Feral Druid Talent BFA Redesign

[Psybearslat]

Hi Everyone,

I have been playing a lot of feral druid on the beta and have come to realise the pit falls of some of our current talent choices. I thought I would make a post on my suggestions for possible overhauls to make feral appear more engaging, competitive and offer 2 of the communities preferred play styles.

Blood Scent

Blood Scent effectively currently works as a flat 10% crit buff. It offers no game play interaction and is simply quite a boring talent. However, it does serve well in acting as a potential CP (combo Point) generator - albeit rather RNG based. Whilst, the other two talents on the row offer viable aoe and impressive ST dps potential, blood scent serves a minimal purpose.

Feral Frenzy (FF)

At the same time, Feral Frenzy is seen by much of the community as a rather uncomfortable talent choice. It does not align with CDs very nicely and can have you frustrated waiting for TF to align smoothly. Additionally, the other two talents in the row far out compete feral frenzy in potential and usability.

Therefore, I would suggest reducing the CD of FF to 30seconds to align better with TF, next I would lower the strength of FF to function similarly to ashamane's frenzy on live, ergo, offering 3 combo points instead of the current 5 and offering the bleed effect (however probably not the damage increase that AF offers!!). This new version of Feral Frenzy could then slot in and replace Blood Scent as a first tier talent. This would offer for huge initial ramp up capabilities and would be a welcome addition to the Tier 1 talents. This would work as an optional gameplay rather than a necessity - creating CHOICE. Predator would still reign supreme for AOE and Lunar Inspiration would definitely contend as a strong ST option, as moonfire offers constant DPS compared to FF offering limited dps during burst/high CP generator phases.

Next,

Predator & Tiger's Fury GCD

I am sure for many of you that have attempted to aoe in any dungeon on Beta with predator and BrS you find yourself torn between wanting to either maintain a high energy level with constantly spamming TF - on proc - whilst also being able to fit in as many BrS procs/thrashes as possible within the burst window before the mob packs die.

So....Remove TF from the GCD.... Not gonna happen?

Okay, well then I suggest this. Simply, Predator (when procced) will restore a fraction of the energy that TF would gain you - perhaps a flat +10 energy. This would mean that during your high intensity burst phases you only need use TF when all 3 BrS are on CD or in order to regain your +15% damage buff. In essence, removing the awkwardness of trying to gain energy and do damage at the same time during very rapid burst windows.

And Lastly, What would replace Feral Frenzy as a final tier talent?

Well, I don't quite have a name for it.

But at the minute, BrS feels very lack-luster. Instead, tab raking in AOE situations seems a much more optimal, yet daunting, option. Between not having enough energy to physically rake each target in a pack, and not having the time, this play style can feel very uninteresting as well as quite fiddly to pull off.

My suggestion is to provide a talent that works much like Lady and the Child for balance druids except instead of moonfire, the spell in question would be rake. This would mean being able to apply rake to twice as many targets, in half the time and with half the energy requirement. Therefore, rapidly reducing our ramp up time on aoe pulls and enabling us to stay somewhat competitive with other much more efficient aoe classes.

In terms of the final tier talent row, this new change would allow for MoC to act as a great ST and AOE viable build, Bloodtalons to remain a very strong pure ST build, and now this new ability to act as a purely AOE/cleave ability. This creates a fluidity in CHOICE as to how you want to combat the challenge ahead. Hedge your bets and take a bit of both, or to go all out purely one or the other.

*Or by all means, put it on the same row as BrS and make BrS directly compete with a second AOE ability. Whilst allowing SR and bloodtalons to compete.*

And Finally,

I thought I would mention the very valuable potential for the current 7.3.5 playstyle of feral to continue in BFA even though many of us would agree that the Feral Bleeder is returning in BFA. Now, what I would say next is based heavily on a new Azerite trait that enables rake to increase the damage of your next FB, so keep this in mind.
And I will open this up for heavy discussion,

Could Predator, Incarnation, Sabertooth, MoC and this new azerite trait allow for a very vers/crit heavy playstyle encouraging you to be able to fit in as many FB into a burst window as possible, not only that, but each FB would be scaling off of Bloodtalons as well as the new azerite trait - all whilst refreshing your bleeds in synergy. Allowing for maximum shred/FB spam.
Whilst the haste/mastery heavy bleed style may still reign supreme, this could potentially open up a second viable CHOICE of gameplay for feral.

TL;DR,
Remove Blood Scent - replace it with a slightly less strong but more synergistic Feral Frenzy.
Buff Predator to - on proc - restore +10 energy. Allowing for cleaner BrS burst windows and compatibility with the current TF GCD changes.
New Final Tier Talent: Acts like LatC but for Rake not moonfire. allows quicker, cheaper, more competitive feral AOE damage.
Incarnation Burst window build still viable?? with the right setup and number scaling.

Thanks for reading, I hope this was interesting or at least thought provoking.

[arkanon]

And this relates to classic how?

[Psybearslat]

And this relates to classic how?

It doesnt. I accidentally posted in the wrong section and now im sorta waiting for it to be deleted. I have since correctly posted this thread in 'Class Discussion - Druid'.
My apologies