Thanks, Exewut, for the link to rapidshare. I uploaded my spreadsheet here:

http://rapidshare.com/files/32002461...ulator_TBC.xls

Filefront took over 6 hours, so I left it waiting overnight. When I checked this morning, the request was denied because there was no description attached. You'd think they would either 1) let you know in advance that a file description has to be included, or 2) immediately deny the share request if the description field is missing.

Anyway, let me know if you have problems downloading from the rapidshare link.

I haven't been playing for some time however I was intersted to see the changes for druid tanks in 2.1

I updated my original spreadsheet using the "Updated in 2.1" filter on wowhead

Its on google spreadsheets here: http://spreadsheets.google.com/pub?k...xRcD0exjiGsLEw

And at rapidshare at: http://rapidshare.com/files/32012011...rT21a.xls.html

To get the most out of the sheet - use the outfit compare columns (put an X in the column for the item you want to wear of that class)

A quick look suggests that there are actually viable upgrade paths for most of the "quest blues & greens" that increase our mitigation / soak.

I have been looking at gearing up and like I have mentioned before have been using gurgle's list as my bible per say.

Obviously Stamina is good and the more health you have the better. Which leads me to a quick spec question. Is LoTP or rather Imp LoTP worth specing into? I mean at 10k health thats what 400 health returned and is only possible every 6 secs.. Two points for that?

iLotP contributes a pretty solid amount of healing over the course of a particular fight.

iLotP is also a group-wide effect, so when you take into account the rogues/warriors that are getting the effect as well, the healing adds up quite nicely. Not an insanely powerful tool by any means, but useful nonetheless.

This is from WoW web stats from 5 prince tries and one kill, all in one setting.
Healing done on the tank:

Elemvor 657,355
Equelibrium 592,970
-> >Lavode 566,335 << -- Tank!
Zuqui 274,968

Of course all of that was not from imp lotp.

Break down of healing attributed to me:

Lifebloom : 314 881
Prayer of Mending 122 752
Improved Leader of the Pack 116 563

so Imp LoTP represented 5.6 % of the total heals I got that evening.
This is a more than worthwhile application of talent points, as absolutely
any feral should be specced LoTP anyway..

For me it really depends on if it's before or after armor, and depends greatly on the fight, fights where I'm getting hit a lot, it's amazing, fights where I'm facing a slow heavy hitter (maulgar) not so much.

For what it's worth, my consumable of choice is still probably going to be the Flask, with Mastery + Ironskin (30 Resilience one) as my farm status elixirs. I'm always fond of dropping items to gain more offensive stats

Brute:

Agility works as the best all-around, over-all, stat to focus upon. Whether you have to emergency tank, or kill the add you are tanking and then go kittie, agility provides the best avoidance AND dps possible. Also, depending on whose numbers you are using, agility is only slightly worse than strength, point for point, in pure dps terms. Or maybe it's just that we like seeing big crit numbers on a very regular basis, i.e. 3k shred crits back to back to back for the win?

Primal Fury.

The faster you get those combo points, the less energy you spend building five, the more rips you can manage. After reaching >2200 AP or so, I started putting a lot more stock into agility. It's just such a great stat, and with Shreds in PVE and an Everbloom idol, you're building up combo points with a very powerful attack that synergizes with Mangle's debuff, as does the Rip at the end of it.

One agility gives you 1 AP in cat and ~.04% of crit, ~.07% of dodge in all forms.
One strength gives you 2.4 AP in cat, OR 2 AP in any other form.

Strength is good for stable DPS. Agility is good for building combo points and general survival (especially if you take an offtank role, as I normally do - having 40% dodge raid buffed while still keeping 22k+ armour and having decent DPS stats is pretty damned cool, <3 malorne). Crit is important because of the Primal Fury synergy.

I would say 4 hit 4 agi gems are your best bet for DPS gems right now, unless you're over about 100 hit rating in which case 8 agi gems are probably best.

4.4k shred crits back to back ftw. (hi solarian, no armour kthx).

As for pots next patch, I'm going to be using Major Agi with the new Fortification potion (250 health + 10hp/sec). IMO the best choice by far for a (bear) tank, even over Flask of Fort.

Back in WoW 1.0 the calculation for the break point between Agi and Str for pure dps was somewhere above 2000 AP which essentially meant that noone would ever reach it. I'm not sure where those calculations went, but we're way past that point now. At the same time, as we leveled up the crit chance per point of agility changed as well.

Plugging the numbers into Emmerald's Feral Gear Calculator TBC spreadsheet the breakpoint where Agility becomes better than Strength from a pure DPS perspective is now around 3200 AP...still pretty hard to reach. However, at 2000 AP base and 28% base crit the numbers I'm showing are 1 Str = 2.47 AP and 1 Agi = 2.43 AP. I haven't gone back and completely checked the math on the sheet and I know I've found a couple errors (like how it handles resilience), but overall it seems pretty solid.

What that leaves us with is that Strength is slightly better than Agility for pure dps purposes, but the difference is small enough that given a 1 for 1 exchange, Agility is almost always the better option and either one is worth about 2.4 AP.

Edit: One other obervation: This is highly dependant on your current crit rate and AP. Agility gets relatively better as AP increases and relatively worse as Crit % increases. With 25% Crit, Agility becomes strictly better than Strength under 2000 AP while with 30% Crit the breakpoint is around 4200 AP.