Warrior leveling guide for WoW Forever

The Warrior grows with every level. At the start you mostly press Heroic Strike and keep Rend ticking. More instant attacks follow as you level, and with the big talents from level 40 you really feel what the class can do. At level 30 you choose between Arms, Fury and Protection, and all three level well. This guide covers the builds, the rotation, the key levels, the class quests and how stances and Rage work.

Easiest spec for leveling	Arms, with a slow two-handed weapon
Key talents	Improved Overpower, Deep Wounds, Impale, Sweeping Strikes, Bloodthrill
Strength	Big pulls with strong cooldowns, high burst, no reagents
Weakness	No heals of its own, rests to eat, a slow start
Talent order per level	Warrior level build
Builds to level 60	After the launch on 4 November

Which spec to level with

All three trees level well. Most players traditionally level as Arms, for its burst and steady play. Fury takes a lot of damage, so you stop to eat more often, but its damage can be worth that. Protection is much stronger than it used to be: it burns down groups of monsters while you lose little health.

The builds below are made for the beta, which stops at level 30. Each has 26 points: you reach that at level 30 with five extra points from Talented in the Legacy system, or at level 35 without them. The talent calculator shows such a build as level 35, because it counts every point as a level. Builds for level 60 follow after the launch.

Levels 1 to 10

You start with Heroic Strike and Battle Shout, without talents or stances to choose from. Rend and Charge follow at 4, Thunder Clap at 6 and Hamstring at 8.

1. Keep Battle Shout up in combat.
2. Charge the monster.
3. Cast Rend if it will live long enough for a few ticks.
4. Use your spare Rage on Heroic Strike.

Need some room? Hamstring slows the monster so you can walk away. Against several monsters, use Thunder Clap on cooldown to slow their attacks.

Stats at these levels: weapon damage per second first, then Strength and attack power, then Stamina, then Agility, then armor.

Level 30 Arms build

The recommended leveling build. It is about Overpower and heavy hits with a slow two-handed weapon. Much of the time you let Rend tick and wait for Overpower. Sweeping Strikes later adds the damage against groups that Arms needs, and it is satisfying to use. Open the build in the talent calculator.

Talent	Points
Improved Heroic Strike	3/3
Deflection	2/5
Improved Rend	3/3
Improved Charge	2/2
Improved Overpower	2/2
Deep Wounds	3/3
Spearing Strike	1/1
Two-Handed Weapon Specialization	2/3
Impale	2/2
Bloodthrill	4/5
Sweeping Strikes	1/1
Improved Slam	1/2

Bloodthrill is the heart of the build: your main-hand attacks against a monster with your Rend on it can make Overpower available. Improved Overpower raises its critical strike chance by 50%, and Deep Wounds and Impale make those critical strikes hurt. Sweeping Strikes lets your next five attacks also hit a monster next to it.

There is some room to change it. You can take Improved Tactical Mastery instead of Deflection, but then you will hardly find the points for Anger Management. Spearing Strike mainly helps against Giants and Dragonkin, which you rarely meet early on; skip it and you can max Two-Handed Weapon Specialization. At the end you choose between Bloodthrill and Weaponmaster. You want both in time, so it is about which you take first. Bloodthrill means more Overpowers.

1. Keep Battle Shout up in combat.
2. Charge the monster.
3. Cast Overpower whenever it lights up.
4. Cast Rend if the monster will live long enough for a few ticks.
5. Use your spare Rage on Heroic Strike, or on Slam once you have Improved Slam.

Stats: weapon damage matters more than damage per second, then Strength and attack power, then Stamina, then Agility, then armor.

Level 30 Fury build

As Fury you fight with two weapons and use all the extra Rage that gives. Your best attacks only come after level 30, so the spec can feel a little weak until then. Open the build in the talent calculator.

Talent	Points
Cruelty	5/5
Unbridled Wrath	5/5
Furious Precision	3/3
Blood Craze	2/3
Dual Wield Specialization	5/5
Enrage	5/5
Death Wish	1/1

Unbridled Wrath and Dual Wield Specialization give you more Rage from every hit, and Furious Precision makes your off-hand miss less. Cruelty adds critical strike chance, and Enrage raises your damage after you take a hit. Death Wish raises your physical damage by 20% for 30 seconds, but you also take 5% more.

There are a few options here. Piercing Howl slows everything around you, good for kiting monsters and players. Lingering Rage keeps your Rage longer after a fight, which keeps the pace high when you go from monster to monster. Once you have Whirlwind at 36, Raging Blows is worth it too, but not before.

1. Keep Battle Shout up in combat.
2. Charge the monster.
3. Cast Overpower whenever it lights up.
4. Cast Rend if the monster will live long enough for a few ticks.
5. Use your spare Rage on Heroic Strike.

From level 30, Fury fights in Berserker Stance, where you take 10% more damage, magic included, and 5% more on top while Death Wish runs. More in this post.

Stats: weapon damage per second, then Strength and attack power, then Stamina, then Agility, then armor.

Level 30 Protection build

Leveling as a tank used to be slow. Not anymore: as Protection you burn down groups of monsters and lose little health doing it. You need a one-handed weapon and a shield. Open the build in the talent calculator.

Talent	Points
Improved Bloodrage	2/2
Shield Specialization	5/5
Anticipation	5/5
Improved Revenge	3/3
Last Stand	1/1
Master of Defense	2/2
Defiance	3/3
Vanguard	1/1
Concussion Blow	1/1
Focused Rage	3/3

Shield Specialization and Master of Defense give you Rage whenever you block, dodge or parry, so the more monsters hit you, the more you can do. Vanguard lets you Charge in Defensive Stance, so you never have to switch. Focused Rage makes your attacks cheaper, and Concussion Blow stuns a monster for 5 seconds. Last Stand gives you 30% extra health for 20 seconds when things go wrong.

There is little room to change it if you go deep into the tree. Doing few dungeons? Move the points from Defiance to Improved Thunder Clap.

1. Keep Battle Shout up in combat.
2. Charge the monster.
3. Cast Revenge whenever it lights up.
4. Cast Rend if the monster will live long enough for a few ticks.
5. Keep Thunder Clap on cooldown.
6. Use your spare Rage on Heroic Strike.

Stats: weapon damage per second, then Strength and attack power, then Stamina, then Agility, then armor.

Key levels

Level	What you get	From
1	Heroic Strike, Battle Shout	Default, class trainer
4	Rend, Charge	Class trainer
6	Thunder Clap	Class trainer
8	Hamstring	Class trainer
10	Defensive Stance, Taunt, Sunder Armor	Class quest
10	Bloodrage	Class trainer
10	First talent point	Talent tree
12	Overpower, Shield Bash	Class trainer
14	Revenge, Demoralizing Shout, Tactical Mastery	Class trainer
16	Shield Block, Mocking Blow	Class trainer
18	Disarm	Class trainer
20	Victory Rush, Cleave, Retaliation, Slam, dual wield	Class trainer
20	Polearms	Weapon trainer
22	Intimidating Shout	Class trainer
24	Execute	Class trainer
26	Challenging Shout	Class trainer
28	Shield Wall	Class trainer
30	Berserker Stance, Intercept	Class quest
30	Berserker Rage	Class trainer
30	Sweeping Strikes, Death Wish, Concussion Blow	Talent tree
36	Whirlwind	Class trainer
38	Pummel	Class trainer
40	Plate armor, riding, Dual Specialization	Trainers
50	Recklessness	Class trainer

Victory Rush is new for leveling: after you kill a monster, it hits and heals you for 10% of your maximum health. Slam has an 18 second cooldown in Forever. With points in Talented from the Legacy system, you reach every talent up to five levels sooner.

The class quests

Warriors have a few important class quests. The most important ones unlock Defensive Stance and Berserker Stance, and give you your Whirlwind weapon.

Level	Reward	Alliance	Horde
10	Defensive Stance, Taunt, Sunder Armor	Human: Bartleby’s Mug. Dwarf and Gnome: Vejrek. Night Elf: Vorlus Vilehoof. High Order Skyborne: The Skybreaker Bulwark	Orc, Troll and Tauren: Path of Defense. Undead: Ulag the Cleaver
20	Armor	Fire Hardened Hauberk, from the chain that starts with Fire Hardened Mail	Brutal Hauberk, from Brutal Hauberk
30	Berserker Stance, Intercept	The Affray	The Affray
30	Whirlwind Axe, Whirlwind Sword or Whirlwind Warhammer	Whirlwind Weapon	Whirlwind Weapon

The human chain starts in Stormwind with Bartleby the Drunk. Path of Defense comes from Uzzek in the Barrens. The Affray starts with Klannoc Macleod in the Barrens and has a 10 minute timer. Whirlwind Weapon comes from Bath’rah the Windwatcher in Alterac Mountains and is a long chain: you can start it at 30, but most players finish it later.

Weapons

A Warrior can use every weapon except wands, but you learn most of them from a weapon trainer.

Weapon	Alliance	Horde
One- and two-handed axes	Buliwyf Stonehand (Ironforge)	Hanashi, Sayoc (Orgrimmar)
One- and two-handed maces	Buliwyf Stonehand (Ironforge)	Ansekhwa (Thunder Bluff)
One- and two-handed swords	Woo Ping (Stormwind)	Archibald (Undercity)
Daggers	Ilyenia Moonfire (Darnassus), Bixi Wobblebonk (Ironforge), Woo Ping (Stormwind)	Sayoc (Orgrimmar), Archibald (Undercity)
Fist weapons	Ilyenia Moonfire (Darnassus), Buliwyf Stonehand (Ironforge)	Sayoc (Orgrimmar)
Staves	Ilyenia Moonfire (Darnassus), Woo Ping (Stormwind)	Hanashi, Sayoc (Orgrimmar), Ansekhwa (Thunder Bluff)
Polearms, from level 20	Woo Ping (Stormwind)	Archibald (Undercity)
Bows	Ilyenia Moonfire (Darnassus)	Hanashi, Sayoc (Orgrimmar)
Crossbows	Bixi Wobblebonk (Ironforge), Woo Ping (Stormwind)	Archibald (Undercity)
Guns	Buliwyf Stonehand (Ironforge)	Ansekhwa (Thunder Bluff)
Thrown	Known from the start	Known from the start

Whenever you learn a new weapon type, you first have to train its skill before you hit reliably with it.

Gear

Weapons are by far the most important upgrade. Most of the time you want a slow, heavy weapon: it raises the damage of instant attacks like Overpower, Whirlwind and Mortal Strike. Humans, Dwarves and Orcs no longer get extra weapon skill for a weapon type, so the choice of weapon is free. More in this post.

Professions

Level your professions alongside your Warrior, so you gather and craft at the right level. Camps give buffs to every profession.

• Cooking is a must: buff food gives extra experience, and you need it for a campfire.
• Blacksmithing makes your own gear, including soulbound pieces with stats you rarely find elsewhere, such as more Defense for a tank.
• Mining goes with Blacksmithing, unless you would rather buy all your ore.

Consumables

• Food. Stay Well Fed for the extra experience; any buff food is better than none. A Warrior has no heals of its own, so you will eat between pulls.
• Potions and bandages. Healing potions for emergencies, now also from First Aid. Bandages from First Aid save a lot of eating.
• Elixirs with the right stats are expensive to keep up, but worth it for a difficult quest or monster.
• Reagents. None. A Warrior needs no reagents at all.

Stances

Only Warriors have stances. Many attacks only work in one or two of them: Overpower in Battle Stance, Revenge in Defensive Stance, Whirlwind in Berserker Stance. Thunder Clap works in Battle Stance and Defensive Stance.

• Battle Stance is the neutral stance, without bonus.
• Defensive Stance lowers the damage you take by 10%, also lowers the damage you deal by 10%, and raises your threat by 30%.
• Berserker Stance raises your critical strike chance by 3%, but you take 10% more damage.

Changing stance usually costs your Rage. Tactical Mastery at level 14 lets you keep 10 Rage, and the talent Improved Tactical Mastery raises that to 25. That matters when you switch to Berserker Stance for Intercept, or to Battle Stance for Mocking Blow. Your spec decides which stance you mostly level in, but not always: Whirlwind is strong in every spec against several monsters. Get a feel for which stance each fight needs.

Rage

Spend your Rage well. Plan your stance changes, and do not throw all your Rage into Execute on a monster with 60 health left. Think about your next monster before the current one dies, and save some Rage for it.

Rage is normalized: what you get from a hit depends on your weapon speed, not its damage. A legendary sword gives the same Rage as your starting sword, as long as they are equally fast. That makes Rage steady, but it can feel slow. Critical strikes give more Rage again, see this post.

Big pulls and cooldowns

A Warrior survives big pulls, at least once every 15 minutes: Retaliation and Shield Wall have a 15 minute cooldown, Intimidating Shout 3 minutes. They can save your life. Do not just keep them for emergencies: a cooldown that is ready and unused is lost leveling speed. Use them to pull more than you normally would.

You can also switch to a one-handed weapon and a shield with Defensive Stance at any time. Then Shield Block stops a lot of damage. Demoralizing Shout and Thunder Clap lower the damage monsters deal, against one or many. Do not be afraid to spend Rage on them.

Utility

Warriors do not count as a utility class, but you bring a lot to a group. Battle Shout raises the attack power of your group. Thunder Clap and Demoralizing Shout lower the damage of monsters, even when you are not tanking. And Sunder Armor raises the damage of every physical attacker on that monster, you included.

More about food, camps and rested XP is in the experience guide.