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Tanking Seals

The two main seals that you can use to generate threat while tanking are Seal of Righteousness (SoR) and Seal of Vengeance (SoV). Both cause holy damage, but cause it in a different way. Which one should you use though? It really depends on the situation. If you are tanking targets that die very quickly the SoR is a little bit better, however for anything that lasts long enough to get 5 or more attacks against you will want to use SoV. Therefore as a general rule you should keep SoV as your main seal.

Seal of Righteousness generates holy damage every time you hit with it, or when you judge it on a target. It causes damage based on its starting damage plus a percentage of your attack power and spell power. Seal of Vengeance works slightly differently as it places a DOT on the enemy that stacks up to 5 times. This DOT causes damage and therefore threat over time. You can also judge the seal to cause additional damage and threat based on the number of times it is stacked on the enemy. This means that at the start of a fight it generates very little threat, but ramps up over the first 5-10 seconds of the fight until it is generating full threat. Seal of vengeance gains a percentage of your attack power and spell power to cause holy damage.

What this means is that generally in short fight situations you will want to use Seal of Righteousness so that you are building full threat right from the start. It is normally used for all trash MOBs in normal instances, some heroic instances and even some of the easy to kill raid trash. However for anything that is going to stand up to your group for more than 10-20 seconds you want to switch to Seal of Vengeance as it will generate more threat over time.

Blessings

The choice of blessings when you are tanking really comes down to two things. Are you over geared for the instance or are you having mana issues? If neither is true then you will want to use Blessing of Kings (BoK) for the 10% boost to all stats. The 10% boost is across the board and grants you more health, mana, threat, and more. None of those should be ignored lightly.

However if you are over geared or having mana issues there are two simple solutions, either pull more creatures at once so that you take enough damage to get enough mana back from healing to keep going, or use the Blessing of Sanctuary (BoS). Blessing of Sanctuary lets you take less damage and provides mana back to you for your blocks, dodges and parries. This will keep you with a full mana bar through almost any situation.

If you have more than one Paladin in your group then you will want both BoK and BoS.

Threat Generation

As of Patch 3.0.2 Blizzard removed the Blessing of Salvation which was a threat reduction blessing. The blessing was up all the time on all DPS and healers in every raid, therefore Blizzard removed it and built the threat reduction that it provided into the game as extra threat for tank classes while in their tanking form (Defensive stance for warriors, Righteous Fury for Paladins). What this means is that while Righteous Fury (RF) is up you gain approximately 40% extra threat from all attacks. This is in addition to the 90% extra threat that RF causes from holy damage and is multiplied on top of it. Therefore when you attack with RF active and cause damage you generate about 140% threat from regular damage and about 270% threat from holy damage.

Attack Rotation for Threat

Ok, you now understand the basics about stats, items, talents, seals, blessings, and threat, but how do you actually tank something? Knowing that most of your threat generation comes from holy damage how do you cause as much as possible as quickly as possible. What is the best rotation to generate as much threat as possible on your target so that they stay attacking you? That is what is looked at here.

Before starting a pull you should make sure that you have all your buffs up and have Seal of Vengeance active. Setup in the proper place to pull the creatures to and prep a consecrate, then wait a split second and send your Avengers Shield (AS) at the target. While the creatures are on their way to you prep Holy Shield (HS) and get ready to attack.

Once they have reached you make sure that at least two enemies (and preferably three) are within 5 yards then attack with Hammer of the Righteous (HotR), then judge your SoV on your target. Wait for consecration to be off cooldown and start your rotation through Consecrate, HotR, HS again, using them as they become active. Because Consecration and HS are on 8 second cooldown's, HotR is on a 6 second cooldown, and Judgement is on a 10 second cooldown, the rotation changes as you go through it and they become active. Once you reach level 75 and gain access to Shield of the Righteousness you need to mix it into the rotation as well.

Comments or questions? Email me (Messiah@TenTonHammer.com) or post in our Paladin forums!

Note from the Author: While I try to cover off everything I have learned about tanking while playing my Paladin and main tanking for my guild in this guide, I would be remiss to not mention the excellent sites that have helped me learn to be a Paladin Tank. The two main forums I read on a constant basis to uncover all the best tricks, tips, tactics and math behind the game are Maintankadin and Tankspot. In game I use the addons Tankadin and RatingBuster and out of game I use WoWwebstats to figure out math, rotations, and mechanics. If you really want to be the best Paladin tank you can be, I strongly suggest referancing all the great material out there.