[воин] Warrior (Forums / Talent Calculator)
The problem with Warbringer
The problem with the PvP side of Warbringer is that when you consider prot warrior versus mage (just as an example), there was nothing a mage could do to a well versed warrior. The warrior carries a lot of stuns, silences, and then any attempt to root him is broken by multiple abilities. So then the warrior's teammate (like a hunter) is just doing tons of damage while the target has no defenses.
For the other side of this change, we certainly don't design 5-player or raid content with the assumption that the tank has Warbringer (or a way out of snares and roots in general). We understand that it can be a big help in specific situations but we don't feel it's the only option in any PvE circumstances. (Source)
Patch 3.3.x nerfs for prot warriors
Let's look first at the Warbringer change.
Will it nerf them for PvP? Yes. Aside from stuns and Dismantle, rooting or snaring the Prot warrior is the major way to keep him off of you. Considering all of the stuns and silences that Prot has, when they can also jump out of every Frost Nova with Warbringer, then there's not much in the way of skill a mage can employ to stay alive. They just get countered in every way.
Will it nerf them for PvE? Yes, but really slightly. I'm not sure I can ever remember a case in my WoW-playing history where my warrior or some other tank caused a wipe because of a root, so even if it did happen, it can't happen that much or be that memorable. Warriors certainly won't get sat because of some new Achilles' heel and we don't design encounters around the assumption that tanks can't be rooted. The important part of Warbringer from a PvE perspective, removing the stance restrictions, is still intact.
Now the damage change. As Bornakk posted recently, what we essentially did was look at some of the successful Prot PvP characters and compare them to some of the Prot tanks out there. We nerfed the block conversion to Shield Slam damage so that it would hit the PvP guy without really hitting the PvE guy. (The PvP warriors aren't stacking a ton of Shield Block Value, but they do have a lot of Strength which also converts to block for purposes of making Shield Slam hit harder -- many of these guys are wearing PvE dps plate.)
Will it nerf them for PvP? Yes. We want Prot to be able to hit reasonably hard, but they also need to pay some price for their massive survivability. We thought the Warbringer change alone would nerf the warriors vs. e.g. mages but wouldn't control their damage. Those big Shield Slam crits should go down a lot.
Will it nerf them for PvE? Probably not, or at least not much. If you tank with a lot of Strength or SBV, you might see your Shield Slams go down, but that's why we buffed the threat of Shield Slam to compensate.
Again, keep the changes in perspective. We want Prot to be PvP viable. We don't want Prot warriors to dominate PvP or have everyone feel like they need one for their team. Likewise, we want Prot to do higher damage than the almost trivial damage that they did in BC. But that doesn't mean they need to be competitive with the dps while they're tanking. (Source)
