Don’t nerf me, bro.
A note before reading: apparently any sort of discussion that in any way discusses nerfs now classifies as “nerd-raging.” This is not an angry rant whatsoever; do yourself a favor and don’t read it as such.
A recent blue post addressed the topic of Feral DPS, suggesting that it is, perhaps, a little “too high.” While that immediately elicited a response from me that probably sounded a little like “Go fuck yourself,” Mr. Ghostcrawler quickly followed that statement with:
I may be mistaken, but this seems to be the first time that someone involved with Blizzard recognized the inherent complexity of a successful kitty DPS rotation. Are we talking Ikaruga hard? No, but as compared to a few other classes that focus mostly on pushing buttons as they come up and/or rely on only one or two primary spells (rather than monitoring buffs, debuffs, Clearcast procs, etc.), we’re up there. This is fantastic. While our rotation has always been something of a pain, it’s incredibly satisfying to finally see that the effort we put into maintaining said rotation (while being mobile and, you know, not dying) entering a directly proportional relationship with our damage output. Remember powershifting? This is how it should be: you play well, you see ridiculous numbers.
Despite the fantastic numbers we’re seeing from some of the best players out there, we still have limitations that other melee DPS classes don’t have (that, perhaps, work to keep our DPS in check). Like what?
- Multiple DoTs. Death Knights aside, Feral Druids arguably suffer the largest overall DPS loss when we’re placed on targets that die quickly. Yogg-Saron’s Immortal Guardians are a prime example. Depending on your rate of combo point generation (read: how much Crit Rating you have), a full-fledged damage rotation generally cannot be accomplished in the time it takes for one of these Guardians to die. The damage loss from Rake and Rip downtime can be mitigated slightly by adopting a different playstyle—if you’ve gone the way of heavy AGI and the Idol of Worship, that is. Equip the Idol of the Ravenous Beast, throw on your ArP gear (if you’re not already stacking it), and make sure Savage Roar never drops. At that point, you can simply Shred and Ferocious Bite to your heart’s content. It is pertinent to mention, however, that even by gemming for ArP and using a cycle that prioritizes Shred and FB, Rip and Rake generally constitute ~20% and ~10% of my total damage, respectively.
- Combo points. Rogues are included in this category as well. If a situation (or a poor raid assignment) requires we switch targets, each switch wipes our combo points and necessitates a rotation restart. The four-piece T8/8.5 bonus helps mitigate the stack of buffs and debuffs we need to reapply (by considerably extending Savage Roar uptime), but if you’re unable to plan how you’ll wipe your points before starting over, you’re wasting your energy. Literally.
- Positional requirements. Unless you’re using Backstab as a Rogue (and if you are, you’re an idiot), no other melee DPS suffer from positional requirements. Shred, our largest damage dealing attack, can only be executed behind a target. Encounters with mobile mobs (or overexcited tanks) make it difficult to score a direct hit from behind. If you’re dancing around the mob just trying to pull off a Shred, your rotation is essentially hiccupping. Other bosses, such as Kologarn, don’t even let you behind the boss (or his arms) at all, resulting in huge DPS losses. Blizzard has already removed the positional requirement from Mutilate, and I’m wondering if Shred won’t be far behind. Despite the frustration the positional requirement causes, I do believe that it functions as a DPS equalizer. If Feral Druids had the ability to run around like a moron and do the exact same DPS as when they stood still, it would be wildly unfair.
Beyond that, we’re still melee. While certain fights are geared toward showcasing our awesome, other encounters are still tuned to keep us running in and out, sidestepping chain lightning, and dodging explosions. Many people cite XT-002 as the example of why Feral Druids are overpowered—and if every fight were designed to mimic that encounter, we certainly would be. XT-002 represents an ideal scenario in which we (melee) don’t need to move very much, if at all, and if you blow your cooldown load during each heart phase (where damage is doubled), you can destroy your guildmates’ minds.
XT-002 is insanely enjoyable, but it is the exception to the rule. While my damage remains consistently high, it fluctuates based on what each encounter requires of me and generally hovers between 5k-7k DPS. Please see the DPS limitations listed above. I succeed, Mr. Ghostcrawler, because I am intensely situationally aware, I don’t die to silly things, I equip the right pieces of gear, and I spend an inordinate amount of time monitoring my rotation. I may be a little biased, but let us cats have our day.
Man, this nerd rage bullshit has me reaching for my unsubscribe button. Ghostcrawler’s mentioned how hard cat is multiple times, and our DPS probably IS a little high at the top end. He’s specifically mentioned all the concerns you have, so it’s not like he’s not aware of this stuff. I really don’t know what else you want him to do.
He can mention it all he wants. The problem is we’ve gotten nothing other than “we hear you”. I mean I don’t want to be like hunters and lose our whole spec, but Runy is just talking about the issues. So what if she’s saying the same thing GC and others are? It’s her PoV on it and she has a right to post it. If you don’t enjoy it there’s hundreds of other blogs.
You’re absolutely welcome to unsuscribe; no one is forcing you to read this. This was, in fact, not a “nerd-rage” article. I’m actually really pleased that he is acknowledging the issues. I’m providing my take on what it means, right now, to be “a little overpowered.”
In retrospect, I probably should have posted this accompanied by my suggested changes. That’ll be going out tomorrow. At the very top end, I’m sure DPS is a little ridiculous; however, I happen to be pretty great at what I do (though I’m not benchmarking) and I’m still in line (usually a little ahead or a little behind) with our Rogues and better DPS DKs.
Nerrrd raaaage!
Just kidding, enjoyed it :]
The key part is “the less-skilled ones might really see their DPS plummet.”
I think I’m above average but nowhere near the godly category some cats are in. I try my best and when the crit RNG goes my way AND I have a mangle bot around I light up the chart. But when I’m not having a good day I have to scroll down to find my name. This isn’t the case with other players of the same calibre…if they are off or on a bad crit streak it might be a 500dps loss, not 2-4 times that. QQ more, I know I know…..
It’s a tricky balance, that’s for sure. Now that my wireless is back here I should be able to post my “suggestions” to fix the problem.
If you need some extra help with what you’re doing, shoot me an email via my Contact page and I’ll see what I can do.
My worst nightmare: they make kitty dps easy and nerf the topend dps. Poor players still produce the dps they expect, and skilled players…. Yawn, and faceroll like (almost) every other class.
Yes, kitty dps CAN be high on certain bosses, but it’s so situational and suffers to varying degrees in very many encounters. Compare to say a hunter, who puts out solid dps in nearly all fights.
If anything, I’d like to see the opposite happen. I’d like to see other classes able to get great dps when handled as masterfully as a cat putting out consistantly astounding numbers.
^This.
I hardly ever dps, but last night in a retro naxx run, I dug out my crappy valorous & malygos gear for a bit of dps duty, and found I was doing almost as much damage on single target bosses (loatheb, sapp, thaddius) as some very skilled friends wearing ulduar25 gear. We even had another feral dpsing in a TON of tank gear, stamina gems & enchants included, doing very serious dps. Now, if you saw a warlock wearing healing gear gemmed for attack power, you wouldnt expect them to do very well on damage would you?
I personally think a nerf is incoming. Its too high for too little effort. Yes, although the rotation is complex, imo a bit of practice and its easy to master; I had not dpsed for 2 months straight and I was able to blow pretty much every other raider out of the water, wearing crappier gear. I’m not THAT awesome player (though I was tempted to assume I am, ofc)
I’d be interested to see a log (WWS, WMO, WOL) of what everyone else is doing, because I don’t think that’s a very common scenario. For example, during a 10-man XT-002 (I’m using this because it’s a normal, high damage encounter) I can average between 7-8K DPS. Last week, I totally blew it and forgot to take off my tank gear (even though I was still specced for DPS). In all my tank gear, I couldn’t break 5k. I’d be interested in seeing what I’d do if I were actually still tank specced.
Regardless, I don’t generally expect to see a Prot Warrior or a Prot Paladin doing a massive amount of DPS; however, it’s pertinent to note that the “Feral” tree overlaps tanking and DPS talents. Warriors and Paladins don’t have this set up (though DKs do).
Will a nerf happen? I’m sure. I’m just hoping that it’s approached in a thoughtful manner.
I’m really, really hoping they don’t make our “rotation” easier. BC kitty DPS was AWFUL. Mangle, shred to 4 CP, rip. Possibly toss up FF. I am loving the difficulty of correctly maintaining buffs and debuffs and kicking DPS charts butts on some boss encounters.
Are the QQers about kitty DPS looking only at specific fights where kitties shine (XT) or are they looking at our performance as whole against a variety of bosses? Funny I never heard people complain about kitty DPS on Heigan or Maly….
I, too, enjoy the complexity of what we do and I’m glad we’re seeing what seems to be proper damage as a result. I tend to hear the most complaints (and compliments) after fights like XT, but I do tend to remain consistently high throughout.
“If Feral Druids had the ability to run around like a moron and do the exact same DPS as when they stood still, it would be wildly unfair.”
I dont know why you think it would be unfair?
Hunters, boomkin’s, mages, SP, Warlock stand at range push 2-3 buttons and max DPS.
sure they need to move from time to time, but Hodir is a freaking night mare. 20% of my attacks are ” you need to be behind the mob”
Really, you shouldnt need to be a concert pianist to actually play a druid.
I’d definitely agree that it’s gotten to a point where you really need an addon to effectively monitor all DoTs, buffs, and debuffs (such as NeedToKnow) in an organized fashion–and that shouldn’t be the case. But as frustrating as it can be, there’s a part of me that really enjoys having to go out of my way to do damage and then see fantastic DPS. It’s fun. It’s relatively challenging, and keeps the game interesting for me.
I think my thought process went a little bit like this:
1) Our standstill damage is very high, arguably higher than certain Ranged DPS classes.
2) When we move in and out and run around, our damage is penalized and thus puts us back in line with Ranged DPS.
3) Thus, if we stayed at that level of standstill awesome all the time, there’d be even more cries of “OMG DRUIDS ARE OP” than there already are.
Is what we do maybe a little unnecessarily difficult? Sure. But if simplifying our cycle also means dropping our damage, I think I’d rather keep the complexity and enjoy the challenge. Unfortunately, I’m sure most other people don’t feel that way (and that’s legit).
I’m happy with feral druids at the moment (being one :D), but… we may be a ’slight’ bit op (talking 5%)
45 minutes ago my guild jsut downed 25 Vessax for the first time and I came #4 DPS after 2 mages and a warlock with 5311DPS (and this is still running 4/5 t7.5, Got Visage, Runed Ironhide Boots, Winter’s icy Embrace and Conq badge Neck, res is naxx, hell got ilevel 200 belt).
Now I have been feral DPSing for a while (ie. since the pre TBC patch) but I have never been in a hardcore raiding guild, only “Casual that are progression focused” type guilds.
I’ve always been up the top, in TBC and WotLK.
But christ, we got to work for it.
I mean, say Mirimon, not only are we managing our Energy, CP, and 3/4 buff/debuff but running the fuck away/being in the right place for stuff.
We have a relativly new feral druid in the guild aswell (Came #7 on vessax, 4647DPS), who that said, has 2pc t8 and is overall, only a bit lower gear level then me. I have been mentoring this guy as much as i can, and he is improving every raid, but fact is, it does take time. I can see him one day pushing to take me, but its going to be a while. Feral DPS aint something you can master overnight, you really have to earn it, learn it, feel it.
I dunno, sure our DPS may be a little high, but damned if we really don’t work hard for it.
I have seen plenty of retarded cats out there…..
If they nerf anything, take a bit of the damage bonus off savage roar. Still makes us earn our DPS and is almost guarantied to be a flat % DPS decrease.
Nerfing Savage Roar is probably the easiest way to drop our damage. It does not, however, alleviate the problem that Ghostcrawler references: the damage drops, but the cycle is still complex for the players out there with a “lower-skill level.” The good players will still be good, and the bad players will still be bad. I think GC wants to move closer to an equilibrium.
“Don’t nerf me, bro”
Too bad.
*sigh*
bad players need to get better…..
I help fellow ferals that i see struggling as much as i can.
But fact is, we have a complex damage cycle, want a easy one…. reroll/respec…