I love having big bites but I also like having big rips.
Blizz and fellow Ferals, would a small percent redistribution be ok? We can start small to see how it is.
Like 5 to 10% nerf to bite and redistribute by buffing: 1/2 of the total to rip and 1/4 to rake and 1/4 to thrash? Something like that?
Seems like it’d help the most in M+ since big packs can have few bites. It’d nerf convoke a little too.
Only reason bite is good is because of sabertooth, they really should just nerf sabertooth to make the other talents a option
This is not the only reason that bite is good.
The rapid combo point generation of critical strikes and Berserk in conjunction with the duration of Rip guarantees you’re going to have more bites in your rotation than you have of any other finisher.
To me, the solution consists of allowing more diversity in which finishing move you press, and that’s by allowing Rip to roll forward damage into subsequent casts. I would even be comfortable if this was a competing talent option that replaces Lunar Inspiration. The third talent option for that row, moving Predator to a different tier, should be Savage Roar, which also sorely needs a buff. This makes that talent row a question of how you choose to use your combo points. (Because Predator is an AoE favored talent, it should compete with Brutal Slash and Primal Wrath.)
Further still, Ferocious Bite should gain a flat 35% damage buff. The bonus damage of Soul of the Forest and Sabertooth removed, and the Mastery changed back to exclusively bleed damage at a better ratio (remove bonus finisher damage). Flat percentage gains to finishing moves via specific talents compensates for poor initial design.
To compensate the loss of power from the bite build, Sabertooth should add a portion of bite damage to Rip, as if it were rolled, or gain a percentage bonus for the number of bleeds on the target, just like the conduit currently does (making this solution unlikely until Shadowlands is over).
Seems like you’re over complicating a simple issue, its obvious sabertooth out performs the other 2 options but i did have a similar opinion has you in a post i made back in october
https://us.forums.blizzard.com/en/wow/t/savage-roar-baseline-and-my-ideas-for-feral/699659/2
I made this post and im curious on your thoughs on it
They should copy swtor “Cull” ability. Maybe call it “Bleed Them Dry” or some variant. A channeled melee ability (non-interruptable) that does damage based on the current bleeds on a target. Channels for 3 seconds and makes each bleed tick multiple times during the channel. Promotes good snapshotting of bleeds and a good setup to make full use of it.
Feral doesnt really need anything more to enhance its single target rotation or big offensive cd, it just needs a small talent overhaul and some dmg numbers relocated underperforming spells like rip/thrash
Some ferals might disagree regarding Berserk. For a 3 minute cooldown, its pretty lacking.
We don’t have to change anything actually. We have tools to play a more bleed-centric play style.
Predator > Sabertooth: buff all your bleeds (and all abilities) while under the effects of almost constant uptime on TF
Savage Roar > Soul of the Forest: increase bleed damage and not have it just focused on finishers
PW > BrS: Rips everywhere!
Feral Frenzy > Bloodtalons: Bleed and Bite in 1!
Circle of Life and Death for AoE and Draught for Single Target
Any of the 4 covenants will work honestly.
No need to convert anything over or change anything. The options and tools are there, you just don’t hear it or see it in the guides because guides aren’t about options. It’s about min/maxing. Even if this play style were to be competitive from a numbers stand point, you wouldn’t see it because it’s not “the best”
Rip is actually our best DPE ability. And Thrash scales well with mob number. Assuming they’ll live the full 12 seconds of the bleed effect. So that’s more situational and could use a little overhaul. But Rip is fine
It being a 3 minute does suck, but the ability to go Shred —> Bite 4-5x in a row is pretty awesome. Especially if you’re able to line it up with any sort of mastery buff!
I’m not sure the math on that adds up in regards to energy cost. Not saying you’re wrong, I just don’t see how I could cast shred and then ferocious bite 4 times in a row without waiting for energy to refill. Maybe MY math is wrong?
5 may be pushing it, but starting with a full energy pool, 4 in a 20 second window is quite doable 
Ah I see. You didn’t literally mean global after global.
Some complain that “20 second window” doesn’t equate to a ton of pressure because it provides ample time for CC, healing, etc.
But your point stands.
I still don’t think it is equivalent to other 3 minute dps cooldowns in the game. The original Incarnation was what I imagined it should be. Energy costs reduced by 50% and Prowl able to be used multiple times was a proper 3 minute cooldown, IMO.
I would much prefer the 50% energy cost myself. At least that way it can at least be used in conjunction with BT talent
brutal slash helps
Not in this situation. Brutal Slash and Swipe have no interaction with Berserk
for the combo point generation yeah but it costs less energy then shred, so if you’re at 4 combo points better off using 1 Brutal slash
Depends on the situation I guess. There were a few of us discussing the new iteration of Berserk during the pre patch and discussing whether or not it would be worth it to fire off a 4 point Bite in Berserk window or risk over capping.
In a perfect world, you’d get lucky with Crits, and get 4-5 back to back 5 combo points off your single Shred.
But back to the 4 point Bite concern.
In the event you fire off a 5 point Bite going into Berserk, and end up with 4 combo points, you have 25 energy as well.
You can burn 25 energy on 69% attack power, or pool 25 energy for 78.6% attack power bonus and a total of 157.2% attack power.
Using BrS to get to 5 CP and then pool 50 energy for a Bite seems like the logical thing to do. And on a single use, it would be.
But in using BrS you’re missing out on the damage bonus to Shred as well as the extra combo point generator ability as well, which is technically free energy, and as such, reduce the amount of Bites you can fit inside that Berserk window (which is what I think the purpose of Berserk is - pump out finishers).
And therein lies the dilemma
Sabertooth power creep is a simple issue.
I agree that (1) allowing more bites rotationally via Rip extension PLUS (2) a 20% empowerment to those bites creates an obvious skew in favor of SbT single target.
I disagree, however, on the nature of bites outside of SbT builds though. Even outside of SbT, bites dominate the kitty kit, except in M+ cleave where Primal Wrath dominates CP usage. In direct response to your note, this is the only portion of my post that was relevant:
Because of this, the distribution at the end of a fight heavily favors FB casts. Thus, the core problem is not “bite”, in my eyes. It’s a choice problem: “How do you want to use your combo points?”
Predator outperforms SbT in cleave scenarios where you’re able to push TF resets consistently; single target though, there is an obvious “loadout” problem that goes deeper than just SbT’s design. And that’s where most of the latter of my post went secondary to the Sabertooth problem.
…
I think “our” problem is we love kitty bleed builds, but big bites has been a go-to since per-use parity was emphasized on FB vs. Rip, and the Mastery was changed to include bonus damage to all finishing moves–a Sub-lite design. Those changes didn’t have anything to do with SbT itself, but were tools devs use to effect (create, not influence) game balance. And that’s when the gameplay really changed for Feral.
I also am in that thread too, except I was focused on druidic magic type there, and thinking how PS could have an offensive talent option. Let’s face it, Lunar Inspiration is just bad. Some people like it for mass pulls, but it’s just not good.
As far as healing through damage, or damage through healing, I feel it’s not as fun of a design as choosing to damage or heal (exclusive choice). If you have both, it’s either underwhelming in one area or too powerful as an HP swing. I do agree that synergy should be a goal, though maybe challenge that the defense and offense axes be maintained distinctly, especially when you start to look at cooldowns or “soft” cooldowns (predatory swiftness, or enhancement shaman’s maelstrom).
If I’m not capped and have a GCD lull, I will still use Regrowth procs on the tank or myself, even if just for the HoT. It’s a little bit of an extra edge, even if not a game-changer. And probably an unpopular opinion here… Feral druid has better sustain healing plus damage than Ret paladin, because we’re not choosing combo point healing OR damage, which WoG and TV coerce a paladin to do.
Here’s some more from me on SbT and SR:
The core design is bite or die.
I think you know that and are trying to balance the idea that something is “doable”, even if not exactly realistic.
So again:
And that question isn’t tackled by the current talent design.
As far as your 4 vs 5 CP bites question during Berserk, I will refresh Rake if its time is below half, even if not a perfect pandemic reset. If it’s the last few seconds of Berserk, I shred, as I can Bite outside the window. I go MoC and pre-pool, TF after the first dump, so the extra energy drain from more bites isn’t as heavy. Might not be perfect but feels right, since combo points are one of the heaviest sources of damage, and overcapping by ~3 is too painful to happen without good justification.
Yes. But the point still stands. You can still focus on a bleed style play with the tools that are available. There’s even Legendaries that focus solely on that 
Getting 4-5x Finishers in a Berserk window is totally realistic lol but it’s still lackluster for a 3 minute cooldown imo. And I stand by my comment of saying I’d rather take away the damage bonus and combo point bonus in favor of 50% energy costs for the 20 seconds
Yeah that’s my personal preference too. Feels better to fire off a 4 point bite than to overcap. But as far as someone sitting down and figuring out what’s truly “optimal” play in that situation, who knows.