Choosing professions for your tankadin
Thanks to the new profession benefits introduced in WotLK, your two sidejobs have been that much more integral for min-maxing your character. Certain professions have some amazing boosts (we’re talking about self-only buffs or BOP items) for the common tankadin. Others… not so much.
A breakdown and my recommendations ahead.
Alchemy
- Mixology, which gives you increased duration/benefit from any flask or elixir you can make. This means that–to use the most common tanking flask–the Flask of Stoneblood will give you 970hp instead of the usual 650. Not bad!
- Indestructible Alchemist’s Stone, which gives +75 stam, 50 dodge rating (1.27% avoidance at 80), and boosts the effect of healing/mana pots by 40%.
Blacksmithing
- Two free gem slots, one for gloves and one for bracers. Assuming you add Solid Sky Sapphires, that’s an additional 48 stamina (or 547hp). When epic gems are released, you’re looking at an additional 60 stamina (or 684hp).
Enchanting
- Enchant Ring – Stamina will give you an additional 48 stamina/547hp when used on both rings. Comparable to BSing right now.
Engineering
- Reticulated Armor Webbing adds +800 armor to your gloves, and is the best enchant you can get for that slot.
- The tank goggles are nice, and were definitely what made Engineering godly in later TBC, but nowadays you’ll be replacing the highest iteration with Naxx10 gear. Hopefully this will change in later patches.
Herbalism
- Lifeblood, a HoT that eventually heals for 2000hp. But that’s what healers are for, or yourself while soloing.
- You also have the chance of finding certain items that can be consumed for boosts to AP or SP… at the cost of physical or magical damage vulnerability. Clearly a no-go for a tank.
Inscription
- Master’s Inscription of the Pinnacle is the best possible shoulder enchant for tanks right now. Much better than the exalted Hodir one.
- I have a warm place in my heart for Scrolls of Recall. Alas, cannot be used in combat, so no Bubblerecalling.
Jewelcrafting
- Dragon’s Eye Gems are an amazing boost, for two reasons: because they’re prismatic you can cut three Solid Dragon’s Eyes and put them in any bothersome red or yellow slots, and the net benefit of using three Solid DEs is 51 stamina, or 581hp. Best hp boost from any profession right now.
- The Monarch Crab is also an awesome trinket. If gemmed right (aka Solid Sky Sapphire and Solid Dragon’s Eye) you’re looking at 137 stamina from one trinket alone. There’s no comparison in pre-Ulduar trinkets as I type this.
Leatherworking
- Fur Lining – Stamina looks awesome at first glance (90 stamina/1024hp!) but consider that you can’t also pick up Enchant Bracer – Major Stamina for 40 stamina. So you’re only looking at a net gain of 50 stamina (seeing a pattern here? …pardon the pun).
Mining
- Toughness, which gives 50 stamina. With talents that comes out to an extra 570hp. Pretty nice EH boost, although, unlike the extra health from Blacksmithing or Jewelcrafting, this number will remain static as further patches come out (unless a Rank 7 is introduced).
Skinning
- Master of Anatomy, +25 to your crit rating (or .54% crit chance). Nice for threat I guess, but overall you want to be focusing on EH or avoidance/mitigation for buffs.
Tailoring
- There’s really nothing here for tankadins, as you would imagine. The one slightly interesting thing was the Lightweave cloak embroidery that would proc sometimes for an additional 1000 to 1200 Holy damage. Great for threat I suppose, but it’s being changed in 3.1 to proc for additional spellpower instead.
Overall, looking at all the benefits above, the best profession combination for a tankadin is Jewelcrafting/Blacksmithing. Right now Mining would be marginally better by 2 stamina, but eventually when epic gems are released, BSing will become better by 10 stamina. So it’d be better to hang onto Blacksmithing and reap the benefits in a future patch.
What professions do you deck out your tankadin with?
Armory Feed
Lke I said on another post, I´m one of those Tankadins still waiting for the engineering profession to become less of the “Joke” it is now, to something more in line with the rest. And if i could, i would go with BS/JC, just for the OPness of it…
@Rhidach
31 March 2009 at 5:17 am #
I hear you Logan, I dropped Engineering right before I hit lvl 80, and it was the saddest thing I ever did in WoW. Especially now that I could get that damn Pet Bombling outside of the RNG membership quest.
I can’t wait til they fix Engineering for real, and I might go back to it.
well, yeah, its sad that our Eng perks are making a mount that costs an stupid ammount of money, making guns that we cannot use ( for being pallies, you know…), and well, having very underwhelming goggles that cannot even be sold to other people….
@honorshammer
31 March 2009 at 9:11 pm #
I’ve been JC/Engy on Honorshammer since late Tier 4, and I’m going to drop it as soon as I snag the pets out of Gnomer.
I’ve been debating what to replace it with, Mining, Enchanting or Blacksmithing. Right now it looks like Blacksmithing is the way to go, especially since I have a level 78 Hunter alt to mine for me.
@PinkRaidFrames
1 April 2009 at 1:20 am #
You picked it man, JC and BS. I agree that it is the best raiding setup. However, you also need some means of income. I’m power-leveling my Blacksmithing now after my farming alt is finally at 450 mining and level 77 w/ epic flying.
I’m a JC/Alchemist. Originally I picked it up the combo in BC for the nice supply chain (transmute mastery 5x proc of earthsiege diamonds which I then cut could mean a 1K profit on a really good day) but I’ve kept it because it means I A) don’t have to hunt down trinkets for any of my specs, B) dragon’s eyes mean never having to say “I can’t get my meta requirement :( ” and C) it’s still a remarkably good money maker, albeit specced to elixir mastery and making flasks and selling spare dragon’s eyes now.
I was bs/mining until 760 when I got bored and dropped mining for jc- I was contemplating dropping bsa but getting bs to 375 and making a stormherald was too much effort to drop;) And know that im a jc/bs and 450 in both it is insane- the 2 extra gem slots get 41 stam gems and the monarch crab trinket is very nice:) Overall I’m as geared as the best people on my server just due to my profession choices.
[...] of profession guides, Rhidach’s Righteous Defense blog has an article on professions for tankadins as well. He gives some detail of the benefits of every profession, including tailoring! Please [...]