All of these things are wrong. You can use any consumable of your choice (including Hourglass Sand) as a bear via a simple powershift macro. The boss never “sees” you in caster form at all because you shift back on the same batch as the consume was applied. Good bears use this not only for Sand, but also for chugging Stoneshield pots when tanking Nef (yes, bears tank Nef all the time), popping FAPs and sappers, etc. Chromaggus also hits like a wet noodle, I’ve never once felt in danger of dying during his enrage.
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Okay, well if the best druid tank in the world is wrong then that’s news to me. My point was to Misadventure. I presented info I got from a guy that has bear tanked naxx. Not made up out of my “own ignorance to disparage druid tanks”.
I appreciate your point of view. You are asking legitimate questions. You are showing ignorance in your questions, but ignorance is not a bad thing. It simply means you don’t know, which is why you are asking questions. I do it all the time.
I learned a great deal from watching Skarm’s videos. It was he that inspired me to play a druid in Classic. His views on this particular topic however were based on false knowledge since it was based largely on private servers. Additionally, there were things he did not think of that have since been figured out.
I play on alliance. We have fear ward. Its a non-issue. Also, warriors require fear ward since they don’t want to be stance dancing while tanking, especially as Fury/Prot (no improved stances). There is no difference between warrior and druid in this regard on alliance.
Don’t delay tranq shot. He also hits like a little girl. Its a non-issue.
Macro is:
/cancelform
/use Hourglass Sand
/cast Dire Bear Form
Because the sand is not on the GCD it can be used in a shift macro. As long as you aren’t on the GCD from something else such as Swipe, there is no delay between the cancelform and re-entering bear form. It is basically the same macro I use for Greater Healing Potions, Healthstones, FAPs, Stoneshield potions, etc., etc. Anything that doesn’t use a GCD can be used in Bear form with no “turning into a human.” (#nightelfmasterrace)
So can warriors in threat gear and dual wielding. It happens ALL the time. The difference is, when it happens to me as a Bear, it is reduced by double the amount it is on a warrior because of my vastly superior armor. A crit is a trivial thing against my armor. A crushing blow is about the same damage as a FULLY BLOCKED HIT against a shield wearing full protection tank. My superior HPs creates a larger cushion against bigger hits, reducing Healer Heart Failure moments. For all the bosses so far, crits and crushes are completely trivial. You underestimate the power of 75% damage reduction.
I think the most important denial of the statement that druids shouldn’t tank those bosses is the fact that I have done so many times and have yet to die a single time on any of them.
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He’s nowhere near the best druid tank in the world lol, check his parses. His druid is an alt that he plays for fun, come visit the class discord for much more up to date information on bears in Classic.
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Back in vanilla, raiders claimed that the entire raids needed FR on Rag, so eh. Has he tried tanking BWL as bear in classic?
Not trolling here. Legit curious.
What are the positives of a bear tank over a warrior tank? What are the negatives? How’s the TPS considering optimal play/consumables? Are there any fights that’d you’d actively prefer one over the other?
Do you see either role getting better or worse into AQ and Naxx? I’ve only played mage/rogue/priest extensively, and mostly PvP, so I’m curious as to how the two tanks stack up against each other as gear gets better.
Each guild has the right to distribute their own loot. Yes, most will be considerate. It’s leftover loot, it would depend on the alt but usually would go to them too.
From my experience as a healer, ZG healing gear is obtained faster than my goal of obtaining the raid’s caster gear. For us, the healer loot isn’t contested.
MC healing loot has long been obtained by our roster, BWL comes down to RNG.
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Potential DPS for the last end of Classic’s content is more considerable.
Extremely high threat ceiling, much more survivability than a fury-prot tank when gearing for equal TPS, much easier to gear up than a warrior, can DPS near-optimally in the same spec used to tank, provides unique party utility via 3% crit aura.
Worse snap threat on pull, lack of defensive cooldowns, and low individual DPS compared to a fury-prot tank.
Top bears are pushing 2.5k TPS on Vael these days.
For sub-40 second Vael kills, fury-prot MT is preferable due to superior snap threat and ability to pop Reck on pull. For Broodlord bears particularly shine because our insane sustained TPS allows us to keep aggro even after multiple knockaways, and because we’re much less likely to die from nasty MS sequences even in full threat gear. FR fights are also quite good for bears generally, since we sacrifice less threat and mitigation in our FR gear than warriors do. Nef is not a great fight for bears because of the cat call. Pretty much anything else can be done equally effectively by either tank.
Both will remain very strong tanks for the duration of Classic, as both scale very well with gear upgrades in AQ40 and beyond.
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/thread. For real. Great answer.
So can fury prot warriors as well bro.
Kek wow you’re ignorant on something you seem to be so confident in, Druids can powershift macro sand to instantly shift in and out of sand
Physically impossible the macro is literally instant unless you shift out on a GCD.
Shes not insulting you, you are being extremely ignorant.
First out Tips Out is about a valid source as my defecation, he’s been wrong about stuff more than I have chromosomes.
Skarm was approaching from the subject of Pservers in which boss generally did more damage and their mechanics hit harder, on the private server he played on Nef and Chrom hit way harder and would not be advisable on a bear for sure, but bears can do chrom and even Nef druid call fine due to how light he hits and stacking armor/hp before the fight the druid before mentioned she could hit 9k hp and 6k armor in cat form.
Yes a theorycrafter who didn’t know if powershifting could even work at the time of the video as a lot of things in classic were unknown is wrong, there is no ‘best druid tank’ as Druid tanking is defined by how prepared/lucky you are, their own threat causing ability is litterally Heroic strike on threat steroids.
Pretty sure any guild would have a lot of /gquits if a ret got DFT. 
Is threat and dps even comparable at their absolute limits?
I’m not sure I understand the question. A Bear gets a lot more TPS from their DPS, so you can’t compare DPS between Warriors and Bears if you are measuring TPS. If that is what you meant.
Forgive me I’m tired. Is that post that I was quoting, implying that bear tps is in the same category as a well geared fury defiant?
Edit: Ye def made a mistake comprehending the part on dps.
This is the key difference that makes Bears superior tanks for many fights. Is my TPS more than TF dual wielding BIS warriors? If I am using MCP on CD and getting enough rage (usually by standing in the fire) sometimes yes, sometimes no. Its RNG, which means its close. BUT I am SOOOOOOOOOOOO much more survivable in the gear I need to do that.
I make gear swaps on almost every pull to optimize my effectiveness (thank God for itemrack!!!) I swap for more threat, or varying amounts of resistance, or more tankiness, etc. But in each case I don’t lose a ton of threat or armor etc. I lose enough that making the gear changes is worth it, but its no where near as much as the costs to a Warrior tank (in general).
Only noob Druids allow themselves to be caught out of Bear form. I haven’t done it since I started getting my pre-bis gear (last September?) Its just something you learn how to not do.
These are the biggest downsides of Feral tank. Its not “Crits and crushes”. That is irrelevant, despite the fact that it was the belief for 15 years. Its snap threat and no shield wall. I can use healthstones though, something that was believed to not be possible. I can use Healing pots. Those have kept me alive numerous times. Because I take less damage, using those really is a defensive CD. In other words, if I use them I wont die. The HPs they provide along with my super-armor keeps me alive long enough to get a heal.
We kill Vael sub 30s every time. This is the only way to do it. By the end my threat is up to the Warrior, but I can’t start the fight because I just can’t rely on getting an initial Maul Crit, and a first swing parry is a wipe (my first attempt at MT on Vael 
) .
In AQ Bears really come into their own. AQ40 is a Bear druid candy store. So much amazing loot (finally!). In Naxx however, warriors will get some pretty crazy stuff. Tier 3 is kinda crazy. Once they get full T3 I think they will pull ahead in overall tankiness. There will still be plenty of fights where Feral shines. Feral will still be the superior tank (both main and OT) for Patchwerk e.g. For MT, as mentioned their TPS vs. survivability is just plain superior, so they can keep threat in gear that allows them to survive the powerful hits. For OT they can get enough HPs and armor to take two full power hateful strikes and live where a warrior cannot.
In fact any fight where threat, armor and resistance is a factor, bears win. In other words, even into Naxx they will be at least on par, and possibly superior in the fights where a balance of any of those two (or all 3) is a factor.
Are you asking if Bear TPS is in the same category as Fury?
I apologize, I likely missed part of the conversation. I was not following this thread from the beginning but came late to the party.
Yeah, basically. The post that I was commenting towards, wrote that bears have a extremely high threat celing. You would think extremely high would be the highest catagory.
They also wrote that bears have more survivability when gearing for equal TPS to a warrior, that implies that they can be equal.
It was my impression that Fury/defiance potential threat is unrivalled, especially with windfury and recklessness.
I’m not sure what “defiance” is. As for the influence of windfury on both bears and warriors, I am not sure, I play alliance. I would think the effect would be similar for each, just like War Chiefs Blessing is, but can’t say for certain.
From my experience, at current gear levels, A BIS warrior (our MT) and a BIS Druid (me), where the Warrior is dual wielding in threat gear, and the Druid is using MCP in (partial) threat gear do about the same threat over a fight longer than 15s, assuming both are getting enough rage. There might be a slight lead to the warrior in that situation, but both are FAR above the rest of the DPS. In those gear levels, the Druid is much more survivable.
Defiance is a 5/5 protection talent that increases threat by 15% while in defensive stance.
31 points in Fury tree to maximise damage, bloodthirst also has a large amount of threat.
Windfury doesn’t work on feral forms at all. It’s a big ooft. Not only does windfury provide more damage for the Warrior, it provides increased rage generation, which feeds back into more increased damage. It has insane synergy with warriors while feral doesn’t benefit from it at all.
It’s important to remember that Alliance don’t have to manage threat as carefully as Horde, because of Paladin’s Blessing of Salvation.