Going Berserk

Throughout the beta, Berserk has gone from "This is awesome" to "Meh. Maybe I'll take it". Which is not a direction a 51-point talent should take.

First they prohibited the use of Tiger's Fury while Berserk is active. That was understandable. With it, you would have been able to use one Shred or Mangle per second for the duration - nobody could survive that, even with healing.

Next, they reduced it to only break and immunize against fear. That was a bit harsh. While it is nice to be able to get out of a fear, stuns are more of a problem, actually. When running around like a headless chicken, I do not take more damage. But when stunned, melees can get behind me and I cannot dodge their attacks - which does increase the damage I take. With the reduced armor we have now this can get ugly.
Also I have the suspicion, that it only works against proper fears, not the other abilities that look and feel like them but are not.

Finally (as of build 8962) they have changed it so that Mangle and Maul no longer hit multiple targets in bear form.

I was seriously considering dropping it for Nature's Swiftness in PvP-builds at that point.


But there is hope. Ghostcrawler has posted a preview on upcoming changes.

1) Feral Faerie Fire becomes a core ability.
2) Brutal Impact increases duration and lowers cooldown of Bash. It swaps with Savage Fury, mostly to keep it out of the paws of anyone but Ferals.
3) Feral Faerie Fire replaced with the old Last Stand component of Berserk. But it's usable in both cat and bear forms.
4) Cat Berserk does not change. Bear Berserk goes back to Mangle hitting 3 targets, and since that isn't so useful on single targets, it also removes the 6 sec (untalented) cooldown of Mangle during the 15 sec duraton for some nice bear burst or threat generation. The Fear immunity is still intact.

Noice.


Separating the Last Stand component is something I was hoping for. It is a pure PvE ability and somewhat misplaced within Berserk, which is more or less focused on PvP. Also, it works in cat form now as well - great! Should help surviving in a lot of boss encounters.
Changing FFF to be a baseline ability to make room for it is a good choice, as it saves us from having to spend another talent point.
One question remains: Will the new Feral Last Stand be on the same CD as Berserk, or not? I could live well either way.

Having Mangle hit three targets again is great. That it no longer works for Maul is alleviated somewhat by removing the Mangle CD while Berserk is active. Which basically makes it a really strong Swipe. Starting out with 100 rage and 33% crit chance, you get out all possible 10 Mangles during the 15 seconds. With enrage you can even mix in a Maul or two.


I like what they have planned, but still would appreciate them adding stun breaking/immunity.
Also it would be great for it to allow Lacerate hit three targets as well. As both Mangle and Lacerate are on the GCD it would not increase our DPS, but still would be nice to have the choice to spread some bleeds. Could come in handy in a zerg.