Gebuz’s Guide, linked from the Class Guides Page, outlines several talent combinations for Nighthold. Many more combinations are possible after patch 7.1.5, as several talent options have been buffed to be more competitive. I tried out a few things the first week, and also looked at top logs. What follows are my plans for this week in Nighthold.

Ideas

My talents selections are in shorthand and refer to each talent’s position in the Nth row. For example, “1233112” would be a standard frequent-AOE build, with Force of Nature, Displacer Beast, Restoration Affinity, Typhoon, Soul of the Forest, Shooting Stars, and Stellar Drift. It may be easier to follow along with the Balance Druid Talent Calculator open in game or in another window. I favor Stellar Drift for all fights as ads are usually high priority, and my Oneth’s Intuition legendary gives free Starfalls to boot. I dislike Displacer Beast and try to use Wild Charge or Renewal when possible to save GCDs. If you are worried about reacting slowly or need to move far distances, Displacer Beast is the safer bet. I like Starlord with Incarnation builds and Force of Nature or Warrior of Elune with Soul of the Forest builds. Taking Starlord when you intend to be casting Starfall with most of your Astral Power seems very unintuitive to me.

Fight-Specific Plans

Skorpyron: 2332112. AOE trinkets. Sephuz. Heavy AOE fight; Force of Nature or Starlord could be justified, all three talents are close with AOE. Sephuz can be reliably proc’d on cooldown by Mass Entanglement. Chronomatic Anomaly: 1333112. ST (single target) trinkets. The ads are up enough to make AOE worth it, but my AOE trinkets require stacked ads. Trilliax: 3333232. ST trinkets. Heavy movement negates Nature’s Balance value, even on a single target fight, and Stellar Drift allows movement while casting during beam. Spelldblade Aluriel: 1333112. AOE trinkets. The multi-ad phases make AOE a priority. Tichondrius: 3333232. ST trinkets. Demon Ring for 2-set (the neck is my non-legendary BiS neck already). You can rank with Soul of the Forest and Shooting Stars on intermission, but I don’t see that as the important part of the fight. Krosus: 3231232. ST trinkets. Demon Ring for 2-set. Classic ST fight if your fellow raiders have perfect execution of mechanics. Stellar Drift is nice if people miss soaking pools and spawn adds; Nature’s Balance is likely better if few adds spawn. Botanist: 1333112. AOE Trinkets. Constant cleave fight after 75%. Star Augur: 3123232. ST trinkets. Little movement, but my legendary and the ads in the last third make Stellar Drift worth it. Elisande: 1223112. ST trinkets. Somewhat similar to Anomaly, the ads are up just enough to make AOE worth it. Gul’dan: 1223112. ST trinkets. Frequent AOE burst, but not up enough to make AOE trinkets worth it.

Trinket Spoilers

For Balance, you actually don’t want to swap out trinkets in Nighthold much, as the same trinkets tend to do well on both AOE and single target. Look for a post tomorrow to see my simulation results.

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