooted/stunned is incredibly handy, and having a 20 second intercept makes it far easier to keep yourself on your target at all times.

I'd prefer improved hamstring or improved execute with the two remaining points, with a bigger nod towards improved hamstring for arena play. Sadly, these points must be taken out of flurry, but the benefits of these 2-3 talents far outweigh the flurry haste buff.

[Chikt]

I have to ask, since it's been seriously pissing me off. But I have a HUGE problem with my warrior [i]not being able to hit things for crap[i]. Combat is a flurry of misses with a few hits here and there. Is this normal at the lower levels, or am I doing something wrong, or what?

[Kaliera]

If I remember correctly from seeing you in Hillsbrad ( /rude to Ayumu's reply to Kali's warning ), you were using a two-handed weapon. Is your skill with said weapon maxed out, and are you attacking mobs that are at your level or below? Attacking higher level mobs tends to be a bad idea as a warrior due to how crippling a miss can be.

If you're not using that mace anymore, then your misses are most likely due to the innate dual wield penalty, which I believe is a 25% miss chance.

[Chikt]

If I remember correctly from seeing you in Hillsbrad ( /rude to Ayumu's reply to Kali's warning ), you were using a two-handed weapon. Is your skill with said weapon maxed out, and are you attacking mobs that are at your level or below? Attacking higher level mobs tends to be a bad idea as a warrior due to how crippling a miss can be.

If you're not using that mace anymore, then your misses are most likely due to the innate dual wield penalty, which I believe is a 25% miss chance.

Still using the mace, yes. Fighting mobs my level though is just insane because all I get are dodges, parries, misses and blocks. The dodges wouldn't be so bad if 50% of the time I couldn't even land an overpower.

[Kaliera]

Still using the mace, yes. Fighting mobs my level though is just insane because all I get are dodges, parries, misses and blocks. The dodges wouldn't be so bad if 50% of the time I couldn't even land an overpower.

When I ground my way up on my warrior, I tried my best to attack mobs 1-2 levels lower than myself. Not only are the miss rates lower for them, but the crit rates are higher, leading to even more rage to burn. I'd also highly suggest investing in a blue-quality weapon of some sort, if you've got the gold for it. You won't be disappointed.

[Bahlmoral]

If I were to offer one piece of advice to any warrior (or any class that can use two-handed weapons for that matter) is to take the time early to get the skill in on those 2-handers. My suggestion would be, pick the weapon you most see yourself using endgame and go that route.

For example, I chose to go the 2-hander Axe route. Consiquently, the rest of my 2-hander skills are crap, but it beat trying to be 70 and leveling up that skill.

Later on you can always buy some vendor trash weapons for each hand and wail away at much lower level monsters to get the single-handed weapon skills up.

[Kaldore]

If I were to offer one piece of advice to any warrior (or any class that can use two-handed weapons for that matter) is to take the time early to get the skill in on those 2-handers. My suggestion would be, pick the weapon you most see yourself using endgame and go that route.

For example, I chose to go the 2-hander Axe route. Consiquently, the rest of my 2-hander skills are crap, but it beat trying to be 70 and leveling up that skill.

Later on you can always buy some vendor trash weapons for each hand and wail away at much lower level monsters to get the single-handed weapon skills up.


/facepalm


Dear god Bahlmoral... Bad advice!

Here's what you do, it's very easy and it will save you a boatload of hearache later on. I *WISH* someone gave me this advice before I had to level Dagger skill from 0-350.

Learn every weapon skill. Level up all of the ones that you could see yourself using every 5 levels using garbage vendor weapons. Right now I'm at least over 300 skill in everything but Staves... Which to be safe I will skill up at some point.

Because you never know what new weapon you might get that is amazing, or if some stupid encounter requires you to pick up a dagger and stab people with it, but if it's a type that you have 0 skill in you could be screwed.

[Raziel]

and the best way to really do this is just to solo lower-levell instances for fun and profit!

[Gorvena]

and the best way to really do this is just to solo lower-levell instances for fun and profit!

1. Solo lower-level instances
2. ???????
3. Profit

[Roth'rili]

..Because you never know what new weapon you might get that is amazing, or if some stupid encounter requires you to pick up a dagger and stab people with it, but if it's a type that you have 0 skill in you could be screwed.

Hehe someone had to go around unMCing people in the Kael fight am I right? *chuckles* I had to chime in I was more lucky my weapon didn't involve any hard work then equipping it.