Warrior "buff" in 2.1: not what we are expecting?

[Garnatian]

lolwut?

WAR...
-Takes more damage
-Requires more healing
-Does comparable damage & threat on a single target (generally within 10%)
-Has a much harder time of sustained AoE threat generation
-Has far worse CDs (and still will)
-Has less utility (and still will)

WAR still will...
-Have a more complex core rotation to maximize threat, DPS, and buff/debuff uptime. It will be less forgiving of errors for optimal play, and even with optimal play will yield basically equal results to PLD as it is now.
-Have inferior baseline mitigation, which should be balanced by a more usable Inner Beast.
-Require more external healing, before accounting for Inner Beast.
-Suffer from inferior burst mitigation.
-Have a less user-friendly AoE threat generation tool.
-Have inferior CDs.
-Lack a Silence ability.
-Remain on par with PLD, by and large, for DPS whether main tanking or not.

Quite honestly I'm excited, as I'll actually have a reason to play WAR instead of PLD 24/7. Both classes will be useful and have their own advantages and disadvantages. The balance will be much closer than it is currently.

My biggest concern is the relative uptime of -20% DR buff from Inner Beast vs. Rampart. With optimal play WAR will have a considerable advantage, although the nature of the mechanisms does help counterbalance that. WAR will not be able to gain its DR buff prior to an alpha strike, and requires much more precise timing to use IB for burst mitigation compared to PLD with Rampart.

The devil will naturally be in the details, but at the end of the day PLD will still be far easier to play optimally, have better utility (on-demand Stun + a Silence), have much better burst mitigation, have more usable AoE threat generation, and instead of just outclassing WAR at all times in all situations, you'll have a compelling reason to consider using both tank classes depending on the situation.

You're correct that WAR takes more damage per GCD, however it does not require more Healing per GCD.

The passive mitigation will be approx. a flat 7~10% thanks to Storm's Path and Inner Beast.

Complex? No. Use Butcher combo until "safety-net" threat achieved, then use Storm's Path combo. Inner Beast at 5 stacks. That's it, that is not complex.

Inferior CDs? Yes, but superior active mitigation in the form of Inner Beast and Storm's Path.

Suffer from burst? No. Holmgang. Smaller CD, cannot die.

Silence? Irrelevant from a Tanking perspective.