Feedback: Druids

#1 - Sept. 7, 2023, 7:30 p.m.

In this thread, please discuss ongoing changes to the Druid class in the Guardians of the Dream PTR.

Balance

In Guardians of the Dream, we’d like to diversify Balance’s talent builds in different content and provide more viable options.

Wild Mushrooms was too expensive to compete with other talent options, so we combined it and Fungal Growth into a single point. Wild Mushrooms is now a choice node with a revised Orbital Strike that is no longer tied to Celestial Alignment – you can choose the steady damage of Wild Mushrooms or a less frequent, big burst of damage with Orbital Strike.

We also removed the conflict between maintaining Rattle the Stars and maximizing Starlord – we like the “save resources and spend during Eclipse” gameplay of Balance and feel Starlord epitomizes it better.

• Damage of all abilities increased by 2%.
• Nature’s Grace now grants 10% Haste (was 15%).
• Power of Goldrinn damage increased by 20%. Moved to where Starlord was located in Fractures in Time.
• Starlord has moved to where Power of Goldrinn was located in Fractures in Time.
• Rattle the Stars has been redesigned – It is no longer a buff that stacks when you cast Starsurge or Starfall and is now a passive bonus that always reduces the cost of Starsurge and Starfall by 10% and increases their damage by 12%.
• Orbital Strike has been redesigned – Call down a bombardment of celestial energy over the target area, blasting all enemies for Astral damage and applying Stellar Flare to them for 16 seconds. Generates 30 Astral Power. Orbital Strike still hits enemies in a 40 yard line and has a 90 second cooldown. Now a choice node with Wild Mushroom.
• Fungal Growth has been removed. Wild Mushrooms now includes the effects of Fungal Growth.
• Wild Mushrooms’ damage has been reduced by 20% and the Fungal Growth damage over time has been reduced to 60% of Wild Mushroom damage (was 70%). Fungal Growth’s damage over time now deals damage over 10 seconds (was 8 seconds).

Feral

Apex Predator’s value varies a lot in single target and AOE, so we’re evening that out a little.

We’re trying a new version of Ashamane’s Guidance, as we don’t love the randomness of the current version with the updated Berserk design – it’s hard to optimize its damage and resource generation without using external tracking mods. The new version will have more consistent value and rewards you for maintaining your most important bleeds.

• Apex Predator’s chance to trigger is increased against a low number of targets and decreased against a high number of targets. Its chance to trigger is about the same as before against 4 targets.
• Cat’s Curiosity has been replaced with a new talent: Saber Jaws – When you spend extra Energy on Ferocious Bite, the extra damage is increased by 40%/80%.
• Ashamane’s Guidance’s effect for Incarnation: Avatar of Ashamane has been redesigned – During Incarnation: Avatar of Ashamane and for 30 seconds after it ends, your Rip and Rake each cause affected enemies to take 3% increased damage from your abilities.

Restoration

• Cenarius’ Guidance’s Incarnation: Tree of Life functionality has been redesigned – During Incarnation: Tree of Life, you summon a Grove Guardian every 10 seconds. The cooldown of Incarnation: Tree of Life is reduced by 5 seconds when Grove Guardians fade.
• Incarnation: Tree of Life now additionally empowers Wrath, causing it to deal 20% more damage and be instant cast.
• Reforestation now grants Incarnation: Tree of Life for 10 seconds (was 9 seconds).
• New Talent: Liveliness – Your damage over time effects deal their damage 25% faster, and your healing over time effects heal 5% faster.
• Circle of Life and Death has been removed.
• Grove Tending healing increased by 30%.
• Grove Guardian’s Nourish healing decreased by 16%.
• Grove Guardian’s Swiftmend healing reduced by 20%.
• Grove Guardian’s Wild Growth healing from Wild Synthesis reduced by 20%.
• Luxuriant Soil now causes Rejuvenation to have a 1%/2% chance to jump to a nearby ally (was 1.5%/3%).
• Regrowth initial healing increased by 20%.
• Regrowth heal over time effect increased by 42%.
• Rejuvenation healing increased by 25%.
• Wild Growth healing increased by 15%.
• Wrath and Starfire damage increased by 90%.
• Abundance caps at 12 stacks, for a maximum of 60% crit/cost reduction.
• Cenarion Ward healing increased by 25%.
• Swiftmend healing increased by 30%.
• Inner Peace now reduces the cooldown of Tranquility by 30 seconds (was 60 seconds).
• Spring Blossoms healing reduced by 25%.
• Sunfire now costs 1.8% base mana (was 2.4%).
• Embrace of the Dream healing reduced by 30%.
• Flourish now extends the duration of all your heal over time effects on friendly targets within 60 yards by 6 seconds (was 8 seconds), and increases the rate of your heal over time effects by 25% (was 100%) for 6 seconds (was 8 seconds).
• Flourish procs from Convoke the Spirits now extends heal over time effects by 3 seconds (was 4 seconds) and lasts 3 seconds (was 4 seconds).
  • Developers’ note: We are reducing the effectiveness of Flourish and increasing the power of rotational heal over time spells with the goal of moving more power into the baseline kit.
• Aberrus, the Shadowed Crucible (2) Set Bonus – Now increases the healing of Regrowth’s periodic heal by 35% (was 50%).
• Aberrus, the Shadowed Crucible (4) Set Bonus – Now increases the rate of your heal over time effects by 26% (was 30%).

#30 - Sept. 21, 2023, 7:35 p.m.

Let’s talk about Balance and Feral Druids! There are a couple important changes coming in the next PTR build.

Balance

We’ve been reading your feedback and agree that it’s important for Balance Druids in PvP to have the option to reduce Celestial Alignment’s cooldown by 2 minutes to coordinate burst phases with the rest of their team. Orbital Strike worked very well in that regard, and also made Celestial Alignment a very prominent visual. So we’re going to change it back to its previous design and position in the talent tree.

One goal we had behind changing Orbital Strike’s design was to give Balance more and different options to do damage quickly at the start of dungeon packs, or when adds appear in a raid fight. To pursue that goal in a different way, we’re tweaking Balance’s Mastery, Astral Invocation. Astral Invocation increases damage you deal to targets with Sunfire or Moonfire on them, with double the bonus to your Astral spells. We like how it prioritizes applying and maintaining your DoTs - we want it to be important to keep Sunfire and Moonfire rolling. However, we’re not happy with how much damage you lose when it’s not practical to put your DoTs up, such as against enemies that die quickly.

In 10.2, we’re changing Astral Invocation to give 2/3rds of its value at all times, and the remaining third when you have Moonfire and Sunfire on targets, like it currently works. The maximum power level is the same, but this means that when you start casting Starfall on raid boss adds, you’ll have most of the benefit of Astral Invocation right away. In dungeons you may enter Eclipse so you can start casting Starfall before you finish applying Moonfires. The goal is greater flexibility while keeping DoTs important.

We also found a couple bugs where Astral Invocation wasn’t increasing the damage of a few abilities, like Orbital Strike and Power of Goldrin. We’ve fixed that, and in some cases reduced their base damage to keep their tuning as intended.
Correction: Upon review, the only ability not currently affected by Astral Invocation is their PvP talent Star Burst. There are no changes to Orbital Strike’s or Power of Goldrin’s tuning in the next 10.2 PTR build. Apologies for the error.

Finally, we swapped the positions of Aethereal Kindling and Lunar Shrapnel in the talent tree. The thinking is that increased damage is always useful, but there may be cases you don’t need extended DoT durations.

Feral

In 10.2, Feral Druids will be able to cast Innervate in Cat Form. Let’s talk about it. Some design philosophy incoming.

One priority we have for druids is to maintain clear and flavorful identities for their various forms. If you want to intimidate your foes with a roar, you have to be a bear. If you want to rip and rake your foes, you have to be a cat. For fantasy reasons, we try to restrict casting spells in Bear Form or Cat Form without a perk like Predatory Swiftness or Lunar Inspiration. We’ve bent this for gameplay reasons, such as allowing Guardian Druids to cast several spells as a bear because they’re usually unable to shift out without dying. Generally, if players can play around their form restrictions, we try to keep them in place.

Which leads us to friction. Friction is when something is harder than it could be. Shifting out of Cat Form to cast Innervate has more friction than simply casting it from Moonkin Form. However, friction is not always bad. Dealing with friction takes flexibility, creativity, and quick thinking. Feral Druids must find a safe place to shift to cast spells. Dealing with friction successfully can be rewarding. High level M+ keys have friction, but that’s why they’re fun! Figuring out how to overcome friction in the moment can help the game keep from getting stale.

So why change it now? Simply, the difference in friction for using Innervate as Feral vs. other druid specs has proven higher than we want in practice. That’s also why we’re not changing Rebirth - it’s harder for Feral to cast Rebirth, but the difference in friction is at an appropriate level.

#40 - Sept. 21, 2023, 8:30 p.m.

Upon review, the only ability not currently affected by Balance’s Mastery, Astral Invocation, is their PvP talent Star Burst. There are no changes to Orbital Strike’s or Power of Goldrin’s tuning in the next 10.2 PTR build. Apologies for the error.

#63 - Sept. 27, 2023, 10:16 p.m.

With the PTR build that went live moments ago:

• DRUID
  • Balance
    • Orbital Strike has been redesigned – Call down a bombardment of celestial energy over the target area, blasting all enemies for Astral damage and applying Stellar Flare to them for 16 seconds. Generates 30 Astral Power. Orbital Strike still hits enemies in a 40 yard line and has a 90 second cooldown. Now a choice node with Wild Mushroom.
    • Mastery: Astral Invocation has been updated – Your Nature spells deal increased damage and additional damage to targets affected by Sunfire. Your Arcane spells deal increased damage and additional damage to targets affected by Moonfire.
    • Friend of the Fae’s tooltip changed to “When a Faerie Dragon is summoned, your spells deal 10% increased damage for 20 seconds.”
      • Developers’ note: This is a tooltip consistency change, not a functional changes. Balance spells whose tooltips say they modify your Arcane and Nature spell damage, like when you get the benefit of both Eclipses during Celestial Alignment, provide double their bonus to Astral spells. Friend of the Fae does not.
    • Orbital Strike is reverted to its original design and location in the talent tree.
    • Wild Mushrooms damage increased by 10%.
    • The positions of the Aethereal Kindling and Lunar Shrapnel talents have been swapped.
  • Feral
    • Rampant Ferocity damage increased by 10%.
    • Feral Druids can cast Innervate in Cat Form.
    • Relentless Predator now reduces the Energy cost of Ferocious Bite by 10% (was 20%).
    • Apex Predator’s chance to activate against a single target is reduced to 7.2% (was 9%), but the rate it activates against additional targets is increased.
  • Restoration
    • Fixed an issue that caused Efflorescence to slay Grove Guardians.
    • Wild Growth now costs 4% base mana (was 4.4%).
    • Regrowth now costs 3.2% base mana (was 3.4%).