Balance Druid 7.3

[Damien 1,514]

This thread is for comments about our Balance Druid guide for Legion.

 

[Guest Justsayin]

In Builds and Talents, the guide recommends not taking blessing of the ancients, because despite being very strong, it has no synergy with fury of elune, which you are unlikely to skip. Guide moves on to tell you to skip fury of elune because it's suboptimal at level 100. It's like the guide can't decide if it's for prepatch or Legion.

[Guest Atraac]

On Rotation page guide skips Stellar Flare, even though on Talents page, it recommends using it over Incarnation.

[Guest Kylis]

So apparently Cyous is saying he never reviewed anything for you. 

Quote

For the record, I have not reviewed anything for Icy-Veins for Legion content.

But I can say that some of their info is incorrect at this time. Stellar Flare seems absent from the guide as well, even though it's our best available talent for lvl100.

Whats the deal with labeling him in the opening?

Also there are some inconsistencies in the guide overall.

[Vlad 411]

12 hours ago, Guest Justsayin said:

In Builds and Talents, the guide recommends not taking blessing of the ancients, because despite being very strong, it has no synergy with fury of elune, which you are unlikely to skip. Guide moves on to tell you to skip fury of elune because it's suboptimal at level 100. It's like the guide can't decide if it's for prepatch or Legion.

There was a bit of a mix-up there between Gapezilla and I. Indeed, Fury of Elune is suboptimal at 100 and shouldn't be used, and neither should Astral Communion due to this fact. Blessing of the Ancients is the recommended choice there, and the guide should now be fixed in this respect.

4 hours ago, Guest Atraac said:

On Rotation page guide skips Stellar Flare, even though on Talents page, it recommends using it over Incarnation.

This was an oversight on our part, the issue should now be addressed.

1 hour ago, Guest Kylis said:

So apparently Cyous is saying he never reviewed anything for you. 

Whats the deal with labeling him in the opening?

Also there are some inconsistencies in the guide overall.

Regarding Cyous, I must apologize. There is a miscommunication to blame and I can absolutely confirm he did not review this version of the guide. As for the inconsistencies (other than the 2 mentioned above), I would love to know what they are so I can fix the issues.

 

I want to thank all of you for your prompt comments. It is much appreciated.

[Guest anon]

Why is Cyous still mentioned in the guide then? :-)

[Guest Vernal Lion]

I'm confused by the single target rotation as the current information regarding the rotation and empowerments seems contradictory:

 

• Use  Solar Wrath to generate Astral Power.
  • If there is more than 1 target present, use  Lunar Strike instead.

 

• Keep in mind that using Starsurge grants you a charge of  Lunar Empowerment and  Solar Empowerment, which cap at 3 and are consumed by using  Lunar Strike and  Solar Wrath, respectively. Avoid capping these Empowerments.

 

If Lunar Empowerment and Solar Empowerment should never be capped, does this mean Lunar Strike should be cast to use the Lunar Empowerment even if there is only 1 target?  

[Furty 51]

15 minutes ago, Guest Vernal Lion said:

I'm confused by the single target rotation as the current information regarding the rotation and empowerments seems contradictory:

 

• Use  Solar Wrath to generate Astral Power.
  • If there is more than 1 target present, use  Lunar Strike instead.

 

• Keep in mind that using Starsurge grants you a charge of  Lunar Empowerment and  Solar Empowerment, which cap at 3 and are consumed by using  Lunar Strike and  Solar Wrath, respectively. Avoid capping these Empowerments.

 

If Lunar Empowerment and Solar Empowerment should never be capped, does this mean Lunar Strike should be cast to use the Lunar Empowerment even if there is only 1 target?  

That is correct. An empowered Lunar Strike is more DPET than an unempowered Wrath.

[Tarazet 144]

There is no specific problem with capping Empowerments at 3, other than possibly capping Astral Power, but do not use Starsurge if you have 3 stacks of either Empowerment or you will overwrite. I'm sure there will be some question about whether to save up Empowerments before using your cooldowns; I'll have to test it out, but my inclination is, the cooldown lasts long enough that delaying usage in the opener will cause more harm than good. For sure, if you are coming up to the second usage, save your Empowerment stacks before CA/Inc is available.

Edited July 19, 2016 by Tarazet

[Guest Oloo]

The build suggestion is just flat out wrong.

Stellar Flare may "look" good on paper regarding the math but it DOES NOT EVEN COME CLOSE to performing near Incarnation or Soul of the Forest - I know a certain math want-a-be will try hard to shoot this fact down but live logs don't lie. 

Furthermore, Astral Communion is far better at allowing your rotation to have some flexibility when it comes to burst phases (i.e. pull, ring, lust).  While it doesn't generate as much resource as Blessing of the Ancients, this flexibility is a MUST - again refer to live logs.  Resource generation is NOT a problem anyways. Shooting Stars provides the most resource generation at 3+ mobs (2 if there is any movement mechanics at all) but again - no flexibility when it comes to burst.  These are things that paper math just can't account for.

Again, while on paper Nature's Balance "looks" like a dps increase - it simply isn't ESPECIALLY if you have the class trinket as the build suggests.  20% increase to Starfall simply IS a DPS increase as Starfall does an incredible amount of damage now.  Even with Nature's Balance, we'll have to refresh our dot's especially when considering any and all mechanics that will prevent us from just standing there casting as the "math" would suggest we'll be able to do. Lastly, the fights currently do not last long enough for Nature's Balance to make up the difference.

In Legion, Stellar Flare may be a viable option at the cost of Starsurge and instead hard casting Starfall.  While Moonkin is competitive and the play has been improved, we will unfortunately rely once again on tier bonus sets or that one awesome trinket / legendary to reduce the cost or perhaps even make starfall or starsurge free to cast (case in point - WoD class trinket is BiS right up until we hit 110 and it no longer works).

 

 

[Vlad 411]

16 hours ago, Tarazet said:

There is no specific problem with capping Empowerments at 3, other than possibly capping Astral Power, but do not use Starsurge if you have 3 stacks of either Empowerment or you will overwrite. I'm sure there will be some question about whether to save up Empowerments before using your cooldowns; I'll have to test it out, but my inclination is, the cooldown lasts long enough that delaying usage in the opener will cause more harm than good. For sure, if you are coming up to the second usage, save your Empowerment stacks before CA/Inc is available.

The guide is meant to say not to overwrite the Empowerments, not cap them. Clearly, a mistake. I'll fix it right now. Thanks :)

[Guest Drodex]

Why  is crit more prioritized than Mastery ?

 Mastery = stronger empowerment for spells after casting SS  + boost for DoTs ( via stronger stellar empowerment ) so if u have class trinket and a bit of luck u have almost perma stellar empowerment on target (s). + with haste u will have enough astral power so spells u cast will be empowered most of the time.

This looks more powerful  or am i missing something about crit  ? :)
 

[Guest noob11111]

It seems to me that there are three damage profiles that synergistic talents build into. Only the level 15, 75, 90 & 100 talents affect it, so I'll only mention them.

Full disclosure, I'm low skilled, geared & experienced. If I'm missing some basic understanding of the game, apologies.

1.  Single target burst : Warrior of Elune, Incarnation, Astral Communication and Fury of Elune.

These skills synergise by; dealing high burst damage with a high resource cost (Fury); buffing burst damage (Incarn.); and quickly generating resources (Warrior & Astral).

A typical rotation would open with applying both dots, and then begin generating astral power using wrath. Once you reach full astral power begin your burst - pop incarnation, cast fury, and then maintain at least 12 astral power using warrior of elune and astral comm - also using lunar/wrath when possible. After the burst, go back to generating astral power. I don't know if it may be more beneficial to stall casting fury again until innacarnation is back up, and build up lunar empowerment charges as you burn excess astral power with starsurge (solely using wrath as the generator). Or you could just use fury again when warrior comes off cd, without incarnation. 

I think this build would benefit most from Crit & Haste.

2. Sustained single target damage with a small area of effect (target + 2-3 close proximity adds): Starlord, Soul of the Forest/Stellar Flare, BotA, and Natures Balance.

These skills synergise by increasing the frequency starsurge can be used, and the potency of it's procs. It also allows you to almost passively maintain your dots on 2-3 targets.

To open you would being by applying moonfire to any mobs in close proximity to your main target, and then applying starfire and monfire to the main target. You then begin building astral power with lunar strike, this refreshes the moonfire dot on all close proximity targets, and cast recast startfire as needed to maintain the dot on all close proximity targets. Stack astral power and when it's full pop celestial alignment and spend your astral power using starsurge to burst the main target. You should be able to get off 3-4 starsurges during CE due to starlord.

Less burst than the previous build, but decent sustained AoE and single target damage (in an 5 yard radius).

3. High AoE DoT: Starlord, Stellar flare, Shooting stars, Stellar drift.

Havent actually tried this out - sorry. Your DoTs are buffed by starfall, your starfall is buffed by stellar drift, and the AP your DoTs generate is buffed by Shooting stars allowing more casts of starfall. 

DoT eveything, starfall when you can, maintain dots, and spam generators in between (while moving around.... wew). You could make the argument for using astral communion (+75 AP) instead of starlord, as casting starfall over starsurge will limit it's effectiveness, and raw AP might be better in low density situations.

I guess you'd go haste & crit....

 

Like I said, I'm super low, but it seems to me like there wasn't much thought put into any builds which don't have the trinket...

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Vlad 411]

On July 21, 2016 at 11:04 PM, Guest noob11111 said:

It seems to me that there are three damage profiles that synergistic talents build into. Only the level 15, 75, 90 & 100 talents affect it, so I'll only mention them.

Full disclosure, I'm low skilled, geared & experienced. If I'm missing some basic understanding of the game, apologies.

1.  Single target burst : Warrior of Elune, Incarnation, Astral Communication and Fury of Elune.

These skills synergise by; dealing high burst damage with a high resource cost (Fury); buffing burst damage (Incarn.); and quickly generating resources (Warrior & Astral).

A typical rotation would open with applying both dots, and then begin generating astral power using wrath. Once you reach full astral power begin your burst - pop incarnation, cast fury, and then maintain at least 12 astral power using warrior of elune and astral comm - also using lunar/wrath when possible. After the burst, go back to generating astral power. I don't know if it may be more beneficial to stall casting fury again until innacarnation is back up, and build up lunar empowerment charges as you burn excess astral power with starsurge (solely using wrath as the generator). Or you could just use fury again when warrior comes off cd, without incarnation. 

I think this build would benefit most from Crit & Haste.

2. Sustained single target damage with a small area of effect (target + 2-3 close proximity adds): Starlord, Soul of the Forest/Stellar Flare, BotA, and Natures Balance.

These skills synergise by increasing the frequency starsurge can be used, and the potency of it's procs. It also allows you to almost passively maintain your dots on 2-3 targets.

To open you would being by applying moonfire to any mobs in close proximity to your main target, and then applying starfire and monfire to the main target. You then begin building astral power with lunar strike, this refreshes the moonfire dot on all close proximity targets, and cast recast startfire as needed to maintain the dot on all close proximity targets. Stack astral power and when it's full pop celestial alignment and spend your astral power using starsurge to burst the main target. You should be able to get off 3-4 starsurges during CE due to starlord.

Less burst than the previous build, but decent sustained AoE and single target damage (in an 5 yard radius).

3. High AoE DoT: Starlord, Stellar flare, Shooting stars, Stellar drift.

Havent actually tried this out - sorry. Your DoTs are buffed by starfall, your starfall is buffed by stellar drift, and the AP your DoTs generate is buffed by Shooting stars allowing more casts of starfall. 

DoT eveything, starfall when you can, maintain dots, and spam generators in between (while moving around.... wew). You could make the argument for using astral communion (+75 AP) instead of starlord, as casting starfall over starsurge will limit it's effectiveness, and raw AP might be better in low density situations.

I guess you'd go haste & crit....

Like I said, I'm super low, but it seems to me like there wasn't much thought put into any builds which don't have the trinket...

Hello. Thank you for your post. I'll attempt to explain why we went with the build we have.

1. The problem with this idea revolves entirely around the legendary ring. Unless you've found a way to convince your entire guild/raid group to delay their ring so you can build up some AP to get a good FoE off, you're going to see very poor results with this. At 110 we'll see a lot more use of Fury thanks to increased AP generation from the artifact and not having to play around the shenanigans of the current legendary ring, but for now this build is suboptimal at best and straight up terrible at worst.

2. "almost passively" maintaining DoTs on more than 1 target via Nature's Balance isn't possible. Between casting Starsurge and Stellar Flare, your DoTs will run out very quickly if you aren't tunneling into a single target. It may be possible on 2 targets if you aren't using Stellar Flare, but for this patch that would just be suboptimal.
That's also not how to use Celestial Alignment. Not only do you run into the problem noted in point 1 regarding the legendary ring, you want to be CAing on the opener regardless in order to generate AP faster and get starsurges out to hopefully proc Seed of Creation's starfall. If you get unlucky (or play incorrectly) and fail to proc a starfall during the ring, your opener will be bad, plain and simple.

3. This is closer to the best build on this patch, but Shooting Stars will not provide better AP generation than BotA below 3 consistent targets. Regarding the playstyle/rotation, this is also something you'll possibly see at 110, but is completely inefficient at 100 due to Seed. You basically never want to manually cast Starfall on this patch. As for AC over starlord, there is absolutely no argument there, you would never do that for this kind of build.

The simple truth is if you don't have a Seed of Creation on this patch, boomkin is a bad class. With it and the right talents, we are one of the stronger classes, top 3 maybe. You must do everything you can to get ahold of this trinket if you want to do competitive dps on this patch, as it is the class's only saving grace in a world without artifacts.

[Vlad 411]

On July 20, 2016 at 1:51 PM, Guest Oloo said:

The build suggestion is just flat out wrong.

Stellar Flare may "look" good on paper regarding the math but it DOES NOT EVEN COME CLOSE to performing near Incarnation or Soul of the Forest - I know a certain math want-a-be will try hard to shoot this fact down but live logs don't lie. 

Furthermore, Astral Communion is far better at allowing your rotation to have some flexibility when it comes to burst phases (i.e. pull, ring, lust).  While it doesn't generate as much resource as Blessing of the Ancients, this flexibility is a MUST - again refer to live logs.  Resource generation is NOT a problem anyways. Shooting Stars provides the most resource generation at 3+ mobs (2 if there is any movement mechanics at all) but again - no flexibility when it comes to burst.  These are things that paper math just can't account for.

Again, while on paper Nature's Balance "looks" like a dps increase - it simply isn't ESPECIALLY if you have the class trinket as the build suggests.  20% increase to Starfall simply IS a DPS increase as Starfall does an incredible amount of damage now.  Even with Nature's Balance, we'll have to refresh our dot's especially when considering any and all mechanics that will prevent us from just standing there casting as the "math" would suggest we'll be able to do. Lastly, the fights currently do not last long enough for Nature's Balance to make up the difference.

In Legion, Stellar Flare may be a viable option at the cost of Starsurge and instead hard casting Starfall.  While Moonkin is competitive and the play has been improved, we will unfortunately rely once again on tier bonus sets or that one awesome trinket / legendary to reduce the cost or perhaps even make starfall or starsurge free to cast (case in point - WoD class trinket is BiS right up until we hit 110 and it no longer works).

 

 

I'm sorry, but Stellar Flare is definitely the talent to use right now. Check basically any top boomkin on warcraftlogs and you will see. It's not about what it looks like on paper, it's about actual performance.

[Guest Oloo]

On ‎7‎/‎22‎/‎2016 at 11:39 PM, Vlad said:

I'm sorry, but Stellar Flare is definitely the talent to use right now. Check basically any top boomkin on warcraftlogs and you will see. It's not about what it looks like on paper, it's about actual performance.

Assault, top 2 didn't use it.  3rd used it and it did a whopping 612k total damage and he cast it 5 times - in other words he wasted that tier talent option.

Iron Reave - top 3 didn't use it.

Komrok - top 2 didn't use it. 3rd used it, cast it once and it did 443k total damage. Compared to his guild mate (who was first) he was only able to cast 3 starsurges which in turn means less empowered solar wraths and lunar strikes - again - wasted tier talent for damage that was done entirely on the burst opener.

Council - top 3 didn't use it.

Kilrogg - top 1 didn't use it. 2nd and 3rd used it to good effect with buff.

Iskar - top 3 didn't use it.

Zakuun - top 3 didn't use it.

Xhul - top 1 and 3rd didn't use it. 2nd did use it to good effect.

Soc - top 3 didn't use it

Tyrant - top 2 used it with great effect. 3rd didn't use it

Manny - top 3 used it good effect

Archi - top 1 didn't use it. 2nd and 3rd used it to good effect.

You are wrong - Stellar Flare is definitely NOT "the talent" to use right now. You check top moonkins on warcraftlogs next time instead of making me do it. 

Further, the only reason they are picking Blessing of the Ancients is because you can maintain 100% energy by swapping in and out of Bear before a pull (most likely soon to be fixed).  Many of the fights at this moment don't last long enough to over come Celestial Alignment - for example on one fight a top moonkin cast 6 Stellar Strike and 10 Solar Wraths which generates an extra 44 astral power.  That's it.  Compared to 75 for Celestial Alignment.....  So the only benefit was to bug the astral power drain before the fight.

On a side note - not on a single log does the author use Nature's Balance - not even on those "single target" fights where the math looks better on paper and thus in this guide.  Which means you and I both agree that it's about actual performance verses paper math.  Nature's Balance, as of right now, is a DPS loss - and quite a large one at that.  BURST is and probably will always be king on the majority of all encounters.

 

[Gapezilla 2]

Oh boy where to begin..

If you're wondering about my logs from last week, you might notice a healthy chunk of the bosses are missing. There were some shenanigans some players did to kill bosses quickly that got our logs deleted...oops. This was also at the beginning of the week before the instance got nerfed another two times (for reference, the health debuff is now 50% and the dmg debuff 40%).

Some clarification: I'm the reviewer, not author, but I do have some changes planned for the recommended talents after having done HFC again this week with the latest round of nerfs.

To quickly go over some of the specific points you made:

Obviously you won't take Stellar Flare on assault. I've been very vocal about how I feel about assault as a "boss". You could decide to unskill all your talents on that boss and jack off in the corner, it wouldn't really matter. it's an extended trash pull and nothing more- an extraordinary waste of time at the beginning of each raid week. 

Xhul, Kumrock, Socrethar, Iron reaver and Fel lord: If your guild is killing them in 30s-1m, take Incarn over Stellar Flare, yes. If the kill time is longer, flare is king. There is no debate, it does more damage the longer the fight is. This becomes increasingly more apparent as you get to the 2m+ range. Especially on Xhul

Kilrogg: Ranking on this fight is a cheesy joke and has been since the instance was released. If your kill time is long enough to even reach the downstairs phase, yes taking Incarn for the extra burst when you come up with the 20 stack buff will do more than Flare.

Iskar: Incarn is best here, its a heavy aoe fight. That's in the guide.

Gorefiend: Incarn is best here, there is heavy aoe and a burst phase. That's in the guide.

 

Something I'd like you to realize however, is that most guilds will not be killing bosses in 30 seconds like you see at the very top end of warcraftlogs. Icy veins boomkin guide is and will continue to be a guide aimed at progression raiders of all levels; a good starting point for learning (or relearning in the case of Legion pre-patch) the class as you move into your preferred level of content. To my knowledge this is where all of the guides on this website are aimed at. As I am in a high end guild with some absolutely breakneck kill-times, you will often see me using different talents than what I would recommend for someone killing the bosses two, three, four, fives times slower than what my guild is capable of.

[Vyncent 0]

Information on Incarnation needs to be updated. It is not a 50% increase, it is only 35%!

[dracuella 0]

When choosing gear for my Balance druid, I rely heavily on this page for guidance. But I'm finding it difficult to decide where the line between the different stats lie and was wondering if anyone has been using simulations to find the precise weights for an addon like Pawn? 
I found them for my BM hunter here on icy-veins (calculated with Simulation Craft  by @Azortharion who wrote the guide) but have so far not had any luck unearthing any for a balance druid. I found some on noxxic (http://www.noxxic.com/wow/pve/druid/balance/stat-priority) but I'm still not convinced those are correct as it once recommended me drop 2 INT for 3 CRIT. 

Any advice out there? Perhaps inserting links to Pawn weights if there are any?
 

Edited August 12, 2016 by dracuella

[PatrickHenry 293]

Balance

• Blessing of Elune now increases Astral Power generation by 25% (was 40%).
• Blessing of An'she now grants 2 Astral Power every 3 seconds (was 2 Astral Power every 2.5 seconds).
• Lunar Strike now generates 12 Astral Power (was 10).
• Mastery: Starlight bonus has been increased to 2%/point (was 1.75%).
• Moonfire and Sunfire DoT damage has been decreased to 50% per tick (was 55%).
• Shooting Stars gives 4 Astral Power (was 5).
• Solar Wrath now generates 8 Astral Power (was 6).
• Developer's Note: We shifted some Astral Power generation from the level 90 talent row into the baseline spec. This both improves gameplay sub level 90 and reduces reliance on these talents at max level.

Baseline Astral Power generation up slightly, with a talented AP generation drop to compensate.  Fewer Wraths to get capped?  Fine with me...

[Guest Elnaturale]

Quote

 

1. Basics

The stat priority for a Balance Druid is as follows.

Haste;

Intellect;

Critical Strike >= Versatility;

Mastery.

 

 

Surely you mean 

 

Int

Haste

Crit>=Versatility

Mastery?

 

[Guest Dan]

Hello. First of all I want to apologize for what may seem to some of you as a noob question, but to be honest I'm at a complete loss as where to find one particular artefact weapon trait. Meaning the Falling Star. Please, if anyone knows where or how to get it, please let me know. Thanks in advance.

Dan

 

[Vlad 411]

3 hours ago, Guest Dan said:

Hello. First of all I want to apologize for what may seem to some of you as a noob question, but to be honest I'm at a complete loss as where to find one particular artefact weapon trait. Meaning the Falling Star. Please, if anyone knows where or how to get it, please let me know. Thanks in advance.

Dan

 

I am not sure what you mean by "where to find it". It's in your artifact weapon trait tree (top left). When you unlock the traits leading up to it and have enough Artifact Power, you'll be able to choose it. It's not a drop or anything.

[Vlad 411]

7 hours ago, Guest Elnaturale said:

 

Surely you mean 

 

Int

Haste

Crit>=Versatility

Mastery?

 

That is not a mistake, Haste above Intellect.

[Guest Dan]

5 hours ago, Vlad said:

I am not sure what you mean by "where to find it". It's in your artifact weapon trait tree (top left). When you unlock the traits leading up to it and have enough Artifact Power, you'll be able to choose it. It's not a drop or anything.

Hello, I'm sorry for the missunderstanding. What I meant was where to find the unlock, as for example the trait Scythe of the Stars which I got as a questreward during a certain questline. Once again thank you so far for your help and thank you in advance for any other guidance.

Dan