Protection Warrior Leveling Spec: Early Level Talents

Level 13 Undead Warrior

How To Spec a Protection Warrior For Fast Leveling (1-30)

Conventional wisdom surrounding prot warriors is that they simply can’t be used for leveling fast.

“Go fury or arms until level 70 then spec protection,” they’ll say.

You’ll hear this constantly from players that have never played a warrior, or that played a warrior years ago and haven’t touched them since.

This is 2009, and these days in post 3.1 WoW, the warrior class can be leveled fast regardless of the talent build.

The important thing to me is that you’re playing a build you like the theme of, that you enjoy playing, or that is effective for you.

The protection warrior can be all of those things!

*this build focuses on early leveling talents to get you off to a fast start*

Protection Warrior Leveling Build: Levels 1-30

Click here for the exact talent build.

Row 1: (Improved Blood Rage, Shield Specialization, Improved Thunder Clap)

The important thing with a protection build, when we’re talking leveling speed, is to ensure you’re generating high levels of rage.

High rage generation as a protection warrior will act as a substitute for “missing out” on the other two build’s higher damage output talents, so don’t forget that as you advance up the tree.

Improved Blood Rage is great for just that – get more rage 50% more rage with each use for only 2 talent points. Sold!

Shield Specialization is another excellent rage builder prot warriors get early on. Max it out with 5/5 and increase your chance to block (lowering damage taken), and has a 100% chance to generate 2 rage when a block occurs (increasing damage output). Together, damage mitigation and increased damage output make this an excellent leveling talent that will serve you well.

Improved Thunder Clap further amplifies your ability to dish out a constant stream of rage based attacks, and cheaply. Max this out with 3/3 points and reduce the cost of Thunder Clap by 4 rage points, increase the damage by 30%, and the slowing effect by an extra 10%.

Row 2: (Incite, Anticipation)

Incite is another good early talent which while basic will keep your average dps high by increasing crit strike chance. Take points here, but leave Anticipation out for now. Its nice to dodge extra (and we’ll take this much later in the build), but for leveling we want to concentrate on rage and damage output.

Row 3: (Last Stand, Improved Revenge, Shield Mastery, Toughness)

This is a good row – starting with Last Stand, you might be tempted not to take it, but when I’m leveling I make mistakes… I accidentally pull extra mobs, or I make some other dumb error that sends me on a big boring corpse run. Avoid that if you like and take last stand – it temporarily increases your hitpoints by 30% for 20 seconds, making it a great panic button.

Improved Revenge is a no brainer – increased damage of revenge (20%) and a 50% chance to sun your target for 3 secs is great for leveling with a shield using protection build because you’re blocking plenty, and the stun will help keep damage down even more.

Stick just one point into Shield Mastery – its a great warrior talent, but as mentioned early, we’re already fine for defence and HP, we need to do damage. Take 1 point to open up the next row (leave the excellent Toughness talent for now too, same reasons).

Row 4: (Improved Spell Reflection, Improved Disarm, Puncture)

A pretty average row for the leveling warrior, we’re really just putting points here to open up row 5. Its a toss up here between Puncture, which gives you great damage when you choose devastate, and Improved Disarm which gives a good 5% boost to damage on disarmed enemies.

If you don’t mind respeccing when you open up Devastate, I’d go Improved Disarm now then change to Sunder.

Row 5 (Improved Disciplines, Concussion Blow, Gag Order)

To end this build we finish level 30 by placing a point in Concussion Blow – a cheap, high damage, easy to use ability (thanks to all our rage) that comes with a massive 5 second stun. Great for leveling since you’ll murder mobs fast, and prevent damage to yourself, reducing down time/chance of death.

I’ll speak more on Imp Disciplines & Gag Order next time… but this build will get you leveling fast with a protection warrior spec.

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Related posts:

1. Protection Warrior Leveling Spec: Mid Level Talents
2. Protection Warrior Leveling Spec: The Build to 80
3. Arms Warrior Leveling Spec