On this page, we list your Arms Warrior coreabilities and how they should be used together (rotation) in World of WarcraftMoP 5.4. We also explain whento use your various cooldowns. Then, we go deeper and present all the subtletiesthat you will need to know if you want to excel at playing an ArmsWarrior.

The other pages of our Arms Warrior guide can be accessedfrom the table of contents on the right.

1. Single Target Rotation↑top

The Arms Warrior rotation is made up of multiple phases, mostly having todo with whether or not the debuff applied by your Colossus Smash is upon the target or not. Whenever your Colossus Smash debuff is not up, it isyour top priority to apply it, as we will see below.

When the target is below 20% health, you have to employ a differentExecute rotation, but we cover this in a subsequent section.

Note that it is important to understand several key concepts of therotation in order to be able to execute it comfortably. We advise you to readour section on key concepts.

1.1. Outside Colossus Smash

When Colossus Smash is not active on the target, your rotation isbased on the following priority:

1. Use Heroic Strike
   • Only to prevent reaching maximum rage, if Slam cannot be used.
2. Use Colossus Smash.
3. Use Mortal Strike.
4. Use Overpower.
5. Use Slam
   • Only if you have fewer than 3 Taste for Blood stacks and 80 or morerage.
6. Use Battle Shout or Commanding Shout.
7. Use Heroic Throw.

1.1.1. With 2-Part Tier 16 Set Bonus

If you have the 2-Part Tier 16 Set Bonus, then the priority becomes:

1. Use Heroic Strike
   • Only to prevent reaching maximum rage, if Slam cannot be used.
2. Use Colossus Smash.
3. Use Mortal Strike.
4. Use Overpower
   • Only if you have more than 3 Taste for Blood stacks.
5. Use Slam
   • Only if you have 3 or fewer Taste for Blood stacks and you have 80 ormore rage.
6. Use Battle Shout or Commanding Shout.
7. Use Heroic Throw.

This complicates the rotation for a relatively small DPS bonus, but it isa gain nonetheless.

1.2. During Colossus Smash

When Colossus Smash is active on the target, your rotation is basedon the following priority:

1. Use Mortal Strike.
2. Use Slam
   • If you have 40 or more rage OR
   • If you are under the effects of Recklessness (in which case youshould spam Slam).
3. Use Overpower.

1.2.1. With 2-Part Tier 16 Set Bonus

If you have the 2-Part Tier 16 Set Bonus, then the priority becomes:

1. Use Heroic Strike
   • Only if you have 80 or more rage.
   • If using Slam while Recklessness is active, ignore thisstep.
2. Use Mortal Strike.
3. If under the effects of Recklessness, spam Slam.
4. Use Overpower
   • Only if you have more than 3 Taste for Blood stacks.
5. Use Slam
   • Only if you have 3 or fewer Taste for Blood stacks.

This complicates the playstyle for a relatively small DPS bonus, but it isa gain nonetheless.

1.3. Execute Rotation

When the boss is below 20% health, the rotation (and the above-mentionedpriority) changes considerably.

The main idea is that you should try to pool rage for when you can use Colossus Smash, and follow this up with as much Execute spam asyou can. However, since it is not possible to predict when Colossus Smash willbe available (unlike for Fury Warriors, where it has a fixed 20-secondcooldown), you will have to keep your rage consumption at a minimum outside ofColossus Smash.

1.3.1. Outside Colossus Smash

While Colossus Smash is not active, use the following priority for yourrotation:

1. Use Mortal Strike.
2. Use Execute if your rage is above 80.
3. Use Overpower (all Overpowers within 10 seconds of having used Execute are free of cost).
4. Use Dragon Roar.
5. Use Impending Victory.
6. Use Battle Shout or Commanding Shout.

As soon as Colossus Smash is available, you should use it.

1.3.2. During Colossus Smash

During Colossus Smash, your rotation is as follows:

1. Use Mortal Strike.
2. Use Execute.
3. Use Overpower (free of cost after having used Execute).

2. Multiple Target Rotation↑top

When facing two enemies, you should keep up Sweeping Strikes and execute a single target rotation. You shouldcast Mortal Strike alternatively on both targets, to maintain Deep Wounds on both of them (or you can use Thunder Clap every15 seconds for the same effect).

When facing three or more enemies, you should:

• Keep up Sweeping Strikes.
• Cast Thunder Clap ever 15 seconds to keep up Deep Wounds onall targets.
• Use Colossus Smash.
• Use Mortal Strike.
• Use Slam.
• Use Battle Shout or Commanding Shout.
• Use Overpower.

Note that while Sweeping Strikes is active, Slam will also deal35% of its damage to any targets within 2 yards of the one hit by Slam. Alwaystry to find the mob that is closest to other mobs within a pack for maximumdamage, assuming one mob does not have a higher kill priority.

Note also that Deep Wounds snapshots your Attack Power and damagemodifiers (including from such abilities as Avatar or Skull Banner),meaning that it does the same damage for its entire duration as it did when itwas applied, even if these factors change. As such, you should be on thelook-out for the best times to re-apply Deep Wounds to take advantage ofthis.

3. Cooldown Usage↑top

As an Arms Warrior, you have several DPS cooldowns. Additionally, you canobtain two more DPS cooldowns from your talents of choice.

• Berserker Rage should be used to help with your Enrage uptime. This is more subtle, and we tackle it in depthin a later section.
• Recklessness should be used as many times as possible throughoutthe encounter. It is ideal to stack it with other cooldowns.
• Skull Banner should be used as many times as possible throughoutthe fight, but keep in mind that the rest of your raid should benefit fromthis as well.
• Shattering Throw is essentially a raid cooldown, so keep in mindthat the rest of your raid should benefit from it as well.

For more details on these cooldowns, as well as on the cooldowns granted toyou by your talents, refer to our detailedcooldown usage section.

4. Stance↑top

Battle Stance grants you a lot of rage with each melee attack youmake, but grants you no rage from damage taken.

Berserker Stance grants you half the rage that Battle Stance does,from your melee attacks, but also grants you rage from damage taken.

Other than this, there is no difference between the stances, and yourabilities are not conditioned at all by your current stance. Therefore, useBerserker Stance when there is high raid damage, and Battle Stanceotherwise.

5. Mastering Your Arms Warrior↑top

The guidelines given above will enable you to play your Arms Warriorwith good results. If you want to push things further and master yourcharacter, then we advise you to continue reading.

5.1. Rage Generation

By default, your rage is generated from two sources:

• Dealing damage with auto attacks.
• Using special abilities that generate rage ( Charge, Mortal Strike, etc.).

Exceptionally, if you are in Berserker Stance, you also generaterage from damage taken.

Your rage is mostly used by abilities in your rotation, although someutility spells also cost rage.

5.2. Opening Rotation

If Dragon Roar is not your Tier 4 talent of choice, fillthe global cooldown with Heroic Throw, and overlap any assignedcooldown for that step with Colossus Smash.

Any abilities on the same line should be used during the same globalcooldown. Cooldowns on the same line as an ability should always beactivated before the spell is cast, so that they may benefit from itseffect.

1. Use your Battle Shout or Commanding Shout and your potion (3seconds before the pull).
2. Begin casting Shattering Throw (1.5 seconds before the pull).
3. Use Charge.
4. Use Mortal Strike.
5. Use Dragon Roar, Bloodbath, and Skull Banner (also use Synapse Springs and your DPS-increasing racial ability, ifapplicable).
6. Use Colossus Smash and Recklessness.
7. Use Slam.
8. Use Mortal Strike.
9. Use Slam.
10. Use Slam.

5.3. Key Concepts

5.3.1. Enrage

Each time you critically strike with Mortal Strike and Colossus Smash, you become enraged, dealing 10% increased physicaldamage for 6 seconds. This will happen passively, so you do not need toconcern yourself with it. Being enraged doubles the healing effect of Enraged Regeneration (if you have taken this talent) so it is advisableto have a way of monitoring this buff.

5.3.2. Colossus Smash

Colossus Smash should be used, primarily, for the debuff which itapplies, and not for its damage. In the 6 seconds after using Colossus Smash,all of your abilities deal significantly more damage.

You should also keep in mind that your Sudden Death passiveability provides you with a 10% chance to reset the cooldown on yourColossus Smash each time you perform an auto attack or have a proc from yourMastery (which basically grants you additional auto attacks). Because thiseffect does not have an internal cooldown, you should use Colossus Smash assoon as possible, when it becomes available, to avoid wasting Sudden Deathprocs.

Finally, you should always wait for the 6-second debuff to wear off beforeusing Colossus Smash again (assuming its cooldown was reset shortly afterusing it), so that the debuffs applied by your subsequent Colossus Smashes donot overlap.

Therefore, you should use Colossus Smash following these guidelines:

• Use as many abilities as possible in the time that the debuff isactive.
• Do not use Colossus Smash while the debuff from the previous ColossusSmash is active. If there are 1.5 seconds or less remaining on theexisting Colossus Smash, you can re-cast it without any real negativeconsequences, though.
• Use Colossus Smash as soon as it is available (provided that the debufffrom the previous one has worn off). You can delay it for a few secondsso that abilities like Mortal Strike come off cooldown or until youhave a lot of rage.

5.3.3. Overpower

Your Overpower ability is normally only usable after one of yourattacks is dodged. Thanks to the Taste for Blood passive ability, ArmsWarriors can gain additional Overpowers. Each time Mortal Strike dealsdamage, you gain two Overpowers (you can have up to a maximum of 5 Overpoweruses stacked up in this way).

Using Overpower reduces the cooldown of Mortal Strike by 0.5seconds.

Finally, each time you use Execute, all Overpowers used within 10seconds are free of rage cost.

5.3.4. Sunder Armor

If no one else in your raid is providing the Sunder Armor debuff,then you should do so yourself. All you need to do is apply it at the startof the fight, after which Colossus Smash should always refresh it(thanks to Glyph of Colossus Smash). If there is a Feral or GuardianDruid, or a Protection Warrior, then the uptime of the debuff ispractically guaranteed.

5.4. Detailed Cooldown Usage

5.4.1. Recklessness

There is no great subtlety to using Recklessness. Simply make sureto use it as many times as possible during the encounter, and try to stack itwith as many other cooldowns as possible (especially with Skull Banner and Heroism/ Bloodlust/ Time Warp).

If you are under the effects of Recklessness, and inside a Colossus Smash window, the priority of Slam increases (moving above Overpower), since much of the extra critical strike chance fromRecklessness is wasted on Overpower (which already has a 60% chance to be acritical strike).

5.4.2. War Banners

Skull Banner is by far the most important of your banners. While weadvise to always use it together with Recklessness (and Avatar, should you chose that talent), you must keep in mind that itis an extremely powerful raid buff. As such, if there is a time when yourraid would benefit more from using the cooldown, than you would by stacking itwith your other cooldowns, you should put the raid's best interests first.

Demoralizing Banner is also a raid cooldown of sorts, although it isa fairly weak one. You should coordinate with your raid leader, or at leastwith your tanks, in order to figure out the best time to use it.

Mocking Banner is mostly useless in PvE raids, but it could havesome merit against adds.

5.4.3. Berserker Rage

Berserker Rage is a very powerful DPS cooldown, especially sowhen you consider that it only has a 30-second cooldown. Berserker Rage mustbe considered together with Enrage.

Their effects do not stack, so using Berserker Rage while Enrage is activeis a waste. As such, you should keep in mind that Enrage will proc off Mortal Strike and Colossus Smash critical strikes, and adjustyour Berserker Rage usage accordingly:

• Always make sure that you are enraged while under the effects ofColossus Smash (6-second debuff). If the Colossus Smash itself did not procan enrage, then you will be presented with the following two posibilities:
  • The Mortal Strike which you used before Colossus Smash did not proc Enrage,in which case you should use Berserker Rage immediately afterColossus Smash.
  • The Mortal Strike which you used before Colossus Smash procced an Enrage,in which case you should use Berserker Rage as soon as this Enrageexpires.
• Try to maximise the optime of your enrage state. The safest way of makingsure that your enrages do not stack is to always wait until after a Mortal Strike- Colossus Smash sequence, and if neither resultedin an Enrage proc, using Berserker Rage.

5.4.4. Shattering Throw

Shattering Throw is a raid cooldown above all else. As such, youshould always prioritise your raid's best interests when determining the timeto use this ability. We advise that you consult with your raid leader, as wellas with other Warriors. Most of the time, however, you will prefer to castthis ability right as the boss is being pulled, since it costs no rage.

5.4.5. Tier 4 Talents

Shockwave and Dragon Roar are both valuable when usedagainst a single target, despite the fact that they are designed with multipletargets in mind. As such, no matter what you choose, you should incorporate itinto your rotation by using it on cooldown.

Bladestorm is a slight DPS loss against a single target. As such,though, it should only be taken and used when you can benefit from one of itsother effects.

Consider the multiple target properties of these abilities, andif there is a situation that is suited for them, try to save them for thattime. For example, if a pack of adds is just about to spawn, it is fine todelay your ability slightly so as to make better use of it (or to make use ofit at all, in the case of Bladestorm).

5.4.6. Tier 6 Talents

Avatar should be stacked with Recklessness and Skull Banner at all times. Additionally, you should try to make surethat you use Berserker Rage while Avatar is active.

Bloodbath should be used on cooldown.

Storm Bolt should be used on cooldown. Due to its short cooldown, itwill essentially become part of your rotation.

5.5. Cooldown Reduction Trinkets

If you have a cooldown reduction trinket, this will reduce the cooldowns ofyour Tier 4 and 6 talents, Heroic Leap, Recklessness, Die by the Sword, and Shield Wall. This leads to a few changes in theway some of these abilities should be used.

Dragon Roar should be used on cooldown (either before or after a Colossus Smash window, but never during).

Recklessness should be used in different ways depending on howlarge the cooldown reduction is (this is determined by the item level ofyour trinket). If your Recklessness cooldown is greatly reduced, allowingyou to use it every 2 minutes, then you should use it (after the initial use)at the 2-minute mark, and you should save your Skull Banner and use ittogether with Recklessness again at the 4-minute mark. If yourRecklessness cooldown is greater than 2 minutes and (roughly) 15 seconds,then you are better off using it together with Skull Banner at the3-minute mark.

In order to reduce the cooldown of Recklessness by enough to make itviable to use every 2 minutes, you will need a Flexible raid version of Evil Eye of Galakras with 2/2 item upgrades performed on it, orbetter.

Finally, if the cooldown of Storm Bolt is around 21.5 seconds, thenyou should delay it by a single global cooldown so that it can be your firstability inside a Colossus Smash window.

6. Changelog↑top

• 20 Oct. 2013: Added opening rotation section.
• 15 Oct. 2013: Made several improvements to the updated versionof the guide (most notably tweaking the single target and AoE rotationsections), and added a section regarding cooldown reduction trinkets.
• 13 Oct. 2013: Made several updates following Jalopy's review.
  • Revamped the single target rotation.
  • Removed the Deep Wounds section since it was completelyunnecessary.
  • Added a mention that it is mostly ideal to use Shattering Throw atthe pull.
• 12 Sep. 2013: Patch 5.4 update.
  • No immediate changes, although we are investigating a possible changethat simplifies that single-target rotation.
• 20 May 2013: Patch 5.3 update: nothing to change.
• 07 May 2013: Added mention that Dragon Roar should be usedoutside of Colossus Smash when the boss is below 20% health.
• 04 May 2013: Revamped the single target and multiple targetrotation.
• 04 Mar. 2013: Patch 5.2 update.
  • Removed mentions of Deadly Calm, following its removal from thegame.
  • Adjusted rotation section to account for various changes made to ArmsWarrior mechanics: updated the way Taste for Blood and Sudden Deathwork, as well as other minor adjustments.