Djoe
Active member
I've realized when playing this build that there isn't a good Wolf build guide on the new fourms, and so I thought I'd share what I've done with a bit of insight as to what other people might do when chasing similar goals. My build excels at doing A-tier damage and B-tier crowd-control (for Ghost Wolf pack and Snow Slide work great, but neither causes helplessness) in high-reaper content. Admittedly, Wolf in general is not the best thing in the game right now (best being based on opinion and preference, but I'd argue Wolf druid objectively isn't the best at any one thing, except of course being fun to play). I still think melee druids are still really good, though, and this build does really well.
As a side note: my character is by no means an uber-completionist, but I have 4 racial points, 1x heroic completionist, +8 Supreme tome, 87 reaper points, and only 66 destiny points, so some of the choices I made are with that in mind. Don't be afraid to explore and experiment if you have more or less of any of these.
Here were my starting stats, 36 point build Horc:
20 Strength (Main stat for to-hit and damage)
8 Dex (Reflex saves. You need 13 if you want to take dodge or precision)
16 Constitution (Hit points!!!)
6 Intelligence (skill points, I take intimidate and swim)
16 Wisdom (spell points and trance stat)
6 Charisma (uhh, alternative trance stat and to buff your social skills?)
Here was my leveling order, and what feats I took when:
1: Druid, power attack
2: Barbarian
3: Druid, Cleave
4: Druid
5: Druid
6: Druid, Great Cleave
7: Druid
8: Druid
9: Druid, Natural Fighting
10: Druid
11: Druid
12: Druid, Imp. Crit, Slashing
13: Druid
14: Druid
15: Druid, Natural Fighting
16: Druid
17: Druid
18: Druid, Natural Fighting
19: Druid
20: Favored Soul, Any deity feat (doesn't matter)
21: Overwhelming Critical
22: Perfect Natural Fighting
24: Dodge (could honestly do anything, I just liked the +3 to fill my 28 dodge cap. Not many good options)
25: Crush Weakness
27: Epic Damage Reduction
28: Doublestrike
30: Epic Fortitude and Scion of Arborea
31: Deific Warding
You could make an argument to take Favored Soul earlier. It's only there for the easy Wisdom trance, which is useful in heroics as well. I just wanted to get to snow-slide as quick as possible, which for me was level 18. I also took cleave and great cleave before the natural fighting feats: you could make an arguement to swap that up as well, but personally I prefered having that extra AoE damage over the double strike and melee power.
Note on feats for 25, 28, and 31: You can take these in any order at all, I just listed them in order of priority to my personal tastes. I don't like Legendary toughness, 100 hit points is 100 hit points but it means little when things easily hit you for 1000 hp at a time in r10.
I'm happy with the numbers I'm hitting on this build, but I should warn you that I have to be really strict on myself to maintain them at this level. Gear swaps are important, and I would be a worse player without them. I use the Severed Tentacle when I rage for the +3 Strength, and when I have time before a fight I use the Titan's Grip clicky on it to get that extra to-hit and damage. If you don't have that item (or items that also give these abilities) then you lose 9 to your main-stat from the get-go. Additionally, I use a prowess swap (20,000 sentient exp on another weapon, perhaps your leveling one if you're like me) to get the +50 melee power for 10 seconds after using an action boost. This is reflected in the screenshot.
I think enhancements and the level-split is where my build gets controversial amongst other Wolf Druid connoisseurs. Ultimately, if DPS is your single end goal, 18 Druid is not for you. The Tier 5 of the Nature's Warrior tree is good (at least in my opinion, extra attack speed is awesome), but it lacks any bonus to critical threat range, meaning that without a bigger split in, say, Barbarian, you are missing out on perhaps your only opportunity to expand your weapon's critical profile. 15-20x3 (what I have on this build, and what you will have if you run this build with a Falchion) isn't a terrible critical-profile, but 15-20x4 is much better. The reason I did 18/1/1 is to get Snowslide, an extremely fun Wolf attack locked behind having 9th level spells. If you are interested in doing a level 18 wolf druid, consider swapping the barbarian level for a Figher level: you trade the 10% movement speed, extra rage charge, and +3 strength while raging for haste boost, which is ultimately more DPS. I use the Orcish rage action boost in the Half-orc tree, which is 100% Sub-optimal but ameliorated by the epic destiny Legendary Dreadnaught's "Carry On" ability. Another common level-split is 8 druid, 11 barbarian, and 1 favored soul, which I would reccomend if you're chasing that DPS dream.
On another note, If you're playing an animal druid and you're not raging, you're doing it wrong. 21 points of your already scarce melee power is locked behind using rage, and you can get strength way higher than any other damage stat. The only stat I would see as viable for your to-hit and damage modifier is if you were using Wisdom because you want to also be able to hit the DC requirements on the abilities like Howl of Terror, but even then you have to give up so much of your actual damage while attacking that I find it hard to justify. That being said, I didn't find myself using rage that much in heroics until I had spent 23 points into the Nature's Protector tree for the ability to cast while raging. Not being able to heal myself or others for spans of 3 minutes or more at a time was really annoying and ultimately not worth it.
In regard to the tier 5 choices in Nature's Warrior, Alpha Strike, Throat Rip, and Go for the Kill are all great abilities. The main issue is that Wolf Druids are loaded up with so many active abilities and attacks that it's hard to justify spending points on and fitting these abilities into one's attack rotation. I used Go for the Kill in heroics before I got snow slide, and Alpha Strike until epics where I got Cutter.
If you want to follow this build exactly but don't have 4 or more Racial action points, just take some points out of the racial tree. You're ultimately only losing a bit of number-pushing, and not anything vital to the build. You could use a different race even, and it wouldn't change the build much at all - I'm mostly using Half-Orc because that's what I'm on in my racials.
For epic destinies, I can't concretely say that this is "the best spread," mostly because there is a lot of opinion that goes into these choices and people all have different amounts of points to spend. I only have 66. This being the case, I can only justify to you why I made which choices. I go 16 points into Shadow Dancer because those are probably the best 16 points to spend in an off-tree of low hanging fruit. 5% doublestrike, 15% fortification bypass, and improved evasion (only evasion if you don't take tier 5s in Nature's Warrior), is all great, plus the other stuff. I go 17 points into Fury of the Wild because I love getting double bonuses to Animal growth (8 strength and constitution vs only 4) and I love Cutter as an epic strike. You can do this + take the 3rd core in the tree for only 14 points, but I had 3 left over and so grabbed some double strike. You could also reasonably use the tier 5 in this tree, but you already get 5% primal hp from heroic core enhancements, the epic moment in Fury kind of sucks, the Great Leveler is hard to find use with on a build that already has so many active attacks, and the only other ability requires you to take a feat - not worth it. That leaves Legendary Dreadnaught, which is awesome because of Action Hero and the sweet auto-crit cleave attack, and in my case I'm already spending 20+ points there because of the mantle and my sub-par choice of action boost. If I had more points, I would proably invest heavier into Fury of the Wild for more double strike and the bigger bonus on Primal Scream.
This is my gearset, I reccomend, for viewing purposes, to open in imgur and then right-click to open in a new tab. That way, you can zoom in and read the text.
It's not pretty and not exactly fine-tuned for this build, but it works really well. I use the 3pcs Devils Infenal Dance set from Vecna Unleased, the 5pcs Dino set from Isle of Dread, and the 2pcs Winter set from Feywild for +30 artifact PRR. With it, I get my Snowslide DC (the only one I need to worry about) at 118, and as per the first screenshot, I manage 124 strength, 78 con, and +202 to my weapon's damage (which I find quite impressive considering Wolf form gets no bonus to how ability score modifier affects weapon damage). I DO NOT recommend farming out my exact gear-set. To any other end-game high-reaper player, I am using sub-optimal loot, even if it's only slightly behind what is optimal. The only reason this is optimal to me is because it is what I already have, and I'm unwilling at this time to commit hours to the fields. Little farming joke there.
Pros:
Lightning speed (214% movement speed multiplier with Snowslide)
Good DPS
Good Crowd Control
Decent heals, self and otherwise
Not too squishy
Fun to play
Cons:
Why do there always have to be downsides?
No imbue :(
Lots of little things to keep active. Rage, primal scream, animal growth, etc.
Umm... uh....
Some other stuff probably
Hope this guide is helpful. I'll try to respond to the replies on this post, or you can message me in game, I'm Djoe or Djhon on Cannith.
As a side note: my character is by no means an uber-completionist, but I have 4 racial points, 1x heroic completionist, +8 Supreme tome, 87 reaper points, and only 66 destiny points, so some of the choices I made are with that in mind. Don't be afraid to explore and experiment if you have more or less of any of these.
Here were my starting stats, 36 point build Horc:
20 Strength (Main stat for to-hit and damage)
8 Dex (Reflex saves. You need 13 if you want to take dodge or precision)
16 Constitution (Hit points!!!)
6 Intelligence (skill points, I take intimidate and swim)
16 Wisdom (spell points and trance stat)
6 Charisma (uhh, alternative trance stat and to buff your social skills?)
Here was my leveling order, and what feats I took when:
1: Druid, power attack
2: Barbarian
3: Druid, Cleave
4: Druid
5: Druid
6: Druid, Great Cleave
7: Druid
8: Druid
9: Druid, Natural Fighting
10: Druid
11: Druid
12: Druid, Imp. Crit, Slashing
13: Druid
14: Druid
15: Druid, Natural Fighting
16: Druid
17: Druid
18: Druid, Natural Fighting
19: Druid
20: Favored Soul, Any deity feat (doesn't matter)
21: Overwhelming Critical
22: Perfect Natural Fighting
24: Dodge (could honestly do anything, I just liked the +3 to fill my 28 dodge cap. Not many good options)
25: Crush Weakness
27: Epic Damage Reduction
28: Doublestrike
30: Epic Fortitude and Scion of Arborea
31: Deific Warding
You could make an argument to take Favored Soul earlier. It's only there for the easy Wisdom trance, which is useful in heroics as well. I just wanted to get to snow-slide as quick as possible, which for me was level 18. I also took cleave and great cleave before the natural fighting feats: you could make an arguement to swap that up as well, but personally I prefered having that extra AoE damage over the double strike and melee power.
Note on feats for 25, 28, and 31: You can take these in any order at all, I just listed them in order of priority to my personal tastes. I don't like Legendary toughness, 100 hit points is 100 hit points but it means little when things easily hit you for 1000 hp at a time in r10.
I'm happy with the numbers I'm hitting on this build, but I should warn you that I have to be really strict on myself to maintain them at this level. Gear swaps are important, and I would be a worse player without them. I use the Severed Tentacle when I rage for the +3 Strength, and when I have time before a fight I use the Titan's Grip clicky on it to get that extra to-hit and damage. If you don't have that item (or items that also give these abilities) then you lose 9 to your main-stat from the get-go. Additionally, I use a prowess swap (20,000 sentient exp on another weapon, perhaps your leveling one if you're like me) to get the +50 melee power for 10 seconds after using an action boost. This is reflected in the screenshot.
I think enhancements and the level-split is where my build gets controversial amongst other Wolf Druid connoisseurs. Ultimately, if DPS is your single end goal, 18 Druid is not for you. The Tier 5 of the Nature's Warrior tree is good (at least in my opinion, extra attack speed is awesome), but it lacks any bonus to critical threat range, meaning that without a bigger split in, say, Barbarian, you are missing out on perhaps your only opportunity to expand your weapon's critical profile. 15-20x3 (what I have on this build, and what you will have if you run this build with a Falchion) isn't a terrible critical-profile, but 15-20x4 is much better. The reason I did 18/1/1 is to get Snowslide, an extremely fun Wolf attack locked behind having 9th level spells. If you are interested in doing a level 18 wolf druid, consider swapping the barbarian level for a Figher level: you trade the 10% movement speed, extra rage charge, and +3 strength while raging for haste boost, which is ultimately more DPS. I use the Orcish rage action boost in the Half-orc tree, which is 100% Sub-optimal but ameliorated by the epic destiny Legendary Dreadnaught's "Carry On" ability. Another common level-split is 8 druid, 11 barbarian, and 1 favored soul, which I would reccomend if you're chasing that DPS dream.
On another note, If you're playing an animal druid and you're not raging, you're doing it wrong. 21 points of your already scarce melee power is locked behind using rage, and you can get strength way higher than any other damage stat. The only stat I would see as viable for your to-hit and damage modifier is if you were using Wisdom because you want to also be able to hit the DC requirements on the abilities like Howl of Terror, but even then you have to give up so much of your actual damage while attacking that I find it hard to justify. That being said, I didn't find myself using rage that much in heroics until I had spent 23 points into the Nature's Protector tree for the ability to cast while raging. Not being able to heal myself or others for spans of 3 minutes or more at a time was really annoying and ultimately not worth it.
In regard to the tier 5 choices in Nature's Warrior, Alpha Strike, Throat Rip, and Go for the Kill are all great abilities. The main issue is that Wolf Druids are loaded up with so many active abilities and attacks that it's hard to justify spending points on and fitting these abilities into one's attack rotation. I used Go for the Kill in heroics before I got snow slide, and Alpha Strike until epics where I got Cutter.
If you want to follow this build exactly but don't have 4 or more Racial action points, just take some points out of the racial tree. You're ultimately only losing a bit of number-pushing, and not anything vital to the build. You could use a different race even, and it wouldn't change the build much at all - I'm mostly using Half-Orc because that's what I'm on in my racials.
For epic destinies, I can't concretely say that this is "the best spread," mostly because there is a lot of opinion that goes into these choices and people all have different amounts of points to spend. I only have 66. This being the case, I can only justify to you why I made which choices. I go 16 points into Shadow Dancer because those are probably the best 16 points to spend in an off-tree of low hanging fruit. 5% doublestrike, 15% fortification bypass, and improved evasion (only evasion if you don't take tier 5s in Nature's Warrior), is all great, plus the other stuff. I go 17 points into Fury of the Wild because I love getting double bonuses to Animal growth (8 strength and constitution vs only 4) and I love Cutter as an epic strike. You can do this + take the 3rd core in the tree for only 14 points, but I had 3 left over and so grabbed some double strike. You could also reasonably use the tier 5 in this tree, but you already get 5% primal hp from heroic core enhancements, the epic moment in Fury kind of sucks, the Great Leveler is hard to find use with on a build that already has so many active attacks, and the only other ability requires you to take a feat - not worth it. That leaves Legendary Dreadnaught, which is awesome because of Action Hero and the sweet auto-crit cleave attack, and in my case I'm already spending 20+ points there because of the mantle and my sub-par choice of action boost. If I had more points, I would proably invest heavier into Fury of the Wild for more double strike and the bigger bonus on Primal Scream.
This is my gearset, I reccomend, for viewing purposes, to open in imgur and then right-click to open in a new tab. That way, you can zoom in and read the text.
It's not pretty and not exactly fine-tuned for this build, but it works really well. I use the 3pcs Devils Infenal Dance set from Vecna Unleased, the 5pcs Dino set from Isle of Dread, and the 2pcs Winter set from Feywild for +30 artifact PRR. With it, I get my Snowslide DC (the only one I need to worry about) at 118, and as per the first screenshot, I manage 124 strength, 78 con, and +202 to my weapon's damage (which I find quite impressive considering Wolf form gets no bonus to how ability score modifier affects weapon damage). I DO NOT recommend farming out my exact gear-set. To any other end-game high-reaper player, I am using sub-optimal loot, even if it's only slightly behind what is optimal. The only reason this is optimal to me is because it is what I already have, and I'm unwilling at this time to commit hours to the fields. Little farming joke there.
Pros:
Lightning speed (214% movement speed multiplier with Snowslide)
Good DPS
Good Crowd Control
Decent heals, self and otherwise
Not too squishy
Fun to play
Cons:
Why do there always have to be downsides?
No imbue :(
Lots of little things to keep active. Rage, primal scream, animal growth, etc.
Umm... uh....
Some other stuff probably
Hope this guide is helpful. I'll try to respond to the replies on this post, or you can message me in game, I'm Djoe or Djhon on Cannith.
