Recent Guardian Druid Nerfs
Guardian Druids have been hit in both waves of class tuning recently, once on March 24th with the launch of the Mythic raid, and once on March 11th with the launch of Season 1 itself. These changes include a flat 20% aura nerf, in addition to larger sweeping changes to the spec, which severely reduced its damage output.
Guardian
Maul, Raze, and Ravage damage reduced by 20%.
Heart of the Wild: Cat Form and Moonkin Form damage reduced by 20%.
Moonfire and Red Moon damage reduced by 10%.
Season 1 4-piece set bonus: Celestial Might causes your Maul, Raze and Ravage to strike again at 50% effectiveness (was 100%).
Guardian
Moonless Night now causes your direct-damage melee abilities to deal 20% additional damage (was 40%).
Wild Guardian Rank 4 now causes echoes to deal 300% increased damage (was 150%).
Ability damage (excluding Moonfire) reduced by 20%.
Moonfire damage reduced by 10%.
Druid of the Claw: Damage dealt by Ravage to its main target reduced by 27%.
Druid of the Claw: Damage dealt by Dreadful Wound reduced by 23%.
Druid of the Claw: Killing Blow now increases Maul, Raze and Ravage damage by up to 70%, based on rage consumed (was 100%).
Druid of the Claw: Strike for the Heart now increases Mangle damage by 10% (was 20%).
Bestial Strength now increases Maul, Raze, and Ravage damage by 10% (was 20%).
These nerfs were very much needed, except they have left Guardian Druid's AoE threat in an awkward position.
Guardian Druid Threat Issues
Guardian Druid has some significant issues with its damage profile and Threat capabilities with these changes. While Guardian Druid's overall damage on single target remains the same, the majority of their damage seems to come from their cooldown windows with Incarnation: Guardian of Ursoc and from the Apex talents:
If you have a Guardian Druid in your group, you will likely need to wait for a couple of globals before they have solid threat on everything.
Overall Damage Profile
Guardian Druid has a damage profile consisting of high peaks and then low valleys, which causes significant problems with threat. As threat is damage-based, if your Tank is doing low damage, that means their threat is going to be low as well. Even with a 10x multiplier currently, Guardian Druid struggles without their cooldowns, in addition to other issues.
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Ability Damage Balance
Guardian Druid now has another problem caused by the recent nerfs. In previous expansions, Thrash was your main pickup button and generated rage, allowing Guardians to gain both Threat and Defensive Value. This is no longer the case in Midnight, with Thrash being tuned to hit like a wet noodle.
Similar to how the damage profile of Guardian is baked into cooldowns, the damage profile of individual abilities is very much tuned towards Raze and Ravage, and away from Thrash and Swipe.
As Raze and Ravage are rage spenders, though, Guardian Druids are forced into a lose-lose situation for Rage at the start of a pull: Survivability (Ironfur) or Threat (Raze/Ravage).
Considering a dead tank does not hold threat, the only real option is to Ironfur first, generate enough rage again to then use the AoE spender. Depending on the rage economy at the start of the pull, this can be up to around 6 GCDs for a bear to solidly have AoE threat - very similar to the old "three Sunders" for Warriors in early WoW.
Conclusion: Wait for Threat
Ultimately, when playing with a Bear Tank, players will have to be very cognisant of their threat. If the Guardian Druid has cooldowns, no threat problems will ever occur. Every other AoE pull between that, though, you’re really going to have to wait until they plant and use their first AoE spender.
