[WoW]Stud or Pud?

[Old Geezer]

I'm not interested in absolutely optimizing my character to within an inch of his life.

But I don't want to suck, either.

Behold. (http://www.wowarmory.com/character-sheet.xml?r=Moon+Guard&cn=Parzival&gn=Templari+Benadictus)

[Jigglypuff]

I'm not good with paladins but I can see a few things..

The Shard of Afrasa should go. If you can get the group quest trinket from Hellfire peninsula. I can't remember the name of it but you have to kill the elite in the pools of agamaur.

Unless you're holy no spell power. As prot you want to gear as a warrior would. This means Str, Sta being good choices.

I'm also not sure how prot levels these days. If it works for you that's ok but I know my level 48 ret paladin rips through everything.

[Korror]

Oooo Soulforge, it's been years since I've seen someone wearing that. You're certainly going to replace everything you have over the course of the next 8 levels so I wouldn't stress too much about gear. Just grab the warrior plate with lots of strength and stamina and you'll be fine.

Your gyphs are chosen oddly. Glyph of holy light is really useful for a holy paladin but not much use for a protection paladin like yourself. Glyph of Righteous Defense might look good but really increasing the chance to hit on your taunt is only useful for special raid encounters where you really have to land a taunt or the whole raid wipes. Replace them with the gylphs for Hammer of the Righteous and Divine Plea which will be more useful to you soloing and in groups.

Your talents could use some minor adjusting but not too much. Basically, you want to have everything from the 6th row down maxxed out, those talents are all valuable and you want every one of them. You could free up some spare points in your lower ranked talents and reassign them to the stuff towards the end of the tree.

[Harwel]

Ret is hugely better for leveling these days. It's not even close really. Prot can slowly grind stuff down, but ret just blows shit the fuck up. If you enjoy prot, it's certainly viable, but it'll be slower. Casters and healers will give you more trouble as well, since bursting them down pretty hard to do as prot. Prot does have an advantage in soloing group quests though. If you want to stay prot, make sure to have Guarded by the Light maxed at level 71 and keep Divine Plea up at all times. Your mana bar with thank you for it.

Your gear choices aren't bad and I know trinkets are hard to get early game, but I would really focus on Hellfire Peninsula and Zangarmarsh quests, because you can replace a lot of your gear with stuff that's far better. Focus on Strength / Attack Power (and crit if ret) and then Stamina. Each expansion jumps substantially in quality of gear, so really for "optimal" you should leave the old world behind at 58 and Outland behind at 68 (ie as soon as possible).

[Old Geezer]

Okay, thanks.

Just for folks' info,

1) Don't really care about leveling. This character is almost two years old to get to Level 61.

2) I never play solo, I always play with my wife's L61 Hunter who does the hurting while I do the standing.

3) We've only just started in Hellfire. We have a few more quests to wrap up in Eastern Plaguelands. We've been having fun semi-role playing our progress. I can see that I'll be getting a lot of new gear soon, so I'm not sweating it. I had found the Lightforge bracers on the AH for about 5 gold, so I did the quest to swap 'em out.

4) I think the glyphs are chosen by "this is what my warlock with enscribing can make". I haven't looked at my glyphs in probably 20 levels. I use the Glyph of Holy Light because when my wife's hunter and I are adventuring together I'm the healer, and it's been handy. I'll give it a second look.

[Rupert]

I'm not interested in absolutely optimizing my character to within an inch of his life.

But I don't want to suck, either.

Behold. (http://www.wowarmory.com/character-sheet.xml?r=Moon+Guard&cn=Parzival&gn=Templari+Benadictus)

I'd move points out of Divinity and into Divine Strength, and also get Guarded by the Light ASAP (it will end any mana issues you might've had), and also move points into Anticipation. Next, start putting points into deflection (in the Retribution tree) and then put a point into Improved Judgements. This will make your ability cooldowns fit together much more pleasantly, making using them easier and more effective.

For serious tanking you'll want to look at tanking gear, which has Defense, parry, dodge, etc. on it. For being a tanky type when out duoing with a partner, DPS plate will be fine - stuff like the Fel Iron gear you're starting to equip, with Strength, Stamina, and DPS stats like Hit and Crit. However, aside from the odd elite that WoW thinks you should have 3-5 people for, outside of instances about the only hard things are self-inflicted - things like attacking mobs many levels higher than you, or pulling huge piles of them. Thus, perfect gearing is less important than picking up gear you like (though I don't recommend using Mirren's Drinking Hat for tanking).

[Harwel]

Guarded by the Light ASAP (it will end any mana issues you might've had

Won't matter until 71, which is when you get Divine Plea. "ASAP" not needed. It's kind of a waste of talent points prior to 71. Of course, I would want it maxed as soon as I hit 71.

[Rupert]

Good point.

[hkgirl91]

I'm guessing the russet cloth gear and the hood is a dress-up social gearset? I'd rather like to see a screenshot of Parzival in his social gear.

[Old Geezer]

This has been illuminating.

There are some tweaks I could make, but apparently no "OH DEAR GOD NO!!!" aspects...