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Start Instance Training Before Level 20

Warrior is a popular class-type on World of Warcraft because of its availability to nearly every race, as well as its ability to wear and wield nearly every piece of equipment available to both deal damage and take damage in a respectable way. In general, Protection-spec'd warriors are in high demand within guilds and Instance parties compared to Arms or Fury-spec'd ones, but the downside is that Protection-spec'd warriors advance through the levels more slowly when playing Solo because Protection focus is on taking damage, not dealing it.

In order to stand out as a quality Dungeon/Instance warrior, you will need to become a solid "tank" with awesome "aggro management" skills. It is recommended that you practice these tanking and aggro management skills in Dungeon/Instance Pick-up Groups (PuGs) regularly as soon as you've reached level 15 or so, as practice is the main way you'll learn and improve.

By the time you reach level 40, Instance party members expect you have a decent grasp on your class's role within a team, and thus will be less forgiving of errors or lack of preparation. It is at this point that a Fury or Arms-spec'd warrior may find themselves being hasselled by partymates: "Why aren't you wearing a shield?", "Are you in Berserker stance??!", "Why are you charging in and aggroing half the room?"

By the time you reach level 55, quality guilds who have members going into Instances on a regular basis will actively blacklist you from their parties, raids or the guild itself if you're not already beginning to show a solid understanding of your class's role. Many guilds are regularly on the lookout for Protection-spec'd warriors with tanking experience, but will deny the recruitment of DPS warriors who have focussed on the Arms or Fury talent trees (usually for PvP or solo play).

Group Strategy Differs From Solo Strategy

Playing your toon in an Instance group requires a different strategy than you've become used to while playing solo, no matter what class you've chosen. Different classes have different strengths and weaknesses within a grouped situation, and as your levels increase and you move closer to instances like Blackrock Depths (Level 52+) and into the rest of the "End Game training" dungeons such as Blackrock Spire, Dire Maul, Stratholme and Scholomance, you knowing your class role becomes more of a necessity if you hope to team up with others who know what they're doing.

If you're okay with teaming up with Mages and Warlocks who want to be the party's Main Tank (MT), Warriors who charge in to every fight and "aggro" far more NPC opponents than is truly necessary, and Priests who aren't interested in healing, then don't worry about this or any other Instance Class guide that's posted here - but don't be surprised to find that (especially at level 50+) it's hard to ever actually get THROUGH an Instance in its entirety as a direct result.

Preparing Your Warrior Toon For An Instance Run

Before heading into an Instance, it is the individual responsibility of each party member to ensure their toon is in tip-top condition and well-stocked with various consumables. As a Warrior, this includes:

• Repairing your equipment
• Restocking your thrown weapons or other range-weapon ammo (bullets, arrows)
• Bringing tanking equipment (including one-handed weapon and a shield, plus high-AC equip with +sta +dmg +crit)
• Bringing a stack or two of HP and Rage potions for emergencies
• Restocking your food supplies for healing and buffing

If you get involved with Instance parties before level 20, it can reasonably be expected that by Level 40, partymates will be able to rely on you for taking enough responsibility to be properly stocked before entering an Instance. Players over level 40 who join dungeon parties without adequate preparation can expect to be alienated in the future by players who ARE prepared. Other players aren't going to be interested in sharing their consumables and a Warrior who "forgets" to bring a shield and repair their equipment, for example, takes a severe nose-dive in terms of being a useful contributor to the party.

Common Warrior Instance Duties

As a warrior in an instance party, your duties tend to be as follows:

• Main Tank (MT), generating a lot of threat, attracting a lot of hate and getting pounded on
• Managing group Aggro in a way that protects other party members from damage
• Main Puller (MP) (although this may be farmed out to a hunter)
• Group buff contributor (battle shout)

Charge, Battlestances and Monitoring Squishy Mana

As a warrior, there are three major ways you'll cause problems within your Instance party:

• Using "charge" to start the fight (it aggros too much in a dungeon instance)
• Fighting in anything but Defensive Stance
• Neglecting to keep track of mana pools of priests, mages and warlocks before starting the next battle

In short, when it comes to Instances, quality warriors are defensive Tanks, not offensive DPS-machines. Since it is your job to take the beats while the Priest or Druid or Shaman heal you and the Mages, Hunters, Rogues and others provide the DPS, Defensive stance is the way to go. Keep in mind before you start the next battle that the casters in your group need mana to do their thing, so don't attack the next thing until your Priest/Druid/Shaman/Mage/Warlock types have topped up their mana pool. Just because YOU are all healed up doesn't mean the rest of the team is ready to support you!

Stay Tuned For Part II!

This article is Part I of a short series of posts on the topic of effectively learning how to play a Warrior toon in a low-to-medium-level Instance or Raid party. Part II will delve more deeply into the bullet-points mentioned in this post, so if you're not sure what something here means, be sure to check back soon for Part II.

Related posts:

1. Horde Newbie Hunter Warcraft Instance Guide (Levels 1-20)
2. Warcraft Priest Instance Guide (1-20), Horde, Newbie
3. Horde Hunter Newbie Tips (Level 1 to 9)