Feral talents/abilities - WotLK discussion - Page 52

mydhrin · 08/25/08, 9:47 PM

Originally Posted by Pzychotix

I feel feral isn't about shapeshifting. It's about staying in a form and benefiting from the abilities of that form. I.e. you become a cat or a bear. Not a crazy shapeshifting bearcatman.

However, I actually wouldn't mind having our mana pool turn into an energy oriented mechanic. High mana regen, but small mana pools to limit the amount of things we can do at once. It's certainly an entertaining thought.

Yup, me too, I would like something that replaces furor, along the lines of a warlock's life tap. If I'm in kitty form, i want to stay in that form and be able to dps, not relying on powershifting to be able to compete with others...

Phorage · 08/25/08, 11:36 PM

Saw this just now. Bug or is there something else going on with FAP?

LK Arena 1 Druid Melee Staff - Items - WOWDB

seminarca · 08/25/08, 11:51 PM

Could just be a wowdb issue. The screenshot I saw on mmo champion a few days ago had FAP as per usual:
http://static.mmo-champion.com/mmoc/...a_weapons2.jpg

• LodeRunner · 08/26/08, 12:03 AM

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• Astrylian · 08/26/08, 12:08 AM

Originally Posted by Phorage

Saw this just now. Bug or is there something else going on with FAP?

LK Arena 1 Druid Melee Staff - Items - WOWDB

I was just going to post this... It's odd; no FAP, but the DPS is reduced as well, same reduction as normal feral items, and caster weapons.

EDIT: Beaten... Yeah, I'm thinking just a wowdb display glitch.

Cuer · 08/26/08, 12:31 AM

I just checked on the beta server; the staff still has 1602 FAP on it.

It has a nice understated graphic, too; the three red crystals on it glow softly. A bit different from the standard over the top graphics of the PVP weapons so far.

Ravager · 08/26/08, 5:57 AM

Originally Posted by Cuer

I just checked on the beta server; the staff still has 1602 FAP on it.

It has a nice understated graphic, too; the three red crystals on it glow softly. A bit different from the standard over the top graphics of the PVP weapons so far.

Like all other classes, Ferals will continue to see their biggest offensive stat upgrades come from their weapons. Casters have tons of spell damage on their weapons and melee simply see bigger numbers with weapons that have higher top-end damage. I don't see why Ferals should be different.

I expect that with the large consolidation of loot that each raid will have at least one tanking Feral staff and one DPS Feral staff so we'll see upgrades more often than we currently do.

loos · 08/26/08, 11:53 AM

Oops, looks like Lich King talents on Live servers counts as Megathread content, not Lich King content. Question moved.

angral · 08/26/08, 10:20 PM

With the changes to Savage Fury, Improved Mangle, and the 'increased tank dps' line Blizzard has been espousing, has anyone seen or heard anything on the beta forums about Mangle (Bear) being returned to it's original scalable form?

• Falk · 08/26/08, 11:31 PM

I'm not sure what you mean by scalable form (AFAIK, Mangle scales pretty damn well on Live compared to, say, Shield Slam), but Mangle and Maul are both literally hitting more than twice as hard for me on Beta in Sunwell gear.

angral · 08/27/08, 3:20 AM

Originally Posted by Falk

I'm not sure what you mean by scalable form (AFAIK, Mangle scales pretty damn well on Live compared to, say, Shield Slam), but Mangle and Maul are both literally hitting more than twice as hard for me on Beta in Sunwell gear.

When mangle was introduced, there was a post on the eu boards showing how the +dmg and multipliers were chosen to give cats and bears the equivalent of normalized instant special attacks that would scale similarly to the specials of rogues and warriors due to the multipliers being almost identical. Cats kept the 2.4 multiplier on mangle and the 30% buff to shred, but bears lost their scaling when mangle (bear) was reduced in damage by 30% and the 30% threat buff was added.

From your reply I am guessing the topic has not come up on the beta boards, and may not because mangle (bear) is still performing it's role as our high threat move with a cooldown.

Melthar · 08/27/08, 3:39 AM

Re-visiting the whole FAP question, the discovery of a second 2H mace in Naxx has me wondering.
Itemising two 2H DPS maces at a given content level would be somewhat absurd considering they're still only usable to 3 classes unless we do end up seeing some change in FAP mechanics so that it will just be tacked onto weapons without replacing white DPS (or we benefit from white DPS directly)

http://static.mmo-champion.com/mmoc/...xxramas_01.jpg
http://static.mmo-champion.com/mmoc/...xxramas_02.jpg

If they don't go the armour from weapons approach, given the FAP treatment that second weapon would make an excellent feral tanking/dps mace, and an excellent Deathknight tanking mace.

seminarca · 08/27/08, 4:20 AM

Originally Posted by angral

mangle (bear) is still performing it's role as our high threat move with a cooldown.

Mangle is fine, really. Yes the intitial nerf did hit hard, but you have to remember they semi undid that later. Mangle is now at 115% damage, not quite the 2h scaling we'd wanted, but still it's something. Improved Mangle makes it just that much better. Maybe it's the "Ramparts in AQ40/Naxx Feral leather" effect all over again, but I (level 70) did Utgarde Keep and Nexus last night with a level 77 Warrior dual wielding Torch and the 2.4 badge Axe, and a level 76 Ret Paladin (admittedly, one with no Judgements) and rarely had threat issues, so long as I was allowed to engage first (1-2 seconds lead time on average). 4.5 second cooldown Mangles are brilliant. Berserk is brilliant (I'm sure you've all seen Falk's movie). Swipe is really good (the fourth target is a boon). On Faerie Fired, but non-Sundered trash mobs I was seeing ~2700 Mangle crits in threat gear with only Battle Shout, Might and the Paladin Aura for buffs.

Admittedly, I haven't had a chance yet to compare threat vs the other classes, and by no means is 2 overgeared instance runs enough to formulate a basis of opinion on, but from all reports, threat likely won't be an issue for us.

Prinsesa · 08/27/08, 4:24 AM

Regarding the whole FAP discussion: The discovery of plate boots with shield block value (unusable by Death Knight tanks), a fast one-hander with defense and parry rating (unusable by Rogues/other DPS) as well as the much more prevalent Spell Power plate (usable only by Holy Paladins) indicates that despite their gear homogenization principles, Blizzard is not beyond making niche items.

While most of us here have some ideas on how to do away with FAP to make their drops more cohesive with the other DPS classes, I think the extent of discovered Northrend gear seals the deal as far as the devs not jumping through hoops just to make homogenized gear at all costs.

Selmarix · 08/27/08, 4:33 AM

I really hope they won't make niche items for ferals. As soon as there is a niche item for a certain slot, that would likely end up being considerably better than the alternatives. The result would be that everyone would have to get that certain item and seriously reducing itemization choice.
If they do the gear homogenization well (and the class changes needed for it), then ferals would finally not all run around in the same gear.

angral · 08/27/08, 5:08 AM

Originally Posted by seminarca

Mangle now at 115% damage.

Good point, I'd forgotten the rebuff. With Mangle (Bear) included on Savage Fury it's AP multiplier is 2.5 * 1.15 * 1.1 = 3.1625. Not far off 3.3, but still far better than most high threat moves in the game.

Animalfury · 08/27/08, 9:49 AM

Anyone know (or can test on beta) if Savage Roar stay there when you change to bear?

The text don't states anything against this and it would be very fun for emergency tanking threat and PvP.

Gurrshael · 08/27/08, 11:50 AM

Originally Posted by angral

Good point, I'd forgotten the rebuff. With Mangle (Bear) included on Savage Fury it's AP multiplier is 2.5 * 1.15 * 1.1 = 3.1625. Not far off 3.3, but still far better than most high threat moves in the game.

Are you sure about the 2.5 multiplier? Granted that I have returned to feral theorycrafting after a long pause from WoW, I am fairly sure it was never multiplied by Bear's weapon speed. Shouldn't it be: 1.15 (Mangle) * 1.1 (Naturalist) * 1.2 (Savage Fury) = 1.518.

Feel free to correct me if I am wrong.

Selmarix · 08/27/08, 11:57 AM

It is based on paw damage, which depends on AP with a multiplier for the speed. Hence the extra 2.5 multiplier.

aldy · 08/27/08, 12:29 PM

Lvl 80 blue cat dps staff from Halls of Lightning instance
http://static.mmo-champion.com/mmoc/...ghtning_09.jpg

Maax · 08/27/08, 1:17 PM

Regarding shifting costs, maybe they could bring back the old-school Swiftshifting.

For those that don't remember, the old version of Natural Shapeshifter (back when it used to be in the balance tree) was:

Swiftshifting
"After leaving a shapeshift form, reduces the casting cost of the next shapeshift by 20/40/60% if used with in 6 sec."

They could change the talent back, or make it a set bonus/glyph/idol.

Promethius · 08/27/08, 2:09 PM

Out of curiosity, what's the expected mana pool with and without heart of the wild at 80 in INT-less rogue gear and the mana cost of bear/cat shifting with and without natural shapeshifter?

loos · 08/27/08, 2:19 PM

Base mana for each class (at lvl 70) can be found here, perhaps someone can update that for lvl 80? According to Wowhead cat form costs 35% of base mana in WotLK, so that would be 2370 * 0.35 = 829.5 mana at lvl 70.

So at level 70

Natural Shapeshifter (1pt): 746.55
Natural Shapeshifter (2pt): 663.6
Natural Shapeshifter (3pt): 580.65

Valerian · 08/27/08, 2:30 PM

Only really need a couple of data points from some beta players to be able to have a fair idea of it. I seem to recall seeing something like 1k for level 80 though I cannot for the life of me remember where I saw it (might have been the beta forums, but I can't access those from work).

Promethius · 08/27/08, 4:24 PM

Just looking over how INT affects my mana currently, I've noticed that my gear provides 3240/7460 of my unbuffed mana, or 43.4% and about 60 mana/5 (138 w/ gear and 78 w/out, granted I have all stat enchants to rings, chest, bracers which add additional spirit).

So if I were to try and shift whenever I had the mana to, without the INT on my gear, with 3/3 natural shapeshifter, I could shift 7 times and would have to wait about 42 sec to perform each consecutive shift. Putting gear back on, I could shift 12 times and would wait 26 sec in between subsequent shifts. With 0/3 natural shapeshifter it would look like 5 shifts and 58 sec wait periods without INT gear, and 8 shifts and 36 sec wait periods with gear.

Outside of powershifting, pvp, and possibly pve encounters involving lots of snaring or long durations of no melee opportunity (like felmyst air phase), druids probably don't shift or use spells enough to worry too much about mana. Currently, with blessing of kings and wisdom, MotW, AI, divine spirit, and possibly totems (do mana spring/tide actually affect mana in forms?), powershifting 1-2 times every 12 sec is hardly taxing on mana. I wonder though, with the reduction of our mana pool and regen from lack of INT on gear in the expansion, will the increased efficacy of raid buffs still allow us to maintain something like 3 powershifts per 16 sec (5 sec rule may add even more restriction here considering ferals have no I5SR regen)? Would Blizzard even consider it to be more than a trivial matter? And where would it leave feral pvp if mana becomes much more restrictive?

Considering with only base mana and base INT, HotW provides about a 8.6% boost to overall mana pool at 70, it may make more sense to change the talent to be providing mana regen instead, based off a stat we naturally look for and is readily available from gear. 20% stam => mana/5 for example in my current gear would give me 167 mana/5. This would give us scaling mana regen without having to go out of our way to gear for, since intensity being based off int/spirit isn't of too much use to us. I suppose this could give rise to some monstrous 0/30/41 feral/resto hybrid with infinite mana, though doing something like having the mana regen only apply in bear/cat can force deciding between mana regen and healing. I'm not sure how this balances out against the mana restoration capabilities of enh shaman and ret paladins in beta, but obviously numbers can be adjusted for parity.

I wouldn't say this is the absolute best way to approach fixing mana regen as there are a multitude of ways to approach the issue of mana, but the most apparent change needed would be with respect to the INT portion of HotW having no itemization to scale off of in the expansion.