Could anyone clarify if TF remained the 6 sec duration? if it did it will be one more ability that you have to time to fit your cycle so you get maximum benefit out of it.

See no reason for a duration change.

DPS Cycle will be:

Trinkets on rip > Tiger's Fury on Mangle > Shred.

The only difference is you have to avoid powershifting while Tiger's Fury is up. A simple modification to FeralKit to check for existance of Tiger's Fury before cancelling form will work.

Also, every third cycle, you will be waiting for max energy rather than powershift like a mofo.

*edit* Another finisher to a cycle is too much. Assuming perfect crits and doing 4CP Rips and Ferocious Bites, even with 2pc t6 bonus, 29 energy mangle, 3x 42 energy shreds, 30 energy rip, is already 185 energy. You also wouldn't be able to powershift enough and build combo points due to having to wait a tick for each shred and the constant gcd's.

My point was a "buff" finisher ala Slice and Dice, since using FB in the cycle is pretty weak. Its kinda clear the FB is a PvP/Soloing move especially with the increased DPE that makes it nice burst but still terribly inefficient DPE. Either that or a finisher that is still effective at lower than max combo points. Currently FB is only more efficient than shred at 5 CPs. If FB was efficient at like 3 CP or something it would fit into a cycle with high crit reasonably (maybe every couple of cycles or something).

In terms of the talents if they stay as they are, I was wondering what an "ideal" level 70 PvE spec will be. I'd assume we'll actually get these talents pre-expansion (like last time) so it may be worthwhile to look into.

I came up with: War Pirate :: Talent tree Druid

I don't like giving up ILotP but almost everything else seems more valuable. I also dont like losing savage fury but again it only affects solo grinding/minor dps loss in raids.

At 80, the ideal PvE spec would probably throw the remaining 10 points into:
1 OOC
3 Natural Shapeshifter
2 Master Shapeshifter
2 Savage Fury (or 1 SF 1 Thick hide, if armor is really needed).
2 ILotP

Thoughts?

I would choose Savage Fury instead of Primal Precision. 10 Expertise is in my gear 6 DPS and the energy cost refund sounds nice, but is only on finishers and with being 2,5% short on the expertise cap wearing current gear you get a very small benefit of that. 20% more mangle damage is rougly 30 dps more in a normal raid dps cycle and 20% more damage in solo play/pvp .

Says 6 sec in the tooltip and it doesn't activate the global cooldown.

Also just to add, SotF gives 2%/4%/6% stats as well as the 2%/4%/6% crit reduction

It says 10 expertise not 10 expertise rating. Unless Im reading too much into the details, but arnt other classes' talents like that too?

ok than my post is irrelevant

I'm thinking the way the feral tree is looking, it is not a choice to either spec cat dps persay or bear tanking, but I think it may be geared at making you choose between being Main tank material or being an off-tank/dps player. Presumably the latter is designed so you have enough to offtank but not quite to main tank on the 25 man raid, but enough to main tank a 5-man or 10-man regardless?

War Pirate :: Talent tree Druid

This has pretty much all you need, talent wise, for DPSing and MTing. You have 2 free points too. One can go to maxing thick hide, the other into Savage Fury, Primal Tenacity even feral aggression. Or you could put two into one of these other talents and neglect one point from thick hide.

The tradeoff is quite minor for any of these choices. The only real MT talent you'd be missing is feral aggression (since demo roar is apparently getting better), but even then it seems as though the warrior one is STILL better then ours and the MT himself doesn't need to be the one putting up Demo anyways.

The talent tree, as is, does make the split between PvE feral and PvP feral though. You definitely don't have enough talent points to get all of the infected claws points, NI, primal tenacity etc which are all solid PvP talents, along with the PvE ones.

Here's the latest patch notes from the new Alpha that was released last night:

Druid

* Soothe Animal now works on dragonkin
* Challenging Roar cooldown changed to 3 minutes
* Maul description changed to "A strong attack that increases melee damage by $s1 and causes a high amount of threat."
* Moonglow now affects Starfall and Wrath too
* Celestial Focus, Vengeance, Focused Starlight - now affect Starfall too
* Predatory strikes
o "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."
* Natures Swiftness - added "with a casting time less than 10 sec." to description
* Improved tranquility threat modifier changed to 30%/60%
* Ferocious Bite and Rip damage values changed
* Entangling roots now tick every second
* Lunar Guidance changed to 4%/8%/12%
* Nurturing Instinct increased healing changed to 35%/70%
* Empowered Touch changed to 20%/40%
* Mangle debuff now affects mangle too
* Owlkin frenzy - haste effect changed to "immune to pushback while casting Balance spells."
* Primal Precision 30%/60% changed to 40%/80%
* Primal Aggression changed to "Increases damage done by your Maul and Shred attacks on bleeding targets by 2%/4%/6%, and increases the critical strike chance of your Ferocious Bite ability on bleeding targets by 10%/20%/30%."
* Infected Wounds proc chance changed to 33%/66%/100%
* Reinforced Hide replaced by King of the Jungle
o "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"
* Living Seed proc chance changed to 33%/66%/100% and effect changed to 30%
* Starfall secondary damage radius reduced to 5 yards
* Natures Fury removed effect "Converts $s2% of your bonus healing into bonus spell damage"
* Berserk Reduces - Energy regeneration replaced by reduced energy cost of all abilities. Also Mangle (Bear) and Maul abilities hit up to 3 maximum targets.
* Replenish - proc chance changed to 5%/10%/15%
* Gnaw renamed to Lock Jaw, description says "stuns the target and deals damage", otherwise unchanged
* Nourish - Additional heal changed to "Heals for an additional 12% for each Rejuvenation, Regrowth, or Lifebloom effect cast by you active on the target."


Source - General: 8391 Changes - Full list


edit: Further down in the discussion, at the link above, someone asks what Gnaw/Lock Jaw is. It says: