Feral Druid Preraid Tank Gear Guide - Page 3

dukes · 11/05/07, 10:16 AM

Unless you stack dodge to a point where you're at the cap (i.e. 103%) armour will always be better in pure survivability terms.

No matter how much avoidance you stack, until you hit the cap there's still the chance of getting 10+ hits in a row. I run at around 60% avoidance raid buffed (over 52% dodge, 5% base miss, ~2% miss from defence) and still get situations where I take 4+ crushings in a row and don't avoid anything within a reasonable timespan (see here)

Armour is permanent mitigation. No matter what damage you take, it's reduced by exactly that amount of damage. This is why stacking armour and HP are the most important things in terms of maintanking most fights, as it increases your time to live no matter how much you avoid. Avoidance is purely long-term mitigation, as over the course of a long fight you can't ever rely on it.

Then again, dodge is good sometimes.

spartakos · 11/05/07, 10:36 AM

Since druids get very near the armor cap early (T4 gear), the comparison should be between stamina and dodge(although since we are OT the dual use of agi will make 4agi 6stam gems allways better than 12stam gems,the high end game itemization sucks that's why i talk only about gems).
Edit: Dukes down post is right, got carried away sorry.

dukes · 11/05/07, 10:45 AM

Spartakos, this thread is entirely about Pre-Raid gear, i.e. before T4. In fact, it's supposed to cover the pre-heroic period too, in which armour is still a critical stat.

Edenfall · 11/05/07, 11:03 AM

I feel we have been discussing too much high end game relative things between the lines - not preraid to low raid. I bet most of you know what Rawr is. So I propose that those who want to engage and discuss can use Rawr to make a gear setup and compare the stats between our gear setups.

If you have a better alternative to Rawr to do this, then please let us know.

Carlos · 11/05/07, 11:06 AM

Originally Posted by spartakos

Since druids get very near the armor cap early (T4 gear), the comparison should be between stamina and dodge(although since we are OT the dual use of agi will make 4agi 6stam gems allways better than 12stam gems,the high end game itemization sucks that's why i talk only about gems).

Currently I still have my 4/5 T4 on MT duty for Morogrim so no space to swap the enchants there and in early progression you do not swap the 12 Stamina if your are part of the backbone of the raid. Till Morogrim is on farm we will swap in the warriors into my MT spot but till the I need to keep T4 for pure tanking.

Nevertheless Pre-Raid it is crucial to stack armor and HP as much as possible. When the first drops from Karazhan and other early raid contnet comes in as a progress oriented person you should start gem and enchant for tanking. The sooner your tanking gear is there the better you can focus on DPS gear.

[Cobrascale Hood] haven't looked at this for a long time but might be really good as an expensive alternative to the [Stylin' Purple Hat].

Edenfall · 11/06/07, 7:06 AM

Allright, I made a preraid gear setup just now with Rawr. Here are the stats calculated by Rawr, followed by the setup items, (gems) and enchants:

Basic Stats

Health: 15240
Armor: 24651
Agility: 341
Stamina: 1108
Defense Rating: 209
Dodge Rating: 38
Resilience: 19

Calculated Stats (rounded)

Dodge: 30,24%
Miss: 7,88%
Armor Mitigation: 67,33%
Dodge+Miss: 38,13%
Total Mitigation: 77,34%
Damage Taken: 22,66%
Chance to be Crit: -1,37%
Overall Points: 77541,79
Mitigation Points: 30888,99
Survival Points: 46652,79

[Stylin' Purple Hat] + [Item not found!]
[Necklace of the Juggernaut]
[Mantle of Shadowy Embrace] + [Greater Inscription of the Knight]
[Thoriumweave Cloak] + 12 agility
[Heavy Clefthoof Vest] + (6 stamina 4 defense)x2 + (12 stamina)
[Veteran's Dragonhide Bracers] + (4 agility 6 stamina)

[Wastewalker Gloves] + (4 agility 6 stamina)x2
[Tree-Mender's Belt]
[Heavy Clefthoof Leggings] + 40 stamina 12 agility + (12 stamina)x2 + (6 stamina 4 defense)
[Heavy Clefthoof Boots] + (4 agility 6 stamina) + (6 stamina 4 defense)

[Ring of Unyielding Force]
[Iron Band of the Unbreakable]

[Badge of Tenacity]
[Darkmoon Card: Vengeance]

[Earthwarden] + 35 agility

Now personally, when looking at this, it is a really strong gear setup. Note that all the stats mentioned are unbuffed. I would say this is enough to tank Prince, though more stamina would be favourable. It might not be a oneshot, but it's more than enough for lower level raiding.

This particular setup includes [Darkmoon Card: Vengeance], which is expensive, and does not include [Barkchip Boots]. Replacing the Clefthide boots with the Barkchip boots the stats changes would be:

- 95 less Health
- 191 less Armor
- 0.78% more Dodge
- 0.41% less Miss
- 0.17% less Armor Mitigation

- (no change in Damage Taken)
- 532,66 less Overall Points
- 0,05% more Mitigation Points
- 532,70 less Survival Points

less
less
more
less
less
Null
less
more
less

6 less + 2 more + 0 Null = -4

Which, oh, actually concludes this was a bad change.

sec...

Heavy Clefthoof Boots are actually better for tanking than Barkchip Boots.
The 24 Strength on Barkchip would mean a slight increase in threat generation,
however the Set(3) Bonus of the Chefthoof set gives 20 Strength. I believe this proves a conclusion about the boots, and in this case more Surivivability was lost than the gain of Mitigation.

[Heavy Clefthoof Boots] + (4 agility 6 stamina) + (6 stamina 4 defense)
vs
[Barkchip Boots]

Edit:
The stats and calculations were based on the Tauren race. A Night Elf would have

- 776 less Health
- 24 more Armor
- 1,82% more Dodge
- 0,61 less Damage Taken
- 853,04 more Mitigation Points
- 2346,47 less Survivability Points

Anias · 11/06/07, 7:17 AM

Originally Posted by Edenfall

As for Stamina/Armor versus Avoidance, a Tank in general should always favour avoidance as it is 100% mitigation. There's a solid difference between a 40% dodge tank and a 20% dodge tank

This is patently incorrect from the point of view of _every_ serious progression minded raid lead I've talked to in the last year.

Tanks are concerned with maximizing their "time to live" without recieving a heal in the worst case available. This means you ignore dodge/parry for the most part and consider instead your Armor/Block Value/Stamina values.* Even with the grossly amazing benefits of agility that a druid tank has in terms of dodge and crit per point (making it a highly desirable stat in the abstract) you still care far more about statistics that increase your time to live in the worst case.

The worst case for a typical pre-raid geared tank is going to be "4 healers graved" on morogrim, a bad infernal on prince requiring you to move away from your healer group, or a high stacked gruul. In all cases, you would much prefer the ability to live through the following damage sequence without relying upon a random number generator to falling back on "if I dodge I live, if I don't dodge we wipe". At the moment, mana is rarely the limitting factor on an encounter - you will wipe far far far more often to the tank having an unlucky sequence of hits/crushings lining up on top of special abilities than you will wipe to out of mana healers.

Great thread, but don't encourage new tanks to gear for avoidance as their suggested set - even with the amazing returns on agility for druids, it's not going to save them repair bills in the long run.

*A caveat, avoidance does have it's place - and you certainly shouldn't ignore (for instance) 2% dodge entirely if the only other difference between the two pieces of gear is 5 AC - just don't consider avoidance your primary concern.

Edenfall · 11/06/07, 7:43 AM

Originally Posted by Anias

This is patently incorrect from the point of view of _every_ serious progression minded raid lead I've talked to in the last year.

Tanks are concerned with maximizing their "time to live" without recieving a heal in the worst case available. This means you ignore dodge/parry for the most part and consider instead your Armor/Block Value/Stamina values.* Even with the grossly amazing benefits of agility that a druid tank has in terms of dodge and crit per point (making it a highly desirable stat in the abstract) you still care far more about statistics that increase your time to live in the worst case.

The worst case for a typical pre-raid geared tank is going to be "4 healers graved" on morogrim, a bad infernal on prince requiring you to move away from your healer group, or a high stacked gruul. In all cases, you would much prefer the ability to live through the following damage sequence without relying upon a random number generator to falling back on "if I dodge I live, if I don't dodge we wipe". At the moment, mana is rarely the limitting factor on an encounter - you will wipe far far far more often to the tank having an unlucky sequence of hits/crushings lining up on top of special abilities than you will wipe to out of mana healers.

Great thread, but don't encourage new tanks to gear for avoidance as their suggested set - even with the amazing returns on agility for druids, it's not going to save them repair bills in the long run.

*A caveat, avoidance does have it's place - and you certainly shouldn't ignore (for instance) 2% dodge entirely if the only other difference between the two pieces of gear is 5 AC - just don't consider avoidance your primary concern.

I pretty much agree with you, and I must say I've changed my opinion on Mitigation versus Survivability. This has made me a lot more clear-minded on their purpose. Mitigation will save mana and in some cases help you avoid additive debuffs from physical attacks (if there are any?), while Survivability makes a Tank more independent and predictable.

Carlos · 11/06/07, 8:31 AM

Nearly the same question has been raised in another thread in this forum.

Protection warrior: Stamina VS mitigation

The problem sometimes in this forum is that a lot of people are already through the content and answers are based on more higher lvl items. I am currently at exactly Morogrim in the MT position to ease the encounter a bit.

Still I stack stamina for tanking and try to get most out of it, while in SSC/TK maintaining an offtank postion and need to focus on the DPS to be a good raid member.

I started early with nearly exactly the set you have below into Karazhan except things like Darkmoon, Badge of tenacity and some others I was working on.

Farstrider · 11/06/07, 8:42 AM

Wait a sec, is that set actually not uncrittable?

Maybe it's pre-raid but what is the likely objective of such a tank? It might be to move into Karazhan, in which case he'll certainly want to be uncrittable!

[e] It is uncrittable, it actually has around 3.96% anti-crit, and is uncrittable from defense rating alone.

Not sure why you have put -1.37% or something as the anti-crit.

Carlos · 11/06/07, 8:50 AM

with 179 def rating he is well above 415. Enough space tobring in other items like Zierhut's.

Allev · 11/06/07, 9:07 AM

While yes, that's the ideal pre-raid setup, I think it's a waste of time to acquire many of those pieces before you enter the raidgame. I don't think you'd farm 50 badges for the ring and neck, for instance, before setting foot in Karazahn. I don't think you'd farm 50 badges before downing Maulgar in a guild, either.

So the setup isn't realistic-- you'd at least have the Kara rep ring in any reasonable character timeline that eventually involves the gear you listed and raiding (given that it's "pre-raid", I assume the goal is to gear up to raid).

Inaiwae · 11/06/07, 9:08 AM

I would use [Verdant Gloves] over [Wastewalker Gloves]. The HP on that pre-raid set you created are enough to tank anything in SSC/TK, while the armor is a bit low.

When i entered Karazhan, i had just blue gear and i did fine (we entered Karazhan sooner than heroics). Apart from the blues you have in your set, i used:

[Strength of the Untamed]
[Shoulderpads of Assassination]
[Manimal's Cinch]
[Umberhowl's Collar]

You receive violet signet after your first steps in kara, so that was probably what i used instead of the badge ring.

And i probably had Earthwarden ..

Just for your "lower" level set, if you will create something like that.

edit: i had to ask GM to return the green belt to me, since i sold it the moment i got it while leveling. Silly ages :-)

Edenfall · 11/06/07, 9:12 AM

Originally Posted by Farstrider

Wait a sec, is that set actually not uncrittable?

Maybe it's pre-raid but what is the likely objective of such a tank? It might be to move into Karazhan, in which case he'll certainly want to be uncrittable!

[e] It is uncrittable, it actually has around 3.96% anti-crit, and is uncrittable from defense rating alone.

Not sure why you have put -1.37% or something as the anti-crit.

I understand that the minus values are confusing.

- A positive value means there is a chance to be crit
- A negative value means not critable ++

Which in this case, means that the Tank can sacrifice some Defense Rating / Resilience for other stats, if he or she wants, and still be crit-immune. Hehe, I'm not insane.

Edenfall · 11/06/07, 9:16 AM

Originally Posted by Inaiwae

I would use [Verdant Gloves] over [Wastewalker Gloves]. The HP on that pre-raid set you created are enough to tank anything in SSC/TK, while the armor is a bit low.

When i entered Karazhan, i had just blue gear and i did fine (we entered Karazhan sooner than heroics). Apart from the blues you have in your set, i used:

[Strength of the Untamed]
[Shoulderpads of Assassination]
[Manimal's Cinch]
[Umberhowl's Collar]

You receive violet signet after your first steps in kara, so that was probably what i used instead of the badge ring.

And i probably had Earthwarden ..

Just for your "lower" level set, if you will create something like that.

edit: i had to ask GM to return the green belt to me, since i sold it the moment i got it while leveling. Silly ages :-)

Hehe, I can refer to your post i the main post, but right now I've got to run. I will be making a pre-Heroic gear guide soon also, and that belt will be in it. Please come with suggestions, if you have any=)