I did a run of Shado-Pan monastery earlier today, making it the second dungeon I've run in the Beta, along with Temple of the Jade Serpent (Stormstout Brewery was already open, and Mogu'shan Palace also opened up with the latest build that brought Shado-Pan.)
The dungeon itself, despite a few missing models and some slightly confusing mechanics in the last stretch of trash (though I loved the last boss fight,) is pretty cool, but I've been thinking a lot about tanking.
The thought these days is that threat is a given. My experience did not exactly reflect that. Despite keeping Consecration down at all times and hitting Hammer of the Righteous on cooldown (and Holy Wrath) I was still losing aggro, sometimes even on single targets.
I think a big part of the problem is that the current supercharged version of Vengeance along with the ultra-buffed Righteous Fury (or equivalent stances/forms) are really the only threat-boosters we still have. There were many passive damage buffs that we, as Prot Paladins, take today on live. We get boosts to our critical strike chances, and just flat buffs to the damage of Crusader Strike. Shield of the Righteous on live is, thanks to Sacred Duty, more often a crit than not.
Now, I realize that they want us to focus more on defense (even if I think they've done a pretty uninspiring job making it compelling so far) but it in a sense that almost seems to suggest that we should have those passive effects more than we do now. If threat is meant to be something you don't worry about, what's the harm in giving us big crits? I'd love to have Sacred Duty back, and some passive crit bonuses.
The other reason for this is that tanks need more damage while soloing. I realize that Dual-specs mean you can play a dps spec while solo, but I leveled up 10-80 as Protection, dammit, and I think that people shouldn't be discouraged from learning their spec out in the world before trying out with others.
Anyway, moving on:
Brewmasters are starting to take shape rather nicely. One major improvement is that Stagger is no longer just a weird kind of Block. Instead, all physical damage you take is Staggered. You then have a debuff that goes from green to red as your Stagger damage gets higher. I imagine I'll create a Power Aura that goes off when Stagger goes red so I can use Purifying Brew. It's a great solution to keep Brewmasters from being the most spiky tank, and the Mastery has been changed to provide Parry (which you won't find on leather) as well as increasing the damage that is staggered, which starts at 30%.
On a low-level Monk (level 28, I think) Guard seems to be lasting its full duration even on boss fights, but I'm sure that at high levels it's more of a Power Word Shield-level damage shield, designed more for the big boss blasts. While I'm not a fan of the current 30-second Holy Shield, the fact that Guard protects against all damage, I'm willing to like it a bit more. Used as a true "pre-super punch" ability it makes a decent amount of sense.
And Keg Smash is back to an 8-yard range. The only weird thing about Keg Smash versus Dizzying Haze is that KS puts Weakened Blows on the target, but not DH. I'd just tie Weakened Blows to DH, much the way it is to Blood Plague, and make it so that regardless of which ability is used, it still puts the debuff up. As it is now, if I pull with Dizzying Haze (the ability) I still feel that I have to use Keg Smash for Weakened Blows, despite the fact that I'm applying Dizzying Haze (the debuff) to enemies who literally just got it.
Breath of Fire is awesome.
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