The Brewmaster Tanking Guide [5.4]

[Deleted]

That's what I was afraid of. Man I'm tired of people who don't understand their class. We've rotated through like 4 or 5 monks now because they get benched for similar issues.

How do you recommend I try and change him? We need a dependable tank right now.

You can point him to guides for a start. There are numerous resources that cover Brewmaster basics, such as the OP in this thread, but that probably won't cover the whole issue.

Some things that go wrong are encounter specific, such as cooldown planning to reduce boss ability damage and talent choices, and will not all be covered in detail by these guides per se. These involve a bit of planning ahead, common sense and reflexes from the brewmaster himself. Your brewmaster should know where potential spikes in damage intake are, and plan cooldowns accordingly or at least mimic what other brewmasters do (less ideal). Sunnier's done a pretty awesome job at covering how she handles the SoO encounters on her site, http://sunniersartofwar.com/, and several threads on this forums also cover encounter specific cooldown usage.

Of course, I'm not in any position to say what you should do with him, but if you intend to keep him, at least let him research his class a bit better, and have him figure our beforehand how he's going to tackle encounters.

[Bonsaii]

You can point him to guides for a start. There are numerous resources that cover Brewmaster basics, such as the OP in this thread, but that probably won't cover the whole issue.

Some things that go wrong are encounter specific, such as cooldown planning to reduce boss ability damage and talent choices, and will not all be covered in detail by these guides per se. These involve a bit of planning ahead, common sense and reflexes from the brewmaster himself. Your brewmaster should know where potential spikes in damage intake are, and plan cooldowns accordingly or at least mimic what other brewmasters do (less ideal). Sunnier's done a pretty awesome job at covering how she handles the SoO encounters on her site, http://sunniersartofwar.com/, and several threads on this forums also cover encounter specific cooldown usage.

Of course, I'm not in any position to say what you should do with him, but if you intend to keep him, at least let him research his class a bit better, and have him figure our beforehand how he's going to tackle encounters.

Yeah, my question was a bit rhetorical I suppose. It's quite frustrating that we're 11/14 heroic and he can't be trusted as anything on progression....

Is there any brewmaster in here who might speak to him in person?

- - - Updated - - -

I'm reading this blog myself and it's quite interesting. What stat priority do you recommend for heroic 25 siegecrafter? We don't have our tanks taking more than 5 stacks.

[Promdates]

Why would you not go above 5 stacks? The general idea is for one to go to 6 and the other to reach 7 before they reset their stacks. I guess you could go with 5, but then the add would die slightly slower, which means less boss damage that you do. Personal preference probably, but we do the usual 6/7 stacks.

[Hottie4Hire]

Hi guys.

I quit WoW in December and recently returned as a DPS. Before, I was a tank. I'm being asked to make myself a viable tank again after essentially a 3 month break and I want to make sure I'm not doing anything terribly wrong in terms of gearing. Would you guys mind taking a look?

http://us.battle.net/wow/en/characte...ydace/advanced

Those are the accurate trinkets I use for tanking. I have alternatives but I don't really like them. 7-8k haste feels right and I don't honestly remember what I had before. The 9k mastery in a 10 man might be a bit much, but the only real negative that brings is less dps, correct?

You guys have been talking about a BM blog which I've read and found to be pretty good. Any other resources in terms of how to specifically approach the fights? The guild is currently 10/14H, so advice on later fights would be especially useful.

[Deleted]

Any other tank class is better as a scorpion than we are.

1.) Paragons hit hard enough that you won't be able to have 2 minutes worth of shuffle banked for the fight, which is how much time you spend in scorp mode. You'll likely also spend some time tanking Korven, and your shuffle bank generally doesn't go up during that period.
2.) Monks have the worst AFK defense of all tank classes, which is essentially what happens when you're in scorp mode. Basically only armor and passives separating you from being splatted (no shuffle as per #1), and we have the worst armor by far of all the tanks.
3.) Monks have a 15% passive damage nerf which applies to scorpion form. This basically balances out our crit, such that the str tanks and monks do roughly equal amounts of scorpion damage. Bears do massively more than the other tanks due to ~85% passive crit and no weakness aura.

We're a better choice than a nontank for sure, but unless you've got two brewmasters in the raid, let the other tank pick the thing up imo.

As always, I learned something new from you again. I didn't know the 15% damage nerf works on us, ew. The reason we decided to make me pick up the Scorpion buff is, that we heard that armour doesn't count, but Monks Mastery works in scorpion form, while our DK's does not. We are already used to this buff layout, we can handle it, but I'll suggest to change it, since its a bad decision after all.

Edit: I usually happen to have that 20 seconds of Shuffle banked before I transform. We only use the buff on Korven and I come out of form immediately after I have deleted him, which takes between 10 and 20 seconds usually. I pop Fortifying Brew, Dampen Harm (doesn't do shit in form, because none of the bosses (Karoz/Korven) hits over 20% of my HP in form, at least as I've noticed, but still) and an 1M Guard before I go scorpion, and our Paladin uses Hand of Sacrifice on me later, so I don't get hit very much. Is it still better for our DK to take the buff? He would only have IBF to use.

[Totaltotemic]

As always, I learned something new from you again. I didn't know the 15% damage nerf works on us, ew. The reason we decided to make me pick up the Scorpion buff is, that we heard that armour doesn't count, but Monks Mastery works in scorpion form, while our DK's does not. We are already used to this buff layout, we can handle it, but I'll suggest to change it, since its a bad decision after all.

Edit: I usually happen to have that 20 seconds of Shuffle banked before I transform. We only use the buff on Korven and I come out of form immediately after I have deleted him, which takes between 10 and 20 seconds usually. I pop Fortifying Brew, Dampen Harm (doesn't do shit in form, because none of the bosses (Karoz/Korven) hits over 20% of my HP in form, at least as I've noticed, but still) and an 1M Guard before I go scorpion, and our Paladin uses Hand of Sacrifice on me later, so I don't get hit very much. Is it still better for our DK to take the buff? He would only have IBF to use.

Stagger is 100% ineffective at reducing damage taken while a scorpion. It does not inherently reduce your damage taken, only smooths it out, but after 10 seconds of being wailed on without purifying you're essentially taking the same damage you would if you had no Stagger at all. The biggest problem with scorpion form is that not only can you not refresh Shuffle but you can't purify, and if you can't purify for an extended period of time then Stagger is completely worthless. A BrM will do less damage and take more as a scorpion than literally any other tank in the game.

[Promdates]

Edit: I usually happen to have that 20 seconds of Shuffle banked before I transform. We only use the buff on Korven and I come out of form immediately after I have deleted him, which takes between 10 and 20 seconds usually. I pop Fortifying Brew, Dampen Harm (doesn't do shit in form, because none of the bosses (Karoz/Korven) hits over 20% of my HP in form, at least as I've noticed, but still) and an 1M Guard before I go scorpion, and our Paladin uses Hand of Sacrifice on me later, so I don't get hit very much. Is it still better for our DK to take the buff? He would only have IBF to use.

There should be at least 2-3 times where you can use it. Prime, Xaril, and then again towards the end. If you're doing 25's, you can probably honestly do it 4 times. Since the timer lasts for 30 seconds, that's 2m of time that you can just poop on bosses. With 4 uses, I ended up doing almost 850k dps.

[Deleted]

There should be at least 2-3 times where you can use it. Prime, Xaril, and then again towards the end. If you're doing 25's, you can probably honestly do it 4 times. Since the timer lasts for 30 seconds, that's 2m of time that you can just poop on bosses. With 4 uses, I ended up doing almost 850k dps.

Yeah, while there are 2-3 times where we (I) could use it, we decided to do it only once, on Korven, because we found it pretty dangerous to do so, and we "don't need" the extra damage. While its extreme fun to use it, I make our healers cry bloody tears if I transform anytime later on, so... :P Note, that we raid 10-mans, so we only have 2 healers to deal with all of the damage.

But again, I'll suggest our Raid Leader, that our DK should pick up the scorpion buff, maybe he's somewhat easier to heal. (I don't think we'd change our tax anyways, since we are already used to this one, but it worths a try.)

Thank you all!

[Promdates]

Yeah, your raid comp isn't that great for outside cooldowns (I see paladin and disc priest). He can probably pop IBF, then call for a Pain Sup, then call for a Hand of Sac. As long as he makes sure all 3 of those are available before he goes into scorpion, he should be fine and be able to use it more often.

[archkiller]

Should I stay mastery and 2 stamina trinkets, or go back to normal crit build with haromm & TED for heroic klaxxis 10man? We have our first attempt yesterday with 2 heals and 6 dps and have problem killing bloodskeer with bloodlust at start (I tanking bloodskeer at entrance) before the blood reach him. Only 50% of our attempts we manage to kill bloodskeer before blood reach him. Thinking of going back crit build with 2 dps trinket to help killing bloodskeer down faster.

[Deleted]

You should be OK with Haromm & TED, but keep in mind, that the Paragons hit hard. On pull, you should start DPSing Rikkal for a few seconds until the first wave of Blood thingies come out, then hardswitch to Skeer and burn the shit out of him. If you still have problems with the DPS, try to kill the Bloods, or keep them in stunlock for a few seconds.

[britishbubba]

Should I stay mastery and 2 stamina trinkets, or go back to normal crit build with haromm & TED for heroic klaxxis 10man? We have our first attempt yesterday with 2 heals and 6 dps and have problem killing bloodskeer with bloodlust at start (I tanking bloodskeer at entrance) before the blood reach him. Only 50% of our attempts we manage to kill bloodskeer before blood reach him. Thinking of going back crit build with 2 dps trinket to help killing bloodskeer down faster.

I'd run double dps trinkets, and just forge into a little bit extra mastery (I think I was sitting at like 10k raid buffed for it). Just be wary that later in the fight (looking at you wind reaver) the bosses start to hit really hard.

On pull, you should start DPSing Rikkal for a few seconds until the first wave of Blood thingies come out, then hardswitch to Skeer and burn the shit out of him. If you still have problems with the DPS, try to kill the Bloods, or keep them in stunlock for a few seconds.

The first wave spawns so fast that I've never had to put any damage into rikkal. Had more of a problem of skeer landing in odd places and almost not making it out of the way of the blood because of how slow he moves.

[Pazx]

http://us.battle.net/wow/en/characte...%A9ar/advanced
this is currently my monk set up.
i'm only running normal SoO and i was wondering if i should look at getting 4set or 2set.
i'm also thinking my trinks could be changed for more dps as to what i really don't know and was wondering if anyone could help.

[Deleted]

The first wave spawns so fast that I've never had to put any damage into rikkal. Had more of a problem of skeer landing in odd places and almost not making it out of the way of the blood because of how slow he moves.

I was referring to the raid when I wrote "you".
Btw in case you haven't figured it out yet, Xuen hits HARD on this fight. Ridiculously HARD.

http://us.battle.net/wow/en/characte...%A9ar/advanced
this is currently my monk set up.
i'm only running normal SoO and i was wondering if i should look at getting 4set or 2set.
i'm also thinking my trinks could be changed for more dps as to what i really don't know and was wondering if anyone could help.

The 2p bonus alone doesn't worth it, since its very marginal.
I personally love the 4p. The harder the content you do and the more you favour Mastery, the better it gets.
Daught and Totaltotemic have done some maths about the value of the t16 4p bonus, both came to the conclusion that it doesn't worth replacing it for offpieces, but the ilvl difference between Normal and Heroic pieces is another question.
Looking for source, will edit soon. (Can't find Daughts calculations. )

Totaltotemic: http://www.mmo-champion.com/threads/...1#post24994571

[Pazx]

I was referring to the raid when I wrote "you".
Btw in case you haven't figured it out yet, Xuen hits HARD on this fight. Ridiculously HARD.



The 2p bonus alone doesn't worth it, since its very marginal.
I personally love the 4p. The harder the content you do and the more you favour Mastery, the better it gets.
Daught and Totaltotemic has done some maths about the value of the t16 4p bonus, both came to the conclusion that it doesn't worth replacing it for offpieces, but the ilvl difference between Normal and Heroic pieces is another question.
Looking for source, will edit soon. (Can't find Daughts calculations. )

Totaltotemic: http://www.mmo-champion.com/threads/...1#post24994571

ahh good read, thanks that was helpful.

[britishbubba]

I was referring to the raid when I wrote "you".
Btw in case you haven't figured it out yet, Xuen hits HARD on this fight. Ridiculously HARD.

Ah simple misunderstanding.

And yeah, xuen goes pretty ham on that fight. Especially if you get a parasite on you for more vengeance.

[Sunnydee]

Doing klaxxi and garrosh heroic while being roughly 10 ilvls lower, how much critt can i sacrifice for some extra mastery and haste?(566 ilvl as it stands now) if i use 4 set il be 564, not sure if worth it atm.

armory can be found in sig, Obviously tthis wont be an easy task. and regarding trinkets, using [Renataki's Soul Charm] [Ticking Ebon Detonator] atm. both reforged into critt. got vial and jugger both on heroic but doubt jugger would help alot so should i most likely gem some extra expertise and use vial´+ TED without reforge or stick to the ones i have?

guild HAVE killed him twice so far on heroic (garro that is) so its not a clean fresh progress group. but i want to make sure il stay alive >.<

[Boomking60]

11: Professions

BS and ALCH ?

Really?

Havent that change to tailoring and engineering now?

[Shamanberry]

11: Professions
BS and ALCH ?
Really?
Havent that change to tailoring and engineering now?

Engineering is a pretty weak profession for tanks in general, since secondary stats are vastly superior to agility given equal value. The alternative tinker is a +dodge cooldown which isn't fantastic. Compared to gaining +640 crit/mastery, it just doesn't work. Tailoring is similar, but it's even worse since your only choice is an attack power bonus which grants you (almost) no defensive benefit.

Even if you're aiming specifically to optimize DPS, the reason that Tailoring/Engineering tend to be so highly valued for DPS classes is that you can line up the cooldowns with other class cooldowns at least once in the fight to enhance their value (if used perfectly) relative to the flat +stat bonuses of other professions.

However, tanks don't tend to have much in the way of offensive cooldowns, and damage doesn't scale well with bonuses like that - the majority of your damage output comes from Vengeance gaming, not small increases to baseline attack power, which is in effect all that both Swordguard and Synapse Springs give you.

[Quotey]

Engineering is the best because of rocket boots IMO. Mobility is pretty damn useful. I run with LW second for the same reason. BS is excellent though!