Kitty DPS at level 80 in 4.0.1

ETA: Additional post with some updates here!

Some quick news first, Cataclysm finally has an official release date of 7 December, 2010! Post here.

Also, as the game world (or at least specs et al) did not blow up this past Tuesday, Patch 4.0.1 is not yet live. It is most likely coming next Tuesday (12th), but I'm not promising anything! As ever, dates can change and nothing has been officially announced (as of this writing, at any rate).

Following my post on Druid healing in 4.0.1, I thought I'd spend some time on Feral DPS in 4.0.1.

Cats are getting a bit of a mixed bag in the upcoming patch and in Cataclysm. We have some nice new talents (even if 'NomNomNom' was retitled 'Blood in the Water', which makes it sound like it should boost our Seal-form dps I think!) which, while not really game changing, are still nice boosts. Those who have struggled with kitty dps in the past will find the buffs and debuffs a bit easier to maintain, while those who enjoy the complexities of kitty dps will be pleased to know that you still have to be sharp as ever to maintain them all. We have a new, reliable interrupt off the GCD for both cat and bear form (and new Brutal Impact which can reduce its cooldown, making it on par with other classes' interrupts). With the new armour specialisations, we shouldn't have other classes yoinking our BiS pieces (oh, the raging I've seen over Tossk's Maximized Wristguards when warriors have rolled on them in pugs....).

In fact, the only real downside for cats right now seems to be in terms of actual damage numbers. As is my understanding (and correct me if I'm wrong), warriors are in a similar position right now on Beta and PTR, and a lot of the issues seem to stem from the disappearance of armour penetration a a stat (as arpen was a massive boost to all physical damage classes). I could have sworn I saw a blue post mention in passing that the developers were aware that both warrior and feral damage was low and hadn't finished being tuned, but I can't for the life of me find that post again (if anyone has seen it and can source it for me, I would appreciate it). Because of that, do not quote me on it! But I'm hoping I did actually read it and didn't just imagine it in my hopes for a fix.

Just doing a straight comparison of simple DPS self-buffed on a dummy on live and on Beta, it seems like I've lost about 2k in straight DPS. (This is with the same gear BUT, some different stats due to the arpen gem change, and missing some talents because of the new level cap). That all being said, don't panic! Simple numbers aren't the end of the world and, especially with more testing on the PTR, Beta, and when patches and more go live, hopefully the numbers will be tuned up. Cat gameplay itself is not facing any drastic changes (and have some really nice alterations in my opinion), and changes in simple numbers (rather than entire abilities) are a lot easier to come about.

Also, do keep in mind, Blizzard is NOT trying to balance all the classes around level 80 at this patch - this is all in preparation for Cataclysm, and for ultimate balance at level 85. EVERY class is going to be out of sorts for a while, and damage roles in particular will have very prominent and easy-to-see changes just from watching the damage meters in fights. The change in level cap will also affect which points we can get - you will be 83 before you can get Master Shapeshifter, which means at minimum 4% less crit than you have currently.

On to how to prepare for patch 4.0.1!

For one, if you haven't already, stock up on some gems. You may want to check the currency converter on MMO-Champ to see just how many Justice Points your current Emblem stock will get you, but I might suggest to play it safe and pick up gems now with Emblems rather than waiting (as gem prices will be changing too). It's looking like the Honour Gem quartermasters are removed as well, so if you have spare honour lying around (gems are 10k each) you may like to pick up some with that too. I suggest picking these up before the patch day as I expect many people will be taking advantage of high demand following the patch, so AH prices will likely be high.

All Armour Penetration gems will be converting to Crit Rating gems in 4.0.1. They will also all become yellow. For cats, the best bet for gemming seems to be replacing those crit gems with Agility (Delicate Cardinal Ruby). While you theoretically could keep the crit gems, remember - Agility contributes both to your attack power in Cat Form and to your crit rating, and Agility will scale with Kings and Gift. Also - Hit gems are becoming blue gems in 4.0.1 (from yellow). Most cats need to gem for hit with ICC gear and you may find yourself losing some socket bonuses where you've placed Hit gems into yellow sockets. Socket bonuses are arguable but you may find you still wish to take them, in which case you may have to shuffle your hit gems around as well as your new Agility gems.

You may also need some new enchants, the first which springs to my mind is the Executioner enchant (which increases arpen on proc). Likely your best bets for a replacement enchant will be Mongoose or Massacre. 

As with Resto and Balance, I recommend stocking up on some glyphs pre-patch, as they will likely shoot up in price on the AH as well.

At level 80, I'm planning on using the following spec at level 80:

As mentioned earlier, we do not have enough points at level 80 to pick up Master Shapeshifter, so we will have a crit loss until at least level 83. A number of the new talents are boosting our buffs, debuffs and energy. Blood in the Water will be excellent towards the ends of fights - you won't have to worry as much about whether throwing in some Ferocious Bites will result in your Rip falling off. Endless Carnage is increasing Rake and Savage Roar durations. Predatory Strikes is increasing our Ravage damage and Stampede makes it easier to actually use Ravage in our rotations, particularly on movement fights. ETA: Playing around on Beta, I've also realised another great boost to Stampede - because we get 10 seconds to use Ravage, you can Feral Charge a target while stealthed, get off a Pounce while still stealthed to get that bleed up, and be able to pop Berserk and still have time to get that Ravage in before launching into your full rotation. With Predatory Strikes increasing Ravage crit chance on targets above 80% health, it's great to throw that into our opening attacks.

Primal Madness is a nice boost as well - increases our maximum energy by 20 during Savage Roar and Berserk. On top of that, haste will now feed our energy regen. I will say this - despite my actual numbers being lower, it was definitely a lot easier to keep all my buffs and debuffs up, and I found myself both having the time and the energy to work in Ferocious Bites a lot more frequently. The difference in energy does feel noticeable (to me at least!).

You can see as well; there are enough points for me to pick up Thick Hide (a Bear/tanking talent which makes me uncrittable) and Survival Instincts, a useful survivability tool. There are enough points remaining for me to pick up Master Shapeshifter and Brutal Impact at 85. 

Glyphs:

Prime: Rip; Savage Roar; Shred. These three glyphs are still as crucial as ever.

Major: I'm still undecided on Major glyphs. It seems like we have the potential to be flexible here (and even be able to pick up some Bear glyphs). Feral Charge seems like a potentially good glyph, particularly as it would allow us to work in more Ravages in a fight. Rebirth might be a nice utility glyph to have in raids, particularly to assist healers when you need to Battle Rez someone. The Major glyphs still feel quite open to me. I'd be interested in doing more detailed research on the Ferocious Bite glyph and in seeing some theorycrafting on it. Preventing it from converting extra energy into damage seems like a waste of extra dps, although perhaps it would have some use in keeping energy levels up. However, as I was not feeling energy starved on Beta, I don't really see an advantage to this glyph in a PVE context.

Minor: The only crucial Minor glyph is, as ever, Unburdened Rebirth. Glyph of Dash is still very useful. Challening Roar may be a nice glyph to have as feral (particularly if you pick up those Bear talents in your spec) for emergency tanking situations to keep adds off of healers. Your minors are pretty flexible though.

In terms of our actual rotation: Really, not much is changing in 4.0.1 and in Cataclysm (so far). The main difference will really be working in Ravage more into fights and likely using Ferocious Bite much more than we do currently (especially towards the ends of fights). (For more information on the actual rotation and maintaining our buffs and debuffs, check out my Kitty DPS guide).

Movement fights will offer the best use for Stampede/Ravage. Some examples in ICC when you can use Feral Charge (Cat) and throw in a Ravage!

- Marrowgar: Jumping to Bone Spikes or back to Marrowgar after a bonestorm.

- Lady Deathwhisper: Leaping to LDW between waves of adds, leaping to adds themselves, or leaping back to LDW after running away from ghosts.

- Gunship: Leaping onto the Battle Mage .

- Putricide: Leaping onto the green or orange goo or Professor Putricide.

- Rotface: Leaping back onto Rotface after Ooze Explosion.

- Princes: Leaping between the Princes on each target change.

- Blood Queen Lanathel: Leaping back to BQL after fear/BloodBolt Whirl.

- Dreamwalker: Leaping onto adds.

- Sindragosa: Leaping onto Frost Tombs or Sindragosa (though be careful of Tail Smash).

- Lich King: Leaping onto Raging Spirits; onto the Lich King when running back from dropping off a Necrotic Plague, back in after transitions or after dpsing valks.

You can also use Feral Charge to open fights - if you're running in and unable to start stealthed, you can cast a Faerie Fire on the run in then Feral Charge, hit a Ravage, then launch into your normal rotation. You also have 10 seconds to use Ravage in before you lose the proc, so you don't need to use it right away - you can refresh another debuff beforehand if needed or, as mentioned earlier, if you start and Charge stealthed, you can get your Pounce in beforehand.

In summation; mostly good changes in terms of talents for Cats. The patch will be a little trickier for dps in terms of rebalancing stats around, as the removal of arpen is very significant for us, affecting both our dps and our gear stats as they shift to accommodate the change. It's seeming like cat dps will be taking a hit in this patch (though we will see when it actually goes live), but hopefully this will be taken care of soon if it is a problem. Though also, do keep in mind, Blizzard is NOT trying to balance all the classes around level 80 at this patch - this is all in preparation for Cataclysm, and for ultimate balance at level 85. EVERY class is going to be out of sorts for a while, and damage roles in particular will have very prominent and easy-to-see changes just from watching the damage meters in fights. Again, don't panic! Have fun, check out the new talents, and play around with your gear and stats (reforge if you need to!) to see what works for you. With a quick glance at Toskk's DPS Gear Method, it does not yet seem to be updated for 4.0.1 (and I'm not positive if it will be - if anyone knows for sure, let me know). I'll be keeping an eye on that and similar sites, as they are all extremely helpful for balancing stats on gear for dps.

ETA: There is a successor to Tossk's DPS Gear Method called Mew. There's a nice write-up of the programme over at the Fluid Druid, which includes some screenshots as well as how it works. There's an online version of Mew here (requires java), a downloadable binary here, and a code developers can download here. Yawning of No Chicks Allowed developed it and also wrote up a very detailed guide to kitty dps which is up on the WoW forums here, definitely worth a look!

As with my Resto guide, I'll begin preparing a full Feral dps guide for 4.0 and Cataclysm. Again, it will be a work in progress, as changes are still coming in and will continue to do so at least until Cata's release, if not for some time after as well.

RAWR!

Beta! Wee! (13066, Resto, Stonecore, and Throne of the Tides!)

News from the Beta!

I'm really excited that I got the invite and have been bouncing around on the beta since! After an initial worrisome period (I think I basically just cannot run the game while it is still downloading, or at least not on beta, as I was having tons of graphics/fps issues), the game is now running smoothly and I've been going around exploring and trying things out.

I'd like to check out the starting zones some but that may have to wait as A) the Worgen starting zone keeps crashing (and seems to be happening to other players too), and B) there may be a new bug? as last I checked it wasn't letting me create new characters, though I should check that again.

I did transfer my druid over though as well as get a premade 85 druid too. It's been pretty fun so far. I've done the starting quests in Vash'jir and, upon realising I needed to discover the Throne of the Tides entrance in order to queue for it, did some exploring around the area. Vashj'ir is a really cool zone - a lot of odd and fun stuff around, some interesting quests so far, and some beautiful areas (the ruins beneath the water are really cool). The Abyssal Depths (which I warily went down to and was immensely relieved to find myself down by an instance entrance after getting sucked down) is quite creepy and beautiful all at the same time. There's a lot more still to explore; I'm undecided just how much questing I'll do in beta, as I really enjoy questing to level so I'd like to leave some surprises for when Cata comes out, though I'll be balancing that with leveling fairly quickly to get to 85. I suppose on one hand being somewhat familiar with the quests will let me get going more quickly so I don't wander around too aimlessly. I think I'm going to hop over to Hyjal next to check out some of the opening quests there. Also, seahorse mounts are amazing (and you get one for free in one of the opening quest chains in Vashj'ir). Only real issue I've found in Vashj'ir so far is how to get back - I hearthed out to Northrend, then had to fly back from Stormwind and didn't quite beat the fatigue timer (fortunately my corpse wasn't far off). Not sure if I just missed a key point or didn't do enough quests to get the flypoint initially, or if there's just something missing.

The ruins in Vashj'ir are really beautiful. I need to double-check the name of this one. Really fun to explore, and not too difficult I found actually... the sea horse gives you 450% swim speed - not certain if that will change or not. There were a few big elites around, though some were neutral, but I wasn't too concerned swimming around.

I've been questing as feral, which has been fine. My feral set is a mix of 264 and 277 gear (to give you an idea of what I'm entering in). I've been using the following spec (at level 80):

At 85 I'll be putting points into Natural and Master Shapeshifter, as well as possibly two points into Brutal Impact (for more frequent stuns to increase utility). As you can see I've picked up Thick Hide (as there are enough points to do a pure cat DPS spec and still pick up that and Survival Instincts) which makes me uncrittable. This spec does not have all the tanking points (Natural Reaction and Pulverize and, possibly, Infected Wounds) so is usable as an emergency tanking set but not a proper tank. I hope it stays in this area, as I really like being able to pick up Surv Inst and Thick Hide for utility.

My impressions questing so far, at least for these early zones; I'm not having any big trouble handling mobs of pretty decent size (I've dealt with 3-5 level 80 mobs with no problem in cat form). I'm not certain if this is just undertuning, or just entry-level mobs, but either way it's been fine. My damage has dropped a lot so cat dps is still an issue, and I also haven't been able to replace my crit gems with agility ones as my jewelcrafting is broken (all of my armour pen went to crit). I lost around 4k attack power from live as well. Hopefully cat dps will be tuned up. That being said, I haven't had any issues killing mobs though.

I've also been playing around with the Resto tree and have been able to heal a couple of dungeons.

First, the specs I've been using:

On my main copied over, level 80:

After a brief chat with a druid I decided to take out the two points in Swift Rejuvenation and put them into Heart of the Wild for the intellect increase. With appropriate levels of haste getting our spells to the 1sec GCD, it may not be necessary to take the two points in Swift Rejuv (I'd like to see some proper theorycrafting on all this before I say anything definite though), so the Int gain (and resulting mana and spellpower gain) is likely worth it. I can't see sparing more than 2 points for it though as I still need points to make it to tier2 in Balance and I like providing Replenishment (for both myself and the group) with Revitalize.

This is the full spec I've put on for my 85 premade:

I'd still like to see Genesis swapped with Nature's Grace to get it into tier 1. With this change you could use this spec and pick up Moonglow, or forego Moonglow and max out Heart of the Wild and possibly Swift Rejuv. That being said, though, Nature's Grace seems like it might not be as much of a waste of points as I had originally though. I'm really just undecided at this point on it, and really need a lot more experience trying it out in both easier and harder dungeons. The haste boost is really nice, but I'm torn mostly about the cooldown on the proc (especially as Resto druids can't reset it as we don't have Eclipse). I have been able to use it by tossing out a Moonfire and using the haste on my Nourishes and Healing Touches, which has been nice. I'm still wary of how much it will actually be able to be used in an end-game environment, mainly whether the GCD and mana will be able to be spared. We shall see!

I will say this: I absolutely LOVE the new Efflorescence mechanic where it procs off of Swiftmend! It's been great both in terms of fun and of utility. Whether I want to target it to a specific group, in which case I might Swiftmend say the tank or a melee, providing the Effl. HoT for that group, or if I need to pop it on the fly, the additional HoT will tick on the target while I heal other people. The increased range (8 yards, up from 6) is also great, it gives a lot more room to move into it and remain in it. I am really pleased with it!

Also, glyphs! I've been using the following glyphs on both toons:
Prime:
Lifebloom (increases crit chance)
Swiftmend (unchanged)
Rejuvenation (Increases the healing of your Rejuvenation by 10%)

Major:
Wild Growth (unchanged)
Rebirth (unchanged)
Healing Touch (when you use HT, the cooldown of Nature's Swiftness is reduced by 5 sec (want to check if this stacks or not))

Minor:
Mark of the Wild (unchanged)
Unburdened Rebirth (unchanged)
Dash (unchanged)

I actually really like the selection for resto (the feral selection is a little limited feels like, but a discussion for another day). I like the choices I have both for Prime and Major, I feel like I was able to pick up both crucial straightforward ones (like Swiftmend, WG and Rejuv) and more utility ones. I like that I was able to pick up the Rebirth glyph - I'm not fond of this glyph on live mainly because it steals a glyph spot from more useful ones, but I do like the effect - it can be really helpful for a person to be battle rezzed with full health, particularly in the new environment where mana and healing is so different from Wrath. So I'm really happy I'm able to pick that up without sacrificing any other glyphs. My Minor glyph choices are mostly for convenience, apart from Unburdened Rebirth still being crucial there's still flexibility there.

I was able to try out two dungeons so far, one on my premade and one on my main who I transferred. I did Throne of the Tides on my main and Stonecore on my premade.

An interesting thing of note - I guess because my main's gear is good enough (almost all 277 gear), I had ZERO (and I do mean ZERO) mana problems while healing Throne of the Tides. I was throwing my innervate out to the shadowpriest every time I could because he was going OoM a ton. I'll be interested to see how far my raid gear goes both in Beta and on Live when Cata is released. Solace of the Defeated is still amazing, along with all of the spirit on my current gear really helps. I found this really surprising just because I healed Stonecore on the premade before TotT and had some mana issues ; went OoM at least once and was definitely running down to at least half mana or less pretty consistently, whereas on my main my mana bar barely moved. While Stonecore is a higher level dungeon than TotT, it was still on regular (NOT heroic) and I was 85.

I'll try to get some proper posts in on the instances themselves (I think this is already getting dangerously long without even going into the boss fights). They were pretty interesting though and I enjoyed going through them. Damage is interesting... there were points where there were some massive hits on the tank, but fortunately the next shot wouldn't kill them, so you had more than a single GCD to recover (which you don't really get in Wrath at the moment). After healing Stonecore on the premade and having mana issues, I was being fairly conservative with my heals at first on my main; I think I'll have to try both again a number of times more and see how that balances out. We didn't use a huge amount of CC though we did use a bit. Spatial awareness is definitely important - a feral druid in the Tides group got himself killed twice on the same boss due to a 'shadow fissure' I believe it was called, he must have been stood in a voidzone. It was essentially a one-shot (or very close to it). I think the tank may have stood in it once as he took quite a substantial hit in the beginning of the fight (it was against the faceless one in Tides - will double check names for proper write-ups) but didn't take another as big as that for the rest of the fight. The fight against the drake in Stonecore involves falling rocks and lava spots, so you definitely need to watch where you're standing! The rocks will also Line of Sight you, so I had to keep maneuovering around to ensure I didn't lose sight of the group.

Also, if you can spot in that screenshot, you can see my druid's name was taken! So I've gone with Derwentt for my premade and Derwentree for my main. Close at least! Sort of.

Overall, though, I'm feeling pretty positive about healing so far. I had fun while healing and going through the new dungeons. I was definitely using all of my different spells. It will take some adapting to find out the best strategies for different fights and, of course, learning the fights themselves, but good signs on the horizons. I feel like our actual heals were reduced a bit - I feel like I'm healing for less than I do on live at times in terms for actual number output of single spells. That may be numbers tuning, I'm not certain. The heals themselves felt good though and seemed to all work well with each other. I'd still like a lower cast time on Nourish but it wasn't awful. I found myself even using Healing Touch when I needed to. I feel like the longer Nourish cast time almost helps HT seem more valid as a spell because they're the same cast time - they each have their different uses both for size of heal and size of the mana cost. Lifebloom is nice on the tank, though I'm still adapting to how often I both need or want to keep it up for - it's a good strong heal to keep on the tank, but I found myself tossing out the occasional unnecessary LBs or Nourishes to keep the stack up. I think one of my favourite things for shifting to tree (and it is on a 3 minute cooldown now, down from 5) is being able to toss out the instant Regrowths for the larger instant heals. The longer cooldown on Wild Growth feels just fine - my innate sense of it is slightly off so I found myself trying to use it sometimes a little bit early, but the longer cooldown definitely isn't limiting. As I mentioned earlier too, I absolutely love Efflorescence proccing off of Swiftmend - I think that's a brilliant change.

The biggest change does seem to be that people (and your tanks), at least so far, do not seem to be dying in just two hits or one GCD, so the longer cast times on big heals like Nourish and HT haven't felt deadly. I still have a lot of testing to go, and I'll be really interested to try all these out when 4.0 hits the live servers so I can try them in fights I know really well in ICC to see how things will adapt and shift. That will be particularly useful as well as I'll be able to compare it to what I do currently so I can really see the changes. I could try doing some Wrath heroics on Beta, but that seems a bit pointless since I overgear the instances so much, I won't have to actually make decisions about which heals to use.

Anyhow, I imagine that's enough for one post! Perhaps even enough for two. I'll try to get more testing in and look more at the heals used and things. I'll also be interested in seeing both for this build and for future ones how slightly different specs work. I hadn't been that keen on Heart of the Wild for Resto, but it does add a decent amount of spellpower it seems like. It's hard deciding which points to drop for that. I had someone suggest dropping Blessing of the Grove, but the decrease in Rejuv power from doing that is substantial (and that is NOT made up for with the spellpower increase from HotW). I think with enough haste, Swift Rejuv will be the one we can drop points from (as we may not need the increased Rejuv cooldown). That still only frees up 2 points. If Genesis is moved to tier1, we'll have some more points freed up to place into HotW I think. Theorycrafting will be interesting on all of that.

Also, Archaeology seems really fun! I think it might be a bit bugged at the moment (I seem to be able to dig at one site, then not be able to dig anywhere else, at least on that continent... need to look into that), but I also haven't had too much time to investigate that. I really like the concept and am looking forward to leveling it, though I imagine it may have to wait until I hit level cap to really get into it.

Alright, stopping before I ramble on too much! I'll leave you with a screenshot of me in my Mim head over Stormwind.

New faction leader models and pets

We had a fun update from MMO Champ today showing off the new Faction Leader models as well as a few new companion pet models, so I thought I'd make a quick post showing those.

There are a few of the Wrath models in there as well (Alextrasza, for instance). The Ysera model looks great, Malfurion is looking pretty cool as well. 

 There's a few cool new pets as well, including two engineering ones! 

This one is pretty cool, will definitely be trying to make that quite quickly. Not too sure if the pattern is a drop or if we can learn it from the trainer.

This is the other one.

This is just a new pet, though they don't know where it drops yet. Pretty cool though!

There was also a quote from Ghostcrawler about Glyphs in Cataclysm:

Bigger topic, but minor glyphs are almost always cosmetic / convenience features for Cataclysm. The big distinction is between prime glyphs (unambiguous dps increases) and major glyphs (utility, survival or very hard to math out dps increases). Under that model, affecting Fear is probably a major.

While we probably won't change every glyph, there is a chance we might, so I ask players not to focus too much on the current LK glyphs.

All for now!

How to Nom on bosses! (aka how to be a cat!)

At long last, I've finished and posted my guide to feral dps! Rather than spam the main page like I did with my Resto guide (which I also partly did to give a few extra posts for the launch of the blog), I published it straight to my pages section (all my Pages are listed on the right-hand side of the blog).

You can find the full guide here: How to be a Cat!

For those who may be following the blog through google reader or RSS feed and haven't spotted the list of pages on the main site, you can also find the full Tree guide here: How to be a Tree!

I will also be compiling the posts of healing guides into one page as new ones are posted to make it easier to access them all. They'll all be linked at the list here.

Enjoy!

Developer Chat recap

There was a Developer Chat on Twitter the other day with some interesting responses for druids! See the full posting here at MMO Champ, druid highlights below!

Q. Will druids finally get shapeshifting on a separate global cooldown like hunter aspects & warrior stances?
A. We have no plans to remove shapeshifting from the global cooldown. Shapeshifting can be used to escape Root and Polymorph mechanics, and so cannot have no global cooldown.

Q. Is Moonfire designed to be a damage-over-time spell with an instant cast nuke, or the other way around?
A. Both. We want the instant nuke to be more meaningful in Cataclysm, especially on the move.

Q: Cat and Bear builds are only off by about 3 talent points. Why not just consolidate fully at that point?
A. This is definitely one of our concerns. We don’t want a player to be able to have an optimal DPS specialization in Cat Form and be able to tank. We will definitely engineer the Feral tree such that being a viable tank, or even off-tank, will have some cost in terms of lost DPS while in Cat Form. The druid talent trees currently in beta are very rough and need more polish. 

Q: Will Arcane spells do more damage with higher Lunar power on the scale? And will more Mastery increase that bonus damage?
A. Currently, the plan is for Mastery to increase the damage bonus of Eclipse (both Lunar and Solar).

Q. Last time I checked the Feral druid tree, there were only 5 points in the first tier which means NO choices. Is that getting fixed?
A. Still working on early Feral.

Q: Last time I checked feral druid tree, there were only 5 points in the first tier which means NO choices. Is that getting fixed?
A. Yes.

Q. What's the deal with Typhoon? Is it going back into talents or will it be a standard druid spell?
A. Typhoon is now back in the tree. Sorry about that. 

Q. Druids now get Swiftmend at level 10 for being Restoration, but it is a talent in the tree. What is the plan there?
A. This was a data error and has been corrected.

Q: Any word on that cosmetic Tree of Life Form glyph? Some players are sad to lose Tree of Life Form completely.
A. The only new glyph we are ready to announce right now is the Glyph of Divine Shield, which reduces the cast time of your Hearthstone whenever Divine Shield is active. :D 

Q. Druids were always a "jack of all trades, but master of none" and usually mocked when specializing. Will new talents change this?
A. In my own raids, I find druids of all 3 specializations that excel at their chosen specialization. So, I don’t understand your question.

Q. Why was the Feral druid's mana reduction cost removed from King of the Jungle? And what happened to two combo points on critical strikes?
A. These are data errors that will be corrected. Neither is intended to be cut. 

Q: Moonkin: What are your plans for Eclipse, and why does it infect so many of our talents? What are your plans to make Moonkin fun?
A. The model we are trying now lets Solar and Lunar Eclipse procs last for about 45 seconds, and each spell of the appropriate type that you cast moves the bar back closer to the middle again. The buff is canceled by reaching the middle. This should let Moonkin "hold" the buff for short periods of time when they need to move or get out of the fire.

Q: Moonkin: What are your plans for Eclipse, and why does it infect so many of our talents? What are your plans to make Moonkin fun?
A. The model we are trying now lets Solar and Lunar Eclipse procs last for about 45 seconds, and each spell of the appropriate type that you cast moves the bar back closer to the middle again. The buff is canceled by reaching the middle. This should let Moonkin "hold" the buff for short periods of time when they need to move or get out of the fire.

Q. Skull Bash has a 1-minute cooldown. Is it supposed to be that way, or can we expect it to be lowered to the likes of Shield Bash?
A. The base cooldown is 60 seconds to keep the ability from being used by Balance and Restoration druids to layer too much crowd control. A Feral tree talent reduces the cooldown to 10 seconds, putting it in line with Kick and other similar interrupt abilities. 


A fair bit of news there, most key of which is the overall theme that our talent trees are still very much works in progress. 


An interesting note for tanks as well;
Q: Any plan to make "Crit Immunity" passive from choosing a tank tree instead of spending talents on it?
A. No, and you can blame the druids. We want a tanking specialization in Bear Form to feel different from a DPS specialization in Cat Form, otherwise it doesn’t feel fair to other classes when the Feral druid can do everything with the same talent specialization. We try to put crit immunity in talents you would normally take.


I suppose that's still not taking into account our different gear sets for tanking vs dps but yes. It would be nice (well, convenient) if we could have a viable bear/cat spec rather than having to differentiate. I would hope though that specialisation for either bear or cat would come down to more than just a few different points - at present, there are enough different talents that to really maximize your tanking or dps spec, your specs will be significantly different. If it's only a matter of 3 or so points in the new talent trees, I imagine many will feel frustrated at needing two specs to maximize their tanking and dpsing for the sake of only a few crucial points.

I'm hoping the Tree of Life cosmetic glyph does ultimately come through - I'll miss my little tree.
The Divine Shield glyph is pretty hilarious!

More to come

How to be a Tree! Part One: Specs and Glyphs

I thought I’d kick off the blog with a guide to being a tree.

The first three important things you MUST know how to do as a tree:

/cheer

/dance

and, of course, how to jump.

Now that you’ve got those down, on to the rest!

All of the following is applicable as of patch 3.3.5.

I’ve decided to break up this guide into three sections:

-Specs and Glyphs

-Spells and strategies

-Gear, gems and enchants

Let’s start with Specs and Glyphs:

My current spec is a 14/0/57 build, which you can see here:

Broken down point by point:

Restoration tree:

Imp. Mark of the Wild 2/2: Increases all attributes by 2% as well as improving Mark/Gift of the Wild buff. 

Nature’s Focus 3/3: Reduces pushback caused by damaging spells while casting Regrowth and Nourish. 

Natural Shapeshifter 3/3: Reduces the mana cost of all shapeshifting.

Subtlety 2/3: Reduces threat caused by Restoration spells, gets you to the third tier.

Master Shapeshifter 2/2: Increases effect of shapeshift form; in ToL increases healing by 4%.

Omen of Clarity 1/1: Each of the druid’s healing, damage spells, and auto-attacks have a chance to cause the druid to enter a clearcasting state. Clearcasting reduces the mana/rage/energy cost of the next ability by 100%. A must in all specs.

Intensity 3/3: Allows mana regen to continue while casting; leads to Nature’s Swiftness.

Tranquil Spirit 1/5: Reduces mana cost of Nourish, Healing Touch and Tranquility.

Improved Rejuvenation 3/3: Increases the effect of Rejuvenation by 15%.

Nature’s Swiftness 1/1: When used, your next nature spell under 10s becomes an instant cast. 

Gift of Nature 5/5: Increases all healing by 10%.

Empowered Touch 2/2: Increases the bonus healing effects on Nourish and Healing Touch. 

Nature’s Bounty 5/5: Increases the critical effect chance of Regrowth and Nourish.

Living Spirit 3/3: Increases your total spirit by 15%.

Swiftmend 1/1: Consumes a Rejuv or Regrowth to instantly heal the target (combine with Glyph of Swiftmend in order to not consume your or other druid’s HoTs - Swiftmend CAN be used on targets affected by another druid’s HoTs).

Empowered Rejuvenation 5/5: Increases the bonus healing effect of your HoTs.

Living Seed 2/3: Nourish, Regrowth and Swiftmend criticals apply a living seed to the target which heals the target when they next take damage.

Revitalise 3/3: Rejuvenations and Wild Growths have a chance to restore Mana, Rage, Runic Power, or Energy to a target.

Tree of Life 1/1: Shapeshift into the Tree of Life.

Improved Tree of Life 3/3: Improves ToL, increases your spellpower by 15% of your spirit.

Gift of the Earthmother 5/5: Increases total spell haste by 10% and reduces the global cooldown of Lifebloom.

Wild Growth 1/1: Heals up to 5 (6 if glyphed) targets over 6 seconds.

Balance tree:

Genesis 5/5: Increases the healing of your HoT spells.

Moonglow 3/3: Reduces the mana cost of Nourish, Regrowth, Rejuvenation, Healing Touch by 9%.

Nature’s Majesty 2/2: Increases the critical effect chance of Nourish and Healing Touch.

Nature’s Grace 3/3: Non-periodic spell criticals increase spell casting speed by 20% for 3 seconds.

Nature’s Splendor 1/1: Increases the duration of your rejuvenation and regrowth spells.

Most of the points in this spec are pretty self-explanatory in terms of boosting healing and heal-over-time (HoTs) spells. I’ll touch on some of the talents as we move up each tier and also explain some of my talent choices which aren’t picked up by all trees.

Tranquil Spirit 1/5: I’ve only placed one point into this talent for several reasons. At higher gear levels and with the amount of replenishment available in 25 man raids, mana is less of an issue, so I’ve found it to be unnecessary to place any more points in there. I have considered removing that last point and putting it elsewhere (possibly to top up Living Seed to 3/3), however, that little bit of mana cost reduction is nice to have. 

My primary mana cost reduction points are over in the Balance tree, in Moonglow. I find Moonglow to be a much better talent to spend points for that purpose. Firstly, for only 3 points, it reduces the mana cost by 9% (3 points in TS will only get you 6% reduction). Moonglow also reduces the mana cost of Regrowth and Rejuvenation as well as Nourish and Healing Touch, Tranquil Spirit does not. The points in Moonglow are also required to get to the next tier in the Balance tree, whereas you can move on in the Restoration tree without Tranquil Spirit, so it’s points better spent elsewhere.

Improved Tranquility 0/2: I find myself rarely using tranquility in raids, mainly due to the fact that it currently only effects the druid’s party rather than the raid. I’ve read they may be changing Tranquility in Cataclysm to act a bit more like a priest’s Divine Hymn, so that it’s effect will be over the raid instead of the party, which will make the spell much more valuable.

Empowered Touch 2/2: I have seen druids not pick up this talent, for various reasons. One common reason arises out of the need for spare points, most often to pick up 18 points in Balance (I will touch on this spec variation shortly); another is some druids find it unnecessary as they tend to use only Rejuvenation and Wild Growth. I consider Empowered Touch to be an important talent, primarily as Nourish is an excellent spell and this talent boosts its heals even more. For more on the value and use of Nourish see the Spells and Strategies post.

Living Spirit and Improved Tree of Life: I mention this only as I have seen druids either skip the Living Spirit talent or, alternately, pick it up but then avoid gear or gems with spirit in favour of mp5 pieces. With Imp. Tree of Life, spirit increases a druid’s spellpower in Tree form as well as feeds into our mana regen, so spirit is nice to have on gear or on gems. (More in the Gear, Gems and Enchants post).

Living Seed 2/3: Another talent often skipped by druids, mostly by those again going for an 18/0/53 spec. This tends to be considered more of a tank-healing spec talent as well, and so is often skipped by those who consider themselves to be solely raid healers and nothing more. Although Living Seed will never make up the top percentage of your heals, it does still contribute to healing and every little bit helps. Often in raids as well, even if tasked with healing the raid, an eye is always on the tanks and I’m always putting my hots on the tanks and swiftmending them. The Living Seeds placed on the tanks will help, and again, every little helps, so I find this to be a good talent to pick up, whether maxxed 3/3 or not.

Revitalise 3/3: I’ve had some mixed feelings about this talent in the past, though I’ve grown more fond of it recently. The mana and rage return doesn’t seem too fantastic, but the runic power and energy return is really quite valuable. I’ve even seen Druids fill up a Death Knight’s runic power through HoTs pre-pull. Those little bits of resource return can add up in fights, particularly in straight dps races like Festergut and, certainly for the DKs and Rogues in melee, for Saurfang.

Gift of the Earthmother 5/5: I’ve seen druids miss this talent, but it’s an important one, particularly with all the haste we need at the moment.

In patch 3.3, Resto druids saw a change to the Gift of the Earthmother talent - it used to increase total spell haste by 20% (it now only increases it by 10%). Suddenly, druids needed a lot more haste in order to reduce the global cooldown to one second.

Using a spec like the one I use, you need approximately 850 haste to reach a one second global cooldown. If you’re low on haste, or prefer to gem only spellpower (see Gear, Gems and Enchants), you may prefer to use a spec which takes 18 points in the Balance tree.

Here is a typical example of the 18/0/53 spec used; here's a 18/0/53 which puts points in Empowered Touch.

I used a similar spec when 3.3 first dropped (though I opted to take points out of Revitalise rather than Empowered Touch) until I got enough haste from gear and gems. Running a spec like this you can get away with approximately 750 haste. The key difference is the 3 points spent in Celestial Focus in the Balance tree. Those 3 points increase your total spell haste by 3%. You also need to spend one extra point in Balance to reach the tier to get CF. One point in either Brambles or Nature's Reach would suffice... Brambles is nice as, if you're consistent in throwing Thorns on your tanks, the little bit of increase in damage from the thorns is nice. Nature's Reach only increases the range of your Balance spells and faerie fire, so not automatically useful, as you're not likely to be dpsing while healing (at least not until you overgear the content, anyway). Still, you might like to throw a faerie fire up on a boss or maybe you need to smack a Kinetic Bomb with a moonfire - the bit of extra range might be nice in those cases.

Lastly, glyphs!

Glyph of Swiftmend: Absolutely crucial for any tree! This glyph stops your Swiftmend from consuming the HoTs on the target, so your Rejuvs and Regrowths will remain on the target. It’s also very important because you can Swiftmend targets that have other druid’s HoTs rolling on them - other trees will not be pleased if you’re getting rid of all their HoTs when swiftmending!

Glyph of Wild Growth: This glyph increases the amount of targets your Wild Growth hits, from 5 to 6. I consider this to be a must-have for raids, particularly in 25mans, as it gives that much more cover over the raid. 10mans it could be arguably replaced with a different glyph, but I still find it very useful. The only time I’d say it’s unnecessary would really be just if you’re -only- healing 5 man dungeons, as at that point the extra Wild Growth would probably only be hoppng onto pets.

Glyph of Nourish: This glyph causes your Nourish spell to heal for an additional 6% for every HoT that is on the target. I think this is an excellent glyph - Nourish is already boosted by 20% if a HoT is on the target, and this glyph boosts it even more, making it an excellent heal. 

Those are the three major glyphs I currently use.

Glyph of Rapid Rejuvenation: I have mixed feelings about this glyph. What it does is it increases the haste of your Rejuv - so, the Rejuv heals will tick faster, BUT, your rejuvenation will end faster. I tend not to use this glyph, mainly as it messes with my healing style - I dislike that the Rejuvs end faster, as it effects my covering of the raid and I find makes it more difficult to use them as a preventive measure. 

Given haste will inherently effect HoT and DoT ticks (without reducting their duration) in Cataclysm, this glyph will become redundant in the future.

For Minor Glyphs, the only one I think is a necessity for any druid is the Glyph of Unburdened Rebirth. It allows your Rebirth to be cast without needing a reagent. This is crucial - it ensures you will never have a moment where someone needs a battle rez and you can’t because you didn’t top up your reagent stash.

The other two minor glyphs are pretty much up for grabs. I like the Glyph of the Wild, which just reduces the mana cost of Gift. This can be useful if someone is battle rezzed and they need to be rebuffed mid-fight, it won’t cost you too much mana to buff them. I also like Glyph of Dash, which reduces the cooldown on your Dash ability. Mainly useful in fights where you need to quickly shift to cat form and dash away from something, it’s nice for that cooldown to be ready sooner in case you need to do so again.

That’s all on specs and glyphs for now. Be sure to check out Spells and Strategies and Gear, Gems and Enchants! 


You can see the full guide altogether on the Guide to Healing page! I will try to keep that page updated with new patches and expansions along with the usual posts about changes on the normal blog.