Should Druids be allowed to Shapeshift into forms out of their spec?

[Better]

Should every hunter except beastmaster stop using pets?

Should every mage except arcane stop using portals and blink?

Should every rogue except subtlety stop using stealth?

Should every shaman except restoration stop using healing spells?

Yes, your questions sounds as stupid as these ones.

Unironically I think the game would be better if all of those were true other than hunter pets (think 2 for BM, 1 for SV, and 0 for MM is good) and mage portals, as they aren't combat related.

[Speaknoevil]

Are you joking?

If they couldn't shapeshift you could kill literally any druid, regardless of their skill level with maybe one 4 second stun and pure DPS.

If you force a moonkin/feral to sit in bear you are winning, they can't really do damage in bear. If you catch a resto out of bear form in a stun and swap, you win. swap off when they go bear unless they're low and they can't maintain HoT momentum or if you have a purge and their DPS aren't effectively setting up peels/gos- rinse repeat.

PS: I do not, nor will ever play a druid. They are lame.

[Deleted]

Are you joking?

If they couldn't shapeshift you could kill literally any druid, regardless of their skill level with maybe one 4 second stun and pure DPS.

If you force a moonkin/feral to sit in bear you are winning, they can't really do damage in bear. If you catch a resto out of bear form in a stun and swap, you win. swap off when they go bear unless they're low and they can't maintain HoT momentum or if you have a purge and their DPS aren't effectively setting up peels/gos- rinse repeat.

the key to winning in a prolonged arena match is not to do stuff, it is to survive until you are able to use your CDs again.

[Speaknoevil]

the key to winning in a prolonged arena match is not to do stuff, it is to survive until you are able to use your CDs again.

CDs only matter when timed correctly with "doing stuff" unless you are playing in lower ratings(which is ok) then yes, its easier to just straight cheese someone.

Your response, coupled with your claim that druids are "neigh impossible" to attack confirms that you are misplaying though.

[Sarevoc]

What's wrong with this screen shot, apart from it showing season start and "who cares about 2v2 arena"?

It's god dam no CD BEAR FORM.
14 out of 26 in total are creatures with access to BEAR FORM! That's 55%! And the best part is, not a single one of them is a real bear (Guardian Druid), they are all bear form abusers! The game has 12 classes and not only 2, in which case it would be ok for Druids to have their 55% share. No compensation "Bear form removal" would quickly fix this inconceivable injustice (and clean up their action bars a little bit).

[ReD-EyeD]

To everyone who thinks that switching forms is "taking another specialization" - No, it's not another specialization in any way. Stop over-exaggerating.

"Hybrid" thing is long forgotten, don't bring it again. Surprisingly, classes that are not "hybrids" are better at defensive maneuvers than those so called "hybrids" and most of the time even better at healing.

On the other hand, if you're strictly talking about PvP then don't confuse balance issues with being "hybrids". Trust me, the moment that moonkin lose cat and bear form he will be compensated with +% damage, some defensive abilities like ice block and so on because all his class is being balanced around having forms.

[Druitz]

What's wrong with this screen shot, apart from it showing season start and "who cares about 2v2 arena"?

It's god dam no CD BEAR FORM.
14 out of 26 in total are creatures with access to BEAR FORM! That's 55%! And the best part is, not a single one of them is a real bear (Guardian Druid), they are all bear form abusers! The game has 12 classes and not only 2, in which case it would be ok for Druids to have their 55% share. No compensation "Bear form removal" would quickly fix this inconceivable injustice (and clean up their action bars a little bit).

Who cares about aids 2v2 bracket?

Rdruid is just very good in 2v2, so is feral. There are few top 3v3 ferals and many 2v2 top ferals.

[Hctaz]

Removing this ability will lead to simpler specs to balance for sure.

Please no. They already gutted the other specs that had cool auras/stances/presences. I played a warrior in Vanilla, Pally in TBC, and DK from Wrath-currently. I HATED that they removed our ability to shift stances. Druid is the last class that has this unique ability, and it should be preserved.

They should add those stances BACK to the game before they remove druid's ability to shapeshift. The only reason you're having a problem with this in PvP is because of the guardian affinity talent. It allows any druid spec to become proficient in one of the three other spec's abilities/form (bear in this case), and they gain special bonuses. Guardian Affinity makes them take less damage naturally and gives them access to a few of the Guardian druid's powerful abilities. I think they should alter this talent, not remove the cool class functionality.

[Deleted]

Please no. They already gutted the other specs that had cool auras/stances/presences. I played a warrior in Vanilla, Pally in TBC, and DK from Wrath-currently. I HATED that they removed our ability to shift stances. Druid is the last class that has this unique ability, and it should be preserved.

They should add those stances BACK to the game before they remove druid's ability to shapeshift. The only reason you're having a problem with this in PvP is because of the guardian affinity talent. It allows any druid spec to become proficient in one of the three other spec's abilities/form (bear in this case), and they gain special bonuses. Guardian Affinity makes them take less damage naturally and gives them access to a few of the Guardian druid's powerful abilities. I think they should alter this talent, not remove the cool class functionality.

So if they alter this talent, nobody will use it, henceforth no need for it to be there at all.

Hate or not, ability pruning was there for a reason, to make Specialties feel distinct enough while being simple and not force you to buy gaming keyboards and mice because you cant fit all your buttons to your keyboard.

Sure, there are duds (Like Ret Paladin, but that spec was always a dud) that do not play well, but even a 4-button rotation can be made to feel good to play.

[lazaros742]

well i mean if you are so against bear form i will happily take perma 20 percent armor like we had in bc, do then i can heal and have some defense against mongo melee cleave bs.

[Whitedragon]

I don't think it needs removing, but I wouldn't mind some number changes to make them more dangerous to play with. Maybe a shape shift skinniness that reduces all other types of effectiveness while retaining some of the old forms strengths for a short duration. So maybe when leaving bear form your healing and damage is reduced by 20% for 1-3 seconds but you maintain some level of the bonus armor and damage reduction.

[thsevecha]

If it's over tuned it should just be tuned, not removed. A Druid is all about versatility and changing forms. If you want those removed you should remove the class altogether.

[ONCHEhap]

Classes shouldn't get ruined more because of PvP,it happened way too often already

[Schattenlied]

That is what Specialty means, different druids specialize in utilizing different forms (

I don't think you understand what specialty means... It means it's their specialty.. Not that it's the only thing they can do...

Does a surgeon who specalized in cardiac surgery not know how to do anything else? Fuck no, they are surgeon, cardiac surgery is just what they know best... It's the same for Druids, they specalize in one (cat for example), they do that one best, and the others not as well.


Pruning needs to be reversed, a lot, for every class, not amplified... and I shun you harshly for even suggesting more pruning.

What you really should be asking for is for them to be less good at their non-specialized field, not for it to be removed entirely.

[Deleted]

Ok lets pretend this would happen and Druids would lose bear form.

What do you think will happen next? Bearform is the only current defense to a class that heals mostly with HoTs and which has no kick protection.
So without bear form druids would be killed in globals which would then lead to buffs for their heals -> Same difficulty to kill them but it will be even more difficult to kill their mates.

People should stop making single minded suggestions. Every change will lead to another one.

Druids have had Bear form since day 1 and even lost their other forms with Legion as you have to pick an Affinity.
I sincerely doubt that Bear Form i currently the issue in PvP in this expansion.

What an issue is: Pruning made DPSing so easy that heals needed to be even more powerful than before so average healers could stand a chance against realy bad DPS.
That led to really good healers be extremely hard to kill, because there is not much of a gap between a bad DPS and a really good one.

[Uselessrouge]

yes of course its a druid

[Hctaz]

So if they alter this talent, nobody will use it, henceforth no need for it to be there at all.

Hate or not, ability pruning was there for a reason, to make Specialties feel distinct enough while being simple and not force you to buy gaming keyboards and mice because you cant fit all your buttons to your keyboard.

Sure, there are duds (Like Ret Paladin, but that spec was always a dud) that do not play well, but even a 4-button rotation can be made to feel good to play.

I mean, the talent is supposed to be there to hybridize the specs which is perfectly fair. That was THE druid class fantasy. The only downside is that it's having some negative effects in PvP I guess.

Ability pruning wasn't there to make specs feel distinct at all by the way. Most of the pruned abilities were abilities that were very obviously class based ones. Stuff that a basic person of that class would be able to do. Rogue's Concealment (which was added back) was not something that needed to be pruned. Auras, stances, and presences were not important to remove either. It made sense that a master of combat would be able to change their fighting stance to be defensive, aggressive, or neutral. It doesn't matter how you specialize, you will STILL remember your basic training. You might not be AS GOOD at them as people who specialize in those stances, but you can still do it. But the entire point of ability pruning was to make way for new abilities. There were a lot of abilities that were removed for no reason. Stuff that was flavor related, or stuff that was "Too passive".

- - - Updated - - -

I don't think you understand what specialty means... It means it's their specialty.. Not that it's the only thing they can do...

Does a surgeon who specalized in cardiac surgery not know how to do anything else? Fuck no, they are surgeon, cardiac surgery is just what they know best... It's the same for Druids, they specalize in one (cat for example), they do that one best, and the others not as well.


Pruning needs to be reversed, a lot, for every class, not amplified... and I shun you harshly for even suggesting more pruning.

What you really should be asking for is for them to be less good at their non-specialized field, not for it to be removed entirely.

I made this exact point as well by using the example of warriors. Warrior stances getting removed MAKES NO SENSE lol. It makes sense for a warrior's basic training to include various stances, right? And obviously certain specs are going to better at certain stances, which just makes sense. If you're a Fury warrior and your entire gameplan revolves around going berserk, you'd be better at going full aggro and worse at being more defensive. Prot warriors will obviously specialize in reducing their damage taken, so they will have the better defensive stance.

Like... shapeshifting forms are just a basic concept for druids. It's one of the first major things you learn. And your point about the surgeon is spot on imo. It's like a Surgeon not knowing how to make an incision anywhere other than the chest simply because they spec'd into their "Cardiac" spec. Cutting into people is a part of your training as a surgeon REGARDLESS of what you choose to specialize in. Just because you can't perform a full knee surgery doesn't mean that you can't open up a knee without causing damage in order to take a look. You probably could even identify what is wrong with the knee, but simply wouldn't be able to replace it.

[Whitepaw]

Thread should be renamed “I can't kill Resto Druids, when they go bear! Remove bear form, so I can kill them”.

No thx.

[Druitz]

Thread should be renamed “I can't kill Resto Druids, when they go bear! Remove bear form, so I can kill them”.

No thx.

Exactly xD So many people dont know that all you have to id is tunnel druid until he leave bear form -> stun and repeat until he is dead

[Deleted]

Classes shouldn't get ruined more because of PvP,it happened way too often already

The last pruning was enforced by a swarm of casual scrubs who despite being evenly geared took a metric dump from their counterparts who were straight out better in using their class' full kit and mechanics at their advantage.

It's not PvP that called for the removal of snapshotting. It's not PvP that called for the removal of Heroic Strike.
It's the bad players that did. Bad players who died to Paragons, who died at Thok, who died everywhere and when they stayed alive had nothing better to do than complain that another Affliction was topping the meter and not theirs.

Calling for mechanical pruning is straight out dumb. Bear should stay. If anything, things should be nerfed a little and depth should be added elsewhere in other specs' kits.