Badge gearFollow

Yes, it's emblem gear now, but still....I know that when I dinged 70 I was supposed to save up 15 badges for the feral idol. What are the mandatory emblem purchases for ferals nowadays? (Complicated of course by the fact that we can now tank or dps, and my DK-heavy guild needs me as dps in raids.)

I just got my 40th emblem last night and it seemed that I should theoretically spend them on this http://wow.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?witem=40684;source=live since it's useful in bear and cat.

depending on your luck with drops shoot for the t7 pieces. from my experience vanquisher tokens drop a lot less then the others, while we have to compete with 4 classes instead of 3

So should a feral tank by that item? I'm completely new to tanking but it seems like that's better for kitty. I have 45 emblems right now and am unsure what my first purchase should be as a bear tank.

Is the tank one you're referring to the Valor Medal of the First War?

I might purchase that one, I don't want to spend badges on stuff I can replace from Naxx drops though, but it might be awhile before we care completely clearing Naxx.

Edited, Dec 15th 2008 3:03pm by Jedius

I'm wondering if that's worth purchasing if you already have Moroes Lucky Pocket Watch. Granted, the Valor stretches it out longer, but the overall effect seems to be the same. Is the plus 40ish increase in dodge from equipping the item worth 40 badges in people's minds?

Is there an article or info on min-maxing? I've never heard of that concept and would like to look up some info.

It is exactly as LockeColeMA says.

Crude example: you have a socket with a gem in it that gives +40 AP. There is a gem available that gives you +41 AP but costs you about 30,000 gold. In min-maxing it is an easy choice: you better get yourself that cash because there is an improvement to make. Because of the "mechanics" of min-maxing, dps-classes have the easiest time, because literally everything evolves around getting the highest total dps possible, how minimal the improvement might be. So there is EXACTLY 1 set of gear for each of the dps classes that gives the highest dps for that class. Just like there is EXACTLY one talent spec and rotation for those classes that provides the highest dps ->for each encounter<-, in the min-max situation that is. For tanks there are at least three factors, being damage mitigation/avoidance, rough health to absorb the remaining damage and high threat generation. Therefore it is a lot tougher to min-max a tank.

That being said, it is a perfect-world scenario, so things like oh-**** are not taken into consideration and might in practice have a lot more value than let's say +100 AP.

Generally speaking, min-maxing is a theory that you should not try to follow, unless you have the choice to do so. Which means fellow group or raid members that know EXACTLY what they are doing, lowering the human error factor (and thus oh-**** moments) towards zero. And that is something that maybe, very maybe guilds like Nihilum can say of themselves...

Now for the original remark by Jedius (40 badges for +40 dodge): eventually when there are no easy large upgrades for your badges, you WILL get that +40 dodge. At the moment it might not have priority though.

Does the above make any sense?

Don't forget that today after maintenance is done your itemization will be different.

I will spend time changing around gear now that my old armor rings aren't as sexy as some of the new ones I have with more Sta and other stats.

Same goes for my back and neck. The back amazed me that it lasted so long. But the armor was to much to swap it out. Which is a bummer as it the only piece I don't have a replacement for yet. :(

neck item.

Jedius, I have no idea what other necks are available, but looking at it it seems more like a warrior/paladin tanking neck. This is because +str translates to block value and for a bear it only translates into more threat created. On top of that, the defence for them translates not only in an increase in chance to be missed and an increase in chance to dodge (druid tanks) but also an increase in chance to parry and block. Defence is not by far as sexy for druid tanks as it is for warrior/paladin tanks.

Somewhere on the first page here there is a thread in which the most important tanking stats are shown. No time to look it up for you now, I am sorry for that, but you will not have a hard time finding it.

Edit: I edited this post just to tell you, Jedius, that I absolutely and utterly love your guild's name!!



Edited, Dec 17th 2008 12:30pm by Immunios

Jedius, for tanking I would go with Stamina until you get in the 40Kish range, Armor, although this usually comes naturally(big changes coming to our numbers here), then Agility & Dodge Rating, Expertise and Hit pretty much in that order.

Stam gives you that huge hp pool to take more hits since you can only dodge and use your high armor to mitigate damage

Armor mitigates the damage you take, that's why we have so much since we can't block or parry, even with our huge dodge numbers we get hit a little more often than warriors/pallies.

Agility will work in a lot of ways, the biggest being your dodge, but it also increases your crit chance for higher damage = more threat and adds a minimal amount of armor.

Dodge Rating only gives you an increase to your dodge, though point for point it is now better than agility at it.

Expertise helps you get parried and dodged less, important for a tank since you'll be standing right in front of the mobs.

Hit obviously gives you a greater chance to hit.

Having Crit and AP is cool too, for extra threat, but I wouldn't go out of my way for them.

Edit: Grammar/spelling ftl!

Edited, Dec 17th 2008 1:31pm by Galenmoon

Question for those saving up for the badge chest -- isn't this potentially pouring emblems down the drain? I havent had a token drop for me yet in Naxx but in theory this should be available there, yes?

Armor from rings, cloaks, necks, and trinkets isn't going to get the dire bear form multiplier anymore. Which makes armor on those items much less appealing. To balance this out, we get an additional 66% armor from our leather items from SotF (and cloth items, but that's splitting hairs, nobody tanks in cloth...). As I understand it, that is.