Howdy, found this site off of thotbott.com, excited to see all the good information here!

I'm a COMPLETE n00b to the game, just started playing about a week ago. I've got a Lvl 16 Horde Druid going, I've been reading on the WoW Druid Forum and here about the talent tree, and I'm SO confused!!

I understand that I can develop my druid towards either healer or tank-type talents (right?), is balanced mean I'm not super strong in either but could switch back and forth and be kinda mediocre for either? Also if I want to be able to have all forms (I've got bear & sea lion now), does that mean I have to build feral? I really want the cat form, just cause it sounds cool, and I like to solo.

I haven't used any talent points yet cause I'm just not sure where to put them, and I don't want to mess up my guy! I really want to be a secondary healer in a group, but I don't want to sacrifice the ability to solo as I level up higher or tank if needed. What do you suggest, or do I need to be more specific? I haven't even been sure what spells to get along the way, so I pretty much have everything you can get up to Lvl 16 so far.

Thanks for the help, this place is great!

Talia

ps. what does "nerf" mean? Is that like if an ability is nerfed in the next build, it's been removed/deleted?

Nerf means some aspect is being made less powerful or useful. As if it were turned into a nerf foam version ;)

Not to be confused with scruffy looking nerf herders.

Welcome to TDG. :)

To try to answer some of your other questions:

To maximize your healing potential and be a primary group healer, you'd probably want to go down the restoration talent tree. For leveling up, though, feral might be a better choice. Feral should be fine for a secondary healer as well.

You don't need to have a Feral talent build to get any of the shapeshifting forms. Cat form and Dire bear are sold from the druid trainers.

Thanks for the help! So it sounds like I should go for a feral build so I can do secondary healer if I want, but level up faster since I know Druids have lousy dps compared to other classes.

-Talia

The talents you need may change over time so fortunately you can start over. The bad news is it costs more each time you do that. Each of the trees supports a different play style. Feral was weak but it looks like they are going to keep working on it till it is viable. Balance is good overall but doesn't really help DPS or Healing. Restoration is what most druids end up spending point in for Guilds that want healers.

I found for soloing OoC is great for caster form soloing since each time it proc's you get a manaless nature spell. If you prefer to cat/bear then Feral is better and Feral you need Bear Charge to disrupt casters and close faster.

I have two druids. One went mostly feral and the other mostly balance (don't have the exact spec). They both are great at soloing! I do also play the feral one with my RL son who has a priest. I go bear or cat, unless/until he runs out of mana (which usually only happens if we are grouped up in an instance). So darn versatile...
:smile: