Reply With QuoteThe raid leader is an idiot.
Stamina is still the king stat for 99% of encounters in the game, and definitely still the best stat for anub, especially since the majority of his damage is melee+magic+stun combination.
Hey all-
I have looked everywhere I can for the answer to this, and couldn't find anything here or on EJ about it so; Should Druids still be stam stacking, or should we be stacking Agi now for Tanking?
The reason I ask is I was running, as dps, in a TOC 10 pug last night and we got to Anub when one of our tanks dc'ed. I was asked if I could switch over to tank spec/gear for Anub and very happily obliged. After doing so I was told I had way to much stam, I sit at 41k health unbuffed as a bear with just about 40% dodge. My armory is as follows;
The World of Warcraft Armory
I had been my old guild's, guild recently blew up thus the server transfer, Koralon tank, as well as tanking some of the harder hitting bosses in 25 mans. The raid leader told me last night in Toc10 that any druid who goes over 40k hp in a 10 man is retarded and that I should switch out all/most of my stam gems for agi gems. My research says otherwise, but now I'm not sure.
I checked the forums here and at EJ and didn't see anything to indicate Stam stacking is dead or a bad thing for druids, but wanted to get the opinions of some knowledgeable druid tanks such as Darksend or Manbearpig here at TS. So the question becomes; should druids still be stacking stam? or are we stacking agi now? Is there a difference between 10 and 25 mans? Are there generally accepted baselines, such as 40k hp for druids then stack stam for a 10 man, or is it still just; stack stam no matter what?
I realize that some balance is probably warranted, so maybe I should switch out the stam gems in my red slots for agi/stam gems. Additionally I understand the Anub fight and that high hp values feed Anub healing. However, as a general rule should druids still be stacking stam likes it is going out of style?
The raid leader is an idiot.
Stamina is still the king stat for 99% of encounters in the game, and definitely still the best stat for anub, especially since the majority of his damage is melee+magic+stun combination.
Agi is nice and all, but I wouldn't give up any opportunities to soak up all the stam you can. Regardless of what is *needed* there really isn't a good reason not to have more health than that. Bears get the most powerful stam to health scaling thanks to their major multipliers, no harm in using that to full effect.
Get your socket bonuses with tasty Shifting cuts, but don't bother unsocketing stam for agi.
The (Old) Book on Death Knight Tanking
The New Testament on Death Knight Tanking
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Originally Posted by Horacio
any time i have any doubts about fundamental gearing/speccing issues, i just armory a few of the notable feral druid tanks to see what they're doing.
specifically regarding this guy, my simple response would be:
"too much stam" - lolwut?
Thanks for the responses guys and gals. I didn't want to just discount what a RL would tell me, but it just didn't jive with what I thought I knew about the class.
As for armory'ing other players, I did take a look at both Darksend and Manbearpig's armories, and they both have agi gems socketed into some of thier gear where they could have strait stam, so I got curious. This also lead to my question about the different requirements of progression tanking vs a pug Toc10. Thanks again!
no i don't.
I have agi-stam combo gems in red slots but every blue and yellow is a straight 30 stam gem.
edit: in fact I have 2 agi stam gems one in my shoulders and one in my weapon the rest are all 51 or 30 stams.
Sorry Darksend, I guess I wasn't specific. I took a look at your gear and noted that you do have some agi/stam gems where you could have straight stam. My mistake, chalk it up to my still learning the class, specifically the tanking side of things.
And of course, it should be noted that 2 red gems are needed to activate the Eternal Earthseige meta.
Darksend - what is your opinion on whether to stack stam or agi as the anub25 heroic tank? First 2 videos that came out seemed to show druids stacking stam, but premo's video shows a druid with far less hp (so I assume he's stacking agi).
who uses eternal?
Austere Earthsiege Diamond - Item - World of Warcraft
and only uses 1 red
no hes not. He is using *special* enchants and using the badge armor trinket instead of a stam trinket.
Yea, I know he was using the glyph as one of his trinkets. Regardless, he seems to be geared differently than the other 2 druids unless he's just severely outgeared by them. I guess I was more asking if stacking your hp that high on anub25 is a smart idea compared to mitigation from armor and resist? I would think armor+resist because of the leech, but how low can you really drop hp while tanking him?
Was looking at my heroic farming helmet instead of my raiding helmet.
My thoughts:
Stamina vs. agility is very situational.
It is very fight dependant and very role dependant. Are you occasionally switching to cat, are you have threat issues, what content are you facing (and more importantly on what level of difficulty).
My experience is that on harder modes or levels of difficulty it is more important to be able to seak up a lot of damage (as you will have more healing on you, anways) than to rely on strings of dodge. If you stacked agility instead of stamina you would simply render yourself unable to tank too many fights. An example hereof would be Fusion Punch, Leeching Swarm or similiar.
As for a generally accepted baseline I tend to go for enough dodge chance (DR in mind) and then go for stamina. My experience is that higher item levels bring enough dodge chance by themselves. I used to aim for 37% dodge chance (pre-DR, UB) and then gem stamina, but back then the itemisation was a bit different so I do not know what the theoretical treshold would be today.
As with most tanking you just have to try it for yourself and with the same healers.
And as for Anub'Arak specifically it may be worth it to see if you can obtain some nature resistance. (Although I would not claim to be able to say much about this)
As a new tank this question has been a biggie for me as well, especially since direbrew drops two +170 stam tinks plus a dodge one - so which to use ??
I found this argument in 'defense' (lol) of dodge useful.
I am also hearing that a lot of the gear dropping at higher levels of progression is dodge heavy - if that is true does it indicate that Blizz are leaning towards less stam more dodge for the class?
For entry raiding the two 170+ stamina trinkets aren't at all bad. They are in fact very nice for some fights. But again - very situational.
As they are in essence free I would make sure to get them all as a bear tank. With lower item level gear I would equip the Valor Medal copy trinket as well as a stamina one. Simply because you generally will have a rather low dodge rating at lower levels of raiding and the stamina requirement isn't steep. As opposed to equipping two stamina trinkets where you will find yourself with an unhealthy balance between dodge chance and health pool.
I think the argument in itself is a bit outdated.
Telanor does make a point here though:
Forget for a second that Telanor suggests to gem defense rating. But pay attention to the bold part.
I wouldn't be qualified to comment Blizzard's design philosophy. What I can say is that I have experienced less need of agility (dodge) at higher item levels of gear as this is naturally supplied by gear. Thus making it alot easier to stack large health pools.
Thanks very much for your considered and informative reply EcoFish.
Realistically I haven't been able to take part in progression raids since BC (not on this toon) and don't expect that to change.
So certainly for heroics (which I'll be doing as soon as Loremaster is out of the way) I'll be taking your advice and equipping the dodge trink. That will still leave me at ~33k SB which is ample I think for heroics (Considering my healadin has had tanks as low as 23k to keep up in the past in their search for the red sword :P ).
There is still room for re-gemming and created items upgrades as well which will improve stam a little. Haven't bothered yet since I am going up against level 15 mobs atm
Thanks again.
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