Thursday, February 5, 2009

[Druid] WTB Moonkin Excitement in 3.1

Moonkin don't need any pressing changes in 3.1. It's not like we're broken. I don't see moonkin tears spouting like waterworks across the forums, so by that measure we're a contented bunch. When my dated comp isn't chugging on a 25-man boss fight I perform quite well, typically in the top 5, which is good living for a hybrid dps spec, which all else being equal, should be doing 5% less damage than a pure dps class.

So why do I feel left out when I don't see any changes in store for us? Last patch the highlight of my moonkin love was finally being able to cast Abolish Poison in moonkin form, which while useful, wasn't nearly as interesting as the changes to armor for our feral brethren.

I have my rotations down, I know how I want to spec and how I want to improve my spec as my mana regen dependancy decreases. While I still like raiding as a moonkin I guess I'm missing something to look forward to, a new mechanic, something that will change the way I play.

And it's not like the announced changes will not affect me even as a balance druid. After all, look at what I'll get regardless:

Savage Defense – this is a new passive ability. When a druid in Dire Bear form deals a melee critical strike, the druid gains a damage shield equal to 25% of their attack power. The next hit completely removes the shield regardless of how much damage was done.


Though this new passive ability is accompanying a nerf to the armor bonus of Survival of the Fittest, moonkin will not have that talent anyway, which means that this will be an across the board buff to the basic bear form for all specs. We won't use it often, but when we toss on feral gear to bear tank for lowbie friends or even tank Gluth we'll be better off than before. It's not moonkin love, but this could be useful.

I'm more ambivalent about it on my PvP feral because I'm not sure where the balancing point will be between Savage Defense and the nerf to Survival of the Fittest, but that will be something for the feral bloggers to ponder.

Faerie Fire (and similar debuffs) now reduces armor by 5%. See Sunder Armor in the warrior update below for additional details.


As long as Faerie Fire and Sunder Armor continue to stack this change doesn't bother me. I never cast this since we have a feral in the raid and a shadow priest for +hit. Improved Faerie Fire currently provides its crit bonus to the moonkin even if the feral is the one providing FF, and so if it stops stacking with Sunder Armor, it would be in my selfish interests to keep having the feral do FF anyway, but Sunder Armor still has multiple applications whereas FF does not, so I'm guessing they'll continue to be separate stacking debuffs.

Survival Instincts now works in Moonkin form


I've never tried a hybrid balance/feral build, though I guess it could be desirable for PvP. There's probably somebody out there who is happy with this change. I'm just not sure who that would be. I'm guessing this change is part of the same line of thinking that makes feral attack power weapons apply to moonkin even though we no longer have a melee for mana mechanic.

And that's really it for us. Maybe something else will turn up later, but for now it looks like 3.1 will be business as usual for moonkin.

1 comment:

Unknown said...

You want something to look forward to? What about...

Abolish Poison: Now ticks every 3 seconds, up from every 2. Now lasts 12 seconds, up from 8. (Take THAT Maexxna!!!)

Faerie Fire and Faerie Fire (Feral): Now decreases armor of your target by 5%. Has a 5-minute duration, and a 40-second PvP duration. (So now, even with a SP in the group it's worth getting for the personal crit bonus and it won't muff up your dps rotation! woo hoo!)

Starfall: Cooldown reduced to 90 seconds. (Add in changes to Glyph of Starfall: Changed to reduce the cooldown by 30 seconds! omg omg omg I'm gonna pee my pants)

Celestial Focus redesigned: Reduces the pushback suffered from damaging attacks while casting Starfire, Hibernate and Hurricane by 23/46/70% (instead of a chance to stun, which imo is better for PvE now) and increases your total spell haste by 1/2/3% .

Eclipse: The benefit to Wrath triggered by casting Starfire has been increased to 30% bonus damage (making weaving of eclipse procs more efficient and I fun I would think).

Insect Swarm: The bonus damage from spellpower on this damage-over-time ability has been increased significantly to match similar spells on other classes. (finally I can work this back into my rotation for ALL bosses and not just Patchewerk :P)

Mark of the Wild and Gift of the Wild can now be cast while in Moonkin form.

Nature's Grace redesigned: All spell critical strikes have a 33/66/100% chance to grace you with a Blessing of Nature, increasing your spell casting speed by 20% for 3 seconds. (so now I won't feel guilty using it up on a wrath because my starfire eclipse proc'd)

Oh, and let's not forget Glyph of Rebirth: Target now returns to life with full health!!!! Nobody will EVER wanna raid without a moonkin (not that they would anyway, because we are awesome...but even more so now!)

In summation, I realize that the list of perks, changes, etc is lacking compared to some other classes. But I'm freaking stoked personally! I hope as you explore in the new patch, you find the changes to bring you as much glee as I have already found in obsessing over the patch notes. =D