PvE Feral Druid DPS Rotations & Cooldowns – WoW Classic

Feral Druids have a rotation that sounds simple at first but becomes extremely complex when you introduce the concept of Powershifting. The optimum way to play is to spam the mechanic while making sure that you hit your targets with Shred and Ferocious Bite but other ways to play the specialization also exist, even if they don’t produce the most optimum Damage Output.

PvE Feral Druid DPS

Stat Priority

Best Professions

Talents & Builds

Rotation & Cooldowns

Pre-Raid & Best in Slot (BiS)

Enchants & Consumables

This section of the guide will showcase both the Powershifting Rotation and the Non-Standard Rotation, alongside the AoE Rotation and Utility Spells available to Feral Druids.

Powershifting Macro

#showtooltip 
/cancelform
/cast Cat Form

Powershifting Rotation

1. Start the fight in Cat Form
2. Cast Faerie Fire (Feral)
   • Refresh it when it’s about to expire
3. Reserve Tiger’s Fury for Burst
4. Cast Shred to build up Combo Points twice
5. Powershift (Macro)
6. Recast Shred until 5 Combo Points
7. Cast Ferocious Bite whenever you reach 5 Combo Points
   • Try to time Ferocious Bite before the next Powershift
8. Powershift (Macro)
9. Repeat Rotation starting from Shred (Point 4)

The Standard Rotation and most optimum way to play Feral Druid in WoW Classic is to focus specifically on Powershifting! The trick to it is Energy Management and Energy Ticks tracking. Since ticks happen every 2 seconds, players must keep this in consideration at all times and closely track their resource bar to execute the rotation properly.

The main two abilities of this rotation are Shred and Ferocious Bite! Shred is your main Combo Points generator while Ferocious Bite is your main Finisher Move. The trick to this rotation is to incorporate as many Shreds as possible to reach 5 Combo Points to cast Ferocious Bite while seamlessly casting the macro right after to ensure another Shred cast. GCD will also be involved since the act of Powershifting takes up one GCD, but the 1.5 seconds is faster than the 2-second Energy Tick that you would normally have to wait for.

In addition, the Rotation is also dependent on a specific item, to ensure maximum output. The item is Wolfshead Helm and it ensures that you always have 60 Energy upon Powershifting. Without it, the Furor talent only ensures that you’ll have 40 Energy, which doesn’t make it worth it at all. It is optimal to wait for another energy tick right after Powershifting to ensure that you get at least 2 Shred casts before the next Powershift if you can’t yet cast Ferocious Bite.

Tiger’s Fury should optimally be used right before the first Ferocious Bite, to ensure multiple casts per combat since the cooldown is only 1-minute long.

Non-Standard Rotation

1. Start the fight in Cat Form
2. Cast Faerie Fire (Feral)
   • Refresh it when it’s about to expire
3. Reserve Tiger’s Fury for Burst
4. Cast Shred to build up Combo Points
5. Cast Ferocious Bite
6. Cast Rake if you need to move and reposition
   • Make sure to cast Rake right before you reposition
7. Cast Rip (Prioritize it for low Critical Strike Chance builds)
   • Cast Ferocious Bite if your Crit Chance is low while Rip is active
   • Cast Rip if you need to reposition and you have Combo Points left on the target

The Non-Standard build is by far not close to optimum play but it takes away from the tediousness of having to track your energy consistently for Powershifting and allows casual players to enjoy the specialization without having to stress that much about it. The idea behind the Non-Standard build is similar to the Standard Build, prioritizing Shred as a Combo Generator and Ferocious Bite as a primary Finishing Move. You should prioritize Rip if your overall Critical Strike Chance is low since its overall base damage is higher than Ferocious Bite. If you manage to include both of them and generate enough Energy to alternate between them, you can choose to do so, but without Powershifting, your overall Energy Generation won’t be high enough for 2 full 5-Combo Points Finishing Moves.

AoE Rotation

The sad reality is that there is no Cleave/AoE ability for Feral Druid in WoW Classic. The only thing you can do is Multi-Dot with Rake or simply use your Single-Target rotation and try to generate as much damage as possible then swap to the next target.

Utility

1. Upkeep Cat Form as much as possible for the Leader of the Pack buff.
2. Gift of the Wild/Mark of the Wild (Upkeep it)
3. Upkeep Faerie Fire (Feral)
4. Innervate (On high-priority targets)
5. Rebirth (Only on targets called out by the Raid Leader)
6. Thorns (Always upkeep on Tanks)

In terms of Utility, Feral Druids shine when compared to the overly complicated Powershifting Standard Rotation. While the design in WoW Classic is extremely difficult to properly grasp, Feral Druids have quite a few interesting and extremely useful utility spells.

By far, the strongest and most desired ones are Rebirth and Innervate! The former is the only Battle Ressurection spell in the entire game while the latter is the best Mana Regeneration tool. Ideally, you will only use both of them according to the calls of your Raid Leader, prioritizing the most important targets. However, if your raid is stacked, you may consider using Innervate on yourself to continue Powershifting if you run out of Mana and want to keep pumping damage.

Faerie Fire (Feral) should always be active on the target at all times! You must always make sure to refresh the effect before it ends, to continue buffing the rest of the raid, even if you can’t immediately cast another ability.

Gift of the Wild/Mark of the Wild should always be active while Thorns should be used on the Tanks or yourself if you plan on Off-Tanking.