This is true, especially the part where you mention that there’s no hard requirement on needing a melee in the group. But given that, the current Meta is 2 ranged and 1 melee.
And that’s why i say to compare Feral to other melee. That’s the slot they’re fighting for. Between Hunter + Boomkin for the 2 others in the group, there’s no reason to bring a Feral (you don’t really need 2 Druids with overlapping utility). Given that, it seems the true melee utility just falls to fast interrupts + highest damage you can get out of melee. And that falls to Outlaw Rogues currently (I haven’t been able to log in and play to see how far they outpace other melee).
But with a Mage + Hunter combo, adding a Feral would be able to fill the gaps very nicely. Issue being…when you can kill things fast enough, you don’t need cover every utility aspect. And thus Outlaw Rogues and their (I’m assuming its AoE) DPS shine.
You hit the nail on the head. It’s why I said earlier, Ferals biggest problem is boomkins exist. The more logical comp is a Mage/Boomkin/MM Hunter for your ranged, and then realistically a DK/WW monk/Rogue for your melee. Even if your ranged dps are MM/Mage for example, you’re still better off with a UH DK for the Brez and AMS plus overall better cleave damage. It used to be Stampeding roar was a Ferals only unique group buff (assuming you didn’t have a bear tank) but even that they gave to Boomkins in SL, plus no one brought feral just for Stamp roar anyway, it was more of a “nice to have” buff than a mandatory one.
Give Ferals something to set them apart, I’d argue Leader of the pack should be it but I’d take anything to give me a reason to play Feral again as it is my favorite Melee DPS in the game to play. But I also want to push >15+ keys and Feral is one of the least useful melee right now, only on par with warriors and survival hunters at best. Even warriors bring an attack power buff and a group HP cooldown.
Same argument could be made for any class with multiple DPS specs.
Shamans, Rogues, Warriors, Mages
One spec will shine above the rest. So while you’ll have 2-3 classes that are held in high regard, it’s actually only 2-3 specs. As mentioned, Outlaw Rogue is shining, and although Assassination has the same utility…they’ll forever be in Outlaws shadow while there’s that much of a DPS difference between the specs within the same class (same for Fire vs Frost for mages, etc etc)
One spec will shine above the rest. So while you’ll have 2-3 classes that are held in high regard, it’s actually only 2-3 specs. As mentioned, Outlaw Rogue is shining, and although Assassination has the same utility…they’ll forever be in Outlaws shadow while there’s that much of a DPS difference between the specs within the same class (same for Fire vs Frost for mages, etc etc)
Sure, but for rogue/mage/warlock they are all melee or ranged dps specs respectively with different flair. They all have the same utility regardless of spec more importantly. All mages have ice block/time warp and all rogues have shroud of concealment.
If you want to DPS as a Druid or Shaman you have 1 ranged and 1 melee which are vastly different play styles to choose from so if one is significantly better than the other you are forced to play ranged in this case even if you wanted to play melee. So really Shaman is the only comparable class to Druid, and both dps specs for sham are pretty close in damage and they both offer the same group utility, just as ranged or melee. There isn’t anything significantly better about an Ele shaman vs Enh shaman. They both have lust, they both have reincarnation, they both have earth ele and they can both off heal.
If they gave Feral Innervate and Treants then I’d say feral is 95% as viable as Boomkin. With that last 5% being the inherent disadvantage melee have currently. The fact is Feral is the only hybrid multi spec class to lack the majority of the utility that is offered to it’s other specs.
What’s blocking Feral right now is not actually performance or utility, it’s social perception. And you can’t change that easily in a patch or two.
I agree this is definitely true for lower end content sure. People running a +10 don’t need to worry about meta. I’d even say Feral is perfectly viable for keys up to 15 and is a very solid dps option in Heroic raids.
But if you want to push higher end content >15 keys or Cutting edge content then the lack of utility does in fact begin to matter. Tolerances for disadvantages in comps become much tighter the higher up you go, so why hamstring yourself with Feral when they offer nothing to help you succeed that another class doesn’t offer and more?
If you’re going to spend all the time gearing out a character why pick one that hits its content ceiling sooner than others? If you have a guild that is happy to group with you then play whatever you want, Feral included, but don’t expect pug groups to carry suboptimal specs when there are objectively better choices compared to Feral. You’ll be spending a lot of time in group finder getting rejected as feral.
As I said though, if you want to play mid tier content and no further, then for sure play feral if you like the spec.
I don’t push keys because I hate M+ so I won’t talk about that.
Feral is perfectly fine in M Castle Nathria though, especially considering everyone in the raid now outgears content by 10-15 ilvls. Of the fights that matter Feral gets sat for SLG and is not great for Denathrius and could be sat, depending on your group comp.
For every other fight Feral is at least an above average choice for your last free melee slot (or last two, depending on how many DKs you’re stacking). Guilds, especially in the mid-level range trying to break through into being a ‘serious Mythic guild’ get too caught up on trying to optimize classes and stacks. If you’re still progressing Nathria today, you should be bringing the best players you have on the classes they’re most comfortable with.
And honestly that extends very far up the world rankings. It’s not always true: sometimes Blizz screws up and designs raids that are too advantageous for some CDs, but it is true more often than not.
Yea most my complaints are M+ related. I did all of H Nathria as Feral and usually was top DPS in my relatively casual guild, especially on pure single target fights.
I think Feral in the early mythic race was simply not used due to it being melee and most of their comps were heavy ranged. The only dps melee were Unholy DKs for AMS plus the fact they do great damage in ST and AOE to boot, and 1 WW for the physical damage buff. However that is more of an issue with Melee balance in general and not Feral specifically. They also used a Prot Warrior and Veng DH tank for their buffs as well.
It does draw attention to the fact that the monk/DH/warrior raid buffs are invaluable and if they gave feral LotP for raid wide crit you might actually see one used in cutting edge raiding. But as it stands monks/DHs/Warriors are guaranteed at least one slot for their buffs, leaving the only truly useless melee dps in Raids as Rogue/Feral which is still an issue even if it’s less apparent in a raid setting than in M+.
Unholy DKs were broken early and AMZ is overly powerful for the way Castle Nathria is designed. They also have the best execute (or 2nd best) in the game. This is why Limit ran 4 Unholy DKs for the RWF.
But now you should not be building your groups that way, especially if you’re still working on any fights other than SLG and Sire. It literally does not matter, and it would be so much nicer if the people who talk about this stuff realized that after the first week or two it’s irrelevant.
The trouble with feral is actually boomy. While boomy has the strengths mentioned previously, innervste, treants, typhoon with ursols, high damage range, durable, brez, root beam. The list goes on. Feral has very little to offer.
As long as boomys are overpowered feral will always be trash to bring to a key or raid.
I mostly just use Feral for world content. It’s competitive in groups, but not as good as boomkin. So as usual the problem is going to be “Why aren’t you a boomkin?”
Pick up the passive talents and it’s pretty easy, especially in AOE situations.
I hate bloodtalons and never take it.
My impression has always been they kind of did it as a one-off thing and then it blew up in popularity without any real plan on how to take it forward.
M+ today is – essentially – the same as it was in Legion. And when it was new it was a neat thing but after, what, 4 years of the same? It’s kind of growing stale and either needs to be made a true 3rd pillar of content, or for everyone to have a come to Jesus moment about it just not being on the same endgame level as raiding.
Point I was getting at, if you’re on farm for Heroic no it doesn’t matter. However, on progression fights the utility people bring matter 100% regardless of gear at this point because so many of the fights have very strict mechanics that if you aren’t mitigating with raid CDs you’re risking an early wipe.
Shriekwing: lol
Altimor: You’re fine with immunities and raid CDs from your healers (please don’t bring 3 resto druids)
Hungering: you’re going to want AMZ here
Inerva: Fine with healing CDs
SKS: you want AMZ probably
Xymox: Fine with healing CDs
Council: You want AMZ
Sludgefist: You want AMZ (maybe?)
SLG: You’re sitting Ferals anyway
Sire: You’re probably sitting Ferals but you might bring one
Having multiple uses of AMZ in a fight only matters on Council, maybe. You want at least 1 obviously but you probably aren’t deciding who to bring in your last spot, a Feral druid or an Unholy DK.
Rally and battle shout can come from a warrior tank and if you don’t have them you can deal. Darkness is actually the CD that might be the deciding factor between a DH and a Feral for last spot down the line, but right now for various reasons you just aren’t going to have equally geared Havoc DHs and Ferals.
Or stay in travel form until the keystone is dropped. This is what I do. Most will assume Balance in LFG tool, and the RIO add on doesn’t show spec, but most will kick you if they figure out you aren’t Boomy before the start.
Once the countdown starts, I’ll shift to kitty and fully half the time there is a “WTF?!?!” from the group.
Absolutely great point about Shaman comparison. The Druid melee and ranged need to be balanced similarly so people can play owl or kitty based on preference like Shaman players do.