Balance Druid Leveling Guide from 1 to 90 — Midnight Season 1

The Druid class in general is a fantastic leveling class that offers a variety of different playstyles and the only class that lets you play as every type of style in the game. Feral for melee, Balance for caster, Guardian for tank, and Restoration for healing. Balance Druid has its own fun and interesting gameplay features that I hope you will come to enjoy as you level yourself!.

The biggest strength of Balance Druid leveling is its sheer toolkit which only increases as it gets levels. With its instant cast DoTs like Moonfire, its unlimited target AoE (Area of Effect) spender, Starfall, and eventually its 45-yard cast range, it is a fantastic puller. You are able to hit mobs quickly from far away and group them to be killed quickly and efficiently.

You can heal yourself and control enemies easily as a Balance Druid. Once you have access to abilities such as Typhoon and Ursol's Vortex, your gain the ability to much more easily pull large quantities of monsters and keep them away from you as you cast on them safely.

If this is your first character, or you simply want to find out more about leveling in WoW in general, we got you covered!

When leveling in open-world or dungeons, Balance Druid is a very basic builder-spender rotation priority. The basic idea is to rotate between Eclipses, which lasts 15 seconds. Apply your DoTs ( Moonfire and Sunfire) to your target and cast the Eclipse-appropriate filler ( Wrath for Solar and Starfire for Lunar). When you have enough Astral Power, you can cast a spender ( Starsurge on a single target and Starfall on multiple targets).

Here are some explanations for some of the phrases inside the guide that may help you understand the information better.

• A DoT refers to Damage over Time spells such as Moonfire and Sunfire.
• Fillers refer to spells that generate your main resource, which is Astral Power. Fillers should always be cast when there is nothing else we can do. Our fillers are Wrath and Starfire.
• A spender is an ability that consumes our main resource. These are powerful abilities that are crucial to dealing damage. Starsurge is spent on single or priority targets, and Starfall on multiple targets.

Balance Druid cooldowns all come from the talent tree. Celestial Alignment is your big cooldown and provides the benefit of both Eclipse states, allowing you to cast whatever you want as well as buffing all of your spells. On a single target, you will still be casting Wrath, and on multiple targets, you will want to cast Starfire.

As an added note, do not forget to make use of Recuperate to top yourself off after pulls as it will be faster than healing yourself.

When you are leveling, equip the highest item level gear. You will be replacing your gear often enough that you can indiscriminately equip based on item level without worrying about other stats.

When using Heirloom items, we recommend using those with Critical Strike and Haste, as they will slightly improve the gameplay flow while leveling. Find out more about Heirlooms in our dedicated guide!

If you are just starting your journey into Midnight, we have a Level 80 import string for you. You can follow the point-by-point allocation of the below tree once you start gaining levels in Midnight.

Move the slider below to make the guide update to your level!

Due to Balance only being unlocked as a talent specialization at Level 10, you should make use of the abilities provided to you in the intro quests until you are presented with the option.

1. Enter Moonkin Form and be in this form at all times.
2. Cast Force of Nature to hold aggro and damage mobs.
3. Apply Moonfire to the target.
4. Apply Sunfire to the target.
5. Cast Celestial Alignment on cooldown.
6. Cast Convoke the Spirits inside cooldowns.
7. Cast Eclipse if Celestial Alignment is on cooldown. Cast Wrath to activate Solar Eclipse on single target and Starfire to enter Lunar Eclipse on multi target.
8. Cast Starsurge when available on a single target and inside Eclipse.
9. Cast Starfall on more than one target.
10. Cast Wrath or Starfire as a filler to build Astral Power inside Eclipse.

When talenting any cooldowns, such as Force of Nature or Convoke the Spirits, you should use them as they come up. While leveling, most enemies will not pose much of a threat or have extended battles. Use these cooldowns to help speed things up as you level.

As you level and earn Talent points, you will begin to unlock the classes full potential. Early on you may be weak and only able to fight one or two enemies. As you get the Talents available in the higher tiers, you will become more powerful and able to handle more enemies efficiently.

If leveling through dungeons, swap out Force of Nature for Nature's Balance or Umbral Intensity, as the treants will taunt off the tank which may not always be wise.

Throughout these levels, focus on fewer enemies, as you do not have all the tools to deal with big pulls if you are not geared. DoT up one or two enemies and focus them down using Starsurge.

At this point, you are going to have some good utility talents to help you run away from enemies, as well as a fair amount of cleave damage.

Use Celestial Alignment and Whirling Stars liberally as they boost your damage significantly, and you can speed up the leveling process by doing big pulls to finish whole quests instantly.

Remember to keep your targets fully DoTed up to deal maximum damage.

You should have all of the tools you need to make sizeable pulls while leveling. Use Force of Nature with Celestial Alignment and Convoke the Spirits to do large pulls or kill dangerous enemies or rares.

We recommend Keeper of the Grove for Midnight leveling as it is a fast paced rotation which focuses more on short bursts making it good for leveling. You can even take Durability of Nature to keep your treants tanking.

In the Midnight Expansion, once you hit levels 81, 84, 87, and max level, you will get additional Talent Points in your Balance tree to spend on the new Apex Talents.

1. Ascendant Eclipses - Activating an Eclipse makes your next Wrath or Starfire instant. The first 3 Starsurges or Starfalls you cast during each Eclipse deal 20% increased damage.
2. Ascendant Eclipses - Your Critical Strikes dealt during an Eclipse cause their victims to languish for an additional 12% of damage dealt for 6 sec.
3. Ascendant Eclipses - Activating an Eclipse also launches Solar or Lunar Bolts at enemies within 40 yds that always critically strike. Solar Bolt hits 1 target and Lunar Bolt hits 3 targets and splashes.

These Apex talents, while impactful, are not gameplay altering. As you have leveled up, these quality of life and damage boosting talents will fit naturally into your rotation as is discussed below.

As you level up, you may want to visit the Auction House to look for level appropriate food, potions, and flasks depending on the type of content you are doing. Consumables can help significantly speed up the leveling process.

You may also wish to purchase Gunshoes to traverse long distances of the new continent quickly as well as Goblin Glider Kits to cancel out fall damage or jump off mountains.

In this section, we will rank the PvP talents best for leveling and doing solo / small group PvE content. Below is a ranking balance of Druid-specific PvE talents.

In this section, we will list the PvP talents best for leveling and doing solo / small group PvE content. Note that these may not be optimal in actual PvP situations.

• Star Burst is a passive effect that calls down falling stars on enemies during Starfall. Enemies who run into this take damage and get knocked up. Allies can pick these up and run into enemies to detonate them.
• Moonkin Aura is amazing for group combat and strong for solo content as well. This can buff all members in your party and help finish quests and rares faster. We would recommend this for all group content.
• Thorns can provide minimal peel or damage in open-world content.
• Malorne's Swiftness will let you move at 100% Movement Speed even while in combat. Great for open-world content.