kalbear

The problem with doing that analysis is that those numbers for armor are the best that we're going to see - and those are at 70. 26.7k armor is not going to be anywhere close to what will be 69.2% mitigation, but it will be close to what we'll have at 80 using pre-raiding LK gear.

 

Malazaar

I don't understand what you are trying to say.

Sure, level 80 greens will not have much more armor than that (if they even have that much) but how is that any different than for warriors/paladins/deathknights (except those probably won't have T6) ?

Level 80 raiding gear will of course have much more armor, why shouldn't it have ? (keep in mind we didn't calculate with bonus armor here).

 

Valerian

Well we should scale better than DKs in terms of armor, even with rogue gear. Its likely our armor will be higher than Warriors/Paladin's as well assuming some non-armor pieces of gear with armor on them (like rings/necks/cloaks etc). Granted Pallies and Warriors have their shields which are a huge chunk of armor, at worst it should be nearly even with them though.

 

kalbear

Okay, 26.7k armor is what you might be able to get at the very end of the game. You're also assuming bonus armor on all non-T6 pieces, right? So both trinkets, both rings, amulet, cloak, weapon, idol and neck. So assuming perfect gear, all the time, that's about the percentage you might be looking at. Furthermore, you're assuming that the rings/trinkets/whatever have armor that is scaling with ilvl.

So in about 15 months from release the highest of the high-end guilds will be able to think about getting that level of gear. I guess that's ok, but I guess that's really not the issue at the end of the day.

Some issues that we won't know for a while:
Will we be getting those non-tier items early on in progression? In other words, will we peak early on in our overall armor, and only be getting small upgrades as it goes on?
What will the level 80 raiding gear for bears be like?
How will it compare to the other tanks?
How will bears scale in other ways with other stats?
And maybe most importantly, how will TBC gear not be chosen over LK gear given its huge amount of armor and how good that armor will be?

Finally - 26871 armor = 69,2% mitigation is only true at level 70. At level 80, that value will be compared to 49k armor as a cap. The mitigation peak for druids as it stands will be much lower.

 

Mijae

Another analysis -

Currently, an entry level 70 feral will have around 26000 armor. It was much lower when WotLK was actually released and even then we were considered great tanks.

Since I haven't seen any confirmation on if Mother Bear is 12% or 15%, I'll give both.

26000 armor @ 70 ~ 68.58% mitigation
-15% MB => 63.03% ~ 28400 armor @ 80
-12% MB => 64.30% ~ 30000 armor @ 80
w/o MB ~ 36300 armor @ 80 (oddly close to current end-game armor).

However, when BC was released entry level Karazhan tanking was more like 20K armor.

20000 armor @ 70 ~ 62.58%
-15% MB => 55.98% ~ 21100 armor @ 80
-12% MB => 57.48% ~ 22800 armor @ 80
w/o MB ~ 27800 armor @ 80

With all of the items currently available from WotLK, the total comes to 5374 x 5.5 = 29557. This does not count any armor from trinkets, agility, or other. Adding in BoT would put the total up to 31251. This is at or below entry level since obviously all items are not available.

So, in LK we should start roughly at or above the same mitigation as BC entry level. Without Mother Bear we would have been slightly better than BC release, with it we are about equal to current values. This doesn't say anything about our scaling, but at least we'll start off right.

Feral DruidStats spreadsheet
v3.2.0.0.xls - updated 8/4/2009

 

kalbear

Right, but that was with bonus armor items. Which...none exist right now.

From looking at LK gear, I get a total of 3110 armor on leather items that require level 80. Where is the difference coming from here?

 

Mijae

There was only a few items with bonus armor at release. At that time the Karazhan rogue gear was better IMO even without bonus armor. Items like Girdle of Treachery and Skulker's Greaves were worth losing the bonus armor for better stats. It's strange they are reversing the decisions they made back when they redid our itemization.

Regardless, the fact that items had bonus armor doesn't change how the totals are adding up. Again, with Mother Bear the current WotLK items put us at or above the current entry level mitigation with bonus armor.

It looks like somehow I missed adding in bracers last time too, so I'll update my other post. Here's what's currently available:

700 - Bloodwood Greatstaff
443 - Arena Druid Melee Helm
409 - Arena Druid Melee Shoulders
545 - Arena Druid Melee Chest
341 - Arena Druid Melee Gloves
477 - Arena Druid Melee Legs
230 - King's Square Bracers
296 - Ouroboros Belt (80 caster)
337 - Scytheclaw Boots (75 caster)
504 - Flowing Cloak of Command
364 - Titanium Earthguard Chain
420 - Titanium Earthguard Ring
308 - Signet of Arachnathid Command (72 ring)
------
5374 x 5.5 = 29557

Maybe it's not right to compare with the armor necklace, but it will be available. Maybe there won't be a better weapon with armor, but there's no way to know yet. For a few slots there isn't even level 80 gear available. There aren't any new trinkets yet either. So, it could of course go up or down some.

Feral DruidStats spreadsheet
v3.2.0.0.xls - updated 8/4/2009

 

angi

The one big question to me is currently only what happens to the heavy-armor sunwell pieces. I assume now that we will have the same amount of armor as paladins/warriors/deathknights when we wear all the wotlk rogue pieces, and that is ok because we now have an equivalent of defstance.

But with the BC-armour gear (especially the sunwell pieces) we have a huge advantage mitigation wise in the first instances. With the neck and all sunwell pieces you can be at 40k armor, with inspiration we are near the armor cap @ 80. Now think about a warrior tank nowadays being at the armor cap, it would be the preferred tank at every encounter with physical dmg, even when he has only 16k health. (Is there any encounter in Naxx where that is not the case? )

I can`t really see this happening so Blizz has to remove all bonus armor from the old BC-items, which kind of makes me sad. :P

 

Kieran

That's actually no bonus armor per se, since the values are derived from the item budget. So lowering the armor on these pieces will invariably mean an increase in attributes making T6 still better for tanking until the level 80 epic sets hit.

 

Animalfury

If they put a cap under 50k, with inspiration, we will hit it after around 3 raid instances.

From pre kara to SCC/TK we almost doubled our armor.
On pre naxx gear with much blue gear to come, people are getting around 30k in theory.
As our armor will not scale as well as on BC, i think we will get around 40k after 2 or 3 raids.
Put inspiration over it and we see what happen.

They must put at least a 20k constant on armor formula, so cap get to 60k.
The higher this constant the better for us, as it decreases the chance to cap and it affects all tanks (so bosses are made with this value in mind).

Hit the cap is not good!
Even when we will try hard to =)

 

nightcrowler

I'm trying to put bear form / cat form switch into my dps calculator so I need to know some info from beta players:

- Does swing timer reset going from cat to bear and from bear to cat? (Example, if you don't have haste, cat attack speed is 1.0, if you are at 0.5 of your swing, do you go to 1.25 swing timer going to bear, to 0 or to 0.5?)
- SR is removed going from cat to bear, isn't it?
- Berserk?
- Does Enrage trigger the GCD?
- When you shift from cat to bear, is the gcd 1.5 sec? And from bear to cat is it 1.0 sec?
- When you miss an attack in bear form does it leave your rage as it is?
- What's the base claw damage?

Ability damage+scaling:
Lacerate?
Maul?
Swipe?

Thanks a lot.

 

Animalfury

I don't think it will be viable just because of threat.

bear form + aggro pull (45% threat + threat skills like mangle) = Raid leader asking why are you trying to tank, when you was suposed to dps.

What i want to do if i spec to dps is just enjoy my SR/WF Totem/OoC/Weapon proc time in cat.

Blizzard want powershift dead. If we try to ressurect it, we risk getting other thinks nerfed.
Let powershift RIP!

 

Vaccine

I always found powershifting a horrible mechanic both in principle and to use. I'm certainly glad to see the back of it.

Those new JC/quest items are really interesting but they raise the question whether the new SotF is going to be a tad pointless if all our jewelry/trinkets are going to be stacked with def anyway. It already looks like we could be sharing items with +parry on them as well.

I think its safe to say there is a long way to go with our tanking at the moment, in particular I think we need to see a change to strength to make it some sort of mitigation stat for us.

@Mother Bear: Forget the bonus AP, its just a little extra. I'd certainly pay the talent points if it was simply the dmg reduction, so the extra AP is just icing on top. Its a fantastic talent and a big step in the right direction, with all other tanks seemingly getting skills to diversify their previous tanking speciality its nice to see we will no longer have the stigma of being the crap magic damage tanks.

On tanking in general every class is wailing at the moment how the other three tanking classes are vastly better in all or most areas. Just gotta hold on till we start to see more final revisions of the tanking trees, itemisations and most importanly areas start opening up that really push a tank like 25s/10s/heroics.

 

• Falk

They're also going to have to do something about current TBC druid gear when Mother Bear goes past NYI status. It's way too good when stacked together. :P

 

nightcrowler

Yes, probably it won't be usable cause of threat, according to my simulation switching bear/cat will increase our dps (but not like the old powershift) what I really want is to SEE how much before blizzard realize that and nerf us without time to test the nerf.

 

Emi

Dont forget that besides the crit immunity SoF will grant us on its own theres also the +6% attributes that comes with that talent.
But i do see where you're coming from. Warriors tend to drop some points in Anticipation later in the game as their gear becomes abundant with def stats, to apply them elsewhere.

Agreed. Either parry or block seem to be out of the equation as far as Blizzard is concerned. Perhaps also turn it into physical mitigation to be added to armors?

 

• Astrylian

Can't answer all your questions, but will answer what I can. Powershifting, even over to bear for a few attacks, seems to really be dead. (The only exception being if Wolfshead remains the way it is, and that'll prolly still be a DPS loss due to not having a good helm)

Dunno about swing timers, SR is removed when leaving Cat (that's the big one), Berserk is not. Enrage does not cause a GCD. All shifts are 1.5sec GCDs. A rage-based ability that fails to land costs the full rage cost anyway. Don't have the numbers for scaling of bear abilities, but they're easy enough to look up on wowwiki, and add the new talents, I don't think any of them have changed in scaling.

Rawr - A theorycrafting tool for Bears, Cats, Moonkin, Trees, Healadins, DPSWarrs, Retadins, Mages, ProtWarrs, Tankadins, HealingPriests, ShadowPriests, Warlocks, Rogues, EnhShams, Hunters, Elementals, RestoShams, Tank DKs, and DPS DKs!
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Grimmock

I'm curious what the napkin math would say about a tank build that skips the resto tree. I understand how important Omen of Clarity is for cat work, but it strikes me as less vital for Bear.

Obviously, Catform dps would suffer for the lack of OOC, but it seems that rage starvation will not be a problem. Missing 4% damage from Master Shapeshifter, and 10% damage from Naturalist seems like the much bigger hit. Could that be offset by being able to take nearly every talent in the feral tree?

This 0/71/0 build would skip Brutal Impact, Nurturing Instinct, and Primal Tenacity. Everything else is maxed except Infected Wounds which only has 2/3.

To be perfectly clear, I am asking this in the context of raid tanking. Main tanking, at that.

 

kalbear

I wouldn't bother with master shapeshifter if you're going bear anyway; 5 talent points for 4% damage is not a good deal, in general. Essentially you'd be trading the 10% damage boost from naturalist for rend and tear (which is a 10% damage boost to about half of your overall threat and does not boost the static component), feral aggression (which is suboptimal if there are any prot warriors in your raid), brutal impact (largely useless for tanking), and an extra point in infected wounds. To my mind that's not worth it. Feral aggression especially is a big waste of points if there are any prot warriors there, and rend & tear is not close to naturalist.

 

• Astrylian

Naturalist effectively costs 10pts, not 5, since Furor is mostly worthless for MTing.

Rawr - A theorycrafting tool for Bears, Cats, Moonkin, Trees, Healadins, DPSWarrs, Retadins, Mages, ProtWarrs, Tankadins, HealingPriests, ShadowPriests, Warlocks, Rogues, EnhShams, Hunters, Elementals, RestoShams, Tank DKs, and DPS DKs!
Download Rawr v2.2.27 <--NEW Nov9th!

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tlbj6142

While we are talking about odd builds, what about taking 2/2 iMotW and 3/5 Furor for 5-man bear/cats rather than 5/5 Furor? Heck even in 10-man you might not have a 2nd Druid. Furor doesn't really help cat in PvE, just leveling and PvP. And Furor isn't really needed if you are MT (5-man) as you can shift enrage. Seems like 2/2 iMotW might be a better use of those 2 points. Thoughts?

 

kalbear

True, but he was taking the 11 points from the resto side (not counting master SS) and putting them in feral aggression & rend and tear (and another in IW). If you're going to spend 10 points in the feral tree and you're only able to take rend & tear as the threat talent, it's a downgrade. Even at 10 points, naturalist is better for tanking per talent point than rend & tear is.

Imp MotW is largely useless in raiding (for ferals, because balance/resto both tend to take it), but for 5/10 mans it might be vaguely okay. It's certainly going to be more useful than furor in the general case. Heck, Nature's Focus might be more useful overall if you're not caring about DPSing ever.

 

• Astrylian

Aye, not saying I disagree, just pointing it out; if you want to compare performance per talent point, you need to consider Naturalist as a 10pt talent. If talent trees went live as they were, I'd prolly also go 0/61/10 for MTing.

Rawr - A theorycrafting tool for Bears, Cats, Moonkin, Trees, Healadins, DPSWarrs, Retadins, Mages, ProtWarrs, Tankadins, HealingPriests, ShadowPriests, Warlocks, Rogues, EnhShams, Hunters, Elementals, RestoShams, Tank DKs, and DPS DKs!
Download Rawr v2.2.27 <--NEW Nov9th!

Are you an active Rogue / Hunter / Warlock theorycrafter and an experienced C# dev, with some spare time and a desire to help build something great for the WoW community? Send me a PM!

 

kalbear

I can see that build and it's one I fought with, but at the end of the day I'd rather have some ability to go cat and dps, and I believe that OoC is going to make cat DPS viable if not stellar. Ideally I'd like to have two points in IW, but one may suffice. If it doesn't, I'd probably dump FFF.

 

dukes

If you're going 10 points in Resto, surely it's worth the extra point to grab OoC? Just looking at the build I'd use as an MT, I'd probably go for this: Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft . The point about not picking it up, I suppose, would be as an MT you'd have enough rage to maul the majority of the time, ruling out OoC procs (assuming that Maul counts as an ability so can't proc OoC) during normal play, and increasing the value of Rend and Tear. The other options are Feral Charge (MT = less use?), FFF (which I'd take for 10 mans where there may not be another druid), or Predatory instincts (which isn't as important as an MT).

I'd also consider dropping Furor for ImpMark/Natures Focus, especially with the change to being able to use items in forms requiring less switching (at the moment it's a pain grinding while picking up quest items such as mana berries in Netherstorm due to losing most of the energy while picking stuff up).