Balance Druid DPS Rotation, Cooldowns, and Abilities — 12.1

The new Eclipse system reduces ramp-up time at the cost of overall uptime. This is most noticeable in raids, but you will feel this downtime on any fight longer than two to three minutes.

On average, you can maintain Eclipse, including cooldowns, for 65-75% of the time. What matters is having Eclipse when it is needed. Plan your downtimes based on the needs of the fight, and avoid capping charges of Eclipse to reach the highest achievable uptime. For example, if you know you want to hit a priority target in 10 seconds, just sit outside Eclipse and generate Astral Power. If your pack in a dungeon is close to dying, save your charge.

Additionally you want to consider the types of spells you cast or actions you take while inside and outside of Eclipse. While inside Eclipse, your top priority should be to spend as much of your Astral Power as possible because it is your most effective damage. Spells such as Starsurge and Starfall will be the best spells and Wrath and Starfire are good spells to cast while inside Eclipse.

While outside of your Eclipse you want to be casting preparation or maintenance spells. Spells that last through your Eclipse state or buff your upcoming abilities. The best example is your DoTs, Moonfire and Sunfire. These will last through Eclipse and since they update with your buffs, you only lose damage on their low damage application. You should also use spells that generate Astral Power or buff you, such as Fury of Elune and Force of Nature.

When DoTing targets, you need to factor in the amount of time those DoTs will be dealing damage. When a target lives through an entire DoT duration, that single global you used to apply the DoT is the most efficient global per damage you can cast. However not every target lives the entire 15 to 24 seconds. If a target will only live 5-6 seconds, you will want to focus on getting as much raw damage into that target as possible via your spenders and other abilities, and forgo DoTing that target as it would do less damage for that global than say a Wrath or Starsurge.

When DoTing targets on AoE, you have to also consider how many globals you will be using. If your targets are spread out, you may only want to Moonfire them as it will cleave to ones much further away than Sunfire. Once the targets are grouped, you will want to Sunfire them there, as you can hit every target with one global.

When casting Sunfire you want to ensure that the targets will live at least 5-seconds. With Moonfire, you want the target to live at least 8-seconds.

On one target it is best to cast Starsurge instead of Starfall.

You will sometimes cast Starfall on two targets and sometimes on three targets. Starfall and Starsurge are generally close on two targets but you will always cast Starfall on three targets. Talents play a big factor in this choice. As a quick go-to, if you are investing in AoE enough to take Meteorites, you will always cast Starfall on two targets. Same with Starweaver with the exception of if you were playing pure single target talents.

If you are taking Stellar Amplification or Power of Goldrinn but not Meteorites when playing Rattle the Stars you will Starsurge on two targets.

Its important to understand that you will generally be taking Meteorites when you are AoEing so you should not need to memorize all the conditionals.

When choosing which Eclipse to enter, you want to know how many targets you will be able to hit with your filler spell. If you are able to hit 3-targets consistently with Starfire, you will want to be in Lunar Eclipse. If you are not able to, make sure you are in Solar Eclipse and cast Wrath.

If you are specced into Elune's Chosen, you will always go into Lunar Eclipse and always cast Starfire. You can open with Wrath to not early pull the boss.

With the amount of free spender procs Balance Druid has, it is important to understand when to use them and which spells to cast./

When using Starweaver, you are given a free cast of spender opposite of what procced it. Starfall procs will always be used but on 8 or more targets, you will not use Starsurge procs.

Starweaver also has differing proc rates for each spender. You are more likely to get a Starsurge proc when you cast Starfall than vice versa. So when you have a Touch the Cosmos proc while talented into Starweaver, you will always cast Starfall.

It is important to first note that Celestial Alignment and Incarnation: Chosen of Elune are both stronger Eclipse states and the rules stated in the Utilizing Eclipse section apply here as well and even more so for the types of spells you cast inside these cooldowns.

The spells themselves provide small stat buffs but the important part is that they provide both Eclipse state which gives your Astral Damage spells additional damage. This includes spenders like Starsurge, procs like Shooting Stars, and cooldowns like Fury of Elune.

You always want to be overlapping your cooldowns together. With Whirling Stars, two charges of this ability and it allows you to stagger their use to line up with other cooldowns such as Convoke the Spirits, Force of Nature, and Force of Nature. The more cooldowns you can stack the more potent they become.

Force of Nature is the primary mechanic of the Keeper of the Grove Hero Talent tree. Casting Force of Nature often and at the right times will boost your damage significantly. By itself, it grants the powerful Dream Surge buff which provides on demand burst, a flat 4% damage bonus, and applies Moonfire on up to 8-targets.

You always want to pair Force of Nature with your major cooldown, Celestial Alignment or Incarnation: Chosen of Elune. If these are on cooldown for 45-seconds (or 30-seconds with Early Spring) you will want to pair Force of Nature with your next Eclipse.

Fury of Elune can be taken with either Hero Talent choice but is more effective and plays differently with Elune's Chosen.

When playing Keeper of the Grove, you are mainly using it for its Astral Power generation. As such it is generally something paired with Celestial Alignment and Force of Nature to allow you to spend more Astral Power while inside those buff windows. You want to use it before entering Eclipse or cooldowns because it is not the primary damage driver.

When playing Fury of Elune inside Elune's Chosen, it becomes a much more potent ability as it is directly buffed by the primary and capstone Hero Talent. Additionally, it has its cooldown significantly reduced by Lunation. What changes with Elune's Chosen is that you will always want to cast it inside your Eclipse and you will want to be casting it as quickly as it comes up, unless you need to save it for a specific damage window.

Always try to overlap Convoke the Spirits with Celestial Alignment / Incarnation: Chosen of Elune as well as the buff from Balance of All Things.

Convoke the Spirits has a 45-yard range from the center of any target's hitbox. This means for larger bosses, max range Convoke the Spirits may end up whiffing all Balance spells if you are too far away.

With Elune's Guidance talented, melee Convoke the Spirits is less consistent than ranged Convoke. Avoid being in melee if possible, or you are more likely to lose a Balance-specific catch. This is a minor point but something to avoid if possible.

If you are using Convoke the Spirits on multiple targets, cast Convoke before casting other Starfalls to raise the chance that you will cast a free Starfall.