M+ Feral vs Boomkin

[chunx0r]

I mainly resto for my M+ progression, 7 is my max so far. However there are quite a few "I can only heal" players in my guild. I raid as feral but it doesn't feel great in M+. I was wondering if anyone has experience on boomkin and feral in dungeons and see how they compare. Looking at logs it seems like both are in the same place dps wise.

[Blizzyb]

I'm main balance. I don't play feral in anything other than World Quests, but I think I can still provide solid feedback:

Each has their strengths and it's mostly going to depend on the rest of the group's makeup. Balance is going to be a bit more flexible in groups, providing a bit better aoe damage (trash), more easily manageable cc, and it's not a melee. I say not a melee because the mechanics are generally more dangerous for melees like exploding spiders, cleave, and less reaction time for things like slicer. Feral will have a better interrupt than balance.

I don't think you'll go wrong with either one, but if you're planning on running with a particular group of people, consider the strengths they bring to the table and fill accordingly. If you're not running with the same people, I think balance is probably going to be easier and more flexible in more situations.

[Adramelch]

It's worth mentioning, of course, that you have to take gear into consideration. As you raid as feral, your gear and artifact progression will be significantly ahead of whatever you have on balance. Under those circumstances, I'd probably stick with feral. But if it were a like for like comparison (similar gear/traits), then I'd go boomkin for the stuff Blizzy mentioned.

[chunx0r]

Yeah all good points. Our guild is a little melee heavy so i'm pretty sure I could switch to boomy. Right now all my gear is tailored for healing 5 man's. So lots of crit mastery which happens to also be good for feral. I guess switching over to haste for boomy might be tough. I'll probably end up trying it just to see.

[Blizzyb]

Yeah all good points. Our guild is a little melee heavy so i'm pretty sure I could switch to boomy. Right now all my gear is tailored for healing 5 man's. So lots of crit mastery which happens to also be good for feral. I guess switching over to haste for boomy might be tough. I'll probably end up trying it just to see.

With that being said, you're going to get a lot better numbers out of your feral than your moonkin. I've found balance to be very gear dependent, which isn't any different than the past. Also, if you've got more points into the feral artifact, that extra stamina should not be taken for granted. A higher health pool has definitely helped me live through things I another spec of mine wouldn't have.

[chunx0r]

With that being said, you're going to get a lot better numbers out of your feral than your moonkin. I've found balance to be very gear dependent, which isn't any different than the past. Also, if you've got more points into the feral artifact, that extra stamina should not be taken for granted. A higher health pool has definitely helped me live through things I another spec of mine wouldn't have.

I'm not too worried about AP. I'm about to hit AK8 and have kinda been slacking on AP. I always think to myself "If i do this next week i'll get more AP for the same effort". Right now I'm 22 resto, 20 Feral, 13 guard, 0 balance. I'm pretty sure i could catch my blance up in a week or 2 to my feral.

[Liandryl]

I can do pretty good as boomkin in high mythic+, but we basically never top the meter, but never suck in the meter either.

I will never do bad dps, but in aoe fights, I cannot compare to WW, Outlaw, Havoc, Fire mage.
The thing is that in +7 and above, the health of the trash is quite high so the ramp up we have is not a problem as I often get close to really good classes in aoe fights with a single target talent tree. (I do not like fury of elune because of its high cd, but it can be extremely good if well used.)

The thing is, what I don't do on the trash, I do on the boss. I am always even with strong ST class on the bosses or I am first because boomkin are good on ST and there are many mechanics that are not melee friendly on bosses.

I haven't played feral during Legion yet, but I have played them in WoD and I am pretty confident in saying the versatility and the consistent dps of the boomkin makes them better than feral in mythic+.

With that said, great feral player can probably do fine even tho feral is not the best spec to have in mythic + so this is only for situations where you are as good a boomkin as you are a feral with similar gear in both.

[Powerlamer]

Don't forget Trees. They are OP in mythic+

[teddabear]

Don't forget Trees. They are OP in mythic+

Almost always what a guild is short om for Mythic+ is tanks. Bears are one of the better ones.

[Myztikrice]

I'd like to see that video

[Traxwow]

Feral is really bad for M+ due to trash having priority targets at high levels. Feral has to spec into aoe in order to do any damage, and they give up their ST damage to the priority target if they do that. If they spec into ST, the priority targets dies quicker, but anything above 3 targets and you won't be cleaving. Boomkin, on the other hand, can run FoE/AC and do just fine on priority targets/aoe. Druid DPS specs cannot compete with DPS if you're looking at 2 equally skilled players. Resto/Guardian are top specs for M+.

[darklogrus]

Feral is really bad for M+ due to trash having priority targets at high levels. Feral has to spec into aoe in order to do any damage, and they give up their ST damage to the priority target if they do that. If they spec into ST, the priority targets dies quicker, but anything above 3 targets and you won't be cleaving. Boomkin, on the other hand, can run FoE/AC and do just fine on priority targets/aoe. Druid DPS specs cannot compete with DPS if you're looking at 2 equally skilled players. Resto/Guardian are top specs for M+.

I play a Feral and this is dead on accurate. Sure on fights with a couple mobs we are fine and on Boss fights were great. Its the larger trash packs that really pushes me to the very bottom on the Dps meters. An based on what i've run so far trash packs dying quick are 100x more important then a boss dying at a normal pace.

Right now I feel Feral is in a bad place Mythic ++ wise and based on the amount of Denies for LFG, its apparent not many want us as a Dps.

[Miff]

i run +8 to +10 mythics as feral. The guys above are spot on... our trash dippers is alright with BS and Predator, but we take quite a large hit on ST boss fights without BT.

I find i can keep up alright with our mage and rogue if i pool my BS and use them at appropriate times... but when you're pushing chests, it's hard to do. plus, even when you have that one trash mob that has to die, usually the single target from the other dps doesnt give your dots a chance to even ramp up lol

basically, if you want to run the higher levels, go tank and you wont feel like you're being carried it kinda sucks that most classes don't have to change up much, or even sacrifice much to perform great in AOE situtations, but still hold their own in ST. I believe we are the strongest tank spec atm, so we do have that going for us.

[Deleted]

if you spec BrS you basically lost single target if you don't you don't do even justifiable AoE... Feral is not good for M+. There might be people who have good success with feral in Mythic+ with some super AoE heavy coms etc...but objective truth is Feral is shit for M+ and Blizzard don't really wanna do anything about it. Maybe BrS baseline without charge system and on 30 energy would fix it but im not a designer. Energy based classes doesn't have good times right now without free cleave like Outlaw or Windwalker.

EDIT: Even if we would get Blade Furry like Outlaw because our damage comes from bleed we wouldn't have fixed aoe. So it is hard to "fix" it. Maybe something like Rip ticking in 4 yrd range from target so in good comps like, with DK we would be gods of AoE. Maybe I bet it can be fixed.

[ZarrBH]

honestly for the groups sake i would go boomy

20% haste innervate is amazing
plus you have most of the cc that feral does the only bad thing is if it is interrupt heavy you may struggle
if a group is melee heavy its better to go feral for the healer so he/she can aoe

but for now i would just go with whatever your playing cause they both do fine in my opinion

BUT if you go Gaurd or Resto you will have an easier time finding a group

RESTO and Gaurd are amazing for mythic+ but than again i havent paid much attention to anything but druids cause imo my off specs are my alts

- - - Updated - - -

if you spec BrS you basically lost single target if you don't you don't do even justifiable AoE... Feral is not good for M+. There might be people who have good success with feral in Mythic+ with some super AoE heavy coms etc...but objective truth is Feral is shit for M+ and Blizzard don't really wanna do anything about it. Maybe BrS baseline without charge system and on 30 energy would fix it but im not a designer. Energy based classes doesn't have good times right now without free cleave like Outlaw or Windwalker.

EDIT: Even if we would get Blade Furry like Outlaw because our damage comes from bleed we wouldn't have fixed aoe. So it is hard to "fix" it. Maybe something like Rip ticking in 4 yrd range from target so in good comps like, with DK we would be gods of AoE. Maybe I bet it can be fixed.

just because they dont do good aoe doesnt make them good at Mythic+

all the dungeons have best group make ups for each one

Feral is strong Boss and st damage and for focusing down adds its amazing plus has a good int

if you have a aoe type healer than having 3 melee makes it really easy to heal as long as your groups good at mechanics

[chunx0r]

So I will definitely stay focused on resto, but this may have given me a good enough excuse to dump some AP into my scythe. I'll get my 3rd elite talent in my resto staff tonight and then probably go for 2 in the balance. Thanks guys.

[Ilnezhara]

No group really wants either unless you're truly exceptional, keep in mind.

[chunx0r]

No group really wants either unless you're truly exceptional, keep in mind.

Yeah I would only PUG as resto, this is just to help out guildies to push keys.

[teddabear]

While an AoE on a timer seems like a good idea at first it is exactly the opposite when you design the entire talent tree to use an AoE finisher.

Predator
Soul of the Forest
Elune's Guidance

All of these are designed to use an AoE finisher. Apparently whoever worked on the 100 tier did not work on any of the other tiers. Very reminiscent of the level of incompetence in the design of Tier 18, the Feral trinket and the legendary ring.

All were exceptionally bad efforts but taken together they are exponentially worse.

[Deleted]

honestly for the groups sake i would go boomy

20% haste innervate is amazing
plus you have most of the cc that feral does the only bad thing is if it is interrupt heavy you may struggle
if a group is melee heavy its better to go feral for the healer so he/she can aoe

but for now i would just go with whatever your playing cause they both do fine in my opinion

BUT if you go Gaurd or Resto you will have an easier time finding a group

RESTO and Gaurd are amazing for mythic+ but than again i havent paid much attention to anything but druids cause imo my off specs are my alts

- - - Updated - - -



just because they dont do good aoe doesnt make them good at Mythic+

all the dungeons have best group make ups for each one

Feral is strong Boss and st damage and for focusing down adds its amazing plus has a good int

if you have a aoe type healer than having 3 melee makes it really easy to heal as long as your groups good at mechanics

Problem is in M+ that Boss is like 10% of total time spent.