Prot paladin or Guardian for SoO?

[Gothmog]

So I've a choice between rolling as a Prot paladin or a Bear in SoO. Both are roughly equally geared (540). Raid composition is a Brewmaster co tank, 3 very strong melee (dk, warr, windwalker) and resto sham & hpal & disco priest. Ranged are clothies and compared to melee, weak. Either way i'm sharing loot tables with 2 core raid members (but not stat priorities)

I had written up a longer post comparing the two, but the key in this question is SoO and it's mechanics.

All I've tried the two specs on are Celestials on Timeless isle and LFR, since that's all that's available now. Based on this, Paladin looks to be a bigger asset. Still very smooth damage intake with 5 BoG EF rolling, stronger cooldowns than the bear and more reliable AM. Traditional class utility should come handy even if there'll be no BoP/Bubble debuff resetting.
I've missed the raid testings.
I guess I should add that I'm more comfortable on Bear, it's been my main these past 6 years and I've regularly ran him as a tank. Prot pal I've been playing past two months and frankly, am worse at than guardian. Please don't quote this past paragraph as the only reason why my choice should be bear



Could someone that's familiar with both specs and has done raidtesting provide some insight into the choice?

Does it look like there'll be any singletank fights? (we've no leather int gear user, so Bear would have a good offpiece set)

[celinamuna]

Honestly it seems like you're in a purty bad position seeing how as regardless which one you pick, you're still compeating for gear with 2 other ppl (either brew + ww or dk +war)

I haven't played much with bears so i don't really know how well they're going to work next tier, but i know that there's basically no solo tank fights.

At the end of the day i'd still suggest to go bear because you are more comfortable and familiar with them.
I've seen plenty of tanks go "fotm" classes and just being unable to use anything that made them "fotm".

[Riemu2k3]

Hi,

first off, I haven't touched my bear since MoP start. Nevertheless, I'm going to give you my PoV in the hope you can take something away from it. This is just my view on things so do not weigh everything in gold.


Gear

I would never ever share the same loot as my co-tank ever again. I did that in Wotlk and Cata and it didn't turn out very well. Especially since (from what I remember) druid is also going for Crit, same as the monk (in a 10-man raid). So you're cannibalizing both your tanks here directly which is not the smartest thing to do. At the very least you would want two equaly strong (not weak) geared tanks or one that's very good geared and one that's averagely geared. Not every fight / raid is exactly the same. For example you can have one tank who generally takes more damage (i.e. galakras towers, protectors double-tanking etc.) and one who is taking less. Or you have a strong healers and an average healer. You can put the strong healer on the weaker tank and so on.

If you run with Druid, I would advice you pick a "lead" tank and try to give him like 3/5 of the gear. Not so much that it really hurts the other tank but just enough.

Windwalker is at the bottom of the DPS chain right now, so his gear priority shouldn't be really high up on the food chain.

On the other hand, Prot Pally only directly affects your DK. Your Warrior usually doesnt want haste items. And - even though it's not ideal - you can take the dodge/parry items without hurting your survival too much. Upgrades are still upgrades if the Delta is high enough. I think Frost 2Hand is abit stronger right now but if your DK doesnt have a strong 2 Hand weapon or is planning on going mastery, you have no problem.

Mastery -> 1h Frost
Crit -> Warri
Haste -> Pally
Dodge/Parry -> Pally or your Warri for his Offspecc

---> Gear is in slight favor of your Prot Pally.


Offspecc

You already have 3 Melees. You don't need another one. So even if there are single target encounters (which there aren't any as far as I know/tested), you probably would just sit in favor of another ranged DPS if you pick Prot Pally.

Your Int Plate Loot is already spoken for aswell.

Druid has the better offspecc (Resto / Moonkin). Resto Druid is a sick healer in 5.4. And Ranged DPS is generally > Melee DPS, especially if you already have 3. Not sure if you have another Healer ready to go, but there are always some encounters every tier that benefit from 4-healing (for example megaera normal / hc). I'm sure SoO has 1 or 2 of those. Resto Druid would be perfect for that.

Also, if you are in die need of a healer (because one can't make it etc.) that would be perfect aswell. If you really have no other use in your raid for leather int items, you can take them all, which is pretty good. (Of course, your Monk could take those aswell...)

---> Offspecc is in favor of your Druid


Flexibility

If you choose Druid, your Windwalker Melee will suffer in gear. But you will gain flexibility. For example, you can 4-heal or switch to Ranged DPS if needed. If you want to 4-heal, your Warrior can switch to Prot. Warrior Tanks will take Crit in 5.4 - so he can use probably half his offence items for tanking. He can also take every Dodge/Parry Item there is because no one else needs it (Dk could, but Warrior>>>DK).

On your Prot Pally you can't 4-heal. You won't get enough items because you will only get the leftovers. Your Warrior Tank might also not be THAT decently geared as compared to if you were druid, because you will probably need 2-3 Items on your Protadin (even though they are dodge/parry).

---> If your Monk doesn't want to heal, Flexbility goes to your Druid


Raid Utility

Both Druid and Pally provide great Raid utility. I guess it depends on what you need the most.

a) Do you need a 2nd Devo Aura? (Pally)
b) Do you need a shorter Raid-Healing-CD? (Pally, LH)
c) Do you need another Battlerezz for when your DK is not present? (Druid)
d) Do you need Symbiosis? (Druid)

Both can offheal with proccs (Lay on Hands / Eternal Flame Blanketing / Instant Healing Touch etc.)


Directly compared, Prot Pally is probably still ahead of the Druid in 5.4. (From what I've read)

But, especially in your case, you should decide on what you really need in your raid.

Playing a Prot Paladin myself, I would only switch to another class if my raid had a serious advantage from it (like gaining a battle ress if we had none etc.)


If you're really 15-20% stronger on your druid than on your pally and you don't think that will change, go with your druid. I don't think the class delta is that high between those two.