Top one, Ela. Staff of Primal Fury beats the Pillar of Ferocity any day.

As much as I value hit, [Brooch of Deftness] isn't the best way to get it. The [Choker of Vile Intent] has a fair bit of hit, as well as agility. As far as expertise goes, the [Shapeshifter's Signet], [Belt of One-Hundred Deaths], [Shoulderpads of the Stranger], and [Gloves of the Searing Grip] will all net you a fair bit of expertise without gimping your other stats -- a total of 4.5% reduced dodge.

I certainly agree it's not optimal - I got it for my off-tank/threat set originally and just started using it to hit the cap - but of the expertise items I only have shapeshifters currently (and I won't take the others over pure dps'ers who want them so not sure I'll ever get them) and that seems like an even bigger drop in power to use over other dps-rings.

As of late, I've felt that Innervates going to Shadow Priests do far more good than to a healer. As you said healers haven't had many mana issues, and in 2.3 many of them got even more longevity than before (updated Intensity/Meditation, Water Shield for Shamans). Whereas the Shadow Priest can use the Innervate to increase mana regen for their entire party.

edit: Re: Brooch of Deftness for DPS. I wouldn't. However, I have made it a mainstay in my tanking set (don't need the defense on Juggernaut) and it's a very solid boost in threat. My "miss" section has shrunk considerably since the patch.

Is this site TBC Bear Tanking Gear List any good for armor choices still?

And if not is there an updated one?

As always having a single list is a good start, but once you get some reasonable gear then you will find certain items moving up or down depending on your other stats.

Programs like RAWR give a better view as to what specific items would be better for you but again it depends on your preferences and making sure that you have enough of the stats that you value.

There is also a another version available for Emmeralds site as a download from this Forum post that includes S3/2.3 items.

I don't quite agree with that notion. Generally each role is best left to the people who excell at it. If a healer tosses the occasional damage spell, I doubt anyone would credit that damage to what made the difference between beating the enrage timer, or wiping to it, because in reality whatever damage they did is not even worth mentioning when compared to the damage the raid did.

Can that regrowth save someone, or be used very successfully? Oh most certainly, especially on a fight like Archimonde. I generally just keep myself alive if I get doomfired, until the ticks are down enough that it won't cause much strain on the healers. Likewise, if melee get knocked back and one of them is doomfired, that regrowth can be the difference between the person surviving to make it back in healer range, or dying, which increases the risk of wiping to a soulcharge.

That said, I don't think overusing it will be very effective. The 2k healing vs 2k damage is an oversimplification. It's probably more along the lines of 1.5k healing (the hot aspect will likely be wasted because anyone low enough to cause you to shift out to heal will have plenty of heals incoming) vs 3k+ damage (have to consider potential energy wasted from shifting, your cycle getting messed up/mangle dropping, etc). While healing has a very noticable effect on any fight (when anyone's hp's drop to zero they die, obviously a very noticable effect), damage, or lack thereof, can have just as serious an impact (even on fights without enrage, eventually attrition will get the better of your raid if damage is too low).

I know that's a concept we struggled with for a long time pre-TBC. Dps slacking can just as easily cause a wipe as healers "letting someone die", which was seen as the primary reason for wiping (nevermind the fact that people died because healers ran out of mana on a fight that lasted several minutes past what it should have).

Anyway, before I ramble on too much, my point is that a smart regrowth here and there can be really helpful, but constantly shifting out to "save people" seems like it's just a complete waste of dps. In reality, most those people you are saving are probably about to receive heals from the actual healers anyway, and if they aren't, chances are your ~1.5k regrowth won't make any difference. It's just situations, like for example Archimonde doomfired outside of healer range, where smart use of our heals can really help (and of course tranquility is always nice, I'm a big fan of using that when the situation calls for it).

If you looked a bit harder you would have found:
[Rogue/Warrior] Weapon Skill Adjustment Discussion
There is now a new thread 2.3: Miss rate vs Boss mobs?
The first thread is long but if you want to dispute anything in it you should read it all to see how they got there.

Was reading the whole post thinking of tranq, but you didn't forget it ^^. When I was feral I loved barskin+tranq or just tranq, it wastes a lot of dps, but if your group is low enough, even with no healing gear at all it heals for very high amounts. The only time I'd shift out other than that were during knockbacks and such, since you're going to have to run back to the mob, might as well throw an instant heal while doing so, exceptions being when you're high on energy(knockback at ~40 and it ticks right after, waste of energy to switch out since you'll come back in melee at 80-100 depending on distance) and when sprint is up.


As for the list linked, I used it not long ago, I'd say you can replace quite a few pieces with heroic badge gear(not sure it was updated at 2.3 since I switched spec), but it's still a good list to find the easy to obtain items on a new druid. Once you start raiding tho, you probably need to consider set bonus(2T4) and what you're doing in the raid(pure dps/offtanking) as well as the gear stats based on the rest of your stats(capped hit, crit immune etc).

Spells that are made instant through talents or set bonuses (NS, or shaman 2t5 or the druid one) do reset your weapon swing timer. It's documented in Enhance Shaman: The Collected Works of Theorycraft, Vol I section XIII: Swing Timer

You disagree then state the same thing we are saying =). Neither of us chain shift out to heal. I let the healers do the vast majority of the healing =). But if someone within range just took a massive hit then my instant regrowth + a priest shield could mean he survives the next hit instead of dying. Neither of us try to top the healing meters, or will regrowth every time. It is purely an emergency thing. I would say half of the time that I instant shift and heal him, he gets other heals within the next second. I could have gone without the heal and done a bit of extra DPS. However the other half of the time, its made a clear difference to the fight. At the beginning of Archimonde tries I would use an instant regrowth on our tank before a fear (yes he was not buff capped) justt o top him off and help out.

There really are no fights I can name that I feel ensuring someone survives is better than me doing an extra 50DPS. Even if every single time I shifted the person was healed to full before my heal landed I would still be fine with this. Letting a rogue die is a FAR larger waste of DPS. The fact that every week I can say I saved at least 1 person makes it worth it. As I stated earlier, some guilds run healer light compared to others. Our healers get stressed healing all the raid damage fast enough so every little bit helps (6 on Vashj, 7 Archimonde, 6-7 Bloodboil).

Of course shifting out every time someone is low would be pointless and a waste, not to mention run you oom VERY fast (I can shift and heal 6-7 times on a full raid mana bar, maybe). But its not difficult to gauge if the healers are under pressure (<3 grid) and if they are, a few well timed instant heals works wonders. Like a tranquility after an AE (Hi Najentus!). We can heal, we should heal, its just practice to do it only when needed, and T5 makes it a lot easier to be a life saving kitty cat.



EDIT

Easy to test this, just turn on logging and spam FFF just before your next kitty attack. After a while check your logs for the gaps between swings and see if FFF affects it or not. I am curious myself and will check it once I get my internet back at home =).