Eye of The Tiger?
Eye of The Tiger?
WoW Blogs - Meowing in the Moonlight Druid Blog
There have been some interesting druid improvements in the last week, mostly feral. Lets take a look at some of them:
Balance
* Soothe Animal is now named Soothe - Soothes the target, dispelling all enrage effects.
Feral
* Frenzied Regeneration now Increases maximum health by 30%, increases health to 30% (if below that value), and converts up to 10 rage per second into health for 20 sec. Each point of rage is converted into 3% of max health.
* Savage Roar now increases autoattack damage done by 50% instead of physical damage done by 30%.
* Bash no longer interrupts spellcasting for 3 sec.
* Enrage now increases physical damage taken by 10% instead of reducing base armor.
* Survival Instincts now Reduces all damage taken by 60% for 12 sec. Only useable while in Bear Form or Cat Form. Instant, 5 min cooldown
* Heart of the Wild now increases your maximum mana by 5/10/15% instead of increasing your Intellect by 2/4/6%.
Restoration
* Master Shapeshifter bonus increased from 2% to 4% for all forms.
* Furor now gives you a 33/66/100% (up from 20/40/60%) chance to gain 10 rage when you shapeshift into Bear form and you keep up to 33/66/100 (up from 20/40/60) of your Energy when you shapeshift into Cat Form. Now increases your total Intellect by 2/4/6%. (Old - Only increased in Moonkin form)
* Naturalist is back as a Tier 2 Talent. Reduces the cast time of your Healing Touch and Nourish spells by 0.15/0.35/0.5 sec.
Before these changes I had nearly given up hope about feral being a viable PvP-spec in Cataclysm. With these changes feral is much more on par with other classes.
One of the biggest failures of feral PvP to date has been the uselessness of bear form. It is mostly used for bash, feral charge and some measly damage reduction. As armor doesn't reduce magical damage or bleed damage, it's useless versus all casters and doesn't even mitigate all damage by melee classes (never go bear versus another feral unless you are going to get a bash through, you'll just bleed to death). But in Cataclysm, thanks to the recent skill and talent changes, bear form will have more use. Old Survival Instincts becomes a Shield wall, replaced by the buffed Frenzied Regeneration. Not only do you get 30% max hp, but you get 30% minimum hp and a hugely improved heal effect. This is good, as Frenzied Regen has been a complete joke throughout WOTLK, but could 30% hp-per-sec be an overkill? That's 600% hp during 20 seconds, expecting the druid has 10 rage available every second. Maybe it has been balanced with less rage-generation in mind? Or maybe there was a mistake in the wording? Or maybe they're just trying something crazy out?
On another note, Soothe Animal has finally been made useful. For example, in TBC priests already got their spell, Soothe Mind, made instant, but the similar and more useless Soothe Animal still had a cast time. It was made instant only in WOTLK. This is a prime example of the design philosophy in which druids are always given things that other classes got in previous expansions. Soothe is still following the same principle, basically being a Tranq. shot -copy, but it's a good and solid PvP-buff regardless. Think about dispelling another feral druid's Savage Roar or a warrior's Berserker Rage or Death Wish. This'll hugely improve any druid + warlock combo versus warrior-combos. "How overpowered will it make resto druids?" is another topic, though. But it'll also make Savage Roar even more laughable and hard to use in PvP.
I also need to touch the topic of the new Tree of Life. Many resto druid enthusiasts have had negative feelings about this change, but I think it's one of the best improvements for resto in a while. The skill itself is as follows:
*Shapeshift into the tree of life, increasing healing done by 15% and increasing your armor by 120% but reducing your movement speed by 50%. In addition, some of your spells are temporarly enhanced while shapeshifted. Lasts 45 sec. 5 minute cooldown. Enhanced spells: Lifebloom, Wild Growth, Regrowth, Entangling Roots, Thorns, Wrath.
When ToL was first introduced, it was more efficient to not take it, since it simply sucked. After that it underwent buff after buff and it became more efficient to take it and always be in it. For nearly 2 expansions it has been a skill that doesn't require any thought. You take it, you sit in it and you heal. The only downside is that you can be banished while in ToL, but that's a minority situation and in PvP only. Rest of the time you just use ToL whenever you cast a heal and only come out to Cyclone or break snares. In PvE it's even more simplified. There's just no reason why you shouldn't take it and always use it. Why have a talent that should be a baseline trainable ability?
At least in Cataclysm it'll be a unique ability that requires thought to be used correctly. In a tight situation it might be a completely new kind of lifesaver. And the throughput of resto druids stays pretty much the same even though they now spend most of their time in caster form.
By the way, how many of you can make a competent feral PvP-spec in Cataclysm? I'm still pissed at that jumble of talents. It's so easy to make a PvE-spec, you just take everything you need, but making a PvP-spec is impossible. There are always 2-3 talents left you can't have but would absolutely want. According to Blizzard this is good, but in my opinion it results in gimpedness. Unless they buff the base abilities of ferals. If the damage output is at all similar to WOTLK, ferals will want every single damage-talent in Cata, but they also need all the survivability - and in the end they still can't compete with the better PvP-specs.
Here's a spec I came up with, heavy on the survival: http://www.wowtal.com/#k=-bxYIuc7u.9sm.druid
What are my thoughts about Cataclysm so far, including these recent talent changes? Ferals might actually become competitive - finally. They get a set of tools that give them control and survivability. But unless they make our damage scale better, we will still struggle in the damage-department. In beginning of WOTLK feral was considered 'OP ezmode noskill class' because Ferocious Bite had a very high burst. I hope it doesn't happen again in Cata, as feral is well known as a spec that does comparatively huge damage in greens and blues.
Leave your thoughts, write a comment!
Last Updated on Tuesday, 17 August 2010 13:06 Written by Vepres Monday, 16 August 2010 20:42