Arms in Forever revolves around your Rend. While it ticks on the target, every main-hand hit has a 20% chance from Bloodthrill to light up Overpower. Add Mortal Strike, a big two-hander and a Slam that now has a cooldown, and you have the spec most warriors level with. In raids it sits a tier below Fury.
Talents and builds
The links open the talent calculator with the finished build, including why the points go where they go.
- Leveling: Arms leveling (points 35/16/0). Differs from the PvE build by skipping Improved Heroic Strike and Improved Bloodrage: Heroic Strike comes too late in the priority while questing, and trading health for rage is inefficient. The calculator shows the point-by-point order below the tree.
- Raid: Arms PvE (raid & dungeons) (points 32/17/2). Goes deep into Arms for Mortal Strike; with more than 30 points in Arms, Fury talents such as Death Wish are out of reach.
- PvP: Arms PvP (points 35/16/0). Rage is scarce in PvP, so the points from Improved Heroic Strike go into Deflection for survivability.
Where it ranks
| Category | Tier | Range |
|---|---|---|
| PvE DPS (raid) | B | D–A |
| PvE dungeon DPS (level 30) | A | C–A |
| PvP (battleground/open world) | A | B–A |
| Leveling | C | C |
- PvE DPS (raid): Slightly more sources say B than A, one list even D. Since 10 November Sweeping Strikes no longer loses charges without a second target. Mortal Strike matters more in PvP than in the raid.
- PvP (battleground/open world): Rises from B to A: four lists say A. Mortal Strike halves healing, Improved Hamstring roots.
- Leveling: All three lists say C: lots of downtime; without a healer or bandages every bigger pull costs time.
The tiers combine several tier lists and level-60 simulations. Raid logs only exist from 9 December, so treat this as a snapshot. Every spec side by side: rankings.
Single-target rotation
You fight in Battle Stance. Battle Shout before the pull (it now covers the whole raid), then Charge, Rend and Mortal Strike. After that:
- Rend stays up on the target. Only your own Rend counts for Bloodthrill, and spreading it to other mobs adds no extra procs.
- Overpower whenever it lights up. Improved Overpower adds 50% crit chance, so it crits almost every time.
- Mortal Strike on cooldown. Hold rage for it instead of dumping it first.
- Slam as the filler. It has a 15-second cooldown, 10 with Improved Slam, which also trims 0.5 seconds off the cast and stops it from resetting your swing. Moving cancels the cast.
- Execute below 20% health.
- Heroic Strike only when you would otherwise cap rage.
Spearing Strike hits for 75% weapon damage, double that against giants, dragonkin and mounted targets, and knocks riders off their mount. It costs 15 rage on a 20-second cooldown. Against dragonkin and giants it moves near the top of the list. Against anything else it is barely worth the global.
Two or more targets
On two targets, pop Sweeping Strikes: your next five melee attacks also hit a second enemy. Since 10 November a swing without a second target no longer uses up a charge. Spare rage goes into Cleave. At three or more, swap to Berserker Stance for a Whirlwind and swap back. Stance dancing is cheap now: Tactical Mastery keeps 10 rage, and 3/3 Improved Tactical Mastery raises that to 25.
Stats and weapon
Use a slow two-hander with a high damage range. Rage from white hits scales with weapon speed in Forever, and crits generate twice the rage. Weapon damage beats any stat on the item.
After that: hit rating, crit rating, Strength. 10 hit rating gives 1% hit, 14 crit rating gives 1% crit. Expertise rating (10 per 1%) cuts how often the boss dodges and becomes worth it once you hit reliably.
Weaponmaster replaces the old weapon specializations. Axes and polearms give 5% crit, maces and staves ignore 15% armor, swords get a 5% chance for an extra attack. Which weapon type comes out ahead will only be clear once people raid.
Common mistakes
- Letting Rend fall off, which shuts down your Overpower procs. On a mob that is about to die, a fresh Rend is wasted.
- Casting Slam or queuing Heroic Strike so Mortal Strike or an Overpower proc gets pushed back.
- Pointless stance swaps. Even with 3/3 Improved Tactical Mastery you keep 25 rage at most.
- Attacking from the front, where the target can parry.
- Using Recklessness at the wrong moment. It requires Berserker Stance and makes you take more damage.
Leveling as Arms
Arms is the comfortable route from 10 to 60. Talent order: Improved Rend, then Improved Tactical Mastery and Deep Wounds, Bloodthrill and Sweeping Strikes, Weaponmaster and finally Mortal Strike. Compared with the raid build, the leveling version skips Improved Heroic Strike and Improved Bloodrage and takes Deflection and Improved Charge instead.
From level 20, Victory Rush cuts your downtime a lot. It is usable for 20 seconds after a kill and heals you for 10% of your health, once every 30 seconds. Berserker Stance, and with it Whirlwind for bigger pulls, comes from the class quest at 30.
Arms in raids
Arms ranks a tier below Fury for raiding. Mortal Strike's healing reduction does nothing against bosses, and with more than 30 points in Arms, Death Wish and Bloodthirst are out of reach. Arms is good on one target and on two thanks to Sweeping Strikes, and you bring Sunder Armor and Battle Shout like any warrior. If raiding is your main goal, play Fury. Arms pays off when you also do PvP, and from level 40 dual talent specialization lets you keep both.
Further reading
- Warrior class guide: races, new abilities and every build of the class
- The other specs: Fury Warrior, Protection Warrior
- Raid comp planner: put your raid together and see which buffs are still missing
- Warrior talent calculator: plan your own build and share it as a link
