Sakuragi's Warrior Guide

UNDER CONSTRUCTION

The Mathematics of Threat Generation

The takeaway here is that you want fast weapons with good ratios that also proc high-threat spells, while getting as much haste and dexterity as possible. If you are allergic to math, skip this section.

As a warrior, your primary means of generating threat is by beating on said monster. Every time you swing your weapon, hit or miss, you will generate WeaponDamage+DamageBonus aggro. Some examples:

 * L40 Warrior with a  Short Sword of the Ykesha in the mainhand: 8+5 = 13 hate per swing
 * L40 Warrior with a  Short Sword of the Ykesha in the mainhand: 8+0 = 8 hate per swing
 * L60 Warrior with a  Blade of Strategy in the mainhand: 14+11 = 25 hate per swing
 * L60 Warrior with a  Blade of Tactics in the offhand: 14+0 = 14 hate per swing

This means that as you level up and increase your damage bonus, fast weapons generate relatively more hate than slow weapons. A 9/18 Jade Mace is actually putting out more melee hate per second (ratio (9+11)/18 = 1.11) than the Blade of Strategy (ratio (14+11)/24 = 1.05).

Your secondary means of generating threat is by equipping a weapon that procs a spell. Your chance to proc is dependent purely on your dexterity: the game computes the number of procs per minute you get (0.5 + 1.5 (dex/255) for the mainhand, half that for the offhand) and then distributes them over your swings. Some examples:

 * 255 dex, 60 delay weapon, 10 swings per minute, 20% chance to proc per swing
 * 255 dex, 30 delay weapon with 100% haste, 40 swings per minute, 5% chance to proc per swing

It's not that hard to put these together (along with estimates for dual wield, double/triple attack, and so on) into a spreadsheet that lets you figure out the estimated aggro for each pair of weapons. Some results (at Level 60, 255 dexterity, 100% haste):

Primary	Secondary	Damage/sec	Hate/sec
Sceptre of Destruction	Sceptre of Destruction	78	98
Feverblade, Bane of the Shissar	Sword of the Shissar	68	90
Willsapper	Blade of Strategy	68	80
Blade of Strategy	Sword of the Shissar	63	79
Veldrak's Short Sword	Veridix's Shortblade	60	79
Blade of the Black Dragon Eye	Ringed Mace of the Ykesha	57	78
Blade of the Black Dragon Eye	Dagas	60	70
Ringed Mace of the Ykesha	Ringed Mace of the Ykesha	52	70
Blade of Strategy	Blade of Tactics	62	66
Sarnak Warhammer	Silken Whip of Ensnaring	54	65
Ykeshan War Club	Ykeshan War Club	44	64
Sebilite Croaking Dirk	Fist of Zek	63	50
Bloodpoint	Bloodpoint	54	49

Don't take these numbers as exact; I'm using data from my tests which seem to indicate that damage is 1 hate per, debuffs are 550 hate, stuns are 500, and poison/disease procs are 750. You can see the testing thread at http://www.project1999.org/forums/showthread.php?t=120110

Anyway, it may not be obvious, but these are actually pretty solid numbers. For example:

Player	Hate/sec	Epic Monk + Stave of Shielding	55
Shaman chaining Turgur's Insects 550 hate/9 seconds !! 61
Epic Warrior !! 66
Wizard chaining Sunstrike 1615 hate / 9.25 seconds !! 175