Dire Cat? What’s That?
I was reading through some of the material about the World Wide Invitational (WWI) in World of Raids when I came across the mention of the dire cat form of Druids for Wrath of the Lich King. It’s still in the planning stages as well as another model for dire bear form but the mention makes one wonder exactly what dire cat form will be.
I haven’t played a druid to high levels yet but based what some people tell me about the situation of the cat druid and the rogue is that they have almost the same dps potential but the rogue is more flexible with his abilities. Rogues can stun, sap and even vanish when he’s in trouble while cat druids can’t. I’ve read of other claims that rogues beat cat dps by a substantial amount. (Someone please tell me which it is).
This leaves a lot of room for speculation about what the dire cat form could be, aside from a model change. Can it mean more damage? Or will it mean more armor or some form of avoiding or mitigating damage? Or will it mean getting a trick or two rogues have for escaping death like a version of vanish or something? My guess is probably as good as good as any one else’s.
At the end of this all, the most important question will have to be answered. Will the dire cat form finally make cat druids a respectable and accepted member of even the most hardcore raiding guilds? If not, then having this improvement won’t really change anything much.
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POSTED IN: Druid
7 opinions for Dire Cat? What’s That?
Wampastompa
Jul 6, 2008 at 11:41 pm
from what I hear, its supposed to be something like the dps of a cat, and the armor of a bear….so basically…an uber-tank. I play a lvl 70 druid on Illidan (wampastompa) and I have put out more dps than a rogue, its all in a matter of gear stats. When I was dpsing I had 3k Attack power, and 33% chance to crit, now I tank so I don’t dps nearly as well. And frankly….its not about dps for druids, it more about their usefullness…there is not really any CC from a druid, other then against beasts…we can hibernate…..but not many PvE instances require much of that. So in my opinion, again, its not about dps, it’s about usefulness, a mage, rogue, or hunter would be much better dps because they have CC.
Angelo
Jul 7, 2008 at 6:40 am
I doubt dire cat will have the armor of bear or what’s the point of bear form then? maybe it will have some armor increase but not at the level of bear.
Based on what you said about cat form, my understanding is correct then. They have the dps potential to stay with the rest of the dps classes but they are less versatile than a rogue in terms of tools they can use.
Guess we’ll have to wait until we get more info to find out what exactly dire cat will be like.
Zumzah
Jul 7, 2008 at 8:38 am
Yeah.. i have close to 4k ap and 42% crit, i dps in ssc and tk for my guild. i already see that my dps is scaling less and less with the gear i get compared to rogues,hunters,etc.. our dps endgame doesnt scale.. even at the kara lvl i was always second place to a rogue with equal gear and skill so about us bein better than a rogue , nope. and i seriously doubt ur gonna tank in cat. i can see there being an armor increase but that would still not be what cat form needs. there are quite a few issues that contribute to the problem that might be looked at by the devs. maybe this form will fix it or maybe they will just give us a little armor boost that in the long run wont mean anything except maybe a extra sin strike or ms to kill us when we are caught in cat or the raid boss will 2 shot instead of 1 shot you when you accidently pull aggro
Kaercha
Jul 7, 2008 at 3:11 pm
I do alot of endgame with a feral druid. At times, I dps (like single tank bosses i.e. Illidan) and tank my fare share as well. Feral druids scale poorly in t5 content, because there is a gap in gear. At the same gear level, on Brutallis, the dps difference is negligible, 3600 vs 3800, at max ranges. As a cat, I run close to 7k Attack Power, and 51% chance to crit. I’ve been looking for any information I can about “dire cat” form. Blizzard has stated that they want tanks to feel like they are doing more damage, but I don’t think this would be a step in that direction, at least not over buffing bear dps. My speculation is that Dire Cat form will be closer in playstyle to an arms warrior. A slow attack speed, with some sort of healing debuff and movement impairing effects.
But, one can argue that the go from Bear Form to Dire Bear form only increased certain stats, like armor converting at a higher percentage. So, perhaps dire cat form is a way to keep the AP scaling for cat fine w/o having to add 1.3k AP to feral weapons.
On another note, the Beta Opt in is open, so I’m sure when the beta goes live, all our questions will be answered, cuz they players won’t be under an NDA.
Cheers!
Zumzah
Jul 9, 2008 at 10:00 am
Visit the alpha wiki.. there is alot of info on our new abilities. There wont be a MS type ability but infected wounds will act as 10% movement and attack speed decrease that stacks up to 5. Our weapon speed will not be lowered.. if that were to happen Mangle,Shred,Ravage would all have to be rescaled to an extreme. Why would you want a hit timer like a arms warrior anyway? And i am goin to assume you have 7k ap and 51% crit raid buffed.. I have a few pieces of endgame feral dps gear that will not be replaced and i dont see me gaining 2k more ap and 7% crit… maybe the crit but the ap is redunk
Joe
Jul 9, 2008 at 6:01 pm
At the lowest levels of raiding, a cat will do damage approaching that of a rogue or any other DPS. Once you start hitting SSC/TK, the numbers start to pull apart. By the time you get into late Sunwell, the rogue is pushing past 2500 DPS and a well-geared cat is scrambling for 3/4 of that.
drood
Aug 9, 2008 at 1:36 pm
At the lowest levels of raiding, a cat will do damage approaching that of a rogue or any other DPS. Once you start hitting SSC/TK, the numbers start to pull apart. By the time you get into late Sunwell, the rogue is pushing past 2500 DPS and a well-geared cat is scrambling for 3/4 of that.
well im hit capped 45 crit unbuffed and close to the 3.6ap i do hyjal za etc and i can tell u even a full t6 rogue pushing past 2500 DPS its not that a big deal if u know how to damage/(mangle shreed rip ;cicles)…no we whont be doing 3/4 of his damage!
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