What Stats Mean to Me

In these next few posts, I want to be able to go more in-depth in all aspects of paladin tanking. The first post was meant as a generalization.

Strength

This stat is important for many aspects of paladin tanking in Wrath of the Lich King. This stat increases attack power. The spells that paladins have now scale off of attack power as well as spell power. Strength also adds to block value. This is a very important stat for tanking because as you increase your block value, the more damage you mitigate each time you block an enemy attack. Block value also increases the threat generated from Shield of Righteousness, which is by far the highest threat-generating, single-target spell available to the paladin.

Intellect

This stat increases your mana pool just like any other class that uses mana, and also increases your chance to crit with spells. Although the increased chance to crit with spells helps with generating loads of threat, you get more spell crit from getting critical strike rating than you would from intellect. Also, you shouldn't need to worry about how much mana you have. You have many ways of regenerating it during combat. Any more mana let's you cast more spells at a time, but this is still not a stat you should focus on.

Stamina

This is by far the most important primary stat for any tank. The more health you have, the more of a safety net you create for your healer(s) in groups and raids. Also, if you spec into the right talents, this stat is increased by a total of 12%. For example, if you have 1000 stamina, that instead becomes 1120 stamina. This is practically free health for you and everyone else to enjoy.
Agility

This stat increases your critical strike percentage, armor, and dodge rating. The critical strike rating is negligible, and so is the armor and dodge rating gained. The agility:armor ratio is 1:2 currently, but it is not an effective stat to increase based on this alone. Also, it is much easier to raise your dodge percentage by aquiring dodge rating instead of agility as 1 point of agility gives far less dodge percentage than 1 dodge rating.

Spirit

This stat increases your health regeneration rate outside of combat and also mana regeneration while not casting. As a tank, you're always casting, so the mana regeneration component is worthless. As for the health regeneration it only applies out of combat, so there's not much spirit can help with in either case.

Ok, so now I've told you about the primary stats. Now it's time to get to some of the secondary stats. Note, I will only list the stats that, as a tank, you should be looking for.

Defense

This is by far one of the most important stats to raise if you want to have any success at tanking raid bosses, heroics, etc. Raising this stat requires that you get items which have "+ to defense rating" on them. It takes approximately 4.62 defense rating to get 1 Defense. This is important, because you will be needing a LOT of defense rating. The defense cap for tanking paladins is 540 (which is 689 defense rating). This ensures that bosses or mobs in any lvl 80 instance, heroic, or raid can get a critical hit on you. This alone mitigates 1/2 the damage a mob could normally inflict on you had you gathered no defense rating at all. There is an advantage to raising defense past the cap for two reasons: You allow more room to gain other stats while losing some defense rating, and you continue to add to your dodge, parry, and block percentages by a small amount.

Dodge rating

This stat increases the percentage chance in which you dodge an incoming attack. When you dodge an attack, the opponent inflicts 0 damage on you. You mitigate ALL the damage the mob would have inflicted on had the attack landed. This is VERY GOOD in terms of your survivability. Although, your dodge percentage suffers from diminishing returns as a fight goes on. So it is not a good idea to gather up pure dodge rating (and making sure not to gimp your defense to go below the 540 defense cap).

Parry rating

This stat increases the percentage chance you have in parrying an incoming attack. When you parry an attack, the opponent inflicts 0 damage to you. You, like dodging an attack, mitigate ALL the damage the mob would have inflicted had the attack landed. This is VERY GOOD in terms of survivability. Another side-effect of parrying an attack is it has the potential to lower your attack speed for your next auto-attack. If you're using Seal of Righteousness or Seal of Vengeance, this equals more threat because you basically get a free attack on the mob/boss. Of course, like dodge percentage, parry chance suffers from diminishing returns too, and should not be too-heavily focussed on.

Shield block rating

This stat increases the percentage chance you have of blocking an incoming attack while wearing a shield. When you block an attack, you prevent a certain amount of damage to be inflicted on your character. The amount of damage you mitigate this way is determined by your block value. Unlike dodge and parry chance, block chance does NOT suffer from diminishing returns as a fight goes on. A good thing about raising your block rating is allowing your Holy Shield to proc more, giving you more oppurtunities to get threat on an attacking mob.

Shield block value

Every time you block an attack with a shield, you prevent a certain amount of damage to pass through to your character. Your character's block value is the amount of damage you prevent every time you block an attack. By raising your block value, you can further and further recieve less and less damage from an enemy's attack. This is VERY GOOD as it allows your health to dwindle at a less alarming rate when you block an attack. For example, you have 800 block value. The boss can normally deal ~5800 damage on you. When you block, you drop the damage he deals to you down to 5000. Even though this is good, let's assume the boss has an attack speed of less than 2.0 seconds. This doesn't quite look so good now. Now let's assume you have 1800 block value. Now every time you block, you reduce the amount of damage the boss deals to you down to 4000. This allows for a MUCH smoother damage intake for healers to manage.

Expertise rating

This stat is extremely helpful for tanking. The more you have of this stat, the less likely you make it for an enemy mob/boss of dodging or parrying an attack. This helps with two things: generating threat and mitigating damage. Remember, if a mob/boss parries an attack, you basically reset their swing timer, allowing them a free attack on you. With a boss that can easily hit you for 8500+ damage per hit that's not good at all. Plus, you lose out on the threat that you would have gotten had you hit the mob. This is the same case with dodge, except a boss doesn't get a free attack on you when it dodges. Raising expertise, however, isn't an ideal stat to focus on primarily, and should be more of a stat in which you get it when you get it.