I can’t play it, and since I got rid of it I stopped dying.
But it seems to be a popular aspect of being a druid so it begs the question; What am I missing?
Strike that last question. I’ve been playing the remix version when I suddenly realized how flimsy the class had become. Went back to my main to figure out how it was deviating from it, whereupon I discovered it was back in my talent tree! It took a lot of effort to get rid of it.
How do I get rid of it? I don’t like being a moonkin, I think it’s over-rated.
For the longest time I’ve opted out of investing in moonkin form in favor of spending my talents towards bear form. For the life of me I couldn’t understand the attraction for the squishy and negligible bonuses offered by the moonkin.
As to saying it is simple to pick up, You do or did, have to make a conscious investment on your talent tree.
Once I made the deliberate decision to forgo the moonkin, I did not miss it leading me to wonder, what the hell was I thinking trying to integrate the moonkin form into my spell rotation. Every time I changed shape or even just heal, I first had an additional keystroke just to get back into moonkin form which was often lost in the heat of battle, half the time I wasn’t using the talent anyway.
Which begs the question, what is the benefit?
What is it that everyone takes for granted that I haven’t grasped?
And be specific, don’t waste my time.
Okay because clearly we all have a different understanding of what you’re saying than you do;
Are you complaining about the talent or the spec. Because ‘boomkin’ implies playing Balance, which is a simple spec to pick up at a base level.
But if you’re complaining about moonkin as a talent, then it’s just flavour (a poor design of it at that), but you aren’t required to actually invest any rotation into it. Stick to the form based on your spec. If you don’t want the talents on the rights ide of the class tree, simply don’t spec into it.
You cant play balance without moonkin form, like im talking you lose 90% of your damage without (no eclipse, no 15% dam or 150% armor). They also removed moonkin form from resto feral and guardian because of this.
Hi OP, I completely agree about moonkin form being overrated. Which is why I myself actually skipped it as a talent for as long as I could.
It is useful, but for me; sitting in a form like that when mog exists is annoying. I also never cared for our label being boomy or laser chicken compared to other potential names lol.
Even with moonkin being made baseline, there is still room for those of us who prefer not to be in it while doing content. Just depends on how you play and how you’ve geared your build.
Sorry, I was in the understanding that all the other specialization’s spells automatically took one out of moonkin form, that you couldn’t do any type of healing in moonkin form and of course feral and guardian are obviously not going to utilize the moonkin form unless possibly starfire and moonfire, but you must first consciously change to moonkin, it has never been a default specialty for any of those spells. If you were to put those spells onto action bars of a cat or bear, it will not shift to moonkin, you need to additionally add another keystroke to engage the moonkn form.
What I guess I’m driving at is that 15% damage bonus as opposed to being able to cast another spell doesn’t strike me as cost effective. Moreover if you should have to heal yourself you are automatically taken out of moonkin form. Whereas bear form gives you a extraordinary boost in hp as well as frenzied regeneration and a moonfire that doesn’t break bear form.
But these observations are probably now obsolete with the new expansion and I apologize.
I can’t speak for anyone else, but I just like being a Druid, and I also happen to like being a caster DPS, so Balance it is.
Druid happens to be the only class in the game that is ranged DPS with a tank offspec. I think that is a huge oversight, and one they could have fixed many times over with:
Shaman tank
Warlock tank
Ranged Monk
Ranged Paladin
Ranged DK (Unholy almost smelled like ranged briefly in Legion)
Ranged DH
etc …
Seeing as none of these will ever seem to come true, it is the only real ranged/tank combo in the game. I’d happily try lean hard into another class if a new combo like that manifested.
I also like the insane list of QoL/perks Druids get. They have an OOC rez, a brez, stealth, 3 very-distinct-but-viable ways to quest, 4 incredible movement spells all baked into Wild Charge, lots of Leather gear sharing with other classes, etc.
I don’t love Balance specifically. My favorite caster vibes are old Elemental Shaman rotations that have mostly been co-opted by Destro locks these days. That said, neither of those classes can offtank and I choose to prioritize the QoL from Druid over those class’ QoL.
So yeah, Balance is really just a local maxima for me, not a global one. Someday they’ll add an incredible ranged 4th spec to a tank class or something and I’ll maybe I’ll properly switch mains, but for now Balance is juuuust good enough to keep me here.
i think druids make a formidable tank as long as you don’t waste talent points on getting mooonkin, but I seem to be in the minority in that regard.
I have had to work as both as a tank and a healer in the same dungeon without having to break from balance specialization. In a BG their biggest asset to shapshift and break the enemy’s focus (IMO).
And as I mentioned earlier bears have a ranged attack, which blew my mind!
Balance druid in tww is completely devoid of anything fun. They stripped it down to the point where it’s basically as basic as it can get for current wow.
I don’t recommend it, it’s boring and it would have been way better had they done nothing and kept everything the same as it was in DF, with the addition of hero talents