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All of the latest Mists of Pandaria newsShifting Perspectives: Balance druid talents and the illusion of choice
by Tyler Caraway 
Mar 11th 2011 at 4:00PM
I often wonder how many people still remember beta. I mean, people will sometime reference beta now and again, but I often wonder how many people really remember everything that even just their own class or spec went through. For balance, one of the larger issues that we had was one of talent choices. The talent spec then was excessively bland. There was no choice, no variation, only the single option.
Balance has changed since then -- quite a great deal, in fact -- yet how much of a choice is there within our talent choices? How much of a difference does choosing the "right" or "wrong" talents really make in our performance? There are lots of variables to choose from, but how much of them are actually a choice and how much of them aren't truly an option?
Talents that help mana regeneration
The core of our talents really focuses on one thing: mana regeneration. To a certain degree, we have 13 talents that influence our mana regeneration. Some of them double as DPS talents that simply aren't a choice: Euphoria and Heart of the Wild. The remaining options are all just that -- options. Furor, Moonglow, and Dreamstate are all optional; you don't have to have them in order to be viable (at least, to a certain degree).
While leveling and first gearing yourself at 85, you will need nearly all of the mana regeneration talents in order to sustain yourself for an encounter. After you've gotten a bit of raiding gear, you can start to drop points from different spots.
First, you can start by switching out points from Furor and/or Moonglow into Blessing of the Grove to increase your Moonfire damage. The increase isn't all that much and certainly isn't noticeable during a single-target encounter, but it really adds up when you are doing the Moonfire AoE spam dance.
After that is where things get tricky. There are no additional real DPS talents for you to choose from. At this point, the only things you can drop mana regeneration for are Perseverance, Gale Winds, or Owlkin Frenzy. Perseverance is a great talent for reducing incoming damage, and I would strongly suggest taking it should you be able to afford the loss. Neither Gale Winds nor Owlkin Frenzy provide any tangible benefit.
Balance druids do not use Hurricane, and Typhoon isn't used for damage but mostly for the knockback on adds. The increased Cyclone range is useful but again not very PvE-centric, given that Cyclone is more of an "OH NOES" CC than a standard one. Owlkin Frenzy is rather hit or miss. As with every case in which someone tried to prove the talent useful in Wrath, it can all depend on the encounter in question.
Owlkin Frenzy only procs from attacks that specifically target you, not AoE-based abilities, which is actually very misleading wording. As an example, Chim's Slime ability hits multiple targets, but each individual bolt is targeted to a specific player so it will proc OF. That being said, I've used OF for that encounter, even on heroic when you get hit by each and every volley, and not gotten any procs. I also used OF on what's currently my highest heroic Chim parse but only had it proc once the entire encounter; the second highest didn't have any OF procs. It simply isn't a reliable source of damage.
Owlkin Frenzy, Perseverance, Gale Winds ... all of these sound like choice. They're not. Aside from Perseverance, neither of the other talents have any significant impact on the druid. If there's no statistical difference between having a talent and not, then what's the point of it?
There's limited variation between balance specs now simply due to the disparity in gearing levels. Come next raiding tier, these won't exist. Every balance druid will have to run 31/0/10. You could argue that some balance druids might favor two points in Owlkin Frenzy over Moonglow, and that indicates choices -- but when there's no discernible difference between the performance of either spec, those two talent points are meaningless.
Why choice matters
I am certain that some people will take this entire rant the wrong way. I am not advocating that balance druids need additional DPS talent options for their talent points; I am saying that our talent choices actually need to make a clear and noticeable difference in our characters.
While playing my warlock, I actually end up having a wide array of choice in how I will spend several of my talent points. When going affliction, the first nine talent points are all spent on DPS-improving talents, while that next talent can go toward some form of utility. Within the next tier, only three of the five talent points can be used to increase DPS; again, I must pick up some functional utility. In total, affliction ends up spending around 8 talent points on utility.
It's not that balance doesn't have utility to pick up; it is more that what limited utility we have isn't worth anything. What's the point of having Gale Winds in a PvE spec? How often are you really going to find yourself using Cyclone? And how many of those times do you need to have the additional range? What does Owlkin Frenzy do? A vast majority of PvE encounters cannot even proc the effect, and the few that can don't offer enough procs to make the talent by any means "useful."
Our "utility" choices come in a different sort and do not really seem that functional. After investing 18 points in the balance tree, druids are first faced with having to choose a non-DPS talent. Usually, these default to Solar Beam and Typhoon. After that, at 23 points invested, you have two additional "free" talents to pick up; then, again you have another two points to invest into utility, after picking up Lunar Shower. Finally, after putting the required eight points into restoration to get all of the DPS talent, we have another two free talents. So what's the problem?
Simply lacking
The primary issue that balance faces is the lack of distinction among choices. We can get Typhoon. We can get Solar Beam. And those are great things to have. After that ... we have nothing of consequence. We have four points of "utility" that must be spent in the balance tree and two points that can be spent anywhere, yet there's just not much to spend them on.
Starting balance druids have to spend four "free" balance talents in mana regeneration to get Dreamstate and Moonglow, but once you reach a high enough level of gear, you simply don't have a use for those talents anymore. Euphoria provides all the mana regeneration that you need.
Of our utility talents, the only one which any argument could be made for is Fungal Growth, yet it is still considered to be an abysmal talent. The issue with Fungal Growth is that it provides a clunkier version of the baseline abilities brought by two other classes. If you don't have a hunter or a shaman, then yes, Fungal Growth is fantastic; with either of those classes present -- note that's classes, not specs -- then Fungal Growth has virtually no use at all.
What needs to change
The largest issue that balance druids have in this regards is twofold. First, too many of our secondary talents focus on mana regeneration. We have Euphoria, Moonglow, and Dreamstate all in the balance tree -- seven points worth of talents. While great for leveling, possibly PvP, and early gearing levels, Moonglow and Dreamstate quickly become outdated with gear. We saw this in Wrath with Moonkin Form, and everyone was saying that we'd see it again this expansion. You cannot balance a spec around scaling mana regeneration and expect it to need to same amount of investment at early levels as later levels.
When mana regeneration is no longer needed in order to sustain the DPS cycle required for an encounter, then what is the point of having it? So that we can have spare mana to "waste" on healing? I'm not saying that these talents need to be removed nor changed; they are still useful for the time in which you need them, after all. What I am saying is that these talents cannot be considered as choices. Either you need the mana regeneration -- and thus, they are not "optional" talents -- or you don't need the mana, and they are worthless talents. There is no middle ground.
The second issue is that balance still has a few outdated talents from Wrath that were never updated to work in the current expansion. Owlkin Frenzy and Gale Winds don't have a point any more -- and frankly, Owlkin Frenzy never had a point to begin with.
Gale Winds does so little for balance druids. The only reason to take the talent is to increase Cyclone's range, and even in PvP, the 4-yard extension isn't that amazing. If feral and restoration druids are working fine without 4 measly yards, why would you think that balance would suddenly find Cyclone to be phenomenally better with it? The damage increase to Hurricane is simply laughable at this point. Hurricane is far too expensive and the damage was never balanced around other AoE spells for this to be worth it.
Hurricane was balanced around the factor of Solar Eclipse, which is simply absurd to begin with. In essence, the spell is utterly dead -- there just isn't a point to it anymore -- so tacking on a damage increase to our talents is just silly. No druid was using Hurricane in beta; why did Blizzard keep this talent?
Balance druids don't need additional DPS talents; they need additional utility talents. We don't have awesome defensive talents that other specs see in their utility, things like Siphon Life, Nether Ward/Protection, Selfless Healer, and many more -- dual talents that can function to increase our survivability in both PvP and PvE. Survivability is still balance's weakest point right now; we are simply crushed by other players.
A large factor in this is that we have so few talented defensive abilities. The only things we actually have in the balance tree are Typhoon and Solar Beam -- interestingly enough, the two things that nearly every balance druids takes. Instead, balance has to rely entirely on the base druid tool kit, and that's hurting us. It hurts us in PvP, and it gives a significant lack of choice in PvE talents.
Utility is not about trading damage for nifty little bonuses anymore; it's about the neat things that you can pick up alongside your damage increases. Balance just doesn't have any of that, and we need it. We are given talents to play around with in our talent spec, yet it makes absolutely no difference where we put these points. We can get additional mana regeneration when we're already finishing encounters with 75% mana ... We can get a damage-increasing proc that never actually procs -- and doesn't function as its supposed to in PvP anyway ... Or we can get a damage increase on a spell we never use. What's the point in all of these talents?
Why do we have so many talents that either become outdated with gear or don't actually do anything at all? The balance tree is still the same mess that it has always been. We have a few scattered, ridiculously powerful talents with utterly worthless talents providing filler. Can we find a compromise between the two? Can all of our talents actually provide something useful to us for a change?
Every week, Shifting Perspectives: Balance treks across Azeroth in pursuit of druidic truth, beauty and insight ... from a moonkin's perspective. We'll help you level your brand new balance druid, analyze balance racials and abilities, and walk you through PvP as a balance druid.
Filed under: Druid, (Druid) Shifting Perspectives
Reader Comments (Page 3 of 3)
Drez Mar 11th 2011 7:18PM
I should add that those are minor points of contention and I agree with your other points. Still, those extra 4 points do add some flexibility. Personally, I put them in 3/3 Owlkin Frenzy and 1/2 Gale Winds right now, but I do switch them around sometimes to play around.
Tyler Caraway Mar 12th 2011 6:03AM
Umm...I'm pretty sure you mean Furor isn't a mandatory talent. You do have to have Heart of the Wild.
Heart of the Wild increases your Intellect by 6%, which means it increases your Spell Power. If you don't have Heart of the Wild, then, no, I'm sorry, you don't have any of the world top parses.
Also, our AoE rotation actually refunds mana -- unless you use Wild Mushroom on cooldown, every cooldown in which case you lose very little mana -- so I'm not following you on AoE being a large mana drain for balance druids.
Finally, Dreamstate is our most worthless mana regeneration talent that we have. While it can restore a large chunk of our mana all at once, you should be using Innervate on a healer instead. Especially if you have to Rebirth one during the course of an encounter.
Running 3/3 Olwkin Frenzy is the best DPS set up, but the number of procs that you can get during any given encounter is rather low. For example, as far as I know, nothing at all can proc it on Halfus unless you end up tanking something. When you reach encounters that can proc it, usually it isn't a good thing. On Cho'gal, Shadow Crash might be able to proc it if you are the target, but I doubt it, and you need to avoid it anyway.
Umm, the CL on phase 3 of TAC should be able to proc it if you are the primary target, but not if it branches out to hit you. What can and cannot proc OF is a very messed up formula. Most AoE abilities shouldn't be able to proc it unless you are the primary target of the ability, and in cases where AoE abilities can proc it, Blizzard usually nerfs it -- see BQL in ICC.
echna Mar 11th 2011 8:23PM
Furor is a good talent to take, even after you're suitable with mana management. It'll help out on your innervate that you will use on a healer (and don't think next tier healer's wont need mana).
Gale of Winds is a good talent, if you have those mana regen talents, you can afford to cast hurricane, and with it glyphed, it makes a great form of AE slow if you don't have a frost mage, DK, or a hunter (Which is often the case in our groups)
Fungal Growth is great for the same reason, especially on fights like Cho'Gall.
These talents you consider worthless may be situational to your group, but that's where the choice comes from.
I'm hitting 78k AE dps without Gale of Winds (with Hurricane counting for 60% of that total AE damage, and typhoon somewhere in there too, but mostly from that initial mushroom burst), which would bring that up to ~90k.
Owlkin Frenzy holds the same spot as in wrath though, incredibly situational and disputed to specific fights.
Tyler Caraway Mar 12th 2011 6:22AM
There is never a reason to cast Hurricane, period. Never, ever ever ever. If you need the slow, then you should be using Fungal Growth and Typhoon in order to slow things down; none of the encounters thus far in the game would require wasting DPS to use Hurricane.
The difference in AoE damage from multi-DoTing and using Wild Mushroom isn't just just slightly above Hurricane, it completely dominates Hurricane by thousands of DPS. In the additional time that the Hurricane slow would actually give you, you would have killed the mobs instead.
If you lack any form of slow in a group, then you should pick up Fungal Growth, probably at the expense of Dreamstate, and run with that instead. The slow field lasts 10s longer than the WM cooldown, and Fungal Growth can be used to create the largest slowing field in the game. Which you might think makes it cool, but it's harder to get that just right and takes far too much time to use on-the-fly. Still, for Cho'gal and Magmaw, Fungal Growth is more than enough if you have no other methods for slowing things down.
Of the many reasons that Fungal Growth isn't great, the primary one is that it changes how you want WM to function. If you don't need the slow, then you want your mushroom placement to be as such that each one hits the largest number of targets possible. When you need the FG slow, then you want to space out the mushrooms to create a large field that functions as a kiting path. Using the second method, WM will often only hit any mobs at all with one a single mushroom, which significantly hurts our AoE output; but the trade off is utility.
Again, in situations where you have no other options for a slow, FG is a great choice. When you do have additional options for it, then FG is a poor choice because you want to set up WM for optimal damage instead, not optimal slowing.
It's a mathematical fact that multi-DoTing and using Wild Mushroom is higher AoE damage than Hurricane by a long shot.
Angus Mar 12th 2011 8:59AM
As a paladin I resent the implication that Selfless healer is anything other than a steaming pile of doodoo.
Seriously, it was put in to try and give Retadins utility. Except they made sure Ret wouldn't be able to off-heal better than a level 10 priest. And then they gave it a damage buff to make Ret consider taking it instead of just scrapping the thing and giving Ret a real utility talent.
Your premise holds true for a lot of classes, actually.
Tyler Caraway Mar 12th 2011 5:31PM
Selfless Healer isn't "amazing" so much as it is situational, and in certain situations it isn't half bad. It's a clutch heal that can be a life saver to someone, just the same as an enhancement shaman can use MW to heal.
It's a DPS loss, the healing isn't stellar, but it's enough to save lives when they need to be saved. That's what makes secondary utility talents amazing.
Drez Mar 12th 2011 11:33AM
yeah... furor >.
tigglet Mar 12th 2011 2:15PM
"yet how much of a choice is there within our talent choices? How much of a difference does choosing the "right" or "wrong" talents really make in our performance? There are lots of variables to choose from, but how much of them are actually a choice and how much of them aren't truly an option?"
That's just it, there isn't a choice, everything is cookie cutter down to everyone using the same websites the same models the same rotation the same macros just to function end game. roughly 2000 members left WoW for Rift because Rift has the model players want, seemingly endless choices for their toons. Now lets wait and see if Rift will listen to the player community when it comes to character customization.
You see blizz, it's not the limiting of choices or the nerfing of classes that gets the community excited over the game it's the expanding of choices that does that.
Tyler Caraway Mar 12th 2011 5:45PM
I do not want to get into a Rift vs WoW fight here as I don't think it is the place, but I did want to say something.
Choice only goes so far, game development takes a lot more than people realize. A game such as Rift with all of the choices that it offers to players treads on a very dangerous line.
On the one hand, it is very easy to overwhelm a player with that many options. While I think that the "basic" player is far more advanced today than they were several years ago, there is still a significant portion of the gaming community that doesn't want to have to really put that much effort into it. A game system such as Rift is actually hell for someone such as myself. I would literally have to spend days computing how to level up my character.
I cannot simply say "This looks like a good DPS talent" and take it. I have to configure what is the absolute best combination of talents and skills in order to create the most effective character. When I can select from an array of 8 specializations each with multiple abilities and multiple talents...it's a lot of work.
Perhaps it is my ego, but I simply cannot believe that a game system such as Rift can be as finely balanced nor easy to use as WoW's system is. WoW's system may feel as though it lacks choice, and at times it does, but it is a very balanced game as far as MMOs go. To believe that a player can just pick up Rift, start playing, and end up with a viable talent build seems ridiculous to me. It is highly possible and actually quite easy to do within WoW; and that is a huge selling point.
Choice leads to complexity, complexity leads to difficulty. Difficult things are far harder to balance than simple systems. If Rift is not balanced, it will fail. Multiple MMOs that have come and gone through the years have proven this. You have to find the sweet spot of complexity, simplicity, and balance; and it's not easy to do.
leumas Mar 12th 2011 3:00PM
I see your logic there, however, my druid only just dinged 81. So no shrooms yet. Versus insect swarm/moonfire as far as overall DPS goes, Typhoon doesnt come close.
Unglyphed typhoon might be useful in some encounters, but while I'm still pugging through 5-mans, I havent seen it yet.
Plus I love finishing off an AoE group with what looks like a giant sneeze!
Sounds like I'll have to tweak my playstyle though when I get to that other game, World of Endgame, which is really the beginning.
Tyler Caraway Mar 12th 2011 5:34PM
Oh, yes, for dungeons I would absolutely use Glyphed Typhoon! It's pretty good in many situations; although it probably isn't that much of a DPS gain once you get Lunar Shower.
Sorry, I do sometimes forget that not everything is about raiding. :(
Angus Mar 12th 2011 7:09PM
Yes, but all paladins have better utility baked in.
In the same time that the person is hitting someone with that crappy heal they could be doing:
HoP: Oh look, have a bubble. Take no damage until a healer can get you up for real.
LoH: Oh hey, welcome to my health pool, NOW ON YOU!
Hand of Sacrifice: Let me take 20% of that for you, Add DP for more fun.
And all of these are BASELINE. None need a talent to boost them. In one case the clutch heal from selfless healer is so much worse than the baseline ability (loH) that it isn't even a fair comparison. Is a secondary utility talent that does nothing useful because you can already do better at any point in time anyway actually utility? Even if it is, it stopped being amazing when the actual tools of the class are compared to it.
You mention enhance using MW for healing, but there is a major difference in that utility. Enhance takes MW because not doing so is DUMB. It is one of the best damage increasing talents they have. The fact that it also adds the option to throw a cheap, mid-powered heal out as needed is juat a boost to a dps talent. Selfless healer had a very poor dps boost added on as an afterthought. They are the opposite approach. Enhance's utility is a side benefit to a dps talent. Even with using half the 5 stacks on healing it is a dps increase over not having MW. Selfless healer is the opposite, even with using it to get the damage buff it will never be a dps increase over using that HP on your damage dealing.
Selfless healer is a talent they refused to get rid of even after it was shown to be utter trash. Owlkin Frenzy for Ret.
In any case, as I said before, your article is spot on.
The talent revamp was supposed to make all these talents cool and awesome. It failed to do this in many cases. Considering a bunch of talents are STILL mandatory for off specs (looking at you ancestral swiftness) it shows a statement that they were going in a new direction, while they spun their wheels in place and really got no where.
Angus Mar 12th 2011 7:10PM
reply fail...
wtb that new comment system the queue has been promising since before ICC...