Thanks

Against equal level quest mobs, SF-Wrath-SF-Wrath*n usually does the trick without even needing to root things. I may get hit once or twice, but it doesn’t really matter. If I get a lucky crit, mobs usually die on its way to me.

With SF-IS-Wrath*n, insect swarm never get to run its course unless I get interrupted in some way. (Stun, silence, fear etc.) Although most of the time when the mob dies, IS is at about 4s or less to go, so it’s not that useless.

I now mix in IS if I’m fighting equal/higher level mobs or if I know the mob has more health than usual. Some mobs start with higher health, some will heal themselves, so IS has its use. I’m even considering glyphing it.

Frenzy is not paying off for me, since mobs don’t hit me much. From my recount mana gains (for doing random quests):
Innervate 14238
Moonkin 4373
Frenzy 1680

Frenzy pays 2% of base mana per tick for 5 ticks. I have 2892 base at level 63, so that’s 15% chance to return 57*5=285 mana over 10 seconds, or 142.5 per 5 seconds.

Dreamstate will give me 28 per 5 seconds, non-stop.

I think for solo questing and leveling, Dreamstate will return much more mana than Frenzy. Time between mobs, looking for mobs, gathering, waiting for a patrol to leave…etc.

But. I can see Frenzy has its worth in an AOE build.

For now, I’m having to drink every five to eight mobs. Innervate is constantly on cooldown. This is definitely much worse than feral. I’ve already turned off my low-mana warning because I found it irritating.

Maybe it’s better to have 2/3 Dreamstate and 1/3 Frenzy?

Finally for glyphs (not mentioned in the post). Wrath is a must, and then the other major glyph is basically a choice of playstyle. For my single-target style I would go for IS (30% more damage for IS) or Hurricane for the odd instance run. But root-dot style people would probably want Entangling Roots; while AOE style people would want something else.

My first character when wow launched was a druid. Back then my goal was to heal so i leveled as resto in bear form(!). Okey it went alot slower than my friends etc but i loved it and hell no one could jump me at.

When hitting 60 i joined a raiding guild with my friends and had probably the best time in wow yet. When TBC came out i put my druid on the shelf to go for a rogue but thats another story.

A few months before the launch of WOTLK i decided to dust of my resto druid and respec feral. I found this very effective and fast but increadibly booring (emphasizing with Whorde here ). But i stood my ground and hit 70 and went back to my old days of healing, this time in pvp.

My carer as a pvp healer was fairly short lived as the arrival of the Lich King spawned a new interest in the death knight class. Hence once again my druid was put on the shelf. Dont get me wrong here i love the druid class over any other, and ive played all classes except shaman over 60 (meaning some 60s several 70s and 2x 80s). But i still find the druid class the most interesting and fun class to play. After a few months of break i decided to start playing again as a class i’ve never experienced before: The Hunter Class.

Since the arrival of 3.2 gearing has been a non-issue and this has resulted with me getting fairly good gear with the downside of me getting tired and bored of doing the same thing over and oooover again.
This got me thinking of my beloved druid and so i decided to pay him a visit. Since i leveled vanilla as resto and TBC as feral i thought: heck why not test balance. Which i did. With mixed results. But my slumbering love for the druid class awokened once again and i decided to level an alt on my current server (as i got teh phat heirlooms there)

———- This is where the story ends——–

So i tested out a balance spec on my 70 druid that i came up with on the go. Of course i read up on what was the deal nowadays but if you’re not a total wacko one can easily discern the good talents from the total useless, although it seems druids almost don’t have useless talents .

After reading the comments here i found that Whorde’s playstyle wasn’t much different from my own when compared to the other dot/root or AOE rotations.

I start out at max range with a wrath. as it flies towards the enemy i set of a starfire which lands almost exactly as the previous wrath which makes a nice opener. I then proceed with a root/NG and move away again while popping IS and FF. Depending on weather Eclipse proc or not i then cast wrath/starfire (not a big fan of moonfire since the term “moonfire spam” was invented way back in the days) until the mob is dead. Lather, rinse, repeat.
I found this way of dealing with mobs very fun and entertaining as it can lead to ninjapulls that will keep me on edge, constantly giving me a challenge and making me use most of the druids arsenal.
I like the hybrid playstyle a druid can have and i am kind of unhappy that blizzard doesn’t put emphasis on hybrid speccing as this would be REALLY fun imo.

Anyways i hope we are getting some interesting changes in Cataclysm cause i sure am gonna play a druid when it launches.

Here’s a hybrid spec that would be fun to try out just for the heck of it. im not a big fan of the moonkin form (hate the looks) so i went for something that would keep me in casterform while still being able to nuke from afar and being versatile with stealth as i see this is one of our class biggest advantages (ah good old TM days) while not burning to much mana on shapeshifts. this is not based on anything but my playstyle and wet dreams of hybrid gameplay =)

http://www.wowhead.com/?talent#0xG0hiIoIb0VhoZxGMZbxcdb

Cheers hope you found the read interesting, now im gonna goof around teh internets since all servers went offline a few hours ago =( WANNA GET BACK TO MY DRUID NAO DAMNIT

Yours truly, Lorne; now known as Milkexpress

I wanted to throw out my solo leveling rotation, as it seems to differ greatly from others I’ve seen. It seems most guides recommend a root & nuke method. I found a nuke – dot – root process to be efficient and fun.

I begin at max casting range. If ‘Nature’s Grasp’ is off cd I trigger it before the pull. Standing sideways so I can strafe away from the target at full speed while casting, I open with ‘Starfire’. I then immediately strafe away and cast my instants on the run: ‘Faerie Fire’, ‘Moonfire’, and ‘Insect Swarm’. There is enough time on normal speed mobs to stop running and cast another ‘Starfire’ (or ‘Entangling Roots’ if ‘Nature’s Grasp’ was still on CD) before taking a hit and activating ‘Nature’s Grasp’. At this point I can step out of melee range and let the dots finish off the mob. If I need more I can toss in a ‘Wrath’ for the killing shot.

I rarely took damage from mobs and had enough time not casting to regen mana for the next pull. It wasn’t until I spec’d into ‘Eclipse’ that I’d stand & nuke for the proc effect.

Hope you find this to be a fun twist to leveling!