Lack of info or changes from BfA.

[exochaft]

They are working harder on other classes/specializations azerite powers and honor talents than on druid baseline/talent changes. Nice to see.

"Azerite Armor Testing - April 3"

This is partly why a bunch of us are waiting, because Azerite Armor bonuses could be why some of these changes came down the pipeline, as we don't have anywhere near the full picture yet. Sometimes changes filter in for stuff that's yet to be added, but makes the changes understandable. Also, it's a feature that affects every class, so they want to make sure the system is working right first, then they'll probably move on to Azerite ability balance/power (which they probably have already started with their internal testing), and then it'll show up on the alpha test realms when they have an acceptable test build of said powers.

Now, some changes I'm still trying to figure out, like the increase in mana cost of Hibernate. Best case, PvP reasons? Certainly not PvE, as I've used the ability once during testing... and it was mostly just to mess around while being Feral with a weird pull. Still don't want to aggro mobs if it's used on an out-of-combat creature, that's a change I think would be worthwhile.

The increase in cast time of Rebirth I kind of understand, especially if Blizz is trying to slow things down. However, I think it should be a change made across the board for all classes, or the change is likely dumb. Hurts Guardians/Ferals more than Resto/Moonkin honestly, although I haven't popped on the alpha since the change to see if it's across all specs or just the caster specs.

[stormgust]

This is partly why a bunch of us are waiting, because Azerite Armor bonuses could be why some of these changes came down the pipeline, as we don't have anywhere near the full picture yet.

Ion himself said, that they consider the current talent layout, which mixed single/aoe talents on a row, to be a failure. I doubt that azerite traits would be able to fix that.

[Polarthief]

Ion himself said, that they consider the current talent layout, which mixed single/aoe talents on a row, to be a failure. I doubt that azerite traits would be able to fix that.

Except talents don't make up for baseline stuff we had since you have to give up a talent point for it (which means losing something else you likely already had). Azerite was intended to make up for losing Leggos, Traits, and Set Bonuses, and from the looks of it, it MIGHT make up for most of the minor traits and maybe a leggo. Hoping we see equip-effects on gear, but hope wanes pretty quickly after seeing the first pass of azerite and it essentially being NLC 2.0.

[Deleted]

So far there are no changes whatsoever for the whole class other than the talent change from Displacer Beast to Tiger's Dash and the removal of Healing Touch...

Are you guys concerned? Because I am. This can mean two things: either we are in a perfect state that none of the specs need changes... and to be honest we are in a very very good spot, but we definitely need changes and adjustments. Or there are some big changes coming and they are not ready yet to be released...

In my humble opinion, Feral is near perfection right now, the 7.3 changes have made me enjoy the spec more than ever, I can actually play with the talents of my choice and not suffer the super big damage loss for not picking the cookie cutter build (goodbye Savage Roar, won't miss you, ever).
Balance is in a solid state but it has two main problems: many talents that nobody pick and the spec is quite monotonous.
Guardian has arguably been the strongest tank the whole expansion and it only needs number tweaking and make it a little less Thrash-Swipe-spam simulator.
Haven't played Restoration other than to do the mage tower but from what I see in raids and bgs, I think it's a very well rounded spec.

All of this leads me to: you see, I've been playing the very same two specs since forever (since mid vanilla indeed), Feral and Destruction, and Destro changes for Legion beta were added two months before the expansion release and it was a mess, most destruction warlocks were complaining here and in the official forums and even in social media, but due to the very short time available, despite the huge amount of feedback we provided they didn't do pretty much any adjust and the spec shipped in a super clunky and unfun state, very stressing to play "correctly"; it was so bad that they had to do a semi revamp of the spec in the middle of the Legion expansion, something they have never done before, and left it in an acceptable-ish state.

My concern is that even we are still far from September, the fact that all other classes have received quite a lot of changes and druids barely any... I don't wanna find Feral or the whole Druid class in the same state as Destro was in Legion release.

What do you guys think? Will we see changes or will we remain as we are with only numbers tuning?

Changes will come for druid specs but as last ones. Devs have been clueless regarding druids for years, so they will drop it when there wont be any time to fix that shitstorm. Forget "this is just alpha/beta" argument. Druid players will probably never form any kind of serious pushback, only few druids are able to play all 4 specs properly/fulltime and rest only play 1-2 specs and switch mains regularly. We are too divided as a community and devs know that.

[Polarthief]

Changes will come for druid specs but as last ones. Devs have been clueless regarding druids for years, so they will drop it when there wont be any time to fix that shitstorm. Forget "this is just alpha/beta" argument. Druid players will probably never form any kind of serious pushback, only few druids are able to play all 4 specs properly/fulltime and rest only play 1-2 specs and switch mains regularly. We are too divided as a community and devs know that.

That's a piss-poor reason to not fix spec-wide spells and talents. Balance is an absolute mess right now. The talents need desperate fixing up, the base rotation has a gaping hole it in addition to how low AsP generation is without the artifact ability. Bears still don't have a way to spend Rage for non-Physical damage which just feels awkward as all hell. There's plenty they could be doing, but aren't.

Class-wide problems aside, I don't see why they couldn't spend an afternoon on Druid specs.

[AngelovV]

That's a piss-poor reason to not fix spec-wide spells and talents. Balance is an absolute mess right now. The talents need desperate fixing up, the base rotation has a gaping hole it in addition to how low AsP generation is without the artifact ability. Bears still don't have a way to spend Rage for non-Physical damage which just feels awkward as all hell. There's plenty they could be doing, but aren't.

Class-wide problems aside, I don't see why they couldn't spend an afternoon on Druid specs.

Off topic. Do you have alpha?

[Polarthief]

Off topic. Do you have alpha?

I don't but a close friend/guildie does, why?

[Lahis]

I don't but a close friend/guildie does, why?

Clearly all of your opinions and feedback can now be negated by saying "You are not in Alpha".

[Mystikal]

Balance is so boring to play on the alpha at the moment. If we're not going to get Moon spells back, we definitely need something else to spice up the rotation.

Resto + Feral Affinity is super fun, though. We have Balance DoTs, Cat bleeds now scaling with Haste and occasional shifting to Bear form to replenish energy (as it is on live), only with the ability to throw out a decently hard hitting Mangle as well when in Bear form. I like the "swiftshifting" and how fluid it feels. Not to mention that, with the ridiculous 15% nerf to Balance damage, the kill speed of Restokitty is about the same as Balance, with several times the utility and self-healing / defence.

I am strongly considering changing my main spec from Balance for the first time in 14 years.

[Irefusetodie]

Clearly all of your opinions and feedback can now be negated by saying "You are not in Alpha".

That's an idiotic argument. Just because one does not have alpha access does not mean that they cannot be informed through the plethora of videos, streams, forum posts, and sites like Wowhead and this site.

[garonne]

That's a piss-poor reason to not fix spec-wide spells and talents. Balance is an absolute mess right now. The talents need desperate fixing up, the base rotation has a gaping hole it in addition to how low AsP generation is without the artifact ability. Bears still don't have a way to spend Rage for non-Physical damage which just feels awkward as all hell. There's plenty they could be doing, but aren't.

Class-wide problems aside, I don't see why they couldn't spend an afternoon on Druid specs.

heal it. i know you think im being facetious but thats the premise behind removing their previous defensive. Take Dk's as an example, they have damage reductions (bone shield etc) but the gameplay is: take damage, heal it back up, paladin reduces damage by blocking it and monks smooth out the damage they take so its supposed to be less spikey.

[huth]

heal it. i know you think im being facetious but thats the premise behind removing their previous defensive. Take Dk's as an example, they have damage reductions (bone shield etc) but the gameplay is: take damage, heal it back up, paladin reduces damage by blocking it and monks smooth out the damage they take so its supposed to be less spikey.

Some people seem to have forgotten that MoU got removed because bears were much to strong against everything, as well.

[Tyze]

Some feedback from me.


So, Balance Druids. Where to start, overall the class works well in Legion. I'm personally not a big fan of the Astral Power build and spend mechanic, I feel its not identical to the spec and so many other classes has the same mechanic.

I would be happy to see Eclipse back, why? First of all it was unique to the spec, no other spec had a similar mechanic. The procs on Starsurge was satisfying to get and it was good rng.

Anyway, the problems with the Balance spec now is mainly our dots. Moonfire and Sunfire has no synergy on our single target rotation what so ever. Before we had Shooting Star that procced if we had our dots on the target. Now they are just a flat damage increase.
Our dots needs to be more impactful on single target, make us want to press the buttons.

Talent feedback:
15 - Starlord should be baseline. Warrior of Elune has its usage in some scenarios. Force of Nature is a waste of a talent.

30 - It's good.

45 - It works, but its rather boring and doesn't provide a lot of utility, the Wild Growth in Restoration affinity is a nice change though!

60 - Utility row, works fine.

75 - Soul of the Forest reduces our Starfall cost to 40 and that should be baseline as well. Incarnation is a strong cooldown. But Stellar Flare has no usage what so ever, it does low damage and its just another dot to apply. Adds nothing else to the table.

90 - The Astral Power generation row. I think its good. Shooting Stars and Blessing of the Ancient is the best for raiding, Astral Communion has no usage in PVE but its strong in PVP. Blessing of the Ancient "Blessing of An'she" isn't being used ever, and should not be used, which is a shame.

100 - Stellar Drift is fine, Nature's Balance is fine. One for aoe one for single target. But Fury of Elune needs a complete rework or replaced with something else. It utterly garbage and hasn't seen any use during Legion.

Talents that needs to be removed and replaced with something else: Force of Nature, Stellar Flare, Fury of Elune.

Currently on Alpha the Balance Druid are a cure for insomnia. They are so boring to play without the moons form the artifact. General rule as a Balance Druid is to not let your dots fall off and try not to use non empowered spells. Currently you spam Wrath to get Astral Power, the generation is slow and the rotation is boring.

To be honest, I would like to see Eclipse back, not only for the uniqueness but it actually made our dots meaningful on single target. The build and spend mechanic is overused already.

[Polarthief]

Clearly all of your opinions and feedback can now be negated by saying "You are not in Alpha".

Yes, because our talents being a mess on live and being the same mess on Alpha is not good enough feedback simply because I'm not on the Alpha. Genius.

Please tell me how NO changes to garbage talents that are never picked and practically mandatory talents still being there is not legitimate feedback just because I'm not on Alpha.

[Lahis]

Yes, because our talents being a mess on live and being the same mess on Alpha is not good enough feedback simply because I'm not on the Alpha. Genius.

Please tell me how NO changes to garbage talents that are never picked and practically mandatory talents still being there is not legitimate feedback just because I'm not on Alpha.

Sorry I forgot my sarcasm tags from the previous message.

I tought it was obvious.

[Polarthief]

Sorry I forgot my sarcasm tags from the previous message.

I tought it was obvious.

You can never be too sure about obviousness vs obliviousness on these forums *shrug* I just don't take my chances. Had enough people turn on me here, lol; sorry about that.

[wing5wong]

Some feedback from me.


So, Balance Druids. Where to start, overall the class works well in Legion. I'm personally not a big fan of the Astral Power build and spend mechanic, I feel its not identical to the spec and so many other classes has the same mechanic.

I would be happy to see Eclipse back, why? First of all it was unique to the spec, no other spec had a similar mechanic. The procs on Starsurge was satisfying to get and it was good rng.

Anyway, the problems with the Balance spec now is mainly our dots. Moonfire and Sunfire has no synergy on our single target rotation what so ever. Before we had Shooting Star that procced if we had our dots on the target. Now they are just a flat damage increase.
Our dots needs to be more impactful on single target, make us want to press the buttons.

Talent feedback:
15 - Starlord should be baseline. Warrior of Elune has its usage in some scenarios. Force of Nature is a waste of a talent.

30 - It's good.

45 - It works, but its rather boring and doesn't provide a lot of utility, the Wild Growth in Restoration affinity is a nice change though!

60 - Utility row, works fine.

75 - Soul of the Forest reduces our Starfall cost to 40 and that should be baseline as well. Incarnation is a strong cooldown. But Stellar Flare has no usage what so ever, it does low damage and its just another dot to apply. Adds nothing else to the table.

90 - The Astral Power generation row. I think its good. Shooting Stars and Blessing of the Ancient is the best for raiding, Astral Communion has no usage in PVE but its strong in PVP. Blessing of the Ancient "Blessing of An'she" isn't being used ever, and should not be used, which is a shame.

100 - Stellar Drift is fine, Nature's Balance is fine. One for aoe one for single target. But Fury of Elune needs a complete rework or replaced with something else. It utterly garbage and hasn't seen any use during Legion.

Talents that needs to be removed and replaced with something else: Force of Nature, Stellar Flare, Fury of Elune.

Currently on Alpha the Balance Druid are a cure for insomnia. They are so boring to play without the moons form the artifact. General rule as a Balance Druid is to not let your dots fall off and try not to use non empowered spells. Currently you spam Wrath to get Astral Power, the generation is slow and the rotation is boring.

To be honest, I would like to see Eclipse back, not only for the uniqueness but it actually made our dots meaningful on single target. The build and spend mechanic is overused already.

Something Cyous mentioned on the alpha forums is that a few of those rows have 2 "choices" and 1 "niche" talent.
For me im OK with treants, they are ok for levelling, and necroticc week, and the best for burst dps every minute. - sure youdont pick it every time, but sometimes you do. The same with astral communion.

Biggest issues for me are still FoE and StFl which just dont fit well in their current rows.
StFl needs one of. AP generation, cast time removed, or empowerment aspect removed.
FoE is just unusable - im hopnig this gets replaced or completely reworked again

[huth]

Turn back FoE to it's original incarnation and swap it with StFl(so both Celestial Alignment replacements share a row), that would be a start.

[wing5wong]

Turn back FoE to it's original incarnation and swap it with StFl(so both Celestial Alignment replacements share a row), that would be a start.

Yea, that would definitely clean up the talent rows to be more consistent. Final tier offering gameplay style adjustments - more dots, more aoe, less dot casting focus.
Also opens up Sotf/StFl combo which would help to offset the empowerment requirement

[Deleted]

That's a piss-poor reason to not fix spec-wide spells and talents. Balance is an absolute mess right now. The talents need desperate fixing up, the base rotation has a gaping hole it in addition to how low AsP generation is without the artifact ability. Bears still don't have a way to spend Rage for non-Physical damage which just feels awkward as all hell. There's plenty they could be doing, but aren't.

Class-wide problems aside, I don't see why they couldn't spend an afternoon on Druid specs.

yes its poor but its mainly what I see, also having vocal minority of so called "theorycrafters" from these discord communities repeating over and over how "feral is in a good spot, just l2p, no changes needed" (legion release it was like this, whoooole legion it was like this until devs changed a few things in recent patches, then feral was suddenly also in a very good place gameplaywise and in reality the playstyle changed by 100% for vast majority of feral players), you see it with balance druids also, these "experts" and however they call themselves claim balance is in a great spot right now, just need moon spells on alpha (which fixes nothing tbh, moonkin needs a complete review and focus on all talents, pvp gameplay - which is very different from PvE experience, and atleast sunfire/moonfire + SW/LS spells which are just ability bloat at this point because they do the same thing, and also AoE nuke has been garbage throughout the whole expansion, ST mediocre at best and spread AoE not that Great outside of starfall...lets just not forget how moonkin sucked balls in m+ until last patch or two when we started to overgear everything and do more difficult content, "wait for better gear later during the expansion" is not the correct answer imo)...many of us know this. You have divided druid community into specs and then also you have division within the divided specs. Its not like paladins when 90% of them play ret and all start to cry when they change something for the worse.

If you look at their design of guardian druid for legion and look through every patch and bfa alpha you will clearly see they had some idea but didnt even bother with scaling or anything. Result is constant stream of nerfs because they were unable to see 1 patch into the future (I think around that time we could easily reach armor cap, im not sure). This was going to be a balancing shitshow from the beginning, first they decided to remove artifact weapons (which is like 7 passive abilities or something on average), then tier sets (lets not fool ourselves, each spec was balanced around tier set, it has always been the case), then haste scaling bleeds (oh look its feral joining the rollercoaster again) and now GCD business (which changes a lot in terms of balancing, especially melee vs ranged).

Im not saying I dislike these changes, I think it will be better (I purely hope, nothing else). I just have 0 faith in devs´balancing capabilities, especially of this magnitude. And again, I bet they have no idea how is, for example feral, going to perform 1 patch down the road with GCD and haste scaling bleeds. Im like 99% sure they will just make it BfA-release playable and control the damage afterwards. To quote some youtuber(s): "it will be a shitshow, obviously."

BfA comes in 4 months, so dont worry, its still just alpha (lol). Now seriously, expect changes at last moment. Do we even know what our class buff is going to be? Last time I checked it wasnt on alpha.

Believe me when I say druid is the last of their problems. 4 months and alpha is barely finished, lot of testing and balancing ahead of them, expansion disguising as PvP expansion and devs admit they dont know why people avoid PvP (maybe because its shit? maybe...who knows?), not much content in BfA so far and most importantly what has been revealed is viewed by most testers as boring crap. Add to this pile of problems divided druid community and no wonder we have seen no changes so far.