Ardent Defender
From WoWWiki
| Ardent Defender | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Usable by | |
| Class | Paladin |
| Properties | |
| Location | Protection, Tier 7 |
| Affects | Damage taken |
| Ranks | 5 |
| Requirements | |
| Points required | 30 |
| Talent required | None |
- When all seems lost...when the darkness is closing in...fear not: the Light protects its own.
Ardent Defender is a Protection Paladin talent. When you have less than 35% health, all damage taken is reduced by 6% per point.
Notes
- Prior to 2.1.0 the effect was: When you have less than 20% health, all damage taken is reduced by 10% per point.
- The Patch 2.1.0 version of this talent (35/30 at max) is better than the old (20/50) by a nominal degree, assuming (for a not-terribly-realistic scenario) that the paladin is taking damage at a constant rate and that the talent is not made irrelevant by a damage spike (leap-frogging) taking the paladin from 35%+ to dead straight away.
Tips
- This talent shines when dealing with trash mobs or DoTs that deal lesser and consistently noncrushing / noncritting damage; this talent may take a backseat when dealing with hard-hitting bosses whose immense damage provide opportunities for leap-frogging to occur.
- If leap-frogging does not occur, this talent provides a stealth bonus to Stamina of 3% per point. Higher Stamina broadens the health range within which Ardent Defender's mitigation occurs, not to mention lessen the occurrence of leap-frogging.
- Finally, it is commonly considered as a extension of stamina/hit points, this is true but incomplete. If Ardent Defender is seen as an extension of 15% life, it is also a zone of the life bar where 1 point of healing does not equal 1 point of damage, but rather 0.7 point of healing equals 1 point of damage, or, 1 point of healing equals 1.42 point of damage, giving healing from all sources a bonus of 42% of efficiency when working in that zone. Some would think it might be good to stay in that zone for mana efficiency. In practice, this is a very risky option. The healers should heal the paladin tank out of the critical zone as fast as possible.
