Guardian Druid Leveling Guide from 1 to 80 — Midnight Pre-Patch (12.0.1)

Guardian Druid, thanks to being a tanking spec, our leveling options are plentiful. If you would like to spam dungeons to level, tank queues are often the fastest. If you would like to level solo, grouping up targets and AoEing them down works perfectly for us. We are also fantastic in a group, as DPS love to have someone gather and tank the mobs for them.

The best gearing while levelling is quick and easy upgrades with the highest item level possible; stats are not relevant, and the gear will be swiftly replaced as you go through the levels, so try not to go too out of your way for a single piece of gear while levelling.

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You are first able to choose talents at level 10. Choosing Guardian automatically grants you the Thrash ability.

Below is a list of high-impact talents that are extremely valuable while levelling, the earliest level at which you can talent into them and their effect. You can also opt to take certain talents at later levels if there are things that you are more interested in acquiring earlier. That is the fun part of talent trees! There is also an example tree to preview with all the talents mentioned.

• Level 13 — Gore — Adds a chance for your Mangle to reset.
• Level 18 — Ironfur — your active mitigation spell, increasing your armor, which will reduce Physical damage taken.
• Level 19 — Berserk — your main damage-increasing cooldown. Reduces the cooldown of Thrash, Mangle and Growl by 50%.
• Level 26 — Skull Bash — charge to a mob and instantly interrupt their spell casting. It can also be used as a handy charge if you ever get knocked back.
• Level 34 — Feline Swiftness — increases your movement speed by 15%,great for faster levelling.
• Level 35 — Untamed Savagery — boosts your Thrash damage.
• Level 37 — Soul of the Forest — Mangle generates 5 more Rage and deals 25% more damage.
• Level 41 — Raze — an AoE version of Maul.
• Level 42 — Stampeding Roar — an AoE 8 second movement speed increase.
• Level 45 — Lunar Beam — summons a beam of lunar light at your location that greatly increases your Mastery and deals damage.
• Level 51 — Twin Moonfire — this increases Moonfire damage and causes it to hit a second target nearby.
• Level 53 — Galactic Guardian — your damage has a 5% chance to proc a Moonfire on the mob and empower your next Moonfire cast by 300%. This is a huge damage boost and will be game-changing once acquired.
• Level 55 — Incarnation: Guardian of Ursoc — transforms your Berserk into a superior ability, lasting longer and granting you an extra 30% health while active.
• Level 70 — Hero Talents! — Boundless Moonlight
• Level 71 — Lunar Insight— Increases Moonfire damage.
• Level 72 — Atmospheric Exposure — Enemies damaged by Lunar Beam or Fury of Elune take increased damage from you.
• Level 73 — The Light of Elune — Moonfire has a chance to call down a Fury of Elune beam.
• Level 74 — The Eternal Moon — Lunar Beam increases Mastery, deals more damage and lasts longer. Fury of Elune also generates more Rage and deals more damage.
• Level 75 — Moon Guardian — Free Moonfire's from Galactic Guardian generate 5 additional rage.
• Level 76 — Stellar Command — Increase damage of Lunar Beam and Fury of Elune.
• Level 77 — Lunar Calling — Thrash now deals Arcane damage.
• Level 78 — Glistening Fur — Bear Form reduces Arcane damage taken by 6% and other magic types by 3%.
• Level 79 — Moondust — Slows enemies affected by Moonfire by 20%.
• Level 80 — Lunation — Arcane abilities reduce the cooldown of Lunar Beam by 3 seconds.

Due to Guardian being unlocked as a talent specialization at Level 10, you should make use of the abilities provided to you in the intro quests until you are presented with the option.

1. Buff yourself with Mark of the Wild.
2. Enter Bear Form.
3. Maintain Moonfire on the target.
4. Use Barkskin on cooldown.
5. Use Berserk on cooldown, ideally against multiple enemies.
6. Cast Thrash on cooldown.
7. Cast Mangle on cooldown on 4 targets or fewer.
8. Fill downtime with Swipe.
9. Spend Rage offensively against a single target with Maul.
10. Spend Rage defensively with Ironfur.
11. Use Frenzied Regeneration if your health gets below 50%.
12. Make sure to always be in Bear Form while in combat.