My guild is young, and we are just starting now to key up for the big raids.

We have two great tanks, and two great healers. I'm great at both, but, I haven't even reached 70 yet. That's not to say I don't plan to run raids, I just have to get there first. Because of this, I've been a little concerned about being included in future raids.

I mentionned this to my guild and they assured me that of course they will need me. They recommended that I consider going Balance.

Balance? Eeew! I've never even thought about it. Not even once. I love healing, I love tanking. Dunno if I'm gonna like this at all.

Any thoughts?

Stay away unless you have the ability to obtain some serious +spell damage gear (cloth or leather)

Unless you max out your +damage, you'll always be beat by Locks/Mages/Rogues/Hunters/Fury Warriors in the damage meters.

If you make a good tank, you'd make an amazing off-tank which helps when learning encounters. If the tank goes down, a good off-tank can save a wipe.

And don't forget about Kitty DPS. Much of your tank gear is easily converted to kitty gear with a new enchant or some new gems :)

I'm balance spec and my guild is just getting started on Gruul (cleared maulgar in the first go). in terms of viability, yeah, you're going to need to work at the gear. its really not as easy as the other casters who can be a bit more lax and still pump out serious dps. if you want to try it shoot for around 600+ (preferably 700), but dont neglect +hit which becomes huge on the long fights for maintaining a high dps level. in terms of kara and most dungeons, i really dont have a problem being high on the damage meters (in non-guilded runs i can easily be first or second in dps). of course gear is supposed to deteriorate after gruuls for a moonkin, as sets dont scale compared to the mains and off items arent created with a moonkin's needs in mind.

as to being needed in raids, mages/locks/pallies (especially pallies) love the crit aura. and improved fairie fire might not get noticed, but your raid leader will (or should) appreciate the bump in melee/ranged dps.

Maybe I just don't understand the mechanic of a Moonkin, but are the stats you need on your gear dramatically different from what a Mage or Lock would need?

I guess in our raids we always tell people to roll on what they can use. I'm not going to begrudge a pally rolling on a cloth piece if its an upgrade for them. Sure I'd love for them to have a 100% pally plate healing set that's tuned for them, but realistically until those pieces drop I'd expect they are wearing cloth, leather, mail and plate. Shaman wearing mail, leather and cloth. And druids wearing leather and cloth.

If you like feral and/or resto roles, stay with em.. if you want some serious damage dishing capabilities in a raid environment as a boomking you really need to gear up and learn to play it pretty well otherwise you'll just be a gimped mage.. but then again.. the +crit aura extra damage the raid does might aswell be counted as "yours", so there's no real definitive answer on that one.. depends on raid setup.

a moonkin just has to work harder to achieve the same level of dps that a mage could achieve. and, yeah they've done a lot to bring itemization in line with a mage/lock. but still, you need to pile up on int and mp5 to avoid going oom. and it can be hard to pick up gear that has high int and +dmg while also carrying spi. the future healing to damage change might affect that.

but yeah, it takes some commitment to be a worthwhile moonkin in a raid, so if you're not feeling it now, dont put yourself through the torture.

but still, you need to pile up on int and mp5 to avoid going oom. and it can be hard to pick up gear that has high int and +dmg while also carrying spi. the future healing to damage change might affect that.


No silly thats what an Spriest, Ele Shaman and raid buffs are for :)

true that :)

i loves my Spriest, but i dont always get one...

but yeah, it takes some commitment to be a worthwhile moonkin in a raid, so if you're not feeling it now, dont put yourself through the torture.

QFT. Just tell them you're interested in either healing or tanking/offtank/dps for the first bit. Once you have access to heroics and kara, you'll be able to gain access to the quality moonkin gear and if they really wanted a moonkin and YOU wanted to do it, you could respec then.

Also, hold off till Patch 2.3

They're tossing some serious Moonkin gear into Zula'man.

Then we'll see everyone go Boomkin.

ZA is gonna help everyone...even more with the badges

For a druid, changing specs changes the game experience so much that I sometimes compare changing spec with changing sexuality.

If my guild ordered me to start being gay I would tell them where to shove it, to be honest.. :P At the end of the day I can tank, dps, and heal very effectively as feral spec and this is far more useful than one extra ranged dps, and far more fun for me. The golden rule is to play the way you want to. Don't allow yourself to be pressured into respeccing; if your guild was that desperate for more ranged dps, they should be recruiting more ranged dps instead of passing the burden onto their existing members.

With all this said, I would recommend trying all the specs out, even if only for a few hours each, to get an overview of what the druid class is capable of. For the record I advocate this approach in real life, too.. ;)


-Annikk

Ah .. the old "is boomkin raid viable?" topic. Never fails to ammuse me when people go NO!

http://i73.photobucket.com/albums/i226/dazzyp150/Nightbanedown.jpg

3rd highest on dps meters.

ind you I did have some imba gear including the crafted LW set for tribal and the nathrezim mindblade. Also a raid viable moonkin druid should spec high enough into the resto tree for the mp5 bonus and some extra off healing power.

Also note that I usually am a maintank and that this was just for a laugh. (Although it was our fist kill).

Don't dis the spec untill youve tried it is what I always say.

Ah .. the old "is boomkin raid viable?" topic. Never fails to ammuse me when people go NO!

http://i73.photobucket.com/albums/i226/dazzyp150/Nightbanedown.jpg

3rd highest on dps meters.

ind you I did have some imba gear including the crafted LW set for tribal and the nathrezim mindblade. Also a raid viable moonkin druid should spec high enough into the resto tree for the mp5 bonus and some extra off healing power.

Also note that I usually am a maintank and that this was just for a laugh. (Although it was our fist kill).

Don't dis the spec untill youve tried it is what I always say.

Ah, the mighty h00tkin
Feathered and silent
Death comes quick to those that oppose him.
For those that claim a h00tkin
Has no place in raids
A fate far worse than death awaits..
Such hapless souls can only pray
They don't turn out to be allergic
To feathers =)


-Annikk

After beeing resto for god knows how long ...moonkin was the most fun i had in ages...
i slowly picked up some good gear "only on rot rolls as it was offspec" from raids and was getting some pretty hot stats...so i respecced boomkin

prepair to wear alot of cloth if you want to be competitive in damage

but with out a Spriest you may aswell call me an OOM kin
its allways a fight with the RL to get me into Spriest group as we generally put them with our healers so to pull him out of a heeler group and put him in a caster group seriously changes our raid make up

the other problem is im essentially taking up a mage or locks spot and have to fight with raid makeup and other core raiders to get a spot in a raid..one of my officers who is a legend with the maths behind wow said that even with the amount of damage and my crit aura just didnt have room in our current raid makeup and progression 8 (

its seems in my experience good moonkins in end content raiding guilds seem to be few and far between
there seem to be a few in kara raiding guilds but not many after that
the ones that are in higher end guilds have had a hard slog to get where they are but can be replaced with another caster quite easily with out messing with a raid

So if you do go moonkin you have a hard slog but if you make it you will have a ball

fun to look forward to includes tanking shaman mini boss in grulls lair in the mulgar encounter

also awsome fun in PVP

For the record I am raid leader in a guild on Azjol-Nerub (Europe) and we are recruiting 1 h00tkin at the moment for adventures in SSC... ^^



-Annikk

rent raid makeup and progression 8 (

its seems in my experience good moonkins in end content raiding guilds seem to be few and far between .

It seems to me that the reason for this is that people want easymode all too often and Balance spec is far from it.

Balance spec is hard 2 pull off but in many occasions people will shout and scream your name if and when you do. I am however not one to go for cloth.There has been many occasions where a quick tank here and there saved the lives of many a priest.Also mana is no issue in this form as long as you remember to switch to a higher dps weapon during a fight for insanely increased mana regen (Illhoof please drop my staff,its been 6 months already :( ) Take SSC for instance. We swear by at least 1 balance specced druid well geared on crafted leathers to tank for us when needed. This replaces a prot specced warrior and thus creates a higher form of dps. Its not all about replacing casters its about balance in all things we do. We can't heal that great neither can we hold huge amounts of aggro in this spec, BUT we can hold aggro and we can heal and that sets a Boomkin druid apart from the rest. Oh and just so you know, a balance druid can achieve as high as 15k armour in caster leather easy.

So in conclusion. No, we don't do highest dps but what we do bring is a feathery bundle of quick tanking and healing combined with a funny dance and druid love all around.

Moonkin druid is the best off healer in game, imo. They don't have to sacrifice any int, thus allowing a high mana pool. And all their +dmg gear works towards their healing, too (sans the +nature dmg only rings in Kara).

However, be forewarned, you'll be hard pressed locating balance gear. There just isn't s* out there between the blues you get in 5 mans and Tier 4.

As a raider who hasn't made it into Hyjal/BT, I have mixed experience with boomkins. I play feral, and an old guildy was boomkin. A very well geared boomkin. Quite frankly, he shamed many warlocks, shadow priests and mages with his damage output.

He also shamed them with how many times he died. Why? He pulled agro. He did not have any fade, no soul shatter, no invisibility, no feign death. He would pull agro and if the mob wasn't tauntable, he'd die.

This wasn't a problem with trash, usually. On bosses, it got to be a real problem. On simple bosses like Lurker, he was able to go berserk and would crank out insane damage. On fights like Void Reaver, he had to hold back so much, he may as well have just healed.

Some fights are fine for boomkins because they can't pull agro easily or there's adds that have to die (Lurker, Alar, a few others maybe...), but on straight up tank and spanks, it was a nightmare. Boomkins generate so much threat without any way to shed it that 'bad things happen' frequently (a boomkin was the only player i ever saw pull agro on magtheridon!).

So, it'll depend on your raid leader and your own abilities to control your agro. In general, healers and ferals have it easier, at least at this point. I still pull agro in cat form, but cower works ok and my damage isn't nearly as spiky as 5k starfire crits.

Bottom line: If you like healing/feral, stick with either of those. Balance is a whole other ballgame.

He also shamed them with how many times he died. Why? He pulled agro. He did not have any fade, no soul shatter, no invisibility, no feign death. He would pull agro and if the mob wasn't tauntable, he'd die.
no Threat meter. no Omen. Really, that's his fault. I pulled agro, maybe once, during my times raiding as Balance spec.

and with the improvement to Subtlety threat isnt too big an issue, especially when stacked with Salv. i have yet to pull aggro on a raid (even in Kara), but my crits are only going a lil past 4k.

Just watch your aggro when you get a crit spree.
got up to 5 5k crits in a row and that's a lot of dmg for 12.5s.

but dmg is not your main reason to be in a raid the 5% crit and the 3% hit for melee and ranged is.

He had a threatmeter, but on some fights, agro is a bit wonky. Like on Voidreaver, with the de-agroing of tanks. It's true, he didn't watch his agro enough on trash or the meter would count the agro a tank generated on one mob as being done to two separate mobs, and when switching targets, the boomkin thought he had lots of breathing room...

But it always irked him that he could never fully open up on some fights like hunters/warlocks/mages because of his lack of deagroing.

Playing a balance druid with the appropriate gear is quite satisfying. Your single target burst damage is some of the best in the game.

If you have the time, the heroic rewards (after the new patch) will make a moonkin out of any druid. The only set you'll have to really aquire (other than the healing set obviously) is your spell hit gear for boss mobs.

I recommend Leatherworking as a moonkin because of the easy (comperable to T4 or 5) crafted gear. If you guild utilizes your build you will find yourself grouped with mages, locks, and shaman (Oh my!) and the drums are a huge asset to your group.

I feel weird, I never liked to heal, I spec'd over to to Feral for all of 2 hours, I didn't like, maybe I should have given it more of a chance, but I love Balance! I feel we get the short end of it in instances (cant root- thats another post) nuff said. I want to PVP with my Druid but that hasnt worked out to well, lol! But end game wise when I hit 70 Im balls to the wall Moonkin :buttrock: My Crit strikes were pretty impressive in my last run thru Manatombs. I just hit 67, flight form is next then focus on 70, wish I could burn thru these next 3 levels.:deadhorse

If you have the time, the heroic rewards (after the new patch) will make a moonkin out of any druid.
Did you notice there still isn't any epic leggings? I think there's a bug in the loot given. There are +healing leggings, but why? There's a good set on Opera. I think those are suppose to be +dmg leggings. Don't you think?

Yea, I would have liked to see Heroic leggings.

If you are looking for good pewpew leggings outside of a raid environment, the occultist legs from the last boss in Heroic BM are quite dandy. It is unfortuate that they are cloth, but the INT and STA and gem slots make it a competetive addition until you can score some T4.

I am a balance spec druid that raids. my gear is mostly kara gear-- leather w/ some cloth. DPS is hovering around 800+damage

yes pulling aggro is a HUGE issue w/ no way to drop it. even if you have the chance to swift shift and cower.

EVERY balance druid NEEDS to take Subtlety in the resto tree. it helps ALOT. I tried w/o it and i pulled aggro w/ Insect Swarm. also a good aggro meter helps but i cant see a raiding guild let alone a raider that dosent have one installed.:twak:

start w/ Faerie Fire and Inscect Swarm when tank charges then charge starfire. if your tank is good you should be ok w/ the 6 sec or so u just gave him. then watch meter. if u see he sucks then wrath might be a better option.....you could always get a better tank =P

Now w/ ZA and season 1 gear we do have options to itemize. its still not the best but its a start.

so my reply ... if your guild allows boomkin{cause we will take a DPS slot} then go for is but keep in mind you really need gear thats not available in the beginning. you will need to piecemeal gear from lower lvl instance or make the WindHawk 3 piece set till you get to kara.

You never absolutely need a boomkin in PvE.

You always absolutely need a tank and a healer.

Not saying you shouldn't go boomkin. Just be ready for that; being a non-cc dps spec without an out-of-combat rez, your presence often will not be required.

any boomkin get their high dps levels by stacking spell crit. This can turn your fun little instance group into full blown aggropalooza. The Moonkin form armor bonus helps but your crits still have launched an aggro fest. So if you're serious about staying boomkin and don't want to aggravate the tanks and healers you run with, don't make topping the damage meter your goal, and try going for spell hit, spell penetration, and spell damage before crit.

For you boomkins out there in SSC+ guilds..what is your round about +spell damage and crit? was kinda curious the other day how the stats are for some moonkins...we dont have any in my guild atm.

My damage and crit depends on my situation.

for 25 mans:

Raid buffed for trash I'm at about 1100 - 1200 +damage and 30 - 33% crit. (Assuming I get the Elemental Shaman)

Raid buffed with 16% spell hit I'm usually about +1075 damage and 23% spell crit.


.KOS

Edit: I'm mid SSC/LootReaver for reference.

Boomkin pull some wicked agro... get an agro meter and taking Subtlety are a very good idea. I have pulled agro temporarily from prot warriors with 1 spell.

Boomkin are LOTS of fun to play, very versatile, and an off heal/battle res/tank are handy if not well respected.

Casters love the extra crit chance, you will be more welcome in a raid with a heavy caster compliment...

Not just casters, holy paladins, too.

I'm usually resto but do take what we call a 'boomkin holiday' every now and then. I've collected some nice balance gear mostly from kara and heroic badges and unbuffed have around 970 damage and 21% crit.

I agree with the others that subtelty is a must and ofc the casters and palas will love you which makes you feel good ^^

Unfortunately for me my boyfriend is main tank and he won't let me leave my resto position too often for fear of humongous repair bills. But for every now and then boomkin is fun :)

For you boomkins out there in SSC+ guilds..what is your round about +spell damage and crit? was kinda curious the other day how the stats are for some moonkins...we dont have any in my guild atm.

With my spell hit gear (aka raiding gear) unbuffed I am at:

Health: 8684
ana: 8930
Spell damage: 1141
Hit: 141
Crit: 18.53% (Moonkin)

If you are gearing to go end game then you should always get Hit first then once you are hit capped it's up to you how to socket I guess. It usually goes Hit>Damage>Crit. I don't socket for crit, which is why my raiding crit is so low by itself, but with buffs and pots it goes up. So I don't really worry about it.

He also shamed them with how many times he died. Why? He pulled agro. He did not have any fade, no soul shatter, no invisibility, no feign death. He would pull agro and if the mob wasn't tauntable, he'd die.

I hardly ever pull threat in raids because I know how to look at my meter, and I know the fights well enough to know when to stop dps (i.e. aggro dump on hydross trans.)

y guild loves balance druids and I love them for loving me! I am Boomqueen!! lol