In light of the paradigm shift where neither Tailoring or Leatherworking creates Bind on Pickup epics, here’s help deciding between the additional benefits of these two production tradeskills.
Druid Changes, Rocket Kitteh and Pounce Videos
Published on July 25, 2008 by Phaelia 
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According to MMO Champion, Blizzard has updated the official talent calculator with what we assume are changes coming to the WotLK beta environment. Here is a summary of all the Druid changes with discussion to follow:
Balance
Moonkin Form mana cost has been changed from 22% base mana to 538 mana.The report of this change has been retracted by MMO Champion.- Typhoon mana cost has been increased from 475 to 645 and the range changed from 20 to 24 Yards.
- Force of Nature mana cost has been changed from 12% base mana to 284 mana. Cooldown has been reduced from 3 to 2 minutes.
- Starfall mana cost has been increased from 655 to 866. Range increased from 30 to 36 yards. Damage seems to be changed as well but it looks like the version displayed in the talent calculator isn’t the first rank of the spell.
Feral
- Faerie Fire range has been increased from 30 to 36 yards.
- Primal Tenacity now increases your chance to resist Stun and Fear mechanics by 5/10/15% (Old version : Reduces the duration of Fear effects by 5/10/15% and reduces all damage taken while stunned by 5/10/15%)
- Improved Mangle now reduces the cooldown of your Mangle (Bear) ability by 7% (instead of 0.5 sec) and reduces the energy cost of your Mangle (Cat) ability by 2.
Restoration
Tree of Life mana cost reduced from 28% base mana to 978 mana.The report of this change has been retracted by MMO Champion.Flourish mana cost decreased from 585 to 450. Amount of healing decreased (Rank 1 now heals 672 HP instead of 1610).It appears that this change may have been made in error. Current talent calculator lists the amount healed at its previously reported value (Rank 1, 1610).
Impressions
Of course, the biggest hubbub (in my head) surrounds the change to Flourish, a change that can only be described as a nerf with its mana cost reduced slightly and its healing output decreased dramatically. Disappointing, but I’m curious what Rank 3 will look like. On a related note, reader Thalosar asked a question about the 15 yard radius associated with Flourish and what we could expect to use it for. In my opinion, it’s preferred use may end up for the MT and surrounding melee since it will count as another HoT and therefore benefit from Gift of the Earthmother (which restores 5% mana on Nourish and Healing Touch per HoT on your target).
Interesting changes to the shapeshifting mana cost, not only of Tree of Life but of Boomkin, too. I’m scratching my head over the rationale, as reader Zaira points out in the comments on yesterday’s Flourish Preview:
Tree Form mana cost shift was changed from 28% base mana to 987 mana (static) which seems a wee bit harsh for level 50 when you can get it, but lacking a movement penalty, and being able to cast all spells in it at the moment, it seems like we won’t be practicing shifting-in-and-out rapidfire, and with master-shapershifter being so conveniently located it will probably be more affordable.
For comparison, at level 70 a Druid has 2370 base mana, 28% of which is 663.6 mana. For a Balance Druid, Moonkin Form costs 521.4. That makes this a nerf at level 70, though it’s not clear how much base mana we’ll have at level 80. Maybe they’re trying to make Natural Shapeshifter more attractive, though I can’t imagine forgoing it since it unlocks Master Shapeshifter, increasing healing done while in Tree of Life by 4%.
The Mangle (Bear) cooldown change represents a nerf of 0.08 seconds since the change means its cooldown will go from 5.5 to 5.58 seconds. Even worse, the energy reduction for Mangle in Cat Form has been cut by 66%, down from 6 to 2. Primal Tenacity is being changed back to its current, live description which is actually a nerf since it removes the mini, perma-Barkskin (while stunned) that they were getting in Alpha. This is definitely a disappointing change for Feral PvP. I asked Runycat of Unbearably HoT for her impressions. Here’s what she had to mew:
Blizzard has apparently reverted to the kind of language we currently see: 5/10/15% resist to stuns and fears. Why? I can only postulate, but I’m assuming they deemed it over-powered — and I may tend to agree.
In terms of PVP, you might think hey, getting damage reduction while feared or stunned (you know, when you’re super dotted or getting the @#$% kicked out of you by a Rogue or a cheap-ass mace Warrior) is pretty great! You could even go so far as to argue that Warriors can pick up 2/2 Second Wind and regenerate health and rage… But if you have a Druid anticipating the fear or stun, shifting into Bear Form, gaining an extra 500-550% armor (depending on whether or not you’ve got all points in Thick Hide) and 25% STA and then having an additional 15% damage reduction? It’s admittedly a little ridiculous. I suppose you could argue, "Hey, that won’t even happen that much if each Fear and stun’s duration is reduced by 15%, but there’s a problem there, too.
I realize that S4 is seeing a massive influx of counter-comp teams (and that those may seem "unfair" to specific teams), but certain classes rely heavily on the key timing of their fear effects (notice I used "Fear" and not "Horrify") to survive, and we certainly wouldn’t want to reduce the effectiveness of mace-stuns (I’m not bitter) either. Apparently Blizzard has decided that it’s better to just give us the "chance" to resist entirely (15%+5% base chance = 20% total chance to resist a fear or stun) rather than give us a straight-up advantage across the boards. While I’m not one to underestimate minor advantages, would riding out a 20 second fear really be worse than a 17 second fear? Maybe; that extra 3 seconds could mean the difference between a quick Cyclone/heal and your teammates dying. But is it worth spending 3 points in the Feral tree? I doubt it.
I admit that I’m shocked to see the mana associated with Balance spells like Typhoon and Starfall increased. One of Balance’s major concerns right now — and apparently in the Beta, too — is mana usage. An increase in mana cost without some improvements to the availability of mana regeneration seems ill-conceived. WTB Line-of-Reasoning on that change.
Moving Pictures of Moving Kitties
And now for something completely more fun and enjoyable than reading about how you’re going to be nerfed before you even get the fun abilities to try yourself (admittedly, it’s probably a lot less painful this way). First up, I have a couple of videos from Felidae of Outland (EU) to share for the new Pounce animation which is really cute (cuteness mileage may vary for mouth-breathing Tauren Cat Form):
And here’s a second video recording from Felidae of the new Feral Charge animation in Cat Form.
There are actually three videos which show Feral Charge in Cat Form, but this was my favorite. You can view the other two here and here.
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I am excited that BRK is back, though!
/cry I love you, ty for everything.
Funny I thought the old-new version of PT was a nerf from the current production version. But I was thinking from a strictly PvE standpoint as I don’t do (well, don’t care how well I do) PvP. But from a PvP standpoint I can now see how the old-new version was a bit OP. I just never thought of the PvP aspect until now.
Unfortunately, this change (reverting to the current definition) makes it more viable for PvE, whereas the old-new version was nearly worthless in PvE making it easy to skip over. But now it is back to a 50/50 talent in an extremely bloated talent tree. Ugh!
Any way I can get 2-4 more talent points? Either that or the Feral tree needs some serious pruning.
Eh, I don’t agree with Thalosar about the range at all.
15 yard *radius* is a perfectly reasonable range for catching everyone you need to. In 5mans, your party tends to spread out less, and I found it perfectly easy to stand somewhere in the middle, using myself as a bridge between the tank/melee and the casters and routinely catch all 5 of us with the spell. The 15 yard radius means smartly picking a central target gives you a 30 yard area of potential targets.
In 5mans, and 25 mans, you have a lot more targets for the spell to pick, and then you’ll be targeting it on areas where it’s needed, keeping it on your melee/tanks, on groups of people who took an AoE in a location, etc.
It works like CoH in that respect, better than CoH on live, because it can intelligently target outside of party lines, and CoH is very powerful.
As for the change to mana cost and healing done, it will still remain to see how it tests out on beta, but I’m not too concerned. At 468 mana it healed a lot and was very powerful, especially for a Rank 1. (A potential of 2700 on five people at 1280 spell power). I think Rank 4 will still be plenty powerful, and I think they don’t want druids to just spam flourish and nothing else.
It is expected they would fiddle with exact amounts.
As to the 15 yard radius, i agree with Kaera. This is still going to be an awesome spell for the whole raid to enjoy. Just takes more running around for it.
Those feral videos… im having such a hard time deciding whether ill go feral or balance for leveling… ><
Doh, that actually reads wrong. Thalosar was inquiring about what kind of range we could expect from 15 yards. The use on melee and tanks was actually my idea! You see, by using it on the tank, we are more likely to hit melee (who are more likely to need the extra healing) as well as bolstering the strength of our Nourish and Healing Touch since it’s a heal over time. Lifebloom x 3 + Rejuvenation + Rank 1 RG + Nourish on a tank would give us 20% mana back from Nourish and Healing Touch which is nothing to sneeze at. Achoo!
I’ll clarify the above so that it doesn’t sound like Thalosar suggested it!
The talent calculator on Blizzard’s site hasn’t been 100% correct since they started the beta. Take the ‘changes’ with a huge grain of salt.
I highly doubt they actually are changing the shapeshifts to a flat value instead of a percentage of base mana, that doesn’t make any sense.
Some of the changes don’t make a single bit of sense, especially the following shaman one:
“Elemental precision increases your chance to hit with Fire, Frost, and Nature spells by 2/4/6% and reduces the threat caused by these spells by 4/7/10% (Old version : 1/2/3% hit and 10/20/30% threat)”
I’m waiting for the next beta build to see what of this is actually real
Thanks for the videos. I love the Kitty Feral Charge. SUUUUUPER KITTY!!
Wulfs last blog post..A Long Time Ago When The Earth Was Green
I dunno, I was thinking that, as things went with Flourish the amount of healing was just way too powerful before, so the new change makes a little more sense to me. 1610 hpx5 = 8,050 hp, and that’s unbuffed, on an instant cast ability, and we can incorporate it into our normal single (or double) target healing rotation without missing a beat, and it will hit more targets per cast than Chain Heal. What niche could a Resto Shaman hope to fill in that scenario? Heroism/Bloodlust bot and totem crapper? It was way too powerful, so I can certainly see why they nerfed it a bit, though I don’t necessarily like it.
Oh, I love that kitty charge. Also on a side note, bout time they did something with the shadows.
Khrules last blog post..Here Comes The Blog…
As things stand now, the 95% + proc rate on Moonkin Form with no internal cooldown can survive these changes, but the problem will come when for some reason Blzzard thinks that this is too strong and nerfs the proc chance into the ground or incorporates an internal cooldown. What I want to see is a definite damage increase and appropriate scaling coefficients for Starfall. I’m actually pretty content with Typhoon (although they need to clean up the animation to actually make it look like a wave [which my real-life self revolts against because a Typhoon = Hurricane = Cyclone, yet we have all 3 and they are all completely different!]). Typhoon fills an interesting niche, even as people complain about Thunder (or is it called Thunderstorm? Make up your minds Blizzard!) which is admittedly completely ridiculous.
[rant] Now I’m confused on whether it costs mana or not. If you look at MMO-Champion’s list of changes, Convection now reduces the mana cost of “thunder” but “thunderstorm” has its damage and mana increased. Does it regenerate mana or use it? Why do they get 20 yards and we get 5? And we spend mana! And ours is only a cone, not a radius! [/rant]
But Starfall is currently the only AoE spell in-game to lose DPS as targets increase beyond 2. This does mean it can be effectively used to dramatically increase DPS on a single target or two, but it is not so useful against multiple targets. And the radius increase should not come at the cost of more mana, because really this is just necessary due to certain PvE situation. Sure, you could cast that on the coffin in Ruins of Lordaeron and it’d hit almost everyone, but the mana cost is already prohibitive. I’m on the fence about whether it should remain at 20 stars or go all AoE effect, because the DPS against a single target is nice as its its set-and-forget style spell. Then again Death Knights are getting Death and Decay which is set and forget but increases in DPS (and the bastards don’t have to spend mana…./drool).
Blizzard also needs to drop OoC down a tier in Resto because that just annoys the hell out of me. Balance has little it wants in Tier 2. Natural Shapeshifter is nice, but not as required for Balance as it is for Feral or Resto, and hardly useful in PvE situations anyway. So just let some of us (i.e. me!) get OoC if we want then Intensity and Master Shapeshifter with more effort. They need to also tweak deep Balance so people don’t just take 1/3 of the talents in order to get all the mana regeneration and min/max damage they can. And Eclipse needs to be overhauled so that the majority of Druids don’t only want 1 point in it instead of 3.
/sigh
-Sylv
/wave
Awww, cute kitties.
Sylvanras last blog post..Moonkins Can Do Everything
@Phae: Flattered by the quote! ^-^ To add to the time-reduction to mangle conversation consider the following. With mangle time reduction being a percentage this means that we also should ask how it is effected by slow effects (such as arcane mage’s slow, or a warriors thunderclap) and how it would interact with any time reducing effects such as set bonuses, or idols one might find. Perhaps that is less of a ‘nerf’ and more of a balance issue.
@kaera: Excelent point on the radius and balance against other healing spells! I agree with Phae’s idea about rotating it in to catch melee and give us nourish mana reductions on MT healing – even if we’re rolling hots on multi-MT’s on fights like Gurtogg.
@Yggdrasil: Shamen occupy a different role than druids. Druids lack big-punch healing to deal with spikes, but we even out spikes to keep our targets up so that the others can land their heals. If you look at the new Shaman talents you’ll note where they are going. Massive crit boosts to help handle spikes even with chain heal. Crit/Crushing-style reduction using timed Spirit Links buffering a tank against massive strikes. And every time they crit now, a nearby person gets a heal from Ancestral Awakening. Shamen are definitely being the ‘keep the raid up’ style healer. AoE and splash damage running rampant? Shammies to the rescue with their raid wide heals and server-side supported lowest-person targetting. Not to mention their crits boost armor and give much needed life-expectancy. Its not really a question of where does Flourish leave Resto-Shammies – because their healing rythm and mechanic is very different from our own. Flourish hits 5 targets in an area (superior for some fights) but chain heal bounces everywhere, and Ancestral Awakening fills in the gaps. With 21% of crit from talents, chain heal might crit on all 3 targets, giving them 6 total targets with good heals on them.
I know 10-mans are going to be the new ‘big thing’ but I’m really getting excited about the synergies between the healing classes. I’m starting to really see how each of the roles will shine and complement each other in 25-man healing. It’ll be an awesome time to heal!
I see that may question is back in the main story
In the other comment someone say that healing range is 40 and balance 30 without improvement. But i mean with starfire.. the green circle of aoe. not the max distance of putting the circle. I think blizzard has the same circle area… and probaly also the warlock aoe.
Can someone test the green circle radius VS 20 yard blink (mage) distance
The healing is alot lower… but it can heal up to 5 targets… so still alot. It is indeed for the MT and melee in raid.
I really don’t have too much of a problem with the reduction of healing for Flourish. As has been mentioned it was of course inevitable that they would tweak the numbers before it ever got to us. However, if you think about it, 1600 base healing for an AOE spell that you could pick up at level 60 could potentially be rather OP. I would have liked to have seen a bit more mana reduction with the decrease in healing, but again, I’m sure the numbers will be tweaked again before they ever see the light of day.
@NotAnIssue: An interesting observation about the PvE/PvP application of Primal Tenacity. Is it something that most tanking Ferals pick up now?
@Kaera: I think 15-yards will be perfect in 5-mans (with the exception of fights like Kael’thas in MgT). My concern is mostly with regard to 25-man raid content where raidmates are frequently assigned to “clock” positions to avoid too many people standing on top of one another. In these type of encounters, your best bet may be to use it on the MT so that it hits him, any OTs, and some melee since it’s also going to bolster Nourish on those targets, too.
@Zackoria: Haha, yeah. Rocket kitty looks so tempting. I might just have to go 0/21/50 for PvP in the expansion!
@Werebeef: Not a bad idea. There’s a lot of speculation on MMO Champion that they simply made mistakes when updating their talent calculators (seriously, how hard can it be? Learn to log-in-to-beta-server-and-write-down-talent-descriptions). For instance, the current preview actually includes the old value of amount healed for Flourish again!! In addition to changing the first tier back to having Nature’s Focus/IMotW. Seems like some of this WAS a mistake! I will happily print a “retraction.”
@Yggdrasil: Shhhh … don’t use the “over”powerful word on a Druid site.
It looks like ALL healers are getting some form of AoE healing in the expansion, even the Paladins with their “Bacon” of Light. It makes me worry about how much raid-wide damage we’re going to be expected to handle since Druids have traditionally been focused on tank healing as our primary role.
@Khrule: The pictures of shadows I’ve seen have been very, very nice. Unfortunately, my system probably can’t handle them. =/
@Sylvanra: Interesting contrast between Shaman Thunder (oh god, I can hear the cheesy emotes now) and Typhoon. And Starfall DOES seem weak when compared to spells like Blizzard, but perhaps it’s intent is to fill a different niche than our now cooldown-less hurricane. We can only hope. =/
@Zaira: Interesting theory about the Mangle cooldown change. Mage Slow only affects ranged and casting attacks. Thunderclap has been in the game since forever. It’s possible that it’s been changed because of some new idol that’s going to be introduced, but I hate it when they nerf something so that they can give it back to you in the form of a new ability or equipment. They used to do that a lot in EverQuest 1, and it was very frustrating.
@Thalosar: Thanks for asking that question; it helped me think about how I would probably end up using that spell which will probably affect where I map it, as well (right now I’m thinking of mapping as an alternate of my Lifebloom key since they both have the same cooldown).
@Andurial: Indeed, it looks like they’ve been “tweaked” back to where they were. ^_^ Um … huzzah!
Our Hurricane is actually infinitely more useful than most people realize. Currently it has a 1 minute cooldown and slows “attack speed” by 25%. But according to MMO-Champion, not only is the cooldown removed, but the secondary effect is buffed to include specifically spells and ranged attacks along with melee attacks and slows them to 50%. This will make it incredibly useful on AoE pulls because I’m pretty sure even the almighty AoEer that is the Mage can only slow movement speed at best. Get a Prot Pally to put up a Consecrate (or a DK with Death and Decay) and go to town. He’ll take 50% less damage overall and Hurricane’s talented damage is reportedly wonderful. It’s not game breaking, but that + indoors Roots makes us a much more desirable class and will hopefully change us from a “OK we didn’t find a mage, you can come…” class where we have to prove we aren’t one of those noob Moonkins to a class people actually want. We’ll have one of the best melee CCs in the game and, talented, great AoE potential. Of course, our main strength will still lie in our strong DPS and hybrid functionality, but it’s a nice change.
Sylvanras last blog post..Ask Moon Chicken: Leveling as Balance
Primal Tenacity is something that I pick up in my all-purpose feral build, although as things stand currently, it’s not something I’d “waste” points on come the expansion. The Feral Combat tree is incredibly bloated right now, and when I attempt to put together what I believe an ideal build is, I’m always something like five points short.
I’m keeping my fingers crossed for a beta invite so that I can really test this nonsense out.
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Duh duh duh da duh daaah! It’s supercat! That’s enough to make me want to go feral again… But then I’d have to forsake my moonkin and treant alter-egos! Such difficult choices…
@Sylvanra: That’s an application I hadn’t considered … now to convince my MT that he doesn’t, in fact, need heals for the first 10 seconds of every pull …
@Runycat: Ah, thanks for explaining!
@Frogs: You could always try it out while leveling. I know several Resto brethren (not to be confused with Resto-kin) are planning on doing the same!
@ Phae- Ok, I’ll be quiet about it after this…;)
@ Sylvanra- Totally agreed. Balance Druids already make a fantastic aoe “tank” for when a Prot Pally isn’t in the group. Hurricane’s cooldown removal, and the addition of an instant cast unchanneled aoe, will only improve this particular underused utility. I’m curious though, about how it is that Starfall lowers in overall DPS, as the number of mobs increases. Could you please explain for those of us who are less knowledgeable? If I remember right (I’m at work so I can’t check), each star has a splash damage effect, so I’d think that numbers would really begin to pile up on an aoe pull with it, if the mobs are packed tightly together (and they should be) This would not, of course, be the first time I was wrong, not even the first time today.
@Zaira- I agree completely that Shamans have a totally different healing approach and style, and god bless ‘em, they’re fantastic. I was just thinking that a large part of their unique flavor could be totally subsumed by ours, and, at the previous healing value, we could conceivably have done their role and our own simultaneously, to a degree. The last thing I want to see is a buff on our part that hurts other healing classes. Not that they become inviable, but less desirable to the point that they are always second choice. I’ve spent too long feeling as though I were at the bottom of the healing totem pole (pun intended) to wish that on another class. I feel that right now, overall, the healing classes are fairly balanced, and I’d like that to continue, if not improve. We healers gotta stick together!
@Ygg – Not to steal anyone’s thunder but AOE spells have gotten something called a ‘aoe damage cap’ added to them as of patch 2.2. Each rank of each spell has a damage cap. Once this cap is reached the spell does less damage to compensate so that it will not exceed its cap. The caps are not affected by gear or talents. So if you have good gear, you will reach the cap on (many) fewer mobs.
I’ll quote wowwiki here on a few of the finer points:
Apparently if mobs resist, the other mobs get more damage for that tick up to the cap. Also, crits seem to be able to exceed the cap for the mobs which are critted. (or maybe there is a crit cap also which just hasn’t been reached)
Example:
Let’s make a fictional AoE spell with a stated damage of 200 and an (unstated) cap of 2000.
1 mob = 200
2 mobs = 400
10 mobs = 2000
11 mobs = 2000
181.8 each.
Now add +1000 damage gear at 40% effect to damage (+400).
1 mob = 600
2 mobs = 1200
3 mobs = 1800
4 mobs = 2000
500 each.
11 mobs = 2000
181.8 each just like before
I understand, but I do not understand how Starfall’s overall DPS would be lower as target number increases beyond 2 for Starfall. Individually, each mob will receive less damage, but the same amount of damage should be present either way. I am aware of the damage cap on AoE, but I did not think that it would reach that cap at only 2 targets. Am I mistaken on this?
AoE Caps are based on level, meaning that downranked AoE has bigger cap issues. Once upon a time people used to say that spells decreased in damage over X mobs, when it was really a spell-damage mechanic. The only thing I can theorize is that there is a non-max-rank of Starfall being used to test it (get the spell via talent and run out and try it) by someone who is overgeared for it.
I have not seen the ‘reduction beyond 2′ data anywhere except in Sylv’s commen, so if we could beg/plead/tickle Sylv into providing a link or a demo movie that might help us understand a bit better I think.
@Sylvanra: Could this be something worthy of a blog post to explain? I know I like to jump on “free” post inspiration where I can.