When I get my recently aquired nimble-foot treads enchanted with agility, I'll be converting all of my red and yellow sockets into +4 agi +4 hit (barring the ones I need for defense and comboing to have 5 blue so my meta gem works) That really is the beauty of sockets.

A word of warning about stacking dodge, I run over 50% avoidance in raids most of the time, so long as I can't be 2-shot (high enough hp/armor) this really is the best method for overall mitigation... However, you will run into strings where you get missed 5 times in a row, and don't land a single auto-attack either, and you're suddenly at <10 rage. This is currently my biggest problem on Gruul as the OT, and have taken to standing in the cave-ins when under 50 rage just so I can stay above the other melee. Next attempt I'm going to try my higher armor gear so I get hit more, but for less.

Boevis, how do you stand versus rogue gear in bearform?
What I mean with that is, do you think http://www.wowhead.com/?item=30942, can be replaced by http://www.wowhead.com/?item=28750 filled with 2 agility sockets for example?
The reason why I ask is that I am wondering if it's possible to make a set which is good for both cat and bear (off-tanking). I take it I'd get pounded to dead if I used that belt on magtheridon's adds though.

If you want a good Bear/Cat set, stack agility. Offtanks typically don't have to handle spike damage, so you can skip a bit on HP and stack armor/agility. Agility is an excellent DPS and Tanking stat, especially since crit has recently become a hot druid stat because it helps keeping up DPS cycles with Primal Fury (especially important now when druids have to keep Mangle up as well) in addition to Predatory Instinct which adds damage on crits.

Y'know, on the subject of druid gear... I'm wondering if anyone shares my thoughts on this - it's been touched on briefly by various people on quite a number of threads, but not really ever planted out in a concise description...

Whereas for most classes, effectiveness scales pretty much with item budget (barring stupid design decisions like dodge on rogue raid gear), druids seem to be able to squeeze the most utility out of the smallest item budgets possible.

Two very obvious examples would, of course, be how much armor benefits tanking vs its item budget (lolgreens!), and how much cat dps gets out of Str+Agi itemization compared to other classes.

To a lesser extent, Sta benefits druids a healthy amount more than other tanks, as does Agi->dodge. Our Agi->crit ratio is ridiculously good for both threat generation and cat dps.

What I mean to say is, if you were to give each class a template set of item budget for each slot, and gave them free reign to allocate the budget to whatever stats they want, most classes would come up with a min/maxed set of gear that are pretty comparable in effectiveness; except the druid set, which would pull out waaay, way ahead in terms of resulting numbers.

I think, to quite a large extent, this is why we don't really see much feral-itemized epics (yet, anyway, other than Zierhut/Chess neck/Windslayer Wraps) and end up making do with socketable rogue gear. Also, take T4/T5 for example... it's not that druids get much out of Int/Spi other than utility, but more that druids scale too well with item budget, hence some "wasteage" goes into those stats as a design consideration.

Now granted, T4/T5's 'nerf' in those regards were probably overdone, and are pretty crud for tanking due to the armor values. We'll see how they're adjusted in 2.1.0, I guess.

Basically, the point I'm trying to get across in the jumble of text above is more or less, from the item design crew's perspective, is that for most classes ilvl represents the power of the gear when itemized as best as possible, while for druids, the itemization *HAS* to be neutered somewhat to prevent druids from scaling way ahead of other classes.

Thoughts on this?

Currently I'm sitting on 2.7k AP unbuffed, and 31%ish crit unbuffed. I doubt any other class can get even close. I'm using some of the best items (windslayer wraps, zierhuts, terestians staff) but it's still pretty ridiculous considering I'm using the primalstrike set (not bad for us, but not perfect), midnight leggings (also not bad but could be better certainly), and the stealthers helm (pretty far off perfect but still damned good). If everything was perfectly itemised I wouldn't be surprised if you could push a good 3k ap and 35% crit. I'm attempting to get my hands on a second t4 helm (already got one for tanking, yes i'm a loot whore) and I wouldn't mind a second set of the shoulders although I'm pretty much certain that won't happen for a good while. I also don't agree with most people who say t4 isn't so good for tanking, apart from the gloves. The chest, as an example, still has over 400 armour and can get 48 stamina with gems (assuming you go x+6, x+6 and 12 to get the socket bonuses), has 30 agility which is 2.5% dodge (+any from the x gems), and the 4 piece makes up for the slightly less armour on say the legs compared to ash tempered - obviously 4 piece is pretty hard to get right now, but it should still be taken in to consideration (and ended up getting a passive buff from the bear armour nerf).

So yeah, I agree with you that itemisation might make druids slightly out of control in both damage and tanking terms if we had perfect setups that weren't hybrid-ised (like t4/5)

For me anyway, when raid buffed, the Girdle with 2 Agi gems works out to be .3% better than Manimals for overall mitigation, and has more sta. The higher AP/Crit it provides should more than make up for the loss in rage from the extra dodge.

I personally think our overpowered returns from Armor are why there isn't a +Armor Gem, Blizzard wants direct control over that aspect of druids. A +Armor gem would, for the record, be around +80 Armor.

I personally think Bear is the only form that scales too well compared to other classes. Cat cares little (but still slightly) about our Agi:odge conversion, and really needs the +AP weapons and Str scaling in order to compete with other classes. Moonkin Scaling is terrible (+int, and more +int ... oh wait +dmg is still better every time!) and Resto scaling is on par though the tree is horribly bloated still.

Bearform on the other hand, when tanking gets simply overpowered returns as you stated. Between Armor being so very cheap, our +50% Scaling on Stamina, and the piece de resistance Agility. As soon as Blizzard gave us megadodge(tm) we started stacking Agi quite a bit, which also means more Crit. Compare Primal Fury with a Warrior's Unbridled Wrath, I get on average 2 rage per second from PF a 2 point talent. Warriors get on average .5 rage per second from a 5 point talent. UW is horribly underpowered compared to their other talents, yet for DPS they don't really have any other choice for their 6-10 Fury talent points, I compare it to our Improved Mark of the Wild for resto - a terrible talent that you take anyway from lack of options.

Just finished off heroic Botanica. Very very painful...

But it was so worth it! Feral staff of lashing didn't drop, but we got a +6 stam +10 AP gem that's almost as good!oneone eleven!!1





No-one wanted the gem.




But atleast I know it's doable now.

Last night finally made it back into Kara after being really sick, and everything seemed fine until the prince.

We wiped around a total of 6 times. 3 of them involved me being 1 rounded.

Especially the attached gem. I've never felt more impotent at tanking then I did last night. Fully potted out, near optimal pieces in every slot, and it still didn't matter. I was at full health, after just getting healed with 3 massive heals, then the prince just winds up and 2 shots me through 16k life 22k armor 37% dodge.

In related news, My warrior dinged 65 last night.

16K life seems awfully low to me for doing prince. Ironically, the second I broke 17.3.k life, I've never died to spikes unless the healers have to move. He wasn't treating our well gear warrior any better.

We wiped for several times against prince when we had a flasked warrior tanking chugging stoneshields. The next time we went back we brought a druid tank and one shotted him. The time after that we had two dps classes die early on but still one shotted him with a druid tank

Huh, if he landed all three, and all three were crushing (that's how I'm interpreting SCT in the screenie anyway) if he landed those on a warrior with shield block up, they'd read something like 5k (blocked) 4.7k (blocked) and then 7.5k crushing. How's that any better?

Seems to me just a really unlucky string of rolls.

And, getting on the bandwagon, Malchezaar is one of the fights I feel much safer with a druid over a warrior.

Edit: Wait, not SCT. Damn newfangled mods.

I'd agree with you, but it kept happening all night. Unless it was just the unluckiest string of attempts ever, it was just painful. After the 4th time in a row it happened to us, we kinda threw in the towel. Came back tonight and it was easy sauce with a warrior.
Was just the first time I've felt that impotent tanking ever. I had more confidence tanking patchwerk then I did that night trying to tank Prince. Pre nerf, I tanked him with ease over and over again. Bad things just kept happening over and over again it made me sad.

I find this a bit odd. For various reasons I missed 3 weeks from TBC launch and my first outing to Karazhan was recently to a half-completed instance with Prince to kill. My gear was far from optimal at the time (apart from the requisite 415 defence) and I never felt like I was in any danger from him. For me the most inconvenient part of the fight was staring at my own backside from 3 yards because I was jammed up against the wall and having to move the camera around to be able to see (go Blizz intelligent encounter design )

The best bit is, with Moonkin form, you can actually solo worth a damn and amuse yourself with a bit of DEE PEE ESS on trash pulls.

Who'd have thought TBC would usher in the age of the moonkin?

I hope resto talk is also welcome in this thread. I was wondering about your thoughts about the best 5 man healing spec (not raiding at the moment). As it stands now I'm ToL specced and while it is decent I feel like I'm using it less and less. I cannot handle burst damage or decurse/abolish poison so at this point I'm only using it at boss fights were there is no burst damage but more of an endurance fight.

I was thinking of changing build to something like this:
http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=MxcrziccZZxxcxxqMco

I would lose some HoT power, mostly rejuv and my regrowth would not crit as much. On the other hand Lunar glow and Moonglow would improve my HT more and HT spam might be need later when I start doing heroic instances. Any thoughts?

Also a question about downranking, is it worth it it still? I'm sitting around 1000 +healing now and will probably improve it to around 1200 soon. Any suggestions how I should downrank for it to be worth it?

Perhaps take out a few points from Tranquil Spirit / Living Spirit, get one in NGrace & Imp Rejuv

Directly, no, but since our AP is high to make up for our lack of weapon dps, they can indeed get close. Rogue in my guild sitting at maybe 1400-1500 AP and 33% crit has an 81 dps dagger, which translates to over 1k AP, putting hm at 2500, and he's still got a decent amount of upgrades ahead. Not a very large gap.

I'm kind of upset with myself; long ago I won my guild's first piece of T4 off Curator, which I rolled on because I was enthralled by the 2-piece set bonus I wished to acquire. When I went to get the item, the stats, which I'd forgotten, disappointed me and I started to feel guilt, considering I easily chose my Verdant Gloves over them for tanking, and would have considered it for Cat except for the hybrid stats and the desire to avoid looking like a loot whore for taking them without wearing them.

If the armor got bumped up to where I could ditch the Verdant, maybe I'd feel better about it, but as it stands now most of the pieces are hybrid Cat, not optimal for tanking and even not optimal from a pure cat DPS standpoint compared to items like Windslayer's.

Then again anybody looking at Hunter Tier 5 would feel better about their sets by a longshot, so...

I think it's just your hp total. For us as a guild, we noticed, just keeping the tanks (both warriors and druids) with over 17K life means the tank rarely dies as long as your healers don't drool. With the speed he attacks, you'd have to have one hell of a tank if he could pop shield wall/last stand between the 2nd and 3rd crushing while keeping up with his CD's. It's the design of the fight, not the faults of the tanks IMO.

Personally, with the new lacerate and mangle, I feel like a damn good replacement for a warrior in any situation except for bloody fears (damn you fear ward). My threat can still match or exceed our MT and I mitigate physical as well as he does.

Actually I think it's to make up for our weapon speed. Cat dps is severely hampered by the 1.00 second attack speed multiplier for our instants. At least dagger rogues get a 1.6? modifier.

The multipliers on mangle and shred are what make up for our 1.0 attack speed really.


I've taken to the dark side and specced moonkin for grinding and some occasional pvp. While I only have like 550ish spell damage it works pretty well.

The more I think about it, you're probably right. I've gone well over 20k pre patch, and I really got into a mindset about pure mitigation and let my hp slide a lot, like Boevis has been doing. It was just painfully obvious on prince that my hp wasnt cutting it.

Help me out here if you could. I noticed a druid chatting in guild chat the other day about tanking and I asked him what his defense was. He said something like 360. I said you should probably get that up to 490. He said 2 thing that puzzled which I hoped you could help me with.

A - defense doesn't do as much for druids as it does for warriors so it's not as important.

B - I don't get crit that much anyway.

Do druids use a different sort of stat makeup to be ready for tanking then warriors? Is it going to signifigantly harder for a druid to reach 490 defense? Doesn't defense rating change between NE form and bear form and cat form?