Feral tank disappointing?Follow

I made 2nd on meters tanking UK the other day, not really sure how...

But regardless, why does it matter? You're there to tank, i.e. soak damage and hold aggro, not top WWS charts. If everybody lives, you do fine.

I am a druid tank. I hit #2 on DPS meters at least once a day. Sometimes its bad DPS. Sometimes I am just kicking a**. I always win on threat and can spike around 5k TPS on some fights. I keep the healer and DPS alive. I am easy to heal and know how to LoS pull when the need arises. I can control a pack of mobs when the DPS is going buckwild on different mobs. I have 2 or 3 healers that will pester me to tank if we are on at the same time. My friends hate PuGing tanks and will wait for me to log to run stuff. I highly doubt it is just me that preforms at a high level while tanking. I mark some mobs, mainly the boss with a nipple mark. I like CC as killing penguins is fun, want a baby seal poly soooo bad.

Druid tanks are fine. At level 80 you will be fine. Hell I felt OP the whole way there. I got whacky and was tanking stuff I had no business tanking before I hit the cap. Druid tanks do have no real AoE threat tool but I manage with FFF, Demoralizing Roar, and Swipe. I use Bash a great deal also to help control unruly mobs.

What is your rotation and lets see an armory.

Druid tanks are indeed fine. I am one and have no problem whatsoever.

I love being able to provide my own CC as well, sometimes roots AND hibernate, it's just too good!

There is a HUGE anti-feral bias on my server. I am routinely told, after running with new people, "Wow!! You're the first bear I've ever had a good run with!" The problem originates with poor players, not a poor class. I'm guessing a lot of folks leveled to 80 as Feral cats, then found out the only way they could get into groups was tanking. So they tried it, and are bad at it. Many of them don't understand tabbing to Lacerate enemies (which majorly increases our Maul damage with Glyph of Maul). Others don't react well to feral charge enemies that break away. A lot don't know how to position an enemy so their attacks miss the other melee. Or they could just not know enemy abilities or boss fights.

All that said, the point is clear. NOTHING is wrong with feral right now. Just learn to tank well (it really isn't hard; I can do it!) and you'll be fine.

What are you guys using for your dps meters and such?

I recently saw this phenomenon when running an instance where me and another druid were DPSing as cats but when ever we pulled more than a couple mobs at once the other druid swapped into bear form and started to aoe spam all of them at once.

cat form never gets any AOE attacks its all single target?

Next patch cat gets a fan of knives-esque attack. 50 energy for what is basically a kitty swipe. I think it's normal damage x260%. From what I hear, it's a little lackluster.

I think he means that 5/5 Rend and Tear increases your maul damage on bleeding targets by a whopping 20%, and the Glyph of Maul allows Maul to hit two targets for the price of one.

Except don't Tab over, Mouseover :)

I think the OP is somehow using Recount to measure success of melee DPS in competition with the tank. IMO this is a mistake, and he even touches on the exact reason.

I don't watch Recount at all when I'm doing my tank thing, and I'm not sure how it actually crunches the numbers...but I suspect that you will find the SINGLE-TARGET DPS versus the tank is much better than the aggregate numbers suggest. Obviously, if I am swiping for 250 damage against 5 targets every second, and the cat is doing 2000 to one baddie in the same time frame, it skews the numbers. I'm not killing anything faster than the cat, but I do more total damage - the more targets I have, the more damage I do. Now line up the mage, hunter, and warlock (all doing similar ~2000 DPS) and I STILL top the meters, even though it would have taken me 4 times as long to kill the same target.

(to others who know better: Is this still the case with Recount, or am I nuts?)

Obviously, meters cannot be totally reliable anyway. The only objective measure is to line up the bear and the cat in front of a target dummy and go at it for a few minutes. In reality, circumstances for close-quarters DPS are rarely ideal. I DPS mostly as a (sucky) Rogue, and some fights are just pure frustration. Between chasing after kited bosses or tank repositioning, taking every AoE on the kisser, being constantly 31 yards from the healer, and slapped down by anything with a tail (Keristraza, I hate you), sometimes I'm lucky if I get enough combo points for one finisher.

IMO the only DPS that matters is the DPS against the target you are attacking - in practice, there are just too many variables. The meter is to be used as a tool for improvement, not a scoreboard.

Strategy is still strategy, and a pull is still a pull. The only difference is they don't ALWAYS involve raid markings anymore. Does anyone really miss marking those targets? I sure don't. I love the fact that "kill heals first" is now sufficient. The reason no one uses them anymore is they aren't needed so much - Tanks generate craploads of threat now, and with AoE tanking in the mainstream a strict kill order isn't needed to keep mobs out of the backfield. I still mark targets, but now they are Pats and just a skull on the primary. If the healer needs to dial damage down a tick, I'll mark CC no problem. Otherwise, bring it! :)

If you are new to the Feral thing, it just requires some time to develop the instincts for it. You can be OP too, just give it a while :) Often on my Rogue, I find myself charging the boss when the Tank goes down, wanting to shift, taunt, finish the fight and save the wipe. For most classes, having the boss's undivided attention is alien territory, but to me, it's home.

Nice link. I am glad I am not the only one who feels fine about where my spec is at.

Last night I OT'd Naxx10 it was sponsored by some other guild that PuG'd the last few slots. I think some of the other PuGers where half wondering why I wasn't MT due to roughly a 10k HP difference over the pally tank. I think he was MT mainly due to him being the guild's tank and having more knowledge of the fights.

So, ya tell people to drop the anti-feral tank bias. It is lame.