Below are a few issues I still see bears having that I would like to see addressed. Its not that I expect all my wishes to be granted but rather that there are some inequities that I don’t see as interesting enough to justify the lack of normalization. I’m OK with certain stuff being lacking in one, or slightly OP in another tank as that adds flavor. When one tank is getting a crappy ability or clunky behavior for no good reason, I scratch my head. Here are some oddities with bears, some comparrisons, and a suggestion or two (with rationalization) of how it could be remedied.

1) How attack speed debuffs are spread: DK: with blood plague (via pestilence, outbreak, w/e). War: Thunderclap (no talent required), Pally: Hammer of the Righteous. Bear: Mangle/Maul. The problem: We can spread to 2 most of the time (3 while zerking), and more eventually. Each of the others can get to ALL targets in 1 to 2 clicks. Keeping that debuff up on an add pack is trivial for all except us. Why is it a problem: tanking add packs we seem to take a bit more dmg than the others. Our armor helps a goodly amount here, but how our mastery works seems to hurt a little.

Suggestion: I don’t think it would be OP to apply Infected Wounds on all targets of a Thrash, at least not from the attack speed debuff side. The fact that it snares as well….arguably would make this OP. I would question whether it was more OP than Avenger Shield+Hammer of the Righteous though. I wouldn’t mind if they split the snare and the attack speed debuff apart if they had to.

2) So much of the Utility that people site about bears and hold over our heads on why we shouldn’t get X-Y-Z is stuff that requires us to shift out of bear form into caster form. I believe its horribly unfair to hold this stuff against us when we pay the huge penalties if we use them.
a) we lose all vengeance stacks
b) We lose all rage
c) we can’t do this while tanking (which should be most of the time) since we lose all our armor and a lot of our life, and dodge, and….you get the picture.
Basically, if you do this while tanking something, you’re dumb. A good bear can sneak in a brez, or the wet noodle that is Innervate on a tank swap, or when any adds they are tanking die, or some such. Its tough though. And I’m man enough to admit I’ve caused a wipe once or twice by misjudging the amount of time I thought I could spend in caster form.

Suggestion: would it really be that OP if we could innervate from Bear? It doesn’t do much anyhow!!! Would it really be OP if we could brez while in bear? I don’t think so. Let us Innervate and B-rez in bear form. Tranq would be pushing it though. Hey, while we’re at it, could I get Thorns while in bear? Just so I don’t have to pop out, cast, and go bear again. (I have that macro’d. Nice for a little extra initial aggro on packs. Especially when you switch to caster gear in between. Mwahahaha)
3) Feral Charge using rage instead of giving: seriously….this is legacy crap that needs to go.

It seemed so obvious…

Otherwise, I’d say Bears are in the best shape they’ve ever been.

lol

SPIN THE WEB

Cheers!

Playing the other tanks lately in 5′s (DK at 85, Pally at 84, 20′s Warrior), I see so much in terms of group control, not just “gather ‘em up and survive.” Bears do decently, but seem to have a smaller toolkit. (Though I could very well be wrong here.)