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Belgarion.
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re: Block - Is it really that bad?

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Uelander

I was reading in another post where T and Lan had made some points about block that discounted it as a valuable stat to tanks for survivability.

I thought I'd better look into this before i rolled a DK and started over and I think there is more value to block than many believe.

The first thing is that if you can equip a shield - you can block - and a shield will provide about 1/3 of your armor - which will account for about 10-15% mitigation in damage taken. The other important fact is that BV is the amount of damage absorbed after all other mitigation is calculated. As an example, Uel mitigates about 60% from armor and 10% from stance. His BV is around 1400 - and he gets 10% additional from talents - so he blocks 1540 70% of the time and 3080 30% of the time with critical block talented. The end result is he can completly mitigate all damage from a physical attack of 4200 every time he blocks and 8400 when the block crits. Looking at WWS - Uel's block averaged 2500 or so in a recent Saph fight -so raid buffs must have a positive impact on this as well.

The value of block diminishes as the attacks get bigger because of the static BV - but even if the boss hits for 20k - the mitigated value is going to be around 7200 and Uels BV will stop 20-40% of that damage. Still a splash -but it winds up being a lot of damage absorbed over 4 or 5 minutes which will at least help keep the mana pools from drying up.

I did some playing with the numbers and found that 1% of avoid (miss, dodge, parry) is worth about 4% of block in terms of pure DPS reduction to the boss. This works for a boss hitting 20k physical and with Uels armor and BV stats. Because block isnt subject to DR - it is much easier to stack up higher block %. At 20k you still get splashed for 15% of your health or so - but bosses that hit this hard are not typically that fast - which gives your heals a chance to react (sounds like rationalization?). If the mob hits for about 6k then 1% block = 1% avoid for Uel. Im looking at equipment to see where i can make that trade. I have an extra tier gear tokens I may use to gem/enchant towards one or the other as well.

I am thinking about how to create a couple of armor sets to max block or avoid depending on the fight. I've already got a 550 def set (max avoid), a 540 def set with higher hit and a 535 def set for trash - it has 10% or so hit on it. I'm mixing in one or two pieces of DPS gear to get the stats where I need them. I lost aggro briefly in a 25 pug a week or two ago to a well geared and aggressive DPSer - we wiped ( but not bec of me needing to taunt) and for the second try - I mixed in a DPS piece to increase my hit and walla - I ran away from him in threat and we all lived hapily ever after. I could afford to give up a little avoidance in that fight. Ive got to believe that putting emphasis on block for certain fights would also pay huge dividends because of the lack of DR and the ability to stack really high numbers there.

There are other benefits to block value too. Shield slam hits harder (our best attack) and damage shield creates more aggro as well. This is a big deal given the limited AoE threat abilities we have to draw upon.

Let me know if you think the math is wrong - it is difficult to find reliable sources for this stuff. If I'm all wet - I'm rolling a DK or a healer....
Belgarion.
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re: Belgarion

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Nicely scripted post. No idea on actual numbers, I wonder if tankspot would have any posts on it. Bel leaned toward mitigation and finally, as nothing we were into was a major danger, kept tweaking to increase tank dps while still staying survivable.

Nice homework. clap

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re: Uelander

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http://www.tankspot.com/forums/f64/50544-ghostcrawler-block-cooldowns-tank-balance.html

Wouldnt you know it - It looks like Bliz is considering how to "fix" block. From the discussion in the attached - it looks like block begins to fail in Uldar - particularly in hard modes where incoming damage is often over 50k unmitigated.

Ok - maybe I was all wet -but Im keeping my warrior - what goes around comes around. shifty
Belgarion.
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re: Laanyan

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That math looks right. Block is great for trash mobs. It reduces, possibly completely, the damage from trash. The trouble comes on bosses. I'm not saying it's a useless stat, it's just useless to stack. Pure avoidance is far superior. There's a lot of math behind it all. I'm sure Turalon will have a spreadsheet for you tomorrow tongue

I think if they made it scale better or something (like blocks 33% of incoming damage instead of always blocks X damage) it might be a much more useful stat. I don't know that I'd ever stack it over pure avoidance unless it got a MAJOR buff.

Like someone posted in that tankspot thread, at 70 you could stack it and block basically negated the hit. Until we get there or close, I'm sticking with pure avoidance.
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re: Turalon

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That math looks about right. The thing to remember, is that while block doesn't have the DR added in, we're talking block value, not block rating. As you noticed, with DPS actually cranking out higher numbers, you need to work harder for threat, block is a great way to do this IF you can sacrifice avoidance.

You're thoughts about gear sets is actually right on. When I tank, I typically have an avoidance set...(very High Dodge and Parry) a block set for trash (30% block before talents and abilities), and a threat set.

The reason it's not recommended to stack block value is that the amount of block value needed to push attacks off the table is too hard to get.


Here are some simple formulas.

Chance to Block

Your chance to Block an attack is a percentage that follows this formula:

* Block% = 5% base chance + contribution from Block Rating + contribution from talents + ((Defense skill - attacker's weapon skill) * 0.04)

Your Block Rating at level 80, you gain 1% to your Block Chance for every 16.39 points of Block Rating.

* Block Rating contribution = 10 / 5 = 2%
* Defense contribution = (325 - 300) * 0.04 = 1% (A mob's weapon skill is assumed to be its level * 5)
* 5% base + 2% Block Rating + 5% talents + 1% Defense modifier = 13% Block chance versus level 60 mobs

Damage Reduction

X = [(Shield [[block value]]) + (Strength / 2)]

The quantity of damage blocked is calculated after damage mitigation from all other sources (Armor, Defensive Stance, Improved Righteous Fury, Blessing of Sanctuary, etc.). That means if the opponent hits you for 200, mitigated to 100 by Armor, and block according to the formula above is 40, then you will see in your combat window: "... hits you for 60. (40 blocked)".

(b) If the block quantity is greater than the damage received after mitigation, you will then block 100% of the damage: "... attacks. You block."

(c) The Warrior "Glyph of Blocking" increases block value by 10% for 10 sec after using Shield Slam.

(d) A Warrior's "Shield Mastery" or a Paladin's "Shield Specialization" talent increases the damage absorbed by (up to) 30%. The formula above becomes: X = [(Shield block value) + ([[Strength]] / 2) ] * 1.3

There are some BC items that increase your block value and rating etc...

It's essentially a filler avoidance stat because it's calculated AFTER dodge/parry/miss etc. This is why its more important to go for those stats vs. straight block. Additionally, it's best used for trash type encounters, as any boss will be hitting you for far more than your "splash" will be able to help. Since block is calculated last, it's always better for straight boss fights to gear more for actual avoidance vs block. You will always get that 1/3 your armor towards mitigation because as a tank you SHOULD have a shield on at all times if you can equip one, so that's not really factored into "gearing for block" since it's always on.
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re: Turalon

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http://forums.wow-europe.com/thread.html?topicId=9036094108&sid=1


just regular forum chatter.. but essentially the same principle comes through.. block is great for trash, but bosses are just hitting far far too hard for it to be a useful stat to 'gear' for vs survivability stats (straight avoidance/stamina)
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re: Uelander

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http://www.tankspot.com/forums/f63/40003-diminishing-returns-avoidance.html

This looks like the DR doesnt apply to the block rating either - but that doesnt change your point.

It looks like- from a total avoidance perspective - we should stack defense and dodge in a ratio of somewhere between 3:2 and 2:1 to get the best total result. Parry is very low return v. rating from gear to invest enchants/gems in that direction once you are d capped. Too bad -because parry has the added benefit of speeding up your swing timer. Nice to be a DK right now.
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re: Turalon

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It's been "nice to be a DK" almost from the get go =P


but yeah even though block rating has no DR, you just can't find enough of it on pieces that don't overlap to really get high enough to make a difference. Maybe once/if they change how it works it might factor in more so that we actually want to stack it again, but i'd keep going with what you have.... block/hit gear for trash and avoidance/sta gear for bosses.

that way you can max your threat on AE mobs via block threat and damage, and you shouldn't have to worry about single target boss threat really.
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