Protection Paladin (PVE)

Gear & Stats

Protection Paladin gearing is all about hitting your defensive breakpoints first, then layering in stamina and spell damage to stay durable while maintaining threat.

Protection Pre-Raid BiS

Stat Priority

Defense to crit cap (490 Defense skill) > Total Avoidance to crush cap (102.4% with Holy Shield) > Stamina > Spell Damage > Hit > Expertise

Key Breakpoints

Crit Cap (490 Defense skill) • Reaching crit immunity is the biggest survivability milestone early on. Crits are unpredictable and hit for 200% damage. Crush Cap (102.4% total avoidance) • Total avoidance is the combined chance for Miss + Dodge + Parry + Block (including Holy Shield). At 102.4% you become uncrushable, removing 150% crushing blows.

Stats Explained

Defense • Prevents critical strikes. Aim for 490 Defense skill vs bosses. Total Avoidance (102.4%) • The sum of Dodge, Parry, Miss, and Block. Block is especially valuable for Protection Paladin because Holy Shield adds a large chunk of block chance. Stamina • Increases your health pool and helps you survive magic-heavy or burst windows where you don’t have a Shield Wall equivalent. Spell Damage • Directly increases threat. Most of your threat is spell-based (Consecration, Holy Shield, Judgement, Seals), so spell damage scales your TPS. Hit • Missed abilities generate zero threat. Once your defensive goals are stable, adding hit improves pull reliability and threat consistency. Expertise • Reduces enemy dodge/parry. Since you tank from the front, it helps both threat consistency and reduces parry-haste risk.

Gearing Notes

You will often swap pieces based on the encounter: • If you are not yet crush capped, prioritize avoidance/block/defense to stabilize incoming damage. • Once you are stable defensively, you can trade some mitigation for spell damage and hit to raise your threat ceiling. Protection Paladins are extremely strong when they can keep targets inside Consecration and when Holy Shield is active, so gearing to support smooth rotations and reliable pulls is a big part of optimizing.