Warrior Guide

by Iceman, 60 Orc Warrior, Mug'thol

The complete guide to playing a warrior in World of Warcraft.

Table of Contents

The Warrior

"Crush your enemy, see them driven before you, and hear the lamentations of their women." - Conan

Overview

The warrior class is the melee, in-your-face-action, fighting class. One can specialize in either offense or defense, or hybridize for an effective mixture of both. Offensive warriors are hard hitting fighters with either large 2-handed weapons or a flurry of damage as a dual wielding master. They are effective in both the PvE and PvP environment of World of Warcraft. With the ability to soak up damage while delivering painful damage himself, the offensive warrior is force to be reckoned with on the battlefield.

Warriors excel in both single combat and group combat. His roll significantly changes with group size. They are always effective tanks with any spec. Warriors are very gear dependent and require constant upgrades to their armor and equipment, but they also improve a lot more with the correct gear then other classes.

Racial Talents Overview

Warriors are the only class where you can be any race in the game. The wide range of choices does cause some people to think that one race choice is superior to another, but every race class makes a very effective warrior. The bonus skills, though they do change your play style in certain situations, they are by no means the “Be-All-End-All” skill. Remember, you will be looking at this character for a long time, so I really think people should go by their aesthetic choice first, but for the power gamer in you, here are the significant differences between the races.

Alliance

Dwarves:

Stoneform - "While active, grants immunity to Bleed, Poison, and Disease effects. In addition, Armor increased by 10%. Lasts 8 sec". - It doesn’t just give you immunity but also gets rid of any current bleed, poison and disease on your character when you activated it. The 10% bonus to armor does diminish in usefulness as you gain more armor because every 1 point of armor adds less to damage mitigation. Not the best of skills, but handy early in the game.

Gun Specialization - "+5 to Gun Skill" - Well, a warrior can use guns, but overall this isn’t all that useful. Warrior just can’t do ranged damage well. Guns can be useful for pulling in instances or with large mobs.

Frost Resistance - "+10 Cold Resistance" - More resistance is always good. Frost damage is not used all that often by enemies though that may change as newer instances come out. Rumor has it the Necropolis Naxxramos is frost based, but that is rumor only. Still the prevalence of fire resistance gear in PvP has caused most mages to switch to cold spells, these 10 points could come in handy.

Find Treasure - "Activate to see treasure chests on mini map - lasts until canceled - no cooldown" - This works like a gathering skill, and because you can only have one gathering skill active at a time, this does make it a little worthless. If you have leatherworking, and a crafting skill, you can use it all the time, but if you are a miner or herbalist then you are stuck a little having to switch between modes. Even then, the chests don’t usually have anything significant inside them anyways. You will be lucky to get a green item.

Gnomes:

Escape Artist - "Activate to break out of a Root or Snare effect - 0.5 sec cast - 1 min cooldown" - One problem warriors have is getting into melee range in the first place. Roots and Snares stop us dead in our tracks, holding a big, bad sword while the arrows or fireballs rain in. This skill helps you get out of this situation. This skill is a channel cast so you can get interrupted, but with the .5 sec cast that is slim.

Expansive Mind - "Increase Intelligence by 5%" - Warriors are dumber than a rock, and a 5% increase isn’t going to improve this much. This helps a little in leveling up weapon skills, but even then warriors are not the target class for this skill.

Arcane Resistance - "+10 Arcane Resistance" - More resistance is always good, especially in something as rare as arcane. Though on the flipside, not much in the game uses arcane. Take what you can get is my motto here. Engineering Specialization - "+15 skill bonus to Engineering" - Engineering is a good profession for a warrior (more on that later) if you don’t want to be an engineer though, this is pointless.

Humans:

Perception - "Activate to dramatically increase stealth detection - Lasts 20 sec - 3 min cooldown" - Warriors kill rogues. We are the Rock to their Scissor. A skill which helps us catch more of them is always good. Very few mobs in the game use stealth so this is definitely a PvP skill.

The Human Spirit - "Increase Spirit by 5%" - Spirit helps regenerate health and mana. Mana does regenerate while in combat, but health does not so this skill is limited in usefulness to a warrior since first aid and bandages cover out of combat healing well.

Diplomacy - "10% bonus to faction point gain" - This trait is worth gold. This game is build around factions, and lots of factions outside of the 4 main racial factions give rewards for gaining reputation with them. These rewards at higher level are epic in quality. Thus a 10% increase in gain means you get the item 10% faster.

Sword and Mace Specialization - "+5 to Sword and Mace skill" - Naturally, as a warrior you will, in some point in your career, be killing something with a Mace or a Sword, it is sort of the object of the game. This helps you kill better. In essence, a +5 skill bonus is a being able to hit something at the equivalent of being one level higher than you are if the skill in maxed out. This helps a lot in leveling in taking on higher level mobs in instances, and still being able to hit them effectively

Night Elves:

Shadowmeld - "Activate while immobile and out of combat to enter stealth mode - lasts until canceled - 10 sec cooldown" - Not as useful to warriors as some other classes, but it does help a little in evading enemies and hiding in order to jump a trap. It isn’t too useful in PvE though. Works as a pinch AFK button so you don’t get attacked on a PvP server.

Quickness - "Dodge chance increased by 1%" This may not sound like much, but when you are in higher level instances and that boss you are tanking can hit you for 4000 to 6000 damage and you dodge said attack, you will feel golden.

Wisp Spirit - "Become a wisp when dead with movement speed increase of 50% (25% faster than normal ghost)" - You will die. It is inevitable. There are no Hardcore servers or modes (like in Diablo), and since there are no death penalties the only annoying part on death is running back to your corpse. As a Night Elf, you do that faster.

Nature Resistance - "+10 Nature Resistance" - If you have been reading so far through everything, invariably, you will know that my motto is more resistance is a good thing. Nature resistance is even more of a good thing since the release of patch 1.9 Ahn'Qiraj, where a large number of mobs do nature damage.

Horde

Orc:

Blood Fury - "Activate to increase base melee attack power by 25% for 15 sec - 2 min cooldown. Applies a healing effectiveness debuff on the user. The healing debuff is applied immediately upon using the ability. " - Use it in a pinch to gain more damage on a target in either PvP or PvE. The healing debuff causes all healing done on you to be only 50% effective. So use it when you know you don’t have healing incoming or healing doesn’t matter.

Hardiness - "25% resistance to stun effects." - Warriors are rogue killers, but one effective way for a rogue to have a chance against us is to use the stunlock tactic. Rogues have enough stuns that they can almost incapacitate a target indefinitely. This trait gains you a 25% chance of resisting said stun, and beat the pants off the rogue.

Command - "Pet melee damage increased by 5%." - Well, we don’t get pets, but in a pinch you can always us /p and command your party members to attack. They don’t get a bonus though. Pity.

Axe Specialization - "+5 to Axe skill." - This increases your axe skill as though you are one level higher than you are. Better skill at hitting someone is always good. More death, more carnage, more blood... well you get the idea.

Tauren:

War Stomp - "Activate to stun up to 5 opponents within 8 yards - lasts 2 sec - 2 min cooldown" - A tauren can put his foot down on any situation. This skill works wonders in a lot of situations. Need to run, Warstomp and flee. Want to disrupt an enemy formation? Charge in and Warstomp. Is a Mage ready to throw that large Pyroblast at you? Warstomp. Have a Gnome problem? Crush him under your boot. Very effective.

Endurance - "Max Health increased by 5%" More health always good and considering how large tauren are, it is no surprise they get more health.

Cultivation - "15 skill bonus to Herbalism" - It works well, if you actually get herbalism. The profession is not required though and the +15 can be gotten other ways. Still, nothing like seeing a several-hundred pound 9 foot Tauren prancing around in the flower garden.

Trolls:

Berserking - "Berserking is an activated ability that increases your melee, ranged and casting speed by 10% to 30%. The value scales upwards towards 30% depending how low your health is when you activate the ability - lasts 10 sec - 3 min cooldown. Requires 5 Rage to activate." - Emergency maneuver. Are you in dire straits and need a way out? Mad as all hell that this mob or person is going to kill you? Sounds like you really need to hit that berserking button.

Regeneration - "10% health regen bonus, 10% active in combat" – It’s not a bad bonus, but it isn’t all that much. At level 60, you usually have a warrior with about 50ish health regen out of combat per tick(more if you have spirit gear). This trait gives you 10% more so you have 55. In combat, though, you would only get 10% of that 55 point regen so about 5 health per tick while in combat, so it isn’t that powerful.

Beast Slaying - "5% damage bonus to Beasts" - You will kill a lot of beasts in this game, so a damage bonus is a good thing. Too bad though that at higher level though most enemies are not beasts.

Throwing Specialization - "+5 to Bows and Throwing Weapon skills" - This skill gives you a better chance to hit and score criticals with a bow or throwing weapon, but we are warriors. If we pull out the bow, then melee range better be close to instant death.

Undead:

Will of the Forsaken - "Activate to become immune to Fear, Sleep, and Charm effects. Can also be used while already afflicted by Fear or Sleep - lasts 5 sec - 2 min cooldown" Considered by some to be the best racial ability in the game. This skill allows you to mitigate the mentioned crowd control effects and keep control of your character. Very effective in fighting Priests and Warlocks who will fear you out of melee range.

Cannibalize - "Activate to regenerate 7% of total health every 2 sec. by consuming Humanoid or Undead corpses within 5 yds - lasts 10 sec - 2 min cooldown" - I recommend the red wine with dead enemy. More or less a free bandage every 2 minutes.

Underwater Breathing - "Underwater breath lasts 300% longer than normal" - One doesn’t do that much swimming in the game, though this skill is handy when you do.

Shadow Resistance - "+10 Shadow Resistance" - More resistance is good.

Talent builds

When designing your warrior with talents, consider what type of warrior you want to be since you will have to max out to at least 31 points in the style you chose. Warrior talents are not meant to be dabbled in, meaning a Tri-build does not work for warriors. One tree should always have at least 31 points in it.

Now the 3 categories are surprising names Arms, Fury and Protection. Here is an overview of each style.

Arms - This Talent build is focused around Mortal Strike, the 31 point talent. Hence the reason this build is also referred to as the MS Build. Large 2-handers are the name of the game with this build. Front loading damage and powerful crits are perfect, when going the damage route. Going much higher than 31 points is usually not desirable. Points put into the other 2 trees are very effective.

Example of a 31 Arms, 20 Fury Build with Axe spec. This is a very powerful offensive build.

Arms Talents - 31 point(s)
Deflection 2/5
Improved Rend 3/3
Improved Charge 2/2
Tactical Mastery 5/5
Improved Overpower 2/2
Deep Wounds 3/3
Two-Handed Weapon Specialization 5/5
Impale 2/2
Axe Specialization 5/5
Sweeping Strikes 1/1
Mortal Strike 1/1

Fury Talents - 20 point(s)
Cruelty 5/5
Improved Demoralizing Shout 5/5
Piercing Howl 1/1
Improved Battle Shout 4/5
Enrage 5/5

Example of 31 Arms, 5 Fury, 15 Protection spec with Swords. This build is still strong offensively, but is a little more well-rounded.

Arms Talents - 31 point(s)
Deflection 5/5
Improved Rend 3/3
Improved Charge 2/2
Tactical Mastery 5/5
Improved Overpower 2/2
Deep Wounds 3/3
Impale 2/2
Sweeping Strikes 1/1
Sword Specialization 5/5
Improved Hamstring 2/3
Mortal Strike 1/1

Fury Talents - 5 point(s)
Cruelty 5/5

Protection Talents - 15 point(s)
Anticipation 5/5
Toughness 5/5
Defiance 5/5

Fury builds can be separated in to two designs. This spec is very gear intensive. Arms is a lot more forgiving on gear. Dual wielding Fury, or 2-handed Fury. Dual wielding fury is a great sustained dps build that isn’t very high on burst damage. 2-handed Fury only starts to shine when your base Attack Power is above 800, which causes the damage from Bloodthirst to be significant.

Example of 34 Fury, 17 Arms Spec

Arms Talents - 17 point(s)
Deflection 2/5
Improved Rend 3/3
Improved Charge 2/2
Tactical Mastery 5/5
Deep Wounds 3/3
Impale 2/2

Fury Talents - 34 point(s)
Cruelty 5/5
Unbridled Wrath 5/5
Piercing Howl 1/1
Improved Battle Shout 4/5
Dual Wield Specialization 5/5
Enrage 5/5
Death Wish 1/1
Improved Intercept 2/2
Flurry 5/5
Bloodthirst 1/1

Protection builds are considered right now the worse of the 3 talent builds. Why? Well Protection is mainly considered a PvE build. This build is meant to help mitigate damage in higher level instances. The problem, though, is that the damage potential is a LOT less than Arms and Fury, but the damage mitigation is only really somewhat better. The talents above 15 are also considered lackluster. This is the reason that a lot of warriors are going with the Arms 31, Fury 5, Protection 15 Spec.

Here is one design of Protection 33, Arms 13 and Fury 5

Arms Talents - 13 point(s)
Deflection 5/5
Improved Charge 2/2
Tactical Mastery 5/5
Anger Management 1/1

Fury Talents - 5 point(s)
Cruelty 5/5

Protection Talents - 33 point(s)
Shield Specialization 5/5
Anticipation 5/5
Improved Bloodrage 2/2
Last Stand 1/1
Improved Shield Block 1/3
Improved Revenge 3/3
Defiance 5/5
Improved Taunt 2/2
Improved Shield Bash 2/2
Concussion Blow 1/1
One-Handed Weapon Specialization 5/5
Shield Slam 1/1

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