Feral's 9-sec, 40 yard range, stunlock chain in 5.3

[Deleted]

I noticed something funny on the PTR.

The druid treants talent got changed and now you can summon 3 treants one after another, each stunning your enemy for 5 sec. Each 10 sec you gain one charge and can summon another.

This means feral can:
1) Stun 3 enemies for 5 sec
2) Stun 1 enemy for 8.75 sec chain

The range of the ability is 40 yards. Do you think this spell is broken? They have to give up incarnation for that, but the control is insane.

---------- Post added 2013-05-02 at 08:39 AM ----------

Here's the change:

Force of Nature is no longer on global cooldown and summons a single Treant. The Treant no longer has a control bar, immediately uses its special abilities on the Druid’s current target, and accumulates 1 charge every 20 seconds up to a maximum of 3 charges.

[Senathor]

Sounds like a fun ability to play with, annoying as f to face those. But losing Incarnation is still HUGE so keep that in mind. But yeah, 5 sec stun every 20 sec in addition to all the CC they already have is stupid IMO. Should be a 2-3 sec stun.

[Deleted]

Sounds like a fun ability to play with, annoying as f to face those. But losing Incarnation is still HUGE so keep that in mind. But yeah, 5 sec stun every 20 sec in addition to all the CC they already have is stupid IMO. Should be a 2-3 sec stun.

I don't think anyone would take it for 2-3 sek stun.

[nyc81991]

Incarnation is pretty much the biggest burst Cd for Feral so the fact that they have to give that up makes it fine in my opinion.

[Stanislav]

and no one will ever take it as stuns have a DR and most things ferals play with in arena uses stuns as its main CC.

in rbg's no one will care about a stun like that at the cost of a huge burst cd. plus no one takes ferals anyways.

[Yvaelle]

I think it's going to turn out to be OP - an off-gcd 40 yard range 5 second stun is ripe for imbalance, but cleaving out three of those at once is why people dislike cloak and dagger->shadowdance->cheap shot spam (which may need a nerf, and this is way better than that) - alternately as you mention it can be chained with itself for a near 9 second stun.

Actually, if it even goes live in the first place - I bet it will be nerfed pretty fast. Let's push the Cloak and Dagger->Shadowdance->Cheap Shot spam comparison a little further. First of all, the above is probably too strong already - while other classes have aoe stuns they are pbAoE (point blank AoE) such as Leg Sweep, Shockwave is directional, Shadowfury is weaker and annoying to target (but can be used at range, within a circle), or have a setup time such as Capacitor and Remorseless Winter. The rogue AoE stun (Cloak and Dagger->Shadowdance->Cheap Shot Spam) costs them at least 4 GCDs, 120 energy, wipes their combo points, and consumes their burst cooldown - by contrast, Force of Nature would seem to cost a Feral none of these things. It doesn't cost GCDs or energy, it doesn't wipe combo points, it doesn't consume a burst cooldown - and - it can be used at 40 yards up from Cloak and Daggers 30 yard range. That all makes it significantly stronger than the rogue version, which already receives a lot of negative press.

I don't think it will go live given the above - and if it does, it will be an oversight on their part that they will nerf. Not to rain on the feral parade, just... don't get too excited about this is all :hugs:

---------- Post added 2013-05-02 at 09:12 AM ----------

and no one will ever take it as stuns have a DR and most things ferals play with in arena uses stuns as its main CC.

in rbg's no one will care about a stun like that at the cost of a huge burst cd. plus no one takes ferals anyways.

Shadow/Feral/Rsham is a reasonably popular comp that has no other stuns on the team (apart from Capacitor totem) and the ferals own stuns, which he doesn't need to use if he's truly worried about DR (more likely though he would use his stuns as well, because stun DR doesn't mean stuns still aren't worthwhile). It won't be great for kittycleave, but that's what options are for.

In RBGs, picture when you are going for that first grip/kill - your feral is told to stealth behind the enemy team and stun all enemy healers - despite them positioning 80 yards apart to avoid simultaneous CC - and ask if that's worth the feral scratching a little harder (and remember that he's still got a full energy bar, and is still using his GCDs for damage *while* CC'ing all the healers simultaneously - likely with a mouseover macro for BattlegroundTargets unit frames).

[Snuggli]

Got to agree with Yvaelle. No matter how important Incarnation is to Feral, pushing a change like this is always going to be bad news. A spammable non-GCD stun with no energy cost or risk, which chains up to 9 seconds? Comps like FMP and Ebolacleave would destroy healers, and revolve purely around that talent.

Possible fixes:

• Reduce Treant bash from 5 to 3 seconds
• Change the initial spell Treants cast from Bash to another spell (An extra bleed?)
• Give the Treant summon spell a 5-10s CD, so they can't be chain summoned

[Deleted]

Cloak and dagger will be 20y next patch, so this ability will be twice more.

The balance version is more balanced (pun intended ) since it's a root.

Could it be that people start taking ferals for RBGs because of treants If so, that would be a great thing!

[Nicola]

Hmm wasn't impressed the first time I've read the description, but it does actually sound sick. No need to use maim or spec into bash anymore, you can just use fero bite instead and spec disorienting roar for additional cc.

Can it be used on a focus target? It would be like a sick version of the old mage impact and off the gcd lol. Just imagine jungle cleave with this.

Every spell that requires a target without any special conditions such as being frozen, can be used on a focus target...

And yes, by the looks of it, this spell is just plain overpowered. Honestly, I don't see why they are adding cc to the treants, knowing that the amount of cc in game is currently a problem. :/

[CHRONICGODX]

surely this wont go live trolololollololo

[Lulbalance]

Got to agree with Yvaelle. No matter how important Incarnation is to Feral, pushing a change like this is always going to be bad news. A spammable non-GCD stun with no energy cost or risk, which chains up to 9 seconds? Comps like FMP and Ebolacleave would destroy healers, and revolve purely around that talent.

Possible fixes:

• Reduce Treant bash from 5 to 3 seconds
• Change the initial spell Treants cast from Bash to another spell (An extra bleed?)
• Give the Treant summon spell a 5-10s CD, so they can't be chain summoned

i agree it could potentially be nasty. but those changes will render the spell useless. maybe add a cd that idea was good though.

to me the most outrageous part of it is the 40 yard range.. that is insane. that is really not good for the game because its largely unavoidable.

---------- Post added 2013-05-02 at 04:45 PM ----------

surely this wont go live trolololollololo

is what we always say before it goes live..

[ChristopherD87]

As a feral player up until MoP lol. I wouldn't mind seeing them get this. IMO now seeing a feral in an RBG its kinda like seeing a ret...yeah they have GREAT burst...at certain times...other than that they're hitting you with a foam baseball bat. At least from the ferals I have seen that have gear. I really wanna re-spec back to feral, but it seems useless, cuz no one wants one for an RBG when I can be boomy and get into any RBG pretty much. Just my thought on the matter, might make them more "Desireable"

[apepi]

Aren't those trees very easy to kill? If they have the same health they only have 40k health.

[Snuggli]

Aren't those trees very easy to kill?

Yeah, but bash is now the first thing they cast - no time to attack them at all (not like psyfiend)

[Glurp]

Incarnation will never be worth dropping in an arena. Using this talent in 3s would be like a Cloak and Dagger Subterfuge Rogue with Cata weapons. Lots of control, no damage. It will at least give them slightly more viability in RBGs, but not much.

[apepi]

Yeah, but bash is now the first thing they cast - no time to attack them at all (not like psyfiend)

But they do have to use in melee range correct?

[Senathor]

and no one will ever take it as stuns have a DR and most things ferals play with in arena uses stuns as its main CC.

in rbg's no one will care about a stun like that at the cost of a huge burst cd. plus no one takes ferals anyways.

You can CC several people, aaaand you're done.

[Lulbalance]

i remember saying cloak and dag was op and people said no one would use it >.< so i like that comparison.

i can see people using this - 1 min CD for godsake.. incarnation is 3 mins.. though obscenely good - its not as easy of a choice as i think alot of you are making it out to be. every 20 sec +1 charge means you can basically always have it charging the / option of a 5 sec stun WITH A 40 YARD RANGE!

..depending on your comp, this could be crazy good.