MisterMerf

loos, the damage per energy of Ferocious Bite (as shown in The Druid Wiki � ToskksDPSGearMethod) is not competitive with the damage per energy of Shred unless there are 5 combo points.

You can FB for kicks, but simply shredding is a less chancy option. (Won't lose sudden 2T4 procs, dodges don't hurt so much, etc).

Question regarding Primal Tenacity + Predatory Instincts.

I've heard many times that they combine. Can anyone confirm a consistent ~35% resist rate in raiding PvE?
Do you resist 35% of Kaz'Rogal stomps? 35% of Archimonde fears? Other fights that I haven't seen?

 

Valerian

You probably wont see a huge difference in performing the optimal cycle on trash compared to just renewing mangle when its about to fall off, shredding and ripping/fb (depending on how quick the mob dies). For mobs that die fast, crit streaks (or lack thereof) will likely affect your dps much more than a perfectly optimal cycle.

 

• Falk

Some facts:

- Berserkers melee for ~2.5k MH/1.2k OH with demo roar up with capped armor (~33k) They also have an attack speed self-buff. They Dual Wield but do not suffer from the generic dual wield miss penalty.
- Fury Mages melee for ~1.4 at a much slower swing speed if locked. Otherwise they cast 5.5k-ish fireballs, or 8-9k instant cast.
- Sunwell Radiance is not active.

What you'll want to have in terms of health buffer would be a 9k fireball plus one round of melee all landing as your rough worst-case scenario as to-survive-before-heals-land. Past this, additional HP's benefit falls off steeply. That'd be 9k + ((2.5+1.2)*2 + 1.4, or one fireball, plus all melee hits (1 set from each zerker and one from the fury mage), or roughly 17.5k HP. Sure, more HP past this is nice, but you'll want as much avoidance as possible.

Going from 60% avoided attacks to 70% avoided attacks, for example, will reduce your total melee damage taken by literally 1/4. When you consider most raid setups can only afford 6 healers in a M'uru raid and you have 1 person healing you much of the time, 1/4 mitigation is going to save you much more than even an additional 10k hp, since it's an issue of throughput.

I'm personally doing the near-side adds, leaving mage last for the DPS boost. When we're on our game, BE tank deaths are rarely an issue.

I'm running about 20.5k HP / 74% avoided hits according to parse (Not too sure what the exact figures are but that's the average of Idol of Terror and Commendation procs), with 5.14% hit and 3% expertise. Shadowmoon Insignia/Commendation are in my trinket slots - so far it's been working out pretty well. Commendation is almost a must-have trinket for this. It caters to every single druid strength - massive stam->HP conversion, and adding 8% dodge when you need it most. Seriously. When it procs and you zoom from 70% avoidance to 78%, the zerkers may as well be doing almost 1/3 less damage. And this occurs only when your health dips. Even taking an instant fireball bringing you to low HP, it's literally guaranteed to proc before you die. The 30 second cooldown also means it can save your ass up to twice per humanoid wave.

Tanking all 3 mobs un-CC'ed, needing to hold aggro over blade flurries/cleave/whirlwind and making sure no adds paste healers despite the formation they run in (They can come in a clump, in a 2 - 1, 1 - 2 or single file... gah) while managing debuffs so that Demo is up, Faerie Fire is up at least on the main target, knowing when to bash a berserker to buy time, etc has to be the most challenging thing I've ever done in WoW. I'm going bald.

 

Duilliath

This was addressed earlier in this thread - outcome was it was listed on the Druidwiki that they don't stack, but there was no evidence produced either way.

 

Ioncannon

Anyone have any expierence with "Beasts Simulator" if so how would you say it compares to rawr?

 

aldy

The only people who have seen Beasts simulator are the 30 druids he had beta test it. He is releasing it when June begins, so just wait a week and see:-) Beasts' Druid simulator / optimizer now on Youtube

 

Mijae

Uploaded a new version of my modeling spreadsheet. Of the more notable changes include:

• Modified primary spreadsheet and options interface.
• Redesigned DPS and TPS modeling systems.
• Added initial powershifting support.
• Updated proc rates and values for known items.
• Added new Sunwell and season 4 PvP items.

While I really like the Rawr interface, there are a few issues keeping me maintaining this spreadsheet. I prefer having numbers and formulas readily available to help in more advanced theorycrafting. This includes analyzing custom cycles like a cat Mangle-spam role or various powershifting time lines.

Edit: http://hosted.filefront.com/mijae

 

coredumperror

To add some additional info to what Duilliath already said in reply, I can say from experience that Archi's fears are special, and cannot be resisted at all, regardless of AOE- or fear-resist talents. I've only killed Archi 3 times, but over the course of at least 70 attempts I've not once resisted a fear, so I'd say that my pool of data points is large enough that I'm confident that 15% AOE resist (I don't spec primal tenacity) isn't working on that fear.

 

Ja7us

I'm pretty sure I've resisted Archimonde's fears before, particularly when I had Primal Tenacity. Do you have any data with that talent active?

 

Anedris

I have resisted Archimonde's fears as a priest. The priest talent is a fear resist talent rather than an AoE resist talent however. (So it doesn't bear directly on this question, though it does indicate that Archimonde's fears can be resisted through talents.)

 

Duilliath

I have resisted Archimonde's fears several times.

//edit: Though, from memory, it's nowhere near the 35% mark, but rather the 15% mark.

 

coredumperror

Well I guess that proves that fear-resist talents do work on Archi's fear, but not AOE resist talents. That's good to know.

 

coldbear

I'd love to see the math on this.

 

Boevis

If you're really concerned about Debuffs, you shouldn't be using Lacerate to begin with. Gift of Arthas is going to help Swipe outpace Lacerate for both Damage and Treat if it isn't already, that's before you take into account other melee classes.

The problem with Arthas is that it's a Guardian Elixir, so you have to be giving up Flask, Ironskin, or Fortitude Elixirs. While I've never done the math on Arthas, I won't be giving up my 30 Resilience anytime soon.

 

Nefrayu

Slightly offtopic, but I guess this is the thread where I should be posting my question..

Imagine a situation where you have 4 combo points, and you get a Clearcast from Omen of Clarity, would you deal more damage keeping your current rotation, Mangle-Shred-Rip, or would you be maximizing your dps if you went for a fifth Combo Point with Shred?

It's been bugging me for a while, as it isn't that odd to get a clearcast on the 4th combo point. I haven't been able to find an answer to this question with the search funtion, I have no idea wether it has been answered to or not, sorry about that ^^


Cheers,

 

Anassar

"Is Rip's damage per GCD greater then Shred?", is what the problem seems to boil down to. I'm aware its more complicated then that, but I have a hard time imagining that Shred wouldn't be best.

 

Mijae

The answer is a bit complex and depends on how often you are powershifting, as well as how much time is left on the current Rip. Ideally you want Rip up as much as possible. However, with no shifts (and no procs) a normal Rip/Mangle/Shred x2 cycle takes 14-16 seconds.

If you've just started the cycle, you don't have much choice but to continue as normal. Your current cycle will be reduced in duration and will not require a powershift. You are effectively reducing your current cycle time.

If OoC procs after you have already done 2 Shreds, using a 3rd will depend on what you plan for the next cycle. If not powershifting, you are better off using it on Rip. If you plan to powershift in the next cycle, your cycle time will already be getting reduced so it will be better to throw in another Shred at the end of the current cycle.

The answer is also going to depend on if you have 2t4 procs near the end of your cycle also. With extra energy and bad timing you might end up wasting energy by saving energy for Rip and then using OoC for it instead.

IMO, number of CP shouldn't be an issue. In fact I think Rip should actually be used if at least 3 CP, not 4 (though it's hard to not have 4 CP after 3 attacks). The generally reasoning to use at 4 CP is due to the AP multiplier. However, even the lower AP multiplier at 3 CP still gives more damage per energy than a mangled Shred. Rip uptime is the most important factor.

 

Papajan

Does anyone have some more followup to the super Rip sub-thread? I could only get like 3 of them in ~30m with the Blasted Lands mobs. Is it easier with high or low latency?

 

aldy

Here are the changes from the newest alpha build:
King of the Jungle (new) - While Enraged in Bear Form or Dire Bear Form, your damage is increased by 5/10/15%, and your Tiger's Fury ability also instantly restores 20/40/60 energy.
Nurturing Instinct - Changed from 50/1000% agi as healing to 35/70%.
Primal Aggression - Increases damage done by your Maul and Shred attacks on bleeding targets by 2/4/6/8/10%, and increases the critical strike chance of your Ferocious Bite ability on bleeding targets by 10/20/30/40/50%.
Reinforced Hide - removed.
Challenging Roar - Cooldown changed to 3 min (down from 10).
Maul - Description changed to "A strong attack that increases melee damage by x and causes a high amount of threat."
Predatory Strikes - Increases your melee attack power in Cat, Bear, Dire Bear and Moonkin Forms by 50%/100%/150% of your level and 7%/14%/20% of any attack power on your equipped weapon.
Ferocious Bite, Rip - Damage values changed.
Primal Precision - Changed from 30/60% energy return on failed finisher to 40/80%.
Berserk - Changed.
Old: Removes all Stun, Fear, Snare and Movement Impairing Effects and increases your energy regeneration rate by 100% while in Cat form, and increases your total health by 20% while in Bear form. After the effect ends, the health is lost. Effect lasts 20 seconds.
New: Reduces the energy cost of your Cat form abilities by 50% while in Cat form, and increases your total health by 30% and causes your Mangle (Bear) and Maul abilities hit up to 3 maximum targets while in Bear form or Dire Bear form. Berserk instantly clears all effects which cause loss of control of your character, and makes you immune to them for the duration. Lasts 20 sec.
Lock Jaw (new) - Finishing move that stuns the target and deals damage. Lasts longer per combo point: x points: x+1 seconds (level 75)

From wotlk.wikidot.com

 

Tembetyu

Interesting new changes. I hope they bring back Reinforced Hide and the change to primal agression looks interesting. Supposing you get enough combo points throwing in a Ferocious Bite might be beneficial and a practically guaranteed crit. I currently run 50% crit raid buffed. Lock Jaw looks like a good pvp finisher besides Maim.

 

malthrin

I'm toying with the idea of putting together a Feral set for M'uru so we can have a 2nd bear tank. The problem: I have virtually no feral gear* and no real familiarity with what I need to be looking for. If I had access to everything before him, what do I need to be looking for? From reading this thread, I get that avoidance and threat are the goals for tanking that fight, but I don't know feral itemization well enough to know what items that means I need. If a M'uru tank could point me at an armory of themselves in the gear they use, that would be fantastic.

*I do have a [Wildfury Greatstaff] I picked up way back when. I have 1850 PR for access to the S3 weapons.

 

CD

I logged out in what I hope to use tomorrow.
The main changes I've considered are:
Helm/ chest gems- either gem to meet the RED requirements or just go pure agility and powerful earthstorm.
Chest- could use t6: gain armor lose hit
Weapon- could use staff of the forest lord and stone/ironshield potions.
Legs- could use Tameless Breeches: more avoidance, lower hit and armor
Rings- there's a variety of lower armor high dodge rings you could use combined with stone/ironshields.
Trinkets- shadowmoon insignia is absolutely outstanding, nothing comes close. Secondary trinket slot can go to shard of contempt to help with threat (Especially picking up the mobs initially), Moroes or Commendation for nice passive benefit + extremely powerful secondary effects. The other obvious contender is Badge of Tenacity- very powerful on- use effect and armor which could obviously help you use low armor pieces elsewhere

You could load up what I have into rawr as a starting point and play around with other items and get some ideas for yourself.
With this gear and imp GoA/ kings/ fort/ motw (I actually specced into imotw for the fight as we initially tried without resto druids in the raid) I'm now sitting at 18734hp, 200 armour below the cap, 77.49% dodge+ miss, 115 hit rating, 20 expertise rating.

The big things for you to work out could be:
Can your raid survive without you healing? My guild haven't been using restos every pull but I think that's a mistake- it is one of those fights you can LB 3 tanks and raid heal; a well played resto has the potential to really smooth over phase 1.
Do you really need 2 feral tanks? Lots of guilds are using 1-2 warriors on the humanoids and spell reflect does appear to be pretty useful here.
Would you be able to get the gear you need? We've been trying to gear up some prot paladins for a while and sometimes it is very frustrating to see their gear progress slowly as the wrong items/ tokens drop.

 

kalbear

Depends on whether the ret paladin is going to get a similar group or be gimped.

A feral doesn't benefit greatly from a shaman the way the other classes do. You'll get strength of earth, unleashed rage and bloodlust, but not windfury. The rogues do nothing for you, of course. The arms warrior gives shout, but that can be done in the tanking group too. So while you do get some benefit, it's not nearly as much as what the ret paladin will get.

On the flip side, you're giving a much better buff to all of those classes. Especially the rogues; 5% crit is a huge boost in overall damage.

I know that our group loves having the feral and doesn't like having ret for their DPS, but I also know that without a dedicated melee shaman the ret pally doesn't do all that well for DPS ,and I do fairly well (not as well, but fairly well) in a shaman/hunter group.

 

Temis

A druid does gain much more from Unleashed Rage than any other class does, owing to our retardedly high attack power. Which at least partially offsets the lack of windfury gains.

 

Dominor