Nerf Feral Haste!

[Whitepaw]

At the start of Legion, Feral got a Haste multiplier (+50%).

Together with the changes made in the BfA pre-patch, this now means that Haste is a LOT better than any other stats - and that every talent enhancing our bleeds are far superior.

The consequence is that Feral can only do competitive dps in certain situations - and that we don't have any burst left in our spec.

So: Remove our Haste multiplier, buff our direct damage abilities.

[Tykus]

I wish there was a way to choose between the two.

Like if you really like bleeds and or just for maybe say cleave/single target. Or direct damage for larger aoe or shorter fights. Not both ways at the same time obviously.

[-aiko-]

Haste as a preferred stat for Feral just makes sense. Energy regen, attacking faster and faster bleeds combined with the core of our spec: snapshotting.

They might have gone overboard, and definitely need to find a way to balance the other talents, but haste making a strong comeback is a good thing for Feral overall.

[Whitepaw]

Haste as a preferred stat for Feral just makes sense. Energy regen, attacking faster and faster bleeds combined with the core of our spec: snapshotting.

They might have gone overboard, and definitely need to find a way to balance the other talents, but haste making a strong comeback is a good thing for Feral overall.

I agree. Haste buffing bleeds is the best systemic change we have had in several years. But the multiplier skews our stats and talents way too much in one direction, leaving us with too many talents as non-choices.

[Rockford]

While our gear is currently overbloated with secondary stats, things will feel very different at 120. Saying that, with Haste and Mastery focusing on bleeds, certain talents will very much out scale others. With the polarisation of those who may, or may not enjoy the SR/BT gameplay, this will introduce further problems later in the expansion.

[Tradu]

I wish there was a way to choose between the two.

Like if you really like bleeds and or just for maybe say cleave/single target. Or direct damage for larger aoe or shorter fights. Not both ways at the same time obviously.

There shouldn't be "2 ways". Feral is a bleed spec, if you don't like that play something else.

OT: they'll probably remove the 50% increase, but haste being (much) better than other stats isn't necessarily a problem. You can target specific stats much more easily thanks to M+.

- - - Updated - - -

While our gear is currently overbloated with secondary stats, things will feel very different at 120. Saying that, with Haste and Mastery focusing on bleeds, certain talents will very much out scale others. With the polarisation of those who may, or may not enjoy the SR/BT gameplay, this will introduce further problems later in the expansion.

As was explained to you on discord, there is no inherent scaling "problem" with SR/BT and haste/mastery.

[Whitepaw]

There shouldn't be "2 ways". Feral is a bleed spec, if you don't like that play something else.

OT: they'll probably remove the 50% increase, but haste being (much) better than other stats isn't necessarily a problem. You can target specific stats much more easily thanks to M+.

- - - Updated - - -



As was explained to you on discord, there is no inherent scaling "problem" with SR/BT and haste/mastery.

As I’ve said a lot of times before: No, I won’t play another spec. I’ll argue for changes that I think makes sense - and I’ll do it with arguments. Not how you do it, with maxims and the arrogant sounding “Play something else if you don’t like it”.

Yes, Feral has been - and should continue to be - a spec with lots of bleeds and management of said bleeds. But there is a lot of difference between having a spec where 70% of the damage depends on bleeds (Legion pre-7.2.5) - or 30% (post-7.2.5). The more bleed-heavy, the less flexible - but also, for a lot of people, less fun.

Try to accept that, Tradu: Some people have less fun with a bleed spec, which is so dominated by bleed management. And they also have less fun having to pick the talents needed to max out the bleed output; some people would like to be able to choose other talents as well.

So why not make a spec with a lot of talents that perform close to each other? Wouldn’t that be nice - to have good performance from all talents, but choose the ones you like the most? The devs try to do that with Assassination Rogues, which also have bleeds deeply integrated into the dps rotation.

[Tradu]

As I’ve said a lot of times before: No, I won’t play another spec. I’ll argue for changes that I think makes sense - and I’ll do it with arguments. Not how you do it, with maxims and the arrogant sounding “Play something else if you don’t like it”.

Yes, Feral has been - and should continue to be - a spec with lots of bleeds and management of said bleeds. But there is a lot of difference between having a spec where 70% of the damage depends on bleeds (Legion pre-7.2.5) - or 30% (post-7.2.5). The more bleed-heavy, the less flexible - but also, for a lot of people, less fun.

Try to accept that, Tradu: Some people have less fun with a bleed spec, which is so dominated by bleed management. And they also have less fun having to pick the talents needed to max out the bleed output; some people would like to be able to choose other talents as well.

So why not make a spec with a lot of talents that perform close to each other? Wouldn’t that be nice - to have good performance from all talents, but choose the ones you like the most? The devs try to do that with Assassination Rogues, which also have bleeds deeply integrated into the dps rotation.

No, it wouldn't, because balancing multiple very distinct builds within 1 spec is what causes problems. Talents should be minor changes to adapt to different situations, but the core gameplay should stay the same. And again, if people have less fun with a bleed spec, Feral is not the spec for them. It's that simple. I'm sick of people asking for specs to be changed to suit them at the expense of people who enjoy the spec as it is, instead of finding a spec they enjoy.
Assassination wasn't a bleed spec until Legion, it was a poison spec with minor bleed synergy.

[-aiko-]

I agree. Haste buffing bleeds is the best systemic change we have had in several years. But the multiplier skews our stats and talents way too much in one direction, leaving us with too many talents as non-choices.

Well, the thing is I'm not sure it's feasible to try and have more than one viable build for each situation because it would be a neverending balancing act that would waste dev time and ultimately probably fail. So I don't think it's realistic or even desirable, for example, to try and make both a single-target "bleed" build with Bloodtalons and a single-target "shred" build with MoC do similar damage. Look no further than the mess that is Havoc right now.

So ultimately I agree with what @Tradu is saying. Talents should exist to add some situational options but there should always be a core way to spec and play. For ferals, this is bleed management and snapshotting. With that said, I don't think Blizzard has quite hit that point for Ferals so there should definitely be some adjustments. The last tier, for example. Bloodtalons is simply too strong. I would like to see Feral Frenzy get some love, perhaps more up-front damage to have it be the option for heavy burst (alongside Incarn).

T90 talents are an example of this concept done pretty well, with each talent being useful for different situations. Savage Roar being the default choice for single target damage, Brutal Slash existing for heavy AoE (though I think it needs a little buff) and Sabertooth being valuable for PvP.

[Rockford]

As was explained to you on discord, there is no inherent scaling "problem" with SR/BT and haste/mastery.

Oh yes. That "conversation".
I guess you're just following up that trend with ignoring the polarisation of player opinion when it comes to BT, saying to "suck it up" when people call BT as being a cancerous example of bad design.

Bad design you say?
Yes... we use a finisher which gives us a limited time buff, where we use it on an instant cast utility (heal/root), that gives us yet another separate buff that increases the damage on the next 2 abilities, which needs to be our 2 ST bleeds while also snapshotting Tiger's Fury while maintaining Savage Roar.

That can be appreciated as engaging, but is largely seen as completely !@#$ing stupid which has no place in modern gameplay.

Alongside that insightful display of toxic design, the overall spec is tuned around the optimal dps output. If players choose to not use the optimal talents (tools), they are effectively !@#$ed over from the alternative. This is largely the case for most dps specs, though difference in output, and the optimal playstyle being so polarising to the gameplay is the issue at hand. As for scaling... pre-7.3 is a wonderful example, and in a kneejerk reaction, we ended up with what came after...

No, it wouldn't, because balancing multiple very distinct builds within 1 spec is what causes problems. Talents should be minor changes to adapt to different situations, but the core gameplay should stay the same. And again, if people have less fun with a bleed spec, Feral is not the spec for them. It's that simple.

Talents should exist to add some situational options but there should always be a core way to spec and play. For ferals, this is bleed management and snapshotting.

This, I very much agree with. Trying to tune both sub-spec is just ridiculous, and can be done much more effectively with simplification of talents. That's not to say that BT/SR should go baseline, but set up the core gameplay, which we have, then integrate talents that only slightly alter this gameplay. Current BT design does not fit into this goal!!!

My criticisms of the gameplay implications BT are founded on how ridiculously shit it feels to play, and that it has effectively polarised the Feral playerbase and the spec itself. With this, one may come to the binary conclusion that I'm "DD or GTFO"...

Not at all. As mentioned above, I want to see Feral to be a very different spec than it is now. I want it to be competitive in both M+, PvP and raiding. I want it to be %^-*ing enjoyable. Without talents that feel like shit, with baseline mechanics that make the player care about Feral's much deserved niche. There is a way to design a modern BT that doesn't rely on the player to juggle buffs, finishers and bleed abilities, all while keeping the gameplay enjoyable for all players of Feral.

[Tradu]

Oh yes. That "conversation".
I guess you're just following up that trend with ignoring the polarisation of player opinion when it comes to BT, saying to "suck it up" when people call BT as being a cancerous example of bad design.

Bad design you say?
Yes... we use a finisher which gives us a limited time buff, where we use it on an instant cast utility (heal/root), that gives us yet another separate buff that increases the damage on the next 2 abilities, which needs to be our 2 ST bleeds while also snapshotting Tiger's Fury while maintaining Savage Roar.

That can be appreciated as engaging, but is largely seen as completely !@#$ing stupid which has no place in modern gameplay.

Alongside that insightful display of toxic design, the overall spec is tuned around the optimal dps output. If players choose to not use the optimal talents (tools), they are effectively !@#$ed over from the alternative. This is largely the case for most dps specs, though difference in output, and the optimal playstyle being so polarising to the gameplay is the issue at hand.
This, I very much agree with. Trying to tune both sub-spec is just ridiculous, and can be done much more effectively with change to talents. That's not to say that BT/SR should go baseline, but set up the core gameplay, which we have, then integrate talents that only slightly alter this gameplay. BT does not fit into this design goal!!!

My criticisms of the gameplay implications BT are founded on how ridiculously shit it feels to play, and that it has effectively polarised the Feral playerbase and the spec itself. With this, one may come to the binary conclusion that I'm "DD or GTFO"...

Not at all. As mentioned above, I want to see Feral to be a very different spec than it is now. I want it to be competitive in both M+, PvP and raiding. I want it to be %^-*ing enjoyable. Without talents that feel like shit, with baseline mechanics that make the player care about Feral's much deserved niche. There is a way to design a modern BT that doesn't rely on the player to juggle buffs, finishers and bleed abilities, all while keeping the gameplay enjoyable for all players of Feral.

If you've stuck with Feral for 6 years of BT while eating it, you're a masochist, not part of some relevant polarization of a spec. Play another spec if you don't like it, there's loads to pick from. Calling BT toxic also means nothing, it's a useless buzzword. There's nothing wrong with casting a spell to gain a damage buff, tons of specs do it. Also nothing wrong with the option of spending a DPS resource(PS with BT talented) on utility instead, also common(keep in mind GCDs are a big resource for most specs).
And Feral should not be changed drastically. It doesn't need it. The only drastic change that might help is removing talents entirely so Blizzard is forced to design specs with a full baseline kit(hopefully including SR and BT baseline). Then they can add talents back later as purely utility/defense/minor tweaks to DPS abilities.

[Rockford]

If you've stuck with Feral for 6 years of BT while eating it, you're a masochist, not part of some relevant polarization of a spec.

You recognise the design problems that BT introduces to the spec? If someone decides that they may not like a particular playstyle of an optional talent (tool), they play only to punish themselves.

Play another spec if you don't like it, there's loads to pick from.

Yeah, I see this a lot when players have criticism with a spec another may not agree with. My issues with BT are not baseless, and I'm honestly surprised that you're not recognising the rift between the Feral playerbase. Casting a spell for a buff, sure, that works. The management of BT is quite a bit more involved than that, and again, saddening to see you're not understanding the issue.

I do agree that baseline Feral does not need drastic changes. It's base functionality is simple, enjoyable, and easy to pick up, where talents can be available for slight modifications in gameplay (it currently doesn't). Including BT/SR baseline is very much a step backwards in design.

Honestly, how does one who's written a review/guide of Feral's current status, not recognise the issue that players have with BT (regardless if you personally like the gameplay it offers), and not actually understand that someone may want to play Feral, but without the issues that BT introduces to how it plays, only to say "play something else", or "suck it up"? Just take a few minutes to let that soak in. Maybe even have a cuppa while you consider that BT may be the barrier to someone enjoying a spec we both love. That it may even be an issue for players that lack the concentration to maintain BT's management, but have no competitive tools as an alternative.

Take off the Mythic raider's hat, enjoy that cuppa, slow down your thought process, set aside your opinions of personal enjoyment, bring in compassion while adding a perspective to a player who wants to enjoy Feral that appeals to them so much more than any other class/spec. The barrier for them is BT (be it enjoyment or concentration) yet they know that to play without, means that their performance is going to be severely lacking.

Console them, understand and empathise with their perspective, regardless of your own experiences.
Not only on this subject, but everything.

[cparle87]

I agree. Haste buffing bleeds is the best systemic change we have had in several years. But the multiplier skews our stats and talents way too much in one direction, leaving us with too many talents as non-choices.

I remember in MoP when they first announced haste would be speeding up dots and I was like /yay! But then they announced it wouldn't affect bleeds and I'm like /wut? We have a 1 second swing time so we don't get too much out of that. The amount of energy it gives isn't much, a combat rogue gets more just from being combat that we'd get before bis raiding gear. So making it affect bleeds was pretty much the only way to get haste out of dead last place for kitties. And now that it is, you want them to undo it? Mastery doesn't have to be king for kitties like it has been since the stat was added.

[Jyggalag]

and that we don't have any burst left in our spec.

We've plenty of burst? Maybe not for the first 5-10 seconds of a raid encounter, but swapping to adds/targets that need bursting with good CP management and you can be as bursty as anything else. I love the feel of Feral ATM, very rewarding and yet very punishing. For all other content this is a non-issue. Our AoE is in a great place ATM as well.

[Tradu]

You recognise the design problems that BT introduces to the spec? If someone decides that they may not like a particular playstyle of an optional talent (tool), they play only to punish themselves.Yeah, I see this a lot when players have criticism with a spec another may not agree with. My issues with BT are not baseless, and I'm honestly surprised that you're not recognising the rift between the Feral playerbase. Casting a spell for a buff, sure, that works. The management of BT is quite a bit more involved than that, and again, saddening to see you're not understanding the issue.

I do agree that baseline Feral does not need drastic changes. It's base functionality is simple, enjoyable, and easy to pick up, where talents can be available for slight modifications in gameplay (it currently doesn't). Including BT/SR baseline is very much a step backwards in design.

Honestly, how does one who's written a review/guide of Feral's current status, not recognise the issue that players have with BT (regardless if you personally like the gameplay it offers), and not actually understand that someone may want to play Feral, but without the issues that BT introduces to how it plays, only to say "play something else", or "suck it up"? Just take a few minutes to let that soak in. Maybe even have a cuppa while you consider that BT may be the barrier to someone enjoying a spec we both love. That it may even be an issue for players that lack the concentration to maintain BT's management, but have no competitive tools as an alternative.

Take off the Mythic raider's hat, enjoy that cuppa, slow down your thought process, set aside your opinions of personal enjoyment, bring in compassion while adding a perspective to a player who wants to enjoy Feral that appeals to them so much more than any other class/spec. The barrier for them is BT (be it enjoyment or concentration) yet they know that to play without, means that their performance is going to be severely lacking.

Console them, understand and empathise with their perspective, regardless of your own experiences.
Not only on this subject, but everything.

I didn't write any review. Making SR a talent was one of the biggest mistakes Blizzard has made with Feral. And your point regarding design problems with talents is exactly why talents should not have big gameplay impact, and SR/BT should be baseline.
I understand that people don't like BT, and they have 2 other talents to pick from(unfortunately, as talents should be situational tools, not playstyle altering in any major way). BT is not hard or complicated, it's very simple to get right at a basic level. And if you manage to fuck it up, there's still 2 other talents, and 7.3 gutted talent power overall, meaning you can play other setups without a big loss. Not that that's even a relevant consideration for most players, because they'd do better with whichever talents they're more comfortable with anyway.
And again, if somebody doesn't like BT, that's an admission that they don't like Feral, seeing as its been effectively baseline for the majority of the spec's existence as a real spec.

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I remember in MoP when they first announced haste would be speeding up dots and I was like /yay! But then they announced it wouldn't affect bleeds and I'm like /wut? We have a 1 second swing time so we don't get too much out of that. The amount of energy it gives isn't much, a combat rogue gets more just from being combat that we'd get before bis raiding gear. So making it affect bleeds was pretty much the only way to get haste out of dead last place for kitties. And now that it is, you want them to undo it? Mastery doesn't have to be king for kitties like it has been since the stat was added.

No, he wants the 50% bonus to haste from gear removed, not hasted bleeds. Also DoTs started getting Hasted in Cata, not MoP.

[exochaft]

I remember in MoP when they first announced haste would be speeding up dots and I was like /yay! But then they announced it wouldn't affect bleeds and I'm like /wut? We have a 1 second swing time so we don't get too much out of that. The amount of energy it gives isn't much, a combat rogue gets more just from being combat that we'd get before bis raiding gear. So making it affect bleeds was pretty much the only way to get haste out of dead last place for kitties. And now that it is, you want them to undo it? Mastery doesn't have to be king for kitties like it has been since the stat was added.

I think the original argument against allowing haste to affect bleeds was the caster vs melee debate, since they believed haste already increased OoC procs via auto-attacks with already increased energy gains... and that it'd be overkill for bleeds to do the same thing (rogue had a similar argument). However, as with many things, Blizz changed their minds either because casters can 'double-dip' benefits from haste nowadays so why not everyone, or Blizz just straight-up forgot a 'lessons learned' moment. Regardless, I think they were concerned haste would be too powerful of a secondary stat, as well, but there's almost always a super-preferred stat... just as long as the spec plays fine regardless of stat allocation. Certainly better than haste in Legion, especially before the direct damage change.

Be that as it may, the main reason I never really liked BT as a talent is that it forces us to use a healing/utility proc for other than its intended purpose (it can do both at the same time, but it still limits your flexibility when aiming to maximize damage). Sure, I can play it optimally with ease, doesn't mean I necessarily like the concept. I preferred the Nature's Vigil route, where the spell itself was intended to be used as both damage and healing.

[cparle87]

I think the original argument against allowing haste to affect bleeds was the caster vs melee debate, since they believed haste already increased OoC procs via auto-attacks with already increased energy gains... and that it'd be overkill for bleeds to do the same thing (rogue had a similar argument).

Yeah, I remember that argument. In my original post, though, I broke down what it did. We have a 1 second swing time, and hundredths of a second aren't a big deal. The energy gain, even in bis gear, is less than what combat rogues got just for being combat. And then there's the OoC proc improvement. And haste was 100% dead last for simming every, single time. Would letting haste speed up bleeds have made it go from bottom to top like it did now? We don't know. But the truth is without the bleed buffing haste is dead last and will remain so.

[Unholyground]

They should make it so whatever secondary stat you have highest gets that boost to that stat.

[Rockford]

Not the review? My bad, I assumed you specifically were the one I had the conversation with (Guiltyas), and not someone else included. Saying that, it is good to see this is progressing further than what we had in discord being that there's recognition of talents being slight modifiers instead of spec defining, severe playstyle altering, despite our personal opinions of the playstyle. Very much agree that someone without the concentration required for BT will do better on another talent due to the punishment of non optimal play.

While I really do appreciate the change in tone while keeping your opinion, I have to disagree that to enjoy Feral, one must accept and use BT. It has been very much a part of the spec for years, and through recent expansions, moved back towards talents. As a talent, it's simply unhealthy to the spec for developers to try and tune around such a spec defining mechanic. To have both a DD and Bleed build contending for player preference is not good for the spec (regardless of pre/post 7.3), when the spec as a whole is tuned against all other classes, only to have a percentage of players isolated because a preferable playstyle is not tuned sufficiently.

Wouldn't it be wonderful if BT were somehow made less cumbersome in an enjoyable design than what it is now (and has been for years), and moved to baseline, essentially freeing up the spec from tuning issues. We have subspec playstyles that (through fault of design) simply should not be as big a tuning issue as it is. DD can be seen as to simplified (and I agree), while Bleed can be considered as cumbersome (of which I also agree). We need a baseline middle ground where the differential of gameplay through talents is much, much less than what it is now.

Edit: Apologies in the moving away from the original conversation of Haste, but the whole BT thing was a continuation of a conversation that had not progressed constructively because of the format.

[Grusalugg]

No, it wouldn't, because balancing multiple very distinct builds within 1 spec is what causes problems.

This is one of the truest posts in mmoc. Applies to most specs and classes.