Guardian Druid Tank Stat Priority — Shadowlands 9.0.5
On this page, you will find out the optimal stat priority for your Guardian Druid. We first present the stat priority, before delving into more complex explanations. Our content is updated for World of Warcraft — Shadowlands 9.0.5.
If you were looking for WoW Classic content, please refer to our Classic Feral Tank Druid stat priority.
The Basics of Stats for Guardian Druid
The stat priority for a Guardian Druid differs depending on whether you are aiming for survivability or damage output.
Regardless of what you are prioritizing, an item 10 or more item levels above another will almost always be an upgrade due to the sheer increase in stats.
Survivability
- Item Level;
- Armor/Agility/Stamina;
- Versatility;
- Mastery;
- Haste;
- Critical Strike.
Armor, Agility, and Stamina are grouped together because they typically appear together on gear, but any one of the "main" stats will be stronger point-for-point than secondary stats.
Damage Output
It is important to note that all secondary stats are very close together in value. This is a rough estimation, as your stat order might slightly differ depending on how much of each stat you currently have. Agility is also very important for damage output, and will often make the highest item level piece the best one to choose. If you want a truly accurate evaluation of which stats are best for you, you should sim your character for stat weights.
- Versatility >= Haste >= Critical Strike > Mastery.
Getting a Better Understanding of Guardian Druid Stats
Agility is your primary stat. It increases your Attack Power, grants you a
small amount of Dodge, and converts into Armor due to Ironfur.
Armor reduces the Physical damage you take. Guardians gain increased Armor
(and Stamina) from Bear Form. It is important to note that "Bonus
Armor" (typically armor granted by trinket effects or enchants/potions) is not
increased by Bear Form.
Versatility reduces your damage taken, increases your damage and healing
done, and increases the size of your absorbs. Versatility is the most effective
stat for pure damage reduction, as well as having benefits to your damage
output and boosting your self healing abilities like
Frenzied Regeneration.
Mastery ( Mastery: Nature's Guardian) increases your maximum health
and your healing received, which effectively functions like a damage reduction
in practice (damage reductions increase the amount of damage you can take before
you die, just like health increases). It also increases your Attack Power and
therefore your damage, but it does not scale as well offensively as the other
stats.
Haste does many things for Guardian. It increases your melee attack speed,
increases the rate at which Thrash and
Moonfire
(and
Feral Affinity bleeds
Rake and
Rip) tick, reduces the global cooldown, and reduces the cooldown on
Mangle,
Thrash, and
Frenzied Regeneration. All of this results in increased Rage
generation and damage output, making Haste your best stat offensively and also a
decent stat defensively.
Critical Strike, while being good for dealing damage, does not do much defensively. It does increase dodge chance, but that dodge chance is subject to heavy diminishing returns, and is generally an unreliable stat for survivability. Other stats increase your survivability far more reliably.
Most encounters have abilities that cannot be mitigated or avoided. Also, you need to have a decent amount of health, in order to give yourself the chance to be healed before a subsequent attack kills you. As such, you need a minimum amount of Stamina. This amount will, in most cases, simply come from the Stamina found innately on your gear. Therefore, item level is the determining factor in keeping your health pool growing.
Gems, Enchants, and Consumables
All gems, enchants and consumables are directly related to your stat priority and you can find advice on this topic on the dedicated page linked below.
Changelog
- 09 Mar. 2021: Reviewed for Patch 9.0.5.
- 23 Nov. 2020: Updated for Shadowlands.
- 12 Oct. 2020: Page updated for the Shadowlands pre-patch.
More Druid Guides
Guides from Other Classes
This guide has been written by Pumps who has played since Vanilla and has tanked in Honestly, the #1 Oceanic raiding guild, since Mists of Pandaria. He also played in the first MDI Mythic+ Dungeon Tournament, where his team placed second. His mindset on tanking has always been taking the utility and damage one can bring to the raid to the next level. He was the #1 Rank DPS Guardian Druid for 5 tiers in a row and top the 1-6 for the last 12 tiers, playing Guardian Druid, Brewmaster Monk and Protection Warrior mainly based on what is the strongest for progression at the time. You can find him on discord — Pumps#0734 — and on Twitch.
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