Imp FF & New Moonkin Spell Rotation
I’m not sure what blogs you guys read, but the main purpose of today’s post is to give my opinion on Imp FF. Before I continue, I know there are certain people that think certain talents are required for any PvE moonkin, and many experienced moonkins think people are stupid for not picking up Imp FF. I have Imp FF in my current talent spec, but when I get home today, I’m dropping it. Please note that this is just myself personally, always think through your build yourself when specc’ing for your raids.
Why I am dropping Improved Faerie Fire (Imp FF):
If you haven’t heard the news from another source, it was confirmed by Ghostcrawler that Improved Faerie Fire would actually give you 3% extra crit, even if the Faerie Fire on the target was put up by a feral druid. When I heard this at first, I thought it was great; we raid with usually a feral druid tank, so I would essentially have an extra 3% crit without having to do anything. I respecced, picked it up, played around with it.
There are a few problems in my raids that don’t make Imp FF worth 3 points, IMO.
1) There is no raid-wide benefit, in the raids that I run, for keeping this up on bosses - As I’ve mentioned in previous posts, both of my raid leaders are shadow priests. I am never going to run a 25 man without a shadow priest, unless I’m leading a PUG. There is no added +hit for the raid if I put this on bosses, and there are already other debuffs that reduce armor.
2) The Feral druids in my raids don’t keep FF up. – Part of the reason most moonkins are now picking up Imp FF is because Feral druids are keeping FF up, meaning they get the free crit and don’t have to keep FF up themselves. Druids are only are trash OTs in raids I run. On boss fights, they don’t keep up FF, they just DPS in kitty form.
3) I’m bad at keeping DoTs (other than MF), up on targets – Let’s face it, do I really want to be worrying about keeping up another DoT? After picking up Eclipse, I’m already worried about when Eclipse is going to proc, timing my Wrath/Starfire spells and trying to make sure I don’t have to reapply MF while Eclipse is up. I’m not a big fan of having a 3rd timer to keep track of.
What do I plan to do with the three points from Imp FF?
When I respecc’ed and picked up Imp FF, I dropped 3 points from Dreamstate, because my mana efficiency was insane. I was regenerating more mana than I could burn, even while innervating healers and Brez’ing people who fail. So, I don’t plan to put those points back in Dreamstate; I’m still doing fine on mana after dropping it and dropping 2 points in Moonglow.
I’m probably going to put at least 1/3 in Owlkin Frenzy. Call it a PvP talent, call it what you want, but in my opinion, I don’t think putting 1-3 points in it is that big of a waste. I mean, think about it; how many bosses do raid-wide damage, which would proc this? How many bosses spawn adds that you, being a moonkin, might tank occasionally? If you actually think about it, you realize Owlkin Frenzy is not that bad of a talent. Go ahead, call me stupid, but when I get home, I’m dropping Imp FF and either putting 3/3 in OF, or 1/3 in OF and 2/2 in Gale Winds. Or maybe, I’ll go 1/3 OF, 1/2 Gale Winds, and 1/1 Typhoon. Anyways…
My Updated Moonkin Spell Rotation
Awhile ago, I wrote a post on my Spell Rotation, and all that jazz. Well, that information is more than a few months old, and currently outdated. Without further adieu, I present to you the new rotation that I am using for bosses on 25 mans, which reflects speccing into Eclipse 3/3, having Glyph of Moonfire/Starfire combination:
MF, IS, Wrath (till Eclipse proc), SF till Eclipse is done, and till CD is done. Rinse and repeat. I pop trees on every CD, and am not afraid to refresh MF on a target even while Eclipse is up.
For trash, you can drop the DoTs, and do the reverse of Eclipse, or whatever. I’ve never really worried about trash DPS too much, and lately, I’ve just been Hurricaning everything down.
Starfall Nerf, and Possible Starfire Nerf? (source)
If you haven’t been keeping up with news in the Moonkin world, when patch 3.0.8 comes out, Starfall will no longer work with Celestial Focus (aka – it will not stun things). Also, and not really mentioned in the patch notes, Starfall will no longer bring players (aka – rogues), out of stealth. I’ve not been one to really spec into Starfall anyways; I don’t PvP much, and the bonus damage it is used for in PvE, in my opinion, is negligible, and too conditional for me to waste a talent spec in it. I know some raiding moonkins take it and use it as almost an extra DoT, but not I.
Anyways, there’s been a lot of QQ about the nerf, but whatever, it happens. The thing that has me actually kind of happy is if they nerf Starfire. It seems Blizz is moving away from all these stuns, and they may be removing the Starfire stun, making the Celestial Focus talent pretty useless. If they remove the stun part of Celestial Focus, I feel they will have to buff it some other way, which is the reason why I’d actually be happy if they nerfed it. The Starfire stun was nice though; in PvP, it helped you nuke down a healer before it could heal itself, and in PvE, it saved my life on trash move than once when I pulled aggro.
Anyways, huge post here guys, please comment! Its been getting quiet around here lately.
Macbook
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Good points all around. I once specced IFF, but dropped in because I tend to run with a shadow priest quite often. I reinvested those points into Owlkin Frenzy which was very helpful in 5-mans as the occasional OT or healer bodyguard.
I’ve grown to like Starfall, but I never relied upon the stun aspect (I relied for that on SF). It is a nice fire-and-forget spell that adds DPS and is heavily used during boss fights when we need the extra edge.
@ Sourcefire –
Thanks for commenting. Yeah, I think I’m going 3/3 Owklin Frenzy when I get on later tonight.
I’ve heard that argument about Starfall, but I feel there’s going to be too many fights where I will forget to use it, or that you simply can’t use it (think – Loetheb, or similar fights). But yeah, I’ve seen most other experienced moonkins using it.
Macbook
Ok, while this may or may not be on topic (I think it does), I was wondering this:
I’ve been leveling with Feral, and at 66 (my first “real” toon), I want to go Mookin. I also don’t want to slow my progression into WotLK. My gear is C+ quality, but I replace it quickly so I’m hoping the better gear comes along as I grow.
Plus, BC groups are hard to find at my level.
Any thoughts, or pointers would be appreciated.
Wattan of Earthen Ring.
[...] Macbook at Moonkin.info explains why he is dropping Improved Faerie Fire despite the buff it’s getting in Patch 3.0.8. He also goes into his spell rotations for his Moonkin as well as analyzes the upcoming Starfall nerf. [...]
Starfall is one of those abilities that one must be very careful and situationally aware to use. Because of it’s range, splash effect, and fire-and-forget nature one can often pull unintended mobs in error. I’ve actually had an elite dragon that was flying around above me (think Coldarra) that was pulled this way. So it’s a very situational ability that is more-or-less an ‘oh crap button to boost DPS on certain fights. Having said that I don’t know where I would put the 1 talent point I would gain by not speccing in it, so it’s got a home for now.
@ Wattan –
I personally levelled from 1-60 as feral, 60-70 as resto (only ran instances to level), and 70-80 as balance.
To be honest, you might have better luck levelling as feral; you might find yourself going OOM quickly while levelling if you are just starting to gear up for moonkin, and that really slows down how fast you level.
@ Sourcefire — What’s your current spec (link?), I’m sure there’s somewhere else that point could be useful.
Macbook
Can you post a link to the talent calculator with your current build?
I find your reasoning for not picking up IFF quite odd (am not saying it is mandatory). I always thought FFF was off GCD, which didn’t penalize ferals for using it. It also stacks with Sunder Armor/Expose Armor (but not Curse of Recklessness and Wasp’s Sting).
Besides that, adding another “DOT” (sigh) shouldn’t complicate your rotation. You seem to blame Eclipse’s complexity. If you have difficulty tracking Eclipse, there are plenty of addons that do it for you pretty much.
Owlkin Frenzy and “tanking adds” as a Moonkin is nonsense in a raiding environment – it just isn’t worth it. It sounds good on paper, but at the end of the day if you go over your WWS, it is just not significant enough to take over 3% universal spell crit.
I can’t help but think you’re very new to Balance spec from reading your post.
~ Yogi
P.S.: Is there a reason there are so many ads on your blog? Even http://www.themoonkinrepository.com has none.
@ Yogi — Thanks for commenting. Let me clarify a little bit on what I said, as I do sometimes post pretty fast and sometimes say what I don’t necessarily mean.
As far as I know, IFF is still on the GCD. I can hit IFF, and I have to wait another second before I can hit another spell. To be honest, I’m not too worried about the reduced armor it gives. We bring very few melee to our raids, and in the raids I run, DPS isn’t a problem.
Lol, its not another DoT, typo there that I won’t worry to correct. Since I initially began complaining about Eclipse, I have picked up Sqawk and Awe, and Eclipse isn’t that bad to manage now. Still, using Eclipse involves more skill than a simple, pre-WoTLK MF/SF combo, which I used up until recently, and still proved to pump out decente DPS.
Regarding Owlkin Frenzy, you are picking a point out of context. The main emphasis on that topic was about bosses that do raid-wide damage. There is quite a decent amount of bosses that do damage to the entire raids, whether it be the vortex in Malygos, the aura in Sapphiron, etc. What I meant by “tanking adds” wasn’t like literally tanking a 25-man mob. It was meant more towards thinks like little spiders in Maexxna hitting you when the tank can’t pick them up, or the hatchlings in OB hitting you for the same reason. All of these things would proc OF.
Like I mentioned earlier, dropping IFF may not be the best choice for the hardcore raider, but for someone such as myself who is often pugging 10 mans, I believe that those talent points are better used elsewhere.
Regarding the ads, there are 3 ad units, and they aren’t really in the way of anything. The site itself doesn’t regenerate enough money to cover its own hosting.
Let me know if my points made sense,
Macbook
[...] FF is up on a target, even a feral’s), Gray Matter on why the talent’s worth taking, and Macbook on the raid circumstances in which it might not be. As with our previous entry on pre-raid Restoration gear at 80, these guides assume that you do [...]
[...] As a note here concerning the recent news on Improved Faerie Fire (in a nutshell, you’ll get the 3% crit no matter whose FF is up on a target, even a feral’s), Gray Matter on why the talent’s worth taking, and Macbook on the raid circumstances in which it might not be. [...]
[...] As a state here concerning the recent news on Improved Faerie Fire (in a nutshell, you’ll intend the 3% crit no concern whose FF is up on a target, modify a feral’s), Gray Matter on why the talent’s worth taking, and Macbook on the assail circumstances in which it strength not be. [...]
[...] As a note here concerning the recent news on Improved Faerie Fire (in a nutshell, you’ll get the 3% crit no matter whose FF is up on a target, even a feral’s), Gray Matter on why the talent’s worth taking, and Macbook on the raid circumstances in which it might not be. [...]
iFF is now worth taking over imp.IS Since it is a 3% flat crit increase over all spells. For Owlkin frenzy, I’m still going to have only 1 point. I am using it for the random AoE proc’ing the 10% damage increase. 15% of the time honestly isn’t that much for a 10% damage increase. The points that would have gone towards to Owlkin, is better off being placed in imp.FF
If this was a pvp situation, 3/3 Owlkin is fine. In terms of PVE, 1/3 Owlkin proc’s enough of the time too buff my damage.
Kus.
@ Kusatteru –
IMO, IFF is not worth more over Imp IS. IIS increased crit by 3% on targets that had MF, if you use SF. I always keep MF up on bosses, so that is a 3% crit bonus to SF without having to keep anything additional up.
Casting IFF is a DPS loss if it doens’t benefit your raid. It is only a real DPS increase for you if you don’t have to cast it on targets, and a feral druid is keeping up FF.
Macbook
[...] As a note here concerning the recent news on Improved Faerie Fire (in a nutshell, you’ll get the 3% crit no matter whose FF is up on a target, even a feral’s), Gray Matter on why the talent’s worth taking, and Macbook on the raid circumstances in which it might not be. [...]
@Mac
The reason why I say IFF is worth taking is solely dependent upon if you have a Feral druid who is putting up FFF. If he isn’t, it depends on the make up of the raid. When you know that you have a S.Priest and a Feral druid who puts FFF up, then IFF is very much worth taking because you don’t have to do anything to gain 3% crit. When you lack a S.Priest, IFF is still worth taking because you are giving 3% hit to everyone (which can make up for your dps loss.
The key thing to note is if the feral druid, preferably a bear tank, is putting up FFF. They do have a GCD to spend on it. In my case, I know my feral tank will be putting up FFF. Therefore in my situation IFF is worth more than Imp. IS. If I had the talent points to spare, Imp. IS would be taken as well. Since it would be 6% starfire crit from just talents alone.
Kus.
@ Kus –
Fair enough. Only thing I have to add is I believe someone did the math, and determined that 3% extra Wrath damage while keeping up IS and spamming Wrath to proc Eclipse was more of a DPS increase than the 3% crit that IFF offered.
Not sure where I saw that, but its definitely something to look into.
Macbook
[...] up-to-date. I would recommend checking my post on the Moonkin Spell Rotation, another post on the casting rotation I use, [...]
I used to have IMP FF in my rotation but i dropped it, i now keep up IS and MF while spamming wrath until eclipse procs etc etc etc.
But im going to drop IMP FF from my talents and try to put the points into something more DoT oriented
Are there any moonkins guide around with some worth reading information about the 2 different eclipses and why one is better then the other.
I usually keep all dots up on my rotation and i only use starfire eclips when starfall is up since Warth hits for 10k+ with both trinkets trigged.
Tried lately going for the starfire eclipse but it didnt improeve my dps at all.. still doing 4.2k on PW (25 naxx)
@ Schugga –
Aren’t your consecutive Wraths + haste + NG bumping into the GCD?
macbook
nice website here, just stumbled into it.
In my opinion, starfall is a useful talent to have, since if gives us chickens another thing to hit whilst being forced to move (think: thaddius/grobbulus) and a nice aoe whilst being able to focus on the boss (think: gluth).
on another note, what do you think about the typhoon + gale winds talents, since its an instant cast aswell and gives some thrash-bonus points?
@ Psychole —
Yeah, this post is kind of dated, I pick up Starfall in my current spec, and will love it even more when 3.1 hits and the CD is halved.
I’m not a fan of Typhoon. IMO – Hurricane still rapes for Trash. While Typhoon is useful for fights like Gluth and solo’ing, when I pick it up, I usually Glyph it.
I do currently have Gale Winds though, but that will change in 3.1 since I will take 3/3 iFF.
Macbook