Warrior Leveling Guide (Level 1-30) - Talents, Rotations, Races & More

This guide shows you the recommended talents for your journey to level 30 in the WoW: Forever Beta.

Protection is built around wearing a shield, with Revenge and Shield Slam forming the core of the class fantasy. WoW: Forever makes this specialization much stronger than before because it has much improved Rage generation with Shield Specialization and Master of Defense. On top of this, Revenge and Shield Slam hit much harder than before. Thunder Clap is also now usable in Defensive Stance, which is huge as Improved Thunder Clap also got moved to the Protection tree.

This build handles open world questing well, with minimum downtime due to all the extra armor and avoidance from your Shield. It also allows you to tank dungeons at maximum capacity, which makes for a smooth leveling experience.

One of the main reasons to go with Protection over Fury or Arms leveling now is that the damage is competitive from 16+ with the Revenge buffs and rage generation on Protection is much better than on the other 2 specializations. Also, you are way more durable, which combined with Victory Rush, means basically no downtime.

1-15

1. Use Charge to engage your target.
2. Keep Battle Shout up at all times.
3. Use Bloodrage on cooldown unless you need to save it to prevent the loss of Rage for 10 seconds.
4. Apply Demoralizing Shout when killing hard enemies.
5. 1. If the fight won't last very long, it's better to use the Rage to deal more damage.
   2. If you are fighting more than one enemy, always cast Demoralizing Shout.
5. Apply Thunder Clap when killing hard enemies.
6. 1. If the fight won't last very long, it's better to use the Rage to deal more damage.
   2. If you are fighting more than one enemy, always cast Thunder Clap.
6. Apply Rend on all targets.
7. Cast Overpower whenever it procs.
8. Apply Sunder Armor until your target reaches ~50% HP.
9. If you have a lot of excess Rage, you can Heroic Strike, but avoid using it often.

16+

1. Swap to Battle Stance and Charge to engage your target unless you are already very close.
2. 1. Once you have Vanguard you will be able to always stay in Defensive Stance.
2. Keep Battle Shout up at all times.
3. Always use your Victory Rush before the enemy dies or your buff expires.
4. 1. Avoid using it if you're already at over 90% HP.
4. Use Bloodrage on cooldown unless you need to save it to prevent the loss of rage for 10 seconds.
5. Use Shield Block whenever it's up.
6. 1. Try to time it right before enemies are about to hit you.
6. Cast Revenge whenever it procs.
7. Cast Thunder Clap when killing hard enemies or if you have an excess of rage.
8. 1. Always cast it on cooldown when fighting multiple enemies.
8. Apply Demoralizing Shout when killing hard enemies.
9. 1. If you will kill an enemy fast, it's better to use the rage to deal more damage.
   2. If you are fighting more than one enemy, always cast Demoralizing Shout.
9. Cast Sunder Armor until the enemy is at ~50% HP.
10. 1. Keep casting it until 5 stacks against elites and bosses.
    2. You can also keep casting if you have a lot of excess rage.
10. Use Heroic Strike when you have a lot of excess rage and the enemy is under 50% HP.
11. 1. Prioritize Sunder Armor because you have Improved Sunder Armor.
11. Use Shield Bash to interrupt spells.
12. Use Last Stand as a panic button to avoid dying.

The key to leveling fast and efficiently is to manage your rage to hop from fight to fight. A Warrior is significantly stronger at 50 Rage than 0. You never want to be at 0 Rage

Warrior is generally poor at multi-target fights and should try to avoid them until you are Protection with good gear. Protection allows you to handle them better by being able to cast a cheaper Thunder Clap and being tankier. When pulling multiple mobs, you should aim to hit one or two at a time, while you Hamstring kite the others to avoid taking damage from them.

Take First Aid for bandages and always prioritize leveling it up. Victory Rush being baseline helps a lot with sustain, but it only triggers after a kill, so extra healing is still valuable. This is key to heal up before your rage starts dropping off.

Train your weapon skill on lower-level mobs whenever you pick up a new weapon type you're not yet proficient with. Weapon skill directly correlates to your chance to hit a target, and if you’re not hitting, you’re not dealing damage.

Stats to Prioritize

1. Strength grants you 2 attack power, which increases the damage most of your spells do.
2. Attack Power
3. Spirit massively improves your health regeneration, which allows you to have much higher damage uptime. Generally, this would be your first priority, but Protection is much tankier, so you don't need to prioritize it as hard.
4. Agility grants you crit chance.
5. Stamina will mainly benefit you when tanking dungeons.

Gear Tips

Upgrading your weapon whenever possible is the key to staying ahead of the curve as a Warrior.

Faster weapons are better when playing Protection, as Revenge and Shield Slam don't scale with your weapon damage.

Take Blacksmithing as a profession and always use Sharpening Stones, as they are free damage. Faster weapons benefit more, as they have a lower base weapon damage with the same dps.

Every race brings something useful to the Warrior, and with WoW: Forever's racial changes there's no real wrong pick. If we had to recommend one for each faction it would be Night Elf/Gnome for Alliance and Orc/Undead for Horde.

Alliance

Human, Dwarf, Night Elf, Gnome & Skyborne

Standout Options

Humans get Will to Survive, allow you to breaking out of a stun every 3 minutes, which is a very powerful tool in PvP. Sword Specialization now grants 2% crit chance when wielding a sword which is still very strong, making it one of the best PvE racials as long as you are wielding a sword.

Gnomes are the best for PvP thanks to Escape Artist. If you choose to take Engineering, which is a solid option for Warrior and almost mandatory for PvP, your gadgets will have a 20% lower chance to miss with Engineering Specialization. Eureka! temporarily increases your ability damage and lowers your Rage costs, great for busting players down.

Night Elf is a one of the strongest options in PvE thanks to its very powerful Elune's Light cooldown.Quickness allows you to stay on top of targets in PvP and also level faster as most of your time is spent travelling. The Dodge Chance it provides synergizes with Master of Defense, but it's not something I would focus on.

Horde

Orc, Tauren, Troll, Undead & Skyborne

Standout Options

Orc is the overall best option for PvE + PvP it has great damage passives such as Blood Fury and Axe Specialization. It also has great defensive passives in Shatter Curse and Hardiness.

Undead has utility in PvP with Will of the Forsaken, but it overlaps with Berserker Rage. Touch of the Grave is insane for Fury Warriors and also great for leveling on Fury or Protection.

Troll is a bit lackluster, but Berserking is a very good offensive cooldown and Regeneration is amazing for leveling.

While tanking, your highest threat skills are:

1. Revenge
2. Sunder Armor
3. Heroic Strike / Cleave
4. Rend
5. Thunder Clap
6. 1. Goes up in priority on multiple targets.

On a tricky or hard pull, you want to pull with your ranged weapon or carefully walk in. If you stand behind a wall after pulling a caster, you can LoS him and get him to come into melee.

When trying to do a dungeon fast, you can just engage with Charge and keep walking forward as fight.

Use Shield Block on Cooldown to enable Revenge and try to tab target all enemies to establish threat. You should use Taunt to get back aggro on enemies.

Keep Demoralizing Shout and Thunder Clap always up on difficult pulls. Sadly, Demoralizing Shout is bugged and does not generate any threat currently, meaning you can't really open with it, or you will instantly lose aggro.

Make sure to Sunder Armor bosses to 5.

Charge and attack macro. Opens the fight and immediately starts your melee swings once you're in range. Start attack macros are valuable for all of your melee abilities, particularly ones you engage with.

#showtooltip
/cast Charge
/startattack

Equip Sword and Shield when swapping to Defensive Stance. You’ll often want your sword and board out when swapping to this stance, so this makes it easier.

/equipslot 17 [shield name]
/equipslot 16 [weapon name]
/cast Defensive Stance

Cast Taunt at a target your mouse is hovering over. Handy for quick taunts if you see an enemy running at an ally.

#showtooltip
/startattack [harm,nodead]
/cast Defensive Stance
/cast [@mouseover,harm,nodead]] Taunt

Cast Mocking Blow at a target your mouse is hovering over. Should be used as a last-resort while tanking dungeons.

#showtooltip
/startattack [harm,nodead]
/cast Battle Stance
/cast [@mouseover,harm,nodead]] Mocking Blow

Battle Shout no-clip macro. Only casts Battle Shout if you don't already have the buff, so you're not wasting Rage refreshing it early.

#showtooltip
/cast [nobuff:Battle Shout] Battle Shout

Berserker Stance and Whirlwind. Drops you into Berserker Stance and fires off Whirlwind in one press when you're surrounded. You will not use this when playing Protection.

#showtooltip
/cast Berserker Stance
/cast Whirlwind