Balance Druid Compendium

Written by Gamz, Vinter, Dsune(Oi)

Patch: 11.0.5
Updated: 11th of November, 2024

News

Forum Feedback Post

  • As is tradition, a handful of people from the Dreamgrove community have spent time collecting feedback to help the developers as we look towards 11.0.7 and beyond. The post is focused in part on changes made in 11.0.5, but also touches on some fundamental concerns with the spec. If you're passionate about Balance Druid, we'd love for everyone to get involved by leaving respectful comments in the post and upvote if you agree with it. This will help keep it visible and ensure we have the best chance of getting our feedback heard. You can find the post here.

29th October tuning

Current Bugs

  • Harmony of the Heavens iconHarmony of the Heavensis not stacking correctly if you press CA iconCA/Inc iconInc after using Starsurge iconStarsurgeor Starfall iconStarfallduring Lunar Eclipse or outside of Eclipse. It currently seems to count spenders cast during Lunar Eclipse towards the cap, even after using CA iconCA/Inc iconInc resets, meaning that your %dmg increase from Eclipse doesn't go to 21% during your cooldown and is instead stuck at 15%. The way to play around this is to use CA iconCA/Inc iconInc in a fresh Eclipse, or right after exiting an Eclipse. The talent does however work as intended with Solar Eclipse.

  • Changing talents from Orbital Strike iconOrbital Striketo Whirling Stars iconWhirling Starscan make macros using CA iconCA/Inc iconInc not work at all, giving you an error message and have your button be desaturated on your bars. This requires a relog to fix.

  • Control of the Dream iconControl of the Dreamdoes not provide the correct CDR value if your raid wipes after you use your cooldowns. The temporary fix to this is to talent into Power of the Dream iconPower of the Dreamin the choice node, swap back and then wait 15 seconds for the CDR to finish counting. There is a Weakaura to make this process easier that you can find by clicking here. You can read the description on the Wago page for how it works.

Tier set

2-piece icon2-piece

Starsurge iconStarsurgedamage increased by 10%. Starfall iconStarfalldamage increased by 14%.

This is a ~3.0% dmg increase from having no set.

4-piece icon4-piece

Lunar Eclipse and Solar Eclipse each increase the Astral Power Wrath iconWrathgenerates by 2 and Starfire iconStarfiregenerates by 5.

This is a ~4.7% dmg increase from having no set.

Sim for tier set

Rotation

Precasting

You can precast from max range, 4 seconds before a boss is pulled.

What is a priority list?

When reading the priority lists below, you should not think of these as steps to be followed in a specific order. At any given point in combat, you should cast the first ability on the list that you are able to cast, provided the conditions for its use are met.

Single Target Priority

Keeper of the Grove - ST

Elune's Chosen - ST

AoE Priority (2+ targets)

Keeper of the Grove - AoE

Elune's Chosen - AoE

Rotational Details

Eclipses and Fillers

Warrior of Elune iconWarrior of Eluneis an off-gcd ability, making your next 3 Starfire iconStarfireinstant for 25 seconds. The ability has a 45s cooldown that starts once you've pressed it. It should be used on cooldown while talented into Lunar Calling, or you can hold for a few seconds to line up with CA iconCA/Incarnation iconIncarnation.

When not talented into Lunar Calling, use Warrior of Elune iconWarrior of Elunecharges to enter Solar Eclipse.

Use Owlkin Frenzy iconOwlkin Frenzyprocs to enter Solar Eclipse, inside Lunar Eclipse or inside CA iconCA/Incarnation iconIncarnation if Starfire will hit 2 or more targets. Keep in mind that Warrior of Elune iconWarrior of Elunecharges are consumed before Owlkin Frenzy iconOwlkin Frenzyprocs.

Whirling Stars iconWhirling Starsis a talent that changes your CA iconCA/Incarnation iconIncarnation cooldown to a charge system, with a 100s recharge. In Keeper of the Grove, you want to overlap these charges with Force of Nature iconForce of Natureand Convoke the Spirits iconConvoke the Spiritsor just Force of Nature iconForce of Natureif your CA iconCA/Incarnation iconIncarnation will recharge before Convoke iconConvokecomes back off cooldown.

In a raid scenario where you pull a boss with both charges up, you want to use your 1st charge on pull, and your 2nd charge together with your 2nd or 3rd set of Force of Nature iconForce of Naturetreants, and save your 3rd charge for Convoke iconConvokeat 2 minutes. After this, you just aim to overlap all 3 cooldowns with the priority outlined in rotation section.

In an M+ scenario, if you're talented into Incarnation: Chosen of Elune iconIncarnation: Chosen of Eluneinstead of Convoke iconConvoke, you want to use your Whirling Stars iconWhirling Starscharges at any time where you can overlap with Force of Nature iconForce of Nature.

When using Elune's Chosen iconElune's Chosenand not talented into Convoke iconConvoke, you can use Whirling Stars iconWhirling Starsright after entering an Eclipse iconEclipsethat procs Sundered Firmament iconSundered Firmament, but this is not a major gain. If you're using Elune's Chosen iconElune's Chosenand you're talented into Convoke iconConvoke, you want to overlap your Whirling Stars iconWhirling Starscharge with your Convoke iconConvokecooldown.

Talents

These are template builds for each encounter and could see substantial change depending on what is being played in the upcoming weeks. Will be updating this consistently.

Raid

Raid Talents
Single Target (Sikran, Rasha'nan, Nexus Princess Kyveza)
Single Target Cleave (Ulgrax, Bloodbound Horror, Queen Ansurek)
Broodtwister Ovi'nax Elune's Chosen
Silken Court/Broodtwister Ovi'Nax Keeper of the Grove
Silken Court Elune's Chosen

Mythic+

The following are dungeon talent builds that will always serve you well but mind that there can be some variations based on your group comp or affixes. Do not be afraid of swapping some talents out if you think it can help your group.

Both hero trees are viable and perform very close to each other. Feel free to choose the one you prefer.

Keeper of the Grove build
Elune's Chosen build

Talent Explanations

Keeper Talents
EC Talents

Nature's Balance iconNature's Balancesims around 0.4% higher than Twin Moons iconTwin Moonson pure single target, but loses out whenever there are more targets, where you can benefit from Twin Moons iconTwin Moonsspreading Moonfire iconMoonfire.

Aetherial Kindling iconAetherial Kindlingis a preferred choice for any sustained AoE scenario where you can benefit from your DoT effects being extended. Very good for m+.

Stellar Flare iconStellar Flaresims 0.5% higher than Wild Surges iconWild Surgeson pure single target, but Wild Surges iconWild Surgesgenerally performs better in AoE scenarios. Stellar Flare iconStellar Flarealso gains value whenever you run Whirling Stars iconWhirling Stars, since it guarantees uptime on Waning Twilight iconWaning Twilightand loses value when you run Orbital Strike iconOrbital Strike, since Orbital Strike iconOrbital Strikealso applies Stellar Flare iconStellar Flareto the targets hit. Putting a point into this node is mandatory, but you can choose to take Wild Surges iconWild Surgeson ST for a DPS loss if you don't like applying Stellar Flare.

For the middle part of the spec tree, you have 9 points you put into mandatory talents, leaving you with just 2 more points to spend before you can continue down the tree. The options you have in the bottom part of the tree are not particularly stronger, so you generally end up spending more points than needed in this section.

Stellar Amplification iconStellar Amplificationis recommended for raid, or scenarios where you cast Starsurge enough to keep good uptime on it.

Soul of the Forest iconSoul of the Forestis a mandatory node for Keeper of the Grove iconKeeper of the Grove, but it is only good for Elune's Chosen iconElune's Chosenin AoE scenarios since Lunar Calling iconLunar Callingmakes it untakeable if Starfire iconStarfireonly hits 1 target.

Crashing Star iconCrashing Star, Sunseeker Mushroom iconSunseeker Mushroomand Astronomical Impact iconAstronomical Impactare all largely interchangeable.

Touch the Cosmos iconTouch the Cosmosis an optional talent if you want more RNG in your rotation. There are generally better options to take, but if you want you can swap out Astronomical Impact iconAstronomical Impactor Sunseeker Mushroom iconSunseeker Mushroomfor this.

Power of Goldrinn iconPower of Goldrinnis another ST damage proc talent you can take for raid encounters.

Sundered Firmament iconSundered Firmamentis optional for Keeper of the Grove iconKeeper of the Grove, but mandatory for Elune's Chosen iconElune's Chosensince it helps provide uptime for Atmopsheric Exposure.

Denizen of the Dream iconDenizen of the Dreamis one of your strongest single target nodes, but it loses value in AoE scenarios. Recommended for all raid fights.

Keeper of the Grove iconKeeper of the Grovecompliments Convoke the Spirits iconConvoke the Spiritspretty well in when you use it with the dmg increase from Harmony of the Grove iconHarmony of the Groveand Celestial Alignment iconCelestial Alignment. Convoke the Spirits iconConvoke the Spiritsis also good for priority damage and boss fights in M+. Incarnation: Chosen of Elune iconIncarnation: Chosen of Eluneis good for AoE scenarios, or in situations like the last boss in Ara'Kara where Convoke the Spirits iconConvoke the Spiritswould use spells on targets you don't want to hit. If you're playing Convoke the Spirits iconConvoke the Spiritsin M+, you should use it in AoE with the conditions outlined in the "Rotation" section.

Control of the Dream iconControl of the Dreamlets you hold on to either Celestial Alignment iconCelestial Alignment/Incarnation iconIncarnation, Convoke the Spirits iconConvoke the Spiritsor Force of Nature iconForce of Naturefor up to 15 seconds without losing a use, subtracting the amount of time you held the ability from its cooldown.

Depending on the fight timer, this talent is stronger than Power of the Dream iconPower of the Dreamwhich it shares a choice node with. As always, you should research the fight you are preparing for on warcraftlogs or sim your character to make an educated guess.

In general, the Druid class tree leaves a lot to be desired when it comes to variety and how many points you have left to spend after taking talents that are mandatory for the content you're doing. Listed below are some talents that you can opt into based on preference, comp or what content you're doing.

Feline Swiftness iconFeline Swiftnessis a strong node in raid. A 15% passive movement speed increase for a 2 point investment is very good for handling sudden movement. This node is not as good to take in mythic+ when there are more mandatory talents to choose there. For a pure single target fight you should also drop Improved Sunfire iconImproved Sunfireto free up another talent point.

Remove Corruption iconRemove Corruptionis a good node for mythic+ if the content you are doing requires a Poison or Curse dispel. Some people are opting to not play Verdant Heart iconVerdant Heartin order to access this, while others are removing points spent in CC talents like Typhoon iconTyphoonor Incapacitating Roar iconIncapacitating Roar.

Matted Fur iconMatted Fur, Ursine Vigor iconUrsine Vigorand Ursoc's Spirit iconUrsoc's Spiritare all defensive nodes. Both Ursine Vigor iconUrsine Vigorand Ursoc's Spirit iconUrsoc's Spiritprovides more health while in Bear Form iconBear Form, where Matted Fur iconMatted Furgives you a tiny absorb shield when using Barkskin iconBarkskin. Assuming you are using Bear Form iconBear Formdefensively, both those talents are stronger than Matted Fur iconMatted Fur. Most top players are opting in to using Ursine Vigor iconUrsine Vigor, with Matted Fur iconMatted Furbeing an option to consider only if you never use Bear Form iconBear Form.

Typhoon iconTyphoonis a talent that lets you knock back adds to stop them from casting or to reposition mobs that are standing outside of the pack. This talent is taken in most mythic+ scenarios, but you can remove it depending on your comp or what dungeon you're doing. This is best used when paired with Ursol's Vortex iconUrsol's Vortexso the mobs don't get spread too far out. Tanks will call you out on using this poorly since they won't be able to parry hits from behind them, use at your own discretion.

Fluid Form iconFluid Formis a very strong talent if used right. Most players are sacrificing points elsewhere in order to take this. It allows you to save a GCD every time you want to cycle back into Moonkin Form iconMoonkin Form. It's very strong against mechanics that root you, allowing you to cancel your form in the middle of casting a Wrath iconWrathand break the roots when shifting back with your next Wrath iconWrath.

Innervate iconInnervateis a good node for raid, but not as easy to take in mythic+. Communicate with your raid leader and healers on the best use for this on a particular fight. If your healers are not asking for your Innervate iconInnervate, consider talenting out of it for another defensive option.

Oakskin iconOakskinis a good defensive talent that is good to take for every scenario. Accessing this section of talents forces you to route through Instincts of the Claw iconInstincts of the Clawwhich is useless for Balance Druid.

Incapacitating Roar iconIncapacitating Roaris a good node for mythic+ where AoE stops are sometimes mandatory.

Well-Honed Instincts iconWell-Honed Instinctsis another defensive node that you can take if necessary.

Forestwalk iconForestwalkis a situationally good node, giving you increased movement speed and healing recieved after casting Regrowth iconRegrowth. This can be strong when paired with Blooming Infusion iconBlooming Infusionand Protective Growth iconProtective Growthfor fights that require good defensive value. Some top players are opting in to play this talent as an alternative when they don't want to route through Instincts of the Claw iconInstincts of the Claw.

Nature's Vigil iconNature's Vigilis not an easy node to take, but could be situationally helpful for your guild. Talk to your raid leader and make a decision that's best for your raid.

Improved Stampeding Roar iconImproved Stampeding Roaris an option for fights with mechanics where your raid can benefit from a movement speed increase, like Rasha'nan intermission or spreading out for charges on Nexus Princess Kyveza. Talk to your raid leader and make a decision that's best for your raid.

Gearing:

Stat Priority:

Sim yourself using Raidbots Top Gear. Do not follow any stat priorities.

Gems and Enchants

Gems - 1x Elusive Blasphemite iconElusive Blasphemite or Culminating Blasphemite iconCulminating Blasphemite mixed with whatever gems sim the highest for your character.

Weapon - Authority of the Depths iconAuthority of the Depths for single target and raid, Authority of Radiant Power iconAuthority of Radiant Power for AoE and m+

Chest - Crystalline Radiance iconCrystalline Radiance

Cloak - Chant of Winged Grace iconChant of Winged Grace

Legs - Sunset Spellthread iconSunset Spellthread

Wrist - Chant of Armored Avoidance iconChant of Armored Avoidance

Boots - Scout's March iconScout's March or Defender's March iconDefender's March

Ring - You should always sim your own character to determine what enchant to use in this slot.

Embellishments & Crafted Items

Embellishments for this season don't offer a substantial gain, so it's important that you always sim your character using Raidbots Top Gear before making any gearing decision, but here are some guidelines:

Darkmoon Sigil: Ascension iconDarkmoon Sigil: Ascension and Writhing Armor Banding iconWrithing Armor Banding

  • This is a solid all-round choice for both single target and AoE. The Darkmoon Sigil: Ascension iconDarkmoon Sigil: Ascension can be crafted on any weapon. If you go this route, you should aim to craft this on a two-handed weapon early, and crafting the Writhing Armor Banding iconWrithing Armor Banding on a low stat budget slot, preferably on the cloak, belt or wrist slot. Keep in mind that this embellishment only stacks during combat, making it a lot less valuable in mythic+. For later in the season when you acquire a 639 weapon, you should recraft the Ascension embellishment on an off-hand.

Elemental Focusing Lens iconElemental Focusing Lens

  • This is a solid all-round choice for single target and mythic+. It's a random damage proc effect, where the type of damage is determined based on what kind of gems you are wearing. Equipping more gems or changing the type does not matter for the damage output. If you go for this choice, you should aim to craft two of them on low stat budget slots, notably the cloak, belt or wrist slots.

Duskthread Lining iconDuskthread Lining or Dawnthread Lining iconDawnthread Lining

  • These are buffs that give you versatility or critical strike when you're above 80% hp. They are decent choices for mythic+, depending on the uptime you can get. They're similiar to the Blue Silken Lining embellishment from Dragonflight. If you go for this choice, you should aim to craft them on two low stat budget slots, notably the cloak, wrist or belt slots.

Remember that you will acquire an enchanted heroic crest early in the season as a quest reward, allowing you to craft a 619 item without spending any of your crests.

Trinkets

Spymaster's Web iconSpymaster's Web is a trinket with a passively stacking intellect buff, capping at 40 stacks and an on-use effect that gives you intellect based on the amount of stacks you've accumulated. Ideally this means you should save it for your 3rd or 2nd use of Celestial Alignment iconCelestial Alignment/Incarnation iconIncarnation, depending on fight timer.

Treacherous Transmitter iconTreacherous Transmitter is an on-use trinket that gives you a random task to perform out of 3 possible tasks, either collect an orb, stand in a circle or jump 3 times to get a primary stat buff. This trinket is good paired with Keeper of the Grove iconKeeper of the Grove's burst cooldowns, but not as good for Elune's Chosen iconElune's Chosenas it has a more flat damage profile.

Please use Top Gear on Raidbots in order to decide what trinkets to use/farm, but the following list should give you a good idea of some of the trinkets you will want to look out for. The list is in roughly power-level order assuming the highest item level versions of the trinkets.

FAQ

Why can't I enter Solar Eclipse?

How can I proc Waning Twilight iconWaning Twilightwithout Wild Mushroom iconWild Mushroomor Stellar Flare iconStellar Flare?

I've read the priority list and I think my rotation looks correct but I'm still doing very low damage. What could be the reason?

  • Log one of your fights and check it with warcraftlogs and wowanalyzer. The main thing to check is if you're always casting: the timeline should have no downtime and, as close to zero as possible, cancelled casts. Another common issue is incorrectly planning your movement and wasting casts on dots: you should always have enough AP to cover some distance just by using spenders.

What is Astral damage?

  • Astral damage is both Arcane and Nature damage. Effects that buff Nature spells also applies to Astral spells, and effects that buff Arcane spells likewise also applies to Astral spells. For example, Solar Eclipse multiplies the damage of all Nature & Astral spells by 1.15x, and Lunar Eclipse multiplies the damage of all Arcane & Astral spells by 1.15x. If you have both eclipses, Astral spells get 1.15 * 1.15 = 1.3225x multiplier, while Nature & Arcane spells get 1.15x.

  • Mind that class buffs only affect class spells so if a trinket does nature or arcane damage they are not affected by our buffs to these spell schools.

Is there a target count where spreading Sunfire or Moonfire is not worth it?

  • No, having your DoT effects up increases your damage done to the target. The conditions for spreading Sunfire and Moonfire are tied to how long the target will live, and not how many targets there are.

How do I sim for M+?

  • It is generally recommended that you steer away from simming unrealistic scenarios like "5 target 40 seconds" as they are likely to give skewed results. Balance Druid stats don't really change much depending on target count either, so you will be perfectly fine just using the default "1 target 5 minute patchwerk" options. If your intention is to sim for mythic+, you can use the MDT Sim WeakAura which allows you to sim dungeon routes. Please keep in mind that ST damage is still a big part of mythic+.

I'm doing really low damage in Mythic+, what am I doing wrong?

  • If you double-checked your rotation and still feel like you're underperforming you could just be playing low keys, together with classes that have very bursty damage profiles. When playing a Balance Druid, mobs need to live long enough for you to actually start doing damage, which is something that doesn't really happen in keys lower than 12+. Consider focusing a bit more on ST or trying another spec, but take into account the fact that DPS isn't everything in a key.

I've seen a lot of people running build X instead of Y in Mythic+, is X better?

  • Try them out and make an informed decision! Most differences between builds are based on variables like target count, comps, combat timer or utility needed.

Why are some top players running different embellishments from the ones mentioned in the Compendium

  • The DPS gain provided by the embellishments can vary significantly because of many external factors such as gear, type of content and group composition. Some of the top players might also happen to use niche embellishments for the same reasons. If you don't have any specific requirements then your best option is to just sim your character and choose the embellishments that provide the highest DPS upgrade.

Do our dots snapshot?

  • No, all of our periodic damage (like Moonfire iconMoonfire, Sunfire iconSunfire, Stellar Flare iconStellar Flare) do NOT snapshot, everything is dynamic. That means any dots gain/lose the damage bonus upon entering/leaving the Eclipse that buffs them and whenever any other stat/damage increases are applied/expire.

I have read through the Compendium and I have some questions that are not outlined in this FAQ?

  • If you have any questions, you can go to the Dreamgrove discord server and then ask in there. This guide should cover everything you need, but there could always be some things left out or not considered. Remember, you are not guaranteed to receive the answer you would like.

Additional Resources

Macros

Orbital Strike macro:

#showtooltip
/cast [@cursor] Celestial Alignment

Force of Nature macro:

#showtooltip
/cast [@cursor] Force of Nature

Trinket macro:

If you are using an on-use trinket that should go along with your cooldowns, use the following macro (/13 for top trinket slot, and /14 for bottom trinket slot)

#showtooltip
/use 13
/use 14
/cast [@cursor] Celestial Alignment

Cancelaura Macros

Cancelling Starlord

Cancelling Starlord is entirely optional and is neither a DPS gain nor loss.

If you want to engage in this entirely optional method without incurring a DPS loss, you should aim to cancel Starlord at any point in an Eclipse window where the buff is currently at less than two seconds, and you are about to use Starsurge iconStarsurgeto prevent overcapping.

#showtooltip
/cancelaura Starlord

Useful WeakAuras and Other Profiles

Balance WeakAura Packs

The following links lead to various Balance Druid WeakAura packs. These contain everything that's recommended to track to play at a high level. None of these are particular better or more useful than others, and which one you should use is up to your personal preference.

Jundies Plater Profile

This profile for Plater is among the most used and asked about public nameplate profiles for moonkins, since it changes the color of a mobs nameplate based on what DoT effects are currently active on the target, being very helpful to more accurately spread your Sunfire and Moonfire when fighting multiple mobs at the same time.

Regrowth Tracker for Blooming Infusion

This weakaura tracks your number of casts of Regrowth before you get the Blooming Infusion buff that increases the damage of your next Wrath/Starfire and makes them instant cast, and also tracks your number of Starsurge casts before you proc an instant Regrowth.

Casts until you can cast Starfire

Starfire Alerter: See the description of the WA for more details. This is not a required WA but will make it easier to not get into situations where you are wasting a Starfire cast inside Solar Eclipse.


Item Strings for Simming

Race Sim

Current APL