Swipe

When I first got swipe I learned what it meant to tank. This was the ability that first made tanking possible for me. It may not have given me alot of single target threat, but it did give me a rage dump and at the same time gave me some aggro on my off targets. Along came lecerate and improved single target aggro to the point swipe got put on a back burner to single target. After gearing up a little and increasing attack power it became easier and easier to hold threat on a single target and I started using a rotation to keep mangle and lacerate debuffs up and swipe the rest, that way I deal more damage to the target. Now SuraBear has told us that at 2600 AP swipe will in general cause more threat then lacerate pretty much moving lacerate to the back shelf in all situations. Except one: you cant lacerate around crowd control. Yes you can position yourself not to hit it, but in general that's a risk you dont want to take.

But wait, I sence news from the test realm patch notes:


Swipe: This ability will no longer strike any secondary targets which are under the effect of crowd-control spells that break on taking damage. i.e. Polymorph, Sap, etc.

on another note lacerate is also getting a buff based on your attack power. Maybe this will negate swipe becoming the single target move of choice, or at least make it take higher AP to do so. But now we will be able to use it without fear. Good news, good news. Continue reading 'Swipe'

Profession

What profession should a druid take?

There are many professions out there. Many reasons to take this one or that one. The biggest benifite of a profession are those that can improve your character directly. Most of these include BOP items or items only usable within your profession. Leatherworking, engineering, alchemy, enchanting and jewelcrafting are all professions I would suggest.

read on




Leatherworking:
obviously leatherworking gives you a lot of equipment to wear. As a druid you will have many sets of armor. being able to make it yourself can save you a lot of headache. Drums come in handy as a usable buff/fear while in combat, now usable in forms.

Engineering
I dont know a whole lot about engineering, but I do know it has some nice items that you cant use otherwise. There are a set of goggles that are quite popular and can compete with many of the other helms available. There are bombs and odd trinkets that you could use (but as far as I know not in any forms). you can make jumper cables to try to offset our only 1 res per 20m limit. you can make repair bots. There is a new extractor thing that lets you pull motes of water/shadow/air similar to another gathering profession on it's own.

All in all it has some nice tricks.

Alchemy
Most alchemy stuff can be traded to other characters. But there is worth mentioning a trinket you can equip which increases the amount of health/mana you get back from a potion as well as giving you a deacent stat bonus. Also worth mentioning are mad alchemist potions, these potions require alchemy to use, restore mana and health, and sometimes give you a random flask bonus.

Enchating
there are few enchants that you can only cast on your own items. right now these consist of ring enchants raising your stats/melee damage/spell damage or healing. The biggest reason I see taking enchanting though is for disenchanting. Yes lots of clothies generally take it and can shard for you in an instance or raid, but clothies cant go with you on stealth runs just to disenchant shards.

Jewelcrafting
Jewelcrafting has many trinkets and jewelery that is BOP. Esp useful while leveling as they are available long before normal trinkets are. Also in the end game there are gem cuts that are BOP.

Which ever profession you chose just have fun with it. There really is no best answer. just make sure whatever you are doing that you enjoy it.
Continue reading 'Profession'

Weightstones

Ive been working on maxing out my potential during raids. First I started out with Flasks and Elixirs. Then I added food. Then I came accross some other buffs that could be benificial. 1 is an item that you add to your chest piece sometimes reducing the damage you take from hits by 400 (cant remember the name, will get back to you) and the other is an item added to your weapon Adamanitite weightstone this item gives you 14 crit rating. While not the biggest deal its a buff equal to about the same as some sockets.

Well after running into these and trying them out I was thinking to myself, "this is nice but I wish that we got the damage bonus too.

Low and behold, what do I find in the 2.4 patch notes?

* Weightstones and Sharpening Stones: The bonus damage from these temporary enchantments now works while shapeshifted.

!!!
They read my mind. nice DPS increase for about 2g per hour. yep Feral druids just obtained a new flask. Continue reading 'Weightstones'

Grull is cleared.

Last week the mystic knights cleared Grull! we one shot high king on a messy pull and moved on to grull which took a few tries but we got him down. I was the OT for the fight. Our main tank (jules)was another feral druid who got the pants. Jules died with grull at 5ish% and I tanked him down the rest of the way. each hurtful strike after jules went down took out another DPS. Soon we should have him on farm (I think 3 kills = farm status). Wish us luck again tonight in proving last week was not a fluke. Continue reading 'Grull is cleared.'

Hybrid Theory

My wife told me last night that she was jealous of me becouse I was needed as a tank and when Im not needed to tank I can switch over to the dps role and still do an awesome job. She on the other hand is a healer. She likes to heal, but she wants the option of doing some DPS when there are more healers then needed.

I have my feral druid. (Best IMO) hybrid out there when it comes to DPS/Tank. What I want to know is what class can pick up the DPS/healer role or the Healer/tank role.



Well lets look class by class at the hybrids available.

Druid:
Dreamstate/Healing touch

What this build loses from a strait DPS is. 10% of spell bonus, 5% crit, 4% hit, and no stun chance on starfire.

What does it lose from a strait healer? Swiftmend, 20% bonus on Hots, 50% crit on regrowth, 15% stronger rejuv, and tree form.

This seems like a strong option to me. still have good DPS and have a strong healing touch. you lose the tree's effect to keep alot of sustained healing up over a long period of time.

Priest:
Holy/Smite

Not using shadow as a DPS priest is the loss here. I dont really know the damage a smite build can put out. Im sure that with the right group it can be deacent though.

Paly:
"shockadin"

This biuld looks like it could be fun, loses very little healing. mostly things that make casting your off spells cheaper. you gain some good dps using holy shock as your main DPS staple.

Shammy:

Resto

Seems to me that you need to go deep into a tree to get the most out of it. resto looked better. There is nothing I can see missing from the resto tree and what you gain in resto may be enough to make up what you miss in elemental even when in DPS mode. Resto adds to damage, adds to hit, and gives you abilities to get aound annoyances like silence.


Any other ideas out there?
Continue reading 'Hybrid Theory'

What do you like about your class.

The question has been thrown out and answered by many of the bloggers over the past week. And I agree with many of them. But I also have my own take on why I love being a druid. This isn't a strait forward answer as why do you like being a druid but why do you like being a healer/bear/cat/dps caster.

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Bear
Lets start with my favorite role. I love to tank, as could probably be seen by my site name and such. Why do I love to tank?

1) people depend on me. The squishies would be nothing without a ball of fur or a shield between them and the meanies.

2) I dont have to hold back, I dont have to be careful like all the DPSers in the group. I can go balls to the wall all run long only stopping long enough for the healer to regen mana. and often times I just innervate them and keep going anyway.

3) swipe, The ability to tank more then one mob at a time. mmm good!

Cat
What attracted me to Druid in the first place was the slick stylin kitty form.

1) high Dps, When not needed to tank I can put on my dps set and deal damage on par with the other dpsers in the group. or I can keep my tanking gear on just in case and go at about 90%.

2) stealth, I love the idea of stealthing past content I simply dont want to do. especially cool in world quests where I can stealth to the guy, kill, and stealth away.

3) Things just die. I kill faster as a cat then any other character, maybe becouse Im better geared then any other of my chars but things just die around me.

Healing
yep we can do this too.

1) NO DOWNTIME while questing (in feral form that is).

2) our heals accent the heals already going on in the group when a little bit more is needed. I pop out of cat and help heal the raid during fights like grull after a bad shatter or whatnot.

3) rebirth! oh crap the rogue is down, we dont have an interupt for the healer. ok, np I'll pick them up.

Caster DPS
moonfire spam FTW!

1) barkskin/hurricane

2) roots & sleep, who just CCed that add? oh it was the druid. Druids have cc? yes, sometimes we do.

3) Moonkin, next week in kara I think Im going to respec as a moonkin and not tell them untill we get to attumen. gotta gear up some first I guess. thats one way to get to tank as a moonkin, just not let them know you arent a bear untill it's too late to stop you.


What else?
That not all we have going for us.

1) Flight form, travel form instant speed traveling buff. nothing not to love.

2) snare free, shifting removes snares/roots.

3) cure poisons and curses.

Continue reading 'What do you like about your class.'

Alt Blogs

I want my site to be a place where a person can go to look for information relevant to his class. I play many different classes and can be quite opinionated at all of them so Ive decided to start a new blog for each character as I want to write about them instead of cluttering this blog with information about other classes. That doesnt mean you cant read them as well, I will be keeping a list off to the side. Also plan on putting up a blogroll of blogs I actively read. If you want to be on the list, and/or you want me to read your blogs post a link in the reply section. Continue reading 'Alt Blogs'

Staying Uncritable

When we hit 70 and start getting geared for tanking we inevitably get a Strength of the Clefthoof set. This gives you 74 defence of the 156. as well as 4 yellow gems slots which could be filled by 8 def gems. a good jump getting twards your crit immunity. but the Strength of the Clefthoof isnt your end all armor. eventually you will want to upgrade to something with better stats and armor. but be careful if you're using the Strength of the Clefthoof as the primary means of Uncritability.

Zierhut's Lost Treads dropped for me on a kara run. and I am working on completing my Malorne Harness. now how do we get back up to that magic 156 def? 16from my Violet Signet, 17 from Iron Band of the Unbreakable, 17 from Mark of the Ravenguard, 27 from Earthwarden, 16 from Bogstrok Scale Cloak 32 Adamantine Figurine

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125 down, 31 to go before I can look at replacing my clefthoof stuff.

I can start at the neck Strength of the Untamed a cenarian rep reward, I'll lose health but will make up for it in dodge? Maladaar's Blessed Chaplet is another option but I dont think I'll get around to that heroic all that soon. Necklace of the Juggernaut is also on the list, but there is a long list of badge items I want. 2 down 29 more to go.

Rings: I will get 2 points soon when I hit the next Violet Signet
Ring of Unyielding Force should be my next badge purchase for a 5 point increase. 7 more down 22 more to go.

Cloak: Gilded Thorium Cloak off Terestian Illhoof. That may take a while but it get me 8 points closer with 14 more points to go.

Im aldor so Greater Inscription of Warding adds 10, taking the total down to 4. alternativly scryers can get Greater Inscription of the Knight adding 15 def.

Glyph of the Defender adding 16 def to a head slot item. 168 def 12 more then we have to have without using any PvP items nor using any body slots.

Now I know what I need to work on, Keepers of Time rep, Aldor rep, Terestian Illhoof kills, Badges, and Violet Eye rep. Hope this posts helps others as much as it has helped me.
Continue reading 'Staying Uncritable'

ZA bear boss

Successfully tanked this past weekend by myself and another feral druid. Let me start by saying, "I love his fight!" The whole concept of the warrior/druid is nice and tanking him as a druid I just find funny. We wiped a few times but it went fairly smoothly for my first time there and my guilds second downing of him. We didnt beat the timer, but maybe next time.

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Tips for the bear boss:
As a tank you are given a roll to tank either the humanoid form or the bear form. you will trade taunts/growls to get aggro.

1) Get your aggro as soon as he changes form follow up with your high aggro moves as quickly as possible. you need to put yourself at 110+% of the other tanks aggro as quickly as possible.

2) when it's not your turn to tank take off auto attack and do nothing for 15-30 seconds. Pretty much untill your other tank has your aggro down to 80% of theirs. When they have aggro solid go back to auto attacking.

3) when it's not your turn to tank use demo roar and FFF. let the other tank worry mostly about the pure aggro moves and keep these debuffs on. every little bit helps. keep lacerate up too, but dont spam it.

4) trinkets help. use any defencive trinkets when the silence goes off, this is when I used my frenzied regen too. every little bit helps.
Continue reading 'ZA bear boss'

$$$

I avoid money grinding like it's the plague. I've done only dailys that I find fun and havent done them repeatedly. I dont even think I have them all opened up. I generally horde or use any mats I come accross. But it's time for me to break down and start saving up for my epic flight form.

So, now I need to find my cash crop. Im a skinning/miner. I could fly around mining, Adamantite ore sells for about 1g a piece on the low end. Or I could send the ore to my jewelcrafter to prospect he doesnt have any good patterns yet but he is working on it. I could go farm primals during off peak hours I could net 3-4 primal fire in about an hour or about 5 shadow. I could then change some of those into shadow cloth which sell for around 40g each as my lock is a shadow tailor. I could go farm hides, but which ones?

Right now Im trying the auction house while I look for my cash crop. I'm buying prismatic shards for around 20g and reselling them for 25 in the AH giving me 23.75g for a profit of 3.75 gold. Im currently juggeling about 30 of them, I started with 8 on sunday. I need to find a better item as many people seem to be doing the same thing I am, but this one is easy to watch the market on.

Anyhow, wish me luck. Have any suggestions, please leave a comment. Continue reading '$$$'

Raging Ball of Fur!

Tanks generally know this: Rage is needed to deal damage, damage is needed to keep threat, threat is needed to keep damage incoming, damage incoming is needed to get rage. What does this mean? this means I want to take damage and/or deal damage. Please dont prevent me from being damaged. lessen the damage (agil & armor buffs) sure, but dont stop it.

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Priests: dont cast power word shield on me when I dont have rage. this is typically done at the beginning of the fight. dont do it! untill I have 70+ rage I dont want you to put this on me unless it's an emergency. if this happens too much I will be dispelling your shields and it will simply be mana wasted. I dont want to work against you please work with me.

Stunners: rogues, druids, palys, the list goes on. Dont stun at the beginning of a fight! I have been guilty of this in the past. I figured that stunning my opponent would help the healer not have to heal as much and we could have a few seconds to beat on the guy. This is true, but if you stun and you and another dps then go all out and I cant becouse I dont have rage I wont keep aggro. use your stuns once the target will be close to dead when it wears off (10% or less after the stun) or when there is extra mobs around and all positioning has already been done by the tank.

CC: let me tank what I can. If I can tank 3 guys without trouble then we dont need to CC them.

Off tanks: just becouse you can off tank (many off tanks think they can tank more then they can) doesnt mean you need to. it's better to down the main target first. if you are called to off tank then it should be assigned to you, dont tank what you arent supposed to unles the main tank falls. off tanks often hurt the healer more then they help as they give 2 targets that need to be healed now instead of just one. also it hurts the main tank if you are tanking something you arent supposed to and he doesnt realize you are doing it on purpose as he will make a move to get aggro back and likely lose aggro on what he is supposed to be tanking. If you are an off tank that needs to be taking hits (such as a warrior needing extra rage) let the main tank know so he can give you a target to off tank.

Everyone Dont hit the target or do any aggro generating moves before combat is fully engaged!!! cant stand it when someone hits the taget while its on the way to me. renew type spells hurt this way too. aggro goes strait to the threat generator before Ive even been hit. since I havent been hit I dont have any rage, since I dont have rage I cant generate any threat, game over.

Everyone: Stick to the dps order!! if I lose threat on the main target and he will be dead within the next few seconds I will switch to the next to get a head start on threat with him. start attacking him next!! dont worry about what Im attacking if Im not attacking the next target or the main target Im doing my job and keeping aggro off the healer. I need to change targets and toss threat moves on them. I understand AOE attacks (esp from rogues and warriors) help out your dps and will try to make them work but focus most of your attacks on the main target.

Till next time may those who need rage have it!

Continue reading 'Raging Ball of Fur!'

Alts

My guild members accuse me of having Alt-itis. I activly play at least 4 chracters at a given time. Currently are my main character with end game elements (druid), my warrior (60) who is leveling with my wife's priest, my healadin (35) becouse the guild needs more healers and I am not respecing Xana, my rogue (52) to get up in levels so I can cut jewels for the guild (human for rep gain), and Ive just made a hunter (16). Also most of my characters level with another character of my wife's.

I like playing multiple rolls and honestly feel that I get a better feel for the game playing as many characters as possible. playing a healadin has shown me the strengths and weaknesses of the class and Ive been able to pass on knowledge I'd not have seen if I hadnt played the class. Ive learned more about DPS and specifically threat by playing my tank.

I also get looked at by many people for advice as I spend alot more time online reading blogs or messageboards then my friends. So, part of leveling up these characters is simply to have something to back up my advice.

This is not something new that I started when I started playing WOW. Every game Ive played as many characters as they give us room to create on a server. this is the first of many games that Ive hit (hell even come close to) the leveling cap. I dont mind, it's how I like to play, it's part of who I am. Continue reading 'Alts'

Who is in your group?

When moving to 25 man raids, one needs to step back and look at who you like to have in your party. Each class has synergy with other classes to a huge degree, while other classes being in the group may help out but not to the same extent. For example it would be a waste to have a moonkin giving a 5% spell crit buff to a group of melee.

One of the reasons I bring this up is sometimes I feel that there is a better place for a character in a group. often times it seems like spec is not taken into account as well. You should know you class and know what other classes work well in a group with you. so make the suggestion to the raid maker if you dont see synergy between the groups. This is mainly for 25 mans where we have a variety of people and more then 2 groups to put them in but can be followed to a degree in 10 mans. (example casters in one group melee/hunters in the other)

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I play a feral druid, my biggest buff is leader of the pack and improved leader of the pack. between the 2 that gives +5crit and a heal when you crit based on your max health with a 6 second cooldown on it. I feel becouse of this ability the feral druid is a class that a group can be built around.


I like the following people in my party:

The tank: assuming Im not the tank, I want him in my party (or another where he gets the same buffs). esp if he is a prot warrior as he should be almost constantly hitting his target. the extra 5% crit will add to his threat and the heals will stealth heal him without me doing anything for a good deal of health over the course of a fight. Ive seen numbers around 10% of the MT's heals come from ILotP.

A beast mastery hunter: (41/20/0) There is so much synergy between a feral druid and BM hunter. When the hunter crits he deals more damage then a normal crit and gives his pet 50 focus which the pet can turn into 2 claw attacks (each with a chance to crit). when the pet crits he enters into a frenzy making him hit faster, also he puts a buff on the entire group that lets them deal an extra 3% damage. in the group with LotP that should be a high damage group, so adding another 3% puts it that much further over the top.

A fury warrior: When a fury warrior crits he goes into a flurry as well, this increases the effect of a simple critical hit a ton. He also has his battleshouts which are more powerful then others who dont go down the fury tree. I prefer the attack power buff myself as I get more from attack power then most other people whereas I dont multiply the health buff any.

An enhancement shaman: Same as the warrior entering a flurry when he crits. A good shaman will also put down agility and str enhancing totems buffing the party that much more. Also they have the tremor totem which is a blessing against my biggest weakness.

marksman hunters: They do more damage on crits (I think 230% normal VS 200% if the talent isnt taken). Also trueshot aura is good as this is a melee group. but honestly if there is a group with a shadow priest the MM hunter is better off there as they can then use their abilities more often without worrying about mana.

Rogue: I think some rogues also get the benifite of doing extra damage on a crit. also rogues simply do a ton of damage. the ability to vanish off threat is nice as well.

healaladin: I like protection aura, but I think its somewhat over rated. Not that it's not great but I think others need an aura more and that the paly itself would be better off in a group where it's getting benifites itself such as with a mana streaming shammy or shadow priest, or in a party with a elemental shamy or moonkin buffing its crit rating. I just feel that if you arent attacking in my party you are taking dps and heals away from someone who is.


This whole thing of course does not take into effect player skill. If a player is unwilling to watch/shed aggro I'd rather keep him out of the group where he is going to get buffs from others that will increase it all together (more likely out of the raid all together).

Watch your groups when raiding, your raid leaders dont know everything and the good ones are always open to suggestion.
Continue reading 'Who is in your group?'

What a week

wendsday is the begining of kara for our guild, this week. I let our main guild tank fight though Attumen & Midnight as he still needs a drop there (he's been killing them for months and still hasnt gotten something, wow). They take him down (still didnt get his drop) and onto Moroes. He tags me in and we down moroes on the second try, first try he had garroted both our healers and they couldnt keep themselves and the tanks up. Zierhut's Lost Treads dropped replacing my Heavy Clefthoof Boots once i get the def somewhere else to keep myself uncritable. Then on to opera where we downed big bad wolf (again the second try, first a few people didnt understand as it was their first trip). We called it there for the night.

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At least we stopped kara, my wife managed to convice one of our healers to do heroic SV. We picked up 2 more dps (wife is a hunter) and got started at this point it's midnight. 3 hours later SV is clear. it's now 3 am and I have to get up at 5 for work ....

Next day I ask about the kara run tonight and an informed that the morning crew got us to shade. uhg, thats not going to get me the Gauntlets of Malorne I want. oh well, I decided to run heroic SP instead. again about 3 hours later it's clear, I got Midnight Legguards for my dps set. I now have 200 rep left for exalted rep. tracked down a handful of coildfang armaments and got my earthwarden. not only that but i have 35 badges and turn them in to get Band of the Swift Paw.

Friday night comes around. Grull!!! now our guild has been going to grull on fridays for about 3-4 weeks. last week we were able to down high king, but we werent 100% guildies we had some outsiders from an allied guild. This week we downed the crew with 100% mystic knights. I tanked the guy on the far left as you look at them. I pulled him into the corner right by where he stands. our first try we downed all but the high king himself who we had at 20 something %. a few bad pulls and then a successful run came. Advice for this fight is easy, tank who you are told to, dont melee the mage, watch out for whirlwind once you are attacking high king. Mantle of Malorne is my reward for the night.

So this week Ive gone from 0 epics on my gear (I dont count the healing epic idol I got a few weeks ago becouse i was the only druid) to 4 on my tanking gear and 5 on my dps gear. what a week!

Continue reading 'What a week'

Hello

Hi, my name is Xanathos feral druid of The Mystic Knights on Bronzebeard. Ive decided to write my own opinions, rants, and sometimes suggestions for others out there. I play other classes, my druid is my most advanced character at this point. Ive progressed much of kara and have started doing heroics at this point. Ive successfully tanked and cleared Steamvaults and Slave Pens so far. So thats where Im at as I start up this blog. Continue reading 'Hello'