Guardian druid threat is so bad its a broken game mechanic

Been playing on a 212 druid alt and the threat for guardian is in an abysmal state. This isn’t even a balance issue, this is a broken game mechanic. You need to tune parameters on guardian threat better, period. Thrash is obviously the highest aoe generator but since you can only press it every few seconds any class that uses a CD on pull will take agro and theres a fight to get it back. This a real problem. Even if you ask your dps to wait two globals under the guise of RPG game mechanics, and they do, then you taunt/thrash on CD and swipe to fill, a strong dps at the same ilvl will pull threat from you on larger packs.

This is infuriating on every pull where there are other mechanics that need to be considered. There is a natural flow to a mob pull. The tank initiates under most circumstances then uses his first few globals to gather threat on all the mobs, the dps enter and start blasting and then everyone enters the mechanics/positioning phase. This includes getting assigned kicks, using CC when you need to, facing mobs away, positioning certain mobs to negate their dmg/effects etc etc. This cycle is broken for guardian unless they berserk which SHOULD be a survivability CD first not a threat CD. My main is a vengeance DH and this cycle works well, even if a mage combusts and a couple mobs think about heading over to him, a nice reactionary click or aoe ability can stabilize threat again, usually in a global or two. Guardian can lose threat and not recover for several seconds. They do not have the capacity sometimes to get it back quickly. During that time you are probably missing kicks, placing yourself in a bad position and foregoing important game mechanics because your class is flawed.

Guardian is really fun to tank but its threat state is terrible. Any player new to tanking that tries Guardian first, will be seriously frustrated and probably not even be sure why hes having a hard time stabilizing threat. He will very incorrectly assume that the game designers wouldn’t leave a class in a near broken state and that it must be his fault for being bad and then never want to tank again.

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Post a log or something, you’re likely creating your own threat problems by wasting GCDs.

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I’m not a fan of calling people out for what they haven’t done yet, but I just looked at your RIO, your highest key is a 14 that you did as dps, then nothing else above 10? I am making a post about bear AOE threat in situations where it actually matters. For example, say a double pull with 8 mobs on keys where your dps will get 1-shot when you can’t sustain threat for more than two seconds without Berserk. And you ask for my logs??? The people on these forums man.

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I did, yeah, but if you just want to whine without ever getting better you can easily do that too.

My guess is you’re swiping too much and are using Incarnation over GG, when GG provides much more stable rage generation + high single target threat. Thrash with UFR, tab moonfire, Mangle on CD, use GG procs on anything that you know is likely to be pulled/high priority.

It’s not rocket science, and I have plenty of experience tanking everything up to and including mythic/heroic content over nearly 15 years.

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Oh yeah, you have a high enough ilvl to prove me wrong. Please, by all means, go step into a key thats challenging for your ilvl, set me straight. BRING logs. On double/triple pulls after your 8th moonfire global, stop and take a survey, ask your dps, particularly melee dps, how they feel your tanking is. If they are still alive, i’ll bet they will have some feedback.

Also, tanking experience is great and I welcome discussion, but if you haven’t had shadowlands guardian tanking experience, why are you assuming anybody with threat issues is instantly wrong. I’m glad you and your experience on shadowlands guardian threat could contribute so meaningfully here.

Okay, you’re right.

Guardian is busted. Please DM Ion on twitter and make sure he knows so he can fix it for you.

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If youre running incarn use that for pulls over 5 or 6 mobs. Threat in that should be too bad.
If youre NF pop balance affinity and get the Starfall rolling, that provides awesome threat when you shift back in to bear.
For 3-4 mobs moonfire as you run in, taunt after thrash and mangle the first target you hit with moonfire.
For 2 mobs taunt and moonfire works well then just build threat with thrash and mangle.
For big pulls with incarn your taunt is like 1.5 or 2 seconds. Thats really good along with the thrash spam.
Running the Ursoc’s pegendary thrash becomes even better with aoe threat.
If you run in and see youre losing agro use roar to stun them for a sec, it does help to get it back or gives that split second for your dps to go “uh oh I need to do something”

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Will happen to any tank if you’ve got retarded DPS that’ll do this before you even get your second GCD off

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This is actually a neat suggestion. However, I do feel this doesn’t invalidate the assertion that guardian threat needs tuning. Guardian shouldn’t need any affinity to hold basic AOE threat. Also, to safely(for dps that is) do a pull of multiple packs they shouldn’t need Berserk/Incarn to hold threat. Even if they have to sacrifice an optimized damage output to hold threat, it should be at least be possible.

Ultimately, they need access to some sort of reliable aoe generator outside of a 3 minute CD. The spec wastes too many globals trying to hold aoe threat with single target abilities that don’t even guarantee that mob we still have threat 4 seconds from now. This is a design flaw unless blizzard changed balance of tanks to both survivability and threat gen where some specs deliberately have garbage threat.

The worst part is guardian is quite fun to tank with and has sooo much potential. However, being pigeon holed into pulling only a handful of mobs at a time when you don’t have berserk available, especially when guardians survivability shines so well, is terrible design. The fun part of tanking is pushing your pulls to the limit because the satisfaction from your damage is mediocre. Also, you as a tank control the numbers your dps puts up. By doing epic but beautifully executed pulls, you can add massive numbers to your party members dps. While I would also love to see a buff to guardian damage output, I don’t want to ask for too much here, needs before wants, but I feel that damage and threat are tied very closely with this spec.

Agreed, I’ve pulled off every tank spec in the game by convoking too early into a pull and getting a lucky series of bite crits.

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I agree, but specifically I’m addressing dps that do wait for two threat building globals, then burst. Also important, there is a discrepancy between tank specs, some of which have the ability to regain threat in a reasonable time frame, and those that can’t.

My longest standing advice to tanks in general from years of tanking previous expansions (although this doesn’t directly solve your base problem) is to always be at the next fight 3-5 seconds before your dps are.

GOGOGO from tanks isn’t just about speed clearing, it’s about getting threat.

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2 globals still aren’t enough to hold threat against someone blowing cooldowns. On any tank. But I will admit, Druids just don’t have the snap aggro that a few other tanks do and with the cooldown on thrash and taunt, kind of like how Resto Druids work, once you fall behind, it’s hard to come back without a fight, like you said.

I came across an interesting video addressing this issue. It is from Dorki who I believe is in the guild Complexity Limit and has the only 3k RIO score for a guardian druid in shadowlands so far. He addresses how he feels each tank will perform after the 9.0.5 changes and he specifically mentions that he wanted to see a base damage buff to guardian druid because their agro is a major problem. If you’re curious:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=neL6xGZNGK8

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its actually bad. shred needs to do triple the threat it does.

i see a lot of non tanks in here that just dont understand, there is clearly a bug with guardian threat, if you play the other tank specs it’s quite obvious.

You mean thrash or mangle? Shred is only usable in cat form.

Bro you must be one the non tanks, real tanks use Shred.

/s

:wink:

Mostly I play guardian. Shred is used in cat form, not in bear form.

Reread their comment. Then reread mine.

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Just did. You’re agreeing with him that shred should generate 3x the threat is does now, so that when guardians tank in cat form…