Guardian Druid Tank Gear and Best in Slot — Shadowlands 9.1

The best loot in the game will come from the weekly chest (now the Great Vault), and from Mythic raiding. Prior to the raid being released you can do your daily Covenant quests which can reward some good gear, Mythic 0 dungeons, or even Heroic dungeons to increase your item level early on.

The following is a recommendation for what items might constitute a best in slot list for Guardian Druids with items purely available from dungeons. The majority of your gearing decisions will be based off what items have the best stats on them. To fully understand what stats are the best to prioritize and why, please visit the Stats page linked below.

Slot	Item	Source
Head	Vicious Surge Faceguard	Spires of Ascension
Neck	Azure-Venom Choker	Spires of Ascension
Shoulders	Malodorous Gristle-Sown Spaulders	Plaguefall
Cloak	Blighted Margrave's Cloak	Plaguefall
Chest	Anima-Splattered Hide	Sanguine Depths
Wrists	Radiant Light Binders	Sanguine Depths
Gloves	Gloves of Haunting Fixation	Halls of Atonement
Belt	Shadowhirl Waistwrap	Spires of Ascension
Legs	Abyssal Disharmony Breeches	Spires of Ascension
Boots	Viscera-Stitched Footpads	The Necrotic Wake
Ring #1	Stitchflesh's Misplaced Signet	The Necrotic Wake
Ring #2	Ritual Commander's Ring	The Necrotic Wake
Trinket #1	Blood-Spattered Scale	De Other Side
Trinket #2	Overcharged Anima Battery	Spires of Ascension
Weapon	Xav's Pike of Authority	Theater of Pain

Patch 9.0.5 brought the ability to upgrade Mythic+ gear with Valor points.

Below is a small list of the some of the best Mythic+ items that can use your Valor points on to upgrade.

Slot	Item	Source
Trinket	Blood-Spattered Scale	De Other Side
Trinket	Inscrutable Quantum Device	De Other Side
Trinket	Overcharged Anima Battery	De Other Side
Trinket	Phial of Putrefaction	Plaguefall
Weapon	Xav's Pike of Authority	Theater of Pain
Legs	Abyssal Disharmony Breeches	Spires of Ascension

The new mega-dungeon introduces new items at a base item level of 226, or 233 if completed on the hard-mode difficulty. Due to the inability to upgrade them, they are mostly sidegrades or great for alts and catch up items for people coming back.

One exception to this however is the quest item to access hard-mode, the Passably-Forged Credentials neck. The proc here activates anywhere, and is extremely powerful to the point of outdoing even max item level options, so it should be used if you have access to it.

Tazavesh, the Veiled Market also brings some unique and powerful trinkets that will be great to pick up early.

1. Ticking Sack of Terror
2. Codex of the First Technique
3. So'leah's Secret Technique
4. Miniscule Mailemental in an Envelope

Patch 9.1 introduces the Domination socket system, with unique slots that can have Shards applied to them that are acquired within the Sanctum of Domination raid. For Leather, these are present on Helms, Shoulders, Chests, Gloves, and Boots acquired within the raid and are something you should aim to get all 5 of.

Your priority for Shards in Raids is in the following order:

1. Complete the Blood gem set bonus, requiring a Shard of Bek, Shard of Jas and Shard of Rev. This bonus also requires you to have a Domination Socket Chest to activate.
2. Fill out your 4th and 5th slots with Shard of Dyz and Shard of Cor gems from the Unholy and Frost types respectively.

Your priority for Shards in Mythic+ is different because the set bonus is not active inside Mythic+ and therefore shifts the order to focus on the 5 overall strongest gems of each set:

1. Shard of Cor
2. Shard of Dyz
3. Shard of Kyr
4. Shard of Bek
5. Shard of Zed

If you would like to know more about the remaining Domination Shards' effects, their set bonuses, or how to upgrade their effects into even more potent forms, please see our official guide detailing everything about this new system of Patch 9.1:

This section contains the best gear to look for in the Sanctum of Domination raid. It does not include anything from outside sources, so with some drops you have access to you might have better choices.

Of note is the Jotungeirr, Destiny's Call weapon that has a unique on-use effect, granting a large amount of all secondary stats for 30 seconds. This shares a cooldown with trinkets and is an extremely strong option if synced with Berserk and Convoke the Spirits.

Slot	Item	Source
Head	Cap of Writhing Malevolence	Remnant of Ner'zhul
Neck	Interplanar Keystone	Kel'Thuzad
Shoulders	Spaulders of the Crooked Confidant	Kel'Thuzad
Cloak	Self-Replicating Tissue	Guardian of the First Ones
Chest	Witherheart Studded Breastplate	Sylvanas Windrunner
Wrists	Fate-Threaded Bindings	Fatescribe Roh-Kalo
Gloves	Hangman's Knotbinders	Painsmith Raznal
Belt	Windrunner's Baldric	Sylvanas Windrunner
Legs	Elite Aranakk Breeches	Kel'Thuzad
Boots	Trenchant Warmonger Treads	Soulrender Dormazain
Ring #1	Tarnished Insignia of Quel'Thalas	Sylvanas Windrunner
Ring #2	Oscillating Ouroboros	Fatescribe Roh-Kalo
Trinket #1	Reactive Defense Matrix	Guardian of the First Ones
Trinket #2	Shard of Annhylde's Aegis	The Nine
Weapon	Jotungeirr, Destiny's Call	The Nine

Whenever you get a new piece of gear, make sure to enchant it or gem it, if possible. In Shadowlands, sockets can come with or be put on: Head, Belt, Wrists, Rings, and Necks. The optimal enchants and gems for Guardian Druids can be found in the page linked below.

Shadowlands brings us multiple choices as to which item slot we would like to apply the unique legendary powers to, sometimes this can be quite significant as some item slots have different stat weights applied to them or some can be socketed. Choosing the right item slot to apply your special legendary power to can generally be the piece with the highest stat budget that does not conflict with a Domination Socket. You can check out our guide on Runecarving to learn more about this new feature.

Below is an in-depth guide for all the information you will need to decide which are the best legendary powers for you.

The following is a list of the most noteworthy trinkets available overall, ranked in order of power assuming equivalent item level. If you do not have any of these, your best bet will be to use a stat proc trinket with a reasonably high item level.

1. Reactive Defense Matrix
2. Shard of Annhylde's Aegis
3. Blood-Spattered Scale
4. Phial of Putrefaction
5. Salvaged Fusion Amplifier
6. Inscrutable Quantum Device
7. Ticking Sack of Terror

Offensively, you can refer to the chart below (courtesy of Bloodmallet.com). Note that these are only recommendations based on general sims; for the most accurate results, you should sim yourself.