Feral talents/abilities - WotLK discussion - Page 90

Mijae · 08/28/08, 4:46 PM

This is a huge nerf to the Furor talent. It's now nowhere near worth 5 points. They better either make additional buffs or reduce the number of points to max it. Tactical Mastery is only 3 points and increases threat generation of other spec abilities.

Regardless, it has never made sense to have Furor in the resto tree. A PvE cat won't need it and they definitely don't need Nature's Focus (IMotW is acceptable). They should at least reduce Furor to 3 points. Ideally they would move it to feral, push both of the shapeshifting talents up one tier, and reduce Naturalist to 3 points. We could then end up with 11-14 points in resto for OoC and possibly Intensity.

Give us the ability to choose if we want talents without having to take worthless alternatives to get something higher up. Picking talents should never be easy. It should be a choice between two equally powerful talents that tweak your character in different ways. I really think Blizzard fails in general with this type of design.

TheNameLessOne · 08/28/08, 5:07 PM

Originally Posted by Pzychotix

Can't say I'm a fan of the changes at all. I'm of the opinion that cap on furor should at least be raised from 40. We're still spending some 800 mana on a shift, and trying to stay on people AND killing them will be harder with less energy on shifts.

It needs significant rework considering enhancement shaman can do the same thing (assuming they are outdoors) without paying such a high opportunity cost for only two talents points and only 13% of their base mana.

Should be changed to keeping all your energy and moved to the side as an optional PVP talent since it is almost worthless for PVE.

Gurrshael · 08/28/08, 5:09 PM

Edit: I should really read all the replies before replying...

Valerian · 08/28/08, 6:33 PM

So the energy regen in other forms is ONLY useful if you have furor and even then is significantly weaker than currently? As in Furor currently is strictly better in every situation than the "new" Furor?

If that is the case it needs SOMETHING added to it for PvE or have naturalist moved up in the tree or something because otherwise you literally have to waste points in the resto tree to get to Naturalist and OOC which isn't generally what they intend.

Duilliath · 08/28/08, 7:58 PM

Originally Posted by Valerian

So the energy regen in other forms is ONLY useful if you have furor and even then is significantly weaker than currently? As in Furor currently is strictly better in every situation than the "new" Furor?

Yes. Basically.

Don't quite like that, though I can understand the desire to get rid of Power Shifting - even if it makes for a very interesting mechanic from a Druid's point of view. Far as I'm concerned they can just go balance around it (as that appears to be the other option).

But as it stands, I think they should just make it 3 points rather than 5, or even 2 with OoC moved to first tier.
To be honest - I think a talent which is a *must have* in every single spec simply should not exist. It should be trainable or even a basic skill. Especially not if it requires you to waste at least 5 talent points to even get there. Moonkins want it, Bears want it, Cats want it and even Trees will want OoC. I just don't think that's good design.

seminarca · 08/28/08, 8:25 PM

The Resto subspec is now a concern without having Furor as the obvious tier 1 choice. I'd agree with the people posting about moving Natural/Master Shapeshifter up a level. So you'd go Imp MotW (2), Natural Shapeshifter (3), then Naturalist (5) and Master Shapeshifter (2) and Omen (1 .. which makes 13 total in Resto as opposed to the 16 we need to spend now). Then I'd remove the Furor talent, and put it on trainers as a base skill. This does a number of things. It gives us 3 more talent points to spend in the Feral tree. It gives us the neutered Furor functionality for free, since it's not quite worth 5 talent points anymore, it's now more a convenience-at-the-start-of-pulls/PvP thing. Least of all, it allows us to pick up Imp MotW.

It's sad that they're killing an aspect of our DPS cycle which was fairly interesting, but without it in the equation, hopefully they can balance other aspects better. Toskk's calculations showing ~2400 DPS at level 80 are very discouraging at this stage =/

Pzychotix · 08/28/08, 8:39 PM

Originally Posted by TheNameLessOne

It needs significant rework considering enhancement shaman can do the same thing (assuming they are outdoors) without paying such a high opportunity cost for only two talents points and only 13% of their base mana.

Should be changed to keeping all your energy and moved to the side as an optional PVP talent since it is almost worthless for PVE.

I totally forgot about Enh Shamans.

Do they get their WF haste while in ghost wolf form now? What prevents them from completely staying in that form for PVP?

Our prospects look grim.

Valerian · 08/28/08, 8:53 PM

Hmm the new buff stacking/not stacking looks pretty weak for druids too.

Compare feral and fury:

Raid crit: both
Demo: both, but very impractical for druids
Armor reduction: sunder > FF unless there's another warrior in raid.
Bleed debuff: druid (i dont think fury can get trauma).

In the case where there is a tank other than a warrior or druid, the fury warrior seems to have a better slot, debuff wise, than ferals.

Wildstyle · 08/28/08, 9:04 PM

Originally Posted by Valerian

Hmm the new buff stacking/not stacking looks pretty weak for druids too.

Compare feral and fury:

Raid crit: both
Demo: both, but very impractical for druids
Armor reduction: sunder > FF unless there's another warrior in raid.
Bleed debuff: druid (i dont think fury can get trauma).

In the case where there is a tank other than a warrior or druid, the fury warrior seems to have a better slot, debuff wise, than ferals.

Sunder and FF will stack, as FF is regarded as minor debuff and Sunder as major (although chances are you'll have a Balance Druid with imp FF ;p)

here's the list of which buffs will and won't stack:

WoW Forums -> Changes to Debuffs, Buffs, and Raid Stacking

The big news here is that Trauma and mangle (debuff) will no longer stack.

Valerian · 08/28/08, 9:26 PM

Originally Posted by Wildstyle

Sunder and FF will stack, as FF is regarded as minor debuff and Sunder as major (although chances are you'll have a Balance Druid with imp FF ;p)

here's the list of which buffs will and won't stack:

WoW Forums -> Changes to Debuffs, Buffs, and Raid Stacking

The big news here is that Trauma and mangle (debuff) will no longer stack.

I know that I mean despite them stacking, FF is obtainable from any druid (with Imp FF from an oomkin just being better). The feral buffs are weak and replaceable because the class that has the same one as us (fury warrs) have better OTHER buffs. This is what they were trying to avoid.

Clearly there will be situations where a feral will be better (no other druids for example allows mark to be provided by the feral) but in a 25 man raid it certainly doesn't look equitable at the moment. Oomkin looks nearly strictly better than Feral (especially with the note improved oomkin aura provides 3% haste).

Now I'll grant maybe there's some other group type buff things going to be provided by feral but at the moment it seems like you wouldn't want a feral in your 25 man raids since you get the same buffs via other classses. Now I suppose if they overbuff feral so they're better (buffs notwithstanding) then I guess it works, but I cannot imagine thats the goal.

Astrylian · 08/28/08, 9:49 PM

I'm guessing that "Horn of Winter" buff listed for Str+Agi is a feral buff.

seminarca · 08/28/08, 10:03 PM

Originally Posted by Valerian

Hmm the new buff stacking/not stacking looks pretty weak for druids too.

You missed Battle Shout, which really is the money buff Warriors bring. But that only strengthens your point (which I fully agree with).

Originally Posted by Astrylian

I'm guessing that "Horn of Winter" buff listed for Str+Agi is a feral buff.

Sounds more like a DK Frost skill to me.

lapin · 08/28/08, 10:45 PM

Originally Posted by Astrylian

I'm guessing that "Horn of Winter" buff listed for Str+Agi is a feral buff.

If I remember correctly there was a blue mentioning that DK´s would get that a cupple of weeks ago.

Astrylian · 08/28/08, 10:46 PM

Well I recall a dev mentioning ferals getting a str/agi buff too, a while ago. That's why I thought that might be ours.

Valerian · 08/28/08, 10:48 PM

Originally Posted by seminarca

You missed Battle Shout, which really is the money buff Warriors bring. But that only strengthens your point (which I fully agree with).

Well I discounted BS since I figured Melee would get BoM and Kings. But yeah you are right if there's no second pally BS is a good one too.

Sounds more like a DK Frost skill to me.

This was my thought too. Horn of Winter just seems odd because winter isn't usually associated with Strength/Agi so I'd guess they added it to the name because its a "cold" skill for DKs.

Now one thing I did miss in my analysis was that feral DOES bring a Bres and Innervate. Then again though so does an oomkin which still leaves that as almost strictly better. The only saving grace, perhaps, will be a buff to Imp LotP so that its a decent raid buff that isn't overshadowed by a directly competing class.