Bear Tanking

[Yoshimiko]

Now that the servers are down for a little bit, I was hopeing to try to get some help with my Tanking druid.

I just came back after a month break due to work/irl issues, but now I'm back with plenty of time to farm! My guild told me WE NEED MOAR TANKZ. soo.. I figured I'd take up the role. Threat-wise I seem to do wonderful, but This guild leader keeps complaining about my hp! {137k} My sims tell me GEM AGI, ENCHANT AGI, GO AGIAGIAGIAGIAGI. I'm in avg ilvl 351, but I'm expected to have 160-180k hp{!} self-buffed. I can't even get close to these numbers. So my question is to you guys: How much Unbuffed HP should I aim for? I really don't like gemming stamina for obvious reasons, but Is it a necessity for bears?

Also, Which is more important- dodge mastery or crit? I keep getting mixed messages from these.

Thanks for your time.

[Marcadius]

For reg raids shoot for 160-180k raid buffed its easy with flasks and such.

i always use Dodge>mastery>crit>expertise>hit etc

Attach a armory whenever it comes up to help us help you

[Yoshimiko]

http://us.battle.net/wow/en/characte...r/altma/simple

Swap trinket #1 for the Stamina version, My back is a 333 back now instead of a 308, curious why it hasn't updated yet...


I'm still playing as cat until I can reach an acceptable gear level, I don't want to hold my Za/Zgs back anymore than I have to.

I'm picking up T11 legs today, Along with that comes epic leg enchants, hence the crap enchants now.

[Stabatya]

If your having trouble making hp requirements (depends on what your tanking, but for reference im hybrid dps/tank spec and often tank 5m heroics, 10m norm raid bosses, raid trash, heroic adds- drakes on halfus for example- all in dps gear) aim for tank enchants on helm/shoulders and grab a couple of stam trinkets (there is an easy one from jc and one from last boss of stonecore).

Grab tank meta (stam and armor), flask, food... Shouldnt have an issue getting above 160k. From there try and grab the raid stam trinkets when possible and once your gear improves there wont be a stam issue.

[Cuandoman]

Freakin' battle net is down. <shake fist>

The basic priority is this: Agility > Dodge > Crit = Expertise > Hit > Haste

Gem Slots:
Red = Agility
Yellow = Agility + Dodge
Blue = Agility + Stamina
Meta = Stamina + 2% armor

The best two trinkets for most normal modes are Tia's Grace and Fluid Death. Reforge both to Dodge.

The WoW druid forums have a sticky that goes into quite a bit more detail. Also check out theincbear (google it, cant post links yet).

[Yoshimiko]

If your having trouble making hp requirements (depends on what your tanking, but for reference im hybrid dps/tank spec and often tank 5m heroics, 10m norm raid bosses, raid trash, heroic adds- drakes on halfus for example- all in dps gear) aim for tank enchants on helm/shoulders and grab a couple of stam trinkets (there is an easy one from jc and one from last boss of stonecore).

Grab tank meta (stam and armor), flask, food... Shouldnt have an issue getting above 160k. From there try and grab the raid stam trinkets when possible and once your gear improves there wont be a stam issue.

I was told to hit 160-180k with just motw, That's what I'm having such an issue with.

[Stabatya]

I was told to hit 160-180k with just motw, That's what I'm having such an issue with.

...Wow, yeah, sorry but your raid leader is ignorant.

Our MT is a feral, full 359+ with 170kish hp raid buffed (inc flasks/food). There is no reason to have that much hp, to even reach that number youd pretty much need full 359 + full tank enchants + full stam gems... Which will result in you being a mana sponge and a terrible tank.

[Kawaii]

There are always huge discussions between stam stacking and agi stacking. Theorycrafting will tell you agi is slightly better for physical damage reduction, but it doesn't take magical attacks into account.

Fact of the matter is that most high-end raiding guild bears stack stam.. Take paragon Maintank as an example;

http://eu.battle.net/wow/en/characte...sejta/advanced

[Yoshimiko]

There are always huge discussions between stam stacking and agi stacking. Theorycrafting will tell you agi is slightly better for physical damage reduction, but it doesn't take magical attacks into account.

Fact of the matter is that most high-end raiding guild bears stack stam.. Take paragon Maintank as an example;

http://eu.battle.net/wow/en/characte...sejta/advanced

Don't *bear* tanks in 372 gear stack stamina due to the nature of Diminishing returns on Dodge making it almost worthless after you break ~35% dodge? If other tanks had to worry about hitting 40% in a single stat, I'm sure they'd stack stam instead as well. Or mastery.

[rated]

There are always huge discussions between stam stacking and agi stacking. Theorycrafting will tell you agi is slightly better for physical damage reduction, but it doesn't take magical attacks into account.

Fact of the matter is that most high-end raiding guild bears stack stam.. Take paragon Maintank as an example;

http://eu.battle.net/wow/en/characte...sejta/advanced

But Sejta is a special snow flake raiding with 24 other special snowflakes. This is what other people are going to tell you. There's reasons why going more agi is better than stam and people can actually back that up. Saying to gem stam cause Sejta does it....that is not a reason, or a good one at that.

[uzumati]

That much HP is not needed for normal mode raids, I tank heroic raids at 172K fully buffed with ~40% dodge with everything proc'd up. If a certain encounter required a bit more hp its just a trinket/flask swap.

[hellboyy]

stop looking at the paragon tank and assuming stam stacking works. bears dont need that much hp cos they have a lot more armor in bear form, about 15k than plate tanks. and they have about 4-5% more avoidance than other tanks.

in full 359 gear u will have about 160k hp, 170+ if u take 2 stamina trinkets.

and diminishing returns affect your rating. not ur dodge percentage.

generally fill ur red sockets with full agi, blue with agi/stam, and u'll have 2-3 yellow sockets where u can put a few agi/dodge gems to activate ur meta.

[Dyzon]

There are always huge discussions between stam stacking and agi stacking. Theorycrafting will tell you agi is slightly better for physical damage reduction, but it doesn't take magical attacks into account.

Fact of the matter is that most high-end raiding guild bears stack stam.. Take paragon Maintank as an example;

http://eu.battle.net/wow/en/characte...sejta/advanced

You're also talking about a high-end progression guild. This is possibly the worst argument ever and I fail to see how it makes sense for a standard guild. There is a point to be said about magic being unmitigated by AGI, but there isn't nearly as much magical damage this raid tier as there was in past tiers. Truth be told magic isn't technically mitigated by anything other than talents and CDs. HP just gives you time to live. Bottom line is you need HP to survive ~3-4 hits of a raid boss (unhealed) which for 10n is about 150k. Much more and you are sacrificing our best stat AGI for HP that is going to complete waste. Unless of course you're in a bleeding edge progression guild - vastly undergeared for content and with amazing healers and DPS. Ultimately the only tank that can even put up the STAM stack argument is DK, and even then it's a pretty crappy argument (it just means you don't know how to use DS).

Sure the STAM AGI argument is more complex than that, but just pointing to a high-end raider doesn't end the argument magically. I mean if you want to point to things that are completely asides, like a high-end raider, you could also say gemming AGI makes you a far better OT, since on fights where you can't tank or only tank half of it, you're gimping your cat DPS. It too doesn't really have a true place in the mitigation talk.

I typically mix a couple of STAM gems to get to a comfortable level, with AGI+STAM gems if the socket is worth it, and mostly straight AGI gems.

Edit: I was too slow...

[Reesify]

This thread... /groan

Have fun thinking magical damage alone is enough of a reason to zerg stamina (hint: It's not).

There is no fight in this tier, not even Sinestra, Nefarion, Cho'gall or Al'akir, where zerging stamina is required to survive.

[lizon]

Now that the servers are down for a little bit, I was hopeing to try to get some help with my Tanking druid.

I just came back after a month break due to work/irl issues, but now I'm back with plenty of time to farm! My guild told me WE NEED MOAR TANKZ. soo.. I figured I'd take up the role. Threat-wise I seem to do wonderful, but This guild leader keeps complaining about my hp! {137k} My sims tell me GEM AGI, ENCHANT AGI, GO AGIAGIAGIAGIAGI. I'm in avg ilvl 351, but I'm expected to have 160-180k hp{!} self-buffed. I can't even get close to these numbers. So my question is to you guys: How much Unbuffed HP should I aim for? I really don't like gemming stamina for obvious reasons, but Is it a necessity for bears?

Also, Which is more important- dodge mastery or crit? I keep getting mixed messages from these.

Thanks for your time.

Let me guess, your GM plays a Pally or Warrior right? For those tanking classes you need stamina. But for bears not so much.

It's a simple fact that bear tanks just take less damage than any other tank class out there. Me and my Pally tank buddy had a little competition a while back to check out damage received so we tanked BH 25m in order to get a pretty even comparison. We took nearly identical damage despite the fact that my druid is in 351 ilvl gear and he's in 358. Our physical damage received was the same.

You should have plenty of stamina from your gear alone. You shouldn't need a stamina trinket at all except for a gimicky fight of if your healers are just unable to keep you up. Course in retrospect if they can't keep you up with the amount of damage that your receiving currently then why the heck would they keep you up if our taking more damage but with more health to soak it up? It's a wash IMO.

Here are some references that you should be looking at for any respectable bear tank.

http://us.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/1126995943 - Reesi's Guide
http://theincbear.com/ - All things about bear tanks.

You also might want to fix your spec a bit. You want to max out fury swipes as it it a net threat/dps gain. Stampede is a pretty bad talent as well for bears, as lets be honest, how often do you feral charge a boss? Once in most cases. KotJ is now a viable talent considering they removed the damage debuff from enrage. Personally I just dropped my extra point into that.

Note: I just noticed your GM is a Blood dk that's stacking stamina, using stamina and dodge gems, has piss poor avoidance, low mastery, and is reforging parry and dodge into mastery then go's around, and reforges some mastery back into parry.....wut? Maybe he should do some research on his own class before trying to tell others what stats they need.

There are always huge discussions between stam stacking and agi stacking. Theorycrafting will tell you agi is slightly better for physical damage reduction, but it doesn't take magical attacks into account.

Fact of the matter is that most high-end raiding guild bears stack stam.. Take paragon Maintank as an example;

http://eu.battle.net/wow/en/characte...sejta/advanced

Bears take less magical damage of all the other tanking classes due to Perseverance. Paragon's main tank is actually geared in a sub-optimal way, he takes way more damage than he should. One thing you need to consider is that he has better than the average Bear (see what I did there) Healers that can handle the extra damage he takes.

He would take a lot less damage overall by stacking agility. But what would be the point in doing that considering that he outgears the current content?

No, stack agility. Ignore your GM's wails of you needing more HP's and run a raid with them then show that same GM of you taking less damage than him.

[Marcadius]

Now that the servers are down for a little bit, I was hopeing to try to get some help with my Tanking druid.

I just came back after a month break due to work/irl issues, but now I'm back with plenty of time to farm! My guild told me WE NEED MOAR TANKZ. soo.. I figured I'd take up the role. Threat-wise I seem to do wonderful, but This guild leader keeps complaining about my hp! {137k} My sims tell me GEM AGI, ENCHANT AGI, GO AGIAGIAGIAGIAGI. I'm in avg ilvl 351, but I'm expected to have 160-180k hp{!} self-buffed. I can't even get close to these numbers. So my question is to you guys: How much Unbuffed HP should I aim for? I really don't like gemming stamina for obvious reasons, but Is it a necessity for bears?

Also, Which is more important- dodge mastery or crit? I keep getting mixed messages from these.

Thanks for your time.

Here we go

-Helm: Use 81stam/2%armor Meta,Enchant the Stam head chant. Regorge the expertise to dodge; Gem 20dodge/20agil
-Neck:Reforge Haste to Dodge
-Shoulder: hit to Dodge; Gem 60Stam; Chant tank enchant
-Chest: Crit to Dodge; gem 30stam/20agil
-Wrist haste to dodge and chant 50dodge
-Gloves: Haste to dodge
-Belt: Hit to Dodge; Gem 60stam and 30stam/20agil
-Legs: Expertise to Dodge; gem 2x 30stam/20agil
-Feet: Expertise to dodge, Chant Earthen Vitality; Gem 20agil/20dodge
-Ring 1: Hit to Dodge
-Ring 2: Crit to Dodge
-Trinket 1: Crit to Dodge
-Trinket 2: Use stam trink
-Weapon: crit to dodge
-Relic: Haste to Dodge

Hope this helps

[mechaj]

You've gone too far into thinking agi > stam. While it is, would you give up 1000 stam for 1 agility? No, they have relative values and you've ignored those.

The places you can most easily pick up stamina and SHOULD:

Head: Use the 81 stam/armor meta. Use the the stamina arcanum as it also provides a tanking stat. The agility arcanum provides an undesirable secondary stat.

Shoulder: I prefer the stamina enchant because I prefer the secondary stat that comes with it. Also, there's no reason to give up the socket bonus here of 10 agi. Put a 20 agi/30 stam since stam is still a good stat. You will have a net result of 30 agi/30 stamina instead of simply 40 agility. Agility doesn't trade with stam at 10 agility for 30 stamina.

Trinket: Go ahead and use the alchemy stamina trinket (I think this is doable). If not, find any trinket other than the one you are using. But hit as the primary stat on a trinket is kind of a waste.

Other: Reforge to dodge, not mastery. Enchant all your stuff. Put armor on cloak, dodge on bracers, mastery or armor on gloves, and something with movement speed on your boots.

[lizon]

You've gone too far into thinking agi > stam. While it is, would you give up 1000 stam for 1 agility? No, they have relative values and you've ignored those.

No I would give up 1000 Stam for 1000 Agility. Agility gives avoidance, threat, and mitigation. It is simply a better stat.

Trinket: Go ahead and use the alchemy stamina trinket (I think this is doable). If not, find any trinket other than the one you are using. But hit as the primary stat on a trinket is kind of a waste.

I have both trinkets personally but I use the agility one as my primary tanking trinket simply because I gain so much avoidance and mitigation with it. Bears get enough stamina from their gear alone to tank appropriate content. So if he's in all 346 gear then he has enough stamina on that gear to tank raids. In my tanking gear I got about 145-155k health with all of my raid buffs and flasks and such (depending on comp of course), and I find that to be more that suitable.

The OP was saying that his GM wants him to have 160-180k hp's which is overkill for the content that he's doing and would hurt the raid more than benefit it. It's a simple matter of someone who doesn't understand bear tanks trying to give out bear advice.

@OP
Get Tia's Grace It is the best trinket for bear tanks outside of heroic raiding.

[Barawr]

No I would give up 1000 Stam for 1000 Agility. Agility gives avoidance, threat, and mitigation. It is simply a better stat.

He didn't say that . . . He said 1000 stam for 1 agility. He was just making a point to not overlook areas where using a hybrid gem is beneficial.

[Moonlapse Vertigo]

You don't need to worry about the theoretical stuff.

Just go for pieces of gear that have mastery on them, crit as a secondary (the ideal piece of gear is mastery/crit). Reforge every item to dodge, reforge hit/haste/expertise to dodge first, then reforge crit > dodge if any items are left un-reforged.

Gem stam in blue. If the socket bonus is stam, mastery, or crit, then gem stam/mastery in yellow slots, and stam/agi in red slots.

There is no need to complicate it beyond theses steps.

Edit: Go for the highest ilevel piece of gear you have, don't worry about the stats on it. A 372 with haste/hit is better than a 359 with mastery/ X