Feral DPS right now is very strong even at 7.5x gear levels with the caveat that the skill level is reasonably high compared to most classes and fight mechanics play a huge role in the type of numbers you'll see.

Something like XT-002 is really going to be out of whack compared to something like Freya or even Hodir (or Kologarn where you can't Shred reliably). Our DPS is much stronger at current gear levels compared to most classes, though doesn't appear to scale as well with the Ulduar gear we do know about, especially if you have BiS from pre-3.1.

This may be ok, because currently on the type of fights where the positional requirements are reasonable and you can "stand and dps", the numbers can be very strong for a well-played cat. Currently, it's fairly satisfying seeing those numbers due to the fact that you have to pay attention and adapt your priority list to the fight (e.g. for Mimiron, if you can time your bleeds and SR activation to your in-and-out movement, you can pull some impressive numbers on a fairly dynamic fight).

People who see 7.5k+ numbers on XT are already calling for nerfs on cat DPS but fail to realize that our DPS is very sensitive to fight mechanics and player execution. Other classes can pull high numbers more consistently across the spectrum of fights, but there are some where we excel.

I am not comfortable with attempting ferocious bite into my dps rotation especially on progression content. I find I either lose dps from lack of CP to apply rip and sr before they expire so I clip timers to ensure they are always up especially if I may need to run out. I currently obtain 5CP then look at my timers and decide. This gives time to focus on other things or call things out on vent.

To attempt FB in my rotation I assume the best setup is have enough CP into SR to have it ~4-6 seconds longer than rip and start after ripping or SR to be safe. On the following cycle FB with as many CP available to get another 5CP rip then whatever can go into SR in that 4-6 second window. Ulduar is quite the change from naxx and I assume talent points to improve FB will become increasing more valuable than talenting swipe. I can't wait for 4T8 where 1/2SR5CP4/5FB rotations are viable?

Im not sure, if benefits from this bonus overwrite the fact, that most pcs T8 is not BiS for cats. Because if you want to raid as feral DPS, it is realy much better to concetrate for ArPen. After 3.1, I regemed for ArPen and got some ArPen support gear and after few Ulduar runs I can say, thats the way.

The rotation became much "trivial" (among druids). ArPen move your DPS from bleeds to DPS from direct physical attacks. This cause, that lost bleeds uptime has less impact to your DPS. The Ulduar encounters are full of stuff you have to watch all the time. Im using FB just if the RiP and SR is up, because there is no time to control, if that will drive SR and RiP to fall ... very often. Refreshing SR for 1 CP is obviously enough for build 5CP RiP even, if you dont have 4 T8. SR is very easy to refresh, but the problem could be the RiP.
I found and can quote what was writen in FBN topic, that using 5CB FB boost your DPS such, that you can let RiP fall for several seconds. Also most Ulduar bosses have spawns/adds and spells which force melee to stop DPS and run and RiPs DPE is wasted, because: mangle/trauma down, no shred increase uptime, SR expire, target is dead.

The most important is, that if you are using FB almost always, when SR/RiP is up for random secs, you still have very good DPS. Im realy satisfied with ArPen style, when you definitely dont care about fallen RiP. Just refresh it for 5CB and no matter, how long refreshing takes. The AGI gear and rotation close to 100% bleed uptime is showed as better for DPS, but its imposible to do that rotation in 90% Ulduar encounters. If you wouldnt like to be a policeman on your timers and wouldnt be depended on some addon, go stack ArPen and get head and gloves T8.

Anyway, Im sorry, if my english is not clear enough :\

I am running the newest rawr and fully raid buffed with the newest gear from wowhead downloaded, and I believe that T8 is best in slot. The main issue is that the set bonus is calculated for t7, but not for t8. Each piece of t8 is either best in slot or second place to best in slot when ignoring set bonuses. The only piece of gear which really surpasses t8 is [Winter's Icy Embrace]. Right now Rawr says that 2 piece t7 is better, but I am positive that will change once the set bonuses for t8 are calculated and added in.

How sure are you?

2pc T7 gives you +2cp worth of time on Rip.

4pc T8 gives you +1.6cp worth of time (8 seconds, 2cp is 10 seconds) of time on Savage Roar.

Also since you probably cast Rip more often -- about 1.5x as often as SR unless something has changed -- then it seems like you're getting more from +2cp worth of Rip time.

Has the theory changed such that 1pt SRs are better now? If that's true, then 4pc t8 might be better than 2pc t7 since you'll be getting those free CP-worth of uptime more frequently than you cast Rip. But I'm not sure.

I just tested it in RAWR fixing the bug using Mijae's advice.
Using 2t7, the rest BIS, full raid buffs, and a LW/Alch (didn't want to calculate BS/JC), the total dps is 8050.
Using the same situation with 4t8, the total dps is 8250.
You gain about 200 DPS by using t8 over t7 assuming other gear is best in slot for each situation.

The 2 piece t8 bonus was rated at 213 dps, and the 4 piece was at 249 dps.
The 2 piece t7 bonus was rated at 209 dps.

I also had rawr calculate rotations using multiple amounts of combo points, and yes it seems according to rawr's algorithm, 1 combo point savage roars are optimal.

A followup regarding Kologarn... his parry chance seems to be much lower than other bosses', if he parries at all. Looking at recount, I did not see a single parry for any of my raid's melee, though there were plenty of dodges. I found a comment on StratFu indicating the same thing: Kologarn strategy available - StratFu

Thus, stacking expertise at the expense of Agi or ArP is not worthwhile.

Regarding the use of FB in a rotation, I'm finding that with the Shred glyph in raids I can use it more than I ever did before 3.1. (I'm also gemmed for agi, for a bit of hybridity and because Rawr still shows it as better than ArP at my gear level when there's sunders.) When I DPS a test dummy, however, the lack of raid buffs makes it impossible to work in many FB at all.

Double post: I just got the new Rawr but I'm still not 100% clear that it takes the newest armor pen knowledge into account. I'll try to find Ast and see what he says about it. But yeah, my results are now similar.

It's in the newest release (2.2.1.0).

Here is what gear I found to be best in slot so far:
Helm: [Conqueror's Nightsong Headguard]
Neck: [Broach of the Wailing Night]
Shoulders: [Conqueror's Nightsong Shoulderpads]
Cloak: [Drape of the Faceless General]
Chest: [Winter's Icy Embrace]
Wrists: [Mechanist's Bindings]
Gloves: [Conqueror's Nightsong Handgrips]
Belt: [Relic Hunter's Cord]
Legs: [Conqueror's Nightsong Legguards]
Boots: [Footpads of Silence]
Ring 1: [Loop of the Agile]
Ring 2: [Cindershard Ring]
Trinket 1: [Grim Toll]
Trinket 2: [Mjolnir Runestone]
Weapon: [Furious Gladiator's Greatstaff]

I used Shred/Rip/SR glyphs and LW/Alch professions.
8307 dps points as of RAWR 2.2.1
The only way I can increase the dps is by making it a BS/JC, but dealing with JC gems is annoying when it comes to testing. Of course RAWR could be wrong, but it is a much better theorycrafter than I.

Edited for readability and grammar (sorry).

Also keep inmind that using both grim toll and mjolnir runestone will cause you to go over the ArPen cap, which rawr wont take into account due to it averaging the procs. imo its better to use only 1 arpen trinket.