Torn between going Kitty or Bear gear

[Hinalover]

Lets start with a few things. I started my druid at the beginning of Wrath (I was 4 bars away from hitting 70 the night when Wrath came out) and was my first real alt I used. Once I got my druid to 80 back in January of last year, I geared her as a bear tank through Naxx. Near the end of Naxx, after I geared out in Bear, I started working on my kitty gear. I stayed kitty spec as my main spec through (SR change was the main reason) Ulduar and ToC. Once ICC came out, I knew finding a group was going to be difficult to find (alts in our guild at the time were not as geared). So I made the decision to go bear spec as my main while gearing up. After getting 4-piece T10 and and the badge waist, I decided to start gearing for kitty.

At this point our guild finally had some geared alts and were moving along in ICC 10 and 25. Up to this point I've been kind of pugging my way into ICC runs, most of which I've tanked. However if I was able to get into the Guild alt 10 man group I would be told to dps (since the 2 tanks in that also tank the ICC 25 alt group). In our ICC 25 alt run, I am asked to help off-tank Marrow and Lady Deathwisper then kitty dps the rest of the instance.

Now here is the issue, I love both bear and kitty spec, but I'm not sure if I should sacrifice my tanking 4 piece for my kitty 4 piece. I have the badges currently to get my 2-piece Kitty right now, however if I spend the 2nd piece on my chest piece I can switch out 2 pieces I use for tanking for kitty. The changes would look something like this:

Tanking
Helm = T10.251 -> T9.245
Shoulder = T10.251 -> T9.245
Belt = Frost belt -> ilvl 245 PVP belt

Kitty
Helm = T9.245 -> T10.251
Shoulder = T9.245 -> T10.51
Chest = Lady Death's Chest -> T10.51
Waist = ilvl 226 Crafted belt -> Frost Belt

[Omeden]

As a diehard bear I wouldn't recommend sacrificing for your kitty gear (not to mention how absolutely awesome the t10 4 piece is for bears) so my only helpful advice is to make sure any new t10 you buy for kitty should be the helm, chest and shoulders. Then run VoA religiously.

Edit: I had only skimmed it previously, sounds like you'd rather be doing kitty anyway so why not switch out the t9.45 gear for bear and use your best gear for your prefered spec? The t10 4 piece is certainly not required to tank Marrow or Deathwhisper.

Go with what you like!

[ziggis]

Hi,

As you only offtank "easy" bosses I would recommend to go with kitty, if you are asked to tank the harder bosses I would focus a bit more on the bear gear.

[Deleted]

You really don't need 4T10 bonus for the 2 bosses you help tanking, so go full mewmewgear tbh

[Retovia]

Sounds to me as you prefer to play as cat the most.

Imo got fo kitty-gear. If you are only going to OT at a few encounters, the downgrade in the gear (T10 -> T9) is minimal.
Also as an OT for those bosses you dont really need the setbonus (atleast I dont hope you need it lol).
The 4 piece set bonus for cats is godlike.

So yeah go for kitty dps, and then after thats sorted upgeade your tank gear

[Sunshine]

As an interesting and semi-related note, I'm one of my guild's MTs, so my 4t10 are all tank gemmed and enchanted. I've managed to pick up quite a few off-set pieces for cat, but no t10 yet. When I went to Rawr to figure out my cat set, it preferred to use the 4t10 even without dps gems/enchants over any off-set pieces, even the helm with the meta and so on.

That 4t10 bonus is pretty powerful!

[Melonberry]

You could always gem some of the t10 a generic agi (Especially if you have an arp trinket for kitty) and use them for both.

The 4p for kitty is insane. Easily 500-1k dps itself.

[Hinalover]

Well, I went ahead and switched out my bear gear for my kitty gear. had to spend 1k gold on gems though... (man RAWR likes using Agil/Crit gems for yellow sockets instead of straight ArP). But anyway, the my target dummy dps did jump nearly 1k (5.4 - 5.6k dps to 6.3-6.5k dps). Granted those early dps numbers are pre-patch, so the patch may have helped in that regard.

But thanks for the help.

http://www.wow-heroes.com/index.php?...&name=deldruid

If you you want to take a look at my gear. My secondary spec is my kitty spec. and don't laugh at my tanking ring. I really don't have anything better to replace the planestalker signet (Heroic) ring with.

[bavarcarus]

I hope they don't ask you to be the third tank in putricide25 lol. That guy hits like a truck.

[Hinalover]

if they did, I would most likely be the off-off tank (the one that dps until P3 and then helps tank the two primary tanks).

[bavarcarus]

if they did, I would most likely be the off-off tank (the one that dps until P3 and then helps tank the two primary tanks).

Well, that's the only phase that he really hits hard. I suppose bear CDs are good enough to make up for it.

[Deleted]

I have no trouble tanking putricide25hc for ~20seconds in full dps gear/spec when i have SI/barkskin/4T10enrage up :P, and the extra 20seconds before you get to 3stack on the 2 real tanks is awesome