Balance Druid DPS Rotation, Cooldowns, and Abilities — Shadowlands 9.1

Balance Druid gameplay is a standard build and spend class with a predictable cadence to their rotation.

At the start of combat or with each use or proc of Celestial Alignment / Incarnation: Chosen of Elune, you choose between either Solar or Lunar Eclipse. To enter Solar Eclipse, you must cast two Starfires and to enter Lunar Eclipse, you need to cast two Wrath.

From there on, you build Astral Power using the appropriate filler. In Solar Eclipse, you cast Wrath to gain Astral Power and, in Lunar Eclipse, you cast Starfire. Each Eclipse lasts 15-seconds and you will then be forced to swap to the opposite Eclipse. Eclipse uptime is incredibly important and you should aim to be inside Eclipse as often as you can.

On single-target, you will use Starsurge, which costs 30 Astral Power. Since Starsurge buffs your fillers, you normally want to cast this at the start of an Eclipse. On single-target, you will often find yourself pooling to 90 Astral Power then casting three Starsurges in a row.

On multi-target, you want to be maintaining Starfall and casting Starsurge when you can, assuming you can fully maintain Starfall.

In this guide, when we refer to our standard rotation or priority list, the priority below is what is being referred back to.

Use the button below to select your Covenant to see how that changes the basic rotation:

• Show Kindred Empowerment
• Show Adaptive Swarm
• Show Convoke the Spirits
• Show Ravenous Frenzy

1. Enter Eclipse
2. Apply or maintain your Moonfire, Sunfire, and Stellar Flare (if talented)
3. Apply or maintain Adaptive Swarm
4. Cast Ravenous Frenzy to line up with the full duration of your cooldowns.
5. Keep Celestial Alignment / Incarnation: Chosen of Elune (if talented) on cooldown
6. Cast Convoke the Spirits when you have less than 50 Astral Power. Try to pair with your other cooldowns but do not lose a use.
7. Cast Kindred Empowerment when either you or your partner have some damage.
8. Spend your Astral Power on Starsurge or Starfall on multi-target.
9. Do not overcap on charges of New Moon
10. Do not lose uses of Warrior of Elune, Force of Nature, or Fury of Elune (if talented).
11. Cast Wrath in Solar Eclipse.
12. Cast Starfire in Lunar Eclipse.

Venthyr is the most powerful Covenant choice in Patch 9.1, especially when paired with Sinful Hysteria. Balance Druid has a basic opener rotation, an inside cooldown priority list, and an outside cooldown priority list.

While the overall is repetitive and basic, the difficulty in the Covenant playstyle is more so in the preparation to utilize your cooldown fully. While often times you can easily go over 30 seconds without having to handle mechanics or moving, there are some fights which will prove significantly more difficult to excel on when the movement is heavy and the mechanics come fast.

Please note that Wrath has a 4-second travel time from max range, allowing you to cast two in a row before they hit and pull the boss. Starsurge has a 1-second travel time from max range.

To avoid pre-pulling or to avoid not being in Eclipse because someone else pulled early and reset you (combat will reset your Eclipse count if you do not finish both Wraths before pull), we recommend queueing up a Starfire which will never pull early and is a minor inconvenience if someone else pulls early instead of a Starsurge which is really bad to cast outside of Eclipse.

The following is the opener rotation for Venthyr Balance Druid assuming you have 50 Astral Power from Nature's Balance:

1. Cast two Wrath 4 seconds before combat and enter Eclipse. Cast an additional Wrath if necessary.
2. Cast Starfire.
3. Apply Moonfire, Sunfire, and Stellar Flare (if talented).
4. Cast Ravenous Frenzy.
5. Cast Incarnation: Chosen of Elune.
6. Cast Starsurge.
7. Cast three Wrath.
8. Follow the cooldown priority list.

When playing Venthyr, you really want to maximize the damage inside this cooldown window. Before entering cooldowns you want to make sure you have Trinkets and cooldowns ready, about 90 Astral Power, and 35+ seconds to freely deal damage.

1. Cast Starsurge to avoid capping Astral Power.
2. Refresh Moonfire, Sunfire, and Stellar Flare; (if talented) once on single-target.
3. Cast Wrath (when below 150% Haste).
4. Cast Starfire (when over 150% Haste).

During Ravenous Frenzy, you constantly want to be fluctuating between 60 to 90 Astral Power. Cast additional Starsurges as necessary. If you have Stellar Drift, you can cast Starfall for minimal loss to facilitate movement.

Venthyr multi-target requires the player to balance a multitude of factors: Ravenous Frenzy stacks, number of targets, and how long they will live. If you can be fully optimal, follow this Weakaura for the appropriate casted filler. That weakaura will have you:

1. Build stacks of Ravenous Frenzy using Wrath and Starfall ( Starsurge if you will overcap Astral Power).
2. Then, depending on your stacks and your target count, will swap over to Starfire.

You should still keep 90 Astral Power for the Starsurges at the end. Timings like when to use Fury of Elune stay the same as well. However, if targets are going to die earilier than a full cooldown duration, it will be more beneficial to swap over to Starfire early when using Soul of the Forest.

Sinful Hysteria is the new Venthyr-specific Legendary that puts even more power into the Ravenous Frenzy cooldown. You generally pair this with Precise Alignment and Endless Thirst and even Incarnation: Chosen of Elune on single-target. The goal is to have a massively stacked Frenzy and try to cast 4 massively-buffed Starsurges with the 5-second Hysteria buff. Here are some optimizations to add to your playstyle:

• If you are not running Precise Alignment or Incarnation: Chosen of Elune, offset your cooldown to line up with the estimated Ravenous Frenzy duration.
• Always enter the 5-second Sinful Hysteria window with 90 Astral Power.
• Cast Fury of Elune with 4 seconds on the Ravenous Frenzy.
• If you can line up cooldowns with a Thrill Seeker without losing a use, you should.
• Potion and Bloodlusted Inscrutable Quantum Device can be cast 5 seconds after starting cooldowns.
• Inscrutable Quantum Device can be cast 10 seconds after starting cooldowns without Bloodlust.
• Instructor's Divine Bell can be cast in the last 4 seconds of Ravenous Frenzy.
• Empyreal Ordnance can be cast almost immediately.

On multi-target, Sinful Hysteria can be optimized further as well:

• Refresh Moonfire and Sunfire before entering cooldowns.
• Always keep Starfall on cooldown. Try to make your last Starfall line up with the 5-second Sinful Hysteria window.
• Inside cooldowns refresh Sunfire once during pandemic, and refresh Moonfire only if the target will live another 20-seconds (up to 6 targets).
• Still pool 90 Astral Power for the Sinful Hysteria window.

The Night Fae class Covenant no longer uses Balance of All Things as its primary Legendary but now uses Primordial Arcanic Pulsar which is more of a passive playstyle. Since we are no longer mandated to cast our Starsurges at the start of every Eclipse, you can pool Astral Power for movement more often.

There are two basic optimizations for playing Primordial Arcanic Pulsar. The first is to pool Astral Power for before entering each Pulsar window and save Convoke the Spirits for Pulsar windows if they would happen before your cooldowns.

Other than this you follow the basic Balance Druid Rotation above.

Please note that Wrath has a 4-second travel time from max range, allowing you to cast two in a row before they hit and pull the boss. Starsurge has a 1-second travel time from max range.

To avoid pre-pulling or to avoid not being in Eclipse because someone else pulled early and reset you (combat will reset your Eclipse count if you do not finish both Wraths before pull), we recommend queueing up a Starfire which will never pull early and is a minor inconvenience if someone else pulls early instead of a Starsurge which is really bad to cast outside of Eclipse.

1. Cast two Wrath 4-seconds before combat and enter Eclipse. Cast an additional Wrath if necessary.
2. Cast Starfire to avoid pre-pulling.
3. Apply Moonfire, Sunfire, and Stellar Flare (if talented).
4. Cast Warrior of Elune, Force of Nature, or Fury of Elune (if talented).
5. Cast Celestial Alignment / Incarnation: Chosen of Elune, your potions, and any trinket.
6. Cast two Starsurges.
7. Cast Convoke the Spirits.
8. Spend the rest of your Astral Power on Starsurge.
9. Build Astral Power for next Eclipse using Wrath.

During Cooldowns, cast the appropriate filler for the moment. If you can cleave, use Starfire as a filler and if you can only hit one target cast Wrath.

Before casting Convoke the Spirits, you will want to make sure your targets are fully DoTed up with Moonfire. Moonfire can and will eat up Balance spells, which could otherwise be Wrath for better Astral Power generation, Starsurge, or even Starfall. This is most important on multi-target.

Lunar is the preferred multi-target and cleave Eclipse state. You can use your cooldown when it feels optimal, but beware of losing uses especially in dungeons.

1. Apply Sunfire if you can optimally cleave multiple-targets
2. Maintain Starfall to consume Astral Power.
3. Cast two unempowered fillers ( Wrath or Starfire) to enter the appropriate Eclipse state. Prioritize Lunar Eclipse for multi-target.
4. Keep Fury of Elune and Warrior of Elune (if talented) on cooldown.
5. When in Solar Eclipse, cast Moonfire on all targets that will live through the next Lunar cycle.
6. Cast Starsurge when available. Always keep enough Astral Power for Starfall when its low duration.
7. Cast the Eclipse appropriate filler to try to fill up your Astral Power for the next Eclipse.

Multi-target and cleave work a little differently than the normal rotation as seen above. Here are a few rules about Starfall.

• When there are three targets, always cast Starfall.
• When you are talented into Soul of the Forest or Stellar Drift, you can cast Starfall on two targets.
• Starfall has an average pandemic refresh timer of about three seconds but no longer stacks.

Our DoT application rules have also changed:

• Try to have Sunfire applied as soon as possible to maximize your bonus from Solstice
• When there are 4 or more targets stacked, and you have Soul of the Forest, only apply Moonfire in Solar Eclipse.

There are some situations that change which spells we prioritize in an Eclipse:

• With 5 stacked targets in Lunar Eclipse, maintain Starfall and only cast Starfire even when capped on Astral Power
• With 5 stacked targets in Solar Eclipse, cast Starfire over Wrath. This is increased by 1-target per 20% Mastery rating

As a Balance Druid, you only have one DPS cooldown, by default: Celestial Alignment. You should use this during periods of increased damage to the boss. In any case, it should be used as many times as possible during the encounter.

Celestial Alignment also fits into the Eclipse theme. When this cooldown ( Incarnation: Chosen of Elune as well) ends, your Eclipses reset allowing you to choose the next Eclipse. Use this to set your own path down in an encounter. If you notice on one pull you would have rather been in Lunar Eclipse but you were in Solar Eclipse at that time, think to see if it would be worth swapping which Eclipse state you started on or reset to.

While the rotations we gave in the previous sections will yield good results, there are a few subtleties that you should understand in order to truly excel at your role.

Be it your Astral Power generation is not high enough or you got messed up on mechanics, managing Eclipse buffs is not always as easy as just pooling at the end and spending at the start. Additionally, using Starsurge at the end of an Eclipse or between Eclipses is a big mistake and should always be avoided.

On single-target you want to prioritize Solar Eclipse. This means that you may need to go through you Lunar cycle with maybe only one or two Starsurges instead of the optimal three. The goal needs to be getting the triple Starsurge in your optimal Eclipse state every time.

The goal on multi-target is to maximize Starfall uptime while empowering Lunar Eclipse as much as possible. Much like how you want to be fully optimzing Solar Eclipse for single-target, this means you may have to sacrifice damage in Solar so you can get some beefy Starfire cleaves.

Try to line up windows of movement with instant cast spells like Moonfire, Sunfire, and Starsurge. Additionally you can delay using Warrior of Elune and save any amount of charges for movement.

If you know there is movement coming in the coming seconds, do your best to hold 30 Astral Power so you can move and cast a Starsurge. Depending on the distance being traveled, you can instead Dash, Wild Charge, or Tiger Dash to reach your destination more quickly. If you cannot reach your destination within two or three globals cooldowns, it is best to use a movement ability.

For single-target, you should practice what is called "Astral Power pooling" or "Astral Power floating". This is where you purposefully do not use Starsurge until you have a large amount of Astral Power saved up. This way, when you need to move, you have enough Astral Power to cast at least two Starsurges, giving you about 2 seconds of movement without any penalty to your DPS.

This method is not as optimal for DPS anymore but can still be used to mitigate DPS loss as doing a slightly delayed Eclipse cycle with late Starsurge is more beneficial than doing nothing.