Selmarix

To add some confusion the names Enrage and Frenzy got switched some time during beta. So Enrage is now the dispellable type and frenzy the low hp, unavoidable one.

 

gnoop

We may end up with encounters that favor the Druid's much smaller cooldown and others that favor the higher mitigation of Shield Wall. I don't necessarily mind that Barkskin is only 20% if that shorter cooldown can be put to good use.

Barkskin also has good potential in pvp. If you're in a longer arena fight, the damage reduction on a regular basis would certainly come in handy.

 

Liar

This. SWP is pretty much designed without the use of Shield Wall from what I can tell so if they keep it like that, then we could use SWP as an example on how good Barkskin could be. Barkskin during a Sathrovarr stun will be nice, during every Stomp on Brutallus, during every (or every second, depending on your luck) Corrosion on Felmyst. I don't really know if you even need it at Twins but you could do it just before a Confounding Blow I guess. On M'uru you could use it once per wave of adds. The only Boss I'd say SW is better would be Kalec if you took your time getting him past 10% so he stacked up too many Enrage stacks but that's about.

About Bear AoE tanking: Anyone else want to see Hurricane in Bear form? You know you want to. <_<
I always thought it would be nice if they gave Druids the old Hurrican back which you could fire and forget instead of the one they have now that breaks when you stop the channel.

Unexpected TankPoints error Clearly someone doesn't understand how EH works. That, or upgrading from T8 to T9 is optional in beating Arthas. Clearly.

 

Pzychotix

You're forgetting situations where you dip low and you suddenly need an OHSNAP button to recover. Even if you're fighting bosses that don't enrage, there's always times where you need a shield wall button, and Barkskin just isn't going to cut it.

 

Liar

Neither is Shield Wall because it's on the GCD. SW is only great if you anticipate this happening or when you can get away with just HSing, otherwise you will have to rely on Last Stand and Trinkets. Is Berserk off the GCD by the way? If not, you guys should try getting it changed.

Unexpected TankPoints error Clearly someone doesn't understand how EH works. That, or upgrading from T8 to T9 is optional in beating Arthas. Clearly.

 

Pzychotix

Even with the GCD, it'd still be effective at saving you from certain death.

 

Thessaly

It'd be like a higher damage consecrate with a longer cooldown. It would fit rather nicely with how they've been altering abilities to pass them around while maintaining core tanking functionality with subtle (or not so subtle) differences.

 

Phorage

There is a trinket in wowhead database (cannot link for some reason) like this:

Defender's Code
Binds when picked up
Unique
Trinket
850 Armor
Requires Level 80
Use: Increases parry dodge by 455 for 20 sec. (2 Min Cooldown)


Looks like a really awesome upgrade from BoT. Also it has the parry dodge thing mentioned earlier.

 

Valerian

That's going to go a ways to increasing our armor over warriors. That's more of a contribution than our weapons.

On that note all the trinkets look pretty damn crazy. They seem quite a bit more impressive than current trinkets even taking the extra 10 levels into account.

 

Pzychotix

Wow, the armor on that thing is ridiculous.

Ridiculously sexy.

Probably going to be using both BoT and this new trinket, unless there's another hot trinket out there.

 

Mijae

Over warriors? With a full Naxx set, we can now get over 45k armor with Badge of Tenacity, Imp Mark of the Wild, Imp Devotion Aura, and Elixir of Mighty Defense. That is before Inspiration. I smell armor cap soon. Sure seems like we're keeping the same niche we had in BC.

Feral DruidStats spreadsheet
v3.2.0.0.xls - updated 8/4/2009

 

Nokiya

Epic Trinkets - WotLK

Now with the Defender's Code use being parry/dodge rating and two below it in the image is Valor Medal of the First war use being straight dodge rating, do you think it would be possible to pop both of these trinkets simultaneously?

 

halmmar

Hurricane doesn't have cooldown.

Two defensive trinkets shouldn't stack. But I'd still use the badge of tenacity, and that effect counts as offensive.

 

Thessaly

Mine has a 1 min cooldown. Or did they remove it in WotLK? I see they did. I'd be fine with it back if it meant we could use it in Bearform. Or made a Bear version of it.

 

manapaws

I noticed in quite a few in the comments regarding cat dps cycles they say 5rip. Does that mean it works out better to go that fifth combo point now? Shredding at 4 and 'risking' critting for an overflow combo point. Or does it just mean do it how we're currently doing it - 5 good, but 4 is fine.

On a different note, have you guys seen the new jewelcrafting trinkets? A blue qual level 75 one is extremely nice, 63 stamina, blue socket, yellow socket, 9 stam socket bonus and a use effect of 300 dodge rating. If thats how good the blue qual level 75 ones are, I can't wait to see the epic level 80 ones. Or will we be forced to use armor ones again?


Oh nevermind I found it:

Figurine - Monarch Crab
Binds when picked up
Unique
Trinket
+63 Stamina
Blue Socket
Yellow Socket
Socket Bonus: +9 Stamina
Requires Level 75
Requires Jewelcrafting (400)
Use: Increases dodge rating by 300 (11.28% @ L75) for 10 sec. (1 Min Cooldown)

 

Vaccine

Does this concern anyone else? They get into the Badge of Tenacity situation once more where they either completely shackle us to one trinket for the entire expansion (least its epic this time!) or they have to start putting duplicates in of this trinket at each higher level because theres one thing we know its that bears aren't going to willingly give up bonus armour so each new trinket has to have more which makes little room for anything else. I was kind of hoping we'd get away from the bonus armour mechanic altogether.

The parry/dodge change is nice but it doesn't address my main issue with the off piece which is the massive amounts of defense on everything. The shoulder/head enchants also got leaked yesterdy, they are all heavy on defense too (though the shoulder may be placeholders, the inscription only ones show the precedent which is def+dodge rating). The best idea I've seen for defense was convert the bonus parry and block it gets into dodge for classes that can't do either of those things at a reasonable conversion.

But the other side is we don't actually have any jewelery on Beta discovered that has bonus parry and bonus armour. So the change is kind of pointless at current, even if it does bode well for future itemisation.

 

raffy

From Blizzard Beta Druid Forums:
1. FFF, Finally!
2. Moves a Cat/DPS talent lower in tree.
3. Decent 11 pt talent
4. Pretty insane for TPS but overall still feels odd, 2 min would be better, doesn't really address aoe tanking concerns.

 

spartakos

So now we have 1 last stand button and 1 insane TPS button. We just have to see cooldown of the new ability since now its 11-points not 51.

 

Vaccine

The new beserk is certainly interesting, not sure if it still feels like a 51 pointer yet though.

In an unlimited rage situation its pretty awesome for AoE tanking by just using it like we use swipe at the moment, tabbing targets to try get max coverage. I'm just worried that in these sort of AoE situations rage isn't often plentiful and it may render the removed CD a little pointless if we're only doing 3-4 mangles anyway. For boss tanking though I guess its nice threat though its hard to judge the value of that again till we see if DPS are being threat limited or not once things are finalised.

 

dukes

Also:
The berserk change is nice, as is introducing a separate Last Stand. FFF as base is very nice.

 

nightcrowler

After doing some math:

in full naxx-10 gear, raid buffed we will have about 2.0 weapon speed. Considering a full stacked lacerate in 15 seconds we will do:

15/2 = 7.5 mauls
13.5/1.5 = 9 mangles
1 lacerate to refresh the stack

Summing up average damage of those ability and dividing by 15 seconds we will do about 3500 dps on average (tank specced and equipped) at that level. Pretty nice aggro-wise.

 

Mijae

Too bad they had to pick the worst dps talent to fill the spot. Savage fury is a bear talent. Why didn't they push Shredding Attacks there instead? Why are the low tier talents in resto better than the low tier talents in feral?

Feral DruidStats spreadsheet
v3.2.0.0.xls - updated 8/4/2009

 

Kieran

Tier 7 4 piece setbonus gives Berserk additional 3 seconds though, so your numbers are off.

18/2 = 9 Mauls,
16,5/1,5 = 11 Mangles
and the Lacerate for stack refresh.

Edit 2: Damn, going by your estimates the bonus would add around 20% damage, for 4200 dps on average.

Edit: reading comprehension is my bestest friend.

 

Liar

You could always pop defensive trinkets at once so I don't see why not.

I wouldn't mind all that much really. Trinkets have always been powerful for any class. DST, DFT from BWL, Moroes have all been used for a really long time, too, so it's not just a bear issue. You can obviously argue if that is a bad mechanic or not but personally I don't mind it.

Unexpected TankPoints error Clearly someone doesn't understand how EH works. That, or upgrading from T8 to T9 is optional in beating Arthas. Clearly.

 

Valaranin

I think it's fair to assume that it will have a 5 minute CD to match the Last Stand of Warriors since its now the same ability in the same position on the tree.

This news definately put a smile on my face.