• sadris

It was justified that Paladins dominated AOE tanking in BC because their mitigation and single target threat generation was atrocious. This is not the case in WLK and as such, it doesn't make sense to give them the best of all three worlds and not provide the same treatment to all tanking classes.

Most importantly though, Blizzard wants tanks to be selected based on player skill rather than class. When one tank can hold aggro on infinity mobs through SoC spam and the others cannot, it is a fairly easy choice for the raid leader as to which tank will be selected.

'[The main argument against gay-marriage] always revolves around ... "the gay agenda"... Apparently all these gays only want to get married so they can adopt children, turn the children gay (probably using their mystic gay voodoo, passed gayly down from one gay generation to the next), and perpetuate their gayness.'
-- rantingkitten

 

• Nopher

AoE tanking is a big deal in WotLK, the reasons why are many:

1. The AoE cap has been lifted so high that it won't be a factor during normal gameplay (a good starting point for more info: the Mage WotLK thread for numbers and discussion).

2. A lot of specs (all of them?) that previously couldn't add significant AoE damage have gained the ability to do so.

3. Paladins are just as good as in TBC at tanking big packs of mobs. Death Knights are close second. Warriors with Shockwave and the glyphed Thunderclap are miles ahead of us. While Berserk is awesome for regular packs (and by awesome I mean omg-this-is-getting-nerfed awesome) we have nothing for big packs.

4. Encounter design, based upon having done quite a lot of regular instances and some Naxx normal raids, seems to be leaning towards larger packs of mobs than in TBC.

The bottom line is that being able to tank big packs reasonably well is currently the norm in WotLK, not the exception like in TBC.

 

ools

I saw the TPS numbers on various talents, but I didn't see DPS numbers. Does anyone have math comparing cat DPS per talent point for:

Naturalist
Predatory Instincts
Rend and Tear
Primal Precision

I know standard DPS cycles are still a question. Can we assume something like the current, but with the first finisher being a savage roar instead of a rip? Or is that too naive at this point?

[Edit: Forget to include Primal Precision]

 

Malazaar

 

Camulos

I stand mostly corrected. As others tried to tell me, the whole niche MT thing is supposed to be a thing of the past.

I thought the whole "way ahead" thing as the trigger for corrective action undermines his point. But I can't argue with GC's intent.

 

Mijae

Here's is an new sorted TPS estimate based on a full blue 80 bear set. This is assuming infinite rage on a single target.

Savage Fury: 510.65 (255.33)
LotP: 139.71
Primal Precision: 242.13 (121.07)
Rend & Tear: 383.58 (76.72)
Predatory Strikes: 205.42 (68.47)
Naturalist: 318.71 (63.74)
Predatory Instincts: 182.44 (60.81)
Sharpened Claws: 167.65 (55.88)
Imp Mangle: 151.58 (50.53)
Protector of the Pack: 132.14 (44.05)
Feral Instinct: 82.01 (27.34)
Shapeshifter (5): 134.84 (26.97)
SotF: 54.07 (18.02)

This order should remain relatively the same if threat values change. As gear levels improve, PI will move up a place in the list. Obviously for multi-target tanking FI goes up and if low rage RnT goes down. I also haven't modeled Berserk (or KotJ) for bear, it will slightly lower Imp Mangle and up Savage Fury.

I'm hoping my estimate for Lacerate is off. Right now I'm assuming the constant threat scales from 70 to 80 at the same rate the bleed damage scales (285 @ 70 => ~588 @ 80). If the 20% damage threat mod still exists, any AP scaling will barely affect threat. Pure swipe is almost equal to just keeping the bleed up (similar to current). Although, the bleed will buff maul through RnT. Maybe they wanted to keep the current bear cycle instead of spamming one or the other.

I've added a macro to my spreadsheet to calculate these from current settings.

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

 

nightcrowler

Edit: Fixed maul

I've tested bear threat on PTR, the assumption I've made on my program was wrong (probably also the ones from Mijae, looking at bear threat value he posted before).

Those are at level 70:

BEAR base modifier (BM): 2.071428571 (it's basically a salvation included value of (1.3+1.15)/0.7 )

The following value are taken BEFORE the bear threat modifier:

Autoattack: dmg * BM (obviosly)
Mangle: 1.5 * dmg * BM
Maul: (322 + dmg) * BM
Swipe: dmg * BM
Lacerate (initial application): (285 + 0.5 * dmg ) * BM
Lacerate (dot): 0.5 * dmg * BM

Feral Fairie Fire: (553+dmg) * BM (where dmg is 0.05*ap+1)

What was changed?
- The have increased a bit the maul static component
- They have increased a lot lacerate scaling component (from 0.2 to 0.5), making it pretty good!
- They have increased a lot mangle scaling from 1.3 to 1.5 (pretty good!)

- Maul untalented (w/o R&T) = Mangle (+ static threat) at T7-naxx level, maul will do about 1.5 times mangle damage but mangle will do 1.5 times more threat.


I dunno the data from level 80 because I can't log Beta, but if static threat scales like static damage it should be 809 for lacerate and 568 for maul.

Actually a t7-naxx druid with this spec will do (unlimited rage) 3140 DPS and 7520 TPS. An average dpser will be at around 4500-5000 dps making threat not an issue, so probably we will be able to swap some dps talents for utility (like ImpLoP and so on).

P.S.
Can someone verify the data and try it at level 80 in beta? for testing i've used Zthreatmeter

 

Melthu

In a full bear spec Master Shapeshifter is clearly not worth taking. Naturalist is essentially a 10 point talent, dropping it to 4th from the bottom in TPS per talent point and not nearly worth taking on it's own. This leaves OOC as the only talent tying a full-time bear into the Resto tree. Can any bears in Beta give an estimate of how important OOC is to tanking, if it is at all? With the feral tree being so bloated for bears I really want to go 0/71/0 (possibly 0/69/2 if I'm the only druid), and only OOC is making me consider the Resto tree. If it can be skipped then all of the important tanking talents can be taken in a single spec, including the situational talents like Brutal Impact and Primal Tenacity.

 

Valerian

Uh FFF is a ridiculous amount of threat for something that is free. Has this been tested empirically (as in using FFF to pull and then seeing how much damage it takes to pull off you) rather than just with a threatmeter? It seems abnormally high to me otherwise.

 

Brotherbear

Hello all. Long time reader, first time poster here.

I was just thinking about the "pure" tank question.

While Naturalist is 10% more damage = 10% more tps, not going into Resto at all does allow for
http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?drui...00000000000000

The primary issue with this build would be that, although you have all the tanking toys in the improved bash for spell interrupts and IW as well as the buffed DR, you might run into TPS issues once your dps start gearing up.

That being said I'll have to take a look at this closer to release as it might be ideal for the gearing game when guilds first hit 80 and surviving instances/heroics is actually a challenge. For endgame raiding however I think you'll miss the threat as well as the viability of cat dps.

On a related note, has there been any further clarification on how the proposed respecing will work?

 

◊ Lord BEEF

I doubt you're going to run into threat issues (at least on single targets). All tanks generate massive amounts of threat now including of course bears. While your dps will gear up, your threat also scales when you get new gear.

Even dps specs that are currently broken and doing like 3500 dps in a raid setting aren't having any threat issues.

As for respecs, they haven't said on that yet either.

 

tlbj6142

On the PTR last night I tried taking out that elite ogre that roams up on the plateau above Shat. In 2T4 plus badge gear, I just about never ran out of rage due to the NR and PF. I don't recall how often OoC proc'd during that time, but I doubt it helped all that much. I assume a real boss would have generated even more threat (due to damage received). And don't forget there are now a few classes who's buffs give us rage per crit, etc.

So, in a pure bear build, I doubt OoC is worth it.

 

Meikel

I have enjoyed playing my druid as a feral hybrid and would like to continue in that role. I have played with the talent calculator and keep coming back to this build:

http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?drui...00000000000000

There is one point left over (two if I take one out of RnT), I'm not sure where I would put the other point(s). I was thinking ILotP but Infected wounds looks interesting. I may have no choice but to take primal precision depending on gear.

Any thoughts?

 

tlbj6142

MS is weak for bear. And, I'm not too sure it is all that great for cat. If that later holds true, you can probably give up those 5 points for PP + IW or IM. So, think of it like this...

Take what you have if you want a slightly stronger cat than bear. Take PP + IW or IM, if you want a slightly strong bear than cat.

 

smurph98gt

Can you post your spec? I haven't come across anyone elses specs for PTR builds, and since I plan on raiding still once 3.0 drops, I'd like to get a feel for what's working well for others. I only had the PTR up for a short time yesterday, and didn't get a chance to take my bear out anywhere.

I went down the line and started picking stuff that sounded good, not having read up on the talents before, so I'm not really sure how well something like this will work. Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft

 

Ronfar

I apologize if there has been a definitive response to this earlier in the thread as I recall the question being asked, but search isn't cooperating with me today. Have LoTP and perhaps the iLoTP effect been changed to be raid wide? I think most of us assumed at the very least the base 5% crit would be raid wide, but the tooltips I've seen on Wowhead seem to suggest that it is still limited to one's immediate party. If the tooltips are incorrect, does the iLoTP heal also apply to all raid members?

 

tlbj6142

I think I am currently spec'd like this. Though I might only have 1/3 in PotP and 2/2 in iLotP. I was trying to stay a bit more cat focused while I leveled yet take a few bear talents to keep me safe in the 70-78 level 5-mans.

 

smurph98gt

I gotcha. I'm going to try a full bear mode just to get a feel for it, but considering that I have a guild full of Pally tanks and Prot Warriors that having raging hardons for the current changes, I'll probably be spending more time in cat mode than not.

Edit: Speaking of cat. Is it worth getting Berserk and skipping over OOC? We all know and love OoC, but a tear shit up every 3 minutes ability seems really awesome.

 

Melthu

From GC:

 

nightcrowler

I've tested the threatmeter with a rogue and a mage, it works perfectly fine. I've also tested FFF with the rogue and he need to do about 2.5k damage before pulling the mob, so it seems ok. But I'd like if someone else test it, basically because if that's true it means tha FFF should be used every CD instead of swipe (with mangle in cd and lac stacked) because it will do more threat than a swipe or a single lacerate.

On a side note:
seing how the threatmeter work there is something strange but not problematic, it seems that threat is pushed by the server 2 times, first time the static modifier plus some damage scaling (probably naked value) and in a second time is passed the equip scaling.

 

◊ Lord BEEF

Does feral faerie fire still have a 1.0 gcd in bear form? I can't remember if that was changed. If so, that's another edge for it in terms of threat per second

 

• Astrylian

Kind of. All the other abilities have GCDs in increments of 1.5 (unless you did 1/3 Imp Mangle, which wouldn't be worth it, I don't think), so there's no way to make use of it, other than to soak up your latency (which is an important effect).

(That said, I haven't actually checked the GCD of it on 3.0, it may have been fixed to be 1.5sec)

Rawr - A theorycrafting tool for Bears, Cats, Moonkin, Trees, Healadins, DPSWarrs, Retadins, Mages, ProtWarrs, Tankadins, HealingPriests, ShadowPriests, Warlocks, Rogues, EnhShams, Hunters, Elementals, RestoShams, Tank DKs, and DPS DKs!
Download Rawr v2.2.27 <--NEW Nov9th!

Are you an active Rogue / Hunter / Warlock theorycrafter and an experienced C# dev, with some spare time and a desire to help build something great for the WoW community? Send me a PM!

 

Mijae

Posted another update based on these threat modifier changes. I've also implemented diminishing returns on dodge based on newest results from Combat Ratings at level 80.

Based on the threat changes (only posting normalized values now):

Savage Fury: 357.19
LotP: 197.77
Primal Precision: 173.17
Rend & Tear: 117.54
Predatory Strikes: 101.2
Naturalist: 93.86
Imp Mangle: 89.74
Predatory Instincts: 86.08
Sharpened Claws: 79.11
Protector of the Pack: 65.1
Feral Instinct: 41.88
Shapeshifter (5): 41.3
SotF: 26.19

The biggest change is the position of Imp Mangle moving up in value (due to the increased modifier).

Nightcrowler - You said they increased the static threat component of Maul? I had this as 322 before, so 285 would actually be a reduction. I'll have to look up where I got that value from before.

Can anyone report on the static threat components for Maul, Lacerate, and FFF at level 80 (and 75 if possible)?

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

 

nightcrowler

It could be then, static value are more difficult to fit properly, on scaling value you can assume that blizzard is not crazy so if you have 1.51 for mangle or 0.495 for lacerate it's easy to assume that they really are 1.5 and 0.5, for static value it's more difficult, expecially for maul because it has a larger variety of damage (lacerate and FFF does every time the same damage if you fix the ap).

So maul probably is 322, I'll do further tests in the afternoon.

 

• Astrylian

Did some napkin math earlier today... Looks like (at least at about my gear level), it's suddenly worth it to drop lacerate in low rage situations, rather than Maul, on single targets, in 3.0. On 2+, Maul wins by a landslide. Maul's rage cost is gigantic, due to missing the rage from the auto attack, but with all the multipliers on it now, it's just as gigantic of a threat boost.

Rawr - A theorycrafting tool for Bears, Cats, Moonkin, Trees, Healadins, DPSWarrs, Retadins, Mages, ProtWarrs, Tankadins, HealingPriests, ShadowPriests, Warlocks, Rogues, EnhShams, Hunters, Elementals, RestoShams, Tank DKs, and DPS DKs!
Download Rawr v2.2.27 <--NEW Nov9th!

Are you an active Rogue / Hunter / Warlock theorycrafter and an experienced C# dev, with some spare time and a desire to help build something great for the WoW community? Send me a PM!