Feral Druid Bear Tanking

Hi all, I'm kinda new in posting on this forum. My English might not be so good because it is not my native Language.

Anyway: what I'm here for is that i saw a discussion and also replyed on it on the European wow forum about Bear tanking is death, but i don't really share that feeling with the ones that are applying to that thought.

The discussion is about the fact that our bear AoE tanking is broken and thus they find that we as a bear tank are not competing enough against the other tank classes.

Although they might be right that druid tanking is harder after the nerves i don't see how we won't be able to hold aggro and generate threat enough when we communicate reasonable with our party members and apply CC where needed and focus on tactics. But i have to say that i have the feeling that it is more a party related problem then a class issue.

If i go in a party to run a hc with my friends i feel that when we communicate and they give me time enough to generate threat and thus give time to put out my rotation that i'm able to maintain aggro , i see and feel that when i pug a group it is harder because the cooperation of the party is a lot harder.

I need to say that i'm still gearing up for raiding so i can only speak from the point off view trough my experience in the new cata HC's.

Pugging groups is lately a harsh thing, they rather want to rush then apply what is needed to get trough the HC like it is needed, thats why i pulled back on pugging with my druid. The problem is still their when I'm tanking on my paladin so i see this kind of attitude as a overall party problem and to be fair it is a little easier to maintain AoE i still don't think it is my druid class that is broken its only needed to work a little harder to get the job don as a team based player.

The point of this post: i want to discus how druid tanking is evolved and that it is so that we need to adapt trough the new tanking abilities as a group or do they really need a fix and i might learn a few things in the process of discussing it ;-)

regards

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The discussion is about the fact that our bear AoE tanking is broken and thus they find that we as a bear tank are not competing enough against the other tank classes.

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This is effectively (albeit boringly) fixed in 4.1 with the CD reduction on Swipe.

Good Ferals don't have a problem when tanking, either in 5mans or raids.

Bad Ferals apparently do. There are some minor annoying discrepancies which could be fixed (Charge costing rage, Enrage cost), along with a bug or two (Thrash Bleed for instance). But nothing at all that makes us inferior tanks. Harder to play maybe.

I'd agree that the main points that bother me as Feral compared to my Warrior are Charge costing rage and needing to use a /cancelaura macro with Enrage in order to avoid being pwned by the extra damage intake.

However, the fact that FFF is free and very high threat makes up for some of this. It's a great way to hold a ranged/loose mob off a healer or even light DPS. It's like Heroic Throw just with an amazingly shorter cooldown.

Bears also have a great 'iwin' threat button in Berserk. The cooldown isn't even that prohibitive either considering how powerful it is. Don't be afraid to use it often. Pull -> Thrash -> Swipe -> Berserk -> Spam Mangle = threat win with perhaps a bit of tabbing to low threat targets. (Glyphing Berserk helps too.)

Otherwise, there aren't many quality of life differences between the two.

I don't find Druid AoE tanking to be terribly difficult at all, and never have. I've never had the bugged PotP as a Worgen Druid, but never really struggled with AoE threat. The thing to remember is to keep in mind that Mangle is really the focus of everything nowadays. Thrash is really nice, and Swipe is OK, but Mangles are a ridiculous amount of threat. So, that being the case, you should always try to multi-Lacerate between Thrash/Swipe cooldowns in order to dramatically inflate your Mangle counts. With Lacerate up on 3 target, you will be using Mangle for nearly every non-AoE GCD and spike very easily in threat.

I'm a bit weary of Blizzard futzing around with the damage of ferals and the general lack of meaningful buttons to press (considering Lacerate is pretty much trash if not for the Berserk procs) but there is nothing that will keep a Bear from being a totally viable tank.

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Originally Posted by Kojiyama

I'd agree that the main points that bother me as Feral compared to my Warrior are Charge costing rage and needing to use a /cancelaura macro with Enrage in order to avoid being pwned by the extra damage intake.

However, the fact that FFF is free and very high threat makes up for some of this. It's a great way to hold a ranged/loose mob off a healer or even light DPS. It's like Heroic Throw just with an amazingly shorter cooldown.

Bears also have a great 'iwin' threat button in Berserk. The cooldown isn't even that prohibitive either considering how powerful it is. Don't be afraid to use it often. Pull -> Thrash -> Swipe -> Berserk -> Spam Mangle = threat win with perhaps a bit of tabbing to low threat targets. (Glyphing Berserk helps too.)

Otherwise, there aren't many quality of life differences between the two.

I don't find Druid AoE tanking to be terribly difficult at all, and never have. I've never had the bugged PotP as a Worgen Druid, but never really struggled with AoE threat. The thing to remember is to keep in mind that Mangle is really the focus of everything nowadays. Thrash is really nice, and Swipe is OK, but Mangles are a ridiculous amount of threat. So, that being the case, you should always try to multi-Lacerate between Thrash/Swipe cooldowns in order to dramatically inflate your Mangle counts. With Lacerate up on 3 target, you will be using Mangle for nearly every non-AoE GCD and spike very easily in threat.

I'm a bit weary of Blizzard futzing around with the damage of ferals and the general lack of meaningful buttons to press (considering Lacerate is pretty much trash if not for the Berserk procs) but there is nothing that will keep a Bear from being a totally viable tank.

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I'm happy with this answer because i use kinda a simmilar rotation but i macro it with maul and berserk my mangle is used mainly and i have a similar feeling about threath generation too, i pop barskin a lot i have that glymp to but i dont have that /cancelaura macro with Enrage in order to avoid being pwned by the extra damage intake that you say so thats a good tip i will take that to heart ;-). But I'm only just playing again after a break of almost a year, for me it was a huge differance when i left playing wow for a while but the first thing i did was reading on here and Elitestjerks about the new ways of druid tanking.

the only way i have a huge problem with tanking is that my party members don't allow me to put out my rotation in a decent way at the start of a pull and if they don't apply CC like it has to be. Several good runs with guild mates gave me the impretion that nothing is wrong with druid tanking, yes we might have bugs but i think if they have a huge ammount of problems they wil iron that out.

We might have a little more difficulty because blizz is fuzzing around about some things but it is like you said it does not keep a Bear from being a totally viable tank.

regards

Another good thing about Druid tanks is their ability to CC compared to Warriors. Entangling Roots is actually a very good initial CC and lasts a long time. Hibernate is situationally useful, but Entangling Roots is useful on nearly every pull you want to CC.

It's also totally possible to battle rez a healer or something as Bear while tanking if you are smart about it. Either using Bash to stun the mob, waiting for a cast or movement phase, or simply using Survival Instincts combined with watching the enemy swing timer to do it while tanking a boss. If you are smart about it, this is not nearly as dangerous as it sounds. I have personally battle rez'd healers while tanking Halfus, Omnitron, and a number of raid encounters.

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Originally Posted by Kojiyama

Another good thing about Druid tanks is their ability to CC compared to Warriors. Entangling Roots is actually a very good initial CC and lasts a long time. Hibernate is situationally useful, but Entangling Roots is useful on nearly every pull you want to CC.

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thats a neat trick to remember to ;-) tbh i almost never did so far so ill try it out.

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Originally Posted by Kojiyama

It's also totally possible to battle rez a healer or something as Bear while tanking if you are smart about it. Either using Bash to stun the mob, waiting for a cast or movement phase, or simply using Survival Instincts combined with watching the enemy swing timer to do it while tanking a boss. If you are smart about it, this is not nearly as dangerous as it sounds. I have personally battle rez'd healers while tanking Halfus, Omnitron, and a number of raid encounters.

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This one is one of my main basics when someone was down in the old raids and HC's from WOTLK and it is idd not nearly dangerous as you said i like it even a lot to do it in mid battle when in a boss fight ;-) it gives kinda a rush if the healer knows what to do and the MBR is sucsesfull ..

Although i have a quistion doh i found this on Recource: http://fluiddruid.net/forum/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=207

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Mastery is an odd little beast for bears. Why? It has a softcap, but what that softcap is will vary between every single fight. It is entirely dependent upon incoming damage. Why does it have a softcap? Vengeance doesn't gain when damage is absorbed. Since SD increases the size of our absorb, it affects the maximum vengeance you can have at any given time. For any type of progression, this shouldn't ever be an issue or a concern.

If you're not tanking progression, you should only need a comfortable amount of mastery and can then gear/reforge for more threat/dps.

Reforging is fairly simple. Reforge the least wanted stats into Dodge Rating.

Yes, you read that correctly. For the first tier of raiding, we are balanced around reforging to dodge instead of mastery on the vast majority of pieces. This is a second reason why Mastery is so important to have on gear, since we won't be reforging to it.

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So if i understand correctly i just reforge as many lower important stats towards dodge but do we need to stop some where like with the paladin? i mean when you reforge for a paladin it is mastery but you stop at 102.4 yes? Is it the same for druids do we have a limit for dodge so we can focus on mastery? Or is mastery not that important or is it enough what we have on the gear?

so far i can't find anything that points in that direction and the question pops up on the wow forum to so i'm wondering, i think that the mastery we gain out of gear is sufficient but maybe we can do better by adding some for the soft cap if we have enough dodge.

regards

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So if i understand correctly i just reforge as many lower important stats towards dodge but do we need to stop some where like with the paladin?

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Yes and no. There will be a point at which you will reforge to Mastery instead if it does not currently exist on the piece of gear in question. We are not at that point yet. Nor will we be until likely HT12 / T13.

Also, for a more updated version of that guide, see: http://us.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/1126995943

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Originally Posted by Katarn

Also, for a more updated version of that guide, see: http://us.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/1126995943

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yeah i saw some difference with that one already but i already had posted it out :s so thats a better link to be up to date ;-)

thanks

Dodge is the best reforge for the near future both due to its direct mitigation and its synergy with extending absorb uptime.

The order for reforging priority is generally: Haste, Hit, Expertise, Mastery/Crit depending on gear.

The thing to keep in mind is that Crit and Mastery actually converge and cross over in value at a certain point. If you think about it, they both interact on the same premise: Crit makes you proc more absorbs and Mastery makes your absorbs bigger. To another degree, Expertise increases the rate at which you generate absorbs as well and actually becomes very viable at higher gear levels if you are below the Expertise softcap. Lastly, Dodge extends the lifetime of your absorbs and leads to a higher uptime on hits.

The general rule on Mastery vs. Crit is that Crit is quite a bit better at lower (blue) gear levels but once you start getting full 346 gear and/or the odd epic, Mastery becomes more worthwhile. Additionally, as mentioned above, Expertise can actually become more valuable than Crit at certain points as your chance to Crit is high enough that the increased chance to land attacks yields a higher SD uptime.

I'd recommend using something like Rawr to sort this stuff out. It's quite variable and depends on a lot of factors as you change the stats of your gear.

For some reference, in full 359 gear with raid buffs, my relative values for mitigation are:
Dodge: 57.35
Mastery 49.12
Expertise: 35.06
Crit: 31.06
Hit: 12.65
Haste: 3.5

However, earlier in my gear progression Crit was worth quite a bit more and Expertise had a much lower value. It's just something you have to be mindful about as your gear changes. (Currently I have around 2070 Mastery Rating, 1180 Dodge Rating, 870 Crit Rating, and 280 Expertise.)

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Originally Posted by Kojiyama

The thing to keep in mind is that Crit and Mastery actually converge and cross over in value at a certain point. If you think about it, they both interact on the same premise: Crit makes you proc more absorbs and Mastery makes your absorbs bigger. To another degree, Expertise increases the rate at which you generate absorbs as well and actually becomes very viable at higher gear levels if you are below the Expertise softcap. Lastly, Dodge extends the lifetime of your absorbs and leads to a higher uptime on hits.

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So if im getting this correct Mastery is not really a problem at the start from cataclysm but will be more important on a later stage, thus because you grant better and higher gear (epics) mastery is higher so reforging to it will be unlikely? Or do i get that wrong, tbh i like the theory math crafting but at a point it becomes a little o.O

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Originally Posted by Kojiyama

I'd recommend using something like Rawr to sort this stuff out. It's quite variable and depends on a lot of factors as you change the stats of your gear.

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I used Rawr in the past but i also like to use the site http://www.askmrrobot.com/wow

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Originally Posted by Kojiyama

For some reference, in full 359 gear with raid buffs, my relative values for mitigation are:
Dodge: 57.35
Mastery 49.12

Expertise: 35.06
Crit: 31.06
Hit: 12.65
Haste: 3.5

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Well i'm a long way from that like said i just started to play again after a break of almost a year my druid is 85 fior 2 monts but because of the latest isseus of pugging and the low online rating on my present guild i need to roll that druid to a the horde side because my paladin is on that side, i like to pick it up again because my druid was my first and still my main tbh, when i started again i was sitting on my druid with my 80 WOTLK raid gear and thinking and now? :p

regards

The crit vs. mastery issue is only an issue in terms of which you prefer reforging to Dodge. Obviously you want to reforge the weakest stat, but you will find a lot of pieces of gear with both Crit and Mastery on them. You need to be mindful of which is better for you at any given time in order to do this correctly. As mentioned, at early gear levels you most likely will reforge Mastery instead of Crit, but as you get better gear this will change.

I honestly can't say much about askmrrobot.. never used it, and not aware of how accurate its modeling of incoming tank damage is. I can say that Rawr is pretty accurate for Bears and actively maintained. At first glance it seems to be undervaluing Expertise somewhat and significantly undervaluing Agility. It also seems to label set pieces as 'best in slot' even when they are not strictly so--given that the tanking set bonuses are extremely situational.

Kojiy ..... :(

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The order for reforging priority is generally: Haste, Hit, Expertise, Mastery/Crit depending on gear.

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It's Haste, Hit = Expertise (after dodge cap), Expertise (before dodge cap)/Crit (depending on gear), Mastery.

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The thing to keep in mind is that Crit and Mastery actually converge and cross over in value at a certain point. If you think about it, they both interact on the same premise: Crit makes you proc more absorbs and Mastery makes your absorbs bigger. To another degree, Expertise increases the rate at which you generate absorbs as well and actually becomes very viable at higher gear levels if you are below the Expertise softcap. Lastly, Dodge extends the lifetime of your absorbs and leads to a higher uptime on hits.

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Crit and Mastery won't converge. Dodge and Mastery will converge. The higher your Crit gets the more valuable Mastery becomes.

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I'd recommend using something like Rawr to sort this stuff out. It's quite variable and depends on a lot of factors as you change the stats of your gear.

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Ew. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. Astrylian is no longer actively maintaining Rawr.Bear, and it is riddled with bugs which will generate incorrect results. At least for Bears.

Use Tangedyn's Sheet, since it is the only accurate and maintained tool that I know of: http://theincbear.com/math/bear-mitigation-spreadsheet/

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For some reference, in full 359 gear with raid buffs, my relative values for mitigation are:
Dodge: 57.35
Mastery 49.12
Expertise: 35.06
Crit: 31.06
Hit: 12.65
Haste: 3.5

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There is no way this is correct. It must not include crit-suppression against bosses. At 359 Expertise should be just barely hitting par with Crit, or maybe a little below it. Moreover at best it would be double the value of Hit, which it isn't.

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I used Rawr in the past but i also like to use the site http://www.askmrrobot.com/wow

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Don't use that either. To generate their gear selections they evaluate stats in a vacuum against a static set of gear. Additionally they place too much emphasis on set bonuses, and their SD uptime formula is terrible and doesn't make any sense. Again, no crit-suppression either I don't think.

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Rawr is pretty accurate for Bears and actively maintained

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It's not, and it isn't. Additionally Astrylian hadn't updated the AP formulas last time I checked.

I don't really see any difference in your reforging priority other than making it a bit overly complex. The chance of getting expertise soft-capped at the moment is exceptionally low with the available gear and certainly not an issue for a new tank. And, again, I think you're missing that Crit is actually more valuable than Mastery at low/initial gear levels until you've built up a strong enough Crit/Dodge base.

The point of Crit and Mastery convergence is very low, but the person asking the question is just starting gearing. Crit is more valuable than Mastery early on prior to having epics or full 346 gear. It makes sense to reforge Mastery to Dodge before Crit until you are sufficiently geared with high enough Crit levels.

If you can give any examples as bugs/why Rawr.Bear is sufficiently inaccurate to warrent so many 'No's, I would love to hear it. A working tanking model hardly needs to be updated at all any more to be fully accurate. I have not made any substantial updates to the underlying formulas in Rawr.ProtWarr in ages, yet it is pretty much fully accurate in terms of modeling. I watch the commit logs and see updates to Rawr.Bear on a regular basis, so not sure what you are talking about. Astrylian updated the Vengeance modeling very recently and all tickets I've seen opened recently have been resolved fairly quickly by various people working on it--I'm also not aware of any major open tickets for Bear right now. Not trying to be difficult, but some justification for your statements would be good to hear.

I'm sure the spreadsheet you linked is fairly accurate, although it has a lot of hardcoded constants and merged values which make it extremely difficult to verify at a glance as to if everything is being taken into account.

(And, realistically, this is all quite moot since the spreadsheet you linked show Expertise and Crit so close as to not significantly matter which you reforge anyway. So, it really doesn't change the general conclusions drawn either way.)

Katarn, what bugs? If you think there are bugs with Bear in the current version of Rawr (4.1.0) please submit Issues in our Issue Tracker so we can look into it and fix them. Bear is definitely being maintained.

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If you can give any examples as bugs/why Rawr.Bear is sufficiently inaccurate to warrent so many 'No's, I would love to hear it.

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AP Modifiers are incorrect.
There is something clearly wrong with Expertise if it is not only 2x the value of Hit until the Dodge cap.
There's something really odd with the average Vengeance calculation. It seems a little high, especially for 10m normal levels. This in turn is over-valuing Stamina for mitigation.
The armor modifier was incorrect until like a week ago.

It looks like it's still being updated, but I do know he's trying to get someone else to take care of it. Since I talk to Tangedyn regularly, I know and understand how his sheet works, and it's 100% always up to date. Additionaly (and unrelated to Rawr.Bear itself) EJ's forum policies are ridiculous and leave something to be desired.

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Katarn, what bugs? If you think there are bugs with Bear in the current version of Rawr (4.1.0) please submit Issues in our Issue Tracker so we can look into it and fix them. Bear is definitely being maintained.

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Since I never use it, I rarely check the change log. As it took so long to update the armor modifier change, I had kind of stopped paying attention to it as an effective tool. I apologize for the assumption.

I could be wrong on the AP modifiers. I only looked at Maul very briefly, but forgot to add Mangle / Bleed bonuses.

Now of course I can't double-check, because I can't install silverlight on my home pc.

Rawr doesn't specifically have anything to do with EJ though other than them hosting the Silverlight version. There is a discussion threat for Bear there, but it's just discussion. The main discussion and issue tracker for Rawr is at http://rawr.codeplex.com/discussions

I know Astrylian did quite a lot of simulation and testing in regard to Vengeance, so I have a resonable amount of faith in those calculations. I'm sure he wouldn't mind hearing reports if it is inaccurate, though.