Feral Druid DPS Guide — Midnight (12.0.1)

With the release of Midnight, Feral sees some fairly significant changes, with many previously core mechanics being impacted. Snapshotting in particular has been simplified significantly, while the number of active buttons used has also been reduced. While some parts remain similar to previous iterations, there's definitely less things to pay attention to - for better or worse. Since these changes have a fairly large impact on how the Spec operates, changes are broken down into sections below.

Feral saw some sweeping changes to snapshotting mechanics and how they relate to Bleeds. Most notably, Bloodtalons has been removed and Sudden Ambush has been reworked, so the primary source of Bleed amplification is Tiger's Fury. This means there's a lot less debuff juggling, and is easier to execute.

Additionally, a few specific changes have been made in the tree:

• Thrash and Brutal Slash have been removed from the tree.
• Chomp has been added as a high damage attack available at certain Energy thresholds
• Feral Frenzy has had a follow-up node added - either reducing its cooldown to 30 seconds with Focused Frenzy, or converting it to AoE with Frantic Frenzy.
• Ashamane's Guidance now reduces the cooldown of Incarnation: Avatar of Ashamane to 1m30s.
• Blood Spattered and Hunger for Battle added, providing bonuses from Rip in AoE.

The new class feature in Midnight are Apex Talents, powerful 4-step talent nodes that provide compounding benefits when taken. For Feral, Unseen Predator focuses on amplifying finishers, increasing damage dealt and triggering bonus attacks:

• Unseen Predator — Ferocious Bite has a 15% chance per Combo Point spent to trigger either Unseen Slash or Unseen Swipe, depending on targets nearby. This deals bonus damage to targets hit.
• Unseen Predator — has two points, increasing all damage you deal by 7.5% per point for 5 seconds when an Unseen Attack is triggered via Unseen Predator. Extra attacks will extend the duration.
• Unseen Predator — increases all Rip damage you deal by 30%. Additionally, casting Tiger's Fury will cause your next two Combo Point generating attacks to trigger an Unseen Attack.

The entire package is quite strong, buffing finishers that lie at the heart of both builds. Wildstalker in particular gets great benefit from the extra Rip multiplier, which also improves both trees significantly in AoE. The effect is, however, mostly passive and happens through regular gameplay.

While the spec saw some sweeping changes at its core, Hero Talents remain very similar to how they were before. Some additional integration has been added to new talent options, but their damage profile split is still looking to remain the same. A brief overview of changes are:

• Druid of the Claw Changes - Click for Details

  • Tear Down the Mighty now increases the damage of Feral Frenzy and Chomp by 25%.
  • Strike for the Heart now increases damage abilities by 10% and Critical Strike chance by 5%.
  • Claw Rampage now has a 20% chance to activate (down from 25%).
  • Three new talents: Limb from Limb, Twin Claw and Exacerbating Wounds.
  Druid of the Claw mostly saw some additional methods to access Ravage, while trying to still keep some value from Bleed effects via new talents. In particular, Tear Down the Mighty has been made more appealing by amplifying both the new Chomp and Feral Frenzy, but is otherwise built in the same way as before: a focus on high impact Ferocious Bite enhancements.
• Wildstalker Changes - Click for Details

  • Three new talents: Patient Custodian, Rampancy and Green Thumb.
  Instead for Wildstalker, very little was changed about the tree, retaining its strong focus on Bleeds and DoT effects. New talents incorporate a stronger focus on Bursting Growth by adding a passive chance for it to trigger from Bloodseeker Vines, but still remains a fairly simple passive tree.

In both the utility and defensive department, Feral remains very similar to The previously, aside from the loss of Nature's Vigil. In exchange, Heart of the Wild was turned into an active defense tool - increasing your maximum health if used during Bear Form by 30%. The Midnight utility toolkit is also is effectively the same, bringing Typhoon, Ursol's Vortex and Incapacitating Roar, while still having Innervate for your healers.