Druid threat

[Warlock]

Interesting.

So your mitigation (at post-defensive respec 7500 armour and an extra 10 def):
57.8% armour
16.03% dodge
13.48% parry
3.62% block (if each block stops 25% of a swing - does the 70 blocked come off the base damage or the armour mitigated damage?)
10% stance.
= 73.4% average mitigation or 19512 melee damage to kill

My mitigation
65.0% armour
11.9% dodge
= 69.2% average mitigation or 18052 melee damage to kill

The warriors I've tested with so far have substantially inferior equipment to you - you're actually ahead in damage to kill and mine were much lower (I can solo SG's without leaving bearform and despite two of us hitting the SG he almost died before I got aggro).

What do your defensive stats look like when gearing for threat rather than survivability?

[Legedi]

A few things you aren't taking into acound on those calculations. the 10% from stance helps with magic, big plus. The plus def also reduces crits by .04% each point. I track all my incoming damage, and with almost 90 def I think I get crit less than 1.5% of the time.

I block 80 damage with my sheild, and from my damage tracker it ends up mitigating about 9% of incoming damage. That is because tanking warriors spam sheild block.

And then the biggest thing people have pointed out, there are a lot more chances for warriors to upgrade their armor.

[Quark]

What do your defensive stats look like when gearing for threat rather than survivability?
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Hah! You mean like "tanking" BRD in Beserker stance while doing 49% of the group's damage?

In ZG as an MA he's still dual-wielding, but he's at least in defensive stance :P

[TheDragoon]

What do your defensive stats look like when gearing for threat rather than survivability?
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I'm not really sure what you mean here. If you're talking about swapping in my offensive gear, that can be a pretty big change. :)

In full offensive gear, using a shield, I have the following:

4599 life (unbuffed)
6548 armor (54.3% damage reduction)
318 defense
9.77% chance to dodge
10.72% chance to parry
5.72% chance to block (40 block listed on the shield)

However, in doing this my crit chance jumps from 11.55% to 23.50% chance to crit and I gain +4% chance to hit. Also note that block value I am listing is only what is on the shield + any bonuses that I have listed from gear. In the tank gear example, I had the 3 piece Might set bonus of +30 block. The actual amount you block is also dependant upon a Warrior's strength.

Overall, I've found that I can more-or-less swap in offensive gear for defensive gear to fit any point between the two extremes (with a few sweet points due to my use of item sets).

One particular set of gear that I like to use when doing main assist work in places like Zul Gurub gives me something like the following:

5039 life (unbuffed)
4751 armor (4x.x% damage reduction) <---- I forgot to write the mitigation down :)
341 defense
11.39% chance to dodge
11.64% chance to parry
10.64% chance to block (70 block) **

In this set, I'm actually dual wielding one-handed swords with a 19.75% chance to crit. Thus, I'm able to very quickly lock down aggro on each target that I select to kill through the use of Sunder Armor and Heroic Strike. Very, very rarely does anyone pull aggro off of me when I'm in this set of gear.

And, of course, I'm still experimenting with this gear set. I can lose a few percent of crit chance for several % better chance to dodge, if I want. :)

** = Since I'm dual wielding, most of the time, this can be discounted. However, for tough fights or when "things go wrong" I swap in a shield for extra damage mitigation. That also makes my armor jump up to 6886 (55.6% mitigation).

[TheDragoon]

Hah!&nbsp; You mean like "tanking" BRD in Beserker stance while doing 49% of the group's damage?

I did this once to help out in a Sunken Temple run and I accounted for 64% of the group's damage! :)

[Warlock]

I've hit 40% of group damage tanking in BRD myself - same gear as above. Much fun :)

I'd still like to see a few more threat tests between full-tank warrior builds and full-tank druid builds (with warriors using enough offensive equipment to get similar crit and attack power numbers to the Druid they're testing against). Based on the reaction I've had from most warriors that I've asked it's probaly going to be easier tofind willing druids (that "I can tank too" chip on our shoulders, you see... :D )

[Concillian]

Without using growl I've been able to pull off the three guild warriors that have been willing to fly to un'goro and test, even after giving each a five sunder headstart.
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Are you factoring in the fact that the warrior is giving you a free ~25% increase to damage by having 5 sunders on the target? Much threat is proportional to damage done, so that would seem quite a significant increase in the amount of threat you are able to provide over a normal tanking scenario.

[Quark]

Are you factoring in the fact that the warrior is giving you a free ~25% increase to damage by having 5 sunders on the target?&nbsp; Much threat is proportional to damage done, so that would seem quite a significant increase in the amount of threat you are able to provide over a normal tanking scenario.
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Maybe, but you can also compenstate by having a Rogue use Expose Armor, or a Warrior going Defensive, hitting 5 sunders, then getting out of Defensive. Also, don't forget that everyone else will be generating additional hate from the damage.

[Concillian]

Maybe, but you can also compenstate by having a Rogue use Expose Armor, or a Warrior going Defensive, hitting 5 sunders, then getting out of Defensive.&nbsp; Also, don't forget that everyone else will be generating additional hate from the damage.
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Right, but he was testing druid threat vs. warrior threat and saying that the druid outpaced the warrior.

In a 5 man scenario a druid will rarely have the luxury of 5 sunders on a target, or expose armor. They simply won't generate that much threat in one of these cases. Also in most off-tanking situations you will not have this luxury, you will want DPS warriors and rogues on the DPS target, not the off tanking target (not like it really matters how much threat you generate off-tanking).

In a raid MT situation you might generate this much threat, but this method of testing doesn't really test that case, because in that case you should both have unlimited rage... as a raid MT will never be short of rage.

I understand that feral Druids generate adequate threat to be MTs. To me, that seems to be the only conclusion you can draw from this scenario.

[Quark]

In a 5 man scenario a druid will rarely have the luxury of 5 sunders on a target, or expose armor.&nbsp; They simply won't generate that much threat in one of these cases.&nbsp;
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Bullcrap. I think Tal can attest to me holding aggro without sunders or expose armor. You highly, highly, overvalue the extra threat from sunder's extra damage.

[Tal]

Bullcrap.&nbsp; I think Tal can attest to me holding aggro without sunders or expose armor.&nbsp; You highly, highly, overvalue the extra threat from sunder's extra damage.
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Yep. Not certain what he did to hold aggro but it worked. =)

[Warlock]

I didn't try to compensate for the extra damage I generated due to Sunder. Nor did I compensate for the extra damage he generated due to Faerie Fire, Leader of the Pack and Mark of the Wild or his extra rage from being hit.

*shrugs* I'd need a larger group to test with neither of us getting any threat benefit from the other being present. The warrior, myself in a different group, perhaps a healer, two other people with known similar threat (identical hunter pets?). I'm not likely to be able to get that group together just to test threat so if you can think of an easier way please let me know.

I know my methodology isn't perfect but the results so far have been pretty conclusive. If you have specific suggestions about improving the accuracy of the test I'll try to repeat with those incorporated. I'd also love to see independent test results.

If Druid threat is higher only due to Sunder Armour, a Druid/Warrior pair tanking a mob will still generate more threat than a Warrior alone and therefore permit more firepower by the rest of the raid.

[Concillian]

Bullcrap.&nbsp; I think Tal can attest to me holding aggro without sunders or expose armor.&nbsp;
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:wacko:

I never said you couldn't hold aggro, in fact I said druids were perfectly adequate at holding aggro. Whiskey Tango Foxtrot did that comment come from?

I was commenting on the test methodology, not insulting a particular person or class.

Edit: I think I see how you misread my statement. "that" in "that much threat" = as much threat as in the experiment. It was not saying "druids won't generate that much threat" it was saying "druids won't generate as much threat as demonstrated in the experiment"

Taken out of context it looks like the former, but in context I think it reads the way I intended.

[Mavfin]

I have a feeling that this might be part of the reason it's working out as you find.  20% chance to crit in "tank gear" is significantly higher than most warriors I know.  It sounds like your gear is more designed for damage compared to the types of tank gear a warrior gets.  For example, when I'm using my offensive gear on my warrior, I usually run around with 25% chance to crit (unbuffed, in battle stance), but when I swap to my tank gear, that drops down as low as 11% chance to crit.  With such a huge deficit in terms of offensive power, it's definitely going to be difficult to hold aggro even if you both have the talents to increase hate generation (Defiance for him, that Feral Instinct for you).  For the warriors that don't have Defiance, they would have to work 15% harder to hold aggro, so I don't think it's a huge surprise they were having a hard time with it.

Rage generation is also going to be a huge factor here.  Warriors in defensive stance with a shield out against one relatively weak-hitting mob aren't going to be generating a whole lot of rage.  With you in a more offensively minded gear set, you might very well have a comparable rage generation to the warriors.  Again, at that point it goes back to the fact that the warrior might be turtling and you are attacking, in terms of the gear you are using.
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And there's a key point. Against big nasty mobs, or groups of mobs, where a warrior has basically unlimited rage to work with, it's different.

Your bear is going to get hit, and get more rage quicker vs single mobs. My 60 warrior is turtled up so well, and so crit-resistant, that rage gen vs single mobs is not great, unless they're big nasties like MC mobs, and instance bosses/minibosses. I routinely ask groupmates in Strat/Scholo/BRS to NOT stun mobs until they've hit me a couple times so i can have some rage for a sunder/revenge pair. Frankly, for those instances, my warrior is TOO turtled up to be really efficient on rage generation. If the healing is there, she tanks dual-wield or 2h for the rage gen, and still takes no more damage than a DPS war with a shield.

Now, on Baron Rivendare, where I have the same headstart as your test or less (2 sunders and a revenge), and basically unlimited rage to work with, your druid hasn't a chance to pull him off me w/o using growl to artificially push you to the top of the hate list for a little bit, and unless my aggro is erased, I'll have him back as soon as that expires. As a tank warrior in that position, I do NOT have 25% crit, I have about 10 or 11. I get my rage and aggro from getting hit, not hitting him. It's a whole different situation than one Stone guy in Un'Goro.

Basically, unbeknownst to you, your test was badly skewed to your bear. Sorry. In that test, my aforementioned 60 warrior would probably lose, vs your 25% crit , and better rage gen vs single mobs.

You're going to be great in quick hate generation situations. So are Fury warriors. Fury wars in dual-wield can generate a lot of hate real quick, but they usually can't stand in there vs a big nasty melee-crit boss unless there's an excess of healing.

Having said that, my perception is that feral druids can tank/hold aggro as well as a non-prot war, and the prot war's edge is in damage mitigation/hate build over time in a big boss fight or multiple mobs beating on you, not necessarily in quick hate generation. In a 10-second fight, defiance won't give you much of an edge. In a 2-minute fight, it most assuredly will.

[Warlock]

I've done the same (pulled off warriors with a headstart without using Growl) on Molten Giants.

Was the Druid you tested against on Rivendare a full tank build (every talent spent on bear form, not the popular cat form/restoration build that calls itself feral)? Talents do make difference.

Defensive warrior builds do have a little more total mitigation. That isn't what I've been investigating.

[Watto44]

Speaking of talents, does anyone know if the feral talent Improved Demo Roar increases the threat generated by demo roar? My guess would be no, but it would be nice to know for sure. :) It would certainly help a fairly "meh" talent if it did increase the threat of demo roar.

On a side note, I'd like to see a lurker produced druid tanking guide. I've never done much tanking - mostly because healing and hybrid roles are so much easier :P - apart from lower level instances and the occasional single target mob. At least lets get a bit of a survey going about the various approaches - both gear a skills - people use.

Like I said, I haven't tanked much and my approach usually involves me mashing the keyboard with both hands and hoping something appropriate happens, so any imput would be helpful. :D

[Warlock]

I haven't tested Feral Aggression (the 1.8 version of Improved Demoralising Roar that also buffs Fercoious Bite). Around patch 1.5 (can't recall exactly when) I tested with and without IDR and found no difference in threat, so I doubt it boosts threat.

I'll see what I can put together about druid tanking. Here's something short in the meantime:

Equip:
From most to least important: armour, stamina, defence, dodge, agility, crit% and strength. If maintanking, forget caster stats - you won't be able to safely shift out mid fight.
Always keep thorns up on yourself and not on anyone you might need to quickly pull off.

Pulling single mobs:
Regrowth, rejuvenation, wrath, barkskin, bearform. (Can also use Feral FF to save mana provided you won't need the edge your own healing gives).

Pulling multiple mobs:
Regrowth, rejuvenation, barkskin, hurricane, bearform.

Holding a single mob:
Faerie fire (if you have it, every time the cooldown is up), Maul whenever you can, Swipe if excess rage. Be very careful with frenzied regen - the loss of rage can make it hard to maintain threat.

Holding multiple mobs:
Make sure anything crowd controlled is behind you or distant. Keep changing targets. Swipe whenever you can, Maul if excess rage, Faerie fire if insufficient rage to swipe.

[Watto44]

Pulling multiple mobs:
Regrowth, rejuvenation, barkskin, hurricane, bearform.
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Hehe, I hadn't thought of using hurricane for pulling. Definately a nice idea (assuming that CC is happening after the pull rather than before). For multiple mobs I've been using moofire, rejuv, demo roar and swipe, which makes it fairly easy to loose mobs early in the fight. (I'm having flashbacks to the death knight zerg in dead Strat. *shudder*)

Another question though. When you use regrowth and rejuv before the pull, do the HoT generate threat? I'm guessing not (and hoping, since I occasionally do the same thing when I'm healing) and that you're using them as a kind of druidic PW:S. Wouldn't it be worth while mixing up the order a bit, maybe going regrowth, wrath/moofire, and then rejuv? You should still have time to get into bear form and would eek out a little more threat from the rejuvination. (I know it's not much, but when I've been tanking, every little bit has been pretty important.)

Anyway, here's my strategy - such as it is, and feel free to replace any part of it with "mash the keyboard and hope something happens". NOTE: Bear (hawhaw) in mind that I have only tanked once since 1.8 came out, so there might be some overkill in terms of generating threat. I really don't have enough of a handle on how much extra threat is generated by Feral Instinct at the moment. :)

Single Target: Depends on how much room I have to move. If I have lots of room, get the party to move way back. Open with starfire, moofire and start running away (which usually distresses my party enormously :D ). While I'm running hit rejuv, barkskin and bear form. Once I'm in it's demo roar, maul whenever I can and faerie fire whenever it's up.

If I don't have room to move or the mob is a caster, I typically barkskin, moofire, rejuv and then hit bear form. I find any other combination gets me hit when I'm not in bear form, which is a bad thing. But generally speaking, I don't have trouble holding aggro on single targets - assuming the group gives me enough time to get a decent amount of hate.

Multiple targets: Again, it's dependant on how much room I have. If there is space, I open with starfire on one mob, moofire on another, barkskin and rejuv before hitting bear form. If it's a three pull, hit the mob who hasn't been tagged with maul, then demo roar. I try and cycle through the targets, hitting each with a maul and faerie fire (which is a very helpful way to tell if you've already "tagged" a mob early in the fight) as well as hitting swipe whenever it's not on cooldown. If the pull has more than 3 mobs, hit demo roar asap and then swipe before cycling through the targets and doing the maul thing.

I will definately have to try pulling with hurricane though. It will hopefully make the start of the fight more controllable.

Pulling off your party: Feral charge if they are your healer/ranged DPS (which they usually are :P). Then taunt. I hit enrage if I feel I'm going to need the extra juice to really grab the mob. By the time I've hit faerie fire and maul, taunt will probably have worn off, so I can assess the situation.

If the mob is sticking with me, I maul another time or two. If it's still following the squishy, I hit bash and enrage if I haven't used it already. Use that rage to maul as much as you can, FF and taunt whenever they're not on cooldown until you're comfortable you've got the mob back.

This is another area when I struggle. I feel I've got the correct sequence to pull aggro off the squishies, but I almost always have to use bash which leaves me in a sticky situation if someone pulls off me more than once a minute. If bash is still on cooldown and someone pulls off me, keyboard mashing is practically guaranteed to ensue. :blush: I feel I'm too dependent on maul critting when I'm trying to pull off people.

[Xanthix]

Another question though. When you use regrowth and rejuv before the pull, do the HoT generate threat?
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HoT spells should generate threat on each tick. For example, as a priest I do not pre-renew tanks, since if it ticks after the pull but before they hit a mob, it will run to me.

So, if you put the HoTs on yourself and then pull, the spells will cause aggro on each tick towards each mob that is aware of you (presumably all of them if you did an AOE pull or got all their attention somehow). Or you could pull and then cast the healing spells, to get the full aggro.

[Warlock]

I'm actually not sure whether pre-cast HOTs generate threat once the mob knows about you. I would guess so, but haven't tested it - Druidic PW:S is right. I'm pretty aggressive when tanking and burning some of my otherwise useless mana before a hard pull can give the healer a few seconds more drinking time.

Backing up while casting the instants is a good idea if you have room and one I'll start working in when appropriate.

Multiple mobs - the cooldown on Swipe was removed in 1.8. It went from 'nice to use when it's up' to a very potent skill indeed. Fully talented it's 15 rage for 110 high threat damage to three targets, with each crit returning five rage and each target giving a chance to proc Omen of Clarity.

1.8 increased the threat caused by talented mauls by over 50% (10% natural weapons, 20% savage fury, 15% feral instinct, an extra 4% crit, an extra 90 attack power, free use from Omen... all of which compound.) There are eight viable DPS classes in the game and now there are two viable tanks.