Druid tanking?

[Deleted]

While as said before it is possible, its defenatly not optimal. My toon bear has 75% Armor (character sheet) and is pretty much in full bis gear (not counting wf items and still missing an amp trinket). 85% would sacrifice so much crit and its not really worth it since there is no boss ability that one shots you that you can't have a CD for.

This made me chuckle. So being in almost full heroic(non-wf) BiS means there's no ability that can even remotely one-shot you? How weird!

As I understand the argument it's that BECAUSE bears have no way of reducing physical damage nukes they band-aid buffed both barkskin (from 60 to 30sec cd) and the stamina modifier on bearform (was 1.2, is now 1.4). Specifically mentioned was G.Nazgrim's 'Execute', which isnt reduced by armor. That being said, im almost sure no physical nukes are modified by armor, only boss-autoattack damage. Otherwise the 3m damage execute would be reduced by both tankpassives (10-25% dep. on class) + 'stance'passive (blood pres. etc) which arent encompassed by the other passive + armor (55%-75% ish). Would not be much left of that 3m after those reductions.

[Frostbyte-2361]

I currently play a Prot Warrior & a Guardian Druid. I have found that tanking as a druid is quite boring in comparison. It just seems like there's less to do.

[Dreyen]

Pretty sure execute is reduced by armor.. ive survived executes with absolutely nothing to reduce damage as a bear, and if armor didnt reduce it, it would hit me for 264k... with my armor it would hit me for 750k-800k, which is about waht it hit me for :O

It's also why the armor debuff makes execute dangerous. You always want to use barkskin on the second execute.

As far as one-shot goes, theres nothing that one-shots in this tier, and nazgrim's execute is what comes the closest to it.

[exochaft]

Pretty sure execute is reduced by armor.. ive survived executes with absolutely nothing to reduce damage as a bear, and if armor didnt reduce it, it would hit me for 264k... with my armor it would hit me for 750k-800k, which is about waht it hit me for :O

It's also why the armor debuff makes execute dangerous. You always want to use barkskin on the second execute.

As far as one-shot goes, theres nothing that one-shots in this tier, and nazgrim's execute is what comes the closest to it.

I can confirm Nazgrim's execute definitely is reduced by armor, even made a Weakaura for the actual amount the ability would hit back when we were doing the fight undergeared (and yes, the numbers lined up nicely).

There technically is stuff that can one-shot in this tier, but most of it depends on how your raid tackles a fight. For example, the debuff application on H Seigecrafter can literally one-shot a tank without some form of active damage reduction depending upon how high you take it. If you tank certain combinations on H Klaxxi, some attacks can one-shot a tank, as well... that scorpion pulls a lot of threat! Even sitting in Annihilates on Garrosh can instantly kill a tank. There are some other outlying situations where instantly dying can occur, however the common theme is that a tank doesn't have to do those things at all to beat the encounters. Most of it was conceived when we were severely under-geared and pushing early progression, and almost every situation that's really dangerous for a tank is on the back end of SoO, too. There definitely isn't a mandatory mechanic or stack size that tanks are required to have that severely threatens their survivability.

I'd say the only thing that I've seen, more often than not, one-shot tanks is when the Warbringers are AoE-stunned on normal Garrosh, followed by synchronized swing timers making quick work of a tank. I guess people don't think about swing timers anymore.

[Vilendor]

If you get oneshooted then you made some really stupid mistake. Honestly i can't remember when did i die last time in this expansion just by tanking the boss and taking too much damage, it's allways a raid wipe or vengeance abuse going wrong, or not avoiding some avoidable boss ability.

And the guy who says druids have low physical reduction and paladins are OP with Shield of the Righteous...are you on drugs?
I prefer 75+% permanent reduction over a 3 second buff what costs 3 holypower to keep up.

[Tntdruid]

So true, i dont take much dmg from physical damage, at 128k armor

[Serendippity]

I'd like to share with you the Mikepreachwow video he released a while ago (maybe 5.1?). You can skip to the guardian druid portion of the video with the annotations on the left. He provides a great view on the spec:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ML870A5tYw

[Phaty]

There are just certain things that can't be healed, AKA one shots. That's why Bears are kind of weak, no way to prevent one shots other than use stamina trinkets where other tanks just use their active mitigation.

barkskin and SV say hello, and with a vial barkskin has a redic fast CD added wit hthe meta proccing all the time

[Tehterokkar]

barkskin and SV say hello, and with a vial barkskin has a redic fast CD added wit hthe meta proccing all the time

Did you read what I typed? For fairly frequent high hits like Nazgrim Execute, Druids are screwed since they have to use their personal CDs where other tanks pop their active mitigation.

[Deleted]

Did you read what I typed? For fairly frequent high hits like Nazgrim Execute, Druids are screwed since they have to use their personal CDs where other tanks pop their active mitigation.

I have been just fine just using SD, sure I take maybe 700k hit but I heal that up quick with FR afterwards.

[Tehterokkar]

I have been just fine just using SD, sure I take maybe 700k hit but I heal that up quick with FR afterwards.

Issue was on progress, where you had a lot less armor and health.

[RuneeBH]

Monks don't have AM to use for Execute either..We have to use guard or rely on (mastery) stagger, just like a druid uses barkskin or relies on (mastery) armor. I don't see why people always have things to say about Guardians (and this is coming from a monk, 576 ilvl) - Monks tank a big hit, purify, and expel themself back to full hp..a Guardian just skips a step since they have their mastery baked in and don't need to manage it, then heal themself with FR. It really isn't a big difference.

[Braindwen]

Issue was on progress, where you had a lot less armor and health.

Technically it was only an issue before the tier came out, as they specifically targeted buffs at us so that we'd be able to handle it (iirc, barkskin was buffed pretty much entirely for that fight). On live, Nazgrim's never been more of a nuisance, sure it sucks to have to care a little bit, but that's about it.

The only places it's an actual weakness now are Blood Rage (not the biggest deal), electrostatic charge (although there's not much point going over 7 and we can solo to 7), and bosses being 1-tanked that can easily global their tanks (thok/garrosh, though we can obviously still 1-tank them).

[Deleted]

You can never roll wrong as a druid. All for specs offer a completely different playstyle, so even if you will find that druid tanking is not what you are looking for, there is still plenty reason to level a druid regardless