For those not following every blue post, an upcoming PTR/Beta patch will contain major changes to the Feral tree.

From http://blue.mmo-champion.com/2/10043226143-what-is-your-intention-for-berserk.html

Okay, I guess Koraa didn't get a chance to post it today.

1) Feral Faerie Fire becomes a core ability.
2) Brutal Impact increases duration and lowers cooldown of Bash. It swaps with Savage Fury, mostly to keep it out of the paws of anyone but Ferals.
3) Feral Faerie Fire replaced with the old Last Stand component of Berserk. But it's usable in both cat and bear forms.
4) Cat Berserk does not change. Bear Berserk goes back to Mangle hitting 3 targets, and since that isn't so useful on single targets, it also removes the 6 sec (untalented) cooldown of Mangle during the 15 sec duraton for some nice bear burst or threat generation. The Fear immunity is still intact.

Yes, Bash will now work as an interrupt even if the boss is stun immune.

That sounds like fun! That sounds like a LOT of fun!

Still a little sad that they're effectively splitting my tree, but I imagine it'll differentiate between a kitty who's wearing a tank costume and a really solid tank?

There were even more changes posted a minutes ago that (IMO) split the tree even more. It will be interesting to see how this split tree thing works out...

Some of this is repeated from above...
* Dash cooldown reduced from 5 to 3 minutes.
* Faerie Fire (Feral) isn't a talent anymore and is now a baseline skill

Feral

* Berserk doesn't heal you anymore in bear form but causes your Mangle (Bear) ability to hit up to 3 targets and have no cooldown instead.
* Rend and Tear now increases damage done by Maul and Shred on bleeding targets by 4/8/12/16/20%. (up from 2/4/6/8/10%)
* Mangle doesn't increase the damage of Maul and Shred anymore
* Protector of the Pack now increases your attack power in Bear and Dire Bear form by 2/4/6%. (Old - increased the bonus attack power by 20/40/60%)
* Predatory Instincts changed from 5 to 3 points, now While in Cat Form, Bear Form, or Dire Bear Form, increases your damage from melee critical strikes by 3/7/10% (Old - 2/4/6/8/10%) and reduces the damage taken from area of effect attacks by 5/10/15%. (Old - 3/6/9/12/15%)
* Savage Fury has been moved from Tier 5 to Tier 2
* Brutal Impact moved from Tier 2 to Tier 5
* *New Talent* Survival Instincts (Tier 3) - When activated, this ability temporarily grants you 30% of your maximum health for 20 sec while in Bear Form, Cat Form, or Dire Bear Form. After the effect expires, the health is lost. Instant, 5 min cooldown

Now I'm interested to see the new trees...looking forward to the updated talent calculators.

how soon are they likely to update the talent calculator on the official site ?

Mangle doesn't increase the damage of maul and shred anymore?


I'm not a happy cat

i have a sad feeling we've had it good and in Wrath we're gonna not enjoy druiding as much :(

Mangle doesn't increase the damage of maul and shred anymore?Becuase maul and shred are boosted by "bleeding effects" which includes Trauma (warrior) and Mangle. Previously, it was just Mangle, now it is more generic. We didn't lose anything just a tooltip change.

* Mangle doesn't increase the damage of Maul and Shred anymore

Hm... I'm not entirely clear on how that will work. Will Mangle still increase the damage of Shred by 40%? The wording seems to indicate otherwise.. It looks almost like we are losing the 40% buff, and getting a crappy 20% in return (for 5 talent points).

At this rate will it even be worth getting Mangle?
Might we see a return of Claw? :P

I can imagine in such a situation Rake would be pretty handy. Make them bleed, then shred shred shred..




-Annikk

Mangle still affects Shred, however so does trauma (it didn't before). So, the wording on Shred and Maul changed to reflect a more generic phrase "bleeding".

The problem is trauma debuff overwrites the mangle debuf so our dps would get nerfed if a warrior put up trauma. blizzard fixed it such that we get the buff even if trauma is up.

Here's the new description of Shred...

"Shred the target, causing 225% damage plus 742.5 to the target. Must be behind the target. Awards 1 combo point. Effects which increase Bleed damage also increase Shred damage."

here's the new description of Mangle(Cat)
"Mangle the target for 160% normal damage plus 507.2 and causes the target to take 30% additional damage from bleed effects for 12 sec. Awards 1 combo point."

Ah sweet! Thanks Tlbj! You has put my mind at rest.. =)


-Annikk

i have a sad feeling we've had it good and in Wrath we're gonna not enjoy druiding as much :(

We've got it really good right now.

Last night in Kara I was second on the dps chart at 600 dps, behind a warlock who was putting out 800+. We wiped twice on Prince because the MT was dropping too fast, so I switched to bear form (28k armor) and tanked Prince. I should point out half my kitty's gear is blue and most of my tanking set is blue.

I'm not terribly surprised changes are coming.

Honestly... look.. the sky isn't falling. In BC we got a HELL of a lot of loving in feral. We aren't A#1 on their OMG you'll be cool list, but they are doinga lot to make our DPS competitive and our tanking too. We are getting the loving, but its a bit more subtle.

Agree. Everything mentioned so far seems to be a buff of some kind. Some of them are massive buffs. Happyfuntimes is ahead!


-Annikk

We are getting the loving, but its a bit more subtle.I agree. Reading the EJ Druid thread (daily), I'm tired of the whiners. I often point out the good changes and most folks dismiss them as stupid. I'm not sure what exactly these people want, but I for one am quite excited about LK. As a tank and DPS.

The only things that I'm PO'd about are...


No flying mounts unitl 77. That just sucks! I just might take a week off work to level to 77. Then sleep for a week.
Vanity Pets no longer take up bag space -- that was the only thing that kept them "under control".
Achievements -- I think they have the potential to have a huge negative impact on the game as they become some sort of ranking system for players. "LFM must have AP > 600"

The other #1 super cool thing... We'll have 1 set of gear with some add on pieces. No longer will we need two completely different sets. We should reclaim a TON of bag space.

The other #1 super cool thing... We'll have 1 set of gear with some add on pieces. No longer will we need two completely different sets. We should reclaim a TON of bag space.I wonder how well that will work in practice since gemming and enchants may be different between tanking and dps.

It will be interesting to see how gemmng works out, but it would still be possible to stack agility and play as a high threat/avoidance/armor tank. I have a feeling it will be stamina for tanking gear though, and agility for cat gear since we don't benefit any more than the other tank classes from agility any more.

Let me run this theory past you guys:

Given that we do not have enough talent points to take all the best tanking talents and we will be getting defense on our non-armor pieces, is it possible for us to save a talent point or two in SotF by stacking defense?

Yes... you could do that, but it depends what other stats you have to give up. In theory though you could gem and enchant for Defense to make up for the shortfall.

Hmmm, from what I have read we will be stuck with defense as a 'wasted' stat anyway. My thought is we may as well use it.

This is what I am looking at for bear spec atm, without taking my above theory into account: Bear (http://wotlk.wowhead.com/?talent=0ZxGGscrdceocIu0o0Eczb)

It looks like the new trees are hugely improved, imo. Feeling much joy atm.:thumbsup:

Edit: PVE Cat (http://wotlk.wowhead.com/?talent=0ZEGMcfrz0eo0huAo0Eczb)

Edit: PVP Cat (http://wotlk.wowhead.com/?talent=0ZxGGscrd0tohcuAo0Eczb)

I would welcome feedback on these, if anyone has the time. TIA

Aww TLBJ, What's wrong with having a little sunshine in our day?

After about the umteenth time our group wiped in Sunken Temple, I pulled out my Azure Whelping and it made me feel better. Dried up all my sad panda druid tears. If it wouldn't have been for him, I'd have thrown my computer through a wall I think...

Aww TLBJ, What's wrong with having a little sunshine in our day?I'm hoping they give us an UI setting to hide pets. I don't want those things affecting my framerates and/or latency.

I am thinking about skipping Master Shapeshifter so I can pick up LotP and Primal Tenacity in bear spec. Thoughts?

TLBJ, I didn't even think about that.

They are introducing a fetch ball that you can play fetch with these vanity pets though, so far as I've heard.

I can only imagine how that'll affect things. I only bring mine out when I need some cheer uppins. Otherwise they sit in the bank and take up space.

I'm sorry :(

I am thinking about skipping Master Shapeshifter so I can pick up LotP and Primal Tenacity in bear spec. Thoughts?

That could work, though I'm wondering why you wouldn't take improved mangle. A reduced cooldown on mangle would significantly increase our TPS I would think in bear. I like improved LotP a lot actually though I suppose for tanking purposes it's not really as key.

I was overlooking your PvP kitty spec though and wonder why you wouldn't want to take improved LotP or shredding attacks? Shredding attacks really gives you the edge you need on your opener. I suppose now with Tiger's fury you could substitute that, but I wouldn't want to blow a 3 minute cooldown on my opener.

I haven't actually played beta or on the PTR but I find shredding attacks especially useful. Also I usually take nuturing instinct if only because I end up having to off heal a lot in arena/BGs. Though with the lack of int on our gear in LK I suppose that will be much less of a viable option. =/

A reduced cooldown on mangle would significantly increase our TPS I would think in bear.The current (as of today) though for talents TPS per talent point are....

This list seems to change daily....
Here's is an new sorted TPS estimate based on a full blue 80 bear set. This is assuming infinite rage on a single target.

Talent: Max rank TPS (TPS per point)

Savage Fury: 510.65 (255.33)
LotP: 139.71
Primal Precision: 242.13 (121.07)
Rend & Tear: 383.58 (76.72)
Predatory Strikes: 205.42 (68.47)
Naturalist: 318.71 (63.74)
Predatory Instincts: 182.44 (60.81)
Sharpened Claws: 167.65 (55.88)
Imp Mangle: 151.58 (50.53)
Protector of the Pack: 132.14 (44.05)
Feral Instinct: 82.01 (27.34)
Shapeshifter (5): 134.84 (26.97)
SotF: 54.07 (18.02)

This order should remain relatively the same if threat values change. As gear levels improve, PI will move up a place in the list. Obviously for multi-target tanking FI goes up and if low rage RnT goes down. I also haven't modeled Berserk (or KotJ) for bear, it will slightly lower Imp Mangle and up Savage Fury.

I'm hoping my estimate for Lacerate is off. Right now I'm assuming the constant threat scales from 70 to 80 at the same rate the bleed damage scales (285 @ 70 => ~588 @ 80). If the 20% damage threat mod still exists, any AP scaling will barely affect threat. Pure swipe is almost equal to just keeping the bleed up (similar to current). Although, the bleed will buff maul through RnT. Maybe they wanted to keep the current bear cycle instead of spamming one or the other.


One more thing, I suspect we'll see a rage 'nerf soon. In T4'ish gear (including 2T4) on the PTR I had nearly infinite rage while taking on that 71? elite ogre that roams on the plateau above shat. NR and PF result in a ton of rage, I even used FR. And, I think, there are new raid buffs that give us rage when we crit or something like that.

Okay, I really don't understand exactly how they came up with those numbers, to be perfectly honest or how rend and tear ranks so high. I haven't met one bear yet who wants to drop 5 talent points for that.

I wasn't even remotely interested in taking that talent for tanking o.O

tljb: I can't help but think that the infinite rage has something to also do with the massive armor nerf we got in the new patch. Out of curiosity did you spec natural reaction? Did you notice a huge difference with the rage generation?

Lately I've had to actually swap out items because rage starvation makes it impossible to really properly tank. Also have you managed to tank any instances or raids yet? I'm just curious because I'm really worried about my tanking abilities after the new patch. I mean, I know a druid in full T6 has little to worry about with an armor nerf, but I'm barely at armor cap and I'm a bit worried about what everyone has said is an approximate 10k armor reduction for bears.

I know LK gear is going to supposedly fix all these things but I was just curious how much it's going to change stuff for BC until we get the expansion.

Okay, I really don't understand exactly how they came up with those numbers, to be perfectly honest or how rend and tear ranks so high. I haven't met one bear yet who wants to drop 5 talent points for that. I agree, however it was recently (last Thursday??) received a buff. It now boost Maul/Mangle damage by 20%??? Rather than 10%???Out of curiosity did you spec natural reaction? Did you notice a huge difference with the rage generation? Yes I had NR, PF and 2T4 on. Rage was not an issue except for the first few seconds. Wait, I just realized why this particular test (ogre dude outside shat) might not be all that valid. He spawns (often) non-elite skeletons. I'm sure I dodged their attacks often which would have led to an insane amount of rage (3 per dodge). At near the end of the fight I think there were 5 of them.

I'll have to try this on a son of gruul or something and see how it goes.

FWIW, I lost about 4K armor over live (26K rather than 30K), though I didn't take 3/3 Thick Hide. Not sure how much that would have helped.

That could work, though I'm wondering why you wouldn't take improved mangle. A reduced cooldown on mangle would significantly increase our TPS I would think in bear. I like improved LotP a lot actually though I suppose for tanking purposes it's not really as key.

It's the tradeoffs forced by the new trees. My thinking was that I didn't want to give up the threat burst of KotJ for IM, and in general I would prefer to Maul and Lacerate between Mangle cd's. Of course final threat gen numbers may have me modify my expected rotation. I just read a GC post that bosses in LK don't change targets when they fear, so PT may not be as valuable. Might be worth looking at trading MS for R&T instead now.

I was overlooking your PvP kitty spec though and wonder why you wouldn't want to take improved LotP or shredding attacks? Shredding attacks really gives you the edge you need on your opener. I suppose now with Tiger's fury you could substitute that, but I wouldn't want to blow a 3 minute cooldown on my opener.

PVP was the hardest spec for me. Again, maybe dropping MS so I can pick up SA and max out SotF might be the best decision. Otherwise, what would I give up? 2 points in FI? I really don't know...tough choices.

Also I usually take nuturing instinct if only because I end up having to off heal a lot in arena/BGs. Though with the lack of int on our gear in LK I suppose that will be much less of a viable option. =/

This.

Honestly... look.. the sky isn't falling. In BC we got a HELL of a lot of loving in feral. We aren't A#1 on their OMG you'll be cool list, but they are doing a lot to make our DPS competitive and our tanking too. We are getting the loving, but its a bit more subtle.
But the same problems cat druids have at the end of BC will more than likely exist in end game WotLK. Ask yourself this question and then tell me what blizzard has "fixed" so this doesn't happen again:

Why do rogues do so much more damage and scale with gear so much better than druids?

My answer? Dual wielding, white damage and haste. To me those are the biggest reasons (there are more, that's for sure) for the ever-widening gap between rogues and druids. How has blizzard addressed the problem? They make haste effect our ppm of OoC.

OOOOH! HASTE B SO POWAH NOW I LUB TO WHERE ROGUE GEAR FUR IT

No matter how "balanced" we end up being on beta, 1-2 years from now when everyone is wearing Tier 9 gear, what makes you think DPS druids will be in a better position than we are at the end of BC?

And if that isn't enough doom and gloom, think about this: now that druids are forced to wear rogue gear and other than "tier tokens" no druid specific gear will drop in pve, what has blizzard changed to make that more attractive than it currently is to wear rogue gear. So right now, when a piece of rogue gear drops, we can look at it and point out all sorts of ways that the item budget could have been spent to make that piece of gear better for druids. In most cases we would rather the budget points be spent on STR and AGI instead of AP, crit rating and haste rating. And that's because STR/AGI benefit us so much more than AP/crit/haste. What did blizzard do to make AP/crit/haste > STR/AGI for cats?

I'd LOVE to be wrong, but I predict more of what we saw in BC: great at the beginning to the point of overpowered, and severely lacking once everyone has geared/overgeared.

That could work, though I'm wondering why you wouldn't take improved mangle. A reduced cooldown on mangle would significantly increase our TPS I would think in bear. I like improved LotP a lot actually though I suppose for tanking purposes it's not really as key.


I think that Improved LotP helps alot with mitigation, correct me wrong but 4% heals to yourself every 6 seconds or so while tanking with 16k or more is 640 hp every 6 seconds. any way we can help out a healer (and the rest of the raid) is a bonus.

I am definately going a 60 ferel, 11 Resto build myself, and will see where we go from there :)

Found this warrior-related post (http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=10532266545&sid=2000) via a blue tracker, but GC slipped a quick druid tidbit so I thought I'd share (bold text is my edit):

Thunder Clap -- Increase in threat generation. No target limit. Swipe gets the same treatment. With these changes, all 4 tank classes should be able to generate very respectable AE threat. Consecration is still a little higher in threat to account for Thunder Clap's debuff.

No more wiping on that awful mana wyrm room in MgT when the rest of the instance is otherwise easy. :thumbsup:

YES!

come on Blizz roll out the damn patch cos I want it and i want it NOW !

i have to say i'm excited that I get to have the new talents go live before Wrath :)

I'm SOOOO going to Magister's Terrace and tanking that room just to see it once the patch comes out!!!!!

...that's overpowered. Druid cleave should be restricted to a fixed number of targets imo.
I wonder if they meant demoralising roar?

If they really do mean swipe... man... that is going to be nuts.


-Annikk

Can you imagine out DPSing the DPS... holy ****. Swipe hits for a decent amount of damage on its own.

Think about the synergy swipe will get with Primal Fury (5 rage/crit) and Natural Reaction (3 rage/dodge). I'm not sure we could run out of rage in an AoE scenario. Swipe, swipe, swipe. maul, swipe, maul, swipe, maul.... Don't forget Maul hits 2 targets with glyph.

That said, I think Blizzard just took the easy way out. I really wanted them to boost thorns (or a new self-only version) of thorns. At least we still have to deal with positioning issues. Though from what I read, swipe is really a "chain effect", with an initial 5y radius, but chains can jump upto 8yards, which means you can probably pull in casters as well.

And for BG PvP, this will be a great flag protection skill. Bear, swipe, Berserk (mange hits 3 targets), barkskin, FR (which is really nice now), etc.

I believe there is also a glyph which increases the duration of thorns by 50 minutes, ONLY when cast on yourself.

Not that much of a buff but quite nice nonetheless :>


-Annikk

Its probably the easy out for now, but Annik is right... its way OP. If you get us swiping with the crits landing (which right now at 70 I'll crit up to like 350 damage) its going to be insane. 10 targets x 350 damage... hmmmm 3500 DPS... translate that to 80 where you'll probably hit for 450 damage.... x 10 targets...

With that and our dodge tanking mechanism thats just too powerful.. I completely agree.

However this brings up an interesting idea for feral druids... AOE burn down situations where you aren't tanking.. you could go for enrage.. build up rage, get a nice head of rage, burn Berserk and then swipe like nuts... should keep you competitive with the aoe'rs.

I am sure they will address the damage issue with swipe, and lower the damage and up the threat. EJ has quite a bit of conversation regarding this atm.

Changing the damage/threat numbers doesn't change the infinite rage issues.

I hate to say this as I usually think that folks that do are a bit too elitist, but....

...is Blizzard dumbing down the game too much? Or have they made other changes to encounters/mobs to "make up" for this?

I think you'll find that they keep upping the Ante so to speak on the raid and boss encounters. They keep requiring you to do more and more. The amount of things and lessons you need to learn keep going up. Having AOE tanks won't make it better necessarily. Some fights can be shortened with AOE tanks, but odds are they'll start throwing in mixed groups where if you tank two or more of X mob you'll be in a world of hurt. So some will need to be AOE tanked and others will need to be single target tanked.

Blizzard isn't so much as dumbing down the game as making it so you can play with your friends and not feel guilty. Instead of having to tell Joe he can't come because we don't need a ret pally we need this shadow priest that we hate... but he's the only one we have, you can bring Joe now. I'm a little saddened that we lose some of our orginality, but in the end they are making it so any tank CAN tank anything, but only the ones who really work at it will be capable of doing it.

I don't think they are dumbing down the game, they are evolving the game. There are plenty of ways they can make the game require skill w/o making certain classes required in order to overcome specific encounters.

Regarding the change to swipe; I would have preferred demo roar become our aoe threat/damage ability because its shape more closely mimics that of consecrate. I would guess it would be an easy change to implement and class balance would be easy to achieve. Swipe is definitely the more problematic solution from my point of view, with the caveat that I don't know the technical situation.

Why would there be a glyph allowing high level Swipes to hit 5 mobs (unglyphed at 4) if they're going to treat Swipe as an unlimited target AoE?

I'm confused...

Or is it that we'd swipe, hit the main target for X amount, the other 4-5 targets for amount Y and then hit the other targets within a certain radius for damage Z?

I'm imagining that the swipe would only cause a small amount of damage to any target beyond targets 4 and 5? Just enough to generate a little threat?

That glyph will change. What will it change to??? Who knows?

That glyph is no longer in the game.

We forget a few things.
- Patch notes can change for better or worse.
- We need no defense gear as tanks and that makes life easier than ever.
- We can use consumables in forms! (I will actually stop having my original 2 Healthstones from the start of the raid to the end of the raid :P )
- As a hybrid class we get the benefit of combined crit hit and haste. (no more failed taunts when offtanking bear in boomkin spec. )
- The following blue post suggests druid tanking will still be great:

http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=10529928432&pageNo=1&sid=2000#12

- We can use consumables in forms!Last night on the PTR I was able to eat while in flight form (on the ground). It was funny, my bird had a cracker in his mouth while I was "eating".

Right now it seems as though Feral tanks maybe a bit OP (too much threat and too much mitigation) for PvE thru Naxx, so I expect we might see a slight nerf at some point. But folks are still QQ'ing because we didn't get a bunch of new buttons to push.

I just don't get why so many folks are whining about the lack of new buttons, when we really got quite a few new "usable" buttons. They just aren't new abilities. Some folks are never happy.

Item use in forms
Swipe unlimited targets
Barkskin in form
CC (roots and/or nature's grasp)
OoC Rez (Revive)
CR reduced cooldown
Berserk (both cat and bear versions)
Tiger's Fury (nice cat boost)
FFF base skill and causes damage/threat in bear form! Ranged sheep breaking!!!
Improved Maim (target can take some damage while maimed without breaking the stun)
Savage Fury (cat dps boost)
Nice tanking talents (NR and PotP)
Furor changed (awesome change for the solo cat and feral pvp)
Improved FR (and with a glyph it is awesome)
Both Rake and FB have a use in PvE


I ran out of space on both my cat and bear bars due do all these "new" buttons.

i've not been keeping up enough with the changes and official blue posts obviously.....from you list tlb i have to say i like :

Swiping unlimited targets
FFF now causing damage in bear form ?
Indoor CC
OoC Rez

and the mention of using at last pots/stones in forms.

They balance the game at level 80. I doubt they will make any changes until they have a bunch of 80's running around unless something is seriously out of whack.

The QQ is because mostly we got our historical complaints fixed but not alot of gee whiz new stuff. Personally, I'm far more satisfied with the feral tree than I am with the others.

I forgot...

Survival Instincts -- Last stand for cats/bears

Just read this on EJSomething to keep in mind when coming up with cat builds is that the 5th point in furor is almost entirely wasted (as brought up on Emmerald's forums a couple days ago). With 4/5 furor you'll shift in at 80 energy and then regen to 95 during the GCD before you can use any. With 0 latency that means that the 5th point of furor is worth 5 energy. You may as well put that 5th resto point in IMotW.That is a very, very good point. Might as well put at least 1 point in iMotW while you are leveling. And this makes me even more comfortable with my decision to go 2/2 iMotW, 3/5 Furor at lvl 80 when Rank 9 MotW comes along.

Very nice, especially since we now have no points at all to spare.

* Mangle - Cat damage increased from 160% normal damage to 200% normal damage. Additional damage increased as well. (507 to 634 for Rank 5)
* Rake damage has been increased. (from [ 6% of AP + 387 ] to [ 18% of AP + 1161 ] for Rank 7)
* Swipe now affects an unlimited amount of targetsThe geeks over a EJ are telling me that Rake will now need to be part of our PvE rotation. You wanted more buttons....

Our PvE rotation will be crazy now (4-5 CP SR, Mangle-->rake-->shred (apply rake as needed, ditto for mangle) 4-5 CP Rip, etc..). I'll probably need a scrap of paper next to my machine just to remember what I'm suppose to do next.

I am a happy druid, that is exactly what I was looking for. Ganking Allies on Quel'Danas beware!

Skwidrific must be beside himself right now.:icon_lol:

I'll probably need a scrap of paper next to my machine just to remember what I'm suppose to do next.
thats a bit old fashioned tlb.

surely you should be using a blackberry or equivalent :crazy:

Just read this on EJThat is a very, very good point. Might as well put at least 1 point in iMotW while you are leveling. And this makes me even more comfortable with my decision to go 2/2 iMotW, 3/5 Furor at lvl 80 when Rank 9 MotW comes along.

That is pretty cool, although getting 0 rage from a bearform shift 20% of the time would be a bit sucky..

I am not sure what I will do yet.


-Annikk

That is pretty cool, although getting 0 rage from a bearform shift 20% of the time would be a bit sucky..That's a bear PvP talent, that I can live without. Enrage alone works for me. Plus as it stands right now, we have excessive amounts of rage. I fully expect some type of rage nerf. It is almost impossible to use it all on multi-mob pulls.

surely you should be using a blackberry or equivalent :crazy:I'm hoping for an addon like the one for the Ogrilla dailies to keep track. Though it might be a more fluid (Annikk will like it!) in that you just have to "keep mangle up", "keep rage up", "keep 4-5 CP SR up", "shred other wise", "use Rip if you have less than 7K AP, FB at 35 e otherwise".

I don't own a smart device. Heck I don't even text.

I don't own a smart device. Heck I don't even text.

then its impressive you manage to play wow and post on these forums......

:thumbup:

LoL Kheldar! My mom just started a druid, she's almost 60 and not entirely computer savvy...TLBJ can't be beyond that I wouldn't imagine.

Since everything seems to change hourly as far as info on the expansion, I'll just wait until it hits then again become the questioning newbpest that I am...(That should have probably been my druid's name...)

I'm computer savvy as I've been using them (nearly daily) since 1980. I fondly remember writing my first "game" (variant on "Hunt the Wumpus") on a mainframe back in '78 in a Saturday morning enrichment type class taught at the local university.

I just don't own a smart device (treo, blackberry, iphone, etc.).

I wasn't saying you were computer illiterate at all...just...

well shucks...now I feel bad!!!

I was just commenting that you don't have to be uber-tech-savvy to be a WoW Elite. In fact, I am tech savvy and still can't seem to find my place amongst the Gods and Goddesses of WoW...

I'm going to go stand in the corner now. Sad Panda...

well shucks...now I feel bad!!!Don'tI was just commenting that you don't have to be uber-tech-savvy to be a WoW Elite.Very true. Though the opposite is also true, you can be tech savvy and be an idiot in WoW.

Yes. I am a perfect example of a tech-savvy WoW idiot. Though I'm courteous and friendly, try to be helpful...my actual skills leave a bit to be desired.

i think i'm in the a bit tech-savvy non-WoW idiot camp !

i mean i'm someone who actually thinks a mobile phone is only to make phone calls on :p

Ok so...I'm not really a WoW-idiot. I know my stuff...I'm tech-savvy FTMP. I just struggle with gear and "math" concepts in game.

Dest - best trick ever for gear: Rawr (http://www.codeplex.com/Rawr/Release/ProjectReleases.aspx?ReleaseId=17339). Use it. Love it. Ignore every list and rating site out there and just use this. Stun your friends and amaze your enemies. No need to learn the math, it's all done for you. Takes the theory out of theorycrafting...I could go on and on.

I am sure many here use it, feel free to ask questions.

Dest - best trick ever for gear: download Rawr. Use it. Love it. Ignore every list and rating site out there and just use this. Stun your friends and amaze your enemies. No need to learn the math, it's all done for you. Takes the theory out of theorycrafting...I could go on and on.

I am sure many here use it, feel free to ask questions.

But, it's ALWAYS a good idea to check your math. I love Rawr dearly, but I've found a few errors.

Additionally, check out www.emmerald.net.

I'll check them both out for sure...maybe I an learn a little more about theorycrafting and how to check the math by playing around with Rawr and Emmerald.com.

Thanks guys :)

Rawr does do some things that are counter-intuitive at the margin - with my gear setup it tells me I should ignore my meta gem and and hit rating to stack agi gems. If I force meta requirements I lose 3 dps, and if I force it to use gear that puts me back at the hit cap I lose 9...

Overall though, I've generated a ton of "how did you beat x's dps with your gear?" and "how did you pull Gruul (that I was supposed to be off-tanking) off that t6 pally?" comments since I started using it.

And Dest - this (http://elitistjerks.com/f31/t21713-rawr_model_development_b16_1_released_9_15_a/) will help, too! ;-)

Dest - best trick ever for gear: Rawr (http://www.codeplex.com/Rawr/Release/ProjectReleases.aspx?ReleaseId=17339). Use it. Love it. I think more folks would use Rawr if the UI wasn't so bad. I think I'd be better off with a command-line interface.

Yuck!

I think more folks would use Rawr if the UI wasn't so bad. I think I'd be better off with a command-line interface.

Yuck!
you're showing your age now TLB ;)

perhaps we could give you a dos prompt or even a cp/m one.

:grin: :crazy:

Hey ! Don't knock the dos prompt ! It's awesome. :P


-Annikk (feast your eyes below on the black screen of sexiness, obediently awaiting your command..)

Mmmm....dos deliciousness!

you're showing your age now TLB ;) Seriously, the Rawr UI is horrible. No gem options, no source filtering, it is a royal PITA to use.

It seems like it could be nice, but you spend hours trying to use it.

In all seriousness is it possible you guys are using different versions of Rawr? I have heard that more recent versions are way better..


-Annikk

The last version I looked at was version 15 about a month ago. They are currently on v16. I doubt the UI has improved, but I could be wrong.

It seems to be more useful for those at the bleeding edge in the game. If you are just a T4 player (like me), the options shown are nearly worthless and very difficult to filter out (every thing is gem'd with epic gems, sunwell, gear, etc.). Plus you get the 5+ entries for the same piece based on gemming which is really annoying.

It is just not user friendly.

So, an easily confused little druid like myself would be better off just learning to theorycraft?

I'd say "yes" and "no." I think it's important to understand the basic mechanics of the game and understand various combat rating values, but if you're really looking at improving what YOU'RE doing, I'd start keeping WWS records and check out your parses from each instance/boss. You can really track what's going on in your rotation and what's being the most effective, and I think that will end up really informing your playstyle.

As for Rawr, I really do enjoy it, but I tend to agree that it's really when you're being a picky bitch that it's exceptionally worthwhile. You can do some gem customization, but there's a lot of hoop-de-doo to flip through.

I did a little write up (although the program has been upgraded about four times since) here (http://www.unbearably.net/2008/03/13/rawr/) and here (http://www.unbearably.net/2008/03/15/rawr-update/).

I don't find it bad to use at all. Right click edit of each item makes it easy to put the gem of your chioce in whatever gear you are looking at. It would be nice if you could globally select gear that is available to you by instance or item level, but once you've done it once or twice it really is easy to use imo.

My only complaint is that so many low ilevel items are best in slot, but that is a Blizzard itemization issue, not a RAWR issue. My guild likes to use wow-heroes or be.imba as a general guideline for determining who to invite on raids. With things like Necklace of the Deep and Earthwarden only being ilevel 100, those sites rate me much lower than my actual performance.:banghead_ When I switched from resto to feral, I ground bg's to gear up since I had bypassed all the good feral drops and quest rewards. Now everytime I upgrade a pvp piece my wow-heroes rating drops...

And don't knock tlbj's age, the only person close to my age in my guild is my younger brother!:nono:

I don't find it bad to use at all. Right click edit of each item makes it easy to put the gem of your chioce in whatever gear you are looking at. Right but that is so clunky. If I want to compare my shoulders with 3 other shoulders how do I do that? I have to modify every entry of the "other" shoulders to use gems I'd buy. What a PITA. Why can't I just select "rare" gems option? And a "show only 'best gem option'" based on your gem setting would be nice instead of showing me 10 combinations for each piece.

It just needs 2-3 things to make it so much more usable. Unfortunately, the devs have said over and over they are not planning on adding source filtering because their data source (blizzard) doesn't provide it.

A gem quality option, a "best gem" only option and a source filter (T4, T5, BoP LW, quest, badges, etc.) and it would be the best by far. Check out www.lootrank.com, it has the best filtering mechanism I've seen, but it doesn't do the theorycrafting like Rawr. If the two of them would make love and have a baby, we'd be set.

Supposedly Wowhead is now going to be doing some item compare based on cookie cutter specs. I'm not sure how it works, but here's the appropriate info:

Help! Yes, read this first. (http://www.wowhead.com/?help=item-comparison)

The actual Item Compare. (http://www.wowhead.com/?compare)

Agreed tlbj, that functionality would be really nice. I just find the results worth the effort.

The latest changes on the PTR...
* Predatory instinct now reduces the damage taken from area of effect attacks by 10/20/30%. (Up from 5/10/15%)
* Dire Bear Form armor contribution from items has been lowered from 400% to 370%
* Growl range has been increased from 5 yards to 20 yards

I don't get the first one. I thought we had way too much mitigation in LK??? The 2nd one isn't a surprise, the third is welcomed!

First one may be a hint of encounter mechanics to come, not surprised by the second one either, hot damn! for the third one.

The latest changes on the PTR...
* Predatory instinct now reduces the damage taken from area of effect attacks by 10/20/30%. (Up from 5/10/15%)
* Dire Bear Form armor contribution from items has been lowered from 400% to 370%

I don't get the first one. I thought we had way too much mitigation in LK??? The 2nd one isn't a surprise
First one may be a hint of encounter mechanics to come, not surprised by the second one either
Aye, I'm sensing more fights involving non-physical AOE dmg to come. I'm wondering if they're trying to showcase DK anti-magic abilities a little too readily.

Yeah the first one about Predatory Instincts doesn't contain all the changes... it will now only apply to cat form.
-> http://blue.mmo-champion.com/2/10535473265-feral-tanking-nerf-actually-a-buff.html

:(

Yeah the first one about Predatory Instincts doesn't contain all the changes... it will now only apply to cat form.
-> http://blue.mmo-champion.com/2/10535473265-feral-tanking-nerf-actually-a-buff.html
:(It is not clear if just the AoE portion applies or both the AoE and crit bonus? If both only apply to cat, then it can be safely skipped for bear builds.

It is not clear if just the AoE portion applies or both the AoE and crit bonus? If both only apply to cat, then it can be safely skipped for bear builds.According to test results on EJ (from the PTR), PI only affect cat crit damage. IOW, PI is now strictly a cat talent.

From 70 to 80 do you think we'll need to invest points into PotP (12% damage reduction) and/or NR (6% dodge plus rage feedback) in order to handle pre-80 5-man tanking? If yes, if you could take just one of those which one would you take?

Given the latest changes I would go with NR for the extra rage. The PI nerf to bear mitigation is also a nerf to bear dps/threat generation. Off the top of my head NR seems to do a better job of compensating for the loss of PI than PotP in five mans.

Theory: Why not take a look at IW? Since you are talking about pre-80 5 mans, IW could be worth as much as an 18% reduction of incoming damage, which I believe is superior in potential to both NR and PotP on all but raid boss fights. You'd have to look at the rage and threat ramifications of that choice though.

Wow... did you see the latest change.. Growl is a 20 yard taunt.

Theory: Why not take a look at IW? Since you are talking about pre-80 5 mans, IW could be worth as much as an 18% reduction of incoming damage,The problem I see with IW is that it requires you to hit mobs with Mangle or Maul twice (for the 10% attack speed reduction). On multi-mob pulls, I doubt that is possible all that often.

If IW would land on Swipe, I'd take in a second, but that would be seriously OP.

Good point, tlbj.

With bears catching up to warriors for tanking tools, we have a chance to be full time MT's now!

I've seen some anecdotal stuff though that people are saying it's harder to heal a bear in Naxx than it is a warrior or a paladin as a result of the latest round of changes. Have to keep an eye on that.

From 70 to 80 do you think we'll need to invest points into PotP (12% damage reduction) and/or NR (6% dodge plus rage feedback) in order to handle pre-80 5-man tanking? If yes, if you could take just one of those which one would you take?
Emphasis mine, likely won't be needing either of those talents until the level 80 heroics -- (refering to this blue (http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=8765643774&sid=2000))

3) In 5-player instances, most warriors, druids, paladins and death knights should be effective tanks. The healing specs may have a harder time than the dps specs. Arms wariors, Fury warriors, Ret paladins, Ferals and most DKs should do fine.

To answer the question though NR would be a bit more relevant to both soloing world quests AND instance tanking. If I stay as feral spec I'd always include IW anyway... at the very least it's great utility for all pesky runners whether of the PVE or PVP sort and at its finest it's great mitigation against big spiky hits from instance bosses.