Yes. It takes a buff slot of your character. The stack keep going then after the timer is up it fades away, and it has a 3 min cooldown.

I see it as a PvP item, since it has such a long cooldown and the mob may not have much armor left with Sunder, CoR, and Faerie Fire. However, I guess it has the "cool" color ;).

badge isn't a debuff - it's a self-buff, and it stacks with sunder. it apparently procs alot when active, and i've been told it adds significant damage. i don't have one myself, though, and it doesn't seem like it would be as good as earthstrike if you're willing to put in the time for that.

we've gotten a lot of DFTs - 4 to rogues, 3 to hunters, 1 to a warrior, and 1 to a druid, i believe. i do agree that rogues make better use of it generally speaking, but the additional itemization options it opens for hunters are really significant. without it i wouldn't be able to actually wear full striker's in a raid setting without gimping my other slots with +hit gear. i've heard the argument that it's 'only an 8 AP upgrade' for hunters because of how it compares to the DM trinket, but being able to wear striker's garb and ring of the godslayer over DS/band of accuria, etc, is much more significant than an 8 ap upgrade.

We have a fury warrior with the Badge (conveniently for him, on the same timer as Fankriss' Fetish) and he reports that it does stack with Sunder, and it doesn't take up any debuff slots. The user gains personal penetration buffs, so you don't have to worry about the stack resetting. Its important to note that you have to spent part of your 30-sec window building the stack up the 6, and the stack disappears when the 30-sec use-window ends.

Not just the off-hand. The best tanking weapon is a level 43 epic staff. The best tanking trinkets are a enchanting trinket (that you can get in your mid-50's by running through BRD to the Black Forge) and an UBRS quest reward.

:socar:


Oaken, I wouldn't call Warden Staff the best tanking weapon anymore. If you want to tank well you have to be able to hold aggro, which is a lot tougher on an item that gives nothing in that regard. The only time I pull it out anymore is on post-Emps trash because healers like to watch me die so the added armor is needed :)

Oh hey feral druid derail :toot:

the best pure mitigation weapon is a level 43 epic staff, yes, but it's by no means the best tanking weapon. bear hate scales purely with damage, and warden staff provides zero attack power. if you actually want to tank, the AQ hammer is by far the best . if you're just trying to survive getting hit, warden staff is the best. if you're running a flag in warsong, it's warden staff across the field and BQWH when you dig in for a standoff so you can actually kill the mages who come to nuke you.

Our stats are 9 drops... 1 warrior, 1 hunter, 7 rogues. It seems unlikely for a low-man hunter like myself to ever see one in his character panel.

Is there another passive trinket to which hunters can aspire?

We do have more itemization holes than any other class, though most of the slots have been filled by AQ

As a mage, you don't have any slots where you still have to use blues from 5/10 man dungeons as your optimal item.

As we say in our AQ Raids "Free the Ferals".

passive trinket, no. the best passive trinkets for hunters other than DFT are the standard royal seal/blackhand's breadth combo. clickable trinkets seem to be the norm nowadays, especially seeing slayer's crest coming out of naxx (drool). earthstrike is really your best bet. i haven't actually done a damage comparison of ZHM to blackhand's breadth or royal seal, but it seems like rotating ZHM/earthstrike could give you solid results.

and 7 rogues? dear me.

Only because Blizzard hasn't figured out that the Dragon's Finger of <whatever> is so blatantly overpowered. <_<

Well they don't drop anymore (Ones with more than 19 +damage), so they may have an idea what is going on.

Yeah, on newer servers greens aren't the best. The wand situation for most servers pretty silly though.

Cold Snap is actually decent for an epic wand, but most of the new ones are junk for mages.

I treasure my +23 to fire damage green wand in the hope someday I'll actually spec fire... :)

Whoops- Yea, you're right. Maybe they did figure out. :)