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Xiera
Officer
Joined: 22 Mar 2007
Posts: 94
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 Posted:
Thu Feb 21, 2008 1:17 am |
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Before the introduction of Resilience, the only way to become uncrittable was to stack Defense. As many feral druids know, the need for high Defense is lessened by the Survival of the Fittest talent. Looking at the stats, we see that:
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Base Defense at 70: 350
Defense needed per level of opponent's expertise: 5
Defense needed per 1% reduced chance to be crit: 25 |
As any warrior or paladin will note, it takes 490 Defense to be uncrittable! That kind of Defense is very difficult for a feral druid to get, though not impossible. With the Survival of the Fittest talent, however, the necessary Defense to be uncrittable is down to 415, which much easier to obtain!
The level 68+ Clefthoof Leather set accounts for a large portion of the remaining Defense. Furthermore, amulets, cloaks, rings, trinkets, and Earthwarden can all contribute to Defense (obviously, they would need the Defense Rating stat on them!). I used the Clefthoof Leather set for a long while and was very happy with it (thanks Shebali!).
If you are ready for PvP, however, Resilience comes into the picture. It takes significantly less Resilience to achieve uncrittability and it is much easier to find Resilience items (via PvP). Statistically,
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| Resilience Rating needed per 1% reduced chance to be crit: 40 |
With 3/3 Survival of the Fittest, you need only 80 Resilience Rating to achieve 2% resilience! Consider that between each of the Veteran's/Vindicator's items and a Band of Triumph, you can reach 80 Resilience Rating.
That still leaves the level difference, which can easily be covered by adding another 40 Resilience Rating or by adding 15 Defense (350+15=365 total).
Any warrior or paladin will rightly claim that Defense is better than Resilience. Unlike them, feral druids do not get to parry or block any attacks, so two of the additional three effects of Defense are negated. But, one might argue, Defense also adds to your dodge chance. This is indeed true, but, as I will explain later, a moot point.
Why resilience? Isn't it a PvP stat? Well, the first reason is that it reduces the chance to be crit by both physical attacks AND spells. This is a non-factor in PvE, but druids have enough armor already that dragging around a PvP set too is cumbersome. Another benefit of Resilience is that it reduces damage taken from damage over time skills and spells. This is especially nice when fighting Moroes, in case you are Garroted. But even this is not a great reason for going with Resilience.
The reason Resilience is the better stat for bears -- and the reason dodge from Defense is a moot point -- is that it takes less itemisation. This means that you can afford to raise other key stats like Stamina and Agility. The dodge bonuses you will gain from Agility far surpassed those you would gain from Defense.
There is an added bonus, too. The bear Defense items are generally designed for tanking -- they have high Armor, Stamina, and Defense. The PvP Resilience items are not so restricted -- they still have green armor, high stamina, and Resilience instead of Defense, but they also have Strength. As your fighting companions become more capable DPSers, it will become more difficult to hold aggro. Having high Strength and Agility helps the bear tank to build higher threat, with the added bonus of being able to be useful in cat form as well.
Key points:
- Defense takes a lot of itemisation
- Resilience takes very little itemisation
- Defense slightly increases dodge; its parry and block effects are moot
- Resilience does not increase dodge
- Resilience items generally have Agility, increasing dodge by more than Defense would
- Resilience items are more versatile, usable in PvP, bear form, and cat form
- Resilience items generally have Strength, increasing threat generation |
_________________
=Rangers of the Myst=
Aarisa - Feral druid - Herbalism*/Alchemy*
Xiera - Moonkin - Tailoring/Gemcutting
Kiriy - Hunter - temp retirement
Shizu - Shaman - Skin/Mining
=Rangers of the Dawn=
Allev - Rogue - Skinning/Enchanting
AIM: Ranger Aarisa |
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Shebali
Officer
Joined: 22 Mar 2007
Posts: 20
Location: Stealthed
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| Posted:
Thu Feb 21, 2008 7:13 pm |
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I will (and have before through IMs) concede that PvP gear is in fact quite useful in PvE for tank characters. I still believe the stats to be more or less moot for non-tanks, and of secondary value when obtaining higher end raid epics becomes viable. But as you say, it takes little to no difficulty to achieve the mentioned 80 resilience with only 2 PvP pieces, leaving a significant number of other slots for PvE statted gear.
I'm not a druid, nor have I ever gotten one high enough for this to be much a consideration, so my opinion is moot by merit of theorycraft. I'll go with my long running outlook: "Whatever works, works." |
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