Jacemora: Latest Druid Blue post

My blog has moved! Redirecting...

You should be automatically redirected. If not, visit http://www.Jacemora.com/ and update your bookmarks.

Monday, September 8, 2008

Latest Druid Blue post

We want druids to be able to MT Naxx and Ulduar.

Cool, OK.

I really don't think they're that far off, but if I'm wrong and bears collapse on Patchwerk, we'll change the numbers until they can stand up. We'll try to change the numbers in intelligent ways so that bears are tanking Arthas too and not standing in the back healing the warrior tank.

Wow... Cool, OK.

Likewise, if cat dps is always near the bottom of the dps damage meters, we'll fix that too.

Ok, this comment is a mixed bag. Near the bottom? I don't know about everyone else but when I am on my rotation timing I am usually top 5 on Boss DPS staying pretty competitive with other pure melee DPS classes. This is with T4, S4, and Badge gear and Rare gems only and through the first 4 bosses of both BT and Hyjal. Now granted this isn't comparing T6 geared level players where maybe the scale comes into play but still. What I find are Feral Druids that don't itemize correctly for Kitty DPS and also don't understand how to use proper rotations to maximize damage... I won't even get into Haste potion macro's and powershifting. What this might mean is a big buff to Feral DPS due to all the players that don't know how to DPS properly as a kitty. For those Ferals that constantly find themselves at the top of the damage meters it could mean crazy DPS and then the QQ'ers and the nerf hammer.

Supposedly Ferals are getting a pure DPS build that will have us putting out Rogue level DPS at the loss of Main Tanking or maybe even OTing mini bosses. I would assume we will still be able to OT trash even with a pure DPS build.

Again, I see more QQing and nerfing.

Personally, I would love to be able to get rid of Feral Attack Power as a stat. It feels a little kludgey and it makes itemization harder because you can't share with anyone else in the game. It's like having a libram for your main weapon. But it's not going to happen for Wrath, at least not initially.

Another mixed bag. Now we are going to be dual wielding kitties with swords or daggers and rolling against Rogues for even more loot that think they are more intitled because I can respec and tank or heal and they can't.

Thanks Blizzard.

Jerks.

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

I dunno, you might want to give Ghostcrawler a break. He has said in the past that kitty dps was terrible in live and they want to make kitties as viable end-game raid dps. So that's good. But lately, he seems to be posting EVERYWHERE, and for everyone. WoW Insider just told us about a post he made for pallies at 2 AM LAST NIGHT. I think the guy is getting burned out and so we should give him some slack.

Not that I won't be as mad as you if I can't dps Arthas though :)

Anonymous said...

Agree with previous post. Can you tell me why players hate Blizzard? They create a game people love, and they play ALL the time... Some even blog about it a fair bit. You yourself have gone a long way in the game. Why, oh why, do players hate Blizzard so much? Is it because players are hopelessly addicted, and rather like the crack dealer they keep revisiting, they hate him because they feel he's watering down their crack just a little too much? I really cant understand the vehemence. Out of all the posts on the forums, the Blizzard staff are the only ones making any sense 90% of the time.

Why is a happy, satisfied, hardcore endgame player so rare? Maybe you could address this in a blog post.... Or maybe I should start up my own happy-hardcore-raider-thinks-blizzard-is-doing-a-great-job blog. That would cause a storm of controversy.

Sometimes I have bad mornings too :)

I do enjoy you're blog alot btw, hope you dont take offence.

Anonymous said...

(Same Anon as first post)

It's not hate at blizzard, it's desperation. All along feral druids (and perhaps Balance, dunno cuz I don't play one) have been weaker then their parent classes. For ferals, this was considered 'fair' because we could tank and dps. I've done some MTing and OTing in SSC/TK/Hyjal/BT but I can still be in the top 3 or so if I'm given a chance to dps. DPS only goes downhill from where I'm at because other classes will scale better from here on out.

Now, we're told that to allow us to be Raid MTs or Raid DPS we have to choose between bear and cat. Okay, sounds reasonable, now we can do uber dps OR uber tanking. It's only fair I guess. But everyone else (and some druids even) still think we should be less than our parent class. To me it makes no sense if I've gutted my tanking ability to dps that I can't dps as well as a rogue. So we're worried.

My original comment still stands though. Ghostcrawler seems like he's trying to do right, but seems overworked. In one thread I even read him saying "Well I had hoped it would be fun to come back and read your suggestions, but I guess not." So much hate gets thrown at the messenger.

Jacemora said...

Come on now, people that read my blog wont find me endlessly bashing Blizzard. They do make a good product and I do enjoy it.

My harsh ending calling Blizzard jerks is due to the fact that they keep putting a band aid on our class.

It does look in Wrath like they are planning ahead on druid items such as weapons but then talk about eventually taking them away.

The biggest issue in making us more like rogues and sharing rogue gear is the lack of understanding from the other classes. Us druids are the most misunderstood class and our gear and itemization is a big grey area for many. Take any instance when you are in an endgame raid and a DPS item falls and it doesn't have feral AP. Ok now, hurry up and bid so we can get moving... why is the druid bidding on that, isn't he just an off tank? Should't he only be bidding on those few druid items with armor bonus or a staff?

Most people even now don't realize with good gear ferals can OT in raids and then contribute some serious raid DPS on the boss fights.

Unfortunately I don't think this is the case with all ferals since I see a bunch who end up DPSing a raid boss in their tanking heavy cleft or what not which makes them bottom of the barrel in damage and probably perpetuates the stigma that we are just OT's.

Now Wrath is going to hit and our damage is going to be even greater and the first time you want to roll on DPS leather a rogue is going to get pissed, especially when you out DPS him on the next boss after winning the roll.

I don't know why but I really feel druids are the most hated class in the game (next to pallies and their bubble). We are OP healers, we get to OT and still roll/DKP for melee items, and the balance druids take gear from mages and locks. Everyone feels like we take gear that doesn't belong to us or we shouldn't have it before another pure class gets it.

The only solution I see is to give us our own gear. Instead we get a band aid, maybe a peice of gear here or there, and now it seems the future holds more sharing.

WOW is a social game and our itemization fails on this level. Socially we are outcasts, infringing on other classes birthright to gear. WOW saying, hey we are making it so you can MT 25 mans, DPS 25 mans, Heal... ok, we can already do that fine... doesn't mean that the rest of the players of the game will know we can do these things. Old roles are already set in many's minds and it will take a lot of good druids to change them... I just don't know if enough exsist.

Anonymous said...

Interesting post & comments. I also feel for GC at the hate he receives; he seems like a very reasonable guy who works very hard in an impossible position:
communicating with all of us.

I think its up to each of us to prove it. I dont care about all the druids in the world, but at least in my own guild, if I can prove that we tank as well as any other class because we specced for it, and we have great skill, and gear to back us up... then I'll be tanking more and we'll all have a lot of fun. As long as the guild is successfully downing bosses at good speed, who cares what some people may think of druids. Everyone has different opinions, you'll never change that. Several top guilds on my server seem to like ferals a lot, and have ferals in RL/GL positions.

Interesting experiences on gear competition. I dont feel misunderstood as a druid! Well, only in as much as a lot of people dont understand all the classes in the game, which is fine. And I've never had issues AT ALL with rogues complaining that I stole "their" gear. In pugs & in guilds, its pretty accepted that druids & rogues have equal rolling rights on leather dps gear, as well as rings etc. Same goes for cloth gear that druids pick up.

The whole feral AP seems like a bit of a hack though, and it does make loot tables harder to design. They could completely reengineer the way feral attacks work, so that our equipped "rogue" weapons suddenly become massively appropriate to our shapeshifted form. Lol, I guess then the rogues you know will complain ever more :P

Also, if some druids give us all a bad rep by dpsing in their tank... well, there's no helping that and big LOLs :) Not every hunter should be judged by the huntard you just booted from your pug, and the same goes for druids. I dont see an issue with bad players spoiling the game for good ones. Blizzard know when a bad player is whining - they're not fools.

Ratshag said...

Lotta stuff's shifting around, Jace, and it happening in any sorta linear order. I don't know diddly about druid dps, but fer us shad priests, Blizz nerfed us, then nerfed us again, then shared what were left of our naughty vampiric touching with them scuzzy survival hunters and ret pallies. Dark times. But then last week they buffed our face melting to where we go from the red-headed step children of dps'ers to up with the mages.

I suspect Blizz is a lot farther from havin' a finished product than the rumor mill would have ya think, and that they haven't even begun ta look at stuff what they'll need to before the end.

Jacemora said...

Good point Rats, I am sure there is a strong possibility dual wielding, sword carring, mad DPSing druids is just a pipe dream and we just get 1-2 new talents along with Shammy WF totem and they call it a day.

My biggest happiness is the possible changes to ferals in PvP so a 2v2 might actually want me over a rogue... now that is going to cause a lot of QQing for sure when I can slow someone in arena, root, cyclone, and heal. I just won't have cloak of OP to disappear and make the match take 15 more minutes than it needs to.

:P

Anonymous said...

if u r top 5 dps as feral (in 25 man) then you need to be gkicking those terrible dpsers below you.

Jacemora said...

This last post highlights what I am talking about. Because a good feral is in top 5 DPS that means everyone else must suck. FYI, feral's through gear and other changes became quite viable in DPS during BC and will be equal with the other melee classes in Wrath... get used to it.