Improved Moonfire is not better than IIS, but the choice is usually between two points in moonglow or improved moonfire because they are required to advance up the tree. Most should be taking IMF as moonglow is our weakest mana talent and would only be maxed in truly awful raid makeups that do not support balance DPS very well at all.

You have to understand that moonfire is only going to be about 9-14% of your total damage on boss fights (Really dependent on how well you use FoN) as opposed to the combination of wrath and starfire which will likely be 55-70% of your damage depending on how heavily you utilize insect swarm. You also have to remember that you lose much of the benefit of Imp Moonfire with the Moonfire Glyph due to the 90% reduced initial damage.

Owlkin Frenzy shouldn't be taken for trash, it's taken because many boss mechanics deal raid-wide aoe damage that triggers it for a significant DPS increase. I've already found that it would be incredibly valuable on the Instructor Razuvious fight: regular raid-wide damage and an encounter which is made much easier the faster you can finish it.
EDIT: I see what you were responding to, and agree 100% that no one should be intentionally pulling aggro for OF procs. You're actually lowering your aoe dps because you're getting pushback on your first hurricane before OF procs, or you're waiting for a 15% proc to hurricane which is wasted DPS time. We're also not nearly as hardy compared to BC; due to the stam scaling on tanks our days as aoe tanks are numbered (And unnecessary as well).

For those looking at raiding specs, my armory should my current 10-man spec choice I used last night. After Monday in Naxx-10 I switched to only one point in eclipse as a nice benefit to DPS without reconfiguring my rotation around it in order to supplement my mana regen. I feel that Intensity and OoC are necessary in the 10-man instance due to less raid-wide buffs, and the mana stress some of the encounters have due to consistent Typhoon usage.

Unless you have an ideal group of Feral Druid + Shadow Priest, you're going to want IFF for ideal raid debuffs and I made the choice of skimping on eclipse for it as opposed to mana regen. These types of decisions are really dependent on your personal experiences and raid compositions; everyone needs to make their own spec decisions rather than relying on one ideal (Because there isn't one).

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I really want to elaborate a bit on Typhoon. On the whole I believe we've dismissed this ability (And I'm one of the biggest offenders here) as mostly for PVP. After using it in heroics and Naxx-10 I've found Typhoon extremely good on both Anub'Rekhan and Maexxna for taking down the tiny adds as well as many heroic boss mechanis. I'm desperately waiting for the Typhoon Glyph that gets rid of the knockback for any type of benefit as the utility of an instant burst aoe is really amazing in 5 and 10-mans but the knockback is extremely frustrating. What really makes this ability shine is the range: we don't have to reposition to apply our instant burst damage. With some research I've found that Typhoon is the only cone with 36 yard range and has higher damage than any other cone burst ability; the ability to finish off swarms and lowish health aoe packs at range is something fairly unique to our spec. It works particularly well when triggering Seed of Corruption to apply significant aoe damage in a very short amount of time.

Thanks for clarifying that. Wouldn't Moonglow be a better choice to advance down the tree at the beginning, when mana is a big issue?

And doesn't Improved Moonfire affect the damage of both the initial strike as well as the damage over time effect? Also - when you crit with Moonfire, does the increased crit damage only apply to the initial damage (in which case, the talent isn't really useful) or does it increase the damage over time component too?

Edit: To add on Owlkin Frenzy. Razuvius is just one encounter from many. Yes, most bosses have AOE effects but they should be avoided. OF is just a very random, uncertain talent. First you have to be hit and then it has to proc. Considering how many difficult choices need to be made, I think there are better available talents.

No DoT's can crit like you're asking, this is a basic game mechanic you definitely should know. It does affect the periodic damage but it is not multiplicative with the glyph. Unlike DK's, Spriests, and Affliction Locks we have no talents that give our dots crit scaling.

Most boss AoE effects aren't designed to be avoided, they're intended to put stress on the healers. The choices are solely dependent on the encounter, you want to tailor your spec for the encounters you'll be interacting with. Just look at the Sunwell encounters: Owlkin Frenzy is very easily more DPS than eclipse on several of those fights, and will proc on all of them.

Mana isn't always a huge issue and moonglow is the worst way to solve your mana issues. Mana talents have zero value unless you would run out of mana without them so it will take experience and calculations to tune your spec. You need to research a bit better in the locked WotLK thread as a lot of this info is in there with the numbers, as well as spreadsheets and simulations. But the key thing is this: tailor the spec for your situation and know the absolute value of each talent point.

I have researched this and I know that Moonglow is our least useful mana regen talent. However, we have to choose either Moonglow or Improved Moonfire in any spec, because otherwise we aren't able to progress further down the tree.

So my point was: As Improved Moonfire seems to provide very little DPS returns, wouldn't taking Moonglow make sense considering that mana regen will be a significant problem when you start raiding due to poor stats on gear?

And yes, the answer to that does depend on personal testing. If you are running out of mana without it, take it. If you don't, take Imp MF.

Edit: And Moonfire isn't a DoT. It's a combination of an instant damage spell and a DoT that's why the question about its mechanics. I assumed it might be different entirely, thank you for clarifying it isn't.

Yes.

Thank you !!! :-)

BTW, Adoriele are you going to host Squawk & Awe on Curse as well?

Doing a quick run of the calcs I made for 70, assuming full raid buffs and talents (i.e. 11% haste), haste reaches parity with Spellpower at 1942 SP, after which you'll want to equalize haste and Spellpower (note that, as with my old calcs, this only applies directly to straight SF spam, but as that's still our main nuke it's a worthwhile benchmark). Hit cap assuming 2/2 BoP and Misery/iFF is 262/3, add a Draenei and it's 236/7. Crit is still, DPS-wise, our least-effective stat, even counting Nature's Grace, mostly because of the heavy itemization penalty it has.

As for spec i'm going for:

66/0/5

The regen talents in resto and master shapeshifter seems a bit too much talents demanding at the moment. With this kind of spec you get all the perks of the balance talents and the nice 10% extra int from furor. I think it's the most versatile spec especially considering 25 man raids, where regen isn't quite as important as you probably gonna have JoW, replenish, totems and bow.

Note: i took brambles cause i like extra treant damage. Not sure it is optimal or not, i had 3 spare points in the end and i wasn't sure about going for brambles, maxing out frenzy with an extra point in moonglow maybe, or even take nature focus for the extra pvp utlilty and the nice antipushback on wrath for those interrupting encounters.

Hit is 17% for 100% Hit Chance.
SP gives you 3%
2/2 BoP gives you 4%

You will need 10% Hit from your Items.

But with the Wrath/Eclipse heavy rotation we're forced to run due to our Starfire glyph getting nerfed, isn't there some kind of benchmark you'll want to hit with crit rating? I only had 24% Crit at 70 fully buffed and I felt like it wasn't enough.