Hey guys,

This has been pondered, argued, flamed and screamed over yet still there doesn't seem to be a clear choice. So here I am :deadhorse

What is more important for a Feral Druid ? I'm balanced in stam and int but should I invest into Str or Agility ? Just looking for more feedback to make me go hmmmmm. Hope there are a few Ferals out there that have tried both.

Thanks

There was a recent post from a Blizzard employee (Caydiem, iirc), which said that Druid cat form would benefit more from Str than Agi.

Zarn

I do str/sta for my feral gear primarily. Cat dps isn't based on agi, it's based on str, and with shred and ravage being based on attack power... strength seems to be the better stat.

Agi will still get you more crits, dodge, and armor though, so it's not bad.

str/sta should be your number 1 priority combo, but increased agi is not a bad thing.

Pre-Caydiem I went AGI and honestly didn't notice a huge increase in the amount of crits that I got, but when I swapped out my INT gear, I was only really adding about 70 AGI total, so that may not have been a large enough shift (90AGI to around 160). I've moved to some various "of the bear" type gear adding about 50 STR and my raw DPS has jumped up at least a good 5-10pts (140-190 STR). I can notice a marked difference just equiping a +18 str item.

I have a fairly solid agility/stamina set, and a solid str/stam set. I try to use the set that matches what I'm doing at the time. I do understand the attack power aspect of the cat, don't know how to correlate the str/ to cat form.

I can attest I "feel" I see more crits out of the cat using my monkey gear as opposed to my bear gear. But for certain can attest to many more crits in my bear gear in dire bear form, than when I'm wearing my eagle gear and go bear for defensive posturing.

If you want raw damage, you're best off going strength. The devs really borked the feral cat spec by making it's damage base from strength whereas most of it's skills/talents would benefit more from crit rates (ie combo points on crits).

So strength seems to be the favored stat. Going primarily Str/Stam do you feral druids feel like you get low on mana fast ? I'm currently lvl 30 and was basically forced to go heavy int so I dont run low on mana after a moonfire/shift/heal/shift combo.

I can see swiftshifting affecting mana comsumpution but I have yet to get enough points into balance to get it ( currently 0/11/5 , and 5 points just sitting there). Does our mana as a Feral become less of an issue in later levels ?

PS. Very glad to have a resource like the Grove to turn to for help, all your time is appreciated.

I carry two sets of gear. One for casting/healing, and the other for feral. The feral set is a bit low on mana, but I tend to swap out as needed.

Right now, for Feral Gear, I have a set which combines sta/atk power/crit%/str, in more or less that order. It seems to work pretty decent for both Bear and Cat form. Of course, it also helps that I do mid-level end-game instances a lot, BRD, Strat, UBRS, etc and the rogues I usually go with pass on a lot of the stuff, letting me take it for my feral set.

Anyway, I find that Str/atk power is much more useful for raw damage increase than agility, thos i still have some agility gear, mainly for the AC and/or cuz I haven't found a better str/sta item for that slot.

str? agi? Dude.. that crap is for players that can't do more complicated things than click-mouse-on-target-and-melee. :)

You clearly need more INT so that you can cast more spells.. can never have too much mana.

str? agi? Dude.. that crap is for players that can't do more complicated things than click-mouse-on-target-and-melee. :)

You clearly need more INT so that you can cast more spells.. can never have too much mana.

Except that feral forms don't HAVE mana, sure.

The base mana pool of a druid is more than sufficient for me to have fun in my feral forms, so my builds are one for strength (bear) one for agility (cat) and my casting set. I think I realize the most fun out of my cat set as I am now critting on my inital hits more than often at over 1000.

str? agi? Dude.. that crap is for players that can't do more complicated things than click-mouse-on-target-and-melee. :)

You clearly need more INT so that you can cast more spells.. can never have too much mana.

without some feral offensive gear (str+/agi+ items), your animal forms will hit for beans... :P but I do agree that you still need mana 'cause there will be times when you need to swich out of feral form for some healing or some ranged blasting. I don't have SS and being caught going in and out of forms for a quick heal and running out of mana halfway through sucks!

without some feral offensive gear (str+/agi+ items), your animal forms will hit for beans... :P

Nope, I find they actually hold up quite well. The animal forms are my best damage dealing option against orange/red creatures no matter what my clothes are.

Orange or red creatures are generally 3-4 levels above your own. Magic against a mob 3 lvls above is sketchy and at 4 levels is pointless. The ONLY way to beat these mobs are in form.