Retaliation


 * Don't think of it as retaliation. Think of it as instant punishment.

Retaliation is a warrior ability, trained at level 62 for. For a short time, any frontal melee attacks will be met with a vicious counterattack. Its obviousness, however, makes it easy to counter.

Functionality
Retaliation is a self-buff that costs no Rage. It has a 5 minute cooldown. While it is active, the first 20 melee attacks taken from the front will result in an instant counterattack with your weapon. It has a very obvious animation making its usefulness in PvP hinge on the opponents knowledge of the ability as many opponents will simply stop attacking the warrior when they see the spinning blades—this however could be viewed as a defensive advantage.

Tips and Tactics

 * Before the implementation of its animation this was one of your most powerful abilities, now it is at best of marginal utility in PvE. The counterattacks from Retaliation are not instant attacks, they are normal swings. Because of this, Retaliation is most powerful when used with an extremely slow two-handed weapon.
 * Although it has a cap on how many counterattacks you can make, it is higher than your average mob will trigger in a fight. So, this skill is best used against multiple enemies, particularly if they attack quickly.
 * Warrior-Tanks can greatly benefit from Retaliation's multiple target threat. As of Patch 4.2.0, Retaliation no longer has a stance requirement, so there is no longer a need for tanks to stance dance in order to benefit from this ability.