What sort of specs (Armor, dodge, health) in bear form should I have to tank, or off-tank (hurtfulls), Gruul?

When I tanked Gruul my gear was identical to this threads recommendation Tank Gear (http://wow.thedruidsgrove.org/forums/showthread.php?t=11762)

That thread seems to show basic lvl 70 starter gear, unless I missed a specific post.

Right now (with full raid buffs ImpGotW and Kings, agi potion, agi scroll, agi food) I have ~29K armor, 19K health and 35% dodge (maybe 40%???). I could have more dodge/armor at the expense of some health as I have the T4 chest gem'd with +agi for kitty, I typically use my Clefhoof chest when tanking that has +sta gems.

I'm working an S2 helm to replace my purple hat and badge bracers. That should give me quite a bit more armor and health over what I have today. Might even have the Kara exalted tanking ring by then.

Hrm, sounds like you should be fine for Gruul so long as your DPS can down him before he grows too much. For hurtfuls you're totally fine. I tanked hurtfuls with like 28% dodge, 26k armor and about 19k health and that was without any problem at all.

Gruul is only a pain because of our lack of mitigation as he grows sort of starts to show. But you should really be okay so long as your group handles the cave ins and shatters well enough and DPSes him down before like grow 15.

Your stats are way more than what you should need, as long as you have competent DPS. If your DPS sucks, your stats won't matter.

I always say imagine how the first druid to successfully tank Gruul was geared, and that's the minimum. So maybe 2t4, HCh set, Earthwarden and fill in the rest with Kara drops max, and probably less? I tank Gruul effortlessly, and your stats are < 5% better than mine.

OK, there is a chance I might be tanking, or OT, gruul tonight. Do you, as a tank, run out prior to a Ground Slam? Do you make any attempt to avoid the cave ins? Besides avoiding others, do you, as a tank, do anything special for the shatters?

I do know we had our tanks rush in right after the shatters to grab/hold/position gruul ASAP. But I didn't pay attention to the other tanking details since I was on DPS.

The only other thing I do is reposition without disengaging Gruul to avoid the cave ins. DBM gives me ample warning to move out of the way.

Ok here we go.. the quick run down on what I do when I tanked him....

One position him towards the middle. If you are in a cave in... get out of it. Just rotate him. If you are OT and ranged starved sit in the Cave in for a sec or two to get some rage. You can use your trinkets, but they are best saved for late stages in the fight. You stay tanking him and immediately after he ground slams I smack charge. I like to be right back on him early as it helps with rage. Everyone else's job is to find an open space. We typically mark our tanks so nobody stands on top of one.

Best/scariest kill Growth 19 as the final tank left standing... um... yeah dodged for like a 90 seconds straight.

You stay tanking him and immediately after he ground slams I smack charge.Don't you worry about being too close to the other tank during the shatter? Or does just the MT charge back in and the OT waits out far until after the shatter to charge?

Yes, just have have the OT wait until after the shatter. And the melee dps too for that matter.

If you hit charge immediately you should have plenty of time for the tanks to adjust themselves before the shatter. At least that's how we've done it. You'll have about 3-4 seconds to spread out, but odds are with the way ground slam works, you'll be on opposite sides anyway.

For Gruul offtanking, make sure you are defense capped, and focus on lots of armour and stamina. Dodge is not nearly as important for this particular role as it is in other tanking situations.


-Annikk

I wasn't expecting it, but I did off-tank Gruul Friday night. While off-tanking we didn't have an issue, but the MT kept dieing (too early IMO) so I'd end up at MT. I had 21K health, 29-30K armor, and 35-37% dodge and still we wipped at ~25% (growth 12????) 3-4 times. We had several new folks on this run (including the MT) so I think the encounter's mechanics (run in, run out, avoid cave-ins, etc.) combined with sub-par healing did us in.

I could not attend, but on Sat night they did get Gruul down after 3-4 more wipes, but I could see they had better DPS and a couple of "better" healers. Same MT (he died around 15% each time) and our guild's true MT as the OT.

Maybe next time. I will say that having to jump in as the MT after the first MT died has to be the most intense gaming experience I've had to deal with. If we had killed Gruul that night, I'm sure it would have taken me a few hours to fall asleep.:grin:

Yeah... I had a hell of a time getting to sleep the night I survived a growth 19 Gruul.... never should have lived. I was the only tank left standing... I kept calling out DPS to run into melee range just so I wouldn't eat the hurtful strike... I dodged ever strike for 90 seconds straight... talk about an experience.... god.. sleeping was hard that night.

Congrats Felkan!

If Gruul is only at 25% on grow 12, the DPS in your raid is asleep.
DPS never gets yelled at for not doing a good enough job - but they should do, imo. Gruul is such an easy, easy fight for dps, they really have no excuse for not burning him down faster than that. :P


-Annikk

/agree with annikk

If he's still standing on growth 12 and beyond DPS is asleep. Honestly the dps requirements for this fight are not that hard... I think a growth 12 kill is only something like 520 DPS average. That should be easily sustainable for anyone who's gone through Kara.

Felkan, do you outgear the rest of your guild? Our stats are nearly identical and I've tanked bosses in SSC and TK without an issue.

Felkan, do you outgear the rest of your guild? Our stats are nearly identical and I've tanked bosses in SSC and TK without an issue.In our top "25", I'm probably in the top 5-10 players gear wise. None of us have gone past Gruul's. Though the top 5 are probably wearing max'd out badge items as they have been running kara for some time.

I have 3T4 (only wear 1-2 while tanking depending on need), S2 shoulders, 2 badge items and PvP wrists in my tanking kit. I'd probably have a better tanking kit, but I have spent (badges, honor, money, etc.) quite a bit upgrading my kitty set (~3200AP, 40% crit, 138 hit). On kara runs I am often 1-2 on DPS if I don't have a tanking assignment. And often top 3 on DPS for the entire run.

I'm in a very casual guild with ~140 accounts and 300+ toons. WRT PvE I say maybe 15-20 "players" actually know what they are doing. The rest just sort of fake it, some are better than others. Even our top Druid tank wears 1-2 items that I would not (trinkets, idols, rings, etc.). And his spec as a few unneed talents, but in BC ferals have 5-8 extra talent points that can be spent anywhere (or nowhere) and they would work out fine. Just wait 'till LK, when the spec will be far more important as currently we come up 5-8 points short.