Zavulona - feral DPS

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zavulon

Zavulona - feral DPS

Postby zavulon » Sat Jul 04, 2009 9:28 pm

Hello!
My name is Christopher and I would like to join AGPG. Here is my application sheet. I hope that I will pass your trial and find my place among your people.


Character name - Zavulona
My primary character on Turalyon is named 'Zavulona'. My previous character was called 'Zavulon' (name is taken from a book ^^ ) but it was already taken on Turalyon, so I decided to make female character this time. She looks a lot better than another bearded, hairy and angry night elf male.


Class - Druid
I love this class for its flexibility, fun gameplay and overall performance. I've chosen it for both leveling and end-game raiding reasons. Forgive me if I'm writing some obvious things, but you need to know they are obvious to me :)

Leveling:
Feral druid is leveling and traveling very fast and smooth. We got a lot of abilities that increase speed as well as IMO the best flying 'mount' in the game (ever tried jumping from the edge of the Outland straight into Twisting Nether and survived? or healed yourself in the middle of air? :P)
Feral druid is a killing machine that never stops. After a fight I'm ready to engage another foe in just seconds. Soloing elites for 'group' quest is rarely a problem. And if all of sudden it is a problem, I can just Shadowmeld and pretend that I've never been there.

End-game raiding:
Druid is the only class that can take every possible in-game role. And if talented and geared properly, can be good in it.


Game experience:
On this character I played more than 17 days, including more than 3 days at level 80. This, however, don't show my overall experience with druid class and with WoW. Before I came to Turalyon, I played for some time on private, free WoW servers. While some things works slightly different there, basics are the same. When I came here, I've had one lvl 70 druid char already (See alts section), so I knew what to expect.


Social or raiding?
While I'm rather social, helpful player, raiding is my priority. I'm very interested in WotLK raid challenges and tired of all those fail PUGs ('OMG I've just assigned item to wrong person sorry lol')
On the other hand, guild raids are always much different. Planned, well organised. People don't think only about their personal gain but rather work for guild community.

Specialisation:
My primary spec is feral DPS (0/55/16).
My secondary spec is feral tank (0/58/13).

I've chosen this specs because I like melee combat. I have experience in both tanking and damage dealing. The extact talent builds are compilation of internet advices and my personal choices. I still sometimes move a point or two to find optimal spec; talents change after each patch. I would like quad-spec to be introduced :)


Experiences with other talent specs:
I have some experience as a party and raid healer in BC raids.
I've never been a moonkin though. Sure, they have a cool dance, but when I deal with my foes, I like face them at close distance. Rawr!

Armory:
http://eu.wowarmory.com/character-sheet ... n=Zavulona

Why this item kit:
I've hit 80 not so long ago, so my item set is not very impressive yet. '
You will probably 'catch' me in my tanking gear, as I lead and tank a few heroics every day.

For DPS set I got almost all epic items (200-213) and still 4 rare items which need to be replaced (pants,helmet,boots,trinket)
Trinket was easiest to get, I got Nobles Deck and wait for next Faire.
Still farming Gundrak hc for pants (they never drop though) and Argent Crusade rep for boots.
A week or two, a few succesful pre-Ulduar raids and my gear will be more epic, I can assure you :)

Other useful items:
High level inscription profession; at the moment I can create 78% of all in-game glyphs.
High level cooking; most interesting northrend recipes.


Kitty in raids:
First of all, I'm hybrid class. As a feral damage dealer my primary job is of course to rip enemies to shreds. While my DPS would be probably slightly inferior compared to pure DPS classes (like rogue), I can provide great variety of raid utilities that they cannot bring.
Improved Leader of the Pack aura that increases critical chance of all raid members by 5% (was: party in BC). Melee damage dealers crit more often and raid DPS is increasing. In addition, raid members heal themselves on critical hits for 4% of their max life in given moment. Maybe it is not very much, but everything counts.
Improved Gift of the Wild is substantial buff that increases armor, all atributes and all resistances my teammates.
I have also Thorns, which is nice buff for tanks that increases aggro, but I probably won't be casting it, as talents that improve Thorns are part of balance talent tree.

I have also some emergency tools. Unlike some other DPS classes, I need to be much more aware what is happening with whole raid and be ready to shapeshift and react fast if something is going wrong.

Innervate is emergency tool that allows me to regenerate healers' mana in mana-intensive fights. (CD will be reduced in 3.1.2 to 3 min)
Rebirth is my unique ability to revive fallen mate during combat. (CD is still 20 minutes, so don't expect miracles though :D )
Quick emergency off-heal can sometimes save a day :)
I can also root/cyclone/hibernate enemy, provided it is not immune to such forms of crowd control and CC is useful in given fight (in most cases just waste of time though .. )
I can Remove curse and Abolish poison on myself and other raid members if needed.
As a feral, I can also be an off-tank. If additional tank is needed or something went wrong and main tank have fallen, or someone need to pick-up adds, I call upon the force of nature and shapeshift into bear, growling, swiping and challenging enemies. I can make my already hard skin even more harder with barkskin and fight even longer thanks to my innate survival insincts.

Tanking is a whole new story. I have a lot of experience as a tank too and I can perform this role, but I'm aware that you have tanks with much better stats, so tanking will be rather my off-spec. Still, for druids some items are very good for both. Maybe not BiS, but still very good.

As a cook, I can also provide some delicious Northrend food and very convenient Fish Feast for raid. Yummy!

I also noticed that new Wotlk items for druids (e.g. T7) don't provide additional intelect, like it was in BC times. That leads to rather small mana pool while cost of shapeshift is still very high. It is probably Blizzard intention to make ferals shapeshift less often and be more concerned about pure DPS.


Raid preparation.
Before raid I read strategies, if I'm not familiar with them and watch video on YT. If something is still unclear I read forums and other players comments.

In-game, I also check food, flasks, potions, reagents, water, items damage (and bag space for loot ^^)


Raiding experience:
Vanilla - not very much, I tanked most of 5-man instances, but no raids.
BC - all from Karazhan to sunwell, BUT remember that I did that on private server, where bosses behaviour (spells, abilities, phases etc.) sometimes differ greatly compared to official ones.
LK - Most heroics done. I've been to Naxx 25, Os25, VoA 25. Can't wait for next challenges!


Why AG Praetorian Guard?
I believe that AGPG is friendly, social and experienced raiding guild, one of best raiding guilds on Turalyon. Two of my RL friends are proud members of AGPG and recommend it. I've seen you in action when I was participating in Naxx25 half-AGPG half-pug leaded by Becc. I don't need more reasons.

Why do you need me?
Invite me and you will get nice druid, nice dps and nice guildmate ;)


On which days of the week are you able to attend raids?
Now its summer break, so basically most evenings IF planned some time before.

TS, Vent
Familiar but didn't use them often. My mic sucks. Hovewer in my case listening is more important ^^

Former member of:
Order of The Light (AlphaWoW, WoWLegion; International Guild), Husaria (Turalyon; Polish Guild)

My characters:

Turalyon:
Zavulona, lvl 80 Night Elf Druid, Feral
Boholt, lvl 45 Human Warrior, Fury
Faoiltiarna, lvl 66 Night Elf Death Knight, Blood

As I mentioned above, I have also some characters on private servers.

Alphawow:
Zavulon, lvl 70 Night Elf Druid, tank/feral dps/resto
Reynevan, lvl 70 Human Rogue, Subtlety

WowLegion:
Zavulona, 70, Druid, tank/feral dps/resto
Zerthanis, 70, Paladin, protection/holy
Kelsay, 70, Undead Rogue, Subtlety


Which character?
Zavulona as feral DPS. I can respec for tank if neeeded.


Did you level all your characters from the start yourself?
Of course. Leveling is fun! Especially after hitting Outland.

Real life.
My name is Christopher (Krzysztof) and I'm from Poland. I'm 23 years old and I study law. My hobby is music - I play electric guitar as well as bass guitar.

Thanks for your time!

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Re: Zavulona - feral DPS

Postby Doomglazer » Sun Jul 05, 2009 12:35 am

zavulon wrote:
I believe that AGPG is friendly, social and experienced raiding guild, one of best raiding guilds on Turalyon.


Good enough for me but i dont have anything to say.

But on a more serious note a nice well written application wish you the best of luck
I'm the Herald, the Gaze in the Dark, the Blinking Madness. Empires I rule, nations I birth, a crown desired

Hayek
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Postby Hayek » Sun Jul 05, 2009 11:40 am

Hi Zavulona,

I've forwarded your application to the other officers for discussion. You'll probably ehar from us in a few days.

Good luck, and thanks for applying!

Hayek
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A Polar explorer needs 5000 calories a day.
- Also when driving to the pole in a sheltered car?
Let's be safe.

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Postby Adso » Sun Jul 05, 2009 12:32 pm

Good Luck.

Well written aplication indeed.

/wave
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Postby Aygo » Sun Jul 05, 2009 5:38 pm

Good luck on the application. Well written and very extensive!
Tycho

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Re: Zavulona - feral DPS

Postby Nkhari » Sun Jul 05, 2009 5:46 pm

A nice post indeed! A fellow Kitty! I have only one critisism :twisted:

[quote="zavulon"]

While my DPS would be probably slightly inferior compared to pure DPS classes (like rogue)... [/quote="zavulon"]

Pre 3.2 wrong! Kitty Druids are more than capable of rocking the meters with the best of the 'pure' dps-ers, but its a challenge to do so with our non-facerolling damage cycle.

Post 3.2 we're seeing reports of 2-5% dps drops depeding on skill and gear level.

As a potential raid member (and rival Kitty : :lol: ) I'd like to know what you think of the 3.2 Feral changes, and what rotation do you use when raiding in Kitty spec?

Rawrs,
Vic
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zavulon

Postby zavulon » Tue Jul 07, 2009 12:29 am

Hello

When I wrote



While my DPS would be probably slightly inferior compared to pure DPS classes (like rogue)...

I was thinking about real end-game DPS. We are not far from Karazhan level now. We will check it again after storming the gates of Icecrown Citadel ;)

The reason that makes me think that is Blizzard's statement they want overall dps of hybrid classes be slightly inferior than pure dps classes. Depending on encounter, or course, but overall we will be doing a little less damage than rogues with comparable gear. That leads to ..

Patch 3.2 Feral changes.

1. Yellow DPS Nerf

(Mangle, shred, rake, rip, swipe (cat))

All of our yellow dps abilities (except FB) are getting nerfed.

At first look I was like 'OMG why do you nerf me? I've been a good kitty ;( '

But then I red elitist jerks calculations. Except Swipe, only constant parts of abilities are getting nerfed and it's not really big nerf. Depending on gear yellow nerf will be around 3-4%, resulting in overall around 2% dps nerf.

Well .. Thats calculations, but if it really will be around 2% .. Then I agree with statement "This is, more or less, a paper nerf to shut people up."

2. New art for our forms! Yeah. Everyone was waiting for it for years. Literally. You may like new art or no, but its a step in good direction. Finally.

For me, taurens look better than NE, though.

3. Feral swiftness talent no longer will be used for travelling, resilience is now even more useless for bears.

DPS rotation.

Well, still finding my best. I wasn't doing much raid DPS in last months. (I cannot practise it in heroics, because thrash don't live long enough and on bosses ... well, in most cases I just pull aggro real quick if I DPS hard)

My favourite rotation is of course:

Mangle Mangle Mangle Mangle Mangle Mangle Mangle Mangle

But more seriously, I do
Mangle, Rake, Savage Roar, (Berserk-if there is time and energy), (Tiger's Fury), Shred to 5CP, Rip

Keep Savage Roar, Mangle debuff and Rake active.
Use OoC procs for Shred
FFF on the beginning, while approaching boss and then if there is nothing better to do (and tank is not bear)

Thats works fine for me, but there may be something I can improve! I would love to hear any suggestions from more experienced kitty :)

Regards
Chris

Nkhari
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Postby Nkhari » Tue Jul 07, 2009 10:15 am

Tbh the nerf still concerns me somewhat. The paper maths says an overall 2% nerf, which I agree is acceptable. However, given that letting just one of our 'keeper-uppers' (SR, Rip, Rake and Mangle) drop can have exponential impact on our damage, I am thinking a 5% drop is in fact a more accurate figure.

I dont know many Kitties who can say they do a perfect rotation on every boss, especially mobile fights.

One question, why do you take Nurturing Instincts? Generally there are 2-5 talent points kitties can play around with so I'm kinda interested why you've gone for this talent over others?

PS I'm well know for totally over-reaccting to nerfs, so you can safely ignore any 'omg nerf!' rants from me ^^
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Alneis

Postby Alneis » Tue Jul 07, 2009 11:10 am

PS I'm well know for totally over-reaccting to nerfs, so you can safely ignore any 'omg nerf!' rants from me ^^


And who doesn't over-react on nerfs to their own class, hmm? ;)

On topic: very nice application, you did put some time into it! Thumbs up! Looks like you finally find some time outside AH and done some reading as well.

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Postby Concho » Tue Jul 07, 2009 11:29 am

Alneis wrote:
PS I'm well know for totally over-reaccting to nerfs, so you can safely ignore any 'omg nerf!' rants from me ^^


And who doesn't over-react on nerfs to their own class, hmm? ;)

On topic: very nice application, you did put some time into it! Thumbs up! Looks like you finally find some time outside AH and done some reading as well.


I think they need to nurf warriors, man we are just to good looking.
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Postby Antarn » Tue Jul 07, 2009 11:33 am

Conchobar wrote:
Alneis wrote:
PS I'm well know for totally over-reaccting to nerfs, so you can safely ignore any 'omg nerf!' rants from me ^^


And who doesn't over-react on nerfs to their own class, hmm? ;)

On topic: very nice application, you did put some time into it! Thumbs up! Looks like you finally find some time outside AH and done some reading as well.


I think they need to nurf warriors, man we are just to good looking.


I don't think gnomes can be good looking apart from Dwiezel :P

Antarn

p.s.

Good application. I hope you will also show some commitment toward raiding since we had quite some applicants who came into guild and then raid very little.
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Postby Icewind » Tue Jul 07, 2009 11:56 am

Nkhari wrote:Tbh the nerf still concerns me somewhat. The paper maths says an overall 2% nerf, which I agree is acceptable. However, given that letting just one of our 'keeper-uppers' (SR, Rip, Rake and Mangle) drop can have exponential impact on our damage, I am thinking a 5% drop is in fact a more accurate figure.

I dont know many Kitties who can say they do a perfect rotation on every boss, especially mobile fights.

One question, why do you take Nurturing Instincts? Generally there are 2-5 talent points kitties can play around with so I'm kinda interested why you've gone for this talent over others?

PS I'm well know for totally over-reaccting to nerfs, so you can safely ignore any 'omg nerf!' rants from me ^^


Less squishy DPS gets the Healers Seal of Approval(tm). Especialy for raid dmg fights like Iron Council and XT-002 to mention two.

zavulon

Postby zavulon » Tue Jul 07, 2009 12:12 pm

Vic:
I have taken both Instincts (Nurturing and Survival) to increase my survivality. Dead kitties don't do very impressive DPS. 10% more from heals (if anyone care to do some group heal:P) may be not very impressive, but sometimes can be a matter of life and death.
Other alternative for those two points was Feral Agression, but 6% from Ferocious Bite vs being alive .. At least, sounds better ;)

Analysing your talent build, maybe I should skip Feral Instinct and take Feral Agression, hmm ...


Antarn:
I hope you will also show some commitment toward raiding


Sure I will. Main reason I'm here is raiding. Simply because I cannot further improve my character without raids. I got all from heroics, rep grinds, emblems and crafting. And I enjoy raids (at least, those succesful ;D )


Alneis:
Looks like you finally find some time outside AH and done some reading as well.


Thanks for compliment ;) I did. On the other hand, I like AH raiding :P And reading don't give you Nobles Deck (thanks for advice) & some crafted epics in like, one week, right?
I will sooner buy Proto-Hide Leggings (ulduar BoE drop) than get Gundrak hc drop. That's fact.

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Postby Nkhari » Tue Jul 07, 2009 1:17 pm

As far as XT is concerned, timing your Barkskin to go of on the Tantrum is more than enough to ensure survivability as well as making the healers job easier - SI, although lacking in some of the top-end Kitty raiding specs, I think I rely on still too much to save my ass - especially when emergency tanking.

At the end of the day, I can understand the use for 'survivability' talents, but I personally havent used Nurturing since early Naxx and havent had any complaints ^^

Nurturing alone isnt enough to make your heals a life-saver as a Feral Druid, if you're still trying to be an all-rounder then GL to you, but these days Druids aren't Hybrids at all, we're expected to pull our weight and be as good a tank, healer or damage dealer as the next man, so we really cant be expected to jump into caster and heal as a Feral, nor jump into Bear Form and tank something as Balance mid-fight.

I use Ferocious Bite as part of my damage cycle, which is why I went for FA. It took a lot of convincing for me to do it, since day one its been a lack-lutre talent, but having recently overhauled my gear/gems and spec I've made a steady 500dps inprovement on my previous build, so its working out very well for me right now.

I'm always keen to chew over Kitty build and choices, its not often you find raiding kittys, so I like to know how the rest of the Mew-mew comminuty think!
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Hayek
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Postby Hayek » Fri Jul 10, 2009 8:32 am

Hi Zavulon,

We'll need a bit longer for this, due to holidays. Perhaps you could try to join a raid (be it 10 man or 25)? Truth be told, óne of the things we're somewhat worried about is your gear level.
A Polar explorer needs 5000 calories a day.

- Also when driving to the pole in a sheltered car?

Let's be safe.


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