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Feral 101: Introduction and Leveling (3.3.5)
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Post by
Tarkeel
Welcome to the first part of my guide on being a feral
As a feral druid, you can do a decent job of both tanking and DPSing with the same spec, in the same gear while leveling. As you approach higher level, gear will diverge somewhat through enchants and gem choices, but it's still possible to be a hybrid. Talent choices are very much the same as well, but glyph choices will vary.
1) Introduction
1.1) Quick Stat Summary
1.2) useful Links
2) Abilities
2.1) Cat
2.2) Bear
2.3) Major Glyphs
2.4) Tradeskills
3) Leveling
3.1) Solo questing/Grinding
3.2) Instances as tank
3.3) Instances as DPS
Post by
Tarkeel
1) Introduction
This guide is meant to be an introduction to the wonderful world of ferocious feral furries; this part will give a quick breakdown of the most important stats. For a more in-depth discussion of each, look at the lvl 80 guides.
1.1) Quick stat sumary
Weapon DPS
As a feral druid, you use your paws and claws to attack with instead of your weapon. As such, the damage on your weapon does not affect your attacks in any way. in stead, high level weapons with DPS greater than 54.8 get that extra damage converted into Feral Attack Power, which will affect your attacks in feral forms.
Therefore, disregard the damage on weapons, and only look for stats and feral attack power. In general, look for staves and 2H maces with agility and stamina, although strength can also be useful. Avoid one-handed weapons as there aren't any good offhands for ferals.
Strength & Attack Power
Attack power increases the damage you do; 14 AP = 1 DPS. Before talents, 1 STR = 2 AP for druids.
Strength and attack power are thus a clear upgrade to the threat you do.
Agility
1 AGI = 2 armor and chance to dodge (varies by level) and chance to crit (varies by level), and in catform also gives 1 attack power.
Agility is usually a better choice then strength for a feral, as it gives you increased survivability in both forms, and increased crit is important for both forms through
Primal Fury
Stamina
Stamina gives your hitpoints, and the most common cause of death in a MMORPG is lack of hitpoints.
1 Stamina = 10 HP in caster and cat form and 12,5 hp in bear form before talents.
Talents increase this to 1.02 * 1.10 * 1.06 = 119% for a total of 14,87hp per stamina.
Hit and Expertise
Hit and Expertise will increase the amount of attacks that hit the target, but these are not very important to focus on while leveling.
Armor
Armor decreases the amount of damage you take from physical attacks (not spells).
If you find items with bonus (green) armor, they are usually worth wearing; but these pieces are rare.
In general, better gear automatically has higher armor.
1.2) Useful Links
Wowhead Druid Forums
Wowhead Druid Talentbuilder
Wowhead Druid Glyphs
Wowhead Feral Druid Abilities
Elitist Jerks Druid Forum
Post by
Tarkeel
2) Abilities
This section deals with the important abilities that ferals use, sorted by when they are available. For more in-depth disucssion of each, check the level 80 topics.
2.1) Cat
Claw
- Builder, Lvl 20
Claw is the first direct attack that kitties gets; it does a modest amount of damage and awards a combo point and thus is called a builder ability. Combo points can be consumed by finishers.
Rip
- Finisher, Lvl 20
Rip is the first finisher kitties get, and places a bleed on the target that does damage every 2 sec for 12 sec. The damage on each tick scales with combo points. When using rip, it's important to make sure that the target will live long enough after use that it actually manages to do some damage.
When using it on bosses and other long-lived monsters, you should only ever use this at 5 CPs.
Shred
- Builder, lvl 22
Shred is the bread and butter of kitty damage in dungeons. It does a large amount of damage, but can only be used from behind the target.
Like claw, this also gives combo points.
Rake
- Builder, Lvl 22
Rake gives a combo point like clawn and shred, and places a bleed on the target like Rip. Rake is one of the best damage-per-energy (DPE) attacks that ferals have, if the bleed can get it's full damage in. To take advantage of this, you keep rip always up on your target, making sure to apply it just after it drops of. In dungeons it is wise to apply it once to every mob at the start of a large pull (if the tank can keep threat), and then focus on one mob at a time.
Tiger's Fury
- Cooldown - Lvl 24
Tiger's Fury is the first damage-increasing cooldown ferals get. It increases the damage done by all attacks for the next 6 seconds.
It doesn't really shine untill you can get
King of the Jungle
though, which you should have maxed out at lvl 53. Once you have KotJ, this ability should be used as often as possible on an empty energy bar to maximize your damage.
Ferocious Bite
, Finisher Lvl 32
Ferocious bite is a finisher that converts the combopoints into direct damage. When the mob would die before rip can do it's full damage (or when rip is running, and you can get enough combopoints for a new finisher before it wears off) use this.
Do not use this with a lot of energy remaining, as it will convert spare energy into damage at a lousy rate.
Mangle
- Builder, Lvl 50 (talent)
Mangle is a direct replacement for claw, so just take that off your action bar once you get it.
Mangle does a modest amount of damage and can be used from in front of the mob. The most important part of mangle though, is the debuff that will increase the damage of all bleeds and shred attacs on the target by 30%. Keep this effect up at all times on mobs, and use mangle when you can't get behind the mob to shred it.
Berserk
- Cooldown, Lvl 60 (Talent)
Berserk is the other damage increasing cooldown for kitties. It will decrease the cost of all your cat abilities by 50%. Try to use this when you have a near full energy bar, and all your timed finishers (Rip and Savage Roar on higher levels) will last through the duration. The best use of Berserk is to just shred away, and refresh savage roar or rip if you must.
You can not use Tiger's Fury while Berserk is on, and if you use it just beforethen berserk will overwrite the damage bonus.
Maim
- Finisher, Lvl 62
Maim converts combopoints into damage and a short stun; don't use this ability for the damage (rip and bite are both much better) but don't be afraid to use it to stop runners or interrupt casters (especially healers)
Swipe
- AoE, Lvl 71
The first true AoE ability for kitties; use this on packs of trash mobs.
Take note that this ability only hits target infront of you, unlike bear swipe.
Savage Roar
- Finisher, Lvl 75
Savage Roar is the final ability of kitties; it will give you a buff that increases all your physical damage done by 30%, combo points decide how long it lasts.
This ability should be kept up at all times; use however many CPs you need to ensure this.
2.2) Bear
Enrage
- Utility, lvl 10
Enrage will give you 20 rage instantly, and 10 more over 10 seconds, at the cost of reducing your armor.
This ability should be used before combat to give you some rage to start with, and can also be used to conserve rage between fights as rage will not reduce over time when enrage is ticking.
You can use this in combat if you are really rage-starved, but this should not be overdone as you will take more damage during the duration.
Demoralizing Roar
- Utility, Lvl 10
Roar will reduce the attackpower of nearby enemies, making them do less damage. In the beginning, this is your only way to do any form of AoE threat, and should be used as such.
Later on, the effect is nice to conserve your healers mana, but not critical to use.
Growl
- Taunt, Lvl 10
Growl is your taunt; it will give you equal amount of threat of whoever the mob is attacking, and make it attack you instead.
Maul
- Threat, Lvl 10
Maul is the bears single-target threat move; with glyph it will hit another nearby target as well.
Maul is a toggle-ability; the ability doesn't trigger when you hit the button, instead it transforms your next auto attack into a maul. This has two effects:
Using maul does not trigger a global cooldown (GCD), and as such is a free action time-wise.
Rage-wise however, it is far from free. in addition to it's printed rage cost, maul will make you lose the rage that the autoattack would have given you, and as such is a move that should be skipped when you are ragestarved.
Bash
- Utility, Lvl 14
Bash is a stun on a medium (1 min) cooldown; which is very useful for stopping healers. Don't worry too much about using this, just don't forget that you have it.
Swipe
- AoE, Lvl 16
Swipe is the spam-ability of bears; it will hit all targets around you (and behind you) for a small amount of rage. With
Primal Fury
and enough targets, you can actually gain rage from using this.
As long as you have rage for it, this ability should be used on every spare GCD you have. Remember that his can be used while moving, and if you move to pick up more targets use this to keep the other mobs on you.
Faerie Fire (Feral)
- Utility/Threat, Lvl 18
Faerie Fire (Feral), commonly just called FFF is your only ranged ability in bearform, and as such your prime pulling ability when you aren't just wading into a pack of mobs.
It will also decrease the targets armor, making melee attacks more damaging and causes a high amount of threat, so it's good to use on single-target fights such as bosses.
Survival Instincts
- Cooldown, Lvl 20 (Talent)
Survival Instincts is the first survival cooldown bear gets, available from a talent at lvl 20.
When used, it will increase your hitpoints by 30% (45% with glyph), giving you that extra time to live which could save the day.
Challenging Roar
- Utility, Lvl 28
Forces all nearby targets to attack you for 6 secs, but does not generate any extra threat on them.
This ability just buys you time to build agro on them through other means (or DPSers could kill them).
Feral Charge
- Utility, Lvl 30 (Talent)
Makes you charge the target, very handy for getting into a pack of mobs before triggerhappy DPSers and keep a high pace on pulling.
Frenzied Regeneration
- Cooldown, lvl 36
Frenzied Regeneration converts your rage into a percentage of your health, and is a good way to heal up when your healer needs help in dungeons or soloing. Due to the percentage scaling, you get best effects when combining this with Survival Instincts.
Glyphed, this also increases healing done on you for the duration, for an extra bonus.
Barkskin
- Cooldown, lvl 44
The last of your defensive cooldowns, barkskin reduces all damage taken by 10% for 12 sec.
Don't be afraid to use this often, the cooldown is very short, and you could easily use it at the start of every pull.
Mangle
- Threat, Lvl 50 (Talent)
Mangle is a high damage and threat single-target attack, which should be used when available in all single-target fights. It's also worth using on the focus target in a multi-target fight.
It applies a debuff that increases the damage of all bleeds, maul and shred on the target.
Berserk
- AoE/Utility, lvl 60 (Talent)
Berserk turns your mangle into a mini-AoE, capable of hitting 3 targets very hard and also removing the cooldown on mangle for the duration. When used with enough targets, this does enormous amounts of damage.
Berserk also removes any fear effects on you, and makes you immune to fear for it's duration
Lacerate
- Threat, lvl 66
Lacerate is a bleed that will stack 5 times on the target, doing a large amount of threat.
When fighting several high-hp targets, you can keep the stack running on several of the mobs for a large increase in damage.
2.3) Major Glyphs
Growl
This increases the chance to hit with bear's taunt, making it in effect not miss.
Useful for fights where a missed taunt is disastrous, but otherwise not worth having.
Maul
Makes Maul hit an additional target.
Except for some very few fights where you do not want to disturb adds; this is the best glyph for bears.
Survival Instincts
Gives you an extra 15% HP when you use survival instincts.
A good survivability glyph.
Frenzied Regeneration
Increases healing done to you by 20% when Frenzied Regeneration is active.
This includes the healing that Frenzied Regeneration itself does, and makes it into a potent selfheal when soloing, and an even better survival cooldown.
Mangle
Increases the damage of mangle by 10%.
This is very handy for soloing, when mangle is your main source of damage. For running dungeons, it's usually not worth it for either bears or cats.
Claw
Reduces the cost of claw.
Useful for soloing kittens before they get mangle.
Rip
Gives Rip two extra ticks of damage for free.
This increases the Damage-per-energy of rip greatly (33% of base DPE), and gives kitties more time to build combo points for other finishers.
One of the most important glyphs for a dungeon-kitten.
Shred
Each shred will increase the duration on rip with 1 tick, up to a maximum of 3.
This also increases the DPE of Rip (50% of base DPE), but you must be using shred to get the effect.
Another key glyph for dungeon-kittens.
Rake
Rake prevents the target from fleeing.
This is at best situational; the damage granted from another glyph is probably better at stopping runners then this.
Berserk
Increases duration of berserk by 5 sec.
At first glance, a very good glyph. It is however let down a bit by the fact that when the bonus time kicks in, your energy pool will be depleted; and in those 5 secs you would only regenerate 50 energy. That's enough for 2 shreds, versus 1 fullcost shred if you didn't have the glyph; so net effect of the glyph is 42 energy every 3 minutes, hardly worth mentioning.
Savage Roar
Savage roar gives 3% more damage done.
Going from 130% to 133% is a 2,31% increase when ever your savage roar is running (which should be always)
2.4) Tradeskills
For a comparison of tradeskills at lvl 80, see the level 80 guides. This is a comparison of the tradeskills while leveling. Not every tradeskill is covered, just those combinations that are worth considering while leveling.
Double Gatherer
Double gathering is a sure moneymaker while leveling. Get skinning and either herbalism or mining.
Skinning will give you a bonus to crit which is useful for either role; mining gives stamina which is useful for tanks and soloists. Herbalism gives a selfheal which is most useful for soloers.
Recommended if your main focus is moneymaking.
Skinning/Leatherworking
Leatherworking is handy for making gear as you level; this is most useful to the pure soloer as the dungeon runners will be getting better gear (and less leather) when running dungeons.
Recommended if you like being self-supplied in gear while leveling.
Herbalism/Alchemy
The main bonus of this combo is that it's very easy to level up; the ratio of materials to skillpoints is lowest of any crafting profession. You also will have a steady supply of potions for any contingency, but it won't make you much money. It will also give you a decent trinket at higher levels.
Recommended for if you like fun potions.
Mining/Jewelcrafting
Jewelcrafting is not a moneymaker at low levels, and can be very painful at times. You can make some minor jewelry for yourself while leveling, and is the easiest way to have two tanking trinkets as you approach 80.
Recommended if you intend to tank at 80.
Tailoring/Enchanting
Enchanting will give you enchanted gear, which is a minor upgrade as you level. Tailoring won't give you much of an advantage except a steady supply of items to disenchant.
Recommended if you do a lot of instances and want a potential moneymaker.
Post by
Tarkeel
3) Leveling
For leveling as a feral druid, you basically have 4 choices: Either solo through questing grinding, running dungeons as either tank or DPS, or through PvP battlegrounds. The last option will not be detailed here, but each of the other three gets its own section.
If you are twinking, the following BoA items are helpful:
Stained Shadowcraft Tunic
- 40 EoH/60 CS
Stained Shadowcraft Spaulders
- 40 EoH/60 CS
Repurposed Lava Dredger
- 65 EoH/95 CS
Dread Pirate Ring
- Kaluak Fishing Derby
2x
Swift Hand of Justice
- 50 EoH/75 CS Each; Questionable value in instances, especially as tank.
Whichever way you choose; the first 10 levels are the same, as you don't get any feral abilities before lvl 10.
As you enter the game as a young tauren or night-elf druid, you only have access to 3 spells: Mark of the Wild - a minor buff; Healing Touch - a slow heal; Wrath - a "bolt" direct damage spell. Do the quests in your entry area, kill mobs by casting wrath from max range and you should be able to get off 2 more casts before mobs reach you.
At level 10, you get a quest from your trainer to see a person in your factions main druid enclave, who will then send you on to moonglade. Just use your new moonglade portal spell to arrive there safely. Go find Dendrite Starblaze in the east side of the village. He sends you to talk to the
Great Bear Spirit
, who is just west of the village. Dendrite will then send you back to your main trainer, who will send you out on a new quest; Taurens must face down
Lunaclaw in the Barrens
and Night Elves must face down
Lunaclaw in Auberdine
. As a reward, you can now unleash your feral potential as a bear.
3.1) Solo questing/Grinding
3.2) Instances as tank
3.3) Instances as DPS
Post by
Tarkeel
3.1) Solo questing/grinding
The builds suggested here are tailored for soloing; you can do a very good job soloing if you use the builds from either of the dungeon guides as well. Some people also prefer to go down the resto tree to get Naturalist and Omen of Clarity before starting on the feral tree; personally I believe that the feral tree has more goodies to counter 10% damage.
Level 10-19:
Spend your first talents in ferocity do bring down the cost of your attacks, then take savage fury to increase damage done, and feral instinct for better swiping in bearform and sneaking past guards.
After doing the quest for bear form (detailed above), you have your first feral form, but without any large abilities yet. You might have better luck using caster form to kill mobs for a few levels, but this is a guide to leveling feral.
When you start as a bear on lvl 10, your only offensive ability is maul, and you have no tools to help you control rage. Rage is the basis for all bear attacks, you get rage by taking damage and by dealing damage with your own auto attacks. When out of combat, your rage will slowly drain away. For now you are best served by using the rage on maul as soon as you can.
At level 12, you get your first tool for controlling rage, called Enrage. Enrage will give you 20 rage instantly, and 10 more as a buff over 10 seconds. The buff wil reduce your armor though, but you can click it off if this becomes a problem. While under the enrage buff, your rage will not drain when out of combat, so you can use enrage to keep rage between fights.
At level 16, you get swipe, the main feral AoE. Bear-swipe will hit all targets around you, even behind you, and can be very effective at bringing down a larger pack of weaker mobs.
At level 18, you get Faerie Fire Feral, which will reduce the armor of the mobs (making you do more damage), and is ranged. Use this to pull mobs towards you before mauling them down.
Level 20-29
Get a glyph of claw if you can and take feral swiftness, then sharpened claws. Next take primal fury, primal preciscion and start on predatory strikes.
At level 20 you get cat-form from trainer. Use this to kill single targets, and go bear form to swipe down packs of weaker enemies when you can. At first, your only cat-moves are claw and rip. Claw will do direct damage to your target and builds combopoints, while rip turns combopoints into a 12 second bleed. You should use rip when you think the mob has about 10 seconds left to live.
At level 22, you get Shred, another direct damage combobuilder. Shred can only be used behind the mob though, so you should only use it as an opener. You cansneak up behind hostile mobs to open with shred, but it's not worth spending too long time getting into the right position.
At level 24 you get Rake, another combobuilder that puts a bleed on the target. This is your highest damage per energy (DPE) ability, so you should use it as much as possible, but be careful to let the old bleed expire before reapplying. You also get Tiger's Fury, which increases all damage you do for the next 6 seconds (and later on with a talent will refund you energy). Try to use this as often as it's available.
At level 26 you get Dash, which is handy to escape when you're in trouble.
Your rotation should go something like this: Rake - Claw - Rip - Claw untill dead.
Level 30-39
Fill out predatory strikes, and put 3 points into Feral Agression befor taking Heart of the Wild. As long as you're just soloing, you don't need a new glyph at 30, but take a look at the dungeon guides for some suggestions.
At 32 you get Ferocious Bite, which wil turn combopoints and spare energy into damage. Use this to finish off mobs when you think the bite will kill them, and try to use it at minimum possible energy. You also get your first stealth-opener, Ravage. This is like shred, you must be behind the target and you must be stealthed to use it. Try to stealth up as close to he mobs as possible to minimize the time you have to move slow. if you have to spend too much time getting in position to ravage, it's not worth using it.
At 36 you get the other stealth opener, Pounce, which stuns the target for 3 seconds and puts a bleed on them. Those 3 seconds is perfect to move behind the mob, and give it a shred.
Your rotation should now go something like: Pounce - Shred - Rip - Claw - Bite.
If you are low on health, just pop out of cat form to cast healing on yourself, you should have no problem getting the mana back by the time you need more healing.
Level 40-49
Take Leader of the Pack, Improved Leader of the Pack, then max out Feral Agression. Take Predatory Instincts and then 2 points in Survival of the Fittest
This is the slow and tedious part of leveling, you don't get any new fun stuff and the quests are spread all over the world. Just stick to doing what you've done so far.
Level 50-61
Take Mangle, Improved Mangle and then King of the Jungle. Now start on the resto-tree and take Improved Mark of the Wild and 3 points in Furor.
Replace glyph of claw with Glyph of Mangle.
At 50, your world changes completely as you take the Mangle talent. Replace claw from your actionbar, and swap the glyph as well. Mangle hits much harder then your other abilites, and you're probably best off not using any finishers for a while. Rip is still worth using, just make sure to Mangle first so Rip benefits from your debuff. For targets with high HPs, use 5 CP rakes.
As you start filling out King of the Jungle, your Tiger's Fury becomes even more potent, and you should now use it on every cooldown (when low on energy).
As you enter outland, you will find a lot of good gear, as well as weapons with feral attack power on them. Try to focus on getting Agility and Stamina gear. At 60, you will get flight form at the trainer, which includes the riding skill to fly, so DO NOT pay for riding training!
Your rotation should be something like: Mangle - Rip - Mangle untill dead, but feel free to experiment with finisher to get a feel for what you find fun.
For elites, I suggest something like: Pounce - Shred - Tiger's Fury - Shred (if possible) - Mangle - Rip - Rake - Bearform and maul/mangle down.
Level 62-71
Take Naturalist, then Omen of Clarity, then take Natural Shapeshifter and Master Shapeshifter.
At 62 you get Maim, a finisher that does direct damage like Ferocious bite (only less, and doesn't use excess energy) and gives a stun. You should use this after getting 5 CP on the mob, as you should be able to kill it before the stun wears off.
Your rotation should be something like: Mangle - Rip - Mangle to 5CP - Maim - Finish it. Use Tiger's Fury as appropriate.
Level 72-79
Take Rend and Tear, Primal Gore and Berserk
Just continue doing what you've been doing since you got Mangle.
At level 75, you get your last finisher, Savage Roar, which increases all your damage by 30%. Use your combopoints on this, and use maim/ferocious bite when killing mobs so close together that you get a new mob to refresh Savage Roar on before it fades.
Post by
Tarkeel
3.2) Instances as tank
Level 10-19:
Spend your first talents in ferocity do bring down the cost of your attacks, then take savage fury to increase damage done, and feral instinct for better swiping.
When you start as a bear on lvl 10, your only offensive ability is maul, and you have no tools to help you control rage. Rage is the basis for all bear attacks, you get rage by taking damage and by dealing damage with your own auto attacks. When out of combat, your rage will slowly drain away. For now you are best served by using the rage on maul as soon as you can.
At level 12, you get your first tool for controlling rage, called Enrage. Enrage will give you 20 rage instantly, and 10 more as a buff over 10 seconds. The buff wil reduce your armor though, but you can click it off if this becomes a problem. While under the enrage buff, your rage will not drain when out of combat, so you can use enrage to keep rage between fights.
Do quests solo untill you are of a sufficient level that the dungeon tool lets you queue up; personally I wouldn't try tanking untill you get our AoE ability (Swipe) at lvl 16. The most important part of tanking dungeons, is knowing where you are doing. You should prepare by checking this wonderful site for maps of the dungeons so you know where you are going.
For packs of mobs, just wade into them and start swiping, pick one target as your focus and maul this when you have spare rage. For bosses, just focus on the boss, mauling it down and using spare rage on swipe for extra damage. Once you get Faerie Fire Feral, use this as often as possible on bosses for good threat.
Level 20-29
Take Survival Instincts, Feral Swiftness, Sharpened Claws, Primal Fury and Primal Preciscion
At level 20 you get Surival Instincs as a talent, this is your first defensive cooldown (also called panic button). This will increase your hitpoints by 30%, and is a good way to survive if you take excessive amounts of damage, or your healer is not caught up with your latest pull. Don't be afraid to use this to save the day.
At level 28 you get a new sort of panic button, Challenging Roar. This does not give you any extra threat on the mobs, but it forces all nearby mobs to attack you for 6 seconds, which should buy you time to get threat through swiping.
Just continue doing what you've done, swipe as much as possible and maul when you can.
Level 30-39
Take Feral Charge, Predatory Strikes and 1 point in Thick Hide before taking Survival of the Fittest and 2 points in Natural Reaction.
Get glyph of Survival instincts.
At level 30, you get a new fancy tool, Feral Charge. Use this when you have enough rage to go charging into the next pack of mobs, buying you a second or two on those trigger-happy DPSers.
At level 36 you get a new tool in Frenzied Regeneration. This will turn rage into a percentage of your health, so good to use in emergencies, especially combined with Survival instincts.
Level 40-49
Take Leader of the Pack, Improved Leader of the Pack, max out Natural Reaction and 1 point in Heart of the Wild before Protector of the Pack, then another 2 in Heart of the Wild
At level 40, your bear form improves to dire bear form; granting you much more armor. You also get Savage Defense, a small shield-effect that comes every time you critical hit a mob. This will increase your survivability by quite a lot.
Level 50-59
Take Mangle, max out Heart of the Wild and Thich Hide, then start on the Resto tree. 3 points in Furor and Mark of the Wild
At level 50 you get Mangle from talent; this is a heavy damage single-target ability that you should use as often as possible on bosses, as well as on focus targets.
Boss rotation: Mangle - FFF - Swipe - Swipe - Repeat; use maul as rage allows.
Trash rotation: Swipe as much possible, using some maul and mangle on focus targets.
Level 60-70
Take Naturalist, Omen of Clarity then Natural Shapeshifter and Master Shapeshifter
Nothing much happening for your abilities in these levels. The dungeons get more difficult though, and now it's more important to do research before you enter the dungeons.
Level 71-80
Take Infected Wounds, Rend and Tear, Primal Gore and/or Berserk.
At level 73, you get your final tanking ability, lacerate. Lacerate is a bleed effect that stacks up to 5 times on the target, doing large amounts of threat.
Boss rotation: FFF on pull - Mangle - Lacerate(x3) - Mangle - Lacerate (x2)
Then repeat: FFF - Mangle - Lacerate - Swipe
Post by
Tarkeel
3.3) Instances as dps
First, get to lvl 20 by any of the other routes, as you don't get your feral DPS form (Cat) until lvl 20.
Level 20-30
Glyph Rip and Wild.
Take Sharpened Claws and Feral Swiftness, then Shredding Attacks, Primal fury and Primal Preciscion.
Take glyph of Shred at level 30.
Kittens don't have any AoE abilities, so your focus will be making the most out of your single target abilities. Put a rake on each of the mobs, using tab to cycle around. Then build 5 combos and finish with a rip, then switch to next target. This way you will spread out your bleeds, and don't waste bleed time on mobs that are about to die. Use Tiger's Fury liberally for a small boost on damage.
Level 31-39
Take Predatory Strikes, Feral Charge and Heart of the Wild.
Continue using rake on as many targets as possible, and then shred to 5CP and rip, alternating targets. Only use Ferocious Bite if it will kill the last mob in the pack, and there is 10 seconds untill the next fight.
To utilize glyph of shred you need to shred the target 3 times after you apply rip, which should probably set you up niceloy for a new rip on the target, especially after refreshing rake. Just don't waste time refreshing bleeds on targets that are about to die if there are better alternatives to attack (without taking agro ofcourse). This is a delicate act of choosing the right target to kill for maximum DPS.
Use feral charge to get quickly in a favorable position on each fight; it's more important to use on bosses then on trash.
Level 40-49
Take Leader of the Pack, Improved Leader of the Pack, 2/3 Survival of the Fittest, Predatory Instincts, 3/3 Survival of the Fittest, 1/5 Feral Agression
Just continue doing the same as before; spread rake around then burn down one target at a time. The main difference is that mobs tend to live a bit longer at higher levels.
Level 50-59
Take Mangle, King of the Jungle, 2/5 Feral Agression then Rend and Tear
At level 50 you will get Mangle through talents; mangle should only be used to apply the debuff and if you for some reason are unable to get behind the mob. Apply mangle before starting rip and shred on the main target; but you should still spread around rip on several targets if you can.
When you get King of the Jungle, you should use Tiger's Fury every time it is available and your energy bar is empty. When you get Rend and Tear, it gets even more important to always keep your bleed effects running on your target.
Level 60-71
Take Berserk, Primal Gore then start on the resto tree. Take Improved Gift of the Wild, 3/5 Furor then Naturalist.
At 60 you get your main DPS cooldown; Berserk: Berserk will reduce the cost of all your abilities by 50% while active. Use it to burn down bosses or large packs when your energy bar is almost full; preferably just after using Tiger's Fury to fill up your energy. While Berserked, you should try to get off as many shreds as possible (while keeping a bleed up for rend and tear). If you have 5CPs and rip still has time left, just keep shredding and waste those CPs.
At level 71, you finally get your first AoE, Swipe: This will hit all enemies in front of you for massive damage. Whenever there are 3 or mobs available to hit, just swipe away, moving over to your old rotation once there is only a few mobs left.
Level 72-80
Take Omen of Clarity, Natural Shapeshifter, Master Shapeshifter and 5/5 Feral Agression.
Glyph Savage Roar at level 80.
At level 75, you get Savage Roar, which should be up at all times. For AoE fights, start with rake followed by roar, then swipe them down. Use rake+roar again when you need to refresh.
For bosses and high-hp targets, you should follow these basic rules (they are further detailed in the lvl 80 cat-thread):
Keep up
Savage Roar
Keep up
Mangle
Keep up
Rake
Use
shred
for CP regeneration (remember, that points 2 and 3 are more important)
When at 5 CP and
Rip
is not up, use Rip
When below
30 Energy
, use
TF
Use
Clearcast
Proccs for Shred
Post by
Capnboomkin
Since it's been 4 hours since your last post, I'm assuming it's safe to post. Looking through your soloing talents, I'm somewhat shocked you didn't add in
Nurturing Instinct
. I found that talent to be immensely helpful when levelling my druid, so you can preHoT yourself for big pulls, or heal up quickly when need be. Personally, I would take the points out of Feral Aggression and put them into Thick Hide and Nurturing Instincts. Otherwise, I have no gripes about the guide. It's clear, well thought out, and organized. Good work.
Post by
Tarkeel
Yeha, posting is safe :) Thanks for the kind words, I'm wondering what people think of the dungeon-kitten and tradeskill parts, as those are more based on opinion then facts.
I've never really seen the need for nurturing instincts; only when you're nearing the end of leveling through northrend does your healthpool exceed your healing capabilities. I've gone with Feral Agression because it increases damage, and killing stuff even one swing earlier is less damage taken then Thick Hide.
As I tried to make clear in the guide though, all three builds should be able to solo without any problems :)
Post by
144872
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
484925
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
ioptzu
I actually used
this spec
from 10 to 19. Felt decent, fast and less mind numbing than mauling in bearform but I think it does not make much of a difference. It is just an alternative.
Also i would personally ignore Rip entirely when soloing, unless your fighting an elite mob. 3cp Rip and below is pretty bad on dpe even if it runs for the full duration. (And Rip running for the full duration is very unlikely unless it is an elite.)
Opening out of stealth also did not seem to pay off for me. As I often found it safer to pull with FFF and not risking any additional pulls once i drop stealth.
Shred without shredding attacks is also not a good move dpewise. Additionally one shred almost equals two claw in terms of energy costs and the additional cp really pays off when it comes to FB.
Last but not least when you get mangle you can almost ignore any bleeds as there will be very few normal mobs, that will live longer than 6s against you. Mangle is also better dpewise than shred without shredding attacks. So do not bother with that eigther.
Post by
299264
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
Tarkeel
Savage roar gives 3% more damage done.
Going from 130% to 133% is a 2,31% increase when ever your savage roar is running (which should be always)
Rofl.
Care to share with the class what you find so funny?
Post by
367103
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
pelf
Since you didn't quote me, I'm going to mystify people as to what my post actually said.
Post by
144872
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
hawke
Funny math ? His math are actually quite accurate.
Or peraphs you're one of those that think that the 310% mount actually go 30% faster than the 280% one ?
Post by
xcrunr1647
Since it's been 4 hours since your last post, I'm assuming it's safe to post. Looking through your soloing talents, I'm somewhat shocked you didn't add in
Nurturing Instinct
. I found that talent to be immensely helpful when levelling my druid, so you can preHoT yourself for big pulls, or heal up quickly when need be. Personally, I would take the points out of Feral Aggression and put them into Thick Hide and Nurturing Instincts. Otherwise, I have no gripes about the guide. It's clear, well thought out, and organized. Good work.
I find the the amount of agility you have versus your health pool while leveling makes
Nurturing Instinct
inconsequential. Until you get to higher levels (at least Northrend, imho not until 80) there won't be a huge difference the the healing. My feral currently has 1286 agility (he's still very fresh) which results in about 900 bonus healing. That's about 4% of his maximum health self-buffed. Even though he's fresh, I've already begun to stack agility on him...so the average feral that is leveling isn't going to have as strong of an agility/hp ratio as far as that talent is concerned. I personally find it more valuable to spend those points in dps talents while leveling so you can kill faster...and thus need less healing in the first place.
Post by
yodadoe
You can not use Tiger's Fury while Berserk is on, but you can use it just before to get use of the damage bonus during berserk.
This is incorrect. The damage bonus from Tiger's Fury disappears the second you hit Berserk. The only reason it might be beneficial to hit Tiger's Fury before Berserking is if you are low on energy and (through KotJ) you wish to jack up your energy NOA and don't want to wait for it to come up on its own.
EDIT: This is a common mistake that I believed for years, due to the poor wording and implementation by Blizzard. Tooltips say you cannot USE Tiger's Fury during Berserk. But it doesn't say you cannot carry the buff into Berserk. Compound this with the fact that the Tiger's Fury icon remains in the buff list at the top of your screen when you Berserk. But you can test this by opening up your character screen and confirming. The extra DPS from Tiger's Fury is removed when Berserk is activated. /cry
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