After reading the article that Monedula poster, seems like lacerate is done for. Which means look forward to druids getting a Devastate like ability that keeps produces lacerates, giving it a reason to exist. Looks like Bear tanking just got a little more boring.

After todays hot fix, Feral Instinct has gone from being a really nice talent - to a must have talent for any sort of tanking.

The changed threat of swipe was really needed as i was beginning to get seriously concerned about Feral threat especially with multi mob packs (like the Sartharion trash). What i found this reset was that even when i get to the pack first and get initial aggro with a Maul/Swipe combo the Warrior or Deathknight would always steal all targets (except primary aggro mob) from me really fast.

Death knight threat seems extremely high at the moment once they are in endgame gear, and even more worryingly it is applied extremely quickly to all mobs in range. Making them (in my opinion) the new kings of AOE tanking - this change will hopefully help us keep up with then at least.

I have not had a problem with single target threat since picking up 'Rend & Tear' so this buff was not really needed in that respect, but hopefully the times that i do manage to fit swipe into my MT rotation will make up for the small threat loss due to the upcoming Mangle change.

In summary i couldn't imaging a tanking build without Feral Instinct now.

Did you go for that build or did you change some stuff to it. The reason I ask is because it kinda surprises me you invested points in Rend & Tear while I don't have it and hold aggro with ease. I am aiming as a MT spec which at some points still will be used as OT because of mechanics. I noticed you avoided a pure mitigation talent - Primal Tenacity - and from what I've learned untill now (most heroics / naxx 10 / naxx 25 and other raids) that being stunned happens quite often.
The rest is more based on how you play the game and how you fill that in with talents is mainly a choice of playing style.

Here you can see what my talents are and I'm happy with it...and the guild healers too!
The World of Warcraft Armory

I have several comments on your build:

• You have 2 points in Intensity. I can't imagine what you'd need the instant rage generation for that shifting to bearform wouldn't give you.
• No Survival Instincts. For a tank build? Really?
• 1 point in Shredding Attacks. If you want to dps, take 2. If not, don't take any.
• No Rend And Tear. This is a hugh increase to your main source of dps and threat in bear form (Maul). You need it in any serious tanking build. You can shift the points from cat-focused dps talents (Imp Mangle, KOTJ, Shredding Attacks) or secondary mitigation talents (Primal Tenacity, Infected Wounds), depending if you're angling for MT or OT position.

Primal Tenacity is pretty much useless in raids other then Maexxna, KotJ is a cat talent that's also barely if ever used for bear, and as Korhaug pointed out, 1/2 Shredding attacks and 2/3 Intensity are both wasted. Having said that - Survival Instincts and Rend and Tear are pretty much a must. The mindset that you only need to do enough threat to keep it off the DPS is somewhat outdated, because it's also part of your job to do as much DPS as you can while tanking, and R&T is absolutely godly for that.

Well, if I don't use Intensity I run dry on rage quite fast at the beginning stage of a fight. The amount of threat is just enough to keep aggro though at that point but I still like to have some spare rage left. Once I get to the second cycle I throw in mauls more often because then my rage is at a point that it almost never runs dry and where I keep progressing further and further away in means of threat so Rend and Tear I realy don't need for it. I do can understand Abradix's view on that matter but at the moment we didn't realy encounter any problems in lack of dps so I'll stick without rend & tear. The point in Shredding Attacks is just to lower the cost on my lacerate even though it ain't that big it still is helpfull.

But I totaly disagree on the use of primal tenacity. There are alot more fights where you get stunned. I do admitt you can discuss on how much impact it has but I rather have that 30% bonus to mitigation at that point then never have it at all...even it's being stunned at a boss that actualy doesn't hit hard. The fact I don't get any threat issues and my mitigation seems to be maxed according with the present gear and talents I dare to say I chose a good build and I'm pretty sure this build will offer me the chance to be a viable tank in end game content. This is ofcourse without taking in Abradix's comment because what he says is indeed a very good angle towards tanking and beyond the normal perspective to it. Nevertheless I'll stick to less damage and more mitigation with some rage control given by talents because thats the way I feel most comfortable with while tanking.
Every build has it's up and downsides but mitigation is in my opinion the first and most important aspect. And thats why I asked him why he didn't go for Primal Tenacity?

That is simply not true. Maexxna is the only raid boss that stuns the main tank and there are none that involve fear, which makes Primal Tenacity useful for 1 boss fight in the game.

Survival Instincts. Hehe, I had numereous discussion about that on our guild forum. I'll try to explain why I think it completely utterly sucks :p

In short, what makes that talent great is the fact you gain health. What it makes dangerous and in my opinion dangerous is the fact you loose that amount of health in an instant afterwards. Now, when I play I try to keep track of more things then only my personal build and the fact I'm a tank. I mean with this I also try to think of ways how I can come forward to our healers needs.
There are 2 things I do for that. First I never or the never start with an enrage as you will probably will do. If I do I will have to throw in a barskin and then i'm on a cooldown on it while I actualy pprefer to use where I need it more (could ofcourse be the cooldown is over by then but thats not something I can be sur of and thus rely on). If I don't use barskin while enraging I'll stress my healers more and I just want to make it as comfortable as possible for them. Secondly, you can argue that throwing in the Survival Instincts would come forward to that demand of making it as comfortable as possible for our healers and let them sit back and relax (figure of speak). Well, in most cases you will use the extra healtth when it gets critical and in most cases that means when the end of the fight is getting closer and nearer. At that point the healers mana will probably be on a low level too. So at that point the extra health seems welcome. Well, I wonder how that healer feels about it when suddenly that amount of heallth you gained suddenly disappears again? No more control, panic, etc. No, then I rather have it more smooth and controlled. Go for the trinket that gives the extra amount of healt when you use it's abilty for it because that guarantees you you don't loose that amount of health afterwards again and thus is a far better compensation in my opinion for Survival Instincts. And by the way, if health realy is an issue try to search for the spots to throw in more stamina. Think many players focus too hard on the numbers and less on the bigger picture and that is you are there as a group so play as a group and exploit every benefit you can get from eachother instead of all relying on that single ability that ain't as great as everyone likes to point out...again in my opinion (i'm far from all knowing but I do have my own thoughts and dare to speak them....even if they go against everything else thats being written) :p

Now, all have great xmas celebrations and I hope we can go further on this after a few days.

Laters

You should not be having rage problems. If you are, this is a problem that cannot be solved by speccing into Intensity. You should re-examine how much rage you get and how you use it. For the same reason you do not need Shredding Attacks for cheaper lacerate - the difference is negligible (this is not the case for Shred).

As many others have commented, you do not need Primal Tenacity. Stuns and fears were a significant issue in TBC, but this is not the case in the current Wrath raiding content.

You are wrong. In several ways.

Survival Instincts is an emergency button. You use it when you are about to die, to buy your healers the extra time they need to heal you up. You can also use it near the end of the fight to get yourself a bigger health buffer, but that's not what it's for and unless the boss hits progressively harder (Gruul, Kel'thuzad adds) this is usually not a good idea.

Your healers should be aware of what this ability is, and how to react. I recommend building a macro that announces it's use (mine yells "Last Stand", which is the equivalent warrior ability).

Emergencies happen. Emergency buttons save your life. Choosing not to use them means you are dying when you could have avoided your death. Staying alive is your job. I really don't think I can put it in simpler terms.

It's okay to get use Enrage and have your armor be lower for the first few seconds of the fight. You'll start with some rage, and get harder, filling your rage bar faster. It's the beginning of the fight, so all of your healers are ready for incoming damage, so there should be no surprises.

Also, Survival Instincts is a panic button. It gives you health, and then after 20 seconds, takes it away again. But during that 20 seconds, you're still alive, and your healers have time to get you back up to a level where it's okay to lose the health that you just gained.

I appreciate you want to keep your healers happy, but have you talked to them about how they heal you?

Eustormragedruid:

First of all, nothing personal, but I don't think you know how your healers feel when it comes to healing you, nor do you know the mechanics behind some talents. Everything I'm going to say here, has been mentioned already, but I'm going to go into greater details on why your arguments are false.

Survival Instincts: The button has primarily two uses. First of all, panic button when your raid has suddently taken a lot of damage and need time to get topped off. A decent example from Pre-TBC was the Reliquary of Souls phase 3 in Black Temple. Tank often use Shield Wall and Last Stand in order to gain a massive amount of effective health in order for healers to be able to not heal him for a couple of seconds to top the raid off. Second, it is usable when there are times when you can expect to take a lot of spike damage, or when you expect when you will go to greater lengths without receiving much, if any healing. Tanking first two drakes during Sartharion +3 drakes fits well in the first scenario, and Maexxna in Naxxramas during a web wrap is a suitable example for the latter. Neither of these situations are meant to give your healer an easier time, but is to give them enough time to change priorities on healing, i.e less focusing about you getting your face deleted, and more about getting other raid members topped off. Like you said, raid is a team game, and this is why YOU as a tank doing WHATEVER you can is important, and not taking Survival Instinct completely contradicts your own theory.

Second, Primal Tenacity is useless in a raid setting. In raiding today, only Maexxna and Frost Blast while off-tanking Guardians of Icecrown justifies taking that talent, somewhat. If it is an issue for your guild on those two bosses, spec into it for said encounters and then spec out of it. Having a talent that's good for 1.5 boss fights and completely useless on other 15+ is a bad investment of talent points.

Rend and Tear: This is one of the best talents per point that increases both a tank's TPS and DPS (since they are almost directly relatead). If you ever look at your WWS breakdown, during a fight with unlimited rage, Maul should at least account for 30% of your total damage and threat, if not much more. Take that 30% and mulitply by .2, and you get a 6%, 1.2% DPS per point of talent, VERY conservatively speaking. This week on patchwerk Maul accounted for 65% of my damage. If you main tank things, the damage increase to Maul alone should be a good enough reason to take it. If you offtank and DPS at all, 20% boost to shred and 50% crit to FB are also good incentives to take it. Long stories short, you are skipping one of the best talents in the game. An arguement you might make here is "Well, my threat is already good enough, so I don't need this." This mentality is completely false. Everyone except the healers are accountible for damage done to boss. The more damage you can pump into a boss, the faster he dies, and the less likely something goes wrong from people blanking out or from random bullcrap RNG. Reason healers are not accountible for damage is the fact that you don't want them to make choices on whether to heal or to do damage, while as a tank your job is to hold aggro, which you do through damage. There might be something as enough threat, but there is never enough dps. As long as you can maximize your survivalability, you should pump out as much damage as possible.

Intensity is OK for trash, as stated before, if you need snap rage that badly that Furor's 10 is not enough, spec into it for that fight and then spec out of it. Having a talent that's most of the time useless and somewhat useful on one, maybe two fights, is just not a good investment of talent points.

Survival instincts...
--Can save you an entire heal cycle on Loatheb, allowing the healers to catch up the raid. Maybe twice if you have a DPS problem or are trying for Spore Loser.
--Is a godsend for the enraged stun (I don't care how good your DPS is, you're not burning her 30% in 20 seconds unless you trivialize the content already) on Maexxna.
--Sure makes it a lot easier to survive Faerlina's frenzy. (You can check, I've got Heroic-Momma said knock you out. Yes, I was tanking.)
--Allows your raid to concentrate on burning down a boss at the end, by eliminating extra tank swaps, etc.
--Is really handy for being the Rivendare tank in a zerg Thane 4H strat
--Is key for busted pulls and shifting from off-dps to emergency OT
--Goes well with the AoE taunt.

--is one point.

You put 3 points in to get a talent that helps you in one boss fight, but you won't put one point in SI? It's a wipesaver, as well as adding flexibility, and I would honestly never raid with a bear tank that didn't take it, because it shows bad judgement. Not having it is indefensible. If your healers couldn't top you up in 20 seconds, you were dead anyway.

Another way to say it is this: Tanks should talent for the worst case scenario, not the best case scenario.

Also, you're using your enrage totally wrong. Pop it before a fight starts and before you pull, and let the enrage timer die right before. You've got 30 rage and no drawback. If 30 rage isn't enough and you'll go dry, I wonder who is healing you; if it's a disc priest, tell them to possibly lay off the shield in the first few seconds.

So Liyana, long story short you are wrong.

Survival Instincts is a 1 point talent that any feral druid should have even if you are not tank spec.

And try tanking malygos without RnT and see if your "threat is good enough"

There's why you have rage problems at the start of a fight. Fine you don't want to stress the healers, drop into bear, enrage, wait for the enrage to be 1 or 2 seconds from wearing off and pull, so you enter combat before the rage starts to degenerate but don't get hit for the first time until the debuff is gone. But, honestly, if your healers are stressed by the little extra damage in the opening seconds, get new healers.

As a healer I can tell you that the opening seconds are the easiest part of the battle. Every healer with a HoT will have one on you to start the battle. Raid healers, who know they've got nothing to do for the opening seconds will be pre-casting a small heal on you, knowing they'll regen the mana before they really have to start healing. Some will expect that you will be using enrage and be a bit more susceptible to damage in the opening seconds so they'll wind up a big heal to hit you. Your resto brethern with their HoTs all stacked on you won't hesitate to Swift Mend, knowing that it will surely be ready the next time they need a burst...

You want to know what really stresses healers out? When the tank is rage starved and loses aggro to a dps'er or worse loses aggro to healing threat... And it really aggravates dps to have to hold back because they've got a bear tanking instead of a DK or Paladin that doesn't start the fight threat capping the raid... You shouldn't be threat capping the raid, use the tools you have to start a fight hard and fast...

I routinely pop enrage at the start of fights and often use barkskin right before the mobs get to me. I figure that more than cancels out any extra damage from enrage and the cooldown is short enough that I'll have it again for any "oh sh**" moments later in the fight.

I was very suprised to see noone has mentioned this so Im gonna go ahead and do that.
Survival instincts is an ungodly powerfull talent, especially when combined with Glyphed Frenizied Regeneration. In Raids, I usually hover somewhere around 41k health. Survival Instincts increases this to 52.3k health. Frenzied Regeneration heals me for for 0.3% of my Max health per 10 rage or 3% of my max health in total. This is 1599 per second or 15990 total. The Glyph increases that amount by 20% to 1918 per second or 19188 total. That's 36% of my HP back up in ten seconds, on top of the increased healing I get from my healers. Usually more than enough to pick me back up in tight spot.

Without Survival instincs, the numbers look a lot more shabby. 1230 (1476) or 12300 (14760). (brackets are glyphed frenzied regen)

Long story short, by not speccing into survival instincs you rob yourself of a decent emergency button and forgo the option to turn a decent emergency button into a brilliant one. Whats better, since only Frenzied regen is on the GCD, you can even combine them with a trinket and get even more out of it in a single button press. Granted, you blow two cooldowns in one situation, but I rarely press survival instincts unless I really need it, which is usually when I need the extra health FR provides anyway. In those situations, rage is never an issue either.

Mine activates [Tabard of the Protector]. It generates a visible blaze of light and an audible sound effect. I wish they'd given this as a use effect for the WotLK launch [Tabard of the Argent Dawn] since the only way to get the first is to have been around during the few days of the TBC launch event.

Rend & Tear - I started this expansion without R&T (foolishly) and had a more mitigation focused build, but when we got to Malygos i really struggled to stay infront on threat, especially with Warlocks getting out of the Vortex and continuing to DPS. This basically forced my hand on respeccing. I have not regretted taking R&T though, it really is a great all round feral talent, and is a close second to SoTF to being the BEST feral talent in my opinion.

The other great thing about this talent is for AOE tanking, in the current state of the game - i.e. pull a pack and AOE it down, you can almost guarantee a bleed up on all targets from warrior bladestorm/whirlwind so when mauling (with glyph) you can be fairly certain you are always getting the best out of this talent without even needing to tab and lacerate targets.

Survival instincts - no brainer really, druids moaned for ages that we had no MT abilities, so they give us last stand, and an improved version of shield wall (in my opinion) - and people are still leaving it out of tanking builds! Why do you think Warriors always used to be considered THE main tanks?

Losing 3% DR if you are going from, for example, 72% to 69%, represents taking 10.7% more damage, since (1-0.69)/(1-0.72) = 1.107

A bit off topic. More of a theory crafting on a possible talent tree change.

For tanking I got some good pvp gear and have some nice pve gear (neck, back) that gives me defense and resilience.
Those combined give me a total of 2.4% over the crit immune cap, which I think is a common thing amongst tanks.
Now looking at the talents I get 6% immunity (2% per talent point). I could take one less talent point in that and still be crit immune.

My grievance is the talent point itself. Survival of the Fittest. If I take one less talent point I loose 2% stats too. With 3.0.8 I will loose 22% armor contribution from gear. So it is no option to take one less talent point, making defense gear not as useful as it could be.

My suggestion would be to remove the crit immunity from Survival of the fittest and add it to a not so much used tanking talent, Primal Tenacity of a cat talent, Predatory Instincts.
This would cost 3 extra talent points, but to compensate Heart of the wild could be only 2 talent points and some other cat thing could be some more talent points... etc. Some tinkering with the talent tree required. Result: Yay Defense!

One drawback though. Blizzard stated it doesn't want it so that pvp gear is a near must for bears to have good gear (as it used to be in TBC). Though the pve content is better then the pvp content (mostly, pvp gloves are still the best (source:rawr)) it would make pvp gear a lot more valuable again since resilience is no longer a wasted stat.

Your thoughts?

This is a discussion we've had before and should never, ever, ever return to these forums. You don't make defense more valuable by removing the anti crit part of SotF. If you move it around in the tree, we'll still get it at the cost of some other useful-yet-not-mandatory talent, if you remove it completely we'll just use 2p Deadly Gladiator plus a resilience elixir while gemming/gearing optimally on the rest of our pieces because the drawback from using two of those items is far less than gemming/gearing for defense. Which in turn means we'll go back to having to have a 2k+ rated arena team in order to have our best PvE gear, something that isn't a very popular nor good design.

On top of that the value of defense will still be crap because all it does is force us to get terrible gear, nerfing our migitation/avoidance at the cost of being crit immune just to hit some arbitrary cap. After we hit that cap defense goes back to being the worst stat we can have and we sigh a breath of relief that we can go back to getting agility.