I also suggested a PVP talent for Regrowth to proc Eclipse. that would definitely fit the bill
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or what if they made something similar to vision of perfection where, say owlkin frenzy causes your next starfire to be instant cast and proc a 5 second eclipse.
but that puts it on a 30sec ICD. 
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without the icd reset of course, and it ignores any cooldown thats its on
Itâll work, sure. But also we donât really know how itâll play out yet either. Once we have more updates, itâll be easier to see where the final product will lean towards. Eclipse needs a bit of work in PVE too, and future updates may impact how PVP Eclipse feels.
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Full moon is very different to greater pyros. One is a spammable PvP mage talent (with ofc a mage toolkit behind it to make it work) based on percentages of health and instantly castable at full power, whereas the other is a built up charge based spell starting off relatively weak to becoming extremely strong after careful rampup and setup.
Itâs not like the spell would be used in a vacuum. You still have the druid toolkit at hand to help you get the spell off even in PvP. Itâs been done before in legion.
On top of that, in PvP if youâre solo, ofc youâll rely on your own utility spells to help you get the casts off, which will work against some classes, and not as well against others, as it goes for any class. But if youâre doing arenas, or bgs, you have a team that will be able to help you out even further to get off those powerful casts.
Itâs not so black and white. It doesnât have to be faster. If itâs faster, it also means it has to be less impactful because else itâs too OP. And if you get down that route, you just end up with starsurge and AP againâŠwhich is way more boring
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i was reading your feedback on the alpha forum where you mention the GCD of Heart of the Wild. You should also mention shifting being off the GCD. Itâs a doubly harsh punishment for druids since if we make the decision to use an affinity ability we are automatically punished by a GCD before we can even do it. Putting all forms on a 1-1.5 second cd after shifting would eliminate any power shifting if thats their concern, but shifting really needs to be taken off.
except itâs not extremely strong. I realize it can be buffed i just donât like the spell, at least not for pvp. I love the animation and when it was stronger it was a fun ability to watch a moon drop down on your enemies head. what would be cool maybe is if they eliminated the new moon/half moon parts of it and then gave it a way to be charged up (higher damage/lower cast time) and then unleashed
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My two biggest issues with the alpha eclipse are two that you neglected to mention here.
1: Bellular may have described it better than I can⊠but needing to react to a lunar eclipse in the middle of a wrath cast isnât going to feel good. A rotation isnât intuitive if it calls on the player to cancel a filler cast in progress to begin casting a different filler.
2: We donât have much of a say as to when the eclipse triggers. Charges are generated randomly now, yes, but at least starsurge offers some consistency. Imagine if shadow priestsâ voidform or DHâs 8 second meta were activated at random.
Agreed, but resource pooling is already recommended to minimize damage loss during necessary movement. Is anyone just tossing out starsurges as soon as they hit 40 astral power now?
Itâs encouraging to see that you and other seasoned druids are optimistic about these changes but Iâm not really understanding why. Resource flooding can be an issue on live for sure but alpha eclipse doesnât feel like a natural answer to that.
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Why do we have to iterate on something that only feels good to PvErs in a vacuum? Why canât we iterate on the current system, which is more compatible with PvP, questing, and leveling?
More charges?
More astral power reserves?
Lower chance for empowerments, but they deal way more damage?
Whatever the current problems are Iâm sure they can be solved in a way that doesnât introduce a mechanic that is only fun for your prolonged rotation and nothing else.
Also the comment about no longer hitting the lit up button doesnât say much⊠okay now you just hit the corresponding button to your eclipse, which may as well be lit up to tell you itâs eclipsed⊠who cares if you press buttons that are lit up?
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Owlkin Frenzy should also work for Wrath, otherwise itâll be difficult to get to Lunar.
In another note, how do you feel about Heart of the Wild? I like the flavor aspect of it a lot, but making it compete with Mass Entangle and Bash which have everyday uses in all aspects of the game just makes it feel like a bad choice. I would prefer Heart of the Wild to be baseline, itâs not like we have Tranquility anymore.
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idk. mighty bash isnât really a good pve talent. how often in pve does a boomkin need to stun a mob? in pve typhoon is much more usefull since it can be used as a ranged interrupt and has shorter cd. mass entaglement also seems better in pve, example being on skitra where it is invaluable on the row of adds that spawn and march across the field.
i think heart of the wild is going to be situational or to be used as an oh crap moment. like a fight where healing gets really intense as a soft enrage mechanic and being in resto affinity and popping HotW gets you past the encounter. or there is a fight where an add needs to be off-tanked and you can use guardian affinity with HotW to perform the function. or it might wind up being the best pvp talent on that row
You seem to be the most organiced druid player with the best overview on class mechanics and balance at least in this forum. Also contributing with some amazing ideas on how to change/add to the balance druid spec!
Would it be possible to ask for some help also on feral at some point down the line, before its too late? There are good ideas out there but none of us are as articculated as you and/or positively focused. And the dissagreements or focus on different aspects prevents us from producing anything really. A truly âferalâ community we are!
I honestly donât know enough about Feral to understand their current issues. There are expert Ferals providing feedback in other channels (non-forum). Weâve been pushing non-publicized feedback through these channels.
Ok that is good to hear, I only see an overwhelming amount of focus on Bloodtalons. But for most of us theres far mree to the spec than BT !
I agree, Mighty Bash is not really used for PvE, but it is used for PvP for a lot of situations (world, arenas, bgs). Mass Entanglement is used for both PvE and PvP.
My point is that having Heart of the Wild without Restoâs Mastery and healing cooldowns, or Guardianâs Mastery and cooldowns, is not really significant with its long duration. If an encounter design requires a Dps druid to be healing for longer than 7 seconds or offtank a mechanic, it would not be balanced design in the current state of the game (not saying it wouldnât be fun).
Currently, throwing a Swiftmend in PvE/PvP, or Frenzied Rejuv, Growl to help in Mythic are already significant contributions without Heart of the Wild, due to the small time window they are needed. I just donât see how Heart of the Wild makes those small time windows more significant for it to be worth a Talent slot for Dps druids with such a long cooldown compared to a 30cd mass root and a 1min cd stun.
I can see it valuable for Resto catweaving in Mythic, or for any Druid with Bear affinity being focused in PvP, or small healing burts, but still, those are small time windows, not 45 seconds, I donât see the reasoning behind having such a long cooldown and long duration. Perhaps a ~2 minute cooldown ~15 second duration would make it more appealing and increase its use cases.
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The problem is you do not represent what the average joe wants, where as they probably do, at least moreso. I hated balance druids from cata through to Legion because the spec was too complicated. Balance druids were low pop in most of those expansions for a reason.
Balance druids are very popular now. There is a reason for that. They are currently fun. So saying the current system is limiting for them is questionable to me when so many people currently play them.
Thats great that a few hardcore druids are going to have to work harder to get their dps. The rest of us just want a relaxing, fluid spec that works when we need it and does not require us to constantly be on edge. I work many 12 hour shifts, I want to give my brain a rest when I play this game.
But to each their own. I predict the balance druid population will drop off for sure in shadowlands.
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yeah idk. iâm not a big fan of the talent. i wasnât a fan of it when we had it back in Mist of Pandaria. Pretty much the only real consistent use i see it having is in PVP. or maybe while questing/soloing
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There is a time and place for extra difficult and rewarding rotations. Talents that modify the rotation, not the core rotation.
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You speak on this class like its some Egyptian hieroglyphs that only you have the knowledge of. Its not that complicated to see the notes and videos and visualize how the spec is gonna be if it goes live like this. BFA balance is the most popular the spec as ever been and thats because its way more fun than any eclipse iteration before it. That should give you a sign. Bringing this spec back to an old and proven unpopular version is just ridiculous and the fact that you promote it makes me question whether or not you have even played the spec at all in BFA. For every 1 person you can quote that says eclipse is good i can find you 4 more saying its bad.
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Youâre right, Balance is easy to visualize.
Consistently, Balance has been one of the simplest specs since WOD. Thereâs room to master the spec, but itâs also easy to deal relatively good damage. Druid is one of the most popular classes, and has been for a decade. That also happens to be as long as Iâve been putting focus into âgameplay feedbackâ for Balance Druid.
When thereâs a major change to Balance, such as WODâs Starsurge/Starfall charges, that was me solving a problem of âDevs donât want Starfall to be used on Single-Target.â That led directly to the Astral Power system in Legion and BFA.
During BFAâs Beta, Balance Druid was looking poor and needed iteration. I was approached by Class Devs to help identify sore points and provide feedback such as âwhat would you change?â I gave them feedback and they made A LOT of changes that aligned with said feedback.
BFA Moonkin has major flaws, though. Shadowlands Moonkin has major flaws too. We have ideas on how to these flaws.
Druid is one of the most popular classes, and has been for a decade.
Guardian isnât great (few players like to play tank).
Feral isnât great, and Balance matches performance of Feral with far less effort.
Balance and Resto are the most popular specs on Druid by a mile and a half.
The Empowerment mechanic has no meaning in BFA. Empowerment is always active. Empowerment is limiting BFA Moonkin specifically because Empowerment no longer provides a meaningful choice. The difference between an Empowered filler and non-Empowered filler is negligible.
And guess what Eclipse does? Practically the same thing as Empowerment, minus the meaningless choice. In single-target, it effectively buffs your fillerâŠlike Empowerment. Once you shift to AOE, Eclipse a little different and itâs currently one of the sore points in Shadowlands weâre hoping to patch up.
Whether or not you agree with feedback Iâve posted, no single person represents âthe average player.â
Every new expansion, I put forward a lot of effort to make Balance Druid as enjoyable as possible for as many players as possible. Iâm glad you enjoyed BFA Moonkin. I hope youâll enjoy Shadowlands Moonkin too.
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