Legion Warrior Class Changes

By Wowhead Updated: 2016/08/12

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Stances have been removed for all Warriors - Gladiator, Berserker, and Defensive.

Bladestorm is no longer a talent for all specs; it is instead baseline for Arms and a talent for Fury.

Recklessness has been replaced with Battle Cry for all specs.

With the removal of raid-wide buffs, shouts have been changed. They are now on a cooldown and provide a short buff for party or raid members.

Arms:
Spell Reflection has been moved to be a PvP only talent.

is now just a talent.

has been moved to be a PvP only talent.

Battle Shout has been removed.

Rallying Cry is the new version of Rallying Cry, which was removed.

Recklessness has been reworked and renamed into Recklessness. 1 minute cooldown, 100% critical strike rating for 5 seconds.

Rend is no longer baseline, but now a talent.

Shield Barrier has been removed.

Thunderclap has been removed.

is no longer baseline, but now a talent.

Slam is now baseline, but it no longer stacks.

Cleave has been reintroduced into the game!

Die by the Sword cooldown increased from 2 minutes to 3 minutes.

We have a new passive called Tactician. Your abilities have a chance to reset the cooldown of Colossus Smash and Mortal Strike.

Haste is now important to us!

Wild Strike has been reworked and renamed Furious Slash.

Rampage has been added.

Defensive Stance has been removed.

Enraged Regeneration has been reworked. Now reduces damage taken by 30% and bloodthirst healing restores an additional 20% health for the duration.

Improved Whirlwind has been reworked. Instead of raging blow cleaving, whirlwind now allows for the next cast of Bloodthirst or Rampage to hit 4 targets instead of one.

Draenor Perks have been removed.

Spell Reflection has changed to be a PvP only talent.

Intervene has been removed.

Berserker Rage has been reworked. Cooldown increased from 30 to 60 seconds. No longer activates enrage, but still grants fear and sap immunity.

Shield Barrier has been removed.

Siegebreaker has been removed.

Rallying Cry is the new version of Rallying Cry, which was removed.

Recklessness has been reworked and renamed into Recklessness. 1 minute cooldown, 100% critical strike rating for 5 seconds.

Victory Rush has been removed.

Vigilance has been removed.

Die by the Sword has been removed.

Rage has been redesigned! Shield Slam and Revenge still generate Rage, but Crits no longer do. Warriors now generate Rage from taking damage. The amount of Rage is based upon % of health taken in damage, but it is tuned to not make Rage generation poor once well-geared.

Shield Slam's cooldown has been increased to 9 seconds.

Shield Block's cooldown has been increased to 13 seconds.

Both of these cooldowns now scale with Haste!

Shield Slam deals 30% increased damage while Shield Block is active, baseline.

Revenge is now an AoE skill that does not require a target selected, and cleaves every melee range target in front of the casting Warrior. Also, it can only reset its cooldown via Dodge and Parry once every 3 seconds, making it no longer able to be spammed.

Protection Warriors now have Battle Cry, a potent offensive cooldown.

Shield Barrier has been replaced with Ignore Pain. Ignore Pain only absorbs 90% of damage taken, lasts 15 seconds, and multiple casts will stack the value rather than simply overwriting the buff.

Charge and Intervene have been replaced with a single skill: Intercept, which has two charges and functions like both, depending on whether the target is friendly or hostile.

Heroic Strike has been replaced with Focused Rage, an off-GCD Rage dump that increases the damage of the next Shield Slam.

Berserker Rage has had its cooldown increased from 30 seconds to 60 seconds.

Shield Wall has had its cooldown increased from 2 minutes to 4 minutes.

Demoralizing Shout has had its cooldown increased from 1 minute to 1.5 minutes.

Victory Rush's self-healing has been doubled in Legion, but the talent Impending Victory remains the same.

Execute has been removed.

Hamstring has been removed. Thunder Clap still slows.

Intimidating Shout has been removed. Warriors are scary enough.

Mocking Banner has been removed.

Battle Stance and Defensive Stance have been removed.

Battle Shout and Commanding Shout have been removed.

Blood Craze has been removed, because Multistrike is no longer a stat.

Improved Heroic Leap and Improved Heroic Throw have been baked into the baseline skills.

Improved Defensive Stance and Improved Block have been removed.

Gladiator Stance has been removed, and Protection as a DPS spec is a thing of the past.

Visual UpdatesLegion Spell Animations PlaylistTalentsLegion Talent CalculatorLegionLegionLegion

Juggernaut

Enraged Regeneration - now Fury Specialization

Taste for Blood

Impending Victory

Slam - Arms Baseline Only

Storm Bolt - Fury and Arms Only

Dragon Roar - Fury and Protection Only

Bladestorm - Fury and Arms Only

Anger Management - Arms Only

Ravager - Protection and Arms Only

Sudden Death

Mass Spell Reflection - Protection PvP Talent Only

Safeguard

Bloodbath

Furious Strikes

Warbringer - Protection Talent Only

Unquenched Thirst

Gladiator’s Resolve

Unyielding Strikes

PvP TalentsPvP Honor Calculator

Rebound - Protection PvP Talent

Sword and Board - Added into Devastate

AbilitiesNew

Ignore Pain: Fight through the pain, ignoring 90% of the next up to damage you take from any sources, based on Rage spent.

: Focus your rage on your next Shield Slam, increasing its damage by 50%, stacking up to 3 times. Unaffected by the global cooldown.

Intercept: Run at high speed toward an ally or enemy. When targeting an enemy, Intercept will root for 1.5 sec, but has a minimum range of 8 yds. When targeting an ally, Intercept will intercept the next melee or ranged attack against the ally within 10 sec while the target remains within 10 yards. Generates 20 Rage.

Former Core Abilities

Vanguard

Spell Reflection

Taunt

Victory Rush

Changed

Bastion of Defense

Demoralizing Shout

Thunder Clap

Shield Wall

Removed

Battle Stance

Shield Charge

New

Rampage: Enrages you and unleashes a series of 5 brutal strikes over 2 sec for a total of (50% + 150% + 100% + 300% + 175%) Physical damage.

Furious Slash: Aggressively strike with your off-hand weapon for 280% Physical damage. Increases your Bloodthirst critical strike chance by 15% until it next deals a critical strike, stacking up to 6 times.

Changed

Enrage

Enraged Regeneration

Bloodthirst

Rallying Cry

Execute

Mastery: Unshackled Fury

Raging Blow

Recklessness

Removed

Die by the Sword - now Talent

Rallying Cry - Renamed to Commanding Shout

Wild Strike

Meat Cleaver

Defensive Stance - Arms/Protection Spec Only

Battle Stance - Arms Spec Only

Victory Rush - Arms/Protection Only

New

Cleave: Strikes all enemies in front of you with a sweeping attack for 90% Physical damage. For each target up to 5 hit, your next Whirlwind deals 20% more damage.

Tactician: You have a 0.65% chance per Rage spent to reset the remaining cooldown on Colossus Smash and Mortal Strike.

Slam: Now ability, no longer Talent. Slams an opponent, causing 170% Physical damage.

Former Core Abilities

Victory Rush

Changed

Rend - now Talent

Colossus Smash

Rallying Cry

Execute

- now Talent

Die by the Sword - now Talent

Recklessness

Removed

Thunder Clap - no longer Arms

Changed

Heroic Leap

Removed

Battle Shout - now gone

Battle Stance - now gone

Berserker Rage - now Arms and Fury

Commanding Shout - Arms and Fury

Vanguard - now Protection

Hamstring - now Arms

Shattering Throw - now gone

Shield Barrier - now gone

Shield Charge - now gone

Spell Reflection - now Protection

Taunt - now Protection

Victory Rush - Arms

Artifact Weapons and Traits

Arms Strom'kar Calculator | Fury Warswords Calculator | Protection Scale of the Earth-Warder Calculator

comprehensive Artifact Weapon guide

All artifacts by spec: any hidden abilities like Gaze of the Val'kyr, and flavor effects like Xal'atath, Blade of the Black Empire whispering you.

Traits: their perks, costs, how to acquire traits, and max level bonus traits.

Relics: how they increase ilvl, how they modify traits, and how to acquire them.

Acquiring artifacts: your first one and later ones for offspecs.

Artifact Knowledge: how this increases the rate at which you acquire Artifact Power, how to increase your AK level, how much extra AK you get at each rank.

Artifact Appearances: Every appearance organized by spec, how to get them, and modelviewer and video links.

Artifact Lore, Wowhead's Art Interview on Artifacts, and FAQ.

Tier SetsLegion Armor GuideCosmetic AbilitiesFantasy and Gameplay BlogLegion Class Preview Series: WarriorLike their counterparts, protection warriors are virtually bred for physical dominance, having been raised in the art of close-quarters combat—but their measured approach to battle is what distinguishes them from their comrades-in-arms. They demonstrate an uncanny knack for blade and shield, nullifying an opponent’s advances and creating opportunities for counterattacks. For the protection warrior, being the toughest soldier on the front means nothing if allies are left vulnerable to the enemy’s attack. Stalwart defenders are integral to the success of any military campaign—the protection warrior seeks to be an unbreakable wall.GameplayAcross culture and kingdom, men and women who demonstrate great physical aptitude are transformed into mighty warriors through tests of strength, endurance, and fighting capability. Their friendships are forged not in the classroom, tavern, or workshop, but in the dueling pits and on the arena floor. As a childhood of sparring defines a warrior’s destiny, so too does one’s choice of weapon determine their role on the battlefield. Arms warriors gravitate toward two-handed weapons instinctively. It’s more than a matter of preference—it speaks to the character of the wielder. Arms warriors are patient in a fight, waiting to capitalize on moments when an opponent is left exposed. Two-handed weapons allow them to deliver devastating, overpowering blows, fully exploiting their enemies’ weaknesses.GameplayOn the battlefield and in the arena, the most feared combatants are often the furious berserkers who lust for battle and thirst for blood. Through a lifetime of training and sparring, these merciless warriors have become masters of carnage—often wielding a weapon in each hand to maximize the destruction. Even without the protection of a shield, the fury warrior leaves little opportunity for an opponent to strike without suffering grievous wounds in return—delivered in a whirlwind of blades that dooms anyone its wake. Brute force becomes a breathtaking display when fury warriors relentlessly dive into the fray.
GameplayBlue Tweetsactive on TwitterBlue Tweet TrackerFuryProtectionArmsGeneralBlue Posts

Blizzard

Fistweaving (and Gladiator Stance) will not be joining us in Legion.

We love the fantasy that each of those “subspecs” promise, but leaving them as subspecs has proven to be problematic, making us unable to properly deliver on their fantasy. Trying to support two different playstyles within one spec restricts how much we can focus and bring out the strengths of either of them. We still love both of their concepts, however, and will look for opportunities to bring them back in the future.

Celestalon

In the latest Legion Alpha build, tanks and healers will notice significant changes to the tuning on many of their defensive abilities. These may appear to be “nerfs” at first glance, but are actually part of a widespread adjustment to improve overall tank (and tank healer) gameplay, that includes reducing the strength/frequency of defensive cooldowns, and adjusting creature tuning to compensate.

Over the course of Warlords of Draenor, tanks have been mostly self-sufficient, providing the vast majority of their own survival, with only minor direct assistance required from healers. Encounter design has unfortunately reinforced this, focusing tank damage into more and more bursty moments in an attempt to challenge tanks. This has made long-cooldown defensive ability usage more and more important, while also further trivializing direct healing requirements.

For Legion, we want to return the overall tank gameplay to a more stable environment. In that, we have laid out some specific goals that we aim to hit:

Tanks will require more direct healing. This will also improve on healer gameplay, as it’s more engaging when there’s a mixture of the types of healing that need to be used on any single encounter.
Active Mitigation abilities for tanks (such as Shield Block or Death Strike) should feel rewarding, allowing an experienced tank to meaningfully reduce damage taken.
Healers should care about the time and mana required to heal tanks, so that taking less damage as a tank is considered valuable.
Tanks and healers’ long-cooldown defensive abilities (such as Barkskin or Shield Wall) should feel like a valuable resource. These abilities should be strong, but not necessarily available for every danger during a specific encounter.
Tanks should have much more survivability than a non-tank. However, they don’t necessarily need to be extremely more sturdy. If the difference in ‘tankiness’ between tanks and non-tanks becomes too much of a gap, we then risk having situations such that if any one add gets loose, it’s likely to instantly kill any poor healer or damage dealer they hit–as the damage that these creatures deal would need to be exponentially higher to offset the sturdiness of the tank. This also brings a risk that tanks would opt to ignore enemy abilities that are designed to be dangerous to non-tanks, just taking those relatively minor blows rather than trying to avoid them as intended.
In raid encounters, tanks should spend more time tanking, and less time waiting for their turn to tank.
Tanks should be able to handle solo content quite effectively. They need to do less damage than dedicated damage dealers, but that difference can be moderate. It doesn’t have to be a massive difference.

Looking at these goals, we’ve made the following changes for tanking in Legion. We hope that these explanations will help you understand the bigger picture, in that these should be viewed as an overall improvement to the style of tank gameplay, rather than nerfs.

In order to ensure that tanks require direct healing from healers, we’re increasing the amount of damage that makes it past a tank’s mitigation. This will include reducing or removing passive defensive abilities, along with the below changes.
We’re toning down how frequently you’re able to use Active Mitigation abilities. This change will generally affect the length of their cooldowns, and not necessarily the strength of the ability. We believe these abilities are important to tank survival; but, when the uptime on these abilities gets too high, skill in knowing when to use them strategically matters less.
EDIT: Passive healing from healers (such as Beacon of Light) will be toned down, and other tank heals adjusted to compensate.
There are many long-cooldown defensive abilities that will be able to be used less frequently, and, in some cases, these abilities may be weaker. Many of these abilities are currently either too numerous or usable too frequently, resulting in a strong cooldown for almost every threatening moment of every encounter.
Encounter design will be adjusted to account for these changes. Overwhelming burst damage will be toned down, in favor of more steady and consistent damage on tanks.
The damage of creatures that are intended to be tanked in group content will be reduced overall, in order to ensure that tanks can still perform their role just as well as before.
Damage output by tanks will be increased, and their scaling with gear will be improved. This is being done so that tanks can stay in-line with damage dealers as a group gears up together.

Please note that many of these changes are preliminary, and we’ll be tweaking our changes based on testing and feedback. We’ll continue making adjustments as the Alpha moves along, until classes are in a more balanced state, and we look forward to hearing your thoughts throughout this process.

For more info on the latest Legion Alpha changes, see our summary thread: http://us.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/20420212939

A lot of great discussion here, and we share a lot of the concerns (even the cynical ones), and will be doing our best to actually meet the stated goals.

Tanks will indeed have much more health than DPS; apologies if that was unclear. It's just that their total effective health can safely be in the 5-15x of a DPS range, doesn't need to be 50x. 50x is kinda silly. Raid bosses will still 1-shot DPS, and that's fine.

Healers are being adjusted with tank healing in mind.

The comments about tanks spending less time waiting for their turn to tank isn't an indication that they'll be expected to run around more, just that they'll have more engaging encounter gameplay.

We especially look forward to more feedback based on playtesting; thanks for what you've given so far! This is going to be an iterative process, and we'll keep adjusting based on it. It surely isn't perfect yet, but we'll keep reading, responding, and tweaking!

Are encounters going to be tuned to have longer time-to-kill for tanks as well?

I ask because in a world where tanks need to be actively healed, dying so quickly that they must be spammed all of the time (read: less than 3 or 4 seconds for 100-0) just leads to a WotLK situation where one person gets to spam the tank forever and everyone else ignores it and nothing is really any different.

I'd like to note that "use Active Mitigation to avoid X ability" isn't usually engaging gameplay. How about I use AM because it helps me survive a powerful attack, not because I get a debuff if I don't.

In regards to tank healing, I am very much a fan of "Many hits to be killed, many heals to be healed." This adds variety and allows the engaging task of healing prioritization (i.e. what makes healing fun).

Most of the posts on here have pretty much already spelled out the problem which is scaling. Once you start scaling these heals more than you scale the HP pools, you run into near instant top offs. Then this begins the slippery slope of competitive (raids) top offs, and the trivialization of mechanics. Then the mechanics become more bursty to make healing more engaging and the cycles repeat.

More attention needs to be paid to ensuring that the gear scaling doesn't lead to instant topping off, so that encounter design no longer needs to keep ratcheting damage to extremely bursty levels. Exponential gear curves work great for DPS, but terrible for healing and tanking. We are of a symbiotic relationship in this regard.

I echo the sentiments of other tanks in this thread regarding the removal of active mitigation abilities. Being responsible for accurately recognizing and appropriately responding to potential threats is fun, is engaging, and does not need to be changed. Requiring active responses to incoming damage increases the skill cap, and is one of the things that allows good tanks to outshine other more mediocre players.

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Tags: PvE