3.0.9 and You

A surprise content patch is on its way, and I'm pretty sure most people are calling it the "PvP nerf patch". Reading through a list a guildie supplied me here is the druid list of changes.

Druids:

• Ferocious Bite: This ability now only uses up to 30 energy in addition to its base cost.

Yup, that's it. It doesn't seem like much, but it has plenty of consequences to PvP and even a little PvE in my mind.

First, let us look at the actual tool tip for FB itself:

Quite simply, any extra energy after the 35 points gets converted to extra damage dealt. If you had 100 energy you would do 1570 - 1710 + 65[9.4+AP/410] damage.

For any math nuts out there, I did a little bit of calculating on my own to demonstrate the change. Bear with me, my math may be a little off...but you'll get the general idea.

Calculations:

Let's first assume our dps kitty has a nice round unbuffed 4200 AP, there are 5 combo points on the target in question and we have 100 energy. Our math will look something like:

65[9.4+4200/410] = 2237 - 2377 damage

That's not too shabby, now let's add full ranks of the Feral Aggression talent.

65[9.4+4200/410]x.15 = 2337 - 2477 damage

Not bad at all. Since we're assuming we have Feral Aggression and 5 combo points, let's also see what happens when we crit on the target in question. This shouldn't be too hard to imagine given Rend and Tear and the fact that we probably already have a Rake on the target.

65[9.4+4200/410]x.15 x2 = 4672 - 4954 critical damage

Again, mind you that this was quick napkin math done without the presence of any kind of food or self/raid buff. Given buffs like kings, Tiger's Fury, or even strength/AP food (to name a few) our numbers are sure to jump.

Now what this new patch intends to do is of course limit the amount of extra energy we can expend on our FBs down to 30. Here now is the approximate math on what that will look like, given of course we're waiting for at least 30 extra energy and 5 combo points on our target.

30[9.4+4200/410] = 1876 - 2018 regular damage
30[9.4+4200/410]x.15 = 1924 - 2064 damage with feral aggression
20[9.4=4200/410]x.15 x2 = 3848 - 4128 critical damage

There you have it, the unbuffed damage difference is not incredibly awful, but noticeable.

Conclusion:

What does this mean to you?

For PvP oriented kitties... This will mean less fast and furious bite-the-healers-face-off burst damage. Again, assuming you would wish to wait to get up to 100 energy before attempting a finisher. Though who wouldn't with abilities like Berserk being so accessible? Giving the healer a dirt nap will make arenas easier of course.

For PvE raid oriented kitties... This may not mean as much to you as to your pvp counterparts. Sure, having that extra 35 energy slip by and go unused kinda sucks but with our rotations being much more dense than when they were in TBC we don't have the luxury of waiting for full energy before maybe using our bites. We've still got Savage Roar and Rip to maintain on bosses, along with the occasional mangle so getting those FBs in there can be tricky at times. Also with most raid trash falling like lead balloons to a well geared group attempting to get 5 combo points on any one target then going for a FB may be a little foolhardy.

All in all, I see 3.0.9 affecting PvP moreso than PvE in almost any circumstance.

Now what I would really love to see is Ferocious Bite working in conjunction with Clearcasting. In the many times I ever had Omen proc off of a hit I made I never saw my FBs consume the clearcasting and instead use all of my precious energy. That was rather a waste of energy no doubt.