PVE Fury Warrior DPS Guide (WotLK 3.3.5a)  

Welcome to the Fury Warrior DPS guide for World of Warcraft Wrath of the Lich King 3.3.5a. In this guide, you will learn about playing a Fury Warrior in a raid. The guide includes Talents, Glyphs, Gems, Enchantments, BiS Gear, Add-ons, Gameplay & Skill rotation tips.

Talents

Everything marked with red is mandatory, no skipping. Green - situational.

What will you take in the tier 1-2 Arms tree is totally up to you.

Talents like Rampage or Precision are situational. Precision is useless if you have good gear with a hit cap. Rampage does not stack with other Warriors Rampage and similar effects.

Example build with Cleave:

Glyphs

Major Glyphs

• Glyph of Whirlwind
• Glyph of Heroic Strike
• Glyph of Cleaving
• Glyph of Execution - alternative to cleave

Gems

Gems are situational and depend on the build and equipment. They are used to reach the required stat caps.

• Meta
  • Relentless Earthsiege Diamond
• Red & Yellow
  • Fractured Cardinal Ruby
  • Bold Cardinal Ruby
  • Inscribed Ametrine
  • Etched Ametrine
• Blue
  • Nightmare Tear x1
  • Bold Cardinal Ruby

Enchants

• Head – Arcanum of Torment
• Shoulder – Greater Inscription of the Axe
• Cloak – Enchant Cloak - Major Agility
• Chest – Enchant Chest - Powerful Stats
• Bracers – Enchant Bracers - Greater Assault
• Gloves – Enchant Gloves - Crusher
• Waist – Eternal Belt Buckle
• Legs – Icescale Leg Armor
• Boots – Enchant Boots - Cat's Swiftness or Enchant Boots - Greater Assault
• Weapons – Enchant Weapon - Berserking
  

Gameplay & Rotations

Fury Warrior has a pretty simple combo:

• Use Bloodthirst then Whirlwind, repeat
• If Bloodsurge procs, then use Slam
• Use Heroic Strike or Cleaveas much as possible

Key thing here is to not interrupt your main combo (1) with Global Cooldowns from other spells

BiS Gear

Armor

• Head - Sanctified Ymirjar Lord's Helmet
• Shoulder - Sanctified Ymirjar Lord's Shoulderplates
• Cloak - Recovered Scarlet Onslaught Cape
• Chest - Sanctified Ymirjar Lord's Battleplate
• Bracers - Toskk's Maximized Wristguards
• Gloves - Sanctified Ymirjar Lord's Gauntlets
• Waist - Coldwraith Links
• Legs - Bladeborn Leggings
• Boots - Blood-Soaked Saronite Stompers

• Neck - Lana'thel's Chain of Flagellation or Sindragosa's Cruel Claw
• Rings - Ashen Band of Endless Vengeance Frostbrood Sapphire Ring
• Trinkets - Deathbringer's Will Death's Verdict

Weapons

• Main-hand - Glorenzelg, High-Blade of the Silver Hand
• Off-hand - Glorenzelg, High-Blade of the Silver Hand
• Ranged - Fal'inrush, Defender of Quel'thalas

Stat Priority

Hit -> Expertise -> Armor Penetration -> Strength -> Critical Strike Rating -> Haste

When dual wielding, the hard cap for Hit is 27%. Most Fury warriors get the soft cap - 8%, which guarantees to hit with abilities. The reason is that getting 27% would sacrifice so much valuable stats and result in damage loss. Expertise soft-cap is 26, which removes the chance of your attacks to be dodged & parried.

Armor Penetration is the primary stat of the build. The hard cap is 100% (with trinket procs). It's important to note that Armor Penetration is more effective once stacked in higher amounts.

Strength is the core stat for Warriors, which increases the effectiveness of the abilities. In the beginning, new players will find gemming for Strength (while gathering ArP gear) to be more efficient. After getting around 50% of ArP, you can make the transition to ArP and focus on it entirely.

Critical strike rating is a secondary stat, but never the less a valuable component of your DPS. We have Impale and Deep Wounds to make critical strikes even more powerful. Crit has a hard cap of 100% (for abilities), which is unobtainable. 55% is a reasonable and obtainable amount of Crit with BiS gear, which is the cap for regular attacks (if we count using 8% Hit and 26 Expertise). Maximizing crit is something you want to focus on in later stages of the game, while gradually improving it with gear upgrades.

Haste is last on the list because it doesn't add much value to this build. The stats mentioned above outweigh Haste by far. You are likely to encounter Haste on items if you decide to include some leather/agility items in your gear, for example - Aldriana's Gloves of Secrecy.