http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/patchnotes/test-realm-patchnotes.html
Test Realm Notes 2.0.10

Druids

When the duration of "Cyclone" ends, area buffs such as "Leader of the Pack", "Tree of Life", and "Moonkin" will now be correctly resumed.
"Bear Form" now grants 25% increased stamina instead of 25% increased health.
"Dire Bear Form" now grants 25% increased stamina instead of 25% increased health. In addition, the armor bonus has been reduced from 450% to 400%.
The multiplier on base weapon damage for "Mangle (Bear)" ability has been changed from 130% to 100%. In addition, the bonus damage has been reduced by the same ratio.
"Savage Fury" no longer affects "Mangle (Bear)".
"Savage Fury" no longer applies to "Maul" or "Swipe".
The critical damage bonus on "Predatory Instincts" reduced from 3/6/9/12/15% to 2/4/6/8/10%.
"Improved Leader of the Pack" can no longer get critical heals.
The armor bonus from "Moonkin Form" has been increased from 360% to 400% (to match Dire Bear Form).
The rage normalization equation has been adjusted to grant more rage.

*sigh*

Fun while it lasted...and how Warlocks and Hunters remained untouched is a miracle to me.

Goddamnit.

hope all the kids whining on the official forums are happy.

*edit: Yeah wtf. OK DEMONOLOGY WARLOCKS OBV DONT NEED A NERF. AND DESTRO LOCKS ARENT OP EITHER. >,< Thats just BS.

Atleast it was only the 5% crit increase for cat. Only bear mangle was reduced.

The armor kinda sucks though =/

Dont really understand the whole more rage thing..i never run out if something is hitting me

Hunters and Rogues are way overpowered.....why doesn't Blizzard touch them? Because there are so many Hunters and Rogues running around that Blizzard is afraid of losing customers. Less folks play Druids so they pick on us!!!!!!!!

Yeah, I guess it kind of sucks... tanking might be a bit harder.

*sigh*

Well, tanking was fun while it lasted. Now? I could live with the reduction in armor and health. But the massive reduction in damage will make it impossible for druids to keep aggro. Not to talk about the usability of the bear form in PvP.
Why they would nerf tanking when every group out there is looking for tanks is beyond me.


Not that it matters when looking at the druid changes above, but they also nerfed Idol of Brutality:

The bonus to "Swipe" from the "Idol of Brutality" has been reduced from 50 to 10.


But I have the feeling that the next patch will bring even more nerfs.

Went over to the test realm...it isnt that bad, I can live with it.

Only one peice of my armor was changed, so catform other than the 5% reduction on that talent didnt change must at all.

Catform:
2342 attack power, 32.99crit ---> 2318 attack power, 32.91crit


Cleansed Fel Pauldrons

208 Armor
+34 Strength(-1)
+18 Agility(-2)
+21 Stamina
Durability 60 / 60
(Equip: Increases attack power by 20) - gone completely

--------

Bearform

11105 hp, 26348 armor to 10254 hp, 24045 armor

interesting is not the word i'd use :(

i dont see it as a small changes.

nor necessary ones.

just as i was really enjoying the game again.

Merged the two threads on this.

I can live with the armor change (it's not that huge), I can live with the health change (it's not that huge although unecessary if you ask me, since warriors are easily reaching the same amount), I can even live with the damage reduction (even with it being rather large, much larger than it needs to be IMO), but what I have a hard time with is the fact that right now, due to the nerf a few patches back our damage in bear form = our threat in bear form when tanking; you take away our damage, you take away our threat.

From what I've read it's close to a 30% damage reduction, which results in a 30% threat reduction, which is a significant amount. I am not currently out-threating good warriors by much, but that 30% will bring me lower than them, and that doesn't seem right, because we've always been the ones that received more damage yet had more aggro, it's how it was balanced out. Now we'll be receiving more damage, having less health/armor to soak if up, AND produce less threat than a warrior? Seems like a bit much if you ask me, that's worse than how it was back when we were just starting to tank ZG and crap. Pallies will out-threat us by FAR, I may as well just level up my pally. Not gonna be worth it to have a bear tank anymore, really, even as off-tank, since we can't build up emergency aggro as fast as we need to. The fact that we could be DPSing, then easily switch to bear if a tank went down and pick up aggro in a couple mauls/swipes, made us pretty awesome in sticky situations, now that might not be possible.

They need to give us more threat, it's that simple. Nerf our damage, fine, but give us some kinda threat-increasing ability, or just up the threat on moves... OR make less mobs lacerate-immune, OR increase its threat.

I dunno. Maybe this 30% isn't as bad as it sounds and even I'm overeacting, but so far I'm not happy about this at all, unless they up our threat.

Makes me mad, cause I never did get to tank Karazhan, even though I'm trying my hardest to collect the gear I need to tank it (my guild's just a bit slow in gettng keyed), never will from the looks of it.

not bothered. account cancelled.

time to move on.

Umm..why are all the druids crying about a damage reductions...its ONLY mangle that is reduced...with the cooldown on mangle, I am usually swiping/lacerating/mauling anyways. Only thing I am going to miss is the pvp damage from it.

A sad day it will be if they ever changed our swipe to have a cooldown

Then read the patch notes again. Maul and swipe got nerfed as well.

Ahh, Savage Fury...didnt realize that one, still isnt that bad to me, atleast not as bad as all the druids I see crying on test realm about.

It's not that bad guys but what I am concerned about is how this will affect druid tanks because as stated before, most of druid threat = dmg.

its nerfed us a lot.

after we got viable as feral. they see fit to screw us rather than address other classes.

good going blizz.

LotR : SoA time methinks.

:texla:

I dont even have the +15% threat talent in bear and I have had no problem tanking anything, from 5 man heroics, Kharazon, Gruuls, might have to get it now, but I dont see the damage reduction as a big thing.

They mostly nerfed bear form, and that was kinda expected i guess.. still sucks, but expected. :/

I saw a 37% decrease in Swipe damage, 38% in Mangle, and 22% Maul.

We will still be able to tank, but it just won't be as easy. it will be hardest on the healers who have to keep us alive. There is such a shortage on tanks that we'll have to keep tanking.

Honestly, bear form needed a nerf. Did I want to see damage, agro, armor and HP reduced all at once? No, but I'm able to solo stuff most people can't touch. You know its bad when you look at elite quests at your level that you debate whether you should invite a healer along or if you can do it solo. When you decide that 90% of them you can do solo, there's probably a problem. I personally think the big bone dragon in the Bone Wastes hits like a girl, but I soloed him at 65. Bear form needed some form of nerf, but probably not everything they did. Just see how it turns out.

Honestly, bear form needed a nerf. Did I want to see damage, agro, armor and HP reduced all at once? No, but I'm able to solo stuff most people can't touch.

While i can agree to some extent that druids are amazing at soloing, i cant fully agree to this. Yesterday i took my 60 lock to outland. The first thing i did was run and try to solo a lvl 62 elite who i didnt manage to solo as druid in 5 tries. I beat him down easy without my pet dying and with 80+% health remaining.
I emphasise, I soloed a elite 2 lvls above myself, which my druid who was equal lvled couldnt get below 30% health.

Druids are insane at soloing group level quests. They are insane at soloing ANYTHING tbh.. I still remember the old days when people needed 3 or 4 people for a quest I easily soloed with my druid (or well, not easily, but still :)).

And on the other druids comment.. ya I agree. Bear tanks was getting a bit imba there.. I still think they should have nerfed the PvE angle more than the PvP angle as I like my bear doing damage in PvP.. but it was expected. :/

Im not sure what to think. I dont like the looks of itfor sure but will have to wait and see how much it effects my ability to tank.

I guess we will see how greatly this effects all the pug groups that are looking and looking for tanks.

When you see people advertising specifically for feral tank and NOT warrior tanks you MUST feel a little for the poor wars tbh. :)

Hmm, as I stated a couple of months ago. We were finally given rights to be any of our trees...now you will see tons of Restos out there, even if tanks are short. Healers are going to start recognising the changes to bears and will once again be under the impression that tank is spelled "W-A-R-R-I-O-R" (from some earlier forum post).
For all those who say "its not that big", concider this...each and every strength we gained in the BC release has been nerfed (Attack Power, Armor, Health) not just in bear, but in kitty form as well. And as I've seenalready they have nerfed some of our gear as well. If someone were to do the math on the talent nerf, racial nerf, armor nerf, attack nerf, equipment nerf you would find a severely crippled druid who will be relegated to the ranks of pre-BC. We basically were given a taste of the sweet life and then shoved back into the gutter.

Warriors needed buffs not Druid nerfs. Warriors got Thunderclap in Defensive Stance and a little more rage. We got told to reroll you will not be a tank. Blizzard just has no idea. And in the future it looks even worse. Most of the upcoming gear is not Feral but it is Hybrid so the difference between Druids and Warriors/Paladins will grow just like it did before TBC.

Ya i agree smartidiot (somehow, it feels wrong to type that nick). They shouldn't have nerfed bear at all, it was fine. They should have buffed wars (and tbh, havent wars been crying for a buff for like, REAL long?).

I myself honestly think they should give bear tanks to the same level as war tanks (and well, ya they did.. for a short while).
They should also boost cat dps to rogue equalent.
They should also buff moonkin.. hard to be competative to other nukers.

But thats just me.. I know we are "jack-off-all-trades-and-master-of-none".. but when you are talking raid-role in a 25+ instance people dont need hybrids.. they need roles!

And tbh, how good is a 41 feral as a nuker? How good is a 41 balance as a tank? How good is a resto as a DPS:er?

Give druids more raid viablility tbh (no, just having us there for innervate and combat rez doesnt work).

its nerfed us a lot.

after we got viable as feral. they see fit to screw us rather than address other classes.

good going blizz.

LotR : SoA time methinks.

:texla:


Ditto, My WoW account is cancelled and i got into the LotR Beta (the stress test was brutal, hopefully beta servers will be lighter) But ive been debating leaving WoW for a while now I'm not even feral but other classes QQ'ing getting us nerfed is lame...

Where do I find info on getting into the test realm? I would like to see the changes first hand.

in a way, i kinda understood why the changes were made. just yesterday (and countless times before), i was trying to pull a single mob, and accidently pulled another. since i had to go bear, i said to myself... hey, might as well pull 2 more of those guys, so i can kill them more efficiently (3 targets with swipe, and aggro generation).

i popped on my idol of brutality, and started swiping for infinite rage, killing them all with ~600 swipe crits. i could've easily taken more too. oh, and those elite giants that spawn multiple non-elite adds? they go down pretty easily too.

mebbe that's exactly wut they wanted to prevent? soloing over 4 mobs, while some of the other classes have problems with 2. however, i'm sure a warlock can do the same by dotting up multiple mobs, and chain fearing until the dots kill? so yeah, where is the warlock nerf bat? i wanna see it.

haha, ok, i'm done with my ranting too! overall, the nerf to druids isn't that bad, imho. the nerf bat just sucks in general.

Thing with chain-fearing is.. the mobs run all over the place and aggro more mobs. XD

they prolly dot them up and kill them too! ;D jk hehe

they prolly dot them up and kill them too! ;D jk hehe

hahah so true.

Want to check the PTR and see how it is. Was barely holding many groups together. Of course I play with some good DPSer's. They are going to have to hold back a lot more now. The least Blizzard could do is give us back our agro modifiers. Swipe is going to be pretty low DPS now.

LotR : SoA time methinks.

:texla:
Yeah, I was in the stress test this weekend, wasn't really all that intersted to be honest, was just something to check out. But now after hearing about the changes, I'm gonna continue playing in the closed beta with a friends key. WoW's days are probably numbered for me.

You know. I been a main-tank, off-tank and sometimes DPS before we got our buffs. It was harder than playing Prot. warrior trying to hold aggro and stuff. Then we got buffed and we just blew away what a warrior was built for. Opening doors for warriors to try new talent specs, while we took over as tank duties. With all our armor and mangle it show us how we druids are adaptable we have become. Now we getting nerfed.. so did we druids forgot that we are the most adaptable class in the game? I think they nerfed us because they know we got the brains to adapt. We can keep going, find a way to work for us, for the party.
I tip my glass to all of you druids, Balance, Restoration and Feral for being strong in the mind, using what we have and going with it. I do feel bad for Druids, but still proud to be one still.

You know. I been a main-tank, off-tank and sometimes DPS before we got our buffs. It was harder than playing Prot. warrior trying to hold aggro and stuff. Then we got buffed and we just blew away what a warrior was built for. Opening doors for warriors to try new talent specs, while we took over as tank duties. With all our armor and mangle it show us how we druids are adaptable we have become. Now we getting nerfed.. so did we druids forgot that we are the most adaptable class in the game? I think they nerfed us because they know we got the brains to adapt. We can keep going, find a way to work for us, for the party.
I tip my glass to all of you druids, Balance, Restoration and Feral for being strong in the mind, using what we have and going with it. I do feel bad for Druids, but still proud to be one still.

After much much thought I cant agree with you more.

Im not going to re-spec and bow down to the masses. My guild mates know what i can do and thats more than enough for me. I always have taken on whatever role the guild has needed from me and I will continue to do so....as a feral spec.. tanking will be more of a challenge, but eh, new challenges are always good. Hopefully the general population will not toss us back on the shelf because of the nerf.

The nerf was expected, but they did go a little overboard with it. I still think that we are better off than we were before and hopefully they will continue to tweek things as time goes by.

You know. I been a main-tank, off-tank and sometimes DPS before we got our buffs. It was harder than playing Prot. warrior trying to hold aggro and stuff. Then we got buffed and we just blew away what a warrior was built for. Opening doors for warriors to try new talent specs, while we took over as tank duties. With all our armor and mangle it show us how we druids are adaptable we have become. Now we getting nerfed.. so did we druids forgot that we are the most adaptable class in the game? I think they nerfed us because they know we got the brains to adapt. We can keep going, find a way to work for us, for the party.
I tip my glass to all of you druids, Balance, Restoration and Feral for being strong in the mind, using what we have and going with it. I do feel bad for Druids, but still proud to be one still.

I have always been a main tank for my guild, since before 1.8 when Feral == LOL. We finally got to be able to fill multiple roles. I think in the end Blizzard will need to buff Druid Threat a bit or we will not tank. We may be the most adaptable class in the game, but it is very tiring being the worst at everything as well. Wish I could get on the PTR and see what the truth is.

I mangle a lot for dps while tanking....ususlly looks like this.

Demoralizing Roar
Growl
Mangle
Lacerate *5
Mangle/Maul until dead


Will this change? How are you guys thinking you'll hold aggro under the circumstances? Mangle is a lot of dmg. Just maul more?

I mangle a lot for dps while tanking....ususlly looks like this.

Demoralizing Roar
Growl
Mangle
Lacerate *5
Mangle/Maul until dead


Will this change? How are you guys thinking you'll hold aggro under the circumstances? Mangle is a lot of dmg. Just maul more?

I do about the same things with FF and some swipes tossed in. Also I try and pull with a Wrath then moonfire, maybe even a quick cyclone if its a multi pull, hoping it will help me get aggro from the adds. Other than that, ya a good Mangle/Maul cycle to hold them. Hopefully this will still be possible.

One thing they really need to do for both us and warriors is put our AOE taunt on a shorter timer. !0 minutes has always seemed way to long to me. 3-5 minutes is what im thinking it should be.

I'm a feral druid, and not really worried about the changes. I've been playing WOW for about a year, which is a lot longer than any other game I've ever owned. A big part of that is the flexibility of the druid class; our ability to do so many different things keep the game fresh to me. Yeah, we're not the best at any one particular task, but I like being able to finish a run through an instance as a tank, then go through another one right after as a healer.

A big part of that flexibility requires us to constantly be thinking or re-evaluating our tactics/strategies. We have to adapt our game style as much as our characters can change forms to adapt to different situations.

So, I guess I'm taking a long-winded approach to agreeing with BlueBoy. They nerfed us and that sucks, but as they say in the military: improvize, adapt, and overcome.

Cheers,
-Vidal

Whats even more depressing is that they are doing it now when our itemization is on par with other classes. When the epics start dropping and more and more ppl are outfitting tier 4/5 gear the true chasm between us and the parent classes will be noticed. While we were able to shine in 5 man and 61-70 grind, we always knew that the gear at epic 70 was going to be a determining factor. I don't think Blizz should have taken what we can do now vs. other classes, but rather how our abilities will be impacted for end game.

I know its going to shaft my feral brothers, but this patch won't hurt me much, as a balance druid. I've only got 12 points into the feral tree, so the Savage Fury, and Mangle nerfs won't hurt me. And I don't have a Idol of brutality.

I'm currently looking at a few armor upgrades to keep me at my current level of 11K hp, and 13K armor. I'm able to tank most instances that are none heroic. I did Ole Hillsbrad successfully sunday night, and plan to do Black Morrass tonight as the tank.

Well this patch sucks, and we are going to be back to seeing a Druid playing about once every third tuesday it looks like.

Whats even more depressing is that they are doing it now when our itemization is on par with other classes. When the epics start dropping and more and more ppl are outfitting tier 4/5 gear the true chasm between us and the parent classes will be noticed. While we were able to shine in 5 man and 61-70 grind, we always knew that the gear at epic 70 was going to be a determining factor. I don't think Blizz should have taken what we can do now vs. other classes, but rather how our abilities will be impacted for end game.

I agree. I think the same thing that happened to paladins (nerfs in damage and scalable damage) are happening to druids.

Both classes were doing really well in greens/blues then Blizzard nerfs them before the dps classes have their epics. At that point it's going to be terribly imbalanced. The nerfs or adjustments should have come after some of the better gear came into the game.

You going to tank as OOMKin? Let us know how it works out. Black Morass is a tough instance.

I find the trick to tanking instances as a Balance druid is to have a lot of CC, and a good healer. And to realize that you have a limit and you shouldn’t go past it. The group I’m playing with are very able to see when its going wrong, and realize we have to get a real tank to progress. But it’s allowed me, a pair of Shaman, a rogue, and a Mage to all get our Kargz keys up to the BM run point.

I tanked BM, we got to the second boss and I got dropped like a prom dress.

We swapped so I was DPS, and brought in a protection warrior. We still got owned on the second boss. I did lead the damage meters though.

I tanked BM last night and I must say I am still a viable tank. The second boss is rough but I seem to have no issues staying up with a pally or priest healing me. I have 21k Armor and 10k+ health. I switched out some of that gear for defense items so I will test that out tonight. I lost about 1300ac but Im hoping the defense more than makes up for that. I am 415+ defense.

For those who complain about the changes, play the damn game and make an honest assessment of the changes. If you ask me, druids still rock as tanks and the aggro increase to mangle was a perfect solution to bear dps nerf. When I tank I dont care about my dps and neither should anyone else. Aggro holding is what its all about and for now, we still do that very well.

Tanked Steamvault yesterday with 2 mages, a hunter and a pally healing. It went okay, but holding aggro on multiple mobs was a hell of a lot harder than before. I like a challenge, so what the heck.

My druid is my main char, always been feral and I know how to tank well. I have about 14k ac, 12k life, 430 def, 24% dodge and 3/3 anti-crit talents specced (nature's fittest or whatever it's called).

If feel lacerate needs buffing as it really doesn't cut it, even when stacked 5 times mobs still run away and too many mobs are immune to bleed effects. The little instant damage it does now (critted for a whopping 70, I mean wow^^) doesn't help either.

Holding aggro on single mobs and bosses was still a piece of cake. I think everyone in the group now needs to realise that just like def tanks, you need to let bear tanks get a few shots in before blowing all your cool downs. Still the group thought that the tanking was just fine, so I believe we are still viable as tanks, not too many worries there then.

I just like to know how some of you reach such high AC and def values, someone posted 40% dodge^^. Are those stats possible without farming the arena or battlegrounds? I do have the 3 piece leather tanking set (grollhoof? I'm expat in Germany, playing a german version) with the superior green def+sta gems socketed and some other nice tanking gear mostly from quests. I am not full attuned for Karazhan yet and am only 14k rep away getting exalted with Cenarion Expedition. Would be great if someone could update the tanking gear post, it's quite outdated at level 70 I believe.

Cheers!

MikeHunt on Blackmoore PVP Germany

did you notice the rage going up quicker?

Yesterday I was SH and I did not notice that I had more rage, and if I did it was only very little. And it comes in big chunks, not a steady stream as before. In some situations I actually did not have enough rage (where before I would be alright). I believe that is because we do less damage now even though they modified the rage equations.

Any others notice something similar?