Off Tanking groups of Mobs and you (AKA top the tank DPS meters)

So, just a short post on tanking trash pulls and what I have found works best with the massive amount of DPS my guildies are putting out these days.

First, here is what I am wearing to OT packs of trash...

Hood of the Exodus - Just an awesome helm for both tanking and DPS, currently my MTing helm.
Boundless Ambition
Heroes' Dreamwalker Shoulderpads - Enchanted and gemmed for Kitty set
Cloak of the Shadowed Sun
Tunic of Indulgence - I will switch this to T7.5 chest as soon as it drops next in Naxx, both gemmed and enchanted for Kitty
Sinner's Bindings - Another great item for both tanking and DPS
Dislocating Handguards - Part of my current kitty DPS set.
Belt of the Tortured - Another Kitty DPS piece
Heroes' Dreamwalker Legguards - Gemmed and enchanted for my MT set
Footwraps of Vile Deceit - Another nice item for both Kitty and Bear, part of my MT set.
Gatekeeper
Surge Needle Ring
Meteorite Whetstone - Kitty DPS trinket
Mirror of Truth - Kitty DPS trinket
Origin of Nightmares - Best for tanking but also good for DPS and has Mongoose on it where my Journey's End has Berserker.
Idol of the Wastes

I also tend to tank most Heroics in this same set up.

This gear gets me lots of swipe crits, does a lot of damage and threat, and survivability seems just fine. Without taunts I can usually peal mobs off of our warrior and pally tanks no problem rotating swipe and maul.

Typically on trash I find myself somewhere between 3-5 of total damage done which is pretty darn good for a tank if you ask me, not to mention when I MT 5 man Heroics I tend to be #1 on DPS for trash as well. I bet a bunch of AoE casters out there run with me and are like wtf?

Whew...

Loremaster done! Whoot!

Now I start farming herbs non stop until my DK turns out my Nobles Deck.

Anywho, I guess by now many feral Druids have seen the coming changes to FB and our new shield thing. I am not going to talk about either, they both seem... well, meh.

Supposedly the FB change is to tone down our burst in PvP. The shield thing in bear is so our mitigation somehow scales with AP, however their attempt seems pretty weak.

Question for you ferals out there... how do you veiw your role as a raid member?

I know my role seems to be one of "we are happy to have you, we will let you know if we need you Tanking, DPSing, Healing, CCing or we won't say anything and you can more or less do what you want" LOL... makes trying to decide what to spend DKP on a little frightening doesn't it? It's not for me of course cause my guild is very cool, a social guild which doesn't nitpick every members decision on gear or spec or rotation.

But I wonder how many of you hybrids out there have it worse... or maybe we have not seen how this is yet because of how easy Naxx is and once we venture into Uldar people will end up more under the microscope.

Speaking of Patch 3.1, how many of you are looking forward to the dual spec switch ability?

I tell you what I miss, being able to Tank, DPS, and PVP in the same spec. I came up with a good spec to both Main Tank and do top 10 raid DPS when not tanking but I had to leave out talents that are needed for PVP. So now if I get into a little world PvP I get my arse beat down.

Now come Uldar I most likely will not be able to MT with this spec... it's just Naxx is so easy I can get away with it but from a PvP standpoint I will prob be in a similar position. So I am thinking about a MT/PvP switch but if Uldar has encounters which might have it more benificial for me to put out more DPS or even do some healing I might have to scrap that idea.

Just patch day rambling for what they are worth.

A little Loremaster hint during the restart.

If you have not seen this already it will help get more quests for your Loremaster Achievement.

MacKreel's Moonshine

This guy is somewhat hidden and has to be jumped too in Arathi Highlands.

Also, after jumping down into the water, 2 things...

1. Sully Balloo's Letter - swim straight down. If you look to the right side of the middle pillar (the south east side) you can see Sully at the bottom of the river, and the letter is near his hand.

2. The quest from the hidden dwarf is timed. Swim quickly to the cave west of Faldir's Cove that leads back to Arathi and take the Flight Path to SouthShore. The dwarf to turn in is in the basement of the inn under the kitchen.

Sooo, I was going to have a long post today...

But it is just rolling restarts and my Loremaster title awaits.

Heroic Naxx is clear and the Wrath love continues.

Let me first mention that I got to MT both Sapphiron and Kel'Thuzad. Our warrior MT for the rest of that nights run was not defense capped with FR gear and had not yet had the opportunity to tank these last bosses even in 10 man.

Getting to do this really made my night as I have always been mostly an OT in my 25 man raiding history.

So we drop Kel'Thuzad Thursday night (1st week without the Lag boss) and look what drops...

Journey's End

Wow... Seriously... for someone who had to buy Staff of the Forest Lord because the staff in ZA and Kara whould never fall after a crazy insane amount of runs... I am just flabbergasted.

Even more luck had happened in the fight prior as Sapphiron dropped Gatekeeper

and before that...

Cover of Silence fell from Thaddius... WHAT? SERIOUSLY?

Somewhere in all the excitement I may have forgotten to mention I picked up Strong-Handed Ring as well... dunno if that was Thursday's run or not though.

After months of struggling to get geared up in BC and having to resort to PvP in order to get geared... 3 best in slot items fall for me in 1st kills?

I ran Kara, no lie, at least 40 times before I saw some of the better leather or the staff. Hell, at that point I had already bought or PvPed my way to better gear because we had already moved on to SSC/TK/Hyjal.

I hope and pray that the following Heroic raids in the upcoming content patches have bosses dropping multiple pieces of loot like in Naxx Heroic.

The only things left in Heroic Naxx that I need are...

Boundless Ambition or Heritage
Cloak of the Shadowed Sun

From there it wouldn't hurt to get

Tunic of Indulgence
Idol of Worship - Watch it never fall again after I passed on it twice... lol

I have still not bothered getting any T7.5 gear so I suppose I will come up with a strategy on which T7 pieces to replace first since I have a lot of DKP built up for these peices. It's looking like I will be going with Pants and probably shoulders or chest to start. I was very tempted to get my first peice after dropping Kel with the helm token falling but with both Epic helms from Heroic Naxx it just didn't make sense to do so when others are still running around in rare quality head gear. Mind you it was really tempting though for someone who never moved past T4 helm in BC... except my PvP Vengeance helm.

Look tomorrow during the server down time for a post on itemization and some curious rankings by RAWR that make no sense to me.