GrobianWhat's on sale?Pliers!Registered Userregular
edited June 2011
Wrath and Starfire are only increased in 4.2 to make up for the huge nerf to T11 4piece. And that nerf is only because they don't want Moonkin to run around in T11 in the next raid tier.
From the PTR notes:
Balance
Starfire damage has been increased by approximately 23%.
Wrath damage has been increased by approximately 23%.
Set Bonuses
The 4-piece Balance druid tier 11 PvE set bonus, Astral Alignment, now provides a total of 15% critical strike chance with 3 charges, decreasing by 5% per charge, instead of 99% decreasing by 33% per charge. This change was made because the set bonus proved so valuable it was not possible to upgrade out of the set into tier 12. To compensate, changes have been made to Starfire and Wrath (listed at the top of the druid class section).
If you were lucky you'd proc an Instant Starsurge while casting a Starsurge and be able to blast off tons of damage in the span of a few seconds. I don't have Balance 4p so the buff to those spells is a pure buff to me.
Thinking of switching from cat/bear to cat/boomkin...I've never actually played that spec.
I'm cat/bear now, but I played Moonkin all through Wrath. It was "easy to learn, difficult to master" back then and it looks like the skill cap is even higher now. If I didn't have to tank every fight in my raidgroup I'd be all over it
Yeah it's still easy to learn and difficult to master. The basics of Eclipse are made easier with Cata's changes but to squeeze out the top dps you've got to know and execute a lot of little tricks all the time, including doing things "wrong" for a little bit for a bigger gain down the road and never ever using Hurricane.
Edit: Actually i just heard about the Heroic Rag kill's Boomkin using Hurricane. Of course he sat and used Starfire in Solar Eclipse so it'd be there for the aoe phase where he popped Hurricane and things died in 6 seconds. He was like 10th in dps until the aoe phase and then he popped up to the top. So shitty that Boomkin AoE's locked to being in Solar Eclipse.
Until you have "hop on my back, I'll carry you all" levels of gear, nothing is harder than pug-tanking. You are fighting the mobs, and your "teammates".
Dodge>mastery>exp(to soft cap)>crit>hit>>>>>>>>haste(its that shitty)
gem for Agi, Tia's grace and fluid death are amazing trinkets.
Keep demo roar up, Mangle every time its off CD, same with thrash, Keep 3 lacerates and pulverize buff up, hit Farie fire over swipe. Use swipe/maul when you have extra rage.
e: When you get to that gear level puging heroics is mindless beyond words tho. Monday night in ZA my healer was MCing mobs during every trash pull, cause why not?
Specifically, gem for socket bonuses using bear tank stat gems, but favor agility. So agi in red sockets, agi/dodge or agi/mastery in yellow sockets, and agi/stam in blue sockets.
Soo, my GM is apparently super biased against Feral Druids. I've been raiding as Resto, but as we don't have another leather wearing class, I get all the AGI leather from Firelands bosses. I'm ~365 average ilvl (with my resto wrist and weapons), but i'm missing a decent weapon (running the 3 heroics that drop it every day til i get it).
Anyway, I'm just curious about how much health I should expect to have when I'm 'raid ready' for tanking AND if that poses any problems. As a healer I know I prefer tanks that take less dmg as opposed to tanks with a bajillion health, but I have had the unfortunate experience of tanks who just don't have enough health to soak 2 hits before dying. I don't wanna be that guy.
365 avg ilevel feral gear is definitely ready to tank Firelands (assuming you get the lack of weapon resolved), assuming you've reforged/gemmed/enchanted it for tanking.
If you want a Firelands ready health number I think 180k is about right. I can't remember if that's before or after raid buffs though (my gut's telling me after).
So, should Maul be doing so little damage? I'm only level 79, but lacerate/mangle/faerie fire all do 3k+, while Maul barely does 1/10th
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GrobianWhat's on sale?Pliers!Registered Userregular
IIrc, Maul was nerfed several times. But still, it doesn't trigger the GCD and it can hit multiple targets (glyphed) so there's no reason not to press it all the time. If you pull enough mobs you can just macro it to every ability like we did in WotLK.
I don't know exactly how Maul's damage compares to prot's Heroic Strike anymore, but they're supposed to serve the same role: an inefficient conversion of rage->damage that's off the GCD, so you're supposed to use it (along with your rotational GCD abilities) when you have a lot of rage and avoid using it in low rage situations.
That said, it doesn't sound right that Maul is doing 300 damage when everything else is doing 3k+. I haven't played bear in a while, but did they really buff lacerate and FF that much to be doing 3k+ at 79? They weren't even doing that at 85 for a while.
Well then if I should be at 180k post raid buff, unless I'm forgetting some buffs, I'm way shy. In double stam trinkets I'm at ~168k Raid buffed. Can someone armory Startron on emerald dream and tell me what I'm missing? Or something I've done tragically wrong?
I don't know exactly how Maul's damage compares to prot's Heroic Strike anymore, but they're supposed to serve the same role: an inefficient conversion of rage->damage that's off the GCD, so you're supposed to use it (along with your rotational GCD abilities) when you have a lot of rage and avoid using it in low rage situations.
That said, it doesn't sound right that Maul is doing 300 damage when everything else is doing 3k+. I haven't played bear in a while, but did they really buff lacerate and FF that much to be doing 3k+ at 79? They weren't even doing that at 85 for a while.
I remember feral damage was really really low earlier in the expansion, but threat generation was okay, so they buffed most of the damage on those abilities and removed the threat modifier
Sounds like bear's all fucked up (big surprise) if Maul is doing so little compared to everything else (besides Mangle, since that's bear's Shield Slam).
Anyone with an 85 bear know what their FFF hits for pre-pull (i.e., without Vengeance)?
forty on
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GrobianWhat's on sale?Pliers!Registered Userregular
My (poorly geared) bear's FFF hits for ~4k on the dummy without any buffs. Mangle is ~7k, Maul is ~2k
OK, those numbers make more sense. It's nice to see that FFF actually does some slightly respectable damage->threat again for picking up mobs at range. I know for a while there it was shitty like Icy Touch.
Well then if I should be at 180k post raid buff, unless I'm forgetting some buffs, I'm way shy. In double stam trinkets I'm at ~168k Raid buffed. Can someone armory Startron on emerald dream and tell me what I'm missing? Or something I've done tragically wrong?
First thing, reforge into Dodge not expertise. Never reforge mastery away. Dodge>mastery>exp to soft cap/crit > exp after soft cap/hit>haste.
You should be fine from a HP perspective. I only have 177k when tanking Rag and I'm at like 373 ilvl, remember to use the AGI flask, all that dodge is way more valuable than the HP.
You are missing a few enchants(armor to cloak, agi to bracers, windwalk when you get a decent weapon). Also the feral movespeed talent is only for cat form, so the MS boot enchants are the way to go for tanking.
Ok, I'll keep that in mind. I was going for the mastery/crit focused build so I could duo tank/dps. If I go to tank a raid I shall have to reforge then.
The missing chants are because thats my off spec and I'm too cheap to spend money on them, but I will also keep that in mind in case my raids demands change. Thanks for the advice!
PSN: Gumbotron88 3DS FC: 0018-3695-0013 (Devon)
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WulfDisciple of TzeentchThe Void... (New Jersey)Registered Userregular
Good lord. Started leveling my druid as bear, and... why was I wasting time leveling as Balance
so I'm back to raiding again. I'm healing and trying to set up a UI that isn't total shit.
Fussing with UI mods (and spending a lot of time with them) is something I really, really, really hate so I'm trying to find a guide or UI compilation or something that is as turn-key as possible.
All I really want is raid frames that show HoT durations. Color coding on the text would be nice. Maybe some of these new-fangled "auras" the kids are using if it's not too much trouble.
Most of the stuff I'm finding in searches about how to set this stuff up is old. I like the setup they are describing http://treebarkjacket.com/2009/01/18/how-to-grid-hot-tracking/ <-here (is it possible to make links not suck on the new forums?) but the GridIndicatorCornerText hasn't been updated in forever.
Thanks for any advice!
[edit] Well it looks like Grid2 + Clique + Power Auras Classic is doing everything I need.
Now, what are some druid-ey looking staves for when transmog goes live?
I saved a quest reward that looks like lok'delar, think it sprouts flowers. Forget the name of it but I can check my bank later. Might be alliance only?
I think all the transmog gear I want is in Ulduar 10
troublebrewing on
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WulfDisciple of TzeentchThe Void... (New Jersey)Registered Userregular
Don't knock some of the stuff from AQ. There is totally not an awesome staff that drops from the last boss of AQ20, and CERTAINLY not any gear that makes you look like a power-ranger >_>
The worst thing about the nerf is the gylph nerf, cause there's no other good glyph to replace it with. Thorns? Innervate? Might as well only have two major glyphs. GC's gylph bullshit in his explanation is terrible.
Yeah, I have no idea what to replace the WG glyph with. I always "liked" that there were only two useful healing-specific majors in Cata since it meant I didn't have to give up something useful to get the mandatory Rebirth glyph.
They really need to make Gylph of Thorns or Barkskin into a healing cooldown instead of what they are now and/or not be dumb about the WG Gylph. They also need to make Typhoon count as an interrupt (or have a glyph that does that in place of the knockback) so Boomkins have an interrupt with a cooldown shorter than 1 minute.
Posts
From the PTR notes:
Starsurge was wrecking people in rate BGs iirc. Its a fast casting nuke with a crazy SP coefficent. 100k crits and such.
Thinking of switching from cat/bear to cat/boomkin...I've never actually played that spec.
Edit: Actually i just heard about the Heroic Rag kill's Boomkin using Hurricane. Of course he sat and used Starfire in Solar Eclipse so it'd be there for the aoe phase where he popped Hurricane and things died in 6 seconds. He was like 10th in dps until the aoe phase and then he popped up to the top. So shitty that Boomkin AoE's locked to being in Solar Eclipse.
Any good general or bear specific resources I should be looking at to help me out?
http://thebigbearbutt.com/ and http://theincbear.com are both pretty decent blogs.
quick and dirty version:
Dodge>mastery>exp(to soft cap)>crit>hit>>>>>>>>haste(its that shitty)
gem for Agi, Tia's grace and fluid death are amazing trinkets.
Keep demo roar up, Mangle every time its off CD, same with thrash, Keep 3 lacerates and pulverize buff up, hit Farie fire over swipe. Use swipe/maul when you have extra rage.
e: When you get to that gear level puging heroics is mindless beyond words tho. Monday night in ZA my healer was MCing mobs during every trash pull, cause why not?
I have the non-heroic Tia's Grace so that's a start. That's interesting that you say gem for Agi instead of Sta.
also any thoughts on spec and is there a spec that is decent at being hybrid-ey if I ever want to dps?
Now I'm reluctant to replace any of it with WLK gear...
Anyway, I'm just curious about how much health I should expect to have when I'm 'raid ready' for tanking AND if that poses any problems. As a healer I know I prefer tanks that take less dmg as opposed to tanks with a bajillion health, but I have had the unfortunate experience of tanks who just don't have enough health to soak 2 hits before dying. I don't wanna be that guy.
That said, it doesn't sound right that Maul is doing 300 damage when everything else is doing 3k+. I haven't played bear in a while, but did they really buff lacerate and FF that much to be doing 3k+ at 79? They weren't even doing that at 85 for a while.
I remember feral damage was really really low earlier in the expansion, but threat generation was okay, so they buffed most of the damage on those abilities and removed the threat modifier
Anyone with an 85 bear know what their FFF hits for pre-pull (i.e., without Vengeance)?
First thing, reforge into Dodge not expertise. Never reforge mastery away. Dodge>mastery>exp to soft cap/crit > exp after soft cap/hit>haste.
You should be fine from a HP perspective. I only have 177k when tanking Rag and I'm at like 373 ilvl, remember to use the AGI flask, all that dodge is way more valuable than the HP.
You are missing a few enchants(armor to cloak, agi to bracers, windwalk when you get a decent weapon). Also the feral movespeed talent is only for cat form, so the MS boot enchants are the way to go for tanking.
And get the last point in perseverance.
The missing chants are because thats my off spec and I'm too cheap to spend money on them, but I will also keep that in mind in case my raids demands change. Thanks for the advice!
Fussing with UI mods (and spending a lot of time with them) is something I really, really, really hate so I'm trying to find a guide or UI compilation or something that is as turn-key as possible.
All I really want is raid frames that show HoT durations. Color coding on the text would be nice. Maybe some of these new-fangled "auras" the kids are using if it's not too much trouble.
Most of the stuff I'm finding in searches about how to set this stuff up is old. I like the setup they are describing http://treebarkjacket.com/2009/01/18/how-to-grid-hot-tracking/ <-here (is it possible to make links not suck on the new forums?) but the GridIndicatorCornerText hasn't been updated in forever.
Thanks for any advice!
[edit] Well it looks like Grid2 + Clique + Power Auras Classic is doing everything I need.
Now, what are some druid-ey looking staves for when transmog goes live?
For a polearm I want to get Blackhand Doomsaw.
[edit] http://www.wowhead.com/item=27877 must be what you're taking about.
[edit] hot damn, I found it http://www.wowhead.com/item=45613#.
I think all the transmog gear I want is in Ulduar 10
For mace I think I'll go for Lok'amir or its lookalike. Unfortunately that and a bunch of other awesome gear is on my first shaman.
Can I start bitching about the WG nerf now? Seriously... It kinda sucks.