A note on my many outfits and when I use them.

Thought I would throw this out there for the feral druids wondering how they can optimize gear for different encounters...

I personally have a bunch of different gear combination depending on the fight... or even trash for that matter.

I won't get into particular pieces of gear since not everyone is as fortunate with drops as the next but just a general idea of how I change gear with the ebb and flow of a given raid. You can see if you like the gear I wear in each set listed in the right most column of my blog including how it is enchanted and gemmed.

I have no math to back this up, just what works for me Main Tanking, Off Tanking, and DPSing in current content. As I have posted before I am a Hybrid BearCat so I enjoy mix and matching my gear to take advantage of what I can do on any given encounter.

First my Sets...

1. Main Tanking set - Gear considered tops for tanking based solely on mitigation. With this setup the DPS might have to wait 3-5 secs for me to get solid agro but from there out it isn't much of an issue. I think I have about 78 hit but I am maxed out on mitigation stats and expertise.

2. Kitty DPS set (raiding) - Top DPS gear with making sure to get 2T7.5 bonus in there. Hit capped.

3. Off Tanking/Trash set - A mix of DPS Kitty gear and MTing gear. I am over the hit cap in this set.

4. Tank Stamina set/FR set - Used for Saph or Sarth, I stopped using this set on Patchwerk because taking 2 hatefuls back to back constantly sucks which happens when you get over 50K HP. Again, this set offers very little hit and avoidance stats suffer from the FR gear. Make sure to only gem your Polar gear with stam gems, you only need to be wearing this gear on fights where stam is king anyway.

5. Kitty DPS set (World) - Basically same as above but dropping the 2T7.5 bonus and using my Idol from BT for strength proc on mangle.

I also have a Healing set, Boomkin set (never use now that we have Kitty Swipe), and Naked set ( I will have to screen shot my couple of naked set ups... I have a Aquaman one and a Tarzan one)

So here is when I use which set...

Malygos - Off Tank set. I tank the adds at the beginning of phase 2 so in phase 1 I am in kitty DPSing on Maly. I use my DPS staff and Idol and then switch it between phase 1 and 2.

Sarth - I have been going with my MT set which still puts out good threat. Note I only have 40 Hit in this set so my DPS gives me a couple secs to establish agro with incoming drakes. If/When I MT Sarth I will go to the Stam set obviously. Before we pull Sarth I tank trash in my trash set of course.

VoA - I could prob tank this in my full Kitty set but I usually just DPS this fight.

Hell, I tanked Saph last night from 14% in my full cat gear with FR stuff just swapping weapon and idol with 2 healers, 1 hunter, and 2 Death Knights left standing... damn buggy Frost Tombs. Of course this has more to do with me wearing a lot of Valorous which is very good in slot for both Kitty and Bear.

Naxx - All trash is in my OT/Trash set.

Anub - I am in OT/Trash set... Kitty DPS on boss between tanking adds
Grand Widow - Usually MT gear for this unless I am Kitty DPSing. Usually I am MTing it or tanking all the adds with swipe.
Maexxna - I kitty DPS this one so my Kitty set.

Noth - OT set for snap agro on spawned adds.
Unclean - Kitty DPS set cause I am in kitty for it.
Loatheb - Kitty set and shreding butt again.

Instuctor - OT set usually as I DPS and also grab adds if/when they break MC.
Gothik - OT set again as I need the snap agro on the spawned adds. Tanking Gothik once he comes down has never been an issue in the set either.
4 Horse - I am almost always the first Korth tank on the left but I wear my OT set for max agro and DPS since we like burning the turd as fast as possible. I don't have issues in this set as long as people stay with me as I do the exchange for when the meteor hits.

Patchwerk - MT set. I no longer use the FR stuff because at too high stamina and too little avoidance it is too easy to get smacked by multiple hatefulls back to back. I like to share the wealth with at least 1 more tank as far as getting beat up goes.
Grob - OT set for slimes snap agro when they spawn and splash damage from swipe and mauls on Grob.
Gluth - OT set usually but I think I could easily OT this in my Kitty set. When our warrior MT has him I go kitty and shread butt watching my target of target for when he gets a 3 stack so I can go bear and run back in front and taunt... which might go even better in Kitty gear being hit capped. In the past I have had taunts miss because of my low hit in MT set. As soon as the 3 stack wears off the MT takes him back and I go back to kitty DPSing.
Thad - If MTing I would prob wear my MT set but lately I have been kitty DPSing... usually in the top 5 kitty DPSing at that :) If all I was tanking was one of the 2 adds I wouold prob wear my OT set just in case the other tank misses the jump. Lately though I am the 3rd tank switching to DPS when I can.

Saph - If MTing Saph I would wear MT set and cap out FR with ring, boots, and belt most likey. Lately I have been kitty though except for last night where I started kitty and ended up MT. Lived in kitty gear switching to tank weapon and idol wearing FR ring and belt only... lol... turned out to be a bad night to scrimp on FR wearing... fortunatly we have really good players and I lived. Our guild has this never give up attitude and we hate wiping even with DC's and bugs we find a way :)

Kel - MT set because the adds hit hard. Antoher interesting fight last night the other OT died before they came out so I had to hold all 4. Healers did a great job keeping me up even though a ton had gone wrong and we lost a lot of DPS and went a minute over our last kill. I was getting clobbered and had to burn a lock cookie (a first in naxx), all my cd's when they were availabe, and even a armor potion for good measure.

If you take anything from all this the important thing is to swap gear depending on many factors.

A. How hard does the boss/mosters hit
B. Tanking 1, 2, or many mobs
C. Main Tanking? Off Tanking? DPSing most of the fight?
D. Magic Damage? Physical?
E. How many healers do you have? How good are they?
F. Agro issues? Do the monsters have an agro reset?
G. Can you afford a taunt miss?
H. Hurtfuls? Silences? Incoming steady damage or spike damage?

Do your best to get the gear you need to make different sets. It is a much better idea than balancing one peice of gear to fill many roles especially with Uldar around the corner and difficulty increasing. You are going to want to min/max what you can depending on your role in any given fight.

You don't want to gimp you Main Tanking set for example gemming for hit if you can just swap in a peice of gear with +50 hit when it calls for it. A fight where an agro reset and early miss could spell a wipe or a missed taunt can be an issue on a tank switching fight for example. This wasn't as easy in BC but in Wrath this isn't nearly as bad as a tradeoff.

Try to keep you Main Tanking set focused on Mitigation, Aviodance, and Survival because as a MT your first priority is staying alive. If this means DPS needs to give you an extra couple secs or watch the meters so be it. Hopefully Uldar is going to get away from the AoE fest that Naxx has been and people will start paying attention again to things like Omen and Agro dump abilities.

On the same note, you don't want to gimp your DPS gear gemming with Stamina because you want more threat in Bear.

Gear that you use in both sets you can balance with purple gems, however I would always enchant and thread for DPS unless you are always the MT.

Even if you are always the MT, no matter what, you still need to consider picking up at least some DPS leather for cases when higher threat is called for instead of survivability... that is just the life of a BearCat.

Viva La 1 night Naxx clear!

Last night Knight Watch ripped through Naxx Heroic in 3 hours 2 minutes. No wipes, quick looting, and AFK'ers were set on follow... amazingly 1 person lived through the dance set on follow... lol

We did this believe or not with 7 healers and 4 tanks. Well, 3 tanks and a Hybrid Bearcat as I like to call myself. Glyph of Rip, Glyph of Maul, Glyph of FR... so 1 of 3 for DPS and spec with both tanking and DPS abilities... can't wait for dual specs.

Anub - Kitty DPSed it, 4th on damage per WWS.
Grand Widow - Kitty again, 6th on meters. (couldn't tell if I was behind her half the time.)
Max - Kitty DPS, 4th on meters.

Patchwerk - Hurtful tank.
Grob - Kitty, first time ever not tanking adds... 9th on the meters. I would have to move a couple keybinds to improve here.
Gluth - Kitty, first time again DPSing... 6th on the meters
Thad - Kitty, had to move a lot... 5th on the meters... was not behind him enough.

Noth - Bear OT adds.
Mr Unclean - Kitty, 8th on the meter, I hate this fight.
Loath - Kitty, 8th, but I only got 1 spore.

Instructor - Kitty for the first time... 8th on the charts... frankly I was scared to go all out.
Goth - Tank Undead Side
4 Horse - Tank left side

Sapph - Kitty, FR gear, 6th on meter with only 75% DPS time... I am a good kitty and get out of ice storms :P
Kel - OT adds

Nothing better than clearing Naxx in 1 night, DPSing in the top 5 at times, always in the top 10, and tanking 5 of the encounters to boot. How people can complain about feral PvE is beyond me.

Get BadKitty and practice your rotations!

This tip might be too late for some...

In the game World of Warcraft you may have noticed that things constantly change. Whether it be what enchant is best on your weapon or even which weapon is best for your class and spec. Blizzard is constantly tweaking abilities and multipliers, heck even racial talents.

One tip I would like to provide that I have used myself since hitting level 70 is this...

Don't upgrade for the sake of upgrading.

Feel good about sitting on 400 Stone Keeper's Shard.
Feel good about sitting on 200 Emblem of Valor.
Feel good about sitting on that Nobles Deck. (Ok, I didn't do this but that is because I OT/MT enough to not worry about taking +90Agi over +90Str but there are those that picked the +90Str that might be kicking themselves in the head come 3.1)

My point is this...

• If your guild is not having issues clearing current content.
• If you can get through heroics either doing good DPS or holding up as a tank with decent healers.
• If you can handle the Epeen effects of being 7th on the DPS meters instead of 5th when off spec DPSing.

Then hold off on upgrading a peice of gear.

By now you might have noticed that with some patches in the game comes new gear. This could be new crafted gear, new PvP gear, new gems, new enchants, ETC. Item A may no longer be the best in slot for you when you couple the effects of new talents, gear, enchants, gems, and underlying combat math.

So do yourself a favor and hold off getting Epic if you are getting by fine without it.

Wait til you need the help and then get what is best to get you over that hump. This way you don't look back at spending X to get Y and wish you would have waited just a couple more weeks since Y sucks now and Z is the way to go.

Needless to say I am waiting for the harder content of Uldar and to see what my guild is going to need first (More DPS or More Tankage) before I start buying gear/gems/enchants that won't amount to a hill of beans difference in the current content.

BREAKING NEWS!

From MMO Champion...

Item - Druid T8 Feral 2P Bonus (Class: Druid) -- The periodic damage dealt by your Rake, Rip, and Lacerate abilities has a chance to cause you to enter a Clearcasting state.

This is HUGE!

To refresh your memory the old 2T4 Proc returned 20 energy. This will basically give you a free special on your next attack which as we all know is more than 20 energy.

Depending of course on the proc rate and internal CD this is potentially a bigger deal than the old 2T4 proc and I am sure everyone remembers what a huge deal this was. It was OP enough that Blizzard had to remove the 2T4 bonus @ 80 and scale back the proc rate after level 70 to make sure we stopped wearing 2T4 as we went into Wrath content.

I would assume with the proc happening from periodic damage it will happen a little less and that they are going to make sure through the proc rate that it is not as OP as the old 2T4 but as a feral druid this bonus has to get you excited about wearing T8 4 sure.

And look at the 4 piece bonus...

Item - Druid T8 Feral 4P Bonus (Class: Druid) -- Increases the duration of Savage Roar and Survival Instinct by 8 sec.

This is one happy Hybrid Feral Druid (Soon to be dual spec Tank/DPS feral druid). I mean I have been really happy with my Tanking and DPSing ability since going with a Hybrid build, check it out... top 5 on Thaddius last night (WTB Ret Pally Nerf :P or DK faceroll ability :P)

Tagged by the Think Tank for a screenshot...

Ok, so here it is. My 6th screen shot taken in Jan of 2008. Kalon from Think Tank pinged me for this so of course I quickly obliged.

This is me and my pet fish Frankie waiting outside SSC... and you thought roller skating Fel Reavers were cool... lol

To my surprise this little guy would evade all attempts to join me in SSC or let me take him back to Shat in a fishbowl for my orphan.

Unfortunately I was unable to find any screenshots prior to this date in a timely fashion but I might get some time to shift through some old hard drives and see what 6th shot nugget I might have from my original WOW install back in 2007.

Malygos down!

WooHoo!!!

Gratz goes out to all my guildmates, great work getting him down on our first real night of attempts.

I even got a little something for my trouble...

Favor of the Dragon Queen and 1000 Rep with Wyrmrest.

Just a couple notes for those of you that might be having trouble with phase 3...

1. The only thing I watch is the middle of the screen for incoming damage and the raid warning that Malygos is looking at me. I can also see my combo point yellow blocks from my IceHUD mod... at least I think that is where they are coming from, or it is the WOW default UI combo points indicator.

2. When I start seeing constant 10K damage ticks I know to move left (or which ever direction your guild has determined everyone will move) until they stop. While moving left even if not facing Malygos I can still fire off 1's and 2's

3. If Malygos looks at me I hit my shield if I have combo points, if not I hit 1 and then start mashing my shield so it comes up as soon as I have the energy for it.

P.S. Since I was having trouble targeting Malygos I started targeting him from the raid frames target of my party. I think it sucks that you can't just use the target nearest enemy from keybinds and have that work.

P.S.S. You might want to move the exit vehicle button from the middle of the screen and put it somewhere else. Hitting that by accident really sucked... lol

So now that we have cleared all WotLK content it sounds like we are going to start working on more than 1 drake up in the near future. Should be fun, hopefully the last 2 pieces of Valorous will finally fall so I can pick them up. Helm and Chest and I am essentially done gearing up for both tanking or DPS in Uldar which will be useful with the new dual spec ability going live in the next patch as well as the bear nerf basically regulating us to poor OT status with Pallies and DK's being better for AoE tanking and Warrior's the better single boss tank... lets hope they figure this out on the PTR and don't make us the last tanking choice in Uldar.

Feel free to read the discussions on the bear changes on Emmeralds site or EJ and draw your own conclusions but I can easily see where I will just be OTing 1-2 trash mobs and then speccing into full on kitty for the boss fights... not that I have a problem with that especially with the Kitty buffs headed our way.