This weeks’ choice was a very hard one. Not because I didn’t have any choices. Oh no!

Thanks to your great suggestions, I have enough choices of killer songs for different moments in Raiding (from boss kills, to boss wipes, to general trash clearing) to last me a year.

The difficulty is, I knew I wanted to put a Cruxshadows song up tonight, because they have dominated my Raiding all this week. Every boss fight, every trash clear… they’ve been there. But which one to pick?

There are three Cruxshadows songs that I have on my rotation that seem to bring very good luck on my Raids, especially this week… and if silly superstitions to explain success are good enough for multi-million dollar baseball players, I ain’t gonna argue.

In the end, I chose Cruxshadows - Eye of the Storm, from their new Dreamcypher album as this weeks’ choice.

However, if you like this one, then I also strongly recommend Sophia from the same album, and Winter Born, from the Ethernaut album.

Bless Amazon… I don’t get any kickbacks from Amazon if you go there, I linked them because Amazon lets you hear samples of each song from an album… so hopefully you can see for yourself.

That’s it for this weeks’ raid song, and remember, keep those suggestions coming in!

I know, I know, I already posted twice. I’m addicted to writing for you guys. And what I was just checking out, even though it’s three months out of date, is still just unbelieveably fun.

So, like, totally two posts ago, ya know? I soooo showed how I put those mouseover hotlinks in my posts. Really! I’m serious! And it wasn’t me what done it, it was that awesome uber geek Okoloth!

Ugh, writing like that makes my head hurt. Sorry.

I was perusing the rest of the insane data mining that Okoloth has on his site, where he makes mention of a data mining spider he’s running to troll through Blizzards’ Armory page and collect data on all of us… all the time. Damn, it’s the man! THE MAN!!!

At first, I thought he was just tracking active players, server populations, etc. Turns out he has been tracking FAR more than that.

In particular, he wrote this report that breaks down, as of 30 July 2007, the total amount of active level 70 druids across the entire WoW server base, everywhere. He then analyzed us based on spec, gear breakdown, everything. Did it to hunters in an earlier post, too. How many folks use the Stylin’ Purple Hat? How many are Exalted with Netherdrake rep?

Seriously… do yourself a favor, and go read this. It is just amazing…

For the record… his data shows a total of 5592 active Druids across all WoW Realms as of 30 July 2007… with Balance 10%, Restoration 30.08%, and Feral a whopping 59.92%! Woot! We shall rise and overcome, my Feral brothers and sisters!

From the title of the post, you might get the idea that my Kara Group had a breakthrough last night.

Yeah, you could say that.

Time for a little raiding progression and recap post, my friends. What have I been doing the last two nights?

Tuesday morning was Karazhan server reset time, so of course as usual all the good little boys and girls came scurrying out in the evening to begin the Karazhan grind once more. And yeah, I do mean grind, because when your Group is unfocused or is constantly changing players, the early fights are a serious challenge, and it can get very, very frustrating trying and trying and never getting past Maiden of Virtue (Boss #3).

It’s the same with every raid, or even hard instance, no matter what your level. If you attempt a run and you either have poor communication, a mix of players that are not used to each other, or a group of players who may not be geared well enough or experienced enough in their current class specialization, then it’s gonna be a steep learning curve no matter what level you’re playing at. I’ve seen folks try and fail repeatedly at Dire Maul wings and full clears of Blackrock Depths just as much as at Karazhan, so it’s not anything new.

Anyone remember timed Undead Stratholme runs? Anyone? When there WERE no levle 70s to bail you out, and you’d run over and over and over, trying to advance in your Dungeon .5 set questlines? [shudder]

As I’ve posted before, my guild has two groups that raid Karazhan. We just barely have enough people to fill two groups.

Group 1, of which I am not a part, was already mostly formed when I joined the guild. They have added other players since then, very good players that can play consistently every raid night without fail

I was approached about possibly joining Group 1 early on, but frankly there is no way that I can meet the time commitments every single week, every raid night to run in Group 1. But I can admire their hard work and determination, and I can cheer on their success. They have cleared all the way up to and including Prince a few times now, and every week they get it down even better.

In contrast, Group 2 generally makes due with players like myself, whose play schedules are a bit uncertain because of family/relationship commitments, work and school. Some folks can only play weekends, others like me simply can NOT play every single night. So every evening it is always a bit of a crap shoot to see if we will get enough attuned players online on time (or close enough to it) to go in.

Last week, there weren’t enough players online most nights to even try. We’d spend two hours hoping more people would log in. Talk about a waste of a good evening.

Last night our guild Raid Leader decided that Group 1 was getting things down well enough that it was time to start spreading the knowledge around. Two members of Group 1, a very experienced Hunter and a solid Paladin, both transferred over to Group 2 to help us coordinate and learn. In exchange, two Group 2 members went to Group 1 to learn by immersion.

Tueday evening start time is 6:30 PM server. As usual, I was on time to the second with consumables on hand. And just as usual, it was past 7:30 before most of the stragglers had shown up. We got charged up, went into Karazhan, I main tanked with a protection warrior as off tank, and we marched our Big Bear Butt down the stables, and took down Attumen and Midnight like a late night snack.

Of course, Group 1 was doing the same thing at the same time… and we each downed Attumen at around the same time. And Group 1 announced that both the [Gloves of Dexterous Manipulation], AND my [Stabilised Eternium scope] recipe dropped! While our loot was caster oriented! Grrr!

We decided to push on to Moroes the front way up the stairs next, so off we went.

Again, as main tank, I was responsible for pulling duty on the stairs, and I performed my function by pulling with Moonfire, running down the stairs out of Line of Sight, and then hitting Barkskin and using Hurricane on the charging mob of non-elites. using Hurricane seems to REALLY get their attention, possibly because I don’t have ANY threat reducing abilities at all. By the time Hurricane has run it’s course and I’ve shifted to bear, it only takes a few Swipes and the group is down at my feet, usually without having gone after anyone else. The only times it’s gotten chaotic is when a second group may get aggro’ed, and my Hurricane isn’t off cooldown yet.

Going in and clearing the room with Moroes, we quickly wipe out the trash and set up for the fight. We have done this part so much that all of us knows very well what to do. Mostly.

We set up, get lined up on Moroes, targeting marks get distributed, kill order is determined, shackles and ice trap rotations are organized, and we’re off.

Again, I’m main tank, and the Prot Warrior is off tank. Moroes is yet another in a long LONG line of bosses and mobs in Karazhan that are utterly unaffected by taunt. You have to establish your threat purely through damage, and if you are letting someone else maintain threat without another tank as backup, then if tank number 1 drops or gets stunned or blinded (as happens frequently on Moroes), global threat producers (can you say the Healers?) get a boss in the face for insta-wipe.

Let me say right now… since acquiring Earthwarden, the Threat Per Second I put out has gone up outrageously. If I am given just 2 or 3 seconds to establish threat on my target, there is just no catching up no matter what the group does. I was consistently maintaining 700+ TPS while in ‘infinite rage’ boss fights or multiple mob pulls. It’s just amazing. I luv that hammer.

Okay, so myself and off tank take on Moroes… battle commences… and a short time later, the bastard is dead. First attempt, and victory! This is cause for celebration!

We do a loot check, and a piece of DPS leather gear drops. There is myself, and a new Rogue in the Karazhan group. The way our DKP system works, the loot order goes in tiers of how much DKP you have in the hundreds. If I have 300 DKP, and another competitor for loot in the run has 250 DKP, 300 gets to decide if they want it first. If he passes, the 250 can decide, and so on into the hundreds, and then the 10s. If you take loot, minimum DKP cost is 50. If two players that want loot are in the same tier, say both in their 300’s, then it’s a bid. I didn’t invent it, it’s just how it is.

Well, so I had 200+ DKP at this time, and the new Rogue had just passed the 50 mark. It was solely my decision. The two problems were that I had never seen the Rogue in any Guild run before, ever. I didn’t know if he would turn out to be a consistent player, or if this was his one visit, or anything. If it was ANY other Rogue, that had been active in the Guild at all, it would be a no brainer. Why was I hesitant? Why didn’t I just say “Heck with it, good for you!” like I have with the [Gloves of Dexterous Manipulation] many times? Because it was [Edgewalker Longboots] that dropped… one of, if not THE absolute best Feral Cat Druid boots in the game… and I do a lot of Karazhan catform work when I’m not the Main Tank. This would not only be an awesome galactic level upgrade to my existing gear, but I would be actively using them in Karazhan with the guild. But they’re also Rogue loot, damnit!

In the end, I asked the Rogue in a whisper if it would be okay if I took them. I was totally prepared to pass if he seemed super excited, but he was nice and really seemed not to care at all, just happy to have been present for a boss kill… this time, anyway :).

So I got the boots, quite shocked at my incredible good fortune. And then we buckled down and moved on to Maiden of Virtue. Who proceeded to kick our butts twice, before we decided to try again the next day.

So by the end of Tuesday night, we had so far matched Group 2’s best historical progression ever. Two bosses in one night. As a Group, Group 2 has NEVER downed Maiden of Virtue. Ever. Despite what some members vaguely claim to remember. Trust me. I’d remember.

Which finally brings me to last night. We started up at 6:30 as usual. And also as usual, it was well after 7:30 before everyone was present and actually ready to go. This time the trash was gone all the way before the corridor leading to Maiden, so it was a fast run up to getting started. Also, unlike the night before, we had Clana the Magnificent to heal us through

We marched down the hall quickly and set up for Maiden. The Protection Warrior from the night before was standing outside Karazhan on standby, and we had another ranged DPS in our group in his place. Again, I was Main Tank. Now, in this fight, Maiden will periodically pump out a group stun. She also has an area of effect blast with limited range that can knock you OUT of the stun. When she stuns the group, she continues to beat on the poor tank, who is no longer getting heals. This time, our strategy was simple, but awesome; when the group got stunned, I had one Paladin as my designated healer for the stun, stnading at teh first step of the platform in my field of view in front of me. As soon as everyone was stunned, I would pull Maiden just close enough to bump him OUT of stun with her own AOE… and then I’d drag her back to the center of her platform.

Boom boom boom…. Maiden down, first attempt of the evening! I won’t pretend it was a certain victory… my health was getting real low, and everyone was running super low on health and mana, and there was no way I could Innervate anyone. But we did it, and now we know we CAN do it, and we’ll just get more comfortable with it over time.

So we checked loot, and she dropped Protection warrior plate, and Paladin Bracers… neither of which anyone could use. And we had no Enchanter. So we took two epics as vendor loot. CRAP!

Still, rejoicing was done. We had downed Maiden first attempt, and were ecstatic. We had some player substitutions as some floks had to log off, but we managed to keep a group of 10. We decided to at least go and find out which of the Opera events we were going to have for the week, so we’d be ready for Wednesday.

This was our first time past Maiden. We kicked butt through the minor trash, and and reached the Stage Manager. Our experienced Group 1 Hunter told everyone to stand off in a room down the hall out of aggro range, so he could go and activate the event. He’d die, but we would know what we’d face the next day. Then we’d go home.

So we’re milling around chatting in Teamspeak when the Hunter begins yelling, “Everyone run onto stage NOW! Go! Go! Go!

We confusedly run out to the stage, scrambling around, as the hunter is telling us that we have the Oz event and it’s starting any second, and off tank (the Prot Warrior) will be kiting Tinhead around, and I as main tank will be tanking Roar and Toto , and keeping them occupied, and then he went on to spread other info while the event itself activated…and I saw Roar for the first time, but no little damn doggie!

I grabbed Roar and began pounding him down and dragging him off to side, while frantically scanning the stage for a dog. “Where the heck is Toto? Who’s he on?” I call. The Hunter tells me he’ll spawn soon… and not to worry about facing two mobs, he’ll Scare Beast on Roar when Toto comes.

Again with the concern that I will die within seconds of tanking two mobs! I’ll never understand that. Don’t reassure ME you’ll scare away Roar, reassure the healers who are responsible for having enough Mana to keep me healed. I can live for a while with two mobs on me, it just destroys healer mana long term.

Anyway, I don’t get to see a lot of the battle with my Big Bear Butt in the way, but I pound on Roar good, and when Toto spawns I’m all over the poor little wolfie. I snatch him up, and keep them both locked up tight. Soon enough, Dorothee, Straw Man, Roar, Toto, and Tinhead are dead, and then the Crone and the Cyclone appear. I spend a good amount of the rest of the fight in the air, sucked into the cyclone.

Barely a moment or two into the fight, it seems, the Crone is down, and loot is being distributed. [Ruby Slippers] and [Earthsoul Leggings] drop.

Well, okay, so I guess we just went ahead and did the Oz Opera event. And completed it on the first attempt, again. So, are we going to quit now? Heck no! We’re excited now!

“Let’s go get Curator!” We shout, and run off towards the back entrance.

Now, I’m gonna cut this short(er). we cleared through the trash from the back entrance to the start of Curator. We set up for Curator with me as main tank. The off tank had to go offline, as did Clana who started sounding REALLY sick on Teamspeak.. like, botulism bad. But we found two replacements, somehow, and went on in. I had never even researched this fight, cause I certainly didn’t expect to be doing it so soon, so I asked the experienced folks what I should do. All they could tell me was to pin hm down and keep him focused on me. Everyone else had complicated roles concerning the Astral Flares and Evocation, but I didn’t even know what those were. I focused reassuringly on the idea that all I had to do was tank. It seemed wrong, because Maiden sure needed more effort, but the 5th boss is simple? I somehow doubted it.

I pulled Curator and drug him into my designated location. We began and I focused on pumping out as much unlimited threat on him as was bearingly possible. Pretty soon, I had him so far into the threat meter compared to everyone else that I could probably kite him all the way to Stormwind. A few Evocations came and went, and I tried to observe and analyse what little information I could see around my Big Bear Butt. It seemed to me that I was NOT getting hit during the times he went into Evocation. I didn’t know WHAT he was doing, but he wasn’t hitting me… I thought.

All of our casters were going super low on mana, so on the next Evocation I decided to test my theory. As soon as he went into Evocation, I shifted to caster, popped Innervate on our Priest, and shifted back. I didn’t know the precise timing of his Evocation, but I was confident I could shift back to Bear in time. Yes, I could, well in time. Enough that I probably could have popped at least three Lifeblooms or Rejuves off on people before shifting.

The Innervate certainly helped, but in the end we still had all casters go OOM, just as Curator hit 19%. I didn’t get heals, I died, and it was all over after that. If we had stopped his last round of Astral Flares before he hit 20%, we could have had him, but the Flares were still spawning when I went down. Lesson learned… on the first Evocation, I need to pop out and Innervate someone, and pop back in so my 6 minute cooldown has time to expire and I can use it again towards the end of the fight.

We did not take a second try at him, even though we had cleared to him, because some folks had to go. It had just hit 10 PM, we had only been in there 2.5 hours, but it seemed like forever. This week remains the most incredibly successful time our Group 2 has ever had. We progressed in two days all the way up to Curator. I think that is something we can be damn rpoud of.

Some times, all you can do is /cheer.

Since I’ve had a few very nice folks whose blogs I love ask me how I put those mouseover wowitem popups in my posts, I thought I’d just post the info here for posterity. This post is 100% about how to add mouseover info popups to your wow item links in Blogspot, so if this does not interest you, you need read no further. I’ll have another post up about the alst two nights’ raiding soon.

Let me say right up front, I did NOT write this code, I didn’t work this all out, all I did was do some web searching to find where the creator of this, Okoloth, could be found when I saw other blogs that had the same thing. There is also a version of wowitem popups that works for Wordpress blogs that dan O’Halloran posted about, but the version I’m talking about here is Okoloth’s work intended specifically for Blogger.

The original work was created by Okoloth at the Armory Musings blog…. for questions or the source post please go there, see his write-up and the comments, and post your own comments and thanks for his hard work there.

The nuts and bolts of this is that you will need to edit your blogspot Template to add a section of code. The code you permanently add will recognize your links for a specific item. After that code is inserted permanently into your blog template, whenever you want to insert a wowitem with an active mouseover popup, you can simply get the Allakhazam/Wowhead item numbers, and insert them and the item name into a snippet of pre-written HTML. I keep a word document with every snippet of HTML code I’ve used previously, so I already have a ton of examples.

Let’s go over specifics.

Installation:

1. Login to your Blogger Dashboard
2. Click the ‘Manage: … Layout’ link
3. Click the ‘Edit HTML’ link
4. Locate a </head> in the Template HTML, and just before it copy & paste the following lines:

<!-- WoW Item Popup v1.3 --> <style type="text/css">
#wowitemfloat { position:absolute; left:200px; top:200px; z-index:100; }
.poor { color:#9d9d9d !important; text-decoration:none; }
.common { color:#ffffff !important; text-decoration:none; }
.uncommon { color:#1eff00 !important; text-decoration:none; }
.rare { color:#0070dd !important; text-decoration:none; }
.epic { color:#a335ee !important; text-decoration:none; }
.legendary { color: #ff8000 !important; text-decoration:none; }
.artifact { color: #e5cc80 !important; text-decoration:none; }
</style> <script type=’text/javascript’>
function showWowitem( event, id ) {
var element = document.getElementById(’wowitemfloat’);
element.style.visibility = ‘visible’;
element.style.top = event.pageY ? event.pageY + ‘px’ : (event.clientY + (document.documentElement.scrollTop || document.body.scrollTop));
element.style.left = event.pageX ? event.pageX + ‘px’ : (event.clientX + (document.documentElement.scrollLeft || document.body.scrollLeft));
document.getElementById(’wowitem’).src = ‘http://wow.allakhazam.com/ihtml?’ + id; }
function hideWowitem() {
document.getElementById(’wowitemfloat’).style.visibility = ‘hidden’;
document.getElementById(’wowitem’).src = ”; }
</script>
<div id=”wowitemfloat” style=”visibility:hidden;”>
<iframe id=”wowitem” src=”" style=”width:370px; height:500px; border:0px; background-color:transparent; filter: chroma(color=#FFFFFF);” frameborder=”0″ border=”0″ allowtransparency=”true” background-color=”transparent”></iframe>
</div> <!– WoW Item Popup v1.3 –>

5. Now click ‘Save Template’

Tada!

You’ve now installed the code to enable the item popup. All you need to do is craft a HTML link to trigger it into action.

- [Gyro-balanced Khorium Destroyer]
<a href="http://wow.allakhazam.com/item.html?witem=32756" class="epic" onmouseover="showWowitem(event,32756);" onmouseout="hideWowitem();">[Gyro-balanced Khorium Destroyer]</a>

- [Beast Lord Cuirass]
<a href="http://wow.allakhazam.com/item.html?witem=28228" class="rare" onmouseover="showWowitem(event,28228);" onmouseout="hideWowitem();">[Beast Lord Cuirass]</a>

Now, that is the entire core of Okoloth’s post. I personally had a lot of trouble in my HTML ignorance finding where in Bloggers’ template the /head was located exactly. In the end, I opened an “Edit… Find (on this page)” window and searched for /head. It popped up instantly. I copied/pasted the above WoW Item Popup V1.3 code into the template right before the /head, and it worked for me the first time. PLEASE, before you try it, do what Blogger suggests and save your template before making changes. If somehow this doesn’t work for you, I’d hate to think I was responsible for taking down a friends’ blog.

What Okoloth’s HTML Template code does is look for a snippet of HTML for the item you are inserting into your post. It will pull the item number you entered from the (event,#####) section of that HTML snippet. That number is what Allakhazam uses as their discrete webpage identifier for the item you want to link to. It adds that number to the end of an inquiry to pull the data on the items’ stats from Allakhazam.

Now, in the snippet of HTML that you modify and insert into your posts yourself, you’ll see a line, http://wow.allakhazam.com/item.html?witem=28228. That line in the HTML snippet is just a hotlink to where you want someone who clicks on the link to be directed. I do not personally like Allakhazam’s UI for my searching, so I have changed that in what I use to direct to the same item in Wowhead instead, as “Someone” in the comments yesterday so astutely noticed.

So the snippet of HTML I use for my actual post links are as follows;

- [Gyro-balanced Khorium Destroyer]
<a href="http://www.wowhead.com/?item=32756" class="epic" onmouseover="showWowitem(event,32756);" onmouseout="hideWowitem();">[Gyro-balanced Khorium Destroyer]</a>

The snippet of HTML also has one other variable, the class=”xxxx” section. That determines what color the text of your item link is gonna be, and you can choose from the following categories;

Categories

• poor
• common
• uncommon
• rare
• epic
• legendary
• artifact

The reason this has been easy for me to use in my posts, is the wierd fact that both Allakhazam and Wowhead use the exact same item numbers in their webpage links. I had heard that they were now both owned by the same parent company, but this still seems darn strange to me. Whatever the reason, so far for every item I’ve wanted to link to both websites have used the same item number. maybe it is a number that Blizzard iteself uses. I have no idea. Anyway, so I have been going to Wowhead, looking up an item, noting what number they used in the webpage for that item, and then inserted that number in BOTH my link, and in my (event,#####). I haven’t even been verifying the number in Allakhazam much anymore before posting, because when I publish the post, I quickly check every link to see if the data pulled from Allakhazam on mouseover matches the item name I wanted. Every single time, the info pulled from Allakhazam has matched the Wowhead item number. Freaky, huh? But it has. The ONLY time I’ve had a discrepency is when I tried to link the Idol of Terror that Wowhead has up from upcoming patch 2.3. Apparently, Allakhazam has not added that item to their database yet, so my link worked but there was no popup data for the HTML to find.

I hope that my posting this here will help you see what I am doing specifically, and will add another location people will find to direct them to Okoleth’s amazing work.

Welcome back to another enthralling episode of ‘I gots my Earthwarden, so NOW WHAT?!?’

There is SO much to do once you reach level 70 in the Outlands, that I think it is a pretty fair assumption that if you are a casual (or dedicated) player of World of Warcraft, that even if you hit 70 within a month of the Burning Crusades’ release date, you still haven’t secured every Heroic instance key, maxed out your professions, gotten to Exalted with Ogri’la and Sha’tari Skyguard AND Netherdrake, and put Kara and Gruul on farm.

Of course, if you have, then you can stick around after this episode and give advice on which pieces to choose to bolster +defense when your gear upgrades remove some of what you already had. That’s right, I’ll put your butt to work!

Anyway, if you are a Feral Druid and level 70, then you’ve likely already seen one of the many ‘pre-raiding tanking gear’ posts that are around the internet.
There’s an excellent one at Adventures in Azeroth that I like, and then theres the pre-raiding tanking gear guide that I put together myself a while back.

Those lists are all well and good. Everything there can be attained from either soloing quests, patient stalking of the Auction House, or regular 5 man instance runs. All reasonable expectations for any competent druid, even if you are forced to PUG it.

But what do you do AFTER that? Sure, you’ve got great gear. Compared to a Protection Warrior, you’re already geared up to start tanking Karazhan, at a point where the Warrior is just starting to think about where to find his first good piece.

Today we’re going to talk about where to go for upgrades in Heroics, and in early Karazhan raiding.

The drawback to having such great pre-raiding gear is that there are very few items that are upgrades once we DO start raiding. If you figure that your gear is good enough to start raiding Karazhan, and you’ll pick your upgrades up from there, then I have bad news for you sunshine; there’s not that much to find in Karazhan for a feral bear tank. Our gear upgrades are a bit harder to track down than that. Nope, even if you’re technically ready for Karazhan, you are going to need to look elsewhere for the bulk of your upgrades. That’s right; Heroics.

And now, we’re getting back to the point that started this post… maybe you JUST hit 70. Or maybe you hit 70 months ago, but you wanted to grind Kurenai reputation to get a Talbuk Mount, and farm money to get your epic flying skill, and then pound out Sha’tari Skyguard and Netherdrake rep for your wriggly sky worm and dragon mounts. [Not that I know anyone that did that :)]

Maybe you’ve already been tanking Karazhan, and you’re guild is rarely getting past Maiden, and NEVER getting to Illhoof, and you’re sick of seeing the same three boss drops over and over and over. Sure, the rep is getting you fantastic Tanking Ring upgrades, but you are getting burned out and miss that excitement at knowing that your tanking just got better. You know that the time has come to finally look at getting keyed for Heroics. But which one to choose first?

Well, there are two possibilities. First, maybe you’re a Pokemon Master, and you ‘gotta catch em all’, and you want exalted with everyone, all at once. You go ahead with that, I’ll admire your dedication and work ethic… from a distance.

The other possibility is you want to know how you can get the most potential return on your time investment. Time is valuable… you are going to have to spend some of it running instances to attain reputation with a faction to earn that Heroic Key. You want to know that the choice you make is going to give you the best chance to get some good upgrades. Right?

There are two different kinds of rewards for achieving reputation with a faction.

• First, there is the immediate reward; a faction Quartermaster has different items to sell, depending on your reputation level with them. As soon as you have the right reputation to qualify, boom, you can buy the item.
• Second, there is the potential reward. As soon as you buy your Heroic key at Revered (soon to be reduced to Honored in Patch 2.3), you can begin to run Heroic instances, with the potential to earn one of the Heroic level rewards. You also earn a Badge of Justice for each Heroic boss you kill, which you can save and turn in to G’eras in Shattrath City for even more epic loot upgrades.

Now, my first recommendation, unsurprisingly, will be Cenarion Expedition.

The reason why is that at Exalted, the immediate reward you will receive is the ability to purchase [Earthwarden] as your new Main Tanking weapon. You won’t have to try to get it to drop, and you won’t have to find a solid group to run Heroics. As soon as you hit Exalted, it’s yours. On the other hand, of course, you have to climb all the way past Revered to Exalted to get it. But frankly, in my opinion, it’s worth it. [Earthwarden] will last you for a LONG time. The next time there is ANY upgrade to your tanking weapon is the [Wildfury Greatstaff], which drops from trash mobs in Serpentshrine Cavern. SSC is a fairly long way down the raiding path for most guilds. You will first need 25 people that are solidly geared from Heroics, Karazhan, AND Gruuls’ Lair before you can realisticly hit Serpentshrine Cavern. Let’s face it… getting [Earthwarden] will likely last you for a long time in your tanking life. Also, don’t overlook that at Revered you can buy the [Strength of the Untamed], which is a pretty darn good tanking neck piece. It’s not quite as highly ranked as [Mark of the Ravenguard] or [Necklace of the Deep], but if you’re focused on Cenarion rep instead of questing you can be happy with this, and you won’t have to buy expensive gems to trick it out like you will with the [Necklace of the Deep].

The only real potential upgrade from Heroic Coilfang Reservoir instances is a fairly nice one, the [Argussian Compass] from Heroic Underbog, which drops from The Black Stalker, the final boss. The [Argussian Compass] is ranked by Emmerald as the highest of all bear tanking trinkets, but as has been pointed out by Kadaan, this is based off of being able to use the effect very often. I personally use the [Commander’s Badge], a trinket that is obtained through Netherdrake faction, which cannot be gotten until after you have epic flying skill. Kadaan also points out that [Moroes Lucky Pocket Watch] from Moroes, second boss fight of Karazhan, and the [Darkmoon Cards] (very high Stamina trinkets) are great choices over this also. Regardless of whether you go after this, or if you prefer a higher Stamina piece, or maybe one of the engineering crafted trinkets, most of your options here can be obtained from the Auction House, professions, reputation, or this instance.

Wow, so with Cenarion Expedition reputation, a profession or the Auction House, you could conceivably max out your Two-handed Weapon and both Trinket slots, lasting well into Serpentshrine Caverns. And no raiding yet!

After Cenarion Expedition, you have a few choices to make. If you are obsessed with getting your Epic Flying Form, than you’ll need to be able to run Heroic Sethekk Halls, which is based off of Lower City reputation. But if we’re talking about tanking gear upgrades, then my recommendation unquestionably has to be Honor Hold/Thrallmar.

Honor Hold/Thrallmar reputation does NOT provide any immediate tanking benefits. In fact, aside from the Quartermaster of Keepers of Time at Revered, there are NO other immediate Quartermaster rewards for feral bear tanks. Sure, there are plenty of professions patterns available from the Quartermasters, but as far as tanking upgrades go, there is zilch.

But the potential upgrades…. Holy Elune! Just look at this stuff…

From Heroic Hellfire Ramparts, we have [Tree-Mender’s Belt], which drops from the chest off the final boss. From Heroic Blood Furnace we have the [Mantle of Shadowy Embrace], which drops from Kel’idan the Breaker. This item should be sending up bright flares to draw your attention, because of the massive pain in the butt finding good tanking shoulders has become. Well, these shoulders kick big butt. And better yet, both of these Heroics are reasonable to run.

Finally, for the insane among you, you can take on Heroic Shattered Halls, and you can shoot for the [Forestheart Bracers], which drop from Warchief Kargath Bladefist. I personally think that this is too small a potential reward in exchange for the massive challenge of a Heroic SH, but since there is very little else to choose from as a bracer upgrade, if you have a good, GOOD group, it may be worth a try. It’s still a solid upgrade from your [Umberhowls’ Collar].

Regardless, the belt and the shoulders alone are awesome upgrades. It is possible to get a comparable upgrade belt from Hyakiss the Lurker, one of the three randomly generated critter bosses in Karazhan. And of course there is PvP gear that is better. But if you do not PvP, or your guild is not raiding Karazhan, or is bypassing the critter bosses, then the belt and shoulders here are just outstanding.

Now, if you’ve gone this far, lol, and you’ve gotten those two Heroic keys, and run those instances to get your [Argussian Compass], [Tree-Mender’s Belt], and [Mantle of Shadowy Embrace], then you should AT LEAST have 25 Badges of Justice.

RUN, don’t walk, over to G’eras in Shattrath City, and buy your [Ring of Unyielding Force]. This ring, coupled with the [Violet Signet] from Karazhan reputation, will be your final two rings well into Magtheridon’s Lair. Starting to look like we’re getting our end game raiding gear here, doesn’t it?

We are now left with Caverns of Time, Auchindoin, and Tempest Keep to choose from. Unfortunately, as I said before, NONE of the three Quartermasters here benefit a feral bear tank, even at Exalted. At Revered, the Keepers of Time Quartermaster, Alurmi, will sell the [Glyph of the Defender], the best tanking enchant for your head armor slot. But you probably got to Revered with Keepers of Time just by running Karazhan attunement, and then running Durnholdt/Old Hillsbrad a few times trying for your [Iron Band of the Unbreakable]. Either way, reaching Revered with Keepers of Time isn’t a difficult grind, and the [Glyph of the Defender] is worth it.

If you carefully compare the potential rewards you can obtain from running the rest of the Heroic instances with the gear that you can obtain as suggested by the beginning guides, you’ll find that none of them are worth your effort. Crazy, isn’t it? Caverns of Time, Auchindoin, and Tempest Keep can all be safely ignored by a feral TANK. There are plenty of DPS cat form rewards, of course, which is well worth an article all on it’s own, but as far as tanking gear… nada.

But after getting this far, and having two rings, two trinkets, a two-handed weapon, shoulders and belt… it’s looking pretty good. Your [Heavy Clefthoof Vest], [Heavy Clefthoof Leggings] and [Heavy Clefthoof Boots] are also solid pieces that can carry you well past Karazhan. So where else are you looking to get gear now?

Well, let’s take a look. First, let’s see what else we can get prior to seriously 10 man+ raiding.

From those Badges of Honor come two more great rewards. For an Idol, coming live in Patch 2.3, is the Idol of Terror for 20 Badges of Justice. (Edit: I know that the hotlink on the Idol wasn’t working right… so I’m going to make it a pagelink for now. Sorry.) For a neck piece, we can get the [Necklace of the Juggernaut] for 25 Badges of Justice.

If you are raiding Karazhan, the Maiden of Virtue can drop the [Barbed Choker of Discipline]. It’s not ranked quite as highly as the [Necklace of the Juggernaut], but if it drops then by all means take it, and save yourself the 25 Badges of Justice for when the new 2.3 Badge rewards are released.

Now we are finally into Karazhan. What you will be looking for are;

• Hands; The [Gloves of Dexterous Manipulation] from Attumen the Huntsman.
• Hands; [Guantlets of Malorne], the Tier 4 drop from Curator.
• Feet; [Zierhuts’ Lost Treads] from Karazhan trash mobs.
• Head; [Stag-Helm of Malorne], the Tier 4 head piece that drops from Prince Malchezaar.
• Back; [Gilded Thorium Cloak] from Terestian Illhoof.

That’s it. No, I’m serious. That’s it for Karazhan for bear tanks. If you don’t believe me, go back and look over all that gear again. It’s okay, I find it hard to believe too, but there it is.

That just leaves the Chest and Leggings. And it’s not pretty, because unless you PvP in a good Arena team, the next upgrades past Heavy Clefthoof are Tier 4 rewards past Karazhan.

For the [Greaves of Malorne], the Tier 4 armor token drops from Gruul. For the [Breastplate of Malorne], the Tier 4 token drops from Magtheridon himself.

I know that there are many dedicated players who actively raid these battles, and well beyond. I believe that if you are one of those players, then you are probably fully aware of what drops from whom, and also where you will be looking for your next upgrade. And if you are actively in The Eye and Black Temple, then bless you. I wish you good luck, and great rolling!

I hope that this greater in-depth look into bear tanking gear beyond the pre-raid warm up opens your eyes to your other options besides Karazhan, helps you to set some achievable goals, focus in on where to go, and exactly what you want to do next.

Until next time, peace out, my friends.