Feral Tank and 4 rets

[Jubber]

Does anyone do this type of group? Does the bear hold aggro well over the rets? I am asking because currently I run 5 rets who are 80 and they are well geared but I am leveling another team that is currently feral tank, Warlock and 3 shamans. I was thinking of switching my pally tank to this group and maybe moving my Feral tank to the rets.

It could just be me being new to a druid tank but my lock is always creeping up right behind him in threat way above my shamans. I would prefer to have my pally teamed up with the lock. Just wasn't sure if my pallies would be too much AOE threat for my feral tank.

[Shodokan]

Why not just drop the feral all together and just tank with one of your rets as prot? As a high geared ret you can get a full set of pve prot gear in under 20 hours played.

[Jubber]

That is a possibility but I wanted to keep a feral tank because it's the only class I haven't tanked as. Trying to maintain the 2 groups of 5. I like the melee aspect, so I just figured a feral tank plus the 4 rets.

[Svpernova09]

Why not just drop the feral all together and just tank with one of your rets as prot? As a high geared ret you can get a full set of pve prot gear in under 20 hours played.

You can do just about anything in 20 hours if the drop rates are on your side. Sweeping general statements are not needed. If you don't have anything of value other than "use a ret as prot" why bother posting? Obviously ferals bring something to the group. ESPECIALLY MELEE GROUPS. Leader of the Pack = 5% crit (and most bears spec impLotP for the 4% total health heal) PLUS infected wounds (50% movement speed reduction + 20% attack speed reduction) AND Demoralizing Roar (Enemy AP reduction). All those jive REALLY well with melee teams. Not to mention in combat rez, Imp Gift of the Wild, and exceptional tanking ability in mediocre gear.

[Ridere]

I can't speak for experience with a bear tank and four melees, but I do have some experience with a bear tank and am getting more every day.

With four rets, your dps will be right on top of the bear. This is good, because the DPS will always be within swipe range. So even if one of your rets gets aggro, you don't need to run back to some line of DPS to pick up the add, or growl, or whatnot. You can just keep up the swipes.

As a bear and four shamans, that's my biggest weakness as a tank. Adds that I don't swipe in time and start picking on my healer, or something.

I say give it a shot. It's not something we've seen around here, and it's always fun to try and out tanks. I like bears.

[shaeman]

And of course bear tanks are crit immune with talents.

I would suggest getting omen - letting your tank get a lead of a few swipes then bringing your team in to batter away.

What spec is your lock? if it's destro it can bang out some big numbers off the bat so waiting a couple of seconds helps your bear get the aggro it needs.

Also - make sure you have soul shatter bound to a key so you can drop the locks threat.

WIth my shaman team I found swipe spam was more than enough to keep and hold aggro - and that was with pvp builds on the shaman that didn't take threat reduction.

[Jubber]

Nice benefits for melee teams. I did not realize that. Yeah my lock is destru and is the only one that comes near my bears threat even with a head start from my bear. Like I said the shaman haven't even come close to the lock in terms of threat. In similiar or better gear. I think I just need even more of a head start.

Guess I am still getting used to bear threat generation as opposed to how easy it was on my pally and DK. I thought it would be more like my prot warrior but even that seems easier to me than this bear. Just using the macro's from these forums for single target and swip spam for multiple targets. It's all good though. Though with all the benefits for melee i think I will switch it up a bit when i hit 80. Move him to my ret team.

[Crel]

Thumbs up for feral tank.
With that aura they pass out " passive healing" based on total help is a great addition, although you could have it as a kitty. I ran into the same thing in moving from a pally to a druid, its just a different type of tanking style.
I think passive healing would indeed be more targeted to a tank with large hp pools instead of smaller ones with more mitigation, as passive healing is chance for the most part.

[Fizzler]

I love my Feral tank, why oh why did I level my Pally Tank on the same account.....

[shaeman]

I love my Feral tank, why oh why did I level my Pally Tank on the same account.....

The solution is only an account transfer away