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All of the latest Mists of Pandaria newsIs Druid insta-shifting overpowered?
by David Bowers 
Nov 2nd 2007 at 5:30PM
Serennia, a gnomish warrior on Tichondrius, believes that the changes to druid shape-shifting [shown in the video clip above] in patch 2.3 make it too easy for druids to get out of snares without being caught in their vulnerable caster form. She puts it very eloquently:
In 2.3, druids can shift from any form to any form (ie cat to bear; bear to travel, etc) without having to enter human form. But, it gets worse, they can shift from the same form to the same form also (bear to bear). Why is this significant? It's basically a free snare removal without ever having to expose themself in human form, making it much more difficult for anyone to kill them. It still costs them mana to do it, yes, but it's an easy trade-off for never being locked in caster form with no armor anymore to get away from a melee. So much for those well-timed caster-form kidney shots, right?She says that this may or may not be what Blizzard was intending when they decided to go ahead with this change, but for my part, I think it's a buff druids really need, especially feral ones, who are likely to get the most use out of insta-shifting between forms. I've said before that, although restoration druids enjoy a lot of success in PvP, it's very hard for many feral druids, and personally, I think this sort of mobility can help make up for other areas where the druid is not as strong, and can provide more synergy between the druid's different forms and abilities without some of the risks that made this synergy impractical before. What do you think?
Druids needed help in 5v5 with a bit better caster form survivability, and they got that with the new Natural Perfection changes and a bit more utility. However, they did NOT need to be even harder to kill with this short-sighted change. Melee might as well not even attempt to catch a good druid anymore, and well, casters never could to begin with.
Reader Comments (Page 3 of 3)
Gryzor Nov 3rd 2007 5:47AM
Am I the only one that read the original topic thinking, do Druids have a Human form? :oP
Todd Nov 6th 2007 10:50AM
Thank you #20, there is someone out there who knows a druid and how they play in pvp, not some fricken KID like half of these asshats
why don't you guys turn your attention towards locks or the 4k crits of a mag or the nearly non dead zone of a hunter and new pots for there pets instead of picking on druids for once
you wonder why there's a tank shortage ... cause non of us ferals will run with your power greedy asses
TheMinority Nov 3rd 2007 10:17AM
It's funny that people complain about druids being OP in world/battleground PvP. Isn't part of picking your class and spec is to be -really- good at something while sacrificing proficiency in something else? If everyone was good at everything then the game would be pretty boring. Why would you want to be a warrior when your rogue could tank just as well? Why would you want to be a warlock when you can fight in world pvp just as well as a resto shaman? So druids are nearly impossible to kill in world pvp and battlegrounds... Their weakness is in their healing and mana pool. Adjust your tactics on killing them. For example: Instead of wing clip, set a freezing trap. If they're not Boomkin, they're going to have to run to -you- to do damage. They'll either have to hit that trap or wait till it goes away. And with this new patch it won't matter if they sit in your dead zone or not.
I do, however, think the instant shift to same form should be considered a bug and be taken off. It might be a free snare removal for my druid, but it's just silly by logic. How can you shift to a bear form as a bear?
MacKoroni Nov 3rd 2007 10:39AM
I'm a resto druid and I don't PvP. I can tell you this is a great change for those of us grind or do dailies solo, being able to go from cat to bear without elf form damage will save some hide! Yes it will help those in PvP (and I think being able to click into the same form will be fixed) but it was a FIX that was needed for all druids, as shape shifters we shouldn't have to go to elf form before shifting into another animal form, it's kind of counter to the nature of what we are. And good point to hose who whine about snare. We've ALWAYS been able in some manner to get out of snare and do not have our own. And yea we can desnare run away from you, but that's about it!
amasen Nov 3rd 2007 11:38AM
What you forgot to say is that the warrior posting this is top rated in all his 2v2, 3v3, 5v5 brackets (number 1 to be exact). And his team mate on his 2v2 is a druid and one of his 3v3 combos is has a druid healing on it.
I am also a warrior that plays with a druid on my 2v2 and while I'm yet undecided on insta-shifting from form to form shifting from the same form to the same form to remove a snare is over powered. Also I believe having no cooldown on this is over powered. While being able to shift without activating the GCD and being able to shift from one form to the other without going to caster is fine, chain shifting and permanently removing snare/poly is just plain overpowered.
No class should be immune to poly and Snares. That makes ice mages, warriors, rogues, hunters and shaman simply unable to catch and kill them (worse for the melee since they will never be able to even hit them).
Verit Nov 3rd 2007 3:32PM
Druids are hard for PVP - for one thing what kind of gear should you wear? I know in world pvp and bg healing seems far more important - in 2v2 not so much.
If your feral and you don't have arena set pieces or even raid gear you can really only shape-shift like 3 times before your out of mana (its 800+ per).
With lots of spirit and mana regen with healing gear that has a decent amount of strength/ap/armor yeah druids are hard to kill - but so are most healing classes.
Tmac47 Nov 3rd 2007 4:33PM
I hear a lot of druids complain about how they're less powerful than other classes, but the thing is that that's precisely what a jack-of-all-trades means. You're not a master of anything, or at least you're not supposed to be.
-20 wrote, "For #5, I bet you can wing clip me for far longer than I can keep shifting. Teeth gnashingly difficult to kill is because we're running away, and unlikely having much success damaging you while we're running away."
Killing someone isn't an issue when we're talking about survivability, which as far as druids goes is pretty ridiculous. As a warrior I have one skill that makes me effective as far as movement impairing goes (I'm not complaining at all, hamstring is a great skill), mainly being able to hamstring classes to keep them in range of my melee is what makes me succeed. While I do think there should be ways to get out of hamstring, I don't think that a simple switch of forms should dispell all movement impairing effects.
Druids are already very OP when you look at PvP. Root and cyclone alone allow druids to be the most versatile cc'ing class in arenas. Granted, it does take a skilled Druid to use these effectively, but their availability does allow Druids to be very OP in skilled hands.
SpamString Nov 9th 2007 10:11AM
@44 LawL a 3 button mashing class bitching bout another class being op priceless, tell ya what give me back my old mangle in bear remove the CD and you can take back the insta form to form shift cause you won't live long enough for me to have to shift so stfu and quit QQing about much needed change to droods.