I haven’t bothered with the math yet, but I’m curious how much the armor increase will help ToI. If it may become more viable anyway.
Like…. It’s not bad…
I was seeing like 5% of my damage from it.
It’s ok…. Nothing game changing though. I only take it to get RotS.
1 Like
Yes, but the fact that they didn’t lead with anything addressing the real problems bear has isn’t encouraging. “There will be more” dosen’t inspire confidence. Who knows what that could be? Reverting these buffs?
Bears have been begging for things like TnC fix, meaningful MDR, and a higher health pool since first day of Alpha and we’re now looking at the buffs they’re dropping to fix the nerf they just gave the weakest tank spec and it’s nothing we’ve asked for.
2 Likes
I agree with your comments completely
While I do agree with you it is concerning, I tend to believe they led with these to placate the bear community for a couple more days as they consider what to do with TnC and magic dr overall.
but was that with a focus on ToI or just passive normal use because of the rage dump going into Raze and not over stacking Iron fur.
Thats part of the problem though, we now have to go raze to make up for the random incarn nerf. Thats more of a band-aid solution then an actual fix. Especially because of how much of a dmg loss raze is in single target.
That or revert that berserk ravage nerf.
I just think to begin with raze should either just do maul dmg or be a choice node at the top of our tree with maul, its kinda stupid that we have to take an ability then it gets replaced with essentially a new ability at the bottom of the tree that deals less dmg in certain situations.
4 Likes
I don’t choose it because I have to……
It’s massive aoe damage.
My #1 attack.
I want this.
Even in my lazer build where it doesn’t generate ursoc shields, it’s my biggest hitter.
More than moonfire.
Pro tip.
You can have both.
Tooth and claw makes raze free.
You can stack IF and use raze simultaneously.
Under incarn when you want to “spam” it, both spells are half the cost. Finding rage to build stacks and “dump” the rest on raze is not a concern.
My major complaint with raze, is how buggy it feels. It fails to work on some bosses unless you are inside their model. Sometimes it seems like it should hit, but it doesn’t.
Just turning it into a pseudo 8 yard ranged ability that explodes in a 360 cleave on your target would solve some of the wonkinrss with it. Or just make it the same range/circle as thrash.
3 Likes
Still a joke of a spec. Worse mitigation, mobility, and utility than any other tank out there. On top of that the talent tree is still a disaster.
Just give druids a free class change, it’s clear you don’t want people playing the class.
2 Likes
^ forgot resto exists
To make berserk actually useful you have to go raze.
What’s the problem?
Your st takes a hit?
K.
I’ll trade those 4 pulls for the 50 others that allow me to push 100-150k dps.
1 Like
Even without Raze I think in some keys you’d end up taking berserk just for the Frenzied regen refresh, honestly.
It’s hard to get through a boss like Crawth without it. (Not impossible, the bleed just hurts really bad on high tyrannical weeks)
1 Like
Thorns of Iron seems horrendously bugged, though.
When I did giga pulls out in the open world (i.e. the outpost near Brackenhide Hollow with tons and tons of gnolls), even though I’m hitting 14+ stacks of Ironfur, Thorns of Iron did barely any damage. Somehow, I don’t think that it should be doing 50 damage to all nearby enemies when I have 90k+ armor…
EDIT: You know, it just occurred to me: Is it being improperly affected by soft target caps? It seems to work fine for 1-5 mobs… 
That might be the case, but I don’t see Thorns of Iron as being an AOE skill. Since damage is split between all targets, it’s more of a single target ability to me.
Im meaning the nerf to berserk makes the over all cd much weaker and that talenting into raze and maul stuff just so our main cd can actually work is pretty bad design.
2 Likes
Well yes, but it shouldn’t be doing less overall damage the more targets you’re hitting with it…
By definition, it should be doing exactly the same total damage regardless of the number of enemies hit. That being said, 90k armor dealing 50 damage implies you have 540 enemies on you.
Hi Druid forum! Long-time lurker. Been maining GuarDruid since its complete conception in Cataclysm. Wanted to finally hop on and give my input and agree/disagree with others’.
As Vincent said here: “These are all good changes, but none of them are really the changes guardian needs.” Like neat, we get extra armor, and Barkskin absorbs a little more. Firstly, we don’t need more armor. Ironfur can keep us up just fine, plus Barkskin’s reduction when we pop it on mixed physical/magical damage pulls. Secondly, none of these changes address the issue that we suffer immensely from magical damage in between our Barkskin/Sleeper CD windows. Tanking +14s, if I don’t have either of those available for magical damage, odds are both of my Regens are on CD. If I’m not in voice comms with my healer, I am most likely down to 10% HP with one or two spells–dead if Bolstering/Fortified week like last week.
Speaking of Regen: please, by god, pull it back off the GCD. THAT would be a step in the right direction of fixing GuarDruids. Since we don’t have beefy HP from Mastery, passive/frequently active MDR, or even decent absorb shields without fully speccing out one side of the talent tree, removing Regen from the GCD would give us more breathing room in being more readily reactive to damage.
Two very easy, very simple solutions to our MDR issues:
- Give Barkskin a MUCH lower CD, or a talent to give it a second charge
- Increase Mastery so we can be bullet sponges again. Either by percent scaling, or through a passive. Hell, you could even make it a required talent node and I’d be happy with it
Remember MoP and Legion with how naturally chunky bears were? Remember WoD with the Ursa Major passive? There’s been a post floating around on these forums about “Please hire someone who actually plays Druid,” and I can’t help but fall into that pit. DOES anyone there know GuarDruid’s shortcoming in the MDR department? DO they actively listen to GuarDruid mains? This update is kind of a spit in the face. “We heard you guys want more Barkskin/MDR, so here’s some more armor!”
Talent tree’s a mess, builds are not well optimized, defenses are skewed against us, etc. upon etc.
This is the first expansion that I’m genuinely looking to find a new main.
6 Likes