Welcome to Bear Guide 4.1+
It's still a work in progress at the moment, but you'll see it become finished in the coming hours/days.
The guild is not acting up for now.
| Table of Content |
I: Introduction
II: Bear Form
III: Bear Stats
IV: Bear Talents
V: Bear Glyphs
VI: Core Abilities
VII: Gears
VIII: Enchantments/Gems
IX: Profession
X: Reforge
XI: Macros
XII: Rotation Tanking
XIII: Addons
XIV: FAQ
I: | Introduction |
The purpose of this Guide is to sum up knowledge around Bear Tank.
Other Druid Spec, check these guide.
- Cat Druid: The Cat Guide 4.0.1 Edition
- Moonkin Druid: The Moonkin Guide Cataclysm-Edition
- Resto Druid: Resto Druid Guide – Cata Edition
First of all, let give recognitions to Gzilia (Original Creator), Arel00 (3.0.0 Creator), Leafre (3.0.0 Co-Creator), Retovia (3.0.0 Co-Creator), Alski (3.0.0 Co-Creator), Qieth (3.0.0 Co-Creator and the creator of The Moonkin Guide Cataclysm-edition), and Infernix17 (Pre-Cata to 4.0.1 Bear guide).
Let also give recognitions to Tangedyn, Katarn, and Barawr for helping me updating the Bear Guild.
Also, thank you to those that contributed to the Bear Guide and will keep contributing. This guide is a collection of many people's contributions. If you feel like adding up to it, or correcting any wrong data, just hit reply. I will make sure the information is updated and is correct.
Since the patch 4.0.0 came out many things were change: Gems, Enchantment, Glyphs, Rotation and even Talents. I will update all the changes from 4.0.0 toward all the major points for tanking as a Druid Bear. We will continue to focus on stats, talents, glyphs, rotation and mechanics designed to develop the tanking skill of Bear druids in 4.0.0+. I have grab couple key-points from Arel00’s Guide and Infernix17’s Guide then carry them over to this guide.
II: | Bear Form |
Pre 4.0.0: There was two different Bear Forms: Bear Form and Dire Bear Form. When 4.0.0 came out both forms merge as one: Bear Form. Dire Bear Form will upgrade the Bear Form at lvl 40 without having to learn a new spell. The spell cost 5% of base mana and it is instant cast.
Here is the tool-tip for Bear Form:
Shapeshift into bear form, armor contribution from cloth and leather items by 65% (120% at lvl 40+), and Stamina by 10%. Significantly increases threat generation, causes Agility to increase attack power, and also protects the caster from Polymorph effects and allows the use of various bear abilities.
The act of shapeshifting frees the caster of movement slowing effects.
Bear Form have 200% (4.0.0) threat generation.
Strength compare to other tanking class (Death Knight, Paladin, and Warrior):
- Immune to Polymorph Effects
- Second Highest Health Pool (» 22.43% stamina boost by level 75)
- Good physical mitigation (High Armor and Savage Defense)
- Can remove movement slowing effectsGood avoidance (High Dodge)
- Good Solo threat generation
Weakness compare to other tanking class (Death Knight, Paladin, and Warrior):
- Harder to control when Mind Control due to the Polymorph Immunity (Stun, Cyclone, Roots, and Blind will work)
- Damage taken from AoE tanking is generally higher than other tanks due to the poor scaling of SD.
- No range silence spells
- Weak AoE threat generation
III: | Bear Stats |
Bear Stats are important to tanking. These stats help you control threat, and survive hard-hitting mobs.
Agility:
This is one of the major stats for Bear Druid. Agility deals with both threat and survival.
- Agility grants Attack Power, Critical Strike %, and Dodge %.
- No longer gives Armor
Code:1 Agility = 2.8875 Attack Power 324.85324 Agility = 1% Critical Strike 243.58 Agility = 1% Dodge before DR
Armor: (Need some data to update)
Armor is survival stat that does help bear deal with physical damages.
- The only thing that get multiplied is the base armor on your leather/cloak.
- The physical damage reduction from armor is capped at 75%.
Code:1 Armor = 4.393752 Armor (This includes Bear Form, Thick Hide and our Meta.) 97718 Armor = 429349 Armor = 75% damage reduction
Critical Strike:
Critical Strike pays a major role in Survival as well as being a threat stat. Each time you deal a critical strike while in Bear Form, you “could” gain a buff called Savage Defense, which does reducing the damage taken from the next attack, more about Savage Defense latter in the guide.
- Increases your chance to proc Savage Defense.
Code:179.28 Critical Strike rating = 1% Critical Strike
Dodge:
Dodge is the bears only “real” Defensive stat, since we can't block or parry with our claws.
- When you do dodge an attack, you would not waste Savage Defense, it will be use if you do get hit or the timer went up.
Code:176.71899 Dodge rating = 1% Dodge before DR
Expertise:
Expertise lowers the enemy's change to parry and dodge.
- Dodge Cap, is called "Expertise soft cap", and is set at 26 Expertise.
- Parry Cap, "Expertise hard cap", is at 56 Expertise
- Bosses’ mechanic called parry-haste; parry-haste can greatly improve the boss damage output, endangering the life of the tank. However all the Cataclysm bosses’ have their parry-haste mechanic turn off. (Will list the bosses if they do have the parry-haste)
- Expertise does help with the up time of Savage Defense.
Code:30.0272 Expertise rating = 1 Expertise 780.7072 Expertise rating = 26 Expertise 1687.5232 Expertise rating = 56 Expertise
Hit:
Hit rating help by lowering our chance to miss an enemy or multiple enemies.
- Hit Cap is set at 8%.
- Hit does help with the up time of Savage Defense.
Code:120.109 Hit rating = 1% Hit 720.654 Hit rating = 6% Hit (Heroic Dungeon) 960.872 Hit rating = 8% Hit (Raid)
Mastery:
Mastery is a new stat in Cataclysm.
- Mastery helps the Bear to improve their Savage Defense.
- Savage Defender give 35% damage reduction (once you learn it from your trainer) then + 4% for each Mastery gain toward Savage Defense.
- Like always, Savage Defense only takes 1 hit, so whether it is a 500 dot tick, 1,000 aura tick or 40k hit, Savage Defense will fade after. It is a little bit RNG based as it can be wasted with a 400 dot tick or sometimes save your life when it absorbs a 60k hit.
- Savage Defender does not get destroy by one hit, it will set up a set number base on how high your critical attack. The damages taken will take some part of that defense. Bosses can or will remove the Savage Defense without a problem. This was fix to solve the AOE problem that Bear seem to have.
Code:179.28 Mastery rating = 1 Mastery
Stamina:
This stats boost our health, the higher the stamina the longer we last until a heal.
See Enchantments/Gems Rules for stats parameters.Code:1 Stam = 17.99721 Health (Bear form, Heart of the Wild, Leather Specialization and Mark/Kings)
IV: | Bear Talents |
You can’t tank without having any talent build.
This is a core talent for every bear tank:
Bear Talent Build
V: | Glyphs |
Here is the new updated list of Tanking Glyph for bears on 7/14/11. (will be updating if there are new useful Glyphs)
~Prime~
~Major~
- Glyph of Maul
- Glyph of Frenzied Regeneration
- Glyph of Rebirth
- Glyph of Faerie Fire
- Glyph of Feral Charge
~Minor~
VI: | Core Abilities | (will be fixing this chapter)
Berserk:
- Your Lacerate periodic damage has a 30% chance to refresh the cooldown of your Mangle (Bear) ability and make it cost no rage.
- In addition, when activated this ability causes your Mangle (Bear) ability to hit up to 3 targets and have no cooldown, last 15 sec.
- Pretty Straight forward, exactly like warriors’ "Sword and Board."
- Still amazing for opening threat.
Feral Faerie Fire:
- Decrease the armor of the target by 4% for 5 min. While affected, the target cannot stealth or turn invisible. Stacks up to 3 times. Like the warriors' Sunders, they will not stack.
- If you put three talent points into Feral Aggression, you only need to cast one Feral Faerie Fire to reach the cap.
- Feral Faerie Fire deal (AP * 0.108 + 1) and additional threat when used in Bear Form.
- Feral Faerie Fire is only useful for opening threat or if the target is far away, if you find time to throw in Feral Faerie Fire then throw it in.
Frenzied Regeneration:
Lacerate
- Increases maximum health by 30%, increases health to 30% (if below that value). 3 minute Cooldown.
- Added WotLK's Survival Instincts to the ability.
- Also, will heal you for
Lacerates the enemy target, dealing (3608 + (AP * 0.0766)) damage and making them bleed for (5 * (69 + (AP * 0.00512))) damage over 15 sec, and causing a high amount of threat. Damage increased by attack power. This effect stacks up to 3 times on the same target. (lvl 85)Lacerate has been changed to only stack 3 times and the Lacerate Dot is bad now, Lacerate(non dot) does an insane amount of damage and you should be pulverizing every 10-15 seconds, so make sure you always have 3 stacks of Lacerate on the target.The only good thing about the Lacerate DoT is that it gives you a 30% chance to refresh the cooldown of Mangle.
MangleMangle the target for 260% normal damage plus 774 and causes the target to take 30% additional damage from bleed effects for 1 min.Mangle is your second strongest hitting ability and needs to be kept on CD at all times.
MaulAn attack that instantly deals (7 + AP*0.264) damage. Effects which increase Bleed damage also increase Maul damage. 3 second cooldown.Maul has been changed to have a 3 second cooldown rather than "on next attack."Macro everything to maul, because it is still off the GCD. **See "XIII Macro" for more information. SwipeSwipe nearby enemies, inflicting 143 + (AP*0.114) damage.Swipe now has a 3 second Cooldown.
Survival InstinctsReduces all damage taken by 60% for 12 sec. Only use-able while in Bear Form or Cat Form.Exactly like warriors "Shield Wall" ability.
PulverizeDeals 80% weapon damage plus additional 150 damage for each of your Lacerate applications on the target, and increases your melee critical strike chance by 3% for each Lacerate application consumed for 10 sec.Used every 10-15 seconds.Make sure to have 3 stacks of Lacerate up before using it.Must be kept up as the 9% crit is huge for our threat and Mastery.
Skull BashYou charge and skull bash the target, interrupting spellcasting and preventing any spell in that school from being cast for 5 sec.Extremely useful for picking up casters.It will not miss.
VII: | Gears |
Each ones show you a link to the BiS List at that ilvl, since it is easier to upgrade the BiS list from there.
*© Blizzard
- Heroic Dungeon (346 and BoE)
- Heroic Dungeon (353 and BoE)
- T11 (359, 372 and BoE)
- T12 (378 and 391) - (Finish)
- T13 - (Finish)
VIII: | Enchantments/Gems |
Enchantments:
The ordering goes by everyone can get it, then Professions only. If you see a Star (*), that mean that Pre-Cata item is BiS right now. It is really your choice on how you enchanted your gears.
Head:
- [Arcanum of the Earthen Ring]: +90 Stamina and +35 dodge rating (Revered - Earthen Ring)
- [Arcanum of the Ramkahen]: +60 Agility and +35 haste rating (Revered - Ramkahen)
Shoulder:
- [Greater Inscription of Shattered Crystal]: +50 Agility and +25 Mastery rating (Exalted - Therazane)
- [Greater Inscription of Unbreakable Quartz]: +75 Stamina and +25 dodge rating (Exalted - Therazane)
- [Inscription of the Earth Prince]: +195 Stamina and +25 dodge rating (Inscription only)
- [Swiftsteel Inscription]: +130 Agility and +25 Mastery rating (Inscription only)
Cloak:
- [Enchant Cloak - Protection]: +250 Armor *
- [Swordguard Embroidery]: Causing your damaging melee and ranged attacks to sometimes increase your attack power by 1000 for 15 sec. (Tailoring only)
Chest:
- [Enchant Chest - Greater Stamina]: +75 Stamina
- [Enchant Chest - Peerless Stats]: Increase all stats by 20
Bracer:
- [Enchant Bracer - Agility] : +50 Agility
- [Draconic Embossment - Agility]: +130 Agility (Leatherworking Only)
- [Draconic Embossment - Stamina]: +195 Stamina (Leatherworking Only)
- [Socket Bracer]: +Socket (Blacksmith only)
Gloves:
- [Enchant Gloves - Greater Mastery]: +65 Mastery
- [Glove Reinforcements]: +240 Armor *
- [Quickflip Deflection Plates]: Allowing you to increase your armor by 1500 for 12 sec. Gloves can only be activated once every minute. No side effect known yet. (Engineering only)
- [Synapse Springs]: Allowing you to find your highest attribute (Agility) and increase it by 480. Gloves can only be activated once every minute. No side effect known yet. (Engineering only)
- [Socket Gloves]: +Socket (Blacksmith only)
Legs:
- [Charscale Leg Armor]: +145 Stamina and +55 Agility
- [Charscale Leg Reinforcements]: +145 Stamina and +55 Agility (Leatherworking only)
Boots:
- [Enchant Boots - Assassin's Step]: increase movement speed slightly and +25 Agility.
- [Enchant Boots - Earthen Vitality]: increase movement speed slightly and +30 Stamina.
Belt:
- [Ebonsteel Belt Buckle]: +Socket
- [Grounded Plasma Shield]: Allowing you to activate a powerful shield that absorbs 16200 to 19800 damages. There is a side effect when it does not work, which give you a debuff called “Plasma Misfire!” that give “Painful Shock” which then delivers an extremely painful static shock to all enemies within 40 yards. The shock does no damage, but will taunt all targets to attack you for 4 sec. (Engineering only)
- [Nitro Boosts]: Permanently attaches overpowered nitro boosts to your belt, allowing you to greatly increase run speed for 5 sec. (Engineers only)
Rings:
- [Enchant Ring - Agility]: +40 Agility (Enchanters only)
- [Enchant Ring - Greater Stamina]: +60 Stamina (Enchanters only)
Weapon:
- [Enchant 2H Weapon - Mighty Agility]: +130 Agility
- [Enchant Weapon - Windwalk]: Permanently enchant a weapon to sometimes increase dodge rating by 600 and movement speed by 15% for 10 sec when striking in melee.
Gems:
These are the tanking gems that will help.
Meta Gems:
- [Austere Shadowspirit Diamond]: +81 Stamina and 2% Increased Armor Value from Items (Requires at least 2 Yellow gems)
Red Gems:
- [Delicate Chimera's Eye]: +67 Agility (Jewelcrafting only)
- [Delicate Inferno Ruby]: +40 Agility
Blue Gems:
- [Solid Chimera's Eye]: +101 Stamina (Jewelcrafting only)
- [Solid Ocean Sapphire]: +60 Stamina
Yellow Gems:
- [Fractured Chimera's Eye]: +67 Mastery Rating (Jewelcrafting only)
- [Fractured Amberjewel]: +40 Mastery Rating
Purple Gems:
- [Shifting Demonseye]: +20 Agility and +30 Stamina
Orange Gems:
- [Adept Ember Topaz]: +20 Mastery Rating and +20 Agility
- [Polished Ember Topaz]: +20 Dodge Rating and +20 Agility
Green Gems:
- [Puissant Dream Emerald]: +20 Mastery Rating and +30 Stamina
- [Regal Dream Emerald]: +20 Dodge Rating and +30 Stamina
Prismatic Gems:
It looks like Blizzard may have skip prismatic gem for Cata will update for patch 4.3 in case if they return.
Cogwheel: Engineering Only
- [Fractured Cogwheel]: +208 Mastery Rating
- [Smooth Cogwheel]: +208 Critical Strike Rating
- [Subtle Cogwheel]: +208 Dodge Strike Rating
Good mixtures for the sockets are:
Almost every BiS from T12 leather pieces have +10 agility or more.
It is ok to to match the socket if it is between 10 to 30 agility, it is not going to hurt you in the long run.
If it has secondary stats, then gem whatever you want meaning you can put in [Delicate Inferno Ruby] or [Solid Ocean Sapphire].
There is nothing wrong with whatever build you take, these are the common gem sockets choices. Doing a mixture between the builds would help.
Agility Build:
Blue Socket:
[Shifting Demonseye]: +20 Agility and +30 Stamina
Red Socket:
[Delicate Inferno Ruby]: +40 Agility
Yellow Socket:
[Polished Ember Topaz]: +20 Dodge Rating and +20 Agility
Prismatic Socket:
[Delicate Inferno Ruby]: +40 Agility
Stamina Build:
Blue Socket:
[Solid Ocean Sapphire]: +60 Stamina
Red Socket:
[Shifting Demonseye]: +20 Agility and +30 Stamina
Yellow Socket:
[Regal Dream Emerald]: +20 Dodge Rating and +30 Stamina
Prismatic Socket:
[Solid Ocean Sapphire]: +60 Stamina
Enchantments/Gems Rules:
Read "We Aren’t in Wrath Anymore, Toto…" by Reesi.
Originally Posted by "We Aren't in Wrath Anymore, Toto..."
It is great read by Reesi and I do hope that we could end the argument.
I will agree with Reesi since everything have been use during progression.
It is more on how your raid is built and how well you play your bear.
IX: | Professions |
All of these are compare to a druid without that Professions.
Alchemist:
- +120 Stamina from Mixology using [Flask of Steelskin]
- +80 Agility from Mixology using [Flask of the Winds]
- An extra hour on Flasks
- Total of Four hours when using [Cauldron of Battle]/[Big Cauldron of Battle]
Blacksmith:
- [Socket Bracer] + [Socket Gloves] = +120 Stamina
- [Socket Bracer] + [Socket Gloves] = +80 agility
Enchanter:
- 2 [Enchant Ring - Agility] = +80 Agility
- 2 [Enchant Ring - Greater Stamina] = +120 Stamina
Engineer:
- [Agile Bio-Optic Killshades] (Only good for T11)
- [Fractured Cogwheel]: +208 Mastery Rating
- [Smooth Cogwheel]: +208 Critical Strike Rating
- [Subtle Cogwheel]: +208 Dodge Strike Rating
- [Grounded Plasma Shield]: Allowing you to activate a powerful shield that absorbs 16200 to 19800 damages. There is a side effect when it does not work, which give you a debuff called “Plasma Misfire!” that gives “Painful Shock” which then delivers an extremely painful static shock to all enemies within 40 yards. The shock does no damage, but will taunt all targets to attack you for 4 sec.
- [Synapse Springs]: Allowing you to find your highest attribute (Agility) and increase it by 480. Gloves can only be activated once every minute. No side effect known yet.
- [Quickflip Deflection Plates]: Allowing you to increase your armor by 1500 for 12 sec. Gloves can only be activated once every minute. No side effect known yet.
- [Nitro Boosts]: Permanently attaches overpowered nitro boosts to your belt, allowing you to greatly increase run speed for 5 sec. (Engineers only)
Jewelcrafter:
- 3 [Solid Chimera's Eye]: +123 Stamina
- 3 [Delicate Chimera's Eye]: +87 Agility
Leatherworker:
- [Draconic Embossment - Stamina]: +195 Stamina (There is no stamina enchantment for the Wrist at this moment, if i have to guess it will be +120 stamina)
- [Draconic Embossment - Agility]: +80 Agility
- [Charscale Leg Reinforcements]: +145 Stamina and +55 Agility
Tailor:
- [Swordguard Embroidery (Rank 2)]: Causing your damaging melee and ranged attacks to sometimes increase your attack power by 1000 for 15 sec.
Scribe:
- [Inscription of the Earth Prince]: +195 Stamina and +25 dodge rating
- [Swiftsteel Inscription]: +130 Agility and +25 Mastery rating
Miner:
- Toughness (Rank 7) = +120 Stamina
Skinner:
- Master of Anatomy (Rank 7) = +80 Critical Strike Rating
Herbalist:
- Lifeblood (Rank 8): Heals for 4% of your health instantly and then grants 480 haste ratings for 20 second. It can be critical.
Profession Combo:
Many Bear tanks choose these one of the crafting profession+Jewelcrafter: Jewelcrafter/Scribe, Jewelcrafter/Leatherworker, Jewelcrafter/Blacksmith, or Jewelcrafter/Enchanter, due to the high Stamina or high Agility:
Jewelcrafter/Scribe:
- +331 Agility and +25 Mastery rating
- +498 Stamina and +25 dodge rating
Jewelcrafter /Leatherworker:
- +331 Agility
- +498 Stamina
Jewelcrafter /Blacksmith or Jewelcrafter /Enchanter:
Also some Bear pick up Jewelcrafter/Engineer due to the [Synapse Springs].
- +423 Stamina
- +281 Agility
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X: | Reforge |
For reforging, the only course of action is reforging the least wanted stat into Dodge Rating.
This is the best support for survivability, while simultaneously keeping our avoidance above the plate tanks.
The Reforge priority is as follows, from least wanted to most wanted:
Haste < Hit / Expertise (if beyond soft cap) < Crit < Mastery
XI: | Macros | Maul is still off the GCD, it just no longer happens on next attack.The reason most won't work is because you will have ranks posted in the code. You can rebuilt the macros using the abilities directly out of the spellbook. Warning you can get rage starve using this macro in heroic dungeon, raid is a different story. #showtooltip/cast (spell name)/cast !Maul
XII: | Priority System/AoE Tanking | The Full Priority System would look like: Enrage > Berserk > FFF > Demo Roar > Mangle > Thrash > Laceratex3 > Pulverize > Lacerate x1 > Mangle/Thrash > Laceratex3 > PulverizeOnly use FFF at the start and if you are waiting for a Lacerate tick and everything else is on CD.Keep up Demoralizing Roar, use every 30 seconds between Mangle and Thrash. (Extra time on Lacerate won't hurt at all.)Use Enrage if needed.If you are having threat issues pop berserk otherwise pop it if needed.When you get a free mangle from the Berserk Proc throw it in first and then move on.AOE: (will be updating) Yes, we now have some pretty bad AoE tanking, although there are many ways around it. Here is a really good rotation you should use. Swipe > Thrash > Mangle >Laceratex1 **>** Swipe > Thrash > Mangle > Laceratzex1 **>** Swipe > Thrash > Mangle > Laceratex1 **Tab Target** You are really going to have to Tab Target, Thorns is going to help keep some good initial aggro, although in time you will have to apply some more. If you do it correctly, you won't have any AoE problems.
XIII: | Addons | TBA
XIV: | FAQ | TBA
LOGS
3/21/2011 - Added the Log Section, added Porcelain Crab to the 346 BiS trinkets list.
5/2/2011 - Adding the 535 BiS lists
7/11/2011 - Fix a couple points and upgrade Alchemist
7/11/2011 - Will be starting to upgrade everything due to couple days off.