Patch 3.3 Preview: Tier 10 Set Bonuses on Plate

Many people are eagerly anticipating not only the new raid instance of Icecrown Citadel from the new expansion, but the brand spanking new tier sets to go along with it. While information on stats and even what it will look like is still scarce at the moment, it seems that much has been learned about the set bonuses that Blizzard are planning to add. It should be kept in mind that the information in this article may well change before the release of patch 3.3 but you should be able to get some idea of the way things are going. The following is all the information on tier set bonuses for plate wearers.

Paladin

Protection
For tankadins, it looks like the 2pc bonus will be a threat boost and the 4pc will give a nice defensive increase. So far the information points to a 20% Hammer of the Righteous damage increase for the 2pc set bonus, and for having four pieces of the set, each time Divine Plea is activated, the player’s dodge chance will be increased by a massive 12%. Given the current state of the best geared paladin tanks, this will most likely be boosting dodge to a whopping 45% or so in tier 10 and equivalent item level gear. Since most tankadins also have around 20% parry and around 45-50% block with Holy Shield active, this is a seriously nice reduction in incoming damage when it goes off.

Holy
For those of a healing persuasion, the 2pc set bonus offers an increase of all healing spells by 35% when Divine Illumination is active, so for 15 seconds every 3 minutes. On top of this, the four piece bonus will be a reduction in the cast time of Holy Light by 0.3 seconds each time you use Holy Shock.

Retribution
One of the most impressive bonuses for paladins comes for those with a ret build. Although it may cause some headaches regarding the nature of a paladin’s rotation, the 2pc tier 10 set bonus will offer normal white melee attacks a 40% chance to reset the cooldown on Divine Storm. The 4pc set bonus will be a less dramatic but still useful 10% damage increase on all Seals and Judgements.

Warrior

Protection
Similar to paladin tanks, protection warriors will gain both a threat boost and a mitigation buff. The 2pc set bonus will increase the damage of Shockwave and Shield Slam by 20% and the 4pc set bonus will remove the health cost associated with Bloodrage and will also make this ability provide damage absorption equal to 20% of the warrior’s total health. If this scales with buffs, this could well mean a shield that absorbs around 9K damage. This is not too shabby at all.

DPS
or those warriors who prefer the DPS role, the 2pc set bonus will offer a 2% chance when Rend and Deep Wounds cause damage to gain 20% extra attack power, although it is unclear for how long. The 4pc set bonus will give the Sudden Death and Blood Surge abilities a 20% chance to give 2 charges instead of one, and will also double their duration.

Death Knight

Tank
Following the pattern yet again with Death Knight’s who like a tanking role, the 2pc bonus will provide a threat boost via 20% extra damage on Death and Decay which already benefits from a threat multiplier on the damage it deals. The 4 piece tier 10 set bonus will give a 12% reduction in all incoming damage for 10 seconds each time you use Blood Tap.

DPS
The two piece bonus for a DPS Death Knight offers a 10% damage increase to the Obliterate, Scourge Strike and Death Strike abilities. Blizzard have chosen an interesting approach for the four piece bonus, which gives an overall damage increase of 3% on all attacks for 15% whenever the Death Knight’s runes are all on cooldown.

When 3.3 comes out, you can bet that Zygor's Guides and Dugi's Guides will be updated to help you be the first to master all the new features.