I'm still resto and plan to be so for a long, long time.
However...I do have some questions for my feral friends. I'm a completist; I like to make sure I have the gear sets to cover any and every situation. I honestly hope they may the guild banks even bigger in WotLK as I'm going to run out of room. I'm already out of room. I have my PvE healing set (complete), my PvP healing set (incomplete), my moonkin set (almost complete), my feral tanking set (mostly complete) and my feral kitty set (complete-ish). I have a good set of gear for most of them, if they're not necessarily Karazhan or tough-heroic ready.
So, here's my question:
How should I gem, enchant and what should I switch out on my feral tank gear so that, if I am needed to tank something like a heroic or maybe even Karazhan, I can do so. Here's what I have gathered so far:
Head: Helm of the Claw
Neck: Strength of the Untamed
Shoulders: Junior Technician's 3rd Grade Shoulders
Cloak: Burnoose of Shifting Ages
Chest: Heavy Clefthoof Vest
Gloves: Gloves of Dexterous Manipulation
Belt: Tree Mender's Belt
Legs: Heavy Clefthoof Leggings
Feet: Heavy Clefthoof Boots
Rings: Delicate Eternium Ring
Trinkets: Arena Grand Master, Violet Badge
Weapon: Earthwarden
Idol: Idol of the Wild
All right, to point out the obvious: yes, my cloak has shield block values on it. To be fair, our tank did not need it when I was there to pick it up (as in the case of any of our instance gear, I only rolled when no one else needed it) and it's the only "tanking" cloak I could find.
Yes, I'm missing a ring. The one I use right now is a random "of the" ring.
Yes, I don't have bracers listed. I don't have bracers for my feral set. I'm not sure why, I guess I just haven't been able to pick any up.
So, for my feral friends, what are your suggestions? Good replacements that I could find, what gems I should socket, and what enchantments I should get. I'm not planning on making this set do much more than be prepared if I'm needed, so perhaps nothing too expensive, but I do want to be heroic-ready. At least gear-wise, of course!
7 comments:
I am really tempted to try to get sets for every occasion too, so far i have some things to switch out for healing gear, and about half a feral kit, so I'll be interested to see the replies to this!
First and foremost, the best tool for this sort of thing is RAWR- http://www.codeplex.com/Rawr
It will let you play around with Bear, Cat, and Moonkin gear until you can really see how buffs, gems, and chants affect your overall effectiveness. (Tree support as well as several other classes/specs are in the works as well.)
Another great resource for tanking gear is Emmerald's feral gear list (for example the Helm of the claw is listed 48th on the list, behind many easy to obtain greens and craftable blues.)
http://www.gurgleblaster.net/emmerald/Bear_Mitigation/Head.html
As for my personal recomendations:
Head: Stylin Purple Hat
Neck: Necklace of the Deep with 2x12 stam gems
Shoulders: Any level 67+ 'of the Monkey' green would probably be better for tanking than the tech 3rd grade ones.
Back: The Thoriumweave cloak that drops in normal Mech would be my pick.
Wrists: If you haven't done the Cipher of Damnation quest chain in SMV, you definately want Umberhowl's Collar
Rings: A little tough. If you don't want to change your Violet Eye rep ring (Which is the best until 2.4) then there is the badge turn in Ring of Unyielding Force, or the Shermanar Great Ring off of Aran
Trinket: Badge of Tenacity is one of the best, but if you don't want to farm/pay for that you could get the Commander's Badge from Netherwing rep
The Gloves, Belt, Heavy Clefthoof and Earthwarden are all solid choices.
As for chants and gems, Agility and Stamina are always the keys. Delicate Living Rubies, Solid Star of Elunes, Shifting Nightseyes, and Enduring Talasite are you best blue level gem options.
A feral tank friend and guildmate of mine wrote a guide for getting started as a bear tank that is my bible when it comes to gear. I've used it combined with great blogs like 'Of Teeth and Claws' and 'BigBearButt' and 'The Rambling Bear' to great success, to become a druid tank.
I can't link you to my friend's article, but I can pass along some of what I've learned:
Head: Get a Stylin' Purple Hat. I put the Cenarion Expedition enchant on it.
Ring: The Wind Trader's Band from a quest in Netherstorm is a great starting point. There's also Sherminar's Great Ring from Karazhan. I'm assuming you took a different Violet Signet, but if you aren't using yours, any more, the tanking Signet is great.
Shoulders: A world blue drop called The Dreamer's Shoulderpads is a great starting point for bears. Not very expensive, either. Other than that, the options are all boss drops from heroic instance runs, like the Mantle of Shadowy Embrace from Heroic Blood Furnace. If you can get an extra shoulder token, your Mantle of Malorne shoulders are just about the bee's knees. :)
Really, I think the rest of your pieces are looking pretty hawt for a bear tank. As far as gems and enchants, Enduring Deep Peridots and Solid Azure Moonstones adorn my Clefthoof set. Depending on your DR, you could consider Enchant Bracer - Major Defense for your bracers. Since you'll be tanking with a resto spec, you're going to need higher Defense Rating than a feral Bear. Without the Survivale of the Fittest talent, your crit rating is 3% lower than a feral Bear, so you need 3 * 60DR per 1% crit reduction = 180 extra DR over what a bear would need. You'll need a total of 595 DR or 336DR from gear alone.
... honestly, I'm not even sure that's possible with pre-25-man gear, but you'll have to ask smarter people than I. I highly recommend talking to Karthis or TripleB or Surabear.
Otherwise, you want Stamina and Agility for Dodge. And don't forget to do your best to maintain at least 142 Hit rating. A tank that gets a lot of misses has trouble generating enough TPS. Believe me. :/ I'm way low on Hit, right now.
Anyway, sorry for the lack of links. They should all be easy to find, but if you have any trouble, just yell. I'll get you proper links.
Good luck!
~Rhoe
AKA Rhese, the babybear
Ahh, I should have probably mentioned:
When I tank something, I respec :)
You...didn't think to ask me?
I'm shocked.
Disappointed.
Hurt.
You need 415 defense (with LotP) to be uncrittable. You probably want to strive for at least 10k life out of bear form, more if possible. You want at least 25% dodge, preferably closer to 30%. This will probably last you through most heroics and as an offtank for most of kara.
@chris - I've talked to you before. And it always goes "I dunno...let's look for another tank."
:P
...
I AM the other tank.
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