I was fortunate enough to receive [Nibelung] tonight, and I wanted to give a quick update on the Val’kyr proc.

The Val’kyr Guardian, summoned by the nonheroic Nibelung, averages about 1750 damage or so.  (1700-1900 damage before resists).

The Val’kyr Protector, summoned by the heroic version, averages about 1950-1960 damage.  (2000-2200 damage before resists).

A small buff to the proc, but a buff none the less.

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I know there’s been some people claiming that Languish is not that much of an upgrade from 4pc T9.  The following is a screenshot of a 10man Saurfang kill I did right after getting 4pc, and you can see that it clearly is an upgrade.

Let’s assume a 60% crit rate on Moonfire, which I think is actually a little on the high side, even given [Improved Moonfire].  Moonfire did 127973 damage.  If 60 percent of them crit and did double damage, 127973*1.60*1.03(meta gem) = 210899.504 damage.

Now, Languish did 108132 damage.  127973+108132=236105 damage.   That’s a 11% boost in damage over 2PC T9, and that’s giving Moonfire a very generous crit rate.  Giving a 55 percent crit rate, and 204308 damage, you’re looking at a 14% boost.

I don’t theorycraft often, so feel free to double check my math.

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The Icecrown 5man dungeon loot has been released, including the reward from the Quel’delar questline.  The 5man dungeon loot will be item level 232, with the questline weapon being 251.

Of COURSE, the DPS caster weapon is a sword, and the caster mace has mp5 on it.  *grumble*

Please see the MMO Champion post here for details on the loot.

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Thanks to our friends at MMO Champion, the stats for the first two sets of Tier 10 (item level 251 and item level 264) have been released.  This looks to be the 10man and 25man (non hardmode) sets.  The 25man hardmode set will be item level 277.

I have yet to compare the sets to the other classes, however it does look fairly well itemized.  As Balourd commented earlier, only two pieces have hit, and there is no spirit, allowing for both haste AND crit to be on the other 3 pieces.  Both hit pieces (gloves and legs) also have a decent amount of crit on them as well.

Please leave your opinions in the comments section!

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According to MMO-Champion, the following is the Tier 10 balance relic:

The periodic damage from your Insect Swarm and Moonfire spells grants 44 critical strike rating for 15 sec. Stacks up to 5 times.

I hope I’m not the only one not impressed by this.  This allows IS and MF to grant 220 critical strike rating, versus the current T9 idol which allows MF to grant 200 critical strike rating.

I realize adding insect swarm to the mix allows for some versatility, but this hardly seems worth an upgrade, especially if you have to spend badges for it.

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I updated the ToC BiS after Chardev upgraded to version 7 and broke all their previous profiles.  I also cleaned up the BiS page a bit, and included Alliance BiS pages as well.  Please let me know what you think!

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Thanks to our friends at MMO-Champion, the Tier 10 Armor has been data-mined, and set bonuses have been discovered (although the data mine doesn’t seem to be perfect for all the set bonuses… the intent is there).

First, the tier gear.  Click on the image for full size:

To be honest, I’m not sure what I think of it yet.  It’s definitely… different.  The shoulders remind me of venus fly traps on steroids.

And now onto the set bonuses:

• Item – Druid T10 Balance 2P Bonus – When you gain Clearcasting from your Omen of Clarity talent, you deal 15% additional Nature and Arcane damage for 6 sec.
• Item – Druid T10 Balance 4P Bonus – Your critical strikes from Starfire and Wrath cause the target languish for an additional 5% of your spell’s damage over 4 seconds.

The 2 piece bonus looks like an interesting new take on things, and with as often as Omen of Clarity procs, I think this could be a nice sustained DPS upgrade.  (And a great boost to Hurricane damage as well).   It looks like they responded to the feedback from balance druids and have updated the 4 piece bonus.  This one looks interesting.  On a 15,000 Starfire crit, you’re looking at 750 extra damage, and on a 10,000 wrath crit you’re looking at 500.  I’ll have to theorycraft it later to see how the exact numbers work out for a DPS value.

FYI, here’s the restoration and feral bonuses.

• Item – Druid T10 Feral 2P Bonus – Your Swipe (Bear) and Lacerate abilities deal 20% additional damage and the cost of your Rip ability is reduced by 10 energy.
• Item – Druid T10 Feral 4P Bonus – Your Enrage ability no longer decreases your armor and instead decreases all damage taken by 12%, and the periodic damage done by your Rake ability can now be a critical strike.

• Item – Druid T10 Restoration 2P Bonus – The healing granted by your Wild Growth spell reduces 0% less over time.
• Item – Druid T10 Restoration 4P Bonus (Rejuvenation) – Each time your Rejuvenation spell heals a target, it has a 2% chance to jump to a new target at full duration.

The feral bonuses both intrigue me.  I think they’ll be quite the buff for tanking as well as DPS.  The resto balances also seem pretty interesting as well.  While I’m not sure what the actual reduction will be on the Wild Growth decay, it will be a pretty big boost to the spell, and the chain rejuvenation seems neat.

EDIT: Updated the Balance bonuses.  Damage was increased from 10% to 15% for 2pc, and 4pc bonus was revamped completely.

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So far, looks like balance druids really haven’t been touched in 3.3. A few tooltips have been re-worded (Genesis and Nature’s Grace), although I do not believe the actual function of the tooltips has changed. In alignment with everyone else, our lower rank spells have had costs reduced, although I don’t see that to be very useful for much. (Perhaps PvP?). Resto druids got a pretty big nerf, though, as [Rejuvenation] had it’s additional tick removed. [Improved Barkskin] got nerfed pretty heavily too, with armor being reduced to 80%. As for ferals, [Swipe (Bear)] was increased to an 8 yard range. I’ll keep you posted of any other changes we see on the PTR.

Update: According to mmo-champion, [Improved Barkskin] was not altered in 3.3, the tooltip was simply clarified.

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The loot gods smiled at me tonight in Trial of the Crusader, and I was able to pick up [Barb of Tarasque], and then by virtue of being the only druid in the raid, I picked up [Bindings of the Autumn Willow].  I think this puts me at 9 slots BiS towards my T8/T9 BiS list.  I’m hoping for [Belt of Pale Thorns] next.  The non-leather pieces, (ring, cloak, trinkets) are going to be the hardest to pick up.

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I’ve drafted a moonkin guide for ToC BiS, but I really would like your input into it.    It’s done from a Horde point of view, and includes a few different gear combinations.   The BiS guide is available to the right under “Moonkin Guides”, or you can click here.

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