I see a lot of people talk about stacking stamina and resilience for arenas and this naturally makes sense, since the normal strategy is to get arena gear and go nuts with elunes, but I don't see much talk about using high armor gear in arenas, nor do I see many people using resist enchants on their shoulders or cloak.

As a healing druid the options I'm looking at specifically are Violet signet of the grand protector (http://www.wowhead.com/?item=29279). I originally took this for pve tanking but I'm very rarely feral these days.

With the next patch I saw they're giving the option to switch this for the healing version, but the tank version is also being increased to 350 armor instead of 250, making it even better for pvp survivability.

I'm also considering the resolute cape (http://www.wowhead.com/?item=24258) as it's being increased to nearly 400 armor with the patch and includes a hefty amount of stamina and resilience. Despite the high materials costs, I'd rather aim for this than the sargeants heavy cape since it's dmg/heal instead of pure heal.

The other thing is resist enchants. I'm not talking about stacking 400 shadow resist whenever I see a warlock, but things like the 7 resist all enchant on shoulders versus the honored aldor +29 heal enchant (not exalted yet), and 7 resist all on cloak versus 120 armor.

Anyone have experience or math with these?

I definitely carry my Sapphiron gear to every 2v2 arena. Nothing worse for a Rogue + Shaman team than to see a Paladin Frost Mage come out the other side. Bubble, BoP, 2 Ice Blocks and one sad rogue. Putting on my frost gear lets me focus on the paladin for a long period of time and not worry if my shaman gets sheeped or counterspelled.

I plan to carry more resist gear when I get around to it as it's usefulness in the smaller brackets is incredible.

Resilience or stamina can cover you on everything while using armor or resists don't, if you're only getting an extra 15-20 resists i'd still rather go for something else...but everything adds up in the end I guess.

Could you clarify what bracket you mean? In 5vs5 I tend to consider armor and resist to be less effective since what can be attacking you changes.

pretty sure enchants are not multiplied, and thats why bears usualy go for 12 agi enchant

was this changed at some point?

There is a stealth enchant to cloak also. Maybe not completely useless for Arenas?
I've seen some resto druids use stealth to establish their teammate as the target.

I definitely like the +stealth enchant... I do Arenas in a raid spec so I can't have 5/5 MoD, so I use my boots off Gothik for +8 stealth, my cloak for +5 stealth, and my NE Racial for another +5... anything I can manage, really. That totals out to 18 stealth which is more stealth than 5/5 MoD can produce by itself, 15.

I think one thing that hasn't been said yet Beefy, is that the most serious Arena teams go for all around viability instead of gimmicks. And stamina and resilience are good in all situations where you'd like to extend your survivability.

In the really high rated games, where you know what you're going up against, you can start to build on the advantages of alternate gear sets - ie, I was close friends with a shadow-priest/warlock team who very consistently went up against a Warrior/Paladin team. Once that W/P team started to collect shadow gear that matchup became very, very difficult.

Let me assume that you aim to play the role of a healer/ccer. I've seen some really great play by resto druids, and their strength is surely in their powerful heals, and the surgical precision that cyclone can afford in taking someone down.

And I'll say to you, to stick with the Gladiator healing set if that's your focus in arenas, if you want to focus on all-around ability. Bearform is a heavy deterrent to melee almost intrisically, but it's not to casters - thus I don't think slotting armor stuff as your default gear is worth it, but keeping it around just in case is. So that is to say - I'd take armor where I can find it, but I'd certainly not prioritize it.

And as far as resists go, it's more or less generally agreed upon that shadow is the most powerful class of resist you can get.

Don't forget that +weaponskill doesn't add crit for targets that are your level.

I'm specifically looking for what's best when stam/resilience isn't available.

As a druid I always run with mark of the wild. Sometimes this is purged/stolen, but by default I have 34 to all resists. I'd have 41 with a shoulder enchant, and 48 if I also put it on cloak. Against most casters with the cloak enchant I'd be at 28 to all (38 to nature due to racial).

Is this enough to make a dent against incoming spells? Would I be better off with 120 armor and +29 healing?


For the rings, I'd be trading 350 armor, 12 stamina, and 16 defense rating (which doesn't mean much, granted), for 21 intellect, 14 spirit, and 48 healing.

That's a tough choice when it's usually rogues/warriors that are the end of me.

Ugh. Shitty choices, but I guess in that situation I'd go for the armor/stam and defense.

What about Soulpriest's Ring of Resolve, Beef?

Personally I think you should have roughly 9,000 health minimum unbuffed, and around 175-200 resilience as a basic goal.