Feral Druid DPS Spec, Builds, and Talents — Shadowlands 9.2.5
On this page, you will find out the best talents for each tier for your Feral Druid in World of Warcraft — Shadowlands 9.2.5. We also have default talent lists for various types of content, such as raiding or Mythic+. If you play with Warmode on, we have your PvP talents covered as well.
If you were looking for TBC Classic content, please refer to our TBC Classic Feral DPS Druid talents.
Talent Choices for Feral Druid
Level | Choices | ||
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15 |
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25 |
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30 |
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35 |
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40 |
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45 |
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50 |
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Talents can be freely changed when out of combat and in a rested XP area
(such as an inn or a capital city). Moreover, Tome of the Still Mind and
Codex of the Still Mind can be used to temporarily allow players to change
talents anywhere, as long as they are out of combat.
Talent Cheat Sheet for Feral Druids
Feral has a number of flex choices within the talent tree that lean toward different damage delivery methods, both with single-target and AoE focuses. Below are two different options that will serve you best in different scenarios as a quick pick up and play build.
Open World, Levelling and Dungeons — AoE Oriented
This build is very much focused upon your multi-target gameplay allowing for additional boosts and flexibility with movement between encounters. It also leverages extra targets dying to allow you to deal more damage, alongside better sustained AoE tools.
- Level 15:
Predator
- Level 25: Player's Choice
- Level 30: Player's Choice
- Level 35: Player's Choice
- Level 40:
Soul of the Forest
- Level 45:
Primal Wrath
- Level 50:
Bloodtalons
Raids — Single Target Oriented
Note that if a Raid encounter specifically demands AoE, then the above build
used in Dungeon situations will likely serve you better, in particular if you
can capitalize upon Predator resets for single-target boosts.
Otherwise, use the following build to get the most out of your damage
to one target.
- Level 15:
Sabertooth
- Level 25: Player's Choice
- Level 30: Player's Choice
- Level 35: Player's Choice
- Level 40:
Soul of the Forest
- Level 45:
Brutal Slash
- Level 50:
Bloodtalons
Raiding
While the builds above cover different broad profiles, they do not cover specific nuance of each individual boss. You can get a breakdown of each encounte ron our dedicated raid page below.
Mythic+
Mythic+ tends to require a more versatile damage profile that can necessitate you mixing and matching different talents to cover a full run depending on affixes or composition each week. If you want advice tailored to Mythic+, you can check our page below.
How To Use Feral Druid Talents
Some of the Feral talents also require additional maintenance to make use of during moment to moment gameplay. You can find more details on how to incorporate these into your priority on our rotation page.
Tier 1 (Level 15) Talents for Feral Druid
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Tier 1 talents offer a variety of different damage boosting effects for different situations.
Predator causes
Tiger's Fury to last an additional 5 seconds, and the cooldown is reset whenever a target dies with one of your Bleed effects active on them.
Sabertooth increases the damage of
Ferocious Bite by 20%, and increases the duration of your
Rip effect on the target by 1 second per Combo Point spent.
Lunar Inspiration allows the use of
Moonfire in
Cat Form, causing it to grant 1 Combo Point, deal damage based on Attack Power, and cost 30 Energy.
Sabertooth will almost always be the ideal choice in
single-target scenarios due to the extra Combo Point retention it grants
by extending your
Rip effect. Coupled with the additional
Ferocious Bite casts and damage, this makes it a strong pick.
Predator in any situation where you will have enemy targets
dying consistently to trigger the reset is a really strong competitor.
This makes it a powerful dungeon and cleave talent, due to the extra damage
increase uptime and Energy to fuel ability casts.
Lunar Inspiration unfortunately requires too much upkeep and
is too locked to a niche multi-DoT playstyle to really shine anywhere.
While the two other options have room to gain additional resources,
this only costs more to maintain. There are some extremely niche builds
that can use this with Necrolord's
Adaptive Swarm and the
Draught of Deep Focus legendary, but is purely single-target and
unlikely to be worth the payoff compared to the alternatives.
Tier 2 (Level 25) Talents for Feral Druid
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Tier 2 provides movement and survival options.
Tiger Dash replaces your
Dash ability, replacing it with a short burst of 200% movement speed decaying over 5 seconds on a 45-second cooldown.
Renewal instantly heals you for 30% of your maximum health on a 1.5-minute cooldown. This can be used in any Shapeshift form.
Wild Charge is an active ability that has a 15-second cooldown. This provides a different movement option based on the shapeshift form you are in, as follows:
- No shapeshift form: Fly to the targeted allies location.
Travel Form: You leap forward 20 yards.
Cat Form: You leap behind your target within 25 yards, dazing them for 3 seconds.
Bear Form: You charge your target within 25 yards, immobilizing them for 4 seconds.
Moonkin Form: You leap 15 yards backwards.
Aquatic Form: Your swim speed is increased by 150% for 5 seconds.
This talent tier provides some situational choices, but usually you will be
taking Wild Charge due to its low cooldown and flexibility. This
gives you ways to stick to your target more consistently without impacting your
other movement tools.
Tiger Dash on the other hand can provide a very
powerful non-committal burst of speed, but the loss of your baseline
Dash in exchange is not ideal, so is more situational based on the
encounter.
As for Renewal, the talent is generally not worth taking since
you have other healing options (such as
Regrowth paired with
Predatory Swiftness), and you can always take
Restoration Affinity
as well if you desperately need more healing. It does, however, have uses
in solo play, such as Torghast.
Tier 3 (Level 30) Talents for Feral Druid
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Tier 3 grants access to affinities, which allow you to focus on a secondary Druid specialization, granting access to a small amount of the tools available to them alongside one crowd control tool.
Balance Affinity grants you the
Astral Influence passive ability, which increases the range of all your abilities by 3 yards. Additionally, you gain access to the Balance-spec abilities
Moonkin Form,
Starsurge,
Starfire,
Wrath, and
Sunfire.
Guardian Affinity grants you the
Thick Hide passive ability, which reduces all your damage taken by 6%. Additionally, you gain access to the Guardian-spec abilities
Ironfur, and
Frenzied Regeneration.
Restoration Affinity grants you the
Ysera's Gift passive ability, which heals you (or a nearby ally, if you are at full health yourself) for 3% of your maximum health every 5 seconds. Additionally, you gain access to the Restoration-spec abilities
Rejuvenation,
Wild Growth, and
Swiftmend.
For increasing your DPS, the only option in this tier is
Balance Affinity, where the increased ability range
will make it easier to multi-DoT targets. The ability to shift into
Moonkin Form for short periods of downtime as well is useful when out
of range (though its DPS output obviously does not compare with
Cat Form abilities if you can stay in melee).
Typhoon
is also a useful tool to control targets or create distance if needed.
Guardian Affinity offers a very useful passive damage
reduction that will almost always be of great worth during progression raiding.
Moreover, going into
Bear Form (combined with using
Survival Instincts), you can soak up very dangerous abilities and in
some cases tank an enemy in an emergency if needed.
Incapacitating Roar
also provides a very strong AoE disruption tool to nearby enemies.
Finally, Restoration Affinity is the least appealing talent in
this tier. The active abilities it provides will not be of much use during
raids due to pulling you out of
Cat Form, but they can be helpful
during solo content. The passive ability is decent for raids but most often
out-classed by the Guardian Affinity damage reduction passive.
Ursol's Vortex, on the other hand, is a unique tool that could make
this very powerful if enemies need to be locked down in a specific spot.
Tier 4 (Level 35) Talents for Feral Druid
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Tier 4 offers different utility options.
Mighty Bash is an active ability with a 60-second cooldown, which stuns the target for 4 seconds. It is usable in all shapeshift forms.
Mass Entanglement is an active ability with a 30-second cooldown, which roots the target and all enemies within 15 yards of them in place for 30 seconds. Damage done to rooted targets may break the effect. Mass Entanglement is usable in all shapeshift forms.
Heart of the Wild is an active ability with a 5-minute cooldown. It substantially increases your chosen Affinity's abilities.
Both Mighty Bash and
Mass Entanglement will only find
use on specific encounters or situations, so your choice here will in most
cases come down to personal preference.
Heart of the Wild, on the other hand, provides much more flexible
benefits, as a long cooldown amplification to your selected Affinity from
the Tier 3 talent row. This can result in extra damage at range via
Balance Affinity, additional on demand survival via Guardian Affinity,
or the ability to output more support healing via Restoration Affinity.
Judging this talent is very hard because the mileage is going to vary
significantly, and will depend on how good you are at adapting to
emergency situations with off role support.
Tier 5 (Level 40) Talents for Feral Druid
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Tier 5 provides a variety of damage delivery boosts depending on the type of fight you are engaging with.
Soul of the Forest causes your finishing moves to grant 5 Energy per Combo Point spent and deal 5% increased damage.
Savage Roar is an active finisher ability that grants you 15% increased damage and 10% increased Energy generation when active. Its duration depends on how many Combo Points you consume when cast, as follows:
- 1 Point: 12 seconds.
- 2 Points: 18 seconds.
- 3 Points: 24 seconds.
- 4 Points: 30 seconds.
- 5 Points: 36 seconds.
Incarnation: King of the Jungle replaces
Berserk. It lasts 30 seconds (up from Berserk's 20), and in addition to Berserk's other bonuses, it also allows
Prowl to be used once while in combat and reduces the Energy cost of all
Cat Form abilities by 20% while active.
Soul of the Forest is currently the recommended choice
due to its ease of use, and provides the best overall boost to Energy
generation alongside a strong boost to your Finishers.
Savage Roar is an option that provides a good overall benefit
assuming it is maintained in single-target and a smaller benefit for AoE.
However, maintaining this efficiently is difficult, compared to its
relatively low payoff versus easier options, and the Combo Points required
could be spent on more impactful Finishers when using a different talent.
Therefore, it is not currently recommended.
Incarnation: King of the Jungle had its bonus effect flipped
with
Berserk in Shadowlands, and the benefit of this
talent is now drastically reduced. If burst damage is a necessity
this could see play, but is unlikely to be a good pick compared
to the much more flexible option in Soul of the Forest. Even with
the new set bonuses and double legendaries allowing for
Frenzyband
to be used to synergize with it, this still has a really hard time
getting the same value out of the alternative unless you really need
extra burst.
Tier 6 (Level 45) Talents for Feral Druid
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Tier 6 grants a variety of different AoE tools that specialize in different target counts.
Scent of Blood causes each enemy hit by your
Thrash casts to reduce the cost of
Swipe by 3 Energy for 6 seconds.
Brutal Slash replaces
Swipe, has 3 charges and an 8-second recharge time (reduced by Haste), a reduced Energy cost and like Swipe, also awards one Combo Point when used.
Primal Wrath is an active finisher ability that deals AoE damage around you, and applies the
Rip effect to all targets hit. Duration and damage is increased based upon Combo Points spent, as follows:
- 1 Point: 4 seconds.
- 2 Points: 6 seconds.
- 3 Points: 8 seconds.
- 4 Points: 10 seconds.
- 5 Points: 12 seconds.
Primal Wrath serves as the strongest sustained AoE option,
becoming the best choice whenever an additional target is present. This
allows for a much better resource cycle, granting a strong outlet for Combo
Points generated when multiple targets are active for high damage. It
is also completely uncapped in AoE allowing you to deal damage to a
higher number of targets at once.
Brutal Slash provides the only option on the row to impact
single-target damage due to the reduced Energy cost when cast, generating more
efficient Combo Points. It can also be used as a small burst of AoE
on targets, but is still limited by the 5 target cap that
Swipe
suffers from.
Scent of Blood is extremely unlikely to see play due
to the AoE cap applied to
Swipe, and the other talents it
has to compete with. While
Thrash is uncapped allowing
you to still stack this very high, the payoff is simply not there for
this talent and should be avoided.
Tier 7 (Level 50) Talents for Feral Druid
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Tier 7 provides alterations to your rotational tools, requiring additional Global Cooldowns to capitalize upon.
Moment of Clarity causes
Omen of Clarity to trigger 50% more often, and increase the damage of
Shred,
Thrash,
Swipe, or
Brutal Slash casts by 15% when consumed, and can stack up to 2 times. It also increases your maximum Energy by 30 when taken.
Bloodtalons increases the damage of your next two
Rip or
Ferocious Bite casts by 30% after using 3 different Combo Point generating abilities within a 4-second window.
Feral Frenzy is an active ability with a 45-second cooldown that deals a burst of Physical damage and additional Bleed damage over 6 seconds. This also rapidly generates 5 Combo Points over 1.5-seconds when cast.
Bloodtalons is currently the strongest choice on the tier,
allowing you to enhance all of your finishers consistently by 30% alongside
still snapshotting the effect to
Rip. This is the most mechanically
demanding talent on the tier to get used to, requiring you to pool then
rapidly trigger different Energy spenders, but provides excellent
throughput when played correctly to feed more damage into big finishers
such as
Ferocious Bite and
Primal Wrath.
Feral Frenzy provides a burst tool that
can smooth out dips in the rotation when you are unlucky with your
Primal Fury triggers and become resource-starved. It can also
be paired with
Tiger's Fury every other cast to provide a mid-range
burst tool if a fight demands this. The gameplay smoothing this
provides by evening out resource gaps alongside providing good burst
when paired with said tools makes this a solid option in short or
timer-based encounters.
Moment of Clarity provides an easy alternative for the rotation,
increasing your Energy generation via free
Shred casts, and by
extension increasing the cycle of your Combo Point expenditure. This has
a lower ceiling compared to both other options, but is much easier to execute
if you find yourself struggling.
PvP Talents (War Mode)
"War Mode" is an optional feature that enables open world PvP encounters that confers some benefits when active:
- Grants access to PvP talents in the open world.
- 10% increase in World Quest rewards at max level.
- 10% more experience gained while leveling.
- Earn Conquest Points which can reward gear every week.
With the benefits of War Mode for leveling and PvE content, it is recommended to enable the feature to maximize your leveling and rewards at maximum level. However, you will open yourself up to open world PvP, so be aware of hostile enemy players who could interfere with you, this is a risk you will have to decide on your own if you want take.
If you are interested in doing PvP as a Feral Druid or just want to know how to navigate Feral Druid PvP encounters, check out our dedicated PvP guide.
Feral Druid War Mode Talents
In this section we will rank the PvP talents for leveling and playing in open world PvE scenarios. Note that in the Shadowlands update, the PvP crowd control reduction talents have been removed, and will be replaced by trinkets available at level 60.
Feral Druid PvP Talents
Generally the selections are made to optimize your ability to kill enemies faster, increasing your pace when moving through content.
Leader of the Pack increases the Critical Strike chance of you and nearby allies by 5%, and causes players to heal for 5% of their maximum health when they critically strike with a 6-second cooldown. This is the best option available on the PvP tree for open world purposes.
Fresh Wound can provide additional burst to targets when applying your
Rake effect, and is a solid increase across the board when cycling between targets.
Ferocious Wound provides additional damage to your
Ferocious Bite that can be useful on high health targets due the maximum health reduction it applies. Value is mostly tied to the difficulty of the enemies you are encountering.
Savage Momentum causes successful interrupts with
Skull Bash to reduce the cooldown of
Tiger's Fury,
Stampeding Roar and
Survival Instincts by 10 seconds. This can be useful for moving around the world and extra burst windows on targets, but you will generally be using
Predator in the open world so that overlap makes it less flexible.
Thorns can provide some use if in situations with extra enemies present, to allow you to deal additional damage back when being hit.
King of the Jungle can provide very limited uses for extra movement
speed, but you will rarely have a large number of
Rips active unless
you are AoEing large groups with
Primal Wrath, at which point you will
likely not be moving far away.
Freedom of the Herd,
High Winds,
Malorne's Swiftness,
Wicked Claws, and
Strength of the Wild on the other hand have very
limited PvE uses, being more focused on in-combat control and group assistance.
These are much more focused on PvP encounters, so are not recommended for
open world play.
Changelog
- 31 May 2022: Page reviewed for Patch 9.2.5.
- 20 Feb. 2022: Updated for Patch 9.2.
- 01 Nov. 2021: Reviewed and approved for Patch 9.1.5.
- 28 Jun. 2021: Updated for Patch 9.1.
- 09 Mar. 2021: Reviewed for Patch 9.0.5.
- 23 Nov. 2020: Page updated for Shadowlands launch.
- 12 Oct. 2020: Page updated for the Shadowlands pre-patch.
More Druid Guides
Guides from Other Classes
This guide has been written by Wordup, a frequent theorycrafter involved in a number of class communities. He is also an experienced player who has been in the world top 100 since the days of Sunwell, currently raiding in Echoes. You can also follow him on Twitter.
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