Introduction
What to say about the warrior class? First off it must be mentioned how warriors since the dawn of the first MMO’s have been included. Maybe not under the same name, but noted that the “tank” type class is a must for any good MMO, and in World of Warcraft it is no exception. When I first started playing World of Warcraft I started as a human warrior. As time went on I realized I really liked the class, but I ended up dieing a lot. Warriors are not the most newbie friendly class as they have no self heal type attacks, and are very equipment dependent.
It takes skill to play the warrior class the right way. Using each stance to its strength and knowing when to switch is key to any strong warrior player. With this class it becomes obviously apparent that using a warrior leveling guide will help you in the long run. Most leveling guides do quests that are at or below the current characters level, this is extremely important when leveling your warrior. As with most warriors you will find that its really hard to take on monsters that are red or orange to you because of warriors not being able to heal.
Of course as daunting as this all may sound, don’t stop playing your warrior just yet. Being one of the most sought after classes for endgame raiding as well as PVP it is a good idea to level your warrior to 80. Of course warriors are also a lot of fun once you hit 80 as well, as you pretty much have access to any raid because you can throw on your tank gear and do a job that most can’t/won’t do.
Profession Choices
Professions have changed a lot since the beginning of WoW. With that we have seen the increase in most leveling guides suggesting that you use gathering professions as they provide you with different benefits. Most of these benefists are stat related which will really be useful as you get to the higher levels.
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Mining – Gather ore from nodes, in turn allowing you to either smelt the ore into bars, or sell/keep the ore. (Mining now also gives a stamina bonus based on what level the gather skill is) 450 skill now grants you +60 to your base stamina. Herbalism – Gather plants from all around the land, either sell these on the auction house or pick up alchemy as well to create potions. You could also choose to do inscription and create glyphs as well as rare cards later on. (A good way to make some extra cash early on is using herbalism and selling the herbs. Herbalism now also gives you a heal over time type of spell, this is helpful for certain classes but as a Paladin you can already heal yourself fairly easily.) Skinning – Skin all of the beast mobs you kill collecting furs and skins. (The bonus with skinning at max level is increasing your critical strike rating by 40 points.) |
On my warrior since he is a tank as main spec and fury as offspec I chose to use mining as my gathering profession. The extra stamina from mining is really nice as a tank especially when you first start gearing your warrior up. Just remember that most likely it all comes down to personal opinion so choose the one you want, don’t choose a certain profession just because its supposed to be the “best”.
Now we get to the good stuff. Below you will find my three favorite warrior leveling guide specs. These specs are my recommendations on what talents to use while leveling your warrior. Now a days ,leveling as protection is actually a decent idea. I personally leveled from 70 to 80 as prot myself. Again it all comes down to personal preference, but below you will find what I think works the best.
Arms Warrior Leveling Guide
As an arms spec warrior you will be one of the hardest hitting melee classes in the game. As you level as arms you should focus on getting a lot of strength and big slow 2 handed weapons. The only downside to leveling as arms is that when you miss, because your weapon is so slow you have to wait awhile to attack again. Of course when you did connect and especially when you crit you will be killing mobs in no time. Arms is a good warrior leveling spec if you plan to PVP or DPS for engame content. Almost all PVP arena teams use an arms warrior because they are so strong.
Arms Warrior Leveling Spec and Talent Build 4.3
Here is a link to the WoW Armory Build
http://www.wowarmory.com/talent-calc.xml?cid=1&tal=3022302023330104002012213131251305000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000
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The last 10 points that you spend really comes down to the style of warrior you want to be. You can continue to grab some of the talents in the arms tree for a more PVP feel, or fill out your weapon mastery in case you use different weapons while leveling. Personally I found that the weapon mastery was the better off way to go as I found myself switching between axes and swords a lot while leveling due to new quests rewards and such. Again though this is strictly up to you and how you want your warrior leveling to go.
Final Notes on Arms Warrior Leveling
Remember that your weapon is slow, so the more hit you get the better. Now of course do not go after weapons that are purely hit as strength factors into a lot of the damage you do, but make sure you are not missing to often. A lot of leveling arms warriors find they don’t like risking their speed to chance and end up going fury as it is a lot faster attacking as well as not being worried about misses. Personally I have leveled a warrior as all 3 specs and found arms to be a fun and way to grind through the levels. Of course the bonus was the fact that I was on a PVP realm and was able to defend myself most of the time from ganks/attacks because of the arms warrior pure strength in wrecking other classes.
Fury Warrior Leveling Guide
One of my most favorite specs in the entire World of Warcraft universe is the fury spec. Since back when I first leveled a warrior I have always enjoyed this talent build while leveling as well as DPSing endgame. Fury warriors are a lot of fun, especially with the introduction of Wrath of the Lich King and titan’s grip, fury warriors became one of the best endgame dps classes. Check below for my current fury warrior leveling build for wotlk and patch 4.3.
Fury Warrior Leveling Spec and Talent Build
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Final Notes on Fury Warrior Leveling
In my opinion leveling as fury is your best bet till about level 60. At level 60 although fury is a good leveling spec, I find protection to be the better choice. Prot allows you to solo a lot of harder group quests as well as allowing you to take almost no down time. Plus the fact that as prot you will have enough crit and attack power for shield bash to do a lot of damage. Back onto fury leveling though. If you do plan to use a fury spec till 80 then I suggest that as soon as you can you find 2 really good 2 handers to use with titans grip. Once you get titan’s grip the game becomes cake, as you can mow through almost any mob with ease. It can not be denied how much fun fury is just because of titan’s grip.
Protection Warrior Leveling Guide
Back in the original WoW most warriors didn’t even use prot to tank. A lot of warriors were able to tank as fury easier then prot because of the extra damage and increase in threat. Of course as time went on Blizzard wizened up to this trend and made protection these spec for raiding as a warrior. Of course that doesn’t mean that prot is worthless as a leveling spec. In fact it is far from that especially in 4.3 and WoTLK. I leveled my warrior as prot from 70 to 80 and found it to be one of the fastest and easiest ways to level. Out of any class I have played, prot as my warrior made leveling a breeze.
Protection Warrior Leveling Spec and Talent Build
Here is the link to the WoW Armory Build
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Final Notes on Leveling as a Prot Warrior
There can be no denying that Blizzard buffed up Prot warriors .For a while protection was even a desired spec in many of the top arena teams. Being able to absorb a ton of damage as well as crit and crit hard with shield slams made warriors a top PVP class. Of course Warriors have always been that way but prot brought us to a whole new level. Now though with certain aspects of protection being nerfed, the question often is, is prot still worth leveling as? The answer of course is yes, I personally even plan to level as protection from 80 to 85 as I know that it makes the leveling process a lot easier then the other 2 specs. Some people will think leveling as prot is slow but that is their loss. Us prot warriors will end up with the last laugh.