Leveling in legion

[xgm541]

I know, I know, 100th post about this topic.

I'm reading a lot of balance druids are going feral for leveling. I assume it has to do with how much easier feral is to level? Can anyone explain?

Also what's the deal with the 9 points in feral artifact? What points are those?

[Tellof]

I know, I know, 100th post about this topic.

I'm reading a lot of balance druids are going feral for leveling. I assume it has to do with how much easier feral is to level? Can anyone explain?

Also what's the deal with the 9 points in feral artifact? What points are those?

I can't fully answer this question since I've neither the beta or play Balance, however I know from playing Feral that stealth is super useful to have in the open world. Opening on a target with a stun, doing some damage, stunning again, you can usually kill your targets without having to take any damage. Tack on predatory swiftness and maybe resto affinity and you have a lot of self-healing to keep you going. Feral also moves 140% base speed so you're cruising around the quest areas pretty quickly.

Regarding the artifact, I don't know why it's specifically 9 points, however I do know that all artifacts are cheap to get traits on up to the first 13. The first 13 cost something like ~6500 artifact power, and #14 alone costs like 7K. For that reason it's not really a big loss to start out Feral and dump some points into traits that will help you be more effective during that time. I would bet money that the time you save from increased performance and speed from 100-110 would be worth much more than the time it would take to get the artifact power you used to accomplish it in the first place. If I had to guess what those 9 points are, I'd assume they are: Ashamane's Frenzy, Feral Power, Protection of Ashamane, Shredder Fangs, and Tear the Flesh. These give some survivability and buff your on-demand damage which is ideal for short-lived monsters in the field.

[Deleted]

i´ve been playing beta for a few days now and my druid lvl 110.. In my opinion leveling as guardian druid (even if u don´t skill anything in your artifact weapon) is so incredible easy compared to everything else.

I also quested as feral but it seems a bit more difficult.

Feral has way more single target dps which is good against named mobs, but as guardian druid you can just pull everything at once and cleave it down

hope this helped a little

[Polarthief]

Don't know much about the Artifacts and stuff, but can't you pick up the Balance artifact then level as Feral, or do you not get Artifact Power if you don't wield an Artifact Weapon?

[Tellof]

Don't know much about the Artifacts and stuff, but can't you pick up the Balance artifact then level as Feral, or do you not get Artifact Power if you don't wield an Artifact Weapon?

You would probably be pretty under-powered without the free 750 weapon. The first 13 traits in an artifact weapon are dirt cheap, so you can sink some points in for extra performance as another spec. I believe at level 103 they let you get your second artifact, so you don't have to go very long without it.

[Polarthief]

You would probably be pretty under-powered without the free 750 weapon. The first 13 traits in an artifact weapon are dirt cheap, so you can sink some points in for extra performance as another spec. I believe at level 103 they let you get your second artifact, so you don't have to go very long without it.

Oh only 103? I thought it was 110 to get your others! That's some good news!

You also get bonus power on your lower artifacts, right? I plan to probably raid as Boomkin, but I will be playing all 4 specs overall, so I have a ton of work to do x.x

[clevin]

Why not just level as Balance if that's what you want to play at 110? Any advantage in leveling speed will be more than offset by catching up the artifact and face it, unless you're a speed leveling addict who cares if it takes another day or even two?

PS: Consider your sources too. If they're all about leveling ASAP then it's possible they're simply doing feral for speed reasons. You can easily level as Balance, though.

[Shauren]

Oh only 103? I thought it was 110 to get your others! That's some good news!

You also get bonus power on your lower artifacts, right? I plan to probably raid as Boomkin, but I will be playing all 4 specs overall, so I have a ton of work to do x.x

Even earlier, at 102.
And no, the bonus power gains apply to all artifacts on your character, the way its balanced is that each trait requires exponentially more power to unlock

[Polarthief]

Why not just level as Balance if that's what you want to play at 110? Any advantage in leveling speed will be more than offset by catching up the artifact and face it, unless you're a speed leveling addict who cares if it takes another day or even two?

PS: Consider your sources too. If they're all about leveling ASAP then it's possible they're simply doing feral for speed reasons. You can easily level as Balance, though.

Because I'm not a huge fan of leveling as Balance. Despite wanting to raid as Balance, I've found that I've been playing Feral a lot more lately in all my 7.0 ventures (out of raiding; not raiding til 110 because screw WoD, lol) because it's faster and not locked to sitting in one place, which is fine for dungeons/raids, but not so fine for questing, at least IMO.

So if I can get away with playing as Feral for world content but still be able to level my Balance artifact, that would be super.

[clevin]

Because I'm not a huge fan of leveling as Balance. Despite wanting to raid as Balance, I've found that I've been playing Feral a lot more lately in all my 7.0 ventures (out of raiding; not raiding til 110 because screw WoD, lol) because it's faster and not locked to sitting in one place, which is fine for dungeons/raids, but not so fine for questing, at least IMO.

So if I can get away with playing as Feral for world content but still be able to level my Balance artifact, that would be super.

I don't think you can level your Balance artifact unless you gimp yourself by not using the Feral one. . And while you 'sit in one place' you have range. Feral HAS to move to get to mobs. Balance doesn't.

[Nythiz]

The first 13 point in an offspec artifact weapon are pretty cheap. So there is no real harm in investing in that.
But IMO it depends a bit whether or not you plan on playing that spec more at level 110.

For resto druids for example, investing in an offspec artifact weapon is really useful, because not only do you level faster, you also will switch to that spec later on to do solo quests/grind/etc.
If your main is balance, than boosting a feral artifact is maybe not the best decision (although again, the choice to do so is very cheap), since it's less likely you'll use that a lot at level 110; unless you like switching things off or something.

It's true that leveling as feral has certain advantages; better mobility, stuns, better selfhealing, some great talents for leveling (such as Predator) and usually melee specs are relatively stronger than casters in the leveling process (IMO).
But on the flip side both guardian and balance have are better at certain things as well. The former has the ability to solo elites much better, can AoE pull, has great selfhealing and frankly has some serious competitive kill speed now that base tank damage has been boosted even further. Balance has a range advantage, and once you get your Astral Power rolling and the moonmoon spells you have pretty solid momentum.

Personally I'm likely going to level with a friend of mine (blood / frost DK), so i'll likely level as balance for a bit and then switch back to resto main spec at 110.

[Polarthief]

The first 13 point in an offspec artifact weapon are pretty cheap. So there is no real harm in investing in that.
But IMO it depends a bit whether or not you plan on playing that spec more at level 110.

For resto druids for example, investing in an offspec artifact weapon is really useful, because not only do you level faster, you also will switch to that spec later on to do solo quests/grind/etc.
If your main is balance, than boosting a feral artifact is maybe not the best decision (although again, the choice to do so is very cheap), since it's less likely you'll use that a lot at level 110; unless you like switching things off or something.

It's true that leveling as feral has certain advantages; better mobility, stuns, better selfhealing, some great talents for leveling (such as Predator) and usually melee specs are relatively stronger than casters in the leveling process (IMO).
But on the flip side both guardian and balance have are better at certain things as well. The former has the ability to solo elites much better, can AoE pull, has great selfhealing and frankly has some serious competitive kill speed now that base tank damage has been boosted even further. Balance has a range advantage, and once you get your Astral Power rolling and the moonmoon spells you have pretty solid momentum.

Personally I'm likely going to level with a friend of mine (blood / frost DK), so i'll likely level as balance for a bit and then switch back to resto main spec at 110.

I definitely plan on playing all 4 specs, with Boomkin being my go-to for group content like raiding, but I still plan to play Feral too. I want to be versatile after years of only playing a Mage where I can't be versatile

So it's not the end of the world having Feral being a bit leveled up, I'm just worried about being screwed. This Artifact thing is simultaneously really cool and really annoying.

[Low Hanging Fruit]

Any amount of worry about spending AP on your non-main spec should be quickly forgotten. Level with what you want. Eventually you will find yourself getting numbers like 42k AP in a single turn in and quickly realize that first bit you spent on some other spec to level is a complete and utter joke.

[Polarthief]

Any amount of worry about spending AP on your non-main spec should be quickly forgotten. Level with what you want. Eventually you will find yourself getting numbers like 42k AP in a single turn in and quickly realize that first bit you spent on some other spec to level is a complete and utter joke.

I legit have no clue on Legion stuff as I've found that spoiling literally everything I can just makes the expansion blah for me. The only things I read up on are the basic systems (Transmog 2.0, Artifacts exist, Order Halls, etc), new class changes, etc. I don't typically bother with the nitty gritty, so I have no idea on the specific numbers and stuff, so this bit of info is very calming to me, thank you

Will probs level as Feral in this case, and maybe switch it up around Level 105.