The Great Druid Armor Nerf Conspiracy Exposed

I am writing here today my brothers to warn you that we druids are in the midst of a great conspiracy at Blizzard Headquarters. Some of you may already know what I am talking about. Others of you may have suspicions but don't want to believe it. I am here to tell you that the developers have conspired to nerf one of our biggest advantages in the expansion - our huge AC!

They have seen us tanking in Blackwing Lair. They have seen us tanking in Ahn'Qiraj. They have seen how we can mitigate 70% or more melee damage with our awesome AC. The developers have seen it all and they are angry! Now they are swinging the mighty nerf bat directly at us bear tanks to put us back in our place.

How do I know this you ask? The evidence everywhere. First I point you to this thread on the beta forums - http://beta.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=220378&sid=1 in which multiple players confirm that all our leather AC has been nerfed. This includes our current armor so that the day the expansion is released all our armor will be nerfed. But wait it gets worse! Ask yourself why they would nerf the AC of all the armor in the game and then look at the trend in all the leaked items from beta. Every leather item I have seen is much lower AC than the items I have right now - and this includes level 70 items! Look at this crafted set which is supposedly for tanking :

Heavy Clefthoof Leggings - http://thottbot.com/beta?i=3420
229 AC

versus my Dark Heart Pants with 296 AC!


Heavy Clefthoof Boots - http://thottbot.com/beta?i=403
180 AC

versus my Boots of the Shadow Flame with 286 AC!


Heavy Clefthoof Vest - http://thottbot.com/beta?i=403
263 AC

versus my Ghoul Skin Tunic with 411 AC!


My fellow druids I have looked at a lot of loot screenshots from the Beta and I have seen a lot of leather items and not one of them is higher AC than what I have now. With this itemization us bear tanks will have nowhere near the amount of AC we have now and we will be fighting against mobs 10 levels higher.

Now I know what you are thinking - "But Jogan, warriors got their AC nerfed too." and in response I will point out two things :

1. Warriors do not depend on AC for mitigation near as heavily as bears. They will still have their parry, high +def and shield block which we lack.
2. Not only is all of our leather much lower AC, but we have yet to see any upgrade to Warden Staff, Smoking Heart of the Mountain or Mark of Tyranny. It is enough of a travesty that us bear tanks are limited to using a level 48 epic and two blues at level 60, but if we are still stuck with these at level 70 it will be disastrous. So far I haven't seen one single +armor weapon or trinket from Beta. When I couple that with this disturbing trend of nerfing our current AC and not seeing any new high AC leather I am convinced that the reason we have not found any new +AC weapons and trinkets is because there is none!

Why would they do this to us you ask? They do it because they are terrified of seeing us out tank warriors. It's the same reason they nerfed mangle. They are terrified that if our ability to perform a role was comparable to other classes then we would be overpowered. Of course, somehow this rule does not apply to our healing role. Oh sure, when the expansion comes out things will be great for a while. Bears will tank and dps all the time in the easy 5 mans. But eventually we will reach level 70, and that means it's time for the big leagues - end game raiding. In raids there's only two roles right now druids are viable in - healing and tanking. But if the Blizzard devs get away with nerfing bear tanks into the ground then our only viable end game form will be a tree.