Gear
Tier Sets
The Protection Warrior tier set for 10.2 is still very strong despite the nerfs it received prior to it going live. The tier set does interrupt the flow of your rotation through Thunder Clap resets, but it’s ultimately positive as it provides a large amount of single target damage, on top of a very high uptime 10-15% damage reduction buff. It’s a very fun tier set to play with and to top it off, it also provides cooldown reduction to one of our major offensive cooldowns, Thunderous Roar!
- The 2-set bonus gives your Rage Spending abilities a chance to cause your next Shield Slam to consume your bleeds on a target, instantly dealing the remaining damage of your bleeds, and reducing your damage taken by 10% for 5 seconds.
- The 4-set provides us an additional 2% damage reduction for each bleed effect consumed, and when your Shield Slam consumes a bleed, the cooldown of Thunderclap is reset and the cooldown of Thunderous Roar gets reduced by 3 seconds.
One thing to note, is that for some reason Ignore pain’s average chance to proc the tier set is higher than our other Rage Spenders. This highly incentivizes you to use ignore pain as much as possible since it has a high chance to give you a large damage boost.
Protection Warrior Best in Slot Gear
The tables below aim to give you a general list of gear that is good for Protection Warrior, these lists are not a perfect replacement for simming your character.
Protection Warrior Combined Best in Slot
The gear listed below is a mixture of Raid and Mythic+ gear from Dragonflight Season 3.
| Slot | Item | Source |
| Head | Incarnate’s Perceptive Casque | Dawn of the Infinite |
| Neck | Ironshell Pendant | Throne of the Tides |
| Shoulders | Molten Vanguard’s Shouldervents | Smolderon / Catalyst |
| Cloak 1 | Shadowfeather Shawl | Black Rook Hold |
| Cloak 2 | Vibrant Wildercloth Shawl | Crafted |
| Chest | Molten Vanguard’s Plackart | Nymue / Catalyst |
| Wrist 1 | Agonizing Manacles | Igira the Cruel |
| Wrist 2 | Primal Molten Vambraces (Shadowflame Patch) | Crafted |
| Wrist 3 | Allied wristguard of companionship | Crafted |
| Gloves | Molten Vanguard’s Crushers | Igira the Cruel / Catalyst |
| Belt | Smoldering Chevalier’s Greatbelt | Tindral Sageswift |
| Legs | Molten Vanguard’s Steel Tassets | Larodar, Keeper of the Flame / Catalyst |
| Boots | Fused Obsidian Sabatons | Smolderon |
| Ring 1 | Band of Burning Thorns | Larodar, Keeper of the Flame |
| Ring 2 | Ring of Contempt | Black Rook Hold |
| Trinket 1 | Cataclysmic Signet Brand | Smolderon |
| Trinket 2 | Augury of the Primal Flame | Fyrakk |
| Trinket 3 | Fyrakk’s Tainted Rageheart | Fyrakk |
| Weapon | Gholak, the Final Conflagration | Dawn of the Infinite |
| Shield | Verdant Matrix Beacon | Nymue |
Protection Warrior Best Gear from Mythic+
The gear listed below are the best options exclusively from Mythic+ for Protection Warriors on Season 3.
| Slot | Item | Source |
| Head | Incarnate’s Perceptive Casque | Dawn of the Infinite |
| Neck | Ironshell Pendant | Throne of the Tides |
| Shoulders | Molten Vanguard’s Shouldervents | Catalyst |
| Cloak 1 | Shadowfeather Shawl | Black Rook Hold |
| Cloak 2 | Vibrant Wildercloth Shawl | Crafted |
| Chest | Molten Vanguard’s Plackart | Catalyst |
| Wrist 1 | Incarnadine Bracers | The Everbloom |
| Wrist 2 | Primal Molten Vambraces (Shadowflame Patch) | Crafted |
| Wrist 3 | Allied wristguard of companionship | Crafted |
| Gloves | Molten Vanguard’s Crushers | Catalyst |
| Belt | Unwinding Eon Girdle | Dawn of the Infinite |
| Legs | Molten Vanguard’s Steel Tassets | Catalyst |
| Boots | Goldsteel Sabatons | The Everbloom |
| Ring 1 | Ring of Contempt | Black Rook Hold |
| Ring 2 | Thornwoven Band | Waycrest Manor |
| Trinket 1 | Accelerating Sandglass | Dawn of the Infinite |
| Trinket 2 | Gore-crusted Butcher’s Block | Waycrest Manor |
| Trinket 3 | Prophetic Stonescales | Dawn of the Infinite |
| Weapon | Servant Splitter | Waycrest Manor |
| Shield | Disc of Indomitable Will | The Everbloom |
Protection Warrior Best Gear from Amirdrassil (Raiding)
The gear listed below are the best options you can acquire exclusively from Amidrassil, the Patch 10.2 raid for Protection Warriors.
| Slot | Item | Source |
| Head | Emerald Guardian’s Casque | Council of Dreams |
| Neck | Amulet of Eonar’s Chosen | Nymue |
| Shoulders | Molten Vanguard’s Shouldervents | Smolderon |
| Cloak 1 | Inflammable Drapeleaf | Gnarlroot |
| Cloak 2 | Vibrant Wildercloth Shawl | Crafted |
| Chest | Molten Vanguard’s Plackart | Nymue |
| Wrist 1 | Agonizing Manacles | Igira the Cruel |
| Wrist 2 | Primal Molten Vambraces (Shadowflame Patch) | Crafted |
| Wrist 3 | Allied wristguard of companionship | Crafted |
| Gloves | Molten Vanguard’s Crushers | Igira the Cruel |
| Belt | Smoldering Chevalier’s Greatbelt | Igira the Cruel |
| Legs | Molten Vanguard’s Steel Tassets | Larodar, Keeper of the Flame |
| Boots | Fused Obsidian Sabatons | Smolderon |
| Ring 1 | Band of Burning Thorns | Larodar, Keeper of the Flame |
| Ring 2 | Signet of the Last Elder | Igira the Cruel |
| Trinket 1 | Cataclysmic Signet Brand | Smolderon |
| Trinket 2 | Augury of the Primal Flame | Fyrakk |
| Trinket 3 | Fyrakk’s Tainted Rageheart | Fyrakk |
| Weapon | Gholak, the Final Conflagration | Fyrakk |
| Shield | Verdant Matrix Beacon | Nymue |
Trinkets
Cataclysmic Signet Brand - S TIER
The Cataclysmic Signet Brand trinket is your BIS. It builds in strength the longer you keep yourself in combat, stacking up to a total of 15 stacks, it applies a damage over time burn that scales exceptionally well. In Mythic plus you’ll need to formulate different ways to maintain this buff and keep yourself in combat as much as possible to fully optimize this trinket, whereas in raid it’s a no-brainer that takes roughly 2-3 minutes to reach full stacks.
Augury of the Primal Flame - S TIER
The Augury of the Primal Flame trinket comes with critical strikes as opposed to main stat, it creates a small feedback loop within itself since its proc is heavily weighted around your own crit. The trinket proc itself does a large amount of damage and is worth using in every situation, both single target and cleave, albeit not as strong as Signet Brand.
Rezan’s Gleaming Eye - A TIER
Making a return from BFA, this trinket is coming back in a slightly nerfed version having lost its haste proc. The trinket itself is still very strong and outputs a large amount of DPS.
Branch of the Tormented Ancient - A TIER
Branch of the Tormented Ancient drops from the first boss of the raid: Gnarlroot. This trinket deals a large amount of burst damage on a 2:30 cooldown. It debuffs you with a minor slow while you attempt to proc its effect, but it’s not bad. It’s definitely worth having if you can get your hands on it and with it’s damage increasing up to 5 targets, it’s even good in Mythic+ as well as single target
Fyrakk’s Tained Rageheart - A TIER
The Fyrakk’s Tained Rageheart trinket is both good defensively and offensively. You get a large absorb shield on as 1:30 cooldown, alongside a sizeable damage proc every 2 seconds for 10 seconds. It’ll be more value in Mythic+ but the damage it provides on damage amplification bosses such as Gnarlroot and Smolderon isn’t something to be overlooked, as well as the safety net of the absorb it’s definitely notable.
Prophetic Stonescales - A TIER
Prophetic Stonescales is a cheat death trinket that restores a large portion of your health as well as providing a huge haste buff and 20% damage reduction. The effect can only occur once every 8 minutes. This trinket is a must have for progression raiding or high Mythic+!
Beacon to the Beyond - A TIER
The Beacon to the Beyond trinket although its from the Aberrus the Shadowed Crucible, it still does a huge amount of damage despite the nerf. It’ll likely be irreplaceable until you manage to get your hands on some of the new heroic raid trinkets. It provides mastery as a base stat, which is great for Warrior defensively. The on-use effect is a channel that deals a massive amount of cosmic damage split between all nearby enemies, increased for each enemy struck (up to 5).
Pip’s Emerald Friendship Badge - B
Pip’s Emerald Friendship Badge is a big stat stick. Doesn’t synergise particularly well with Protection Paladin but if you manage to get it to trigger during wings you’ll output a large amount of solid damage. Every 12 seconds you have a chance to trigger the trinket, providing a massive amount of secondary stats before diminishing over 12 seconds, giving you a chance to proc it again. It’s proc chance isn’t great, but it’s not an awful option.
Accelerating Sandglass - B
The haste buff from the Accelerating Sandglass trinket is nice but similarly to Pip’s trinket, it’s nothing special. You gain up to 8 stacks of a haste buff. Once you receive your first stack, a 20 second timer starts and that’s when you’ll begin to build stacks. When the buff expires it deals damage and the effect repeats.
Gore-Crusted Butcher Block - B
Another BFA trinket coming back into the mix. Gore-Crusted Butcher Block is a Crit stat stick. It has good value in mythic plus, less so in raid. It’s a solid choice but there are definitely better options on the market.
Gift of Ursine Vengeance - C
The Gift of Ursine Vengeance trinket isn’t great. It was a powerhouse of an option before the most recent round of nerfs, seeing its potential drop massively. It’s still an okay option if you have nothing else. It’s a stat stick that procs from any damage event every 3 seconds.
Best Embellishments for Protection Warrior
- Shadowflame-Tempered Armor Patch (2x is BiS)
- Unstable Frostfire Belt (if you still have access to Eranog ring from previous tier)
- Elemental Lariat (If you have 5+ sockets on your gear)
Notable Items
Gholak, the Final Conflagration
A drop from Fyrakk, this weapon has massive value, providing a large damage proc. There is the downside of it dealing damage back to you, but the amount is negligible.
Servant Splitter
Easily the best weapon from Mythic+ that’s obtainable. If you’re unable to get your hands on Fyrakk’s weapon, this is the next best thing. At the cost of some secondary stats not being present, it gives you a large damage dot proc.