What the hell is up with Feral Tanks?

[Revolve]

Hey. Just had to share this. I'm a newly dinged Feral Tank, lying at about 5k gs, 4 pc t10. Stacking stamina and mastery, capped in Hit and Expertise.
I just did Festergut 10 man. Not any specifically good group or so. I was tanking, and going cat form whenever the other tank was tanking.

I was lying at about 9k DPS. WTF?! As a tank? I've never played druid before, I know the rotation and stuff, but still, 9k? I think that's pretty wicked.

Druid love for sure, my new main for Cata is settled <3

[Deleted]

Ok, you're clearly new. But still, you're talking about tank damage. Why the heck would you care about flat damage numbers as a tank? With some of the tank specs you can practically tank with doing zero damage just using high threat abilities (think Sunder Armor et al).

As long as a tank does their role (which has nothing to do with damage numbers, btw), then how the do it is not that important.

But I'm glad as a newly dinged tank you're already in ICC and enjoying being a Bear!

[Ripture]

You do realize the Bloat debuff that Festergut puts on the top aggro target is a damage increase, right?

[Dethaele]

Festergut gives you either +80 or +90% damage with 8-9 stacks of bloat. You also switched to kitty which deals more damage than bear when the other tank was tanking. I know our single target dps has gone up a bit since 4.0.1 hit but your 9k dps on Festergut is easily reasoned.

[Revolve]

Oh. Ripture, had no idea That explains alot. But Feral Tanks still does amazing damage, for sure. And Squeeze, I don't aim for it, but when I see those numbers on my recount, it cheers me up

[Ripture]

Yeah, I did it recently on my 251/264 pally tank and was up to 11k without much trouble.

[Roose]

Ok, you're clearly new. But still, you're talking about tank damage. Why the heck would you care about flat damage numbers as a tank? With some of the tank specs you can practically tank with doing zero damage just using high threat abilities (think Sunder Armor et al).

Blizz has all but done away with abilities that simply generate threat. Threat is now based on damage done. Druids typically had higher damage than other tanks because warriors and pallies had so many abilities with threat modifiers. Threat modifiers are ambiguous and boring. That is why they made it simpler and more fun with tanks actually doing solid damage now.

That said, tanks in general do some decent damage now. I know that I for one would prefer a tank that contributed to damage done rather than just putting out threat. Tank damage counts just as much as DPS' on a boss's health.

Bears will be a great choice for Cata, but I do not see going wrong with any class. Bears definitely had a ton of positive changes though.

[Deleted]

I've been a bear during Wrath and I sure ain't changing for Cata! I can't wait! I'm getting positives from raids currently.

[YoNorrath]

On my pally (about 5.8k GS~) I pull 11k-ish. Saw a prot warrior pull around 10k. These are pretty average numbers for the first tank on this fight. It's a lot more than pre-patch, but it's one fight and doesn't mean a hill of beans.

[Clawtrocity]

On fights where vengence can stack fully you can do 9-10k DPS. Druids on festergut are getting to 20k DPS in top gear.