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Which Specialization is best?
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Post by
1068599
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
xcrunr1647
Depends on what playstyle you prefer...
If you like staying back and pounding on people from a distance, play boomkin. If you like getting up close and personal and enjoy an in-your-face style, go feral.
Simple as that.
Post by
Mike
to be a bit more specific.
Range DPS is Balance (Moonkin form - also known as Boomkin)
Melee DPS is Feral (Cat form - similar to a rogue)
You can also be a Guardian (Bear form) which is a Tank, and allows you to attack multiple enemies at once and AoE them down with trash and swipe
It's personal preference, each are equal and as fun, though arguably Feral can have a bit more work involved.
Though if you go Tank, you can queue up for dungeons while you level for the extra xp rewards.
Post by
1068599
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
xcrunr1647
You can't really distinguish between feral and guardian and say one is better than the other for dungeons, because they fulfill two completely different roles. Feral is a damage spec, whereas guardian is a tank spec.
Feral undoubtedly does more damage than guardian, and the closer you get to the endgame, the bigger the discrepancy becomes. The reason Mike suggests playing as a guardian druid is that you can have very, very fast queue times for dungeons, should you choose to run any.
The reason Mike said feral can be more work is (I assume) because in order to be played to it's full potential, feral has a rather complicated rotation to follow...or, more accurately, an extensive list of abilities to keep active on the target, and a priority as to which are most important to keep up, 2nd most important, 3rd most important, etc.
But as you're not even level 20 yet, you'll be missing several key abilities...and honestly, you can level just fine without following any sort of rotation. You don't really need to worry about that until you hit 90 and start raiding.
So just play whichever style is more fun for you for now :-)
Post by
1004665
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
Martyx
My first toon I rolled was
Feral
DPS and have since moved servers and re-rolled a second
Feral
who once up to max level ran as
Guardian
tank through Dragon Soul. And now offtank/dps for current MOP raids.
Recently I have rolled another druid as Boomkin/Resto (so DPS and Healer) and currently at level 86.
My favorite spec by far has to be and in my opinion the easiest spec to level with is also Feral.
I agree with above that Guardian gets quicker dungeon queue times as tank.
Try this (if you're paid up)... Level in Feral up to 30 then dual-spec Guardian. The gear between Feral/Guardian is the same (apart from trinkets) and you can't do anything to differentiate between them until you are able to reforge at high levels.
Post by
Trishi
Feral cat
is a dps spec where you are attacking the
target head-on.
For the love of god, no.
You never attack something head-on as a damage dealer. Sorry, but this isn't something to tell new players. Whenever possible,
attack from behind
. Shred is only useable from behind, and that's your main ability in dungeons. Bleeds, from Rip, are a major part of your damage against monsters that survive long enough, otherwise, use Rake to apply the bleed. Rake doesn't do all that much damage, but makes your Shred do 20% more damage. This is all dungeon stuff, of course, but you should be doing a whole lot of it through the dungeon finder. That's the place where you learn the most about your class.
When solo'ing, Mangle + Ferocious Bite is pretty much fine until Cata/MoP levels. Savage Roar is decent, but unless you somehow get your hands on the Glyph, not really something I'd consider worth it when going from mob to mob. And as Martyx pointed out, Ferals are more easily able to dual-spec as a tank, which can also come in handy.
I know there are details to be considered (Like the "Mangle or Shred" discussion), but for a new player, Shred forces you to stick behind the monsters. My first DPS was a Feral, and it taught me wonderfully how to always stick behind the boss whenever possible. Even today, way too many people forget positioning, and it's bad for so many reasons.
Post by
nioxic
feral needs more work.. means you gotta (in order to do optimal dps, at higher level) click specific skills in a specific order at specific times.. well, thats just the basic of what it means.
i just started up a new druid and havnt played them since 2007, so im not really into the optimal rotation.
but as a newcommer to the druid, i would rather worry about wether or not you even think feral is fun, or if you prefer moonkin/balance and nuking from a distance (it is supposedly also more simple, so you might wanna start with that.. )
personally im feral, and im just reading all the skills, then thinking and making up my own mind in how to use it optimally. i then try it out in a semi competitive enviroment and see if i can keep up. if i fail miserably, then i look up for some help online.
Post by
1004665
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
Caras
Feral until 90. It's that simple. At 90, Then you start asking these sorts of questions. Feral is hands down the most efficient leveling spec, and your DPS in a lvl 60 dungeon won't matter between feral and boomkin,
Post by
617248
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
Mike
Talking of the discrepancy between feral and guardian damage in end game I saw a bear doing 620k dps on the ToES trash before protectors the other day.... 620k.... I did a double take at my recount when I first saw it. It's obviously not balanced because its just an AoE cleavefest but even his single target damage was pretty competitive on boss fights, around 60k or so.
There was a full heroic raid geared spriest doing 200k or so on the trash and after he saw what the bear had been doing he just wouldn't stop QQing the entire way through the rest of the raid. ^_^
Yeah that's vengeance for you. I assume it was more than 1 of the 4 adds, right?
And a heroic geared Spriest (i assume ilvl 500-510) only doing 200k dps? thats pretty low, really low.... i see ilvl 485-495 people pushing out those numbers on trash.
Post by
617248
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
Karlzone
That is just how vengance works.
I do not understand why people cannot get the fact into their minds that tanks are an incredibly big part of your overall raid dps.
The more vengeance --> the more dps.
Any tank (in decent gear on a fight with just a bit of vengeance) who does less than those 60k you mentioned is not even trying.
Post by
leksisamisfit
I was restro for a while but I'm really considering rerolling feral.
Post by
MrVolare
Druids are wonderfully flexible. I am feral primary, healing secondary and keep int/spr armor in my bag to switch out if I need to. I tanked through cata and boomkin'd to 90. At that point, Feral just seemed more fun.
Respec is cheap, and Druids are the only class with 4 specs to try. Don't worry about feeling stuck into just one role.
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