2. Feral Spells and abilities

Feral Druid leveling (spells & abilities):

Feral druids – level 1 thru 7 -

You have to level up as a caster for the first 8 levels, with:

• Level 1 – Wrath (direct spell damage with a short cast time),
• 4 – moonfire (instant cast spell that does damage over time)
• 5- thorns (a short duration buff on yourself that does damage to things that hit you)
• 7 – roots (used to keep things from hitting you)

Rotation 1 to 7: Mostly spamming wrath as you level up. Use moonfire early, so that the damage can tick over time. When you want to keep something off you, you can use roots to hold them in place. (So, a rotation at level 7 could be: roots, moonfire, and then use wrath until your target dies).

Feral level 8 thru 14 (Kitty attack!):

• 8 – This is where you get cat form (a lot earlier than we used to before). When you shift into cat form, you now do melee damage and you get a new set of abilities that you can only use in cat form:
• 8 – Rake (does bleed damage over time, awards combo points)
• 8 -Claw (does direct melee damage,  awards combo points)
• 8-Ferocious Bite (Uses the combo points you generated from other abilities to do a big burst of damage to your target).

Cat rotation at 8: Use rake, then claw until you have 4 or 5 combo points, and then use ferocious bite.

• 10 – Prowl (enemies can’t see you, but you move slow). At level 22, this becomes more useful (when you start to get abilities that require you to prowl). Until then, just use it when you want to sneak past things.
• 10 – Mangle (when you choose feral as your talent specialization, you get this ability. It does direct damage, and replaces your claw.  Also makes bleeds, like ravage, do more damage.

Cat rotation at 10: Getting mangle changes your rotation to: mangle once (to increase bleed damage the target takes), rake (applies a bleed), mangle until 5 combo points, then Ferocious bite.

Feral 15 thru 19:

Cat rotation stays the same through these levels, and you gain no new cat abilities. However, what you gain at this point is Bear form, and 2 other shapeshift forms. Bear form is the “tank” form that you can use to fill a tanking role in instances. I don’t use it very much while soloing (unless there are 3 things hitting me). Mangle works in bear form (mangle – bear) and works basically the same way as it does in cat form.

• 15 – bear form (turns you into a heavily armored tank with more health)
• 15 – Maul (bear ability – does direct melee damage)
• 15 – Growl (forces things to hit you instead of someone else. Only useful in groups.)
• 15 – Demoralizing roar (applies a debuff that makes things not hit you as hard. I use this a lot to keep things from killing me when I’m fighting more than one thing in bear form as I level)
• 16 – travel form (you can shift into a cheetah and run faster)
• 16 – Aquatic form (swim faster in water)

Feral 20 thru 30:

• 20 – Feral charge (a talent you can pick up to charge up to your target in cat or bear form)
• 22 – Skull bash (you charge up to your target, and interrupt the spell they are casting. Works in bear & cat form)
• 22 – Ravage: (when you use prowl in cat form before a fight, and then sneak up behind something, ravage is a big direct hit)
• 22 – Enrage (bear ability that generates rage)
• 24 – tiger’s fury (increases damage done by your cat form)
• 24 – Faerie Fire Feral – (Decreases your target’s armor. Can be used to hit things that are far away and make them come to you instead of charging up to them. Works in cat or bear)
• 26 – feline grace (you take less damage when falling off cliffs in cat form)
• 26 – Dash (you move faster in cat form for a short time)
• 28 – Challenging Roar (bear form ability used to taunt all the nearby things to hit you. Only used in groups.)

Cat rotation 20-30: Prowl, feral charge cat to get to your target faster, then open from stealth with ravage, mangle, rake,  mangle until 5 combo points, Ferocious bite. If you want to make things come to you instead of going up to them, then use faerie fire and start with the mangle/rake/bite rotation.

From Arielle in post 66 of the forum thread:

“Rotation 30-45: Remains the same as 20-30. You get Pounce, but it isn’t really any good unless combined with Shred and Brutal Impact.

Rotation 46-53: Pounce->Mangle->TF->Shred until they wake up. Then depending on the situation either FB for the kill or Mangle for more CP then FB.

Rotation 54+: Remains the same as 46-53 with one exception. If you are fighting a stunnable elite mob (typically for a quest) open with: Pounce -> Mangle -> TF -> Shred/Mangle to 5cp -> Rip -> Bear. Those Elite quest mobs can melee pretty hard, and you just end up tanking it out until they die from bleeds.

Key things:

1) Heal often. Mana is not a resource you will use except for healing and shifting into Cat form. You also regenerate it fairly quickly. Don’t be shy about shifting out to throw a Rejuv on yourself.

2) CC Multi-Mob pulls if necessary. Roots works everywhere.

3) Cyclone is your friend.

4) Interrupt casters. You can’t “block” them.