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Dreamgrove

Guardian Druid Compendium

Written by Kitch, Xora

Patch: 11.0.0
Updated: 6th of October, 2024
Changelog

News

Season 1 News

2-Piece!

Thrash and Moonfire increase your damage done and reduce damage you take by 1% for 8 seconds, stacking 3 times.

A pretty boring and minor effect but one that is almost always active. Around a 2% damage increase since there will be some occasions where it drops just due to it being such a minor factor and other spells being so high in the Guardian priority list.

4-Piece!

Arcane damage you deal is increased by 5% and bleed damage you deal is increased by 8%.

Another pretty minor factor but this one is permanently active just for having the 4p set equipped with no maintenance neccesary. Numbers wise this roughly equates to another 2-2.5% damage increase depending on your chosen hero tree.

Rotation

Druid of the Claw

Reminder: The rotations below are purely about damage dealing. For further information on potential nuance for the rotations with regards to survivability please read the follow-up sections (primarily Ironfur and Defensives)

What is a priority list?

When reading the rotations below, you should not think about them as steps to follow in a specific order. At any given point in combat, you should cast the highest priority thing on the list that you are able to cast, providing any stated conditions are met.

Pre-combat

  • Make sure the duration of your Flask, Food and Rune buffs will last for the entire encounter
  • Enter Bear Form iconBear Forma few seconds before you pull
  • Press Heart of the Wild iconHeart of the Wilda second before you start combat

Single Target Rotation

  • Press Ravage iconRavage
  • Press Thrash iconThrashif not at max stacks of the debuff or if it is about to expire
  • Press Moonfire iconMoonfireif the dot completely falls off
  • Press Heart of the Wild iconHeart of the Wildif you have 6 Feline Potential stacks
  • If at 6 stacks of Feline Potential then:
  • Press Heart of the Wild iconHeart of the Wild
  • Press Lunar Beam iconLunar Beamif available, hold to sync with Incarn/Berserk if it will be available in the next 10 seconds
  • Press Rage of the Sleeper iconRage of the Sleeperif available, hold to sync with Incarn/Berserk if it will be available in the next 10 seconds
  • Press Incarnation: Guardian of Ursoc iconIncarnation: Guardian of Ursocif available (see the dedicated Berserk/Incarn rotation section below)
  • Press Berserk iconBerserkif available (See the dedicated Berserk/Incarn rotation section below)
  • Press Mangle iconMangleif at < 6 stacks of Feline Potential
  • Press Maul iconMaulif at 2 stacks of Tooth and Claw iconTooth and Claw
  • Press Maul iconMaulif at 3 stacks of Vicious Cycle iconVicious Cycle
  • Press Ironfur iconIronfurif above 40 rage
  • Press Mangle iconMangle
  • Press Thrash iconThrash
  • If the following conditions are met then use a Cat Form iconCat Formfinisher after entering cat form via the priorities below and before leaving Cat Form iconCat Formvia Mangle iconMangle
    1. If the Feline Potential Rip iconRiphas fallen off the target AND you have 3 or fewer combo points, press Rip iconRip. Never overwrite a Feline Potential empowered Rip iconRip
    2. If the Feline Potential Rip iconRiphas not fallen off the target OR you have 4 or more combo points press Ferocious Bite iconFerocious Bite. Make sure to press it at >50 energy
  • Press Rake iconRakeif it not currently active on the target (or in pandemic range) and you are below 40 rage
  • Press Shred iconShredif:
    • You are below 40 rage and Rake iconRakeis already active on the target
    • You are already in cat form and are just waiting for Mangle iconMangleto come back off CD
  • Press Swipe iconSwipe

Cleave Rotation (2-3 Targets)

AOE Rotation

  • Press Ravage iconRavage(on your priority target if there is one)
  • Press Thrash iconThrashif not at max stacks of the debuff or if it is about to expire
  • Press Heart of the Wild iconHeart of the Wildif available. Ideally press this as you are running into a pull to save yourself the global during combat.
  • Press Lunar Beam iconLunar Beamif available, hold to sync with Incarn/Berserk if it will be available in the next 10 seconds
  • Press Rage of the Sleeper iconRage of the Sleeperif available, hold to sync with Incarn/Berserk if it will be available in the next 10 seconds
  • Press Incarnation: Guardian of Ursoc iconIncarnation: Guardian of Ursocif available (see the dedicated Berserk/Incarn rotation section below)
  • Press Berserk iconBerserkif available (see the dedicated Berserk/Incarn rotation section below)
  • Press Convoke the Spirits iconConvoke the Spiritsif the following conditions are met:
    • You are not in Berserk
    • You have < 40 rage
  • Press Raze iconRazeif at 2 stacks of Tooth and Claw iconTooth and Claw
  • Press Raze iconRazeif at 3 stacks of Vicious Cycle iconVicious Cycle
  • Press Ironfur iconIronfurif above 40 rage
  • Press Mangle iconMangle
  • Press Thrash iconThrash
  • Press Swipe iconSwipe

Incarn/Berserk Rotation

During Incarnation: Guardian of Ursoc iconIncarnation: Guardian of Ursoc/Berserk iconBerserk we follow a slightly different priority system which is described below.

Elune's Chosen

What is a priority list?

When reading the rotations below, you should not think about them as steps to follow in a specific order. At any given point in combat, you should cast the highest priority thing on the list that you are able to cast, providing any stated conditions are met.

Pre-combat

  • Make sure the duration of your Flask, Food, Oil/Stone and Rune buffs will last for the entire encounter
  • Enter Bear Form iconBear Forma few seconds before you pull
  • Press Heart of the Wild iconHeart of the Wilda second before you start combat

Single Target Rotation

Cleave Rotation (2-3 Targets)

AOE Rotation

Incarn/Berserk Rotation

During Incarnation: Guardian of Ursoc iconIncarnation: Guardian of Ursoc/Berserk iconBerserk we follow a slightly different priority system which is described below.

Ironfur

Ironfur iconIronfuris your active mitigation as a Guardian Druid. Ironfur iconIronfurcosts 40 rage, and each application of Ironfur iconIronfurincreases your armour by 112% of your agility.

You hit the armour cap at 85% physical mitigation, so roughly 5-6 stacks (4-5 with an augmentation evoker) will reach the armour cap.

How To Use Ironfur

The general aim with Ironfur iconIronfuris to:

  • Maintain at least one Ironfur iconIronfurwhilst tanking.
  • Use more Ironfur iconIronfurs if you're ever in a scenario where you're taking heavy physical damage and have limited/no defensive cooldowns available (a large pull in a key, taking a tank buster etc).
  • Use additional Ironfur iconIronfurs if you're ever going to overcap on Rage. This is for some (very minimal) ToI damage, and to dip into Incarn cooldown reduction if you're specced into it.

Defensive Usage

In addition to Ironfur iconIronfur, which is our active mitigation (meaning it should basically be active all of the time that we are tanking mobs and taking physical damage) Guardian has a plethora of limited window Cooldowns which also significantly aid our survivability. The main way that defensive cooldowns function is by increasing our Effective Health Pool (EHP). EHP is a measure of how much damage we can take whilst also factoring any damage reduction or resistances we have, E.g. if someone has 1 million health, but takes 50% reduced damage then they can actually take 2 million damage before dying. That would make their EHP 2 million, which is obviously a big increase from their Raw Health Pool (1 million in this scenario).

Cooldowns for Guardian work in two primary ways but both fulfil the criteria of increasing our EHP. They will either reduce the damage that we take for their duration in some way and/or massively increase our hp for the duration, often doing this with some additional benefits. Our main Defensive cooldowns are:

These defensive's should primarily be used in a way that enables us to survive through an encounter but as mentioned, several do come with additional benefits. For example, Rage of the Sleeper iconRage of the Sleeperwill reduce our damage taken by 20% and also grant 20% leech for its 8 second duration, both of which aiding our survivability. However, it will also increase our damage done by 15% and reflect damage back at our attackers.

Because of this Offensive and Defensive duality that many of our cooldowns possess we need to factor in both sides of them when planning for an encounter. The general goals for any encounter should be:

  • Cover all major/threatening damage events (typically tank busters) with an adequate cooldown.
    • It is usually not advised to use multiple defensive cooldowns to cover a single damage event due to how they interact with each other (see below).
  • Aim to cover as many individual damage events as possible by having some form of cooldown active and "rolling" into the next one as the first expires.
  • Prioritise getting as many uses of your multi-purpose cooldowns as possible.
    • E.g. if you have a choice between using Rage of the Sleeper iconRage of the Sleeperand Barkskin iconBarkskinto cover a tank buster, it would be ideal to use Rage of the Sleeper since it also provides a sizable damage benefit and may lead to additional uses of this cooldown later in the encounter.

Overlapping cooldowns with a direct damage reduction component (Barkskin iconBarkskin, Rage of the Sleeper iconRage of the Sleeper, Survival Instincts iconSurvival Instinctsand Pulverize iconPulverize) is less ideal than spacing them out because multiple instances of damage reduction reduce the effectiveness of the cooldowns i.e. they are multiplicative with one and other, not additive. For example, say that without a cooldown a tankbuster would hit you for 1 million damage. With Barkskin iconBarkskin(20% Damage Reduction) you would take 80% of this, so 800k. If you then pressed Survival Instincts iconSurvival Instincts(50% damage reduction) on top of this, you would reduce your incoming damage (800k after factoring in Barkskin iconBarkskin) by 50%. So you would take 400k damage, from a 1 million damage hit, meaning that combined you would mitigate 60% of damage - not 70% (20% + 50%), effectively reducing the effectiveness of the cooldowns compared to their seperate use.

Talents

General Talent Build Information

Before choosing your talent setup there's a couple of important details to be aware of:

  • Whilst both hero talent trees perform similarly damage wise in AoE scenarios, there is a huge disparity between the damage of the two trees in Raid/Single Target situations, with Druid of the Claw being ahead by around 10-25% depending on talents.
  • Both trees offer similarly strong defensive benefits with the option to easily swap into additional survviability or damage talents if they're needed/wanted.

It's also important to clarify what we mean by the terms "Maul-Centric" and "ToI-Centric" (Thorns of Iron iconThorns of Iron) playstyles:

  • Maul-Centric is simply where Maul iconMaulis considered you're primary spender. The goal is to spend as much rage as possible on Maul iconMaulwhich will account for the majority of your damage from spenders. These builds will likely still take Thorns of Iron iconThorns of Ironbut this is simply because some rage will still be spent on Ironfur iconIronfur(e.g. If you need additional physical mitigation for a physical tank buster or if you are about to overcap rage)
  • A ToI-Centric playstyle is in opposition to this, where Ironfur iconIronfurwill make up the vast majority of your rage expenditure. Maul iconMaulwill still be pressed sometimes, such as to utilise Tooth and Claw iconTooth and Clawprocs (either offensively or defensively) or when at 3 stacks of Vicious Cycle iconVicious Cycle, but the focus is usually not on Maul iconMaulas the primary spender - see the DotC section below for clarity on why its "usually" and not "always".

To further clarify, because there is a lot of overlap in the talent choices between these builds you are not hard locked into one particular playstyle for an entire encounter or key. For example, you could play more toi-centric whilst doing a large trash pull in a dungeon but then play more maul-centric on a boss encounter. Ultimately a fluid approach is often best - especially for keys, where there are vast differences in the requirements of an encounter from pull to pull.

Raid Talents

Below you will find the most optimal builds for DAMAGE in a raid setting, with additional notes mentioning what to change for a more mixed/defensive style build.

Druid of the Claw Raid Talents

ToI-Centric with Full Catweaving

Despite being a "ToI-Centric" build, the primary focus of this build is Ravage iconRavage. For a detailed overview of the rotation refer to the Rotation section above but in general the goal of this build is to spend as many Maul iconMaulmodifiers (Tooth and Claw iconTooth and Claw, Vicious Cycle iconVicious Cycle) on Ravage iconRavageas possible. As a consequence of this we actively press Maul iconMaulless because they would consume the buffs that we ideally use to get massive Ravage iconRavagecasts. Because we can only press Ravage iconRavagewhen it procs and we press Maul iconMaulinfrequently to save the modifiers our last remaining option is to spend rage on Ironfur iconIronfurfor damage - hence this being a (technically) "ToI" build.

Druid of the Claw Notes

  • For more sustain across an encounter you can opt to pick up Ursoc's Fury iconUrsoc's Furyinstead of the point in Flashing Claws iconFlashing Claws.
  • You could also similarly improve self-sustain by opting into Innate Resolve iconInnate Resolve- likely moving Gory Fur iconGory Furto do so.
  • If you're lacking DR cooldown coverage then you have three main options:
  • For a large increase to group survivability you could drop Layered Mane iconLayered Maneand Reinforced Fur iconReinforced Furin favour of Survival of the Fittest iconSurvival of the Fittestand After the Wildfire iconAfter the Wildfire. This would be a fairly singificant loss to Thorns of Iron iconThorns of Irondamage specifically but would be a large increase to self healing as well as the healing cleave onto any stacked raid group.
  • If an encounter requires Improved Stampeding Roar iconImproved Stampeding Roaror Mighty Bash iconMighty Bash/Incapacitating Roar iconIncapacitating Roar then both Well-Honed Instincts iconWell-Honed Instinctsand Innervate iconInnervateare both fairly inconsequential and easy to move around.
  • You could also use these point for nodes outside of the bottom third if required, such as Typhoon iconTyphoonor Thick Hide iconThick Hide
  • Because of the introduction of Wildshape Mastery iconWildshape Mastery, Tiger Dash iconTiger Dashactually becomes a very potent burst movement speed cooldown that is usable in almost any situation without fear of getting one shot. Very useful if you need cover a distance quickly and are unable to Wild Charge iconWild Chargeto a target.
  • The suggested build was made with the idea of Rip/Catweaving. If you are not planning on doing this aspect of the rotation then you have no need for: Rake iconRake, Rip iconRip, Ursine Vigor iconUrsine Vigor(Swap to Matted Fur iconMatted Furto allow pathing) nor Fluid Form iconFluid Form(Swap to Improved Stampeding Roar iconImproved Stampeding Roarto allow pathing).
  • On some encounters with predictable increased damage phases there is an argument to be made for taking Convoke the Spirits iconConvoke the Spiritsover Incarnation: Guardian of Ursoc iconIncarnation: Guardian of Ursocif damage is your primary concern. This is because if you have the fully stacked Feline Potential buff (the one that causes your next cat finisher to hit for 225%), convoke will not consume the buff. This means that all of your Bites during convoke will gain the increased damage from Wildpower Surge iconWildpower Surgeand you can then consume the buff with Rip iconRipafterwards. Ordinarily, this is a damage loss compared to Incarn but during fights with short damage increased phases (Sludgefist, Smolderon, Silken Court) there is a potential for Convoke to win if the damage multiplier is large enough and it aligns well with Convokes cooldown.

Elune's Chosen Raid Talents

Maul-Centric EC

Important to note that Elune's chosen (at least the builds presented here) is noticably easier to play. There is no form of catweaving to worry about and generally less attention will be focused on tracking buffs like Vicious Cycle iconVicious Cycle/Tooth and Claw iconTooth and Claw. Worth baring in mind if you're looking for a simpler rotation and playstyle, albeit at the cost of a significant amount of damage.

If you do not enjoy Maul-Centric builds and would prefer a lower damage (around 5% lower) ToI-centric alternative for Elune's Chosen then you can use the same talents and potential adjustments as seen below but your rotational priority would shift.

Elune's Chosen Notes

Boss Specific Build changes

This section will be updated upon Raid Release

Below is a short summary of noteworthy talents to swap and take on each individual boss in Nerub-Ar Palace. These are not mandatory but may be beneficial to you as a guardian or to your raid group.

Ulgrax

Bloodbound Horror

Sikran

Rasha'nan

Broodtwister Ovi'nax

Nexus-Princess Ky'veza

Silken Corruption

Queen Ansurek

Mythic+ Talents

Druid of the Claw Builds

Below are some potential ideas for builds you could run using Druid of the Claw. There is a decent amount of variation due to a selection of talents you could swap in and out to suit different scenarios, see the customisation section underneath for more information on the benefits and costs of swapping out some of Guardian's talents.

High Damage
Balanced Build
Heavy CD Cycling

Customisation

This image gives a rough idea of the relative power of a talent node based on its assigned colour, I strongly encourage you to take this information below and use it to either adjust the trees above to you/your groups needs and wants or to come up with your own from scratch. The key for what each colour represents is:

  • Yellow - These are your staples. Every DotC mythic+ build should aim to have every single one of these talents.
  • Green - Niche options but when played in the right scenario can be very powerful.
  • Purple - In a vacuum, pretty powerful talents that should be taken in most builds.
  • Blue - Generally a bit meh, either because of their relative power or their cost or position. However, these nodes are needed to either flesh out a sections point total or for pathing to stronger nodes further down the tree.
  • Grey - Not worth considering currently.
GuardianDotCM+

In the class tree there's a few talents to move around that offer some customisation. Here are some of the main ones to consider:

  • Rake iconRake, Rip iconRip, Ursine Vigor iconUrsine Vigorand Fluid Form iconFluid Formare all reliant on catweaving so without Wildpower Surge iconWildpower Surgethey are effectively useless. Worth noting that typically you'll only want one of Matted Fur iconMatted Furor Ursine Vigor iconUrsine Vigorfor pathing, so simply make this choice based on whether you're planning to weave or not
  • Hibernate iconHibernateis situational because not only do you need a beast mob present in dungeons, it's also a fairly awkward ability to use - even though you don't drop form it does still have a cast time - so it is likely best to find an alterantive method for cc in the group if possible.
  • As for Innervate iconInnervate, most of the time in m+ this won't be needed given the healers ability to constantly top up their mana - they may be times where a healer requests it for a particularly rough tyrannical boss and we don't typically lose too much given Heart of the Wild iconHeart of the Wildnor Well-Honed Instincts iconWell-Honed Instinctsare not particularly significant.
  • Rejuvenation iconRejuvenationand Remove Corruption iconRemove Corruptionwould be niche picks if they werent our best method to access the entire right side of the tree so realistically will be taken all the time despite being entirely useless in some dungeons.
  • It's a similar story with regards to Ursol's vortex and Soothe iconSootheto access the likes of Stampeding Roar iconStampeding Roarand Lycara's, but at least Ursol's Vortex iconUrsol's Vortexis always a useful spell to have even if soothe isn't
  • Tiger Dash iconTiger Dashhas some potential as a personal burst movement cooldown. Particularly useful if you need to kite and are already being slowed since it will automatically shift you into Cat Form iconCat Form(removing the slow/root) and give you the massive movement speed buff to create distance immediately without putting you in danger due to the bonuses from Wildshape Mastery iconWildshape Mastery

The only real choice in the Druid of the Claw hero tree is whether to take Wildpower Surge iconWildpower Surgeor Empowered Shapeshifting iconEmpowered Shapeshifting. In short, if you intend to weave on bosses for a significant gain to ST damage, take Wildpower Surge iconWildpower Surgeand the talents mentioned above in the class tree, if not then take Empowered Shapeshifting iconEmpowered Shapeshifting

The Spec tree easily has the most factors to consider, especially at the changeover from Dragonflight to The War Within:

  • After the Wildfire iconAfter the Wildfirewill still do a very good amount of group healing, however, its not the automatic group Lay-on-Hands that it was in Dragonflight, due to the significantly inflated health pools with no compensation buff to the healing and also a nerf to the rage to trigger. It will still contribute a lot of healing on a high throughput, rot encounter but the factors mentioned previously mean its not an automatic lock in anymore.
  • Dream of Cenarius iconDream of Cenariuswas affected similarly by the stamina inflation, you can still save a life but it may not be enough healing alone to immediately put a DPS out of danger entirely.
  • Improved Survival Instincts iconImproved Survival Instinctswill still provide the added flexibility to some boss encounter by allowing you keep one charge rolling and pooling the second to allow for better cooldown coverage, but unless the encounter is planned out and this is the only way to safely cover all tank hits (unlikely given barks power and low cooldown, Rage of the Sleeper iconRage of the Sleeperor the option to take Pulverize iconPulverize) it's usually not worth the point.
  • Pulverize iconPulverizeis incredibly niche, but that niche is usually what people take improved SI to try and handle - there is no singular node in our class tree that provides more ST mitigation than Pulverize iconPulverize. For particularly hard hitting Tyrannical bosses/Scary, singular Fortified threats it is absolutely incredible, but thats about it.
  • Ursoc's fury took a hit with the stamina changes and another significant hit by nerfs reducing its shield conversion from ~50% to 25%. It will still provide a very solid amount of absorbs (which speaks to its stupidly high power level in Dragonflight), not in small part due to the ridiculous power of Ravage iconRavagebut it's not the throughput machine that it was last expansion.
  • Galactic Guardian iconGalactic Guardianand Twin Moons iconTwin Moonsare still incredible talents even in the largely physical focused DotC tree, just like in Dragonflight they will provide a good 15-20% of your rage generation in AoE without you even pressing Moonfire iconMoonfireat all.
  • On the topic of Rage generation, Blood Frenzy iconBlood Frenzystill conitrbutes around 30+% of your total rage gen across a dungeon, this talent is absurdly powerful and you should never be without it in mythic+.
  • There is definitely a case to be made for taking one point away from the bottom third of the tree to get 2/2 Sotf - potentially having a 34 second Barkskin iconBarkskinwith 40% DR (Reinforced Fur iconReinforced Fur + Oakskin iconOakskin) for 12 seconds is a frankly ridiculous combination of defensive talents.
  • Earthwarden iconEarthwardenas a talent is good against slow but hard hitting mobs. What mobs will hit you and eat the earthwarden stacks is generally out of your control unless you pull with that in mind or take it for a specific Boss/Lieutenant.
  • Also worth noting that we will likely be sitting at the armour cap of 85% phsyical reduction a lot in aoe and even ST pulls, the combination of Killing Strikes' agility gain (which increases Ironfur iconIronfurarmour), Killing Strikes' 20% more armour from Ironfur iconIronfur, Layered Mane iconLayered Maneprocs and Reinforced Fur iconReinforced Furwill likely make maintaining the 85% armour cap fairly trivial with good rage generation.
  • Berserk: Ravage iconBerserk: Ravageis an unusual point to consider dropping but because of Claw Rampage iconClaw Rampage's chance scaling per target hit (i.e. 57% per mangle cleave cast and each Thrash cast scaling to a higher chance at 4+ targets) it is very unlikely that we'll ever be in the situation to press it anyway. And even if we are Swipe iconSwipewould grant the same Ravage proc chance as thrash due to being included in the Claw Rampage iconClaw Rampageeffect. Food for thought.

Elune's Chosen Builds

Below are some potential ideas for builds you could run using Elune's Chosen. There is a little variation of talents you could swap in and out to suit different scenarios - albeit, typically less than Druid of the Claw. See the customisation section underneath for more information on the benefits and costs of swapping out some of Guardian's talents.

Balanced Build
High Self+Group Sustain
Thorns of Iron build

Customisation

This image gives a rough idea of the relative power of a talent node based on its assigned colour, I strongly encourage you to take this information below and use it to either adjust the trees above to you/your groups needs and wants or to come up with your own from scratch. The key for what each colour represents is:

  • Yellow - These are your staples. Every EC mythic+ build should aim to have every single one of these talents.
  • Green - Niche options but when played in the right scenario can be very powerful.
  • Purple - In a vacuum, pretty powerful talents that should be taken in most builds.
  • Blue - Generally a bit meh, either because of their relative power or their cost or position. However, these nodes are needed to either flesh out a sections point total or for pathing to stronger nodes further down the tree.
  • Grey - Not worth considering currently.
GuardianECM+

The Druid class tree offers a little more in the way of customisation for EC compared to EC, largely due to the points saved from not having weaving being a part of the rotation. Below are some of the notable options to consider:

  • Since several points are saved in comparison to DotC (due to the lack of catweaving in EC) we do have a couple more points to play with in the top/middle section of the class tree.
  • As a standard picking two from Primal Fury iconPrimal Fury, Verdant Heart iconVerdant Heartand Naturalk Recovery are likely the best options to consider.
  • You could also make a case for spending those two points in Rake iconRakeand Feline Swiftness iconFeline Swiftness, but this would purely be for the movement speed whilst running EC.
  • The two extra points to play with also do allow an easier time taking some utility that would other leave us very right on points, Typhoon iconTyphoonis a potentially useful stop/displacement that was difficult to justify as DotC but is much easier to grab here.
  • Rejuvenation iconRejuvenationand Remove Corruption iconRemove Corruptionwould be niche picks if they werent our best method to access the entire right side of the tree so realistically will be taken all the time despite being entirely useless in some dungeons.
  • It's a similar story with regards to Ursol's vortex and Soothe iconSootheto access the likes of Stampeding Roar iconStampeding Roarand Lycara's, but at least Ursol's Vortex iconUrsol's Vortexis always a useful spell to have even if soothe isn't
  • Hibernate iconHibernateis situational because not only do you need a beast mob present in dungeons, it's also a fairly awkward ability to use as a tank - even though you don't drop form it does still have a cast time. So it is likely best to find an alterantive method for cc in the group if possible.
  • As for Innervate iconInnervate, most of the time in m+ this won't be needed given the healers ability to constantly top up their mana - they may be times where a healer requests it for a particularly rough tyrannical boss and we don't typically lose too much given Heart of the Wild iconHeart of the Wildnor Well-Honed Instincts iconWell-Honed Instinctsare not particularly significant.

In the Hero Tree there is really no choice at all for keys.

  • Due to the Bear aura not affected non guardian spells and frankly very low tuning of Lunar Beam iconLunar Beam, Stellar Command offers no perceivable benefit whilst Lunar Calling does increase thrash damage by all of our arcane modifiers and also increases kit synergy with Lunation.
  • The Light of Elune offers a decent chunk of rage at fairly regular intervals and Astral Insight is unfortunately tuned too low to make a massive impact.
  • Moondust is effectively a permanent slow on any cc'able mob in the dungeon due to our automatic moonfire spreading which is significantly more impactful than a 3s shorter cooldown on wild charge.
  • Lastly, Lunation drastically increases our uptime on the focal point ability of the hero tree (Lunar Beam iconLunar Beam) whilst Arcane Affinity offers an almost inperceivable buff to our Arcane damage.

The Spec tree is where the majority of our customisation options come in:

  • Given the nature of the Elune's Chosen hero tree we are naturally pushed towards taking more of the arcane focused talents, in particular Lunar Beam iconLunar Beamfor which the shortest and most powerful path to access is directly through Galactic Guardian iconGalactic Guardianand Twin Moons iconTwin Moons.
  • After the Wildfire iconAfter the Wildfirewill still do a very good amount of group healing, however, its not the automatic group Lay-on-Hands that it was due to the significantly inflated health pools. It will still contribute a lot of healing on a high throughput, rot encounter but the rage trigger nerf combined with this means its not an automatic lock in anymore.
  • Dream of Cenarius iconDream of Cenariuswas affected similarly by the stamina inflation, you can still save a life but it may not be enough healing alone to immediately put a DPS out of danger entirely.
  • Improved Survival Instincts iconImproved Survival Instinctswill still provide the added flexibility to some boss encounter by allowing you keep one charge rolling and pooling the second to allow for better cooldown coverage, but unless the encounter is planned out and this is the only way to safely cover all tank hits (unlikely given barks power and low cooldown, Rage of the Sleeper iconRage of the Sleeperor the option to take Pulverize iconPulverize) it's usually not worth the point.
  • The previously mentioned focus on Arcane tends to push Elune's Favoured ahead of Ursoc's Fury iconUrsoc's Furyas a trickle sustain option. Whilst UF is still a decent consideration given the increased damage on Thrash thanks to Lunar Calling and amount of razing possible through rage generation, the raw damage of Moonfire, arcane Thrash and Lunar Beam iconLunar Beam(on mass AOE) tends to push the healing of Elunes favoured noticably ahead.
  • Earthwarden iconEarthwardenas a talent is good against slow but hard hitting mobs. What mobs will hit you and eat the earthwarden stacks is generally out of your control unless you pull with that in mind or take it for a specific Boss/Lieutenant.
  • Because of the massively increased health pool due to the high uptime of Lunar Beam iconLunar Beam, talents that increase the frequency with which we can cast Frenzied Regeneration do gain a bit of value since their healing directly scales with health.
  • Because of the rage generation and lack of need to save Vicious Cycle iconVicious Cycle/Tooth and Claw iconTooth and Claw for a specific ability (ravage), dropping Berserk: Ravage iconBerserk: Ravageis an even more likely option as EC since so many more of your globals during Incarn/Berserk will be pressing Raze you will stil never need to swipe unless you're overpressing Ironfur iconIronfur.
  • Incarn is still an incredibly powerful defensive cooldown, but given the abundance of low cooldown defensives available to EC it may be an option to consider dropping the two incarn points in favour of other talents in the final third - such as RotS, UF, or Flashing Claws iconFlashing Claws.
  • Moonless night is a powerful offensive tool but offers next to no defensive value, its worth mentioning as an option for your weekly keys but do not expect to see it much in higher difficulty key levels.
  • Even with the slightly higher rage generation from EC's hero tree, Blood Frenzy iconBlood Frenzycontributes 30-40% of your rage generation throughout a dungeon. This point continues to be far too good to drop.
  • Berserk: Aggression is an option to consider dropping if you choose to focus entirely on the Thorns of Iron iconThorns of Ironplaystyle. However, be aware that this is your best path towards Rend and Tear and still an additional 15% haste during your biggest damage window, so even in ToI-centric builds it is a very strong node.

Consumables

Flasks

Food

Potions

  • Tempered Potion iconTempered Potion Strongest combat potion available. Important to note that whilst using Flask of Alchemical Chaos iconFlask of Alchemical Chaos it will provide all 4 secondary stats.
  • Algari Healing Potion iconAlgari Healing Potion The standard healing potion for the first tier of TeWaWi. You should always have some of these on you if you're planning to do any challenging content.
  • Draught of Silent Footfalls iconDraught of Silent Footfalls The invisibility potion for TeWaWi, fairly niche given our access to Prowl iconProwlbut, on occasion, invisiability does enable pathing that stealth does not.

Oils/Stones

  • Ironclaw Whetstone iconIronclaw Whetstone/Ironclaw Weightstone iconIronclaw Weightstone Both of these are functionally identical except they can only be applied to one type of weapon. The whetstone variant can be applied to Polearms and the weightstone can be applied to Staffs and 2h Maces.

Runes

Gearing

Stat Priority

Offensive

Sim yourself using Radibots Top Gear to decide on what to use out of items you have. Use Droptimizer to identify potential damage upgrades you can get from content. Do not follow a set stat priority for damage

Defensive

Initial Disclaimer: The defensive difference between secondary stats on the whole is incredibly minor. In terms of a rough value, generally less than a % gain in survivability by focusing on one secondary stat over another. The defensive gain from equipping a higher item level piece of equipment will (with the exception of trinkets/cantrip effects) always be better for survivability than choosing a lower item level piece with specific secondary stats.

Agility >>>> Mastery > Vers > Haste/Crit

Tertiary Stats

Tertiary stats are - as the name implies - a tertiary consideration. They are not a significant enough factor to Tank survivability to influence your gearing on their own outside of very specific circumstance.

Embellishments

  • Adrenal Surge Clasp iconAdrenal Surge Clasp and Writhing Armour Banding iconWrithing Armour Banding - This is the ideal end game setup for us this tier. Patch would ideally go on wrists but if not boots are fine as the next best option.

  • For more immediate gains or if you're not raiding (and thus have a lower chance to obtain a Myth track weapon quickly) you could consider crafting a Charged Halberd iconCharged Halberd with Darkmoon Sigil: Ascension iconDarkmoon Sigil: Ascension applied. Follow this up with a Writhing Armour Banding iconWrithing Armour Banding applied to wrists (or boots if not) and you're in a very strong position and ready to transition to Adrenal Surge Clasp when you receive your fourth spark and/or a Myth track weapon.

Enchantments

Gems

In TeWaWi, we have seen some changes to how Gems work compared to Dragonflight:

  • You can now only add two gems to your neck, instead of three.
  • You can now add two gems to each of your rings rather than just one.

Blasphemite Gems

Effectively Meta gems from previous expansions, each gem will provide you with an amount of Primary stat and an additional buff based on what other gems you have equipped. You can only have 1 Blasphemite Gem socketted in your gear at a time.

Culminating Blasphemite iconCulminating Blasphemite is our gem of choice. It will provide 181 Agility and increases your critical strike damage by 0.15% per unique Algari gem colour you have equipped.

Elusive Blaphemite iconElusive Blaphemite a potential alternative for those who like to go fast. Especially given how minor the critical strike damage from Culminating Blasphemite ends up being.

Algari Gems

These are your standard gems, you can equip as many of these types of gems as you want so long as you have the socket slots to hold them. They come in various combinations of Critical Strike (Rubies), Haste (Emeralds), Versatility (Sapphires), Mastery (Onyxes) and Stamina (Ambers). You will typically wear one of each of the four secondary stat variants (and not socketing an amber gem) but simming using Raidbots' Top Gear function is the best way to find the ideal combinations of gems for your gear. Be aware that this will likely change through the tier as your gear changes so sim regularly to check!

Trinkets and Cantrip Items

Trinkets

Damage Trinkets

Because of the new addition of the "Tank Tax" in the form of a 33% reduction to trinket/cantrip damage for non dps specs our options here are bit limited because everything is close. That said, the main damage trinkets of note are:

  • Foul Behemoth's Celicera iconFoul Behemoth's Celicera - Provides a decently powerful on use damage effect and also comes with a defensive benefit (discussed below). Likely to be a staple raid prog trinket for any tank.

  • Mad Queen's Mandate iconMad Queen's Mandate - Very strong, bursty, on-use damage trinket. Trying to game the cooldown reduction portion is very difficult as you need to actually deal the killing blow with it (not just be hitting it as it dies), but even without that its very strong.

  • Void Reaper's Contract iconVoid Reaper's Contract - Powerful damage proc. Great if you can get it but if you are being selfless then you would be a lower priority for this trinket than other agi classes that can equip Void Reaper's Warp Blade iconVoid Reaper's Warp Blade in your raid group since this would activate the 2-set effect (Monks, DH's, Enh Shaman's and Outlaw Rogues).

  • Ara-Kara Sacbrood iconAra-Kara Sacbrood - A strong passive option for damage, even with the nerfs to it.

Defensive Trinkets

  • Swarmlord's Authority iconSwarmlord's Authority - Decent passive absorb procs combined with a potent on use absorb effect on a very short cooldown. This trinket will likely be a lock-in for key pushing.

  • Foul Behemoth's Celicera iconFoul Behemoth's Celicera - Noticably more beneficial in raid, where the longer encounters allow you gain a notable amount of additional HP over several uses. This is less prevalent in keys since when you leave combat the additional HP becomes a shield, could be played around a bit by chain pulling or using at the start of pulls.

  • Silken Chain Weaver iconSilken Chain Weaver - Difficult to acquire one of relevant item level, however if you do manage to acquire a Champion track (Tier 7+ Delves) or Hero track (Tier 8 Delve Vault slot) then this will likely be a very strong defensive option for dungeons. DISCLAIMER: Currently, the attack speed reduction part of this trinket is not functioning. If this changes then this disclaimer will be removed but for now be aware that this massively reduces the power of this trinket.

Cantrip Items

Wings of Shattered Sorrow iconWings of Shattered Sorrow Not a very strong effect for tanks but it does come with a full stat budget in addition to the proc. It's fine to wear but would not reccomend going out of your way to get it.

Seal of the Poisoned Pact iconSeal of the Poisoned Pact Full stat budget ring with an additional free damage proc. We should also be able to take advantage of the additional dose effect via Brambles iconBramblespulsing damage (not the reflect portion). Regardless, this will be one of your BiS rings.

Sureki Zealot's Insignia iconSureki Zealot's Insignia Another full stat budget item with an additional free proc, this time providing stats to you simply for being healed. This one also has the added benefit of making your healers like you more. One of, if not the, BiS necks for Bear.

Harvester's Interdiction iconHarvester's Interdiction Full stat budget weapon with an additional damage proc. Unfortunately, this weapon is only available from Mythic+ so to get a Mythic track weapon you'll need some luck on your side in the Great Vault. The damage proc is only worth around 0.5% damage compared to a standard weapon of the same ilvl, so sim yourself to see if a Heroic track version is better than any Mythic track weapons you acquire.

Miscellaneous

Macros

BoP Cancelaura macro

A situationally useful macro for tanks primarily. BoP (Blessing of Protection) is a paladin external that will remove many harmful debuffs from its target, the downside is that it renders the target immune to physical damage so mobs will target someone else since they cannot hit you as the tank while Bop’d.

This macro will remove the Blessing of Protection buff from yourself, meaning that mobs will continue to target you rather than your allies but you will still have the applicable debuffs removed by the BoP application.

/cancelaura Blessing of Protection

Set Mouseover as Focus macro

A macro that is more useful in some content than other (Keys and pvp primarily) but still a useful tool to use is the focus targets. To set a mouseover target as your Focus target simply mouseover over the mob and press this macro:

/focus [@mouseover,exists,nodead]

Note: To select a different mob as your focus you can simply mouseover the new mob and press the macro again. To completely remove any mob as your focus you can simply mouseover nothing and press the macro once more.

Mouseover Combat Res macros

An essential macro for all druid specs. This macro will attempt to cast Rebirth at your current mouseover target so long as they are a friendly character and are dead.

#showtooltip
/cast [@mouseover,help,dead] Rebirth

Many players prefer to use a more advanced version of this macro which will cast either Rebirth or Revive based on whether the player is in combat or not. This is entirely personal preference but the macro would look something like:

#showtooltip
/cast [@mouseover,combat,help,dead] Rebirth;
/cast [@mouseover,nocombat,help,dead][] Revive

One Key Shapeshift/Fluid Form macros

Some people prefer to have a single keybind that will allow them to shift between Bear Form iconBear Formand Cat Form iconCat Formrather than binding both forms seperately, which is typically done by a macro.

This macro will:

  1. Check if you are not in Bear Form, and if so will attempt to switch you to Bear Form
  2. If you are already in Bear Form, it will attempt to switch you to Cat Form
#showtooltip
/cast [noform:1] bear form
/cast [form:1] cat form

With the addition of Fluid Form iconFluid Forma variant of this macro has become fairly popular for use during combat that allows lets you press Rake (or Shred) in Bear Form and Mangle in Cat Form using a single key bind.

This macro will:

  1. Check if you are not in Bear Form, and if so will attempt to cast Mangle
  2. If you are already in Bear Form, it will attempt to cast Rake

Note: If the macro is not shifting you when you press it then check that:

  • You have Fluid Form talented
  • You are in range of the target to cast Rake/Shred/Mangle
  • Mangle is not on cooldown
#showtooltip
/cast [noform:1] Mangle
/cast [form:1] Rake

Bear Form Required Ability macros

Several spells require you to be in bear form in order to actually function. You can add a condition to the macro to first check if you’re in bear form (and if not, then cast it) before casting the desired spell.

This macro will:

  1. Check if you are in bear form, and if not will attempt to switch you to bear form.
  2. Will cast Growl at your current target
#showtooltip Growl
/cast [noform:1] bear form
/cast Growl

This macro will:

  1. Check if you are in bear or cat form and if not switch you to bear form.
  2. Check if you have an active focus target and if so will attempt to cast Skull Bash at it.
  3. Will attempt to cast Skull Bash at your current target.
#showtooltip skull bash
/use [noform:1/2] Bear Form;
/use [@focus,harm,nodead][] Skull Bash

Ursol's Vortex and Mass Entanglement macro

This macro is useful because Ursol’s Vortex and Mass Entanglement iconMass Entanglementare mutually exclusive as they are two halves of a choice node, meaning they can share a keybind.

This macro will:

  1. Cast Ursol's Vortex iconUrsol's Vortexat your cursor location if the spell is known
  2. Cast Mass Entanglement iconMass Entanglementat your mouseover target so long as your mouseover is a hostile target and the spell is known
  3. Cast Mass Entanglement iconMass Entanglementat your target if you do not have a mouseover so long as your target is a hostile target and the spell is known
#showtooltip
/cast [known:102793,@cursor] Ursol's Vortex;
/cast [known:102359,@mouseover,harm,nodead][known:102359] Mass Entanglement

Mighty Bash and Incapacitating Roar macro

Similar to the above, this macro is useful because Mighty Bash iconMighty Bashand Incapacitating Roar iconIncapacitating Roarare mutually exclusive being two halves of a choice node.

This macro will:

  1. Cast Incapacitating Roar iconIncapacitating Roarif the spell is known
  2. Cast Mighty Bash iconMighty Bashat your target if the spell is known
#showtooltip
/cast [known:99] Incapacitating Roar;
/cast [known:5211] Mighty Bash

Soothe and Remove Corruption macro

It can be useful to macro certain spells that require mutually exclusive conditions together onto one keybind. The following does that using Soothe iconSoothe(requires an enemy target) and Remove Corruption (requires a friendly target). There are many different spells that this can be done with so simply change the name and possibly the conditions to suit your needs.

This macro will:

  1. Attempt to cast Remove Corruption iconRemove Corruptionat your current mouseover target if they are friendly.
  2. Attempt to cast Soothe iconSootheat your current mouseover target if they are hostile.
  3. Attempt to cast Soothe iconSootheat your current target
#showtooltip
/cast [@mouseover,help,nodead] Remove Corruption;
/cast [@mouseover,harm,nodead][] Soothe

Cooldown with trinkets macro

Macroing big cooldowns together with trinkets and cantrip effects is often a sensible idea, it makes things easier for you as the player since you only have to press a single key to trigger multiple effects that you would want to happen at the same time. This ultimately requires that all or all except one effect be off the GCD. It is generally best to not do this with trinkets that trigger GCD or channeling effects. Refer to the trinket section for info on which trinkets this is applicable to.

This macro will:

  1. Attempt to cast berserk or incarn (if talented).
  2. Use whatever trinket is located in Trinket slot 1 (top).
  3. Use whatever trinket is located in Trinket slot 2 (bottom).
  4. Use whatever cantrip effect is located on your Weapon slot

Delete rows as required before using this macro or you may not use the correct trinket slot with your cooldowns.

#showtooltip
/cast berserk
/use 13
/use 14
/use 16

Useful WeakAura(s)

Ironfur Tracking WeakAura by Naemesis

Kitch's Guardian WeakAuras by Kitch

Xora's Bear WeakAuras by Xora