So me and my Priest buddy seems stuck in the 1700s for the time being.
It's frustraring that roughly 1 out of 4 team we fight has Gladiator Title and/or access to S3 weapons (either gotten thru pre-hot fix cheese or from teams in other brackets).
But what's even more frustrating is the endless number of Druid team. 11 games today (6-5, bleh), and out of those 11 we faced 7 druid teams - of which we lost all but 5 games. Our 2 victories were due to the druid @#%^ing up in both case, rather then us outplaying them. Yeah, it's a small sample size, but I've got a feeling it's the same story for pretty much everybody - it's raining druids out there. It sure doesn't feel like they're one of the less played class.
Druid sucks in 5v5... so they're actually more likely to get buffed because of that rather then get nerfed due to thier dominance in 2v2 (and I predict, in 3v3 as well). So while I could write pages after pages about the kind of balance change I'd like to see them go through, the truth is they're more then likely here to stay.
In other words, a good arena spec is a spec that counter druids. Doesn't matter what class you are, it's all about countering the druid now. It's all about the metagame.
For rogues, the problems with druids are 3 folds:
1 - They pretty much neutralise our poison. This prevent us from snaring properly and gets rid of our anti-healing debuff.
2 - They're extremely mobile. Which compounded with the first issue means it's damn near impossible for us to try and kill them first. This also make it quite easy for them to get out of combat and drink (removing drinking from Arena would hurt druid more then any other class in the game).
3 - They're a powerful support class. Possibly the most mana efficient healer in the game (which compounds problem 2), backed up with Cyclone/roots which allow them to shut down a rogue's ability to pursue a target (compounds problem 1).
So how do you remedy that? It's easy to go into a 'woe be me!' mode and cry about how the top class in (small) Arena is apparently designed to counter us, until you realise that the druid's high mobility, quick cast and ability to shapeshift into mana-less form to avoid drainage pretty much make him the bane of everybody.
But the other classes can do their own brainstorming. :P
Bursting down the druid's partner is rarely a viable option. They usually team with rogues (too slippery), warrior (plate) or Warlock (soul link). Having only Blind as a real CC, the Druid's teamate will usually survive the onslaught and get healed and then the Cyclone/Root dance begins. On the rare occassion where I've manage to land a Blind - keep on the partner for 6 second - Vanish - Sap Druid they've usually managed to pull throught anyway. Extremely frustrating, since it's a rather hard thing to pull off (At my skill level anyway) consistently and it's sad not to see it pay off.
I suppose this might work differently for double dps team, but as a rogue/priest combo, bursting down the druid's partner doesn't work often enough for it to be a viable strategy. I don't see mage/rogue having an easier time (since druid can't be poly'd), but Warlock/Rogue with spammable fear might actually have a chance at controlling the druid.
It would seems what is needed is to kill the Druid, since his ability to heal himself goes down somewhat when he's being focused. We have a had a high success rate on a few occassion where I found the druid while he was in stealth, starting a stunlock with him in Catform is the optimal way to start a fight... but it's also pretty unlikely.
While HARP gave us somewhat of a counter, that was mostly due to the double Sprint and Double Vanish, giving us more of a chance to stop the Druid then ever before. Using AR against a druid is tricky, since they can usually outlive it in Bear form (why such a mobile and powerful healer is so damn tough is beyond me) with Frenzied Regeneration and if their ally has any brain at all, he will be using whatever CC ability he has to get you off him (especially with
warlock/druid - you aren't catchin a druid when you're getting fear spammed).
What's going to hurt HARP against druid isn't so much the lost of 1 more AR (Since you rarely got the full use of it anyway), but the Hemo nerf.
Shockingly enough, I think 20/0/41 might be the way to go. Taking 5/5 in poison talents (at the cost of 1 point in lethality). Shadowstep should allow us to stay on the Druid somewhat, or at very least re-establish contact with his partner after Cyclone (and fear) spam... and the poison talents, might actually help fight the druid's damn near constant dispel via Abolish Poison.
Even if shadowstep ends up not working, I think I'll be going 20/41/0... The poison talents I think, are simply to big to skip in the current arena setting.
TLDR Version:
The worth of a 2v2 team is directly related to their ability to handle Druids. HARP, Mutilate and even Combat fail in that regard. Shadowstep has on paper, what it takes to counter druids. Even if it doesn't, revisiting the poison talents as a combat rogue might be a necessity.
Edited, Dec 19th 2007 5:32pm by Tyrandor