[Feral] 9.1 discussion

[Local Skinwalker]

We basically need buffs to all bleeds. I know - we can buff bleeds by talents, covenants and conduits. But that nerfs our single target burst by a LOT, while at the same time still leaving us short.

A buff to Rip, Rake and Thrash with about 15-20% should do it.

i think a buff to bleeds is also warranted....or maybe a spell that makes them tick faster for a short time kind of like assassination rogue’s exeguinate?

[Myztikrice]

No.

It would mean that our bleeds did more damage. I'm not talking about re-balancing our damage to be more bleed-heavy. I'm talking a straight up buff to our bleeds.

Right, and he's saying Blizzard would never give you a straight damage buff without taking away power from somewhere else

[Raugnaut]

Right, and he's saying Blizzard would never give you a straight damage buff without taking away power from somewhere else

Except that Blizz has been doing that through the entirety of this expansion, and the last, and the one before that?

[Whitepaw]

Except that Blizz has been doing that through the entirety of this expansion, and the last, and the one before that?

Feral has basically been buffed since the start of Legion and until now. And I’m not saying that all that buffing has been for nothing - but the spec still suffers from player base prejudice concerning viability and ability to compete.

At a meta level, the whole discussion of melee versus ranged is present as well. But even without that, we’re still doing AoE primarily with bleeds (ramp up etc), where we use up to 4(!) builders to use a finisher (up to 5 with LI) - with frequent uses of Tiger’s Fury. And that’s without Savage Roar, but with Bloodtalons. I know, you can do AoE without Primal Wrath and Bloodtalons, but it won’t be anywhere near competitive. Oh, and if you really want to squeeze out more dps, you weave in Moonkin AoE as well, with the added “fun” of GCDs from shifting.

I don’t think there’s another spec in game with the same level of complexity to do competitive AoE.

At the same time, we’re still underpowered dps-wise. And since our bleed dps is now somewhat underwhelming, a buff to our bleeds seem to be in order. Will that raise our bleed % when compared to our direct damage %? Yes, it will - obviously. But it should be a buff to bleeds - without any nerfs to our direct damage.

[Zellas]

No.

It would mean that our bleeds did more damage. I'm not talking about re-balancing our damage to be more bleed-heavy. I'm talking a straight up buff to our bleeds.

It's been quite a while since they deliberately 'straight up buffed' cats that way.
IIRC the last time this happened was in Ulduar. So... yeah.

[Fudge]

Either make us a bleed class or a big-hitter class... We don't shine at either trying to play them both together. :-/

[Aedruid]

A big buff to Thrash DoT would do it. A buffed Thrash + (Primal Wrath) Rip ticking on a bunch of targets with the reduced duration leggo. Maybe even a buff to Sunfire / Starfire when Owlweaving?

[dewd]

i really miss the few months during antorus in legion with soul of the arch druid and chatoyant signet equipped. yes on sims theyre bad but it was so much fun to just spam ferocious bites that hit like a truck.

now im energystaved, bleeds do literally zero damage and are only there to boost the mastery and by the time i have 5 cps that i would like to use to fb my rip is about the run out, letting me get maybe 3 fbs during a mythic+ bossfight and only during berserk. the only highlight is convoke which you shouldnt even use in catform. what a joke.

[Aedruid]

Necro Feral is pretty fun, believe it or not, it is actually competitive and all your damage is DoT based. However, it is really hard to be competitive in M+ with. I think Venthyr Feral would be really fun in M+ but I have yet to try it out. I wonder if Feral can burst as much as a Owlkin, I really want to try it out!

[Local Skinwalker]

Could an ability like Exsanguinate work for Feral? Much like Assassination rogues.....but used more often for Feral? Lower cooldown I mean.
To help put an emphasis back on doing DoT damage instead of Ferocious Bites.

[neocount]

Meanwhile, I get to watch WW monk pulling almost 40k, without PI, on a trash pull in Mists, and nearly catching up to me on ST damage on the boss. Good times.

[Aedruid]

A good buff to help burst AoE would be to buff Berserk. Make Berserk buff swipe / brutal slash damage by 60% and have double the chance to crit like Shred already does. Blizzard can still keep the AoE cap, but that would give Feral the ability to do more damage in AoE situations every 3 minutes. An alternate option to the double crit idea, would to make swipe / brutal slash have no cap on additional targets, but that might be a tougher thing to develop.