Guardian Druid Frequently Asked Questions — The War Within (11.1.7)

This is the main question most people will ask with tanking. The basic answer is that if you are progressing or are on a character you do not feel comfortable playing offensively with, you should play defensively. As you get comfortable, you should start looking at DPS more and playing a more mixed style, pushing DPS while slowly giving up survivability. Once you feel completely comfortable with the encounter and will not hold your raid back, you can go for DPS. This point is different for every person, as it depends on your group, your character, your gear, and your skill level.

Simply put, stats for Guardian are all extremely close in terms of power and should be treated evenly. It doesn't matter if you have 5000 haste or 5000 vers. There are no breakpoints or anything to aim for; just acquire as much item level as possible. People lean towards haste and vers as they are the best "feeling" stats. If you are aiming to maximize your dps, you should always sim your character for best results.

Similarly to "Should I play defensively or offensively," you should only catweave if you are extremely comfortable with both the spec and the encounter . Catweaving is extremely risky if done improperly or without considering the damage profile of a boss fight. It can very easily end up getting you or your co-tank killed. The DPS gain is not worth it if you introduce additional risk to the raid's success. Depending on the patch, catweaving may or may not even be a DPS increase; currently, in The War Within Season 2, it is not.

Generally speaking, the highest item level always wins, as our stats are all quite close in relative strength. The exception with this is trinkets or items with special effects, as some effects are far more powerful than the item level would suggest.

The only exception to this rule is when a specific fight dictates a certain set of optimal talents, for example. If you are curious about what kind of setup to go for a specific fight, WarcraftLogs.com's rankings and statistics are a good place to see what others are doing.

For the most part, there is no set "amount" of Haste (or any secondary) that you should have. Nor are there stat goals or a particular distribution of stats that you want to go for. It is very common for people to overestimate the importance of having the "right" secondaries. A higher overall quantity of stats will almost always beat having "better" stats. Having 120 of your worst stat is often better than having 90 of your best stat since the differences are not as big as many people think.

There is no "correct" race for Guardians. Generally speaking, which race you choose will have a minor impact on your ability to play Guardian effectively, and so it is recommended that you choose a race based on your personal preferences for shapeshift appearance, flavor, and transmog. That being said, some racial bonuses are better for tanking than others; Highmountain Tauren grants Versatility through Mountaineer and flat damage reduction through Rugged Tenacity, and Tauren increases your Stamina through Endurance and grants you the ability War Stomp On the Alliance side, we would say that Kul Tiran is better for raiding Guardian due to their Brush It Off. Night elf can be extremely useful in Mythic+ due to Shadowmeld.

Offensively, yes, you can. SimulationCraft fully supports Guardian Druid DPS. This is the recommended way to determine if an item, trait, or talent is an upgrade for your damage output.

Defensively, no. While there is sparse support for Guardian Druid survivability in SimulationCraft, the default configurations are unsuitable for obtaining accurate information about your survivability. Additionally, simming tanks for defense is not advisable in general. There are too many factors and variables that go into accurately modeling a tanking situation, and no single metric will tell you, "this item or trait will make you more tanky." For example, something can reduce your overall damage taken but not improve your ability to survive spike damage, two factors of tanking that will vary in importance depending on the encounter. You will be much better off following the recommendations of a guide concerning defensive gearing than you will by following sims.

The War Within introduced some fantastic talents that boost our robust toolkit. We are in a fantastic position overall, feeling quite stable in all content. We currently perform great in both raids and Mythic+ dungeons. For more information, refer to our section on Guardian Druid Viability.