Expertise skill with Feral form

[Jyynx]

I have been loooking in the Armory and noticed druids without any expertise skill unlike say a warrior, does this not apply to the feral forms?

[Aurorawind]

Is your feral hitting ability based on the weapon skill of the weapon you have equipped?

Say you have staff of Iwin equipped but 100 in staff skill, are you missing right an left? If it does, then I'd say that implies expertise would apply.

[Nortibiry]

I'd say expertise is more like +hit than anything -- if your attacks get parried and dodged I'd have to imagine it works. I'm not sure why druids wouldn't have it, unless it has less impact on them (my threat gets sketchy fast if some key attacks don't land) or the itemization just isn't there on leather gear.

[edit] Oh yeah welcome back to the internet :)

[Jyynx]

Well I know to level the staff or mace skill we have to be out of feral form, which I have at 350 for them but was thinking it would affect us too and generate some kind of expertise skill when in form, wasn't sure if anyone has a feral druid or knows someone to see. Thanks for feedback thou guys.

[Wildeyez]

Welcome back Jyynx!

But to give you some insight about expertise and feral druids its really no different than anyone else. Expertise only reduces the chance the enemy mob has to dodge or parry your attacks. Now as far as the weapon skill for druids goes it doesn't effect you at all, hell you can take your weapon off and still do okay damage to a target so the only thing we benefit from weapons are the stats and AP they give us. If Im wrong please correct me but I really never saw how weapon skill effects us seeing as how we aren't ever using our weapons for our damage in catform or bearform.

[Aurorawind]

I could be wrong on it. I do remember on my druid using 2-h maces for a long time, then getting a staff with my staff skill so low I was getting a string of misses or very weak hits in cat form. That's what made me think it mattered.

[Nortibiry]

If I remember correctly all druids get a "feral weapon skill" that's automagically at the appropriate max for their level, which is why staff/mace/whatever skill has no impact on feral form, but does in caster/moonkin form. On the flip side stuff like +hit works outside of the weapon skill mechanics, so it still applies. Weapon skill used to be the mechanic by which you could counter dodge and parry, but it was confusing (to the point where even the theorycraft nerds weren't really sure what was going on) so they eventually just gave up and made expertise, which is like +hit for that other stuff on the combat table (effectively +hit doesn't add to your chance to hit, it decreases your chance to miss -- which is based on relative level among other things. Expertise does the same with dodge/parry chance).

disclaimer: I am not a druid

[Jyynx]

Thanks for the info guys, I was curious to this due to like arena and how it may apply, but sounds like more for the game mobs and not for pvp use.

[Aurorawind]

Actually I'd guess this is for PVP use. Since expertise reduces dodge or parry chance, this is for when a hunter pops deterrance or aspect of the monkey...or similar things to increase their parry and dodge.

[Assault]

I think it's definitely more useful for pve than for pvp. Players have much higher rates of dodge (and potentially parry to a lesser degree) than mobs do. Capped expertise vs. zero expertise is an ENORMOUS raid dps increase for me but the same amount of expertise would, while still being helpful in pvp, be far less useful.