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Ui-charactercreate-classes warrior Warrior
the Iron Bulwark
Attributes Tank, DPS Armor Types Cloth, Leather, Mail, Plate, Shield
Weapon Types Bows, Crossbows, Fist, Swords (2h), Axes (2h), Maces (2h), Spears, Daggers, Staves,
Thrown, Unarmed
Races Human, Dwarf, Gnome, Night Elf, Orc, Forsaken, Tauren, Troll
Physicaldamage 60
Defensepower 100
Spellpower 0
Difficulty 100
Statistics
Health 20 Strength +3*
Mana 100 Agility 0
Stamina +2*
Intellect 0
Spirit 0
* - Denotes any major statistic.
For related articles, see Category:Warriors.


Warriors are melee fighters highly trained in the arts of weaponry. They are strong and quick on the battlefield. Depending on their spec, a warrior can often deal very high damage, or be tough as nails to kill. Warrior abilities depend on rage generation. This is different to all but one melee class, which is the druid; specifically a druid in bear form. Rage is generated through damage being dealt to and by the warrior and is capped at 100. Warriors have several talents capable of aiding rage generation.

Warriors can change between three combat stances: Battle Stance, Defensive Stance and Berserker Stance. Many abilities have a stance requirement. However, stances give the class a fluid play style allowing the player a variety of responses to any given PvE or PvP situation. Warriors can wear any type of armor although they receive a bonus from [Plate Specialization] for wearing plate armor Level 50 and beyond, although they can wear Plate starting at level 40. They are able to use shields and can wield any weapon with the exception of wands and relics.

The primary warrior attributes depend on the talent spec of the warrior. For Fury, attributes are strength and agility. For Arms, attributes are Strength and Stamina. For Protection, attributes are Stamina and Strength. Keep in mind this is generally for leveling warriors, and not endgame. Stamina is the most useful while leveling for all specs until around level 60 as critical strike rating on gear is rare until later levels. Warrior-oriented gear found towards end-game provides a wider range of attributes. Gear oriented specifically to damage dealing warriors may include critical strike rating, or haste. Gear oriented to warrior tanks usually includes some combination of block rating, dodge rating or parry rating. Hit rating or expertise rating are also commonly found on gear and can be useful for warriors performing either role.

For endgame warriors (level 60), the attributes are more advanced. Depending on your specialization and whether you are PvP or PvE geared, you will want different amounts of each attribute. For both PvP and PvE, your primary goal is to cap your hit rating so that you have a 100% chance to hit your target. For PvP this is only 5%. In PvE it will be 8%, as you will often be fighting mobs higher level than you generally. Even if you are hit capped for PvP, keep in mind that Night Elves will always have a small chance of causing you to miss. This is due to their racial passive ability Quickness. No matter how much hit you have, you will always miss a Night Elf on occasion. After your Hit rating is capped you will generally go for strength and critical strike rating for Arms and Fury, and Stamina and Mastery for Protection. Since Protection are tanks, you will want a lot of dodge and parry rating for PvE, and resilience for PvP.

Background[]

See also: List of warriors

As long as war is waged on Azeroth, there will be men and women who fight those wars. The warrior is no mere sword-swinger; they are skilled combatants, combining strength of arm, knowledge of weaponry and practiced maneuvers to slice or bludgeon their foes into little red bits. The warrior is the most versatile of the combat classes, and they supplement their fighting prowess with the ability to rally their allies and spur them to victory, but not only can they rally their allies into victory; they can themselves charge into the heart of the battle, take several lives and live to tell the tale. All races fight, and all races boast many warriors in their ranks. Warriors are common among dwarves, Forsaken, humans, and orcs, but are less so among the other races. Masters of swords, spears, and weapons of all kinds, warriors share a common way of life on Azeroth. Using their abilities to deal pain and cause bloodshed, warriors are deadly adversaries and welcome friends in violent times (which seem to be all the time in recent decades).[1] Warriors have existed in every race, from the murlocs to the tauren. Anyone willing to take up arms to defend their people can be classed as a warrior. A knight is the warrior elite among humans.

Notable warriors[]

Races[]

Main article: Warrior races

The warrior class can be played by the following races:

Race Strength Agility Stamina Intellect Spirit Armor Health
Horde ForsakenForsaken Forsaken 22 18 22 18 25 36 60
Horde OrcOrc Orc 26 17 23 17 22 34 70
Horde TaurenTauren Tauren 28 16 23 16 22 32 71
Horde TrollTroll Troll 24 22 22 16 21 44 60
Alliance DwarfDwarf Dwarf 28 16 23 19 19 32 70
Alliance GnomeGnome Gnome 18 22 22 24 20 44 60
Alliance HumanHuman Human 23 20 22 20 20 40 60
Alliance Night elfNight elf Night elf 19 24 22 20 20 48 60

Racial advantages[]

  • Humans: Sword and Mace specializations give +5 increased skill with swords and maces, which are two very popular warrior weapons. Perception acts as a "racial trinket" and gives the ability to detect stealthed units.
  • Dwarves: Stoneform removes poison, disease and bleed effects, and increases armor by 10%. Both of these can be very useful in PvE and PvP fights. The additional Frost resistance is always useful, as a warriors sworn enemy is the frost mage. Increased skill with maces provides a better chance to hit when using them. Though warriors will not primarily be using guns as their main weapon, they can be useful for a pull, and Gun Specialization helps with this category. Lastly, warriors are notorious for their high repair bills. Treasure Finding can help alleviate some of this payment, though it is minimal at best.
  • Gnomes: Escape Artist can be very useful, primarily in PvP situations, but also in PvE situations. Warriors being the prototypical tank often have to lead mobs and bosses away from the healers and ranged fighters, thus making Escape Artist very useful. Gnomes also benefit from increased Arcane resistance, which is always useful. Because of their small size, gnome warriors are useful in PvP environments, posing a difficulty to target. Inexperienced or careless opponents can be quickly hit by Hamstring, Thunder Clap, and Sunder Armor before they have any idea as to what happened.
GnomeWarriorTCG

Gnome Warrior

  • Night elves: Quickness adds an extra layer of survivability to night elf warriors. The enhanced nature resistance is always nice. Shadowmeld provides an interesting element to night elves, who can stealth to avoid mob detection (more useful for solo play). In addition, in PvP settings, Shadowmeld can be devastating. Stealth, Charge, Hamstring, Thunder Clap, etc., and Ta-da! You just became a rogue in heavy armor!
  • Orcs: Axe Specialization increases skill by 5 when wielding an axe or fist weapon. Hardiness reduces stun duration, which can save a warrior in PvP settings, or save their group in PvE settings. Blood Fury increases attack power, (depending on class) and scales with the players level. The formula for scaling attack power is [(level*4)+2]. This grants 242 AP at level 80.
  • Trolls: Berserking increases attack speed by 20% for 10 seconds, useful for all warriors, particularly Fury warriors, but can also provide a marginal TPS buff to Protection warriors. Health regeneration in combat can help keep you alive during PvP fights, or boss battles, and the increased healing can reduced down time for soloing players. The increased damage against beasts can be useful, since beasts are located almost everywhere in the world. Da Voodoo Shuffle reduces the duration of movement impairing effects by 15% as well, and the less time you spend walking to something then the more time you spend hitting it.
  • Undead: The increased shadow resistance is always useful, as is Cannibalize, which can rapidly increase your health, and save your healer's mana. The increased Underwater Breathing is also useful, especially when soloing, where a warrior might not have access to an alchemist or warlock. Will of the Forsaken is one of the best racials in game, and can be the difference between life and death in both PvP and PvE settings.
  • Tauren: War Stomp is very important to interupting a caster, especially at low levels, when warriors have no stuns or silences . Endurance provides tauren with extra health, meaning tauren warriors can have the highest possible HP of any warrior. The additional nature resistance is always a plus.

Rage[]

Main article: Rage

By default, a Warrior's rage bar is empty. Warriors can gain rage by being struck in combat, dealing damage, drinking rage potions, or using certain abilities. Most of their abilities require a certain amount of rage in order to be activated. When a Warrior exits combat, any left-over rage slowly decays until the bar returns to empty. A Warrior's rage bar will drop to 0 immediately if they switch their stance. At level 58, the passive ability Stance Mastery allows them to retain 25 rage through a stance change, and the Tactical Mastery talent increases this by 25 rage per rank up to a maximum of 75 rage.

Warriors need to be in combat or use a rage-generating ability to generate rage. The longer the battle, the more rage a warrior can accumulate. A Warrior with a full rage bar can quickly unload a large amount of damage.

Stances[]

Main article: Stance
ArtTaurenWarrior

A tauren warrior in art.

The warrior has different stances for different situations. Which stance to use will also be determined by the warrior's talents.

  • [Battle Stance]: The standard starting stance for all warriors. A balanced combat stance. Increases damage done by 5%. Decreases damage taken by 5%. Primary stance for Arms warriors.
  • [Defensive Stance]: A defensive combat stance. Decreases damage taken by 10% and damage is decresed by 10%. Increases Threat generated by 200%. Primary stance for Protection warriors.
  • [Berserker Stance]: An aggressive combat stance. Increases damage done by 10%. Primary stance for Fury warriors.

Some warrior abilities are not available based on which stance you are in, so choose wisely!

Abilities[]

Main article: Warrior abilities

The warrior has various abilities, which are typically limited to certain stances.

  • In Defensive Stance, the warrior can use abilities such as [Revenge] or [Taunt] to hold aggro, and [Shield Block] or [Spell Reflect] to reduce damage.
  • In Battle Stance, the warrior can use a balanced array of abilities. Abilities such as [Overpower] and [Deadly Calm] are useful for dealing damage.
  • In Berserker Stance, the warrior is focused on maximizing damage potential with abilities such as [Recklessness] or [Whirlwind].

How stats affect the warrior[]

Normal stats[]

Stat Effect
Strength Increases the warrior's Attack Power, thereby increasing the warrior's damage.

1 Strength = 2 Attack Power

Stamina Increases health points. This is critical for warriors due to their melee range restriction and inability to significantly heal themselves while dealing damage, as well as to absorb the large amounts of damage mobs will try and cause against a party while tanking. In addition, warrior self-healing abilities such as [Enraged Regeneration] become more effective as you gain more stamina.

1 stamina = 14 health

Mitigation and avoidance stats[]

Stat Effect
Armor Armor reduces the amount of damage received from physical attacks. Armor has no effect against magical or bleed attacks.
Dodge The warrior moves out of the way of the enemy's attack, and takes no damage from it. It is extremely useful to have a trinket which increases dodge rating for a short time to help healers keep up with healing. (If you're not getting hit, you don't need heals.) A warrior can only dodge frontal attacks. Attacks from behind cannot be dodged.
Parry The warrior parries the enemy's attack and takes no damage from it. Parrying attacks increases the warrior's melee haste rating, causing him to hit faster than normal. A warrior can only parry frontal attacks. Attacks from behind cannot be parried.
Block Rating The warrior raises his shield and blocks the enemy's attack. Block rating increases a warrior's % chance to block. Unlike dodge and parry, blocking an attack only reduces the amount of damage done to the warrior by 30%, or 60% on a [Critical Block] which comes from mastery. A warrior can only block frontal attacks. Attacks from behind cannot be blocked.

DPS/ Threat boosters[]

Stat Effect
Hit Increases the chance for the warrior to hit his enemy. Attacking raid bosses requires 9% (6% if your weapon skill is 305) chance to hit for you to never miss with special abilities, and 28% (25% chance if your weapon skill is 305) to hit for an auto-attack.
Critical Strike Increases the chance for the warrior to critically strike his enemy, dealing double damage. It is advised to be hit capped before attempting to add additional critical strike, as reduced hit chance results in reduced critical strike chance.

Talents[]

Warrior talents are split into three trees: arms, fury, and protection. Blizzard's talent calculator can be found here.[1]

Arms[]

  • Specialties: Strong bleeding skills, high burst damage with a two handed weapon. Can keep up [Colossus Smash] consistently thanks to [Sudden Death]. Can reduce healing on enemies with [Mortal Strike].
  • Strengths: High rage gain ([Anger Management]) and rage efficiency skills ([Overpower]). Access to [Tactical Mastery].
  • Weaknesses: Rotation can be easily disturbed in movement fights as rend and other debuffs fall off a boss and have to be re-applied.

The arms tree consists of abilities which focus on slow two-handed burst coupled with heavy bleeding damage to better effect. The arms talent tree is capped by the [Bladestorm] ability, which when activated, whirlwinds every second for 6 seconds and causes the warrior to become unstoppable, unless killed, for the duration. Due to almost every arms skill being based on weapon damage, such as [Rend], [Overpower], [Deep Wounds] and [Mortal Strike], slow two-handed weapons are favored by almost every arms warrior to maximize effect. Bleeding skills are enhanced as well with the talent [Blood Frenzy] and [Taste for Blood] allows Rend to open up opportunities to use Overpower regardless of whether the the target dodged your attacks.

Fury[]

  • Specialties: Powerful sustained damage and can regenerate with [Bloodthirst] and [Blood Craze]. Can passively reduce healing on enemies with [Furious Attacks]. Able to wield two 2 handed-weapons with [Titan's Grip]. Unlike the other specs, fury also allows dual-wielding in [Single-Minded Fury]
  • Strengths: Powerful sustained damage with dual wielding and capable of high burst damage with [Bloodsurge] and Bloodthirst.
  • Weaknesses: More fragile than the other specs, taking in more damage with [Death Wish] and relying on two weapons to perform at best, forsaking the use of a shield save for highly situational times.

The fury tree bolsters the use of dual wielding (but does not limit the warrior in any way), to dish out the highest damage that the warrior is capable of. Critical strikes allow the fury warrior to [Flurry], while the attacks they use most have a chance of proccing Bloodsurge, throwing in high [Slam] burst damage with their already high sustained damage. While the cost to uphold this kind of damage taxes on rage heavily, dual wielding solves the problem. With the final talent, Titan's Grip, the warrior is able to dual wield two 2-hand weapons, greatly increasing rage gain in bursts, allowing the warrior the needed rage.

Protection[]

  • Specialties: Access to two stuns [Concussion Blow] and [Revenge] if talented properly. The tank spec proficient at both AoE tanking [Thunder Clap] and singular tanking, can maneuver the battlefield quickly.
  • Strengths: All-new powerful damage that was unheard of before Patch 3.0.0, making the shield not just a defensive tool, but a powerful offensive one as well. Able to take very high amounts of damage and dishing high amounts back.
  • Weaknesses: Technically rage-starved if not being hit, though speccing deep in protection allows you to make your hits crit more often, still allowing you to burst damage without rage ([Sword and Board]). No healing debuff. Damage output very limited when not the focus of enemy attacks, due to key abilities dependent fully or partially on blocking (i.e. [Revenge], Sword and Board.)

Tanking has been redefined by Blizzard, and so the protection tree likely got the biggest change (for the better) in comparison to the other trees.

The protection tree features the traditional one-handed weapon + shield combination with talents to improve its use. It is likely that one would think the overall damage is lower due to not using a "powerful two-hander" or "dual-wielding two weapons". But when facing a protection warrior, they need to consider the shield as well. With it protection warriors could absolutely crush anyone foolish enough to attack him/her in melee, and use it to harass and silence casters. And with that new offense comes higher aggro buildup, making them threat machines.


Videos[]

See also[]

Dwarfwar

Dwarven warrior

Notes[]

  • In the Warcraft RPG, warrior and fighter were separate classes. Warrior was an NPC class, while fighter was a core class.[2] In the World of Warcraft RPG, the old warrior class was replaced with the soldier class, while fighter was replaced with a new warrior class for gameplay purposes. [3]
  • Warriors have the most widely available choices in permanent Legendary weapons, as most are designed (through use or through lore) as melee weapons, which is the warrior's forte. The only one that was never available to warriors was Atiesh, Greatstaff of the Guardian (only magi, warlocks, druids, and priests could obtain it).

References[]

  1. World of Warcraft: The Roleplaying Game, 54, 88
  2. Warcraft: The Roleplaying Game, 54
  3. World of Warcraft RPG Conversion Document, 1

External links[]

Check out the warrior guide leveling 1-60.

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