Balance in mythic+ question

[Kobjorn]

Hi everyone, I just want to hear some thought about balance druid performance in Mythic+. I most of the time pug mythic+ runs as boomy. I'm currently at 872 ilvl with no legendary and I found it extremely frustrating getting refused 90% of the time regardless the keystone level. Yes I can create my own group but then I only have 1 key which is 2 or 3 runs till it gets too high or depleted.
Now that with the mindset boomy sucks (and I feel we really do) in mythic+, how do you guys handle it and how do you generally perform in say a 9+ run? What talents do you recommend if there is 0/1/2 strong aoe classes in my group?

[Mayve]

We don't suck in Mythic +. We don't have the quick burst that some classes have, but we have pretty solid AoE DPS on packs that don't die right away. Maybe we're not the best for like +2 or +3, but when you get into +6 +7 and higher, we're much better. I am competitive with every other spec in the runs I do. We also bring a lot of utility, we're one of the only classes with a battle rez, we can use our treants to make tanking easier and to alleviate some of the affixs, we have innervate, an out of combat rez (most classes cant now), can heal up ppl if the healer is drinking, can go bear and tank so you don't wipe if the tank dies, etc. We have more utility than most classes, if you play it right. No, we don't have an AoE stun and no, we don't have huge AoE burst, but we bring way more to the table and you don't need 3 people with huge AoE burst to complete a +10 on time, you need a well rounded group, and a balance druid works really well for it.

[Kobjorn]

but we have pretty solid AoE DPS on packs that don't die right away

So...what exactly do you mean by "solid aoe dps"? Well with +6 +7 everything dies pretty much under 15 seconds (definitely no more than 2 starfall duration) and I don't see how boomy can be competitive here. With +10 or higher/trash affix, the gap gets smaller but I don't really pug a +11 run.

we're one of the only classes with a battle rez

People always prefer a hunter in a pug.

we can use our treants to make tanking easier and to alleviate some of the affixs

And that only makes us more useful like, I don't know, 25% of the time? And with gear progression, tanks can live through necrotic or whatever just fine.

we have innervate, an out of combat rez (most classes cant now), can heal up ppl if the healer is drinking

Innervate doesn't mean much in mythic+ when you can drink between every pull. And if you are healing your group while your healer is drinking, you might as well have everyone just drink up that'll be more efficient.

can go bear and tank so you don't wipe if the tank dies

When the tank dies to trash, we can't taunt every single mob at the same time and it's probably a wipe anyway. When the tank dies to a boss, hmm tbh I've never seen a tank died to a boss fight in mythic+. It's always about group damage and healers can't top up dps.

Yes I can complete a +10 on time, but how do you convince people to invite you in the first place? It's not like I'm going to copy paste everything you said whenever I apply to a group and people in pugs tend to look for strong aoe classes (dh, mage, hunter, monk, etc). Yes we have more utility than most classes, but at the end of the day, it's aoe dps that matters most.

[xtramuscle]

Mythic + is supposed to be another end game alternative to raiding and pvp. With the gear it drops currently, being on par or better than mythic gear I'd say the devs achieved that.

Now looking at other end game content, you don't regularly see people pugging their was to 2.7k in 3s, 7/7m in raids or finding randoms for 2.4k in rbgs. Perhaps the problem isn't with the class, as you yourself said, you can compete, and others have said we're in a solid spot. Perhaps the problem lies in that you want to pug the hardest content available.

If you wanna do M+ every week, how about making a group you play with weekly, or even joining a guild who do alot of M+ runs?

[Dahti]

I switched from BotA to shooting stars and it seems magnitudes better for M+.

My problem is I'm typically with a fire mage/MM hunter and WW/Enh/Ret. I get crushed on aoe, cleave, single target, and have the longest CD on interupt. Definitely eclipsed by fire mage.

[Pouponu]

Look, @Kobjorn, it seems like you're frustrated with the state of group finder and being perceived as 'sub-par' just based on your spec. That's certainly a fair complaint if you are looking to play this game solo, but as xtramuscle noted, the high-end content of this game (of which mythic+ now falls into) simply isn't designed to be completed by PUGs.

You ask "how do you convince people to invite you in the first place," but I think you already know that people's biases (which are only recirculated and echoed on forums, reddit, etc.) aren't going to change, regardless of how hard you try. The group finder is ALWAYS going to be toxic for those who aren't playing classes at the top of logs and sims, despite how well a spec may or may not perform in reality. That's not something that Blizzard can change, and it's frankly not something you can change. The only real solution is to find a guild, or another group of people who are willing to run mythic+ with you to really do some solid progression.

[Dahti]

If you decide you only want to pug then I'd suggest getting your guardian/resto gear up to snuff and starting there.

[Beckers]

To be honest, you will keep getting refused to 90% of the groups, just apply to lot of them and suck up your pride.

is it a ideal? Hell no, but that is not too bad.

Make sure you are a good player and make friends along the way the the rest is history. I made a lot of nice friends on the way just from playing well and doing my part.

As for doing your part, do not expect to do anything close to a demon hunter or a monks AoE, but then again on high levels (fitting your gear) that matters less since it's more about nuking most critical targets other than zerging like lower levels.

Don't be shy to DoT everything, I see a lot of boomkins not using moonfire on all targets that live 10+ seconds and that it a major DPS loss. I myself do that and mooncycle+starfire between starfalls and seem to pull between 350k-500k on groups (I do have Oneth and it does help a bit) with an occasional starsurge).

I just cleared a +9 with two chests with a PuG and that was no trouble at all - just keep looking, and make sure once you do get accepted to make sure people know what balance druids can do!

[Albimoo]

It can be frustrating but just keep trying to find people to run with. Guilds help in that regard. Managed to clear a 15 this week playing balance and kept up in dungeon damage with an outlaw rogue.

[Emerald Archer]

A lot of balance druids play very poorly in m+, so people avoid them. Assuming that's the norm.
I've found balance druids VERY strong in 8+, you spend one trash pack building resource, and then fury of elune the next. And repeat. So every 2nd trash pack you do very average, but the other 2nd you will double anyone else in your group easily.

Don't try to compete on every trash pack, starfalling everything and just dotting is a waste of time. Play to your strengths. Which is a huge burst that lasts like 15 seconds, with your damage that's as long as the pack will last.

Hell, you can do the same thing in lower m+ too, just every third or so pack. It's not as juicy but it's still damn good burst.

[Kaizun]

I run several mythic+ every week with my guild. We don't have a really set roster for mythic+, so it's usually me, one of two healers, and our main tank. Then any two random DPS who happen to be on/who respond to my texts. We are not pros by any means- most of us are in 855-860 gear. I'm usually top on bosses and high on cleave while a bit lower on true AoE. As others have said, and you probably already knew if you've read any of the fifty other similar topics on MMO C, it's an issue with using the group finder, not your class.

[kamero]

Boomies bring a lot to mythic plus. AoE silence, AoE KB, sustained and spread AoE damage. They are one of the best ranged classes for mythic plus. Plus, pug boomies tend to be smarter and more reliable than pug huntards. I just wish they would put a note in lfd to indicate that they are boomies cuz half the time druids are feral which is no bueno.

[Myztikrice]

To be honest, you will keep getting refused to 90% of the groups, just apply to lot of them and suck up your pride.

is it a ideal? Hell no, but that is not too bad.

Make sure you are a good player and make friends along the way the the rest is history. I made a lot of nice friends on the way just from playing well and doing my part.

As for doing your part, do not expect to do anything close to a demon hunter or a monks AoE, but then again on high levels (fitting your gear) that matters less since it's more about nuking most critical targets other than zerging like lower levels.

Don't be shy to DoT everything, I see a lot of boomkins not using moonfire on all targets that live 10+ seconds and that it a major DPS loss. I myself do that and mooncycle+starfire between starfalls and seem to pull between 350k-500k on groups (I do have Oneth and it does help a bit) with an occasional starsurge).

I just cleared a +9 with two chests with a PuG and that was no trouble at all - just keep looking, and make sure once you do get accepted to make sure people know what balance druids can do!

350k is very low, akin to carries in +9 keys that you need two 880+ DPS to make up for. These kind of statements aren't really qualitative if you don't mention the other group composition and DPS.

[Jyggalag]

We're definitely one of the last classes you think about bringing when you're after that +10 clear for the week. That said we are by no means not viable.
I've had some great success in +10 as balance and end up doing very well compared to some classes on overall damage but it's important to realize that the majority of balance druids don't and are getting ignored by pugs.
A good balance druid can pump out very high sustained ST but that's about it and with the changes (or lack-thereof from balance PoV) we're closer to middle of the pack now at this even.
lower key boosts/spam is also nowhere near as efficient as any class with on demand burst aoe damage, especially when the whole team outgears the key and packs melt in seconds. By the time you've your sunfire up and are half way to generating enough AP for a starfall the mobs are dead.

Volcanic is a very limiting affix for us and can be the difference of 200k dps if you have to move in your opener (killed a few CoS +10 tries for us on last boss playing with ED due to the soft enrage with anything after 5th winds being unhealable).
Teeming also puts us at the back of the list because our AoE is very poor, both in burst and sustained, without sunfire relics. The starfall artifact trait is also very weak and won't do a lot to alleviate this. Many balance druids might be holding out thinking this will be a huge buff to their aoe when in reality it's only several % of an increase to AoE.

These other people talking about AoE silence, AoE KB, treants, off tanking etc are living in fairy tale if they think any pug leader who wants a mythic done with no nonsense will invite a balance druid over many other existing classes because of these types of utility.

In pugs i've taken to tanking as Bear. I'm really enjoying my alt prot warrior over all druid specs atm. Tanked +10 arcway at 860 ilvl and cleared kara timed and nightbane as prot war and I enjoyed it so much that I can't be arsed doing another M+ on my druid.

[Beckers]

350k is very low, akin to carries in +9 keys that you need two 880+ DPS to make up for. These kind of statements aren't really qualitative if you don't mention the other group composition and DPS.

I am ilvl 870, and you did mention the lower range of what I said. 350k is the minimum damage expected for a druid without legendaries.

I do just fine and never last place in mythics and all kinds of + runs, I guess you are from the people who over exaggerate the ilvl needed, good luck with that .

[Ilnezhara]

I am ilvl 870, and you did mention the lower range of what I said. 350k is the minimum damage expected for a druid without legendaries.

I do just fine and never last place in mythics and all kinds of + runs, I guess you are from the people who over exaggerate the ilvl needed, good luck with that .

Really curious how you get 350k at all ever at 870?

[boz0]

Really curious how you get 350k at all ever at 870?

I'm interested as well. Are you using AC/FoE? And are you using a specific aoe rotation, or just single target + splash?

[Kharahh]

I've qued for so many mythic + and have made plenty of pug friends whilst doing so at high level (9-11) who keep reinviting me. FoE sub 5, SS post 6 is mandatory for mythic + if you want to get anywhere. Farm whatever you can to get your sunfire relics too.

To those that say 'dream on' about treants / offtanking being negligible - maybe the problem is too many group leaders are stupid , or maybe the reality is many do not know how to play properly. For example, to the guy who earlier said you cant multi taunt all the trash - boomkins other than mages pull a hell of a lot of threat so mobs will likely come running to you. Pop bear and that threat multiplies. There have been many times where ive purposely gone bear after the tank has exploded, tanked and kited with displacer / typhoon to stay alive while rolling dots / throwing starfall down and maintaining some semblance of dps. Anyway point is that a good boomkin and a good group lead who knows how to utilise one will do well with all the extra utility a boomkin provides.

One thing that I will agree on is that boomies have a bad name, their dps is not competitive aoe wise vs melee but I do think you can be competitive in other aspects where the others can fall behind (ST, crowd control, high uptime for healer, wipe prevention). We do also have one of the best toolkits available for affixes e.g.

volcanic - lol stellar drift
teeming - treants / typhoon / SS cleave
skittering - treants / SS for AsP uptime generation during kite
necrotic - treants / typhoon / mass entangle

Just get out there, have faith, keep applying, make friends and try change the stigma of balance 'being subpar'

[xtramuscle]

Unfortunately each spec gets a rep based on bad players. A bad fire mage. Or demon hunter can still do well. A bad boomie really is a burden on the group, but a good one can be extremely successful. Other than linking the +10 in time achievement there isn't much you can do to convince someone else. Outside of guild groups I go guardian if I want to pug boost runs. Guardian is incredibly strong right now, and taking charge as tank really does set the pace in a m+

[Moonstream]

Unfortunately each spec gets a rep based on bad players. A bad fire mage. Or demon hunter can still do well. A bad boomie really is a burden on the group, but a good one can be extremely successful. Other than linking the +10 in time achievement there isn't much you can do to convince someone else. Outside of guild groups I go guardian if I want to pug boost runs. Guardian is incredibly strong right now, and taking charge as tank really does set the pace in a m+

This. I've run into so many bad boomkins that I don't even want to invite them (when on alts) and I would only consider myself an average boomkin.