Introduction (http://www.thedruidsgrove.org/wow/forums/showthread.php?t=9578#post125935)
Starting out (http://www.thedruidsgrove.org/wow/forums/showthread.php?t=9578#post125936)
Server selection
Character creation
Spells and Abilities (http://www.thedruidsgrove.org/wow/forums/showthread.php?t=9578#post125937)
Talents (http://www.thedruidsgrove.org/wow/forums/showthread.php?t=9578#post125939)
Equipment (http://www.thedruidsgrove.org/wow/forums/showthread.php?t=9578#post125940)
Weapon skills
Professions (http://www.thedruidsgrove.org/wow/forums/showthread.php?t=9578#post125942)
PvP (http://www.thedruidsgrove.org/wow/forums/showthread.php?t=9578#post125943)
The high-end game (http://www.thedruidsgrove.org/wow/forums/showthread.php?t=9578#post125944)


Introduction

Welcome to the Druid's Grove World of Warcraft druid guide! This guide is intended to help new players, or even just players new to druids, learn more about the druid class and its aspects.

Druids are an extremely versatile class, and can fill many roles in a group. In caster form, druids are excellent healers and buffers, second only to priests, and can do moderate damage with nukes and DoTs, as well as other utilities. In bear form, druids can tank sufficiently for most groups. In cat form, druids can do good damage, and sneak around with Prowl. Druids are great when adaptability is needed.

However, all of this adds up to a class that isn’t always the easiest to play. Hopefully this guide can get you started.

Starting out

Server selection

There are four server types available: PvE, RP, PvP, and PvP-RP. PvE is the standard server – you fight mobs, and optionally, you can fight players if you turn on your PvP flag, or join a battleground. RP stands for role-playing, and these servers are the home to players who like acting out their characters from a storyline perspective. On the other side, PvP servers turn your PvP flag on for most level 20+ areas, so be prepared to fight! PvP-RP servers are a combination of, well, PvP and RP... "For the Horde!"

Character creation

There are two races available for druids, Night Elves (Alliance) and Tauren (Horde). Night elves have slightly higher intellect and agility, while Tauren have slightly higher strength, stamina, and spirit; in the long run, however, base stats are not enough to make a large difference.

Night elves get Shadowmeld, which allows them to hide while standing still; Nature Resistance, which gives them +10 nature resist; Quickness, 1% extra dodge chance; and Wisp Spirit, with which you can run 50% faster while dead. Tauren get War Stomp, an activatable 2 second AE stun with a 2 minute cooldown; Endurance, 5% extra maximum health; Cultivation, +15 herbalism; and also Nature Resistance, which is the same as the Night Elf racial.

Generally, people will pick a race for its faction, so they can play with their friends, rather than for stats or racials. However, War Stomp is a great reason to choose Tauren, and Shadowmeld for Night Elves can occasionally be handy as well. Also, if you’re planning on practicing Alchemy and Herbalism, the Tauren bonus is nice.

Spells

The majority of druid spells are all available from druid trainers. Druid trainers for Alliance are in Teldrassil (Aldrassil and Dolanaar), Darnassus, Stormwind, Felwood, and Moonglade. Druid trainers for Horde are in Mulgore (Red Cloud Mesa and Bloodhoof Village), Thunder Bluff, and Feralas. Asking a city guard will show a flag on your map with the location of the trainer.

However, there are a few quested druid spells and abilities: Bear Form, Aquatic Form, and Cure Poison. We have guides available for these quests in our guides forum. You can find them with the following links:

Aquatic Form - Alliance (http://www.thedruidsgrove.org/wow/forums/showthread.php?t=8149)
Aquatic Form - Horde (http://www.thedruidsgrove.org/wow/forums/showthread.php?t=9813)
Bear Form - Alliance (http://www.thedruidsgrove.org/wow/forums/showthread.php?t=8297)
Bear Form - Horde (http://www.thedruidsgrove.org/wow/forums/showthread.php?t=9782)
Cure Poison - Alliance (http://www.thedruidsgrove.org/wow/forums/showthread.php?t=8148)
Cure Poison - Horde (http://www.thedruidsgrove.org/wow/forums/showthread.php?t=9492)

Cat Form and Dire Bear form are currently purchased from the trainer, though there are indications that quests will eventually be added for these. Moonkin Form is the end talent of the Balance talent tree.

Also, there is one dropped druid spell, Gift of the Wild. Rank 1 of GoTW is available at level 50, and rank 2 at level 60. This is a group version of Mark of the Wild, which takes a reagent to cast and lasts for an entire hour! The drop rate of this spell was recently greatly increased, and you shouldn’t have many problems finding it in groups or raids, or buying it from the Auction House. Rank 1 generally drops off level 50ish elites, and rank 2 off level 60ish elites.

Rebirth, our resurrection spell, is the only rez-type spell castable in combat, which makes it handy to bring your tank or priest back in an emergency. Rebirth has a 30 minute cooldown, and also requires a reagent.

It’s a good idea to keep reagents on hand for Rebirth (and Gift of the Wild, if you have it), regardless of price. Generally, the guards in the major cities will tell you where to find reagent vendors.

Talents

Druid talents, like those of other classes, fall into three trees. For druids, those trees are Balance, Feral, and Restoration. Balance talents are primarily aimed at increasing your spell damage, Feral talents will mostly add to your shapeshifted form abilities, and Restoration talents are generally designed to boost your healing and buffing ability. Druids can function in all areas even without a specific talent build, but the talents definitely increase skills in their areas. So, if for example you find yourself doing a lot of healing, a Restoration talent specialization might not be a bad idea.

Some talents that have been recommended for druids, depending on build, are Omen of Clarity and Improved Wrath from the Balance tree, Furor, Intensity, Improved Mark of the Wild, Nature's Focus, Nature's Swiftness, and Innervate from the Restoration tree, and Feral Charge, Heart of the Wild, and Leader of the Pack from the Feral tree. Of course, your mileage may vary.

You can also find a great talent builder (http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/classes/druid/talents.html) on the World of Warcraft community site.

Equipment

Because of our shapeshifting abilities and our different roles, most druids tend to keep multiple sets of gear – one for caster form, and one or more sets for feral forms.

For caster form, you’ll probably want to focus on intellect, stamina, and spirit. For feral forms, you’ll probably want to focus on stamina, strength and agility. Intellect will increase your mana pool and spell crit chance, making it a must for casting spells. Spirit will increase your mana and health regen, and is greatly magnified when using Innervate. Stamina will increase your maximum health, and is helpful in almost any situation. Strength will increase your attack power, and thus damage, and is good for bear and cat form. Agility will increase your chance for melee crits, your chance to dodge hits, and your attack power in cat form. Which of those to place the most emphasis on is often debated.

With that said, generally there isn’t much point in collecting multiple gear sets at lower levels. It’s hard to keep two sets up to date while you level up. However, around level 50 or so, you can probably start collecting items for other gear sets.

Try to get the quests for instances as you level up, especially the quests that involve killing the bosses – you can get some great loot, such as the Staff of Westfall (http://wow.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?witem=2042) from a Deadmines quest, or the Crescent Staff (http://wow.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?witem=6505) from a Wailing Caverns quest. At higher levels, we have Wildheart (http://wow.allakhazam.com/db/itemset.html?setid=185), Cenarion (http://wow.allakhazam.com/db/itemset.html?setid=205), and Stormrage (http://wow.allakhazam.com/db/itemset.html?setid=214) sets.

There are a ton of excellent items out there, and I can’t come close to listing them all! Our Equipment forum (http://www.thedruidsgrove.org/wow/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=58) has some good threads on equipment choices.

Weapon skills

Druids can use staves, daggers, one-handed and two-handed maces, and fist weapons. While druids could use spears in beta, druids cannot train polearms anymore.

For Alliance, you can train one-handed and two-handed maces, and fist weapons in Ironforge, and also fist weapons in Darnassus. For Horde, you can train daggers and two-handed maces in Thunder Bluff, and fist weapons in Orgrimmar. As before, ask a guard and it will show a flag on your map.

Weapons damage, delay, and skill have no effect while in bear or cat form. (Thanks to Ender for testing out (http://www.thedruidsgrove.org/wow/forums/showpost.php?p=125012&postcount=5) weapon skills in forms.) Aquatic, travel, and moonkin forms are different, however. They do use the damage, delay, and skill of your current weapon.

Stat bonuses will still have an effect in all shapeshifted forms. Weapon combat effects (procs) will only work in aquatic, travel, and moonkin forms.

Weapon skills will not go up in bear or cat form. Weapon skills will go up in aquatic, travel, and moonkin forms.

(This post reserved for a future section.)

Professions

There are great general descriptions (http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/professions/) of the various professions on the official World of Warcraft site. In addition, you can check our Trade Skills forum for further discussion and tips on professions.

Generally, leatherworking and skinning, alchemy and herbalism, or engineering and mining will probably be most useful for a druid.

We have excellent alchemy (http://www.thedruidsgrove.org/wow/forums/showthread.php?t=8175) and fishing (http://www.thedruidsgrove.org/wow/forums/showthread.php?t=8583) guides available here as well.

Player vs. Player (PvP)

Player vs. player combat is one of the more interesting (and controversial) facets of World of Warcraft. As you might expect, the Alliance and the Horde aren’t exactly on friendly terms with each other. Currently, you can PvP in a few different ways:

Type /pvp to toggle your PvP flag, to engage in PvP outside battlegrounds.
Attack a PvP flagged opponent (NPC or player), or buff/heal a PvP flagged ally to enable PvP for 5 minutes.
In contested zones, your PvP flag will automatically be turned on. On a PvP server, most 20+ zones are contested. On non-PvP servers, entering the opposing faction's capital cities will turn your flag on.
Battlegrounds. There are three of these, Alterac Valley, Warsong Gulch, and Arathi Basin.

[Note: I am not very familiar with PvP. If you live and breathe PvP and want to help expand this section, please send me a PM. -Yrys]

High-end Game

Often, you’ll hear people refer to the high end game. Generally, this means levels 55+, and especially at 60, where gameplay changes quite a bit from the lower levels. At 60, you no longer gain experience, so you have to figure out other things to do. ;)

Some of the options for high-end gameplay include:

Saving money for epic mounts, buyable items, and other things.
Killing monsters of a specific type for reputation (http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/basics/reputation.html), to gain access to special items. An example of this is the Argent Dawn. Killing undead in the Plaguelands will yield AD reputation; after you get to friendly with AD, one of the things you can buy is special food that regens both mana and HP.
Participating in PvP in battlegrounds, to gain honor and reputation for PvP items.
Doing high level instances for quest rewards, keys, items, and other goals.
Raiding! A very large portion of WoW’s high end game is centered around raid progression. Ndainye has written a great raiding guide (http://www.thedruidsgrove.org/wow/forums/showthread.php?t=9485) if you want more information on this.

(This post also reserved for a future section.)

Wow, I have been playing a Druid till level 57 so far and through all the forums I haven't found one that actually explicitly tells if Agilitly increases attack power (in cat form)until now. Thanks for
the great post and keep it up!

Fantastic thread, thanks! :sumo:

amazing

thanks for the tips

ty!

I'm a lvl 14 druid and found the info quite interesting, but some of the links no longer work. (or at least not for me!) I'm looking for any info that will help. Currently speccing feral. Really enjoyed reading it!

Whoops. I'll update the links. Thanks for pointing that out.