WoW Guardian Druid Tank Guide

Guardian Druid has gone over a number of reworks since beta and it seems like they’re still trying to fully figure it out, having to balance four specs with three roles into one class tree is very difficult and means there will be talents along the way you won’t be needing in a lot of content but does provide many benefits in the outdoor content. With varying builds in the spec tree, you have a lot of options on how defensive you’d like to play and what your rotation priority can be.

Community perception is unfortunately against Bear at the moment, the meta is formed around what can do the highest end bleeding edge keys and bear admittedly suffers in that department, where their shortcomings become amplified. If you are going after Keystone Master or Hero, this tank is perfectly capable of doing so without any problems and has unique solutions to some boss encounters that make it easier than some other tanks.

How the 10.1 Tier set changes the playstyle

2pc: When you take damage, Mangle and Thrash damage and Rage generation are increased by 15% for 8s and you heal for 6% of damage taken over 8s.

4pc: Maul/Raze damage is increased by 20% and casting Ironfur or Maul/Raze increases your maximum hp by 3% for 12s, stacking up to 5 times.

The increase in damage to our core three physical abilities means that while it may not be the meta option, the alternative physical builds will be a lot more competitive. Guardian druid damage was admittedly underrated, I’ve been running physical build in keys for the latter have of the season and have been competing with my other tanks or out right beating some. The issues of Guardian have been surviving in high keys, the addition of the 6% stagger bonus on tier will add a considerable amount of healing to your kit, as long as you can live the hit, adding to this Ursoc’s Fury will now be replenished quicker for bigger and more consistent shields by the increased damage gained by the tier.

The increase in Rage Generation deserves its own paragraph, when you take damage gain 15% increased rage generation. The struggles with guardian druid aren’t all going to be fixed with this, but the rage gen gained is high enough to be noticeable, keeping up Ironfur stacks is going to be easier in the end and you should be gaining enough rage to dedicate more spent rage to Maul/Raze without the Tooth & Claw proc if you want to play more aggressively without sacrifice any more physical tankiness.

Coming into 10.1, Guardian Druid has a number of builds that can work in its favour, depending on which playstyle you enjoy. Laser bear is in the forefront for the meta pick, although the physical alternatives are not far behind it (and personally, more fun).

This build utilizes moonfire for damage and damage reduction as well as healing. Spread your moonfires as much as possible while you rely on Galactic Guardian procs

Build Code:

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This build focuses heavily on physical damage to gain big absorbs and lots of self healing variations in Dream of Cenarius Regrowth, After the Wildfire & Frenzied Regeneration healing. This blends a more beginner friendly rotation, lots of defensives and self or off healing. Below are two codes, one for the main build, the other with our dispel opted into, since dispels are going to be important you may have to sacrifice a lot of things things to get it.

Build Code Without Dispel:

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Build Code With Dispel:

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• Improved Stampeding Roar (flex): reduces the cooldown of Stampeding Roar by 60s.
• Heart of the Wild (flex): A 5m cooldown is rather hefty, but this will increase the power of your abilities that aren’t from your main spec for 45s. As a guardian druid this will increase all magical damage by 30%. This is a great talent pickup if you are playing laser bear, since a lot of your damage comes from Moonfire.
• Natural Recovery (flex): For two points, gain 4% increase healing done and taken.
• Remove Corruption (flex): Poison and Curse dispel. Take when needed.

The Class tree unfortunately sees a lot of dead points due to the nature of druid, it has to cater to 4 specs with completely differing playstyle that all meld together based on shape changing.

• Maul (default): A large single target hit for a cost of 40 rage, with talents below there are means of making this a free rage cast.
• Survival Instincts (default): A 50% damage reduction for 6s, on a baseline 3m cd.
• Gore: Thrash, Maul, Moonfire and Swipe have a 15% chance to reset the cooldown of Mangle and grant its next cast 4 extra rage.
• Brambles (default): Brambles gives a small passive reflect, while Barkskin is active, you deal Nature damage back to you attackers. When compared with Bristling Fur giving you more burst rage generation, the passive of Brambles will gain more net benefit most of the time.
• Mangle (default): Mangle deals 20% more damage to bleeding targets, Thrash applies a bleed, this buff will be up for 100% effective combat uptime.
• Gory Fur (default): Mangle has a 15% chance to make your next Ironfur cast be reduced by 25% rage(10 rage baseline, 5 rage in Incarnation).
• Berserk: Ravage (default): Grants you the Berserk ability, which we will be opting for Incarnation down below. This talent decreases the cooldowns of Thrash, Mangle, and Growl by 50% during Incarn. For more information see Incarnation talent below.
• Innate Resolve (flex): Innate Resolve grants you a second charge of Frenzied Regeneration and increases its healing by 20%.
• Reinvigoration (flex): I personally opt for the talent wherever possible. Reducing the cooldown of Frenzied Regeneration by 40% increases bear’s self-sustain. In more organized groups your healer may compensate for the need for this talent, but in PUG groups, I rarely run without it.
• Vulnerable Flesh (default): Gives Maul an extra 30% chance to critically strike, also applies to Raze.
• Vicious Cycle (default): Mangle increases the damage of your next Maul/Raze by 15%, Maul/Raze increase the damage of your next Mangle by 15%, stacking up to 3 times. This talent adds some nice feedback loops for bear since you are rarely pressing the same ability one after another. A nice damage gain all around.
• Tooth and Claw (default): Auto-attacks have a 20% chance to empower your next Maul/Raze, stacking up twice. Empowered Maul/Raze damage is increased by 40% and cost no rage. As an added benefit this applies a 15% damage reduction for 6s to targets hit. This damage reduction is big to shore to a major weakness for bears, magic damage.
• Survival of the Fittest (default): Reduces the cooldowns of Barkskin and Survival Instincts by 30%.
• After the Wildfire (flex): This is a talent I’ve seen a lot of people love, and dislike. Every 200 rage you spend you heal allies within 12 yards for 600% Attack power. This is major burst healing, unfortunately is may not always be proccing when you want it since its based on rage spent, which is variable depending on Gory Fur proc’s, whether or not you are in Incarnation or not. This ability can save lives, but also be a ton of overhealing in a run.
• Soul of the Forest (default): Mangle generates 5 more rage and its damage is increased by 25%.
• Berserk: Unchecked Aggression (flex): Grants you 15% haste during Incarn and reduces the cooldown of Maul/Raze by 50%. See Incarnation below for more information.
• Berserk: Persistence (default): Reduces the cooldown of Frenzied Regeneration by 100% and the rage cost of Ironfur in Incarnation by 50%.
• Incarnation: Guardian of Ursoc (default): Incarnation is Bears most powerful ability, replacing Berserk and extends the duration to 30s, you gain all the effects of Berserk that you talent into up above all while gaining 30% increased Max HP and causes Mangle to hit 3 targets. There’s a recent movie about a bear that ate several pounds of cocaine in the 1980’s that was dropped off by the cartel in the forest, and for a very short period of time, that bear was in all likeliness the most feared Apex Predator in existence, that’s what Incarnation makes you feel like.
• Ursoc’s Guidance (default): For every 20 rage you spend, you reduce the cooldown of Incarnation, with fairly aggressive play and rage spending you can reliably get Incarn down to almost a 2 minute cooldown.
• Rage of the Sleeper (default): There’s a couple of ways to get this talent but you should always aim to get it. Prevents 25% of all damage you take, grants you 15% increased damage, 25% leech gain and reflects a portion of the damage you take(based on Attack Power) back as nature damage.

The Capstone area of bear is flexible depending on what build you want to play, with that in mind we are mostly going to be talking about what talents you want and when for what builds.

• Pulverize (flex): A melee blow that consumes two stacks of Thrash bleed that deals above average damage for a global, and places a debuff on the target that reduces their damage to you by 35%. A great option for tyrannical weeks in dungeons that have really hard hitting bosses, Liu Flameheart(TJS) and Crawth(Algeth’ar Academy) are two prime examples.
• Ursoc’s Fury (flex): Thrash and Maul/Raze grants an absorb shield for 50% of the damage done (is capped) for 15s. If you are playing laser bear you’ll most likely be opting out of this talent since Moonfire healing will provide similar mitigation, but in physical builds, this will be a critical talent to take. The absorb is constantly replenishing itself rotationally and as a tank, it’s usually better to absorb damage first than heal up HP damage taken.
• Dream of Cenarius(flex): When you take non-periodic damage, you have a chance equal to your critical strike to cause your next Regrowth to heal for an additional 200%, and to be free, castable in all forms for 30s. This effect cannot occur more than once ever 20s.

Last season this talent was really underwhelming, in 10.1, our HP got a 25% increase as well as we take 25% increased damage, to compensate for this, a lot of off healing talents were increased by 25%, Regrowth was increased by 50%. After testing this with Protector of the Pack in keystone, the Dream of Cenarius proc packs a wallop and provided some Paladin level off healing that really came in handy. The buff lasting 30s means you can easily hold it from big incoming party damage and help the healer or a big tank hit to “death strike” heal yourself back up. I understand this isn’t the playstyle for everyone, you can easily opt out of this talent for any of the other flex options.

• Rend and Tear (flex): Granting you a 2% damage gain and reduction for each stack of your Thrash bleed. While 6% doesn’t sound like a lot, it compounds nicely with the other talent we’ve selected in both trees.
• Flashing Claws (flex): Thrash has a 20% chance to proc an extra Thrash cast, this can proc off itself. Best used on you Fortified weeks where the real value of this talent will be most valuable.
• Cycle of Life and Death (flex): Your DoT’s deal their damage in 25% less time, HoT’s in 15% less time. In the laser build, this is a talent you should really be taking with the synergies with Moonfire damage and healing. In both builds this does increase the bleed damage of your Thrash, the increase in damage is minor, but it is a damage increase.
• Blood Frenzy (flex): While a flex talent, you’ll be opting for this more often than not. Gaining two rage every time thrash deals damage is a massive passive rage gain due to the importance of Thrash to our rotation.
• Raze (flex): Replaces Maul with an AoE frontal ability that is really solid AoE damage. Best used on Fortified weeks.
• Fury of Nature (flex): Increased Arcane damage by 20% while in bear form. If running the laser build this talent is a must.
• Elune’s Favored (flex): I’m opting to call this flex since with an easy pathing option to get down to Rage of the Sleeper, but you can tailor your build as you’d like. While in bear form you deal 10% increased arcane damage and you are healed for 30% of the arcane damage done. You’ll be grabbing this talent in most scenarios.
• Thorns of Iron (flex): When you cast Ironfur, you deal 30% of your armor value as physical damage split among enemies within 12 yards. Reduced damage above 4 stacks of Ironfur. While this talent could have been strong, the change of the 4 stack reduced cap really hurt this ability, although it did promote a really degenerate playstyle and build.
• Scintillating Moonlight (flex): Targets affected by moonfire deal 10% reduced damage to you. Always taken for laser build.
• Galactic Guardian (flex): Central to the laser build. Your damage has a 5% chance to proc a free moonfire on that target. When this procs, your next moonfire will generate 8 rage and deal 300% increased damage. Combine this with twin moonfire, you have an easy means of spreading and maintaining moonfire for a constant stream of healing mitigation.
• Twin Moonfire (flex): Again, Moonfire deals an increased 10% and strikes a second target within 15 yards. If playing Laser, this is a default choice.
• Earthwarden (flex): When you deal direct damage with Thrash, gain a stack of Earthwarden which then reduces the next auto-attack against you by 30%. This talent isn’t great in low keys, but the higher the key level the more amped up auto attacks become and this talent can see some real value.

Bear offers a wide variety playstyles and defensive options to choose from. While its shortcomings may be present in bleeding edge keys, if you want to get keystone master or hero, its in a solid position to do so. With good self sustain, options for absorbs or healing and great utility Dragonflight bear is honestly an improvement of play from Shadowlands Thrash spam.

10.1 Bear is looking to be an underrated tank with answers for a lot of scenarios present this season.