Guardian Buffs Incoming - Updated PTR Notes - April 30

Classes Druid
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[quote="Tewa-hyjal, post:79, topic:148815, full:true"]
  • Remove Corruption castable in bear form. This is great. It only took, what, 14 years? This is the latest in a long line of “making bear actually playable” that’s been going on for ages, along the lines of when they made it so we could use potions and healthstones in bear form (remember when we couldn’t?). But this is just another step on the road. ALL mana-using spells should be usable in bear form, including not just Sooth & Remove Corruption but also Hibernate, Entangling Roots, Regrowth, etc. There’s zero excuse to make the Guardian Druid drop out of bear form to cast spells, just as there’s zero excuse to make the Paladin unequip their shield to cast spells - which is why the Paladin never has to do that. We need the same treatment.
  • The rage adjustments will help but the numbers are still off and Blizzard doesn’t understand still how Ironfur works. ONE stack of Ironfur brings us up to the armor of a Warrior who’s standing there doing nothing. The shift-to-bear should set our rage to 40 so that we can start with an Ironfur up, bringing us up to the base armor that a Warrior has at the start of the fight (for which the Warrior has to do nothing but be a Warrior). At an ABSOLUTE MINIMUM it should be 35, so that we can Thrash-Ironfur at the start of a pull and have Warrior base armor.

Other things they stole from us that we need back:

  • We need our damn slow back, Blizzard! We had it since vanilla and now we’re the only tank without one. Put it back NOW. BASELINE.
  • We need a DPS cooldown to replace the removed Berserk & Rage of the Sleeper. Rage would be perfect here with its loss-of-control prevention added as well, which gave bears a semi-unique niche in the game, something we completely lack right now. Being able to pop it on fights like Portal Keeper, etc. to prevent ourselves from being knocked back was great. I could have used this on Blockade this week on a badly-placed Ire where I was the only person near it, and I soaked it to prevent a wipe, but I only had time to barely reach it, not to position myself properly, so I got knocked off the platform and we had no tank. (We still got our 1st kill, bearly, on that pull, but it was “a close ting” as Rokhan would say.) So rage with its damage component + loss of control prevention + mitigation would be very welcome, here. (I don’t care as much about the Leech, they can leave that off.)
  • Some kind of magic mitigation like Adaptive Fur or Mark of Ursol. Nice that they upped Demon Hunters’ passive magic mitigation, but Guardian still left out in the cold with nothing.
  • FR off the GCD, as has been said. And make it worth using. They don’t want to make it like Death Strike, fine. (Although I have no idea why that’s the case - if we can’t have DKs’ Death Strike, then they shouldn’t have our battle rez. Take battle rez away from DK’s.) But make it worth using. It’s not worth using, now.

Long term “make the spec interesting” is easy:

  • Split up Gore into single-target and AoE parts. Currently, Thrash/Swipe/Moonfire/Maul all reset the cooldown on Mangle. Wrong way to do it. Moonfire/Maul should reset the cooldown on Mangle, while Swipe should reset the cooldown on Thrash. This requires the bear to pay more attention and adapt to procs like other specs do.
  • Pawsitive Outlook was a fun proc to have and would also help with rage generation a little. Bring it back.
    [/quote]

Blizz, please. Everything about this is what the community wants! Make people wanna be bears again!

Also, please look at feral damage. <3

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108

It’s not about what does and doesn’t matter. I read something I agreed with and decided that it is possible for a playstyle like that to come back with a healthier way to spend and generate resources.

I don’t dismiss feedback or decide what should or should not matter to other players.

It is what it is though. I don’t care enough to continue a debate about feedback that isn’t even mine.

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109

I’m happy about the changes but I would like to also see:

  • FR come off the GCD.
  • FR be a flat heal instead of a hot.
  • Add a FR charge or have a reduced CD.
  • Add adaptive fur back.
  • Add the thrash slow back.
  • Give us an offensive CD.
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110

That’s fine. Although, I can’t say that I’ve seen any feedback from you on how you feel about the changes. Just asking us about our’s.

Edit: Which, after thinking about it, is exactly what you have just said you didn’t want to do. /boggle

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What I won’t do is justify if someone else’s feedback is good or bad, everyone’s got an opinion, and I’m not going to tell someone theirs is bad just because mine doesn’t align. I enjoy reading the conversations.

My perspective is of Guardian druid as fc in rbgs which isn’t currently a mainstream thing yet even though its getting stonger, 8.2 might change that and renew my interest although its not shaping up to be that way atm, but because of vengeance in legion I didn’t really bother to focus on my bear in any capacity. Since I don’t like many post legion classes, don’t think they aged well past the artifact, and decided not to play Legion Guardian I just lurk and see what people are talking about.

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No worries. I’m with him in the feels that even really thinking about something like 2 target Maul while the other, larger issues remain broken is… hasty. Now, from your apparent viewpoint as pvp, I can see where that would seem tasty. And some of what we would like fixed doesn’t really have as much of an impact as you’d like as to how it relates to pvp.

I’m with you on the spec being just… not interesting since Legion. No Disco Bear is just… sad. If they nerfed the effect of GG practically into the ground but made it proc way more often, people would take it just for the amusement factor. I manged to get shoulders kind of early in Legion and told a friend of mine who played Bear how fun it was to star in your own rave show. He didn’t get it until he got his and had a blast.

But no matter your viewpoint, be it pvp or pve, we can all agree that while the changes they have put up so far are good (even if the higher end bears find the increase in available rage to be amusing and not really NEEDED)… I also think we all agree that there is still more that NEEDS to be done. The particulars might be something we fuss about, beyond a few we all agree on, but we can be united in the NEED for more.

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One thing you’re not taking into consideration is how much extra rage we’re starting with going into fights with the changes. That’ll give you excess rage where you you have Iron Fur up, you have excess rage and depending on the pull, if you don’t need to use a GCD on FR, you have a GCD to burn.

So increased rage generation and reduced ability cost allow for same/better amount of active mitigation while still allowing for you to use Maul a rage dump. I’m not really seeing the issue here?

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So not to experienced of a Guardian Drood here (I recently started tanking mythic +, highest I’ve done is a level 9) but I’d have to agree with a few of the posters here on the “fun factor” of playing a Guardian. I’ve played a few other tanks (Brewmaster and Warrior) and I really enjoy playing those more than Guardian. Guardian just seems so simplified in that we have a few abilities that we use - Mangle for rage generation - thrash and swipe for your other 2 damage dealing abilities. So basically just 3 buttons and you’re set. I do enjoy the pulverize talent but it’s only really uesful for single target and for dungeons there are big aoe pulls which I feel Rend and Tear will pull ahead on. Just my $.02.

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In a way, they masked a resto nerf behind guardian buffs which is pretty shady. I’m gonna miss my bear form moonfires.

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Grizzle, hear me when I say this. There is absolutely nothing I have not taken into consideration when it comes to druids, and I believe you have grossly overestimated exactly how much rage we’re talking about here.

Blizzard has stripped this class down to a shadow of its former glory, and then turns around and offers back the very same things they have taken from us and have the gall to call it a “Fix” or “Buff”

Maul used to cost 15 rage. Did you know that? Probably not. True none the less. It was doubled in Cata and then brought back down to 20 for WoD. Then some clown in legion decided to triple the original cost and brought it up to the 45 we see today.

Now I’m supposed to get all excited because they proposed a reduction of 5 rage? WOOPIDY FREAKIN DOOO!! The only scenario where using maul as a rage dump is considered a good idea is during tank swaps, and even then you should be pooling that rage for IF stacks for when you need to taunt back.

The Furor buff is a nice touch. However any warm and fuzzy feelings I might have about it are soured by shifting being taken off the gcd. Not to mention the Iron fur stacks I lose by shifting out of form.

Blizzards “fix” for keeping iron furs stacks up longer is to force me to waste 2 globals in between pulls by shifting, loosing the stacks i currently have, and then reward all that work and sacrifice for a meager 25 rage? Even with the 5 rage cost reduction and mangle rage buff, I still wont have enough rage to refresh IF for at least 2-3 globals. Yeah, thats pretty stupid if you ask me.

HARD PASS!

If only guardians druids had an ability similar to a warriors Demo shout. You know…something that gave 40 rage on demand and a 15% damage buff for 14 seconds while also taking 20% less damage. No, silly me, Im being selfish again, lets forget the damage buff and just settle for rage on demand. Something like an enrage!

oh wait… Thats right. They removed our enrage back in WoD.
(dont even get me started on the physical damage debuff it had untill cata)

And before you even think of mentioning Bristling fur as an option, ill remind you that this talent requires you to TAKE DAMAGE in exchange for rage. A little counter-intuitive if you ask me.

Just for fun though, lets indulge into your little scenario of being rage capped or having “excess rage” as you put it.

Thanks to being overwhelmed with Gore and Galactic Guardian procs, my thrash,3x swipe rotation currently has no room for another filler. Despite its impressive damage, I never have a “gcd to burn” for maul. Blizzard made sure of that when they took Maul off the “on next attack” as it should/used to be and placed it on the gcd with the rest of my attacks (and cooldowns). My aoe threat suffers enough already with out having to waste a gcd on a single target attack (or 2 target cleave, for arguments sake). That rage is always better spent on IF. Always. Even if you already have one rolling. Guess what? It stacks! Add another one! Or better yet, pool that rage untill its about to fall off to prolong its uptime.

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118

damn I didnt realize we had a dgrove theorycrafter here : |

:open_mouth:

Dam Tical, I can understand all the animosity when the PTR closes and these are all the changes, but you gotta relax, it’s not even up yet. And aiming blame at your fellow druid ain’t helping no one. I’m not saying you gotta pretend to be happy hoping not to bite the hand that feeds but it’s not your fellow droods that led bears to the stat their in now.

3 Likes
119

Oh… you haven’t heard of me? Im kind of a big deal. I have cabinets made of rich mahogany!

All joking aside… we’re too deep into an expac to be having these types of discussions. Perhaps thats the cause of my animosity. Its no longer funny. Its embarrassing (for blizzard).

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BAD KITTY!
Tical, you can’t be a druid and be owning pieces of nature as furniture! > : |

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What I find kinda funny about the latest ranting is that an ability to turn rage into aoe damage (strength-wise, it would need to be something like “maul now hits in an AoE”) would actually help a lot.

Like, our biggest problem with aoe rage generation is that almost everything we can do to generate more rage is a significant DPS loss. Our potential rage generation in AoE is actually very high. Gore procs a ton, and pure rage generation talents can add a lot on top of that. But, the difference between a pure offensive setup (brambles/GG/offensive azerite traits) and a pure defensive one is a huge amount of damage lost.

Being able to convert rage to AoE damage means you could actually run the defensive talents if you need them for part of a dungeon, and just burn away excess rage on mauls when it’s less needed. Bonus points for making Guardian’s Wrath less of a joke trait.

Probably simpler to just make us want to cast mangle in AoE, but I do just find it funny that an AoE rage dump is dismissed out of hand when the biggest issue with our AoE rage is not that it doesn’t exist, but that it’s a massive DPS loss to do.

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I haven’t even read what you wrote just great guild name

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If its going to cost 40 rage to do so, I dont want it. There is not one talent (or multiple combined for that matter) that can equal the mitigation we receive from multiple Iron fur stacks. We need it, we drop like flies without it, and a dead tank is about as useless as breasts on a nun, regardless of how high their aoe damage is.

If mangle were to stay a 6 second cd and gore instead proced free mauls. (and maul just happened to cleave), Then you bet your butt I’d use it.

But as stated above, its quite unoriginal and very similar to a prot warrior’s revenge.

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That’s a pretty simple-minded approach. I’m going to assume you have never spec’d GG this expansion (it’s virtually never ideal for survival), almost never spec’d brambles, always prioritize mangle above anything else even in AoE, etc.

Or, since those aren’t true (you’ve literally said you do thrash-swipex3), you clearly understand the value of prioritizing AoE damage occasionally, but just don’t want this particular way of doing it. Using swipe over mangle is essentially paying 12 rage for the damage of a swipe, so you’re already fine with spending rage on damage.

Sure it’s unoriginal, but it would be quite nice to have. It would be nice to be able to run defensive talents without completely nuking our damage.

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lol ok…
Expect that the reality of prioritizing aoe or “paying 8 rage for a swipe” is because I dont want to have to explain to my party why we just wiped because I decided to use only rage generating attacks so that I could to maximize my uptime on IF and possibly squeeze in a maul!.

What a ridiculous argument.

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12 rage*

You’re virtually guaranteed a gore proc in AoE environments. I suppose I could say between 11-12 since it’s only about a 75% chance you’ll have gore at 3 targets, but it’s still not 8.

It’s still kinda funny that it’s never worth spending rage to do extra aoe damage, except when it is.

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Weak.

Maul change is almost irrelevant. You should almost always be either saving rage for ironfur or using ironfur. Maul only sees real use in soloing, and even then a 10% reduction in cost on something so marginal and weak in effect is a waste of time. I guess if I am near 100 rage, the pack is almost dead, and I think I can recoup that cost before the last mob dies, I might hit maul. Maybe.

Ironfur cost change helps some, but again the overall effect seems weak. 10% cost reduction, eh, ok, whatever. Every bit helps.

Spells changed? My god, finally. It only took more than a decade for this to happen, and taking spells away from other specs while in bear form is bad. I’m not sure why they needed to take stuff away from other specs. Is there some rule that guardian/feral is ever allowed a straight buff without any nerfs?

Weaksauce bandaid changes, again. It’s all guardian ever gets, if that, so I guess I should be happy that something changed. Pretty obvious that no devs play guardian, if any of them even play the game at all anymore, and that guardian will likely remain the worst of the tanks.