Not getting into all of things that were not fixed, but here are some thoughts on the patch notes for druid.
Skills
Generators / Basics
Earth Spike
Milk toast damage and resource increases. Fortify Bonus is nice though
Wind Shear
Again fairly pointless tiny damage and resource increase.
Claw
Same base damage and resource bonus. Somewhat ok since Claw is one of the few basic abilities with a full build around it.
Wild Claw Double Attack Chance increased from 10% to 15% is actually a really nice bonus for any Crone staff build (which there are a few)
Fierce Claw base damage is pointlessly small damage with Toxic Claw filling itâs niche role already. Wild Claw will remain strictly superior in every build
Maul
Tiny increases. Does nothing for the skill
Lightning Storm
Duration increase is mostly pointless once your build is online and the extra bolt is pretty much always superior given the immobilize percentage is still so small
Shred
A decent buff actually. Healing buff will be noticeable as well as both of the optional buffs getting decent upgrades. The crit bonus is still going to be the best bet as it scales with all damage and not just base.
Wolves
Cooldown is basically completely worthless past early game. Any and all companion build basically have to use packleader. This makes balancing around cooldowns pointless. Buff packleader if you want to buff companion cooldowns.
Ferocious Wolfpack Lucky Hit chance increased from 10% to 40%. This makes it an actually usable upgrade. It was far to rare before to the point of being completely unreliable. May be a good source of fortify if wolves are ever worth running.
Also please fix wolves getting stuck in the ceiling on jumping, wolves having clunky animations, and wolves rabies aspect being almost impossible to use due to poor animations and low chance to use.
Hurricane
Great damage increase. The aspect that stacks hurricane damage looks more appealing now.
Rabies
Base Poisoning damage increased from 53% to 76%. This is not enough damage. There is no scenario where building rabies is worth it. This cooldown should be decreased to like 5 seconds for it to be viable. Even still probably wouldnât be though. I think it needs to have more utility built into it for it to compete.
Cataclysm
Minor damage buff for an ultimate that just isnât as good as the others. Will remain unused
Lacerate
Iâm amazed. Simply amazed. This skill is basically worthless before and after patch. If you want to take the low effort route and just tweak a number you need to lower this things cooldown by half or jack up its damage by like 300%. Or both TBH. I think given how good petrify is for control and damage and the generally power and utility of grizzly rage, the other two ults need a LOT of love. Not a little.
Petrify
Cool little buff to a decent ultimate. Not much to say.
Pummel
This is the dismount skill. Who cares about dismount skill balance
Passives
Bestial Rampage
Nice little buff but not enough to switch off of build enableing passives. Needs something more or a much larger buff.
Natureâs Fury
Awesome buff. This will actually help smooth out this playstyle
Lupine Ferocity
Worthless damage buff. If anything lower the number of hits to proc to like 3. Itâs currently competing with earthen might for werewolf grizzly rage style builds. Needs a lot more to compete with that level of power and utility.
Legendary Aspects
Runeworkerâs Conduit
This is an ok buff for storm claw style builds.
Mangled
As it only give 1 spirit, this should probably just be at like +80% or more chance
Seismic-Shift
This cooldown reduction is good but it still needs to be slotted into a two hander or amulet slot to be usable as a spam skill. And this aspect is not worth those slots. I would change the cooldown to always be .5 seconds and give it a damage bonus component that scales with slot bonuses instead. That way you can put it in gloves, ring, offhand and it wonât feel as bad to try to make it work.
Blurred Beast
Decent damage increase. Itâll be nice for the shred poison build. But blurred beast is pretty annoying to use (at least to me). Iâd just remove the dashing component and nerf the damage a little. Itâll end up feeling better and being a dps increase instead of spending time walking around.
I am super disappointed they did nothing with the wolf companions!
Is it really that hard to just buff their HP and/or make their HP scale properly when you level up?!
They didnât even bother to fix the companion damage bug either it seems.
Itâs deeply frustrating to be honest. As I lost my appetite to log into the game anymore, since hitting Tier 3 and it will stay that way until they bother to fix companions and make them actually viable in mid game (Tier 3) and upwards.
This isnât supposed to be a rework patch, itâs simply small changes. Game hasnât even been out for a month so itâs fine for now. Just as long as that patch doesnât take half a year.
Iâm in the same boat. Had my heart set on a combination Werebear + Companion build, skipping the Ultimate in favor of a second Companion skill. Wolves are still bugged, Ravens are still useless, there are no Unique items or Key Passive for Companions. I hit 58 T3 on my Druid and havenât played in some weeks now.
The hurricane âbuffâ actually reverts it back to where it was back in the open beta. They literally took something away and gave it back later in a buff patch. Thatâs like when retail companies Jack up prices before Black Friday and âslashâ prices back to their original prices for the sale.
I am actually shocked that they did not buff the wolf companions. I was watching my 3 wolves trying to kill one of those flyâs and it got so bored I had to basic (took three basic attacks).
for context, I use the stormâs companion and my crit is 45% with 236% crit damage.
Since when? There is nothing in the patch notes about Ursine, which only applies to Werebear, and we distinctly lack bear companions. Bestial Rampage only applies to Werewolf, which even if it worked on Companions (it doesnât), you still need an Aspect to change the wolves into werewolves. Hate to tell ya friend, but you be tripping.
Since this whole time. There is a legendary aspect that makes the companions benefit from bestial rampage and the 30% more damage while healthy has always benefitted non-bears.
Good call about the attack power, I suppose thatâs an indirect buff, though still only temporary because of the condition. As for wildrage, Iâll contribute that to poor wording. I was interpreting âafter being a werewolfâ as literal when applied to companions, not indirectly via your own shapeshift. That said, that fact that we need multiple Aspects to even attempt a Companion build is awful.
Every build should and does need multiple aspects. Companions have long cooldowns, low base damage, and seemingly bugged damage (does lower than it should) all kind of dogpile the issue.
As well aspect of changeling being bugged and not critting. Aspect of blurred beast and changeling not working on suppressor mobs hurts creeping vine builds badly.
Wolves being contantly CCed and easily killed, clunky animations, ending up stuck after jumping sometimes, and having one of the few aspects that is additive and not multiplicative all hurt wolves.
RavensâŚwell, Ravens need a lot of work to make them viable.
I agree. The damage increase is a start in the right direction, but itâs not enough. And, we have zero aspects that augment Lacerate. I still think an augment that lowers the cooldown by 1-2 seconds on critical attacks while using the skill would really help bring the skill âonlineâ and more in-line with grizz rage (which is still far superior for WW builds).
The changes to the wolf companions is nice (except CD because everyone uses packleader with them anyway) - but they need to address their survivability. They get melted like necro pets in higher difficulties.
It was a huge leap for my build, I mean Iâm one of the few who plays Shred Rabies and thought it was pretty awesome before, now it plays even better.
I have a question though, maybe someone knows, if I use Claw to generate spirit, does the perk double attack hit spirit generation or is it just a small damage bonus?
