So I love the idea of this and i can think of so many fun builds… if it worked but it does not, You needing to be in form for a 2.5 secs is to much to get both buffs. I think just make it so if you hit you get the buff. What do my fellow druids think
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The buff persists outside of form. The idea is you could potentially do a build that shifts back and forth between bear and wolf and maintain both buffs, or utilize one or the other if you are doing a pure build.
You would have to have a rotation of abilities that keep you in each form and cycle through them to keep the buffs rolling.
This passive is really odd to me because most other items and passives that incentive the ‘shift weave’ playstyle would make you want to constantly shift between wolf and bear every global if possible. But this key passive wants you to stay in each form for 2.5 seconds which means 3-5 skill uses per form.
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Lower the required time down from 2.5 seconds to 1.5 and up the buff time to 20 seconds. It would make shifter builds so much better.
I tried a shifter build variant that focused on dire wolf with roar without the legendary and it worked pretty well except for the 2.5 seconds I just ran around as a bear waiting for the buff. I guess you could do the opposite with a bear and run blood howl as you wolf shifter…but again doing nothing for 2.5 seconds while waiting for a buff is kinda lame.
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That works in theory, and before the game even launched, I had even planned my Druid build around that same sort of concept where I was constantly shifting.
The only problem is until you try it, and realize how long 2.5 seconds actually is to activate one of the buffs, then do it again for the other one. It feels pretty bad ngl
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Yeah thats an idea. I dont have the fix but i think something so i can use 1 or 2 big chunky pulv and shift back and forth would be great
Just remove the 2.5 sec requirement doesnt need one you already have to give up grizzly rage for 100% uptime on both.
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Yeah I think the duration needs to go. It works against the theme of the pasive.
When you consider the aspect which gives you health on shift, you really want to maximize the frequency of shifting forms. Having to wait the 2.5 seconds at least twice every 15s sucks.
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There is a weird way to work this that relies on an overly clunky playstyle. One cast of claw and wiring the full duration will meet the WW form, cast trample to charge in drop a couple pulverize will activate the bear, howl to wolf (with spirit gen version) followed by a couple claws to pulverize spam for bear and just alternate this back and forth.
You are going to drop the buff between mobs at times though because they density and backtracking in dungeons is not ideal. It’s an overly clunky play style that relies on managing two additional timers that will only refresh each time you spend 2.5 seconds in form.
I would rather have a longer activation time and a shorter duration with a refresh condition for simply shifting rather than shifting and holding. This could open damage options with quick shift passive combined with resonance if you have the affix that makes your pulverize and earth skill and the crone staff making your claw also cast storm strike.
Activate and keep alternating for sustained damage. Even if you kept it would still be weaker than the builds that rely on grizzly rage for it’s big damage multiplier, but it would give some viability for those of us who want to move between the different forms.
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The 2.5 second timer is too long.
1.5-2 seconds is better. 1 buff is easy to keep up since your generater will probably be a shapeshifting ability so you’re really only micor-managing 1 buff,
I found that 2 seconds was a reasonable time frame
1-1.5 seconds of ability spam
0.5-1 seconds for repositioning
Probably don’t want to make it too low. Otherwise, it becomes too strong compared to to Ursine Strength and Lupine Ferocity.
Some other ideas I like:
- Change it to a stack mechanic (shapeshifting grants 2-3 stacks)
- Add some sort of CDR to Shapeshifting abilities like reduce cooldowns by 0.25-0.5 seconds per shapeshift.
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I think if they didn’t want to change the 2.5 second timer it takes to trigger. A potential change they could make at least is to make it not require 2.5 consecutive seconds. Like you can form weave, and then once you’ve reached a TOTAL 2.5 seconds in a given form, you gain that buff. But as it is right now feels so bad to play.
Random thought:
Regardless of how they change up the offensive modifiers, attach a healing component:
Shapeshifting heals you for 1% of your total Health. Triple this bonus for your companions
Maybe more than 3x but since this seems to be the intended Key Passive for pet builds, this should help with their survivability.
The healing component for shapeshifting is tied to a spirit boon already that many of us are running.
I do like your stacking idea. Works similar to barbarian when they swap weapons. Ramp up the damage for switching forms and cap it so it doesn’t become an infinitely stacking broken multiplier.
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the idea here is to have it apply to pets. Figured throwing 1% in for the Druid itself wasn’t game breaking.
Pushed reply too soon above, see the second half regarding stacking.
Stacking makes more sense as it incentivizes swapping over as much. Feels the most “natural” in terms of gameplay and still makes it so that Ursine Strength and Lupine Ferocity work better for their niche.
To speak to the companion heal a bit more. Could remove the Druid heal all together.
The IAS buff also only affects wolves to my understanding. It does nothing to reduce the time between Creeper passive attacks, unless IAS is somehow rolled into the damage, it’s a useless passive for them. The heal somewhat makes up for that fact for dedicated pet builds
Pets need their own key passive added. I prefer not to have a throw in or add on to another passive entirely. Would like to see something along the lines of pets copying your barriers and health potion healing plus a vulnerable damage element to make them more enticing to play.
I actually really like the idea of making the two different buffs for each form into a stack mechanic for each respective buff. That makes a lot of sense, and really would fit thematically with the kind of gameplay flow you’d think this sort of hybrid form playstyle would have.
I doubt it happens tho tbh. But maybe that’s me just being a negative nancy lol. Ya never know
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Totally agree with most of coments in this post.
Current version of this passive is making gameplay loop terrible on duo-shapeshifting builds, waiting for 2.5s without taking any actions just to activate it and track it is super painfull.
All other aspects/passives, encourage constant form switching and this one is outlaying.
For the solution, any of the mentioned above is better than what we have now.
I’ve died so many times waiting for the passive to have both, should be instant on shifting. Remove the 2.5 seconds.
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