Druid Catform DPS Guide

All Credit for this guide goes to Demoneater of the Druid Forums. To see the original post click here. This is also where the most updated version of this guide can be found)

LAST UPDATED: September 3, 2009

Feral DPS is one of the more involved DPS specs. It's in many ways similar to how Combat rogues played in The Burning Crusade; it's also likened to a melee affliction warlock. To do it well requires paying attention to several timers and maximizing their uptimes.

This guide should help people new to the role get up to speed, and hopefully stem the flood of threads on the topic.

Index
Part 1 - FAQs
Part 2 - How to DPS
- Specs
- Glyphs
- Idols
- Abilities
- Rotation
Part 3 - How to gear
- Stats
- Stat conversions
- The Hit Cap And You
- Set Bonuses
Part 4 - Pre-Heroic/Pre-raid gear

Part 1 - FAQs

These are the most common posts about feral DPS, so I'm putting them at the very top for easy access. If you are here to learn how to DPS as a feral from scratch, go ahead and skip this section and come back to it later.

Are cats competitive DPS?
Yes. The design is for cats to do slightly less DPS than rogues and hunters, since they cannot respec to tank or heal, however the gap is supposed to be only a few percent. This is close enough that gear and skill are usually the determining factors on the DPS meters, rather than class design - excepting overpowered and/or bugged specs. Cats are proving to be quite competitive in 3.1, with an average DPS on their most favorable fights currently within 10% of that of rogues.

What's the DPS rotation?
There isn't one. It's all about refreshing timers, somewhat like a melee affliction warlock. See Part 2 for more detail, but in a nutshell:
- Keep Savage Roar up
- Keep Mangle up, unless you have a bear or arms warrior in the group
- Keep Rake up
- Keep a 5-point Rip up
- Use Shred for combo points
- Use Tiger's Fury on the cooldown

How do I gear?
The best resources for this question are:
The Druid Wiki
Toskk's calculator
Rawr
Elitist Jerks Druid forum
All are excellent sources of information and theorycrafting. Almost all of the information in this FAQ has been derived (or unashamedly cut-and-pasted) from those sources.
Some pre-raid gear suggestions are in part 4 of this FAQ.

How much hit rating do I need?
- According to extensive testing by Elitist Jerks and other theorycrafters, the melee hit cap on raid bosses in WotLK has changed to 8%. Heroic bosses should remain unchanged at 6%.
- 32.79 hit rating is required for 1% hit
- The hit cap against raid bosses for feral druids is 263 rating, or 230 if you have a Draenei
- You to not need to hit cap as a feral druid. See the Part 3 section "The Hit Cap and You" for details.

How much expertise do I need?
- Raid bosses have approximately a 6.5% chance to dodge.
- Since we attack from behind, bosses cannot parry us, unless they turn.
- It requires 32.79 expertise rating for 1% dodge reduction.
- 2 points in Primal Precision grants 10 expertise, or 2.5% dodge reduction.
- The dodge cap against raid bosses is 26 expertise. With 2/2 Primal Precision, it takes 131 rating to reach the cap. Each point you take out of Primal Precision increases the cap by ~41 rating.
- Like hit, you do not need to cap. Assuming you are not capped on either, 1 hit rating and 1 expertise rating will increase your DPS by the same amount.

What gems should I use?
Agility at first. Strength and agility are very close initially, but in raid gear with 25-man buffs, agility is a little ahead. Also, if you gem a piece of gear for agility, you can use it for tanking as well as DPS, so that's the route most druids will go. Armor Penetration pulls ahead at certain gear levels, but requires a lot - in the order of 350-400 - before it becomes worth stacking at the expense of other stats.

Armor Penetration caps at ~1232 rating, when you reach that point with a trinket procced (612 with a Grim Toll, 566 rating with a Mjolnir Runestone), it's usually best to switch back to agility.

What glyphs should I use?
In order of DPS increase: Glyph of Shred, Glyph of Rip, and Glyph of Savage Roar.

What's the best weapon enchant?
- Yes, weapon proc enchants work in feral forms, they have since Lich King launched, you can stop asking now.
- The best DPS enchant is a toss-up between Berserking, Massacre, and Mongoose, depending on a few factors - mostly, presence of windfury, gear level, and the particular fight.
- In 3.1, Massacre became affected by Predatory Strikes, buffing it to 132 AP, which is the approximate same benefit of Berserking with a 33% uptime. For Berserking to be better than Massacre, its uptime must be greater than 33%.
- Berserking's proc rate can be frustratingly low soloing, and even in raids sometimes. It also pretty much requires Windfury to be present to raise its proc rate.
- Massacre is a little cheaper than Berserking, and is always active. It's the preferable enchant for soloing/5-mans, and raids without Windfury.
- You can find enchant uptimes by saving your combat log from a raid and viewing it with a web site such as WorldOfLogs.
- According to Elitist Jerks, Mongoose can slightly outscale Massacre and Berserking at high gear levels. However, like Berserking it requires very good uptime, and very good gear. It also works OK as a cheaper enchant for a weapon you'll replace, and as an enchant for a weapon you intend to use for both DPS and tanking.
- Greater Savagery is very effective for the dirt cheap price, use it on blue weapons.

Does the talent Protector of the Pack affect attack power in cat form?
No. Protector of the Pack is only active while in bear form.

Does the talent Genesis affect feral bleeds?
No. Despite the unclear tooltip, Genesis only affects Balance and Restoration spells.

Does weapon skill affect DPS?
No. In feral forms you use "feral combat skill", not your equipped weapon skill. Feral combat skill is always maxed for your level. You can have skill level 1 with your weapon and it won't make a difference.

Am I ready for heroics?
Are you level 80? Do you have at least mostly blues from Drak'tharon Keep and above, and Storm Peaks/Icecrown quests? Then yes, you are ready for heroics. Also keep in mind that your best ticket into heroics may be a good tanking set, if you don't mind doing it.
Self-buffed, the best-possible pre-Heroic gear setup will have about 5600 AP, 35% crit, 5% hit, and ~22 expertise. If you're anywhere close to this (say, 4800-5000 AP, 30% crit, and 3-5% hit and dodge reduction), you're fine for heroics.

Am I ready for raids?
Are you level 80? Do you have a fair number of decent level 80 blues from normal and heroic instances, gemmed and enchanted? Then yes, you're ready for raids. A few purples from heroics and/or exalted reputations would be icing. A best-possible set from heroics self-buffed will have about 6500 AP, 40% crit, 8% hit, and 26 expertise, plus some haste and penetration. Again, get somewhere close to that and you'll be fine - 5500 AP, 35% crit, 6% hit, and 18 expertise would be a general ballpark.

What addons are good specifically for feral?
Try out:
DruidBar (shows your mana bar in feral forms)
BadKitty (feral ability timers)
Facemauler or FeralByNight (recommends next ability, to help you get a handle on the cycle)
Other non-class-specific timer mods such as NeedToKnow, Classtimers, and Elkano's are also popular for monitoring the many timers Feral druids have to keep up.

Part 2 - How to DPS

Specs
In 3.1, the highest DPS cat spec is probably this
It takes only DPS-increasing talents and nothing extraneous. This spec can't tank beyond normal-mode instances and has very little utility, but is the one to have if you're aiming for the top of the meters.

If you want a hybrid spec which is capable of both tanking and respectable DPS, say for running as an off-tank or for a heroic instance spec that allows you to fill either role, the following is a reasonable hybrid spec

However, it lacks Infected Wounds, so you would be relying on another group member, such as a death knight's Frost Fever, for an attack speed debuff when you are tanking.

Glyphs
In general, most ferals will be using Glyph of Savage Roar, Glyph of Shred, and Glyph of Rip. Glyph of Mangle is a slight DPS loss, depending on gear, but may result in easier cycles for some. If you really want Glyph of Mangle, Glyph of Savage Roar is the one to sacrifice. Obviously, Mangle is useless if you have a feral tank or an arms warrior.

Glyph of Rip - A very solid DPS glyph. It adds 4 seconds to Rip, our primary finisher, which has the dual effect of granting extra damage for free, and extending our cycle, making it easier to keep all of our timers up.

Glyph of Shred - A staple for boss fights. Increases Rip's duration by 2 seconds for every Shred we use, up to 6 seconds. Slightly superior to Glyph of Rip unless you cannot get behind your target.

Glyph of Savage Roar - Increases the damage bonus of Savage Roar by 3% (additive, total of 33%). The best trash DPS glyph, and a very strong boss DPS glyph, increases *all* cat damage by a flat 3%.

Glyph of Mangle - This one is optional depending on your raid makeup. If you will always have another feral druid or an arms warrior keeping Mangle/Trauma up on the boss, Glyph of Mangle won't do much for you. But if you're the only feral in the raid, this glyph is ok, as it significantly reduces the number of times you have to apply Mangle, simplifying your rotation and freeing up more energy for Shred.

Glyph of Berserk - This glyph extends the duration of Berserk by 5 seconds. It's great for extra threat in bear, but is lackluster for cat DPS, because by the last 5 seconds, you're mostly tapped out on energy anyway, and it's likely to only give you one additional shred in that time.

Glyph of Dash (minor) - Yes, this is a DPS-increasing glyph. Reducing the cooldown of Dash on a long fight with a lot of movement will give you more time on target, increasing your DPS marginally.

Idols
Idol of Mutilation - New in 3.2, purchased with 25 Badges of Triumph. Has a chance to give 300 agility for 16 seconds on Mangle or Shred. The new best-in-slot idol for cat DPS, regardless of the situation.

Idol of Worship - This idol drops from Grand Widow Faerlina in 25-man Naxxramas, and is also available for purchase from the Emblem of Valor quartermaster. Mathematically better than Idol of the Ravenous Beast, and better than Idol of Corruption if you have a mangle-bot. However it depends on good cycles for full benefit - if you shred too much and let your other timers suffer, you might not get as much dps as you would from Idol of the Ravenous Beast.

Idol of the Ravenous Beast - Available from the Emblem of Heroism. vendor for 15 badges. It's pretty decent for a trash/burst idol before you get Idol of Mutilation. The 203 damage it adds to shred comes before all the multipliers like Mangle and Rend and Tear, making its actual damage even larger. However, it will get replaced once you have Mutilation.

Idol of Corruption - Drops from General Vezax in Ulduar25, or available from the Emblem of Conquest vendor. An update of Idol of Terror, granting more agility on Mangle. If you do not have Idol of Mutilation, and are responsible for your own Mangle, this ends up being the best DPS idol in many circumstances, but obviously if you have a mangle bot, don't bother.

Idol of the Wastes - A green quest reward in Dragonblight. For a new druid, this is probably the best DPS idol to use until you can save the badges for one of the above epic ones. It apparently now DOES proc off Cat Swipe as well as Bear.

DPSing
Feral DPS does not have a solidified rotation like, say, arcane mages or blood death knights. Doing maximum DPS as a feral relies on maximizing the uptimes of your different buffs and debuffs.

As mentioned above in the FAQ section, it boils down to:
- Keep Savage Roar up
- Keep Mangle up, unless you have a bear or arms warrior in the group
- Keep a 5-point Rip up
- Keep Rake up
- Use Shred for combo points
- Use Tiger's Fury on the cooldown

Abilities
Mangle - Although many ferals rely on it primarily for soloing and PVP, Mangle typically takes a back seat in raid DPS. Its primary function is to keep the target debuffed to increase bleed and Shred damage, and cheap initial combo points to get Savage Roar up.

Rake - Once the Kryptonite of cat DPS, Rake is now important to use. It has amazing DPE (damage per energy), and will increase Shred damage by 20% through Rend and Tear if you haven't yet got Rip up. Rake should be kept up as much as possible on everything you kill, but you absolutely need to wait for the previous one to wear off before you reapply it. Refreshing it before it drops will cost you a lot of damage.

Shred - Your primary combo-point builder. Comparing the tooltip directly to Mangle it doesn't look like much, however it benefits from both the Mangle debuff and Rend and Tear, causing it to ultimately outdamage Mangle by a very large amount. That said, if your target is not mangled or is not bleeding, don't use Shred until you've corrected that.

Swipe - Similar to the Bear version, hits everything in front of you for approximately Mangle-like damage. Does not award combo points, is mostly for use on trash.

Rip - Your primary finishing move. It doesn't give you big numbers on your screen like Ferocious Bite, but over its duration it will do more damage. Unlike Bite, it ignores armor, and doesn't consume extra energy. It has great DPE, serves as a bleed to buff Shred's damage, and fully glyphed with the two-piece Dreamwalker bonus, lasts for 20-26 seconds on just one application. Theorycrafting says it's OK to refresh rip with a second or two left on it, but most prefer to wait until it drops completely. Make sure you have Savage Roar up before using Rip; Rip's damage will not increase if you use Roar after applying Rip.

Savage Roar - Increases your damage by 30%. This is the single greatest damage increase you have. Like a Rogue's Slice and Dice, you should get it up as soon as possible, and keep it up all the time. Its potency doesn't change with the number of combo points you use, only its duration, so most druids fire it up with 2 points to start, and refresh it with 5. You can refresh it with less, but doing so uses more energy for the same amount of uptime. Using Savage Roar will not increase the damage of bleeds already on the target - conversely, if it drops, bleeds already on the target will not lose damage.

Ferocious Bite - This is the finisher to use on a target that won't live for the duration of a Rip. It's used a lot on trash, on bosses with low health, and occasionally as a combo-point dump. Note that Ferocious Bite converts up to 30 leftover energy into damage. It will consume the extra energy even if you have Clearcasting. You should use this ability with as close to 35 energy as you can for maximum efficiency, and never use it if your target is not bleeding.

Tiger's Fury - Increases your melee damage, and restores 60 energy through King of the Jungle. This ability has a 30-second cooldown and is free - essentially you want to hit it every time it's up. You should hit it when you have less than 25 energy, otherwise latency or unforseen events such as the target moving or a clearcasting proc can cause you to cap out on energy and waste some of your regen.

Berserk - Decreases the energy cost of all your abilities by 50% for 15 seconds and renders you immune to Fear effects. You cannot use Tiger's Fury while under the effects of Berserk, so it is best used immediately after Tiger's Fury. This is our big DPS cooldown, very similar to a combat rogue's Adrenaline Rush.

Faerie Fire (Feral) - Reduces your target's armor by 5%. Changed to a 5 minute buff in 3.1, you should put it up unless another druid in the raid is handling that. It's free, and 5% less armor on the boss multiplied by all the physical DPS in your raid is a good raid DPS increase.

Ravage/Pounce - Our two stealth openers have little place in DPS. Ravage is a dangerous tool to use - if you crit and your tank got parried, it could cause the boss to turn and one-shot you - and its damage is not high enough to justify using it over just starting your DPS rotation. Pounce can be worthwhile on some stunnable trash, as long as your tank is not lacking rage, but its damage is too low and its cost too high to be worth using on bosses.

Rotation/Cycles
All of this assumes that you are responsible for keeping Mangle up yourself. If you have another druid or an arms warrior keeping a bleed damage debuff up, you can obviously mostly ignore your Mangle button.

Opening
Step 1 of DPS is to let the tank get aggro. If they get a parry right off the bat and you open up, you end up thinly pasted on the floor.
You should usually not bother with stealth and openers. Just run (or feral charge) into position and start your cycle.
Get Savage Roar up as soon as possible, usually people suggest opening with Mangle, Roar, then Rake.

Trash DPS - single-target
Single-target trash is all about burst. Once you have Roar up, make sure Rake is up, and spam Shred, using Tiger's Fury whenever it's up. At 5 points, judge how long your target will live - use Rip if it'll be up a while, or Ferocious Bite if it will die soon.

Trash DPS - AOE
Most trash in heroics and Naxxramas is simply AOE'd down.
Get Roar up ASAP, and just spam Swipe - Cat wantonly. Be careful, it's easy to pull mobs that are being AOE-tanked, AOE trash is the prime cause of death of raiding cats.
Use Berserk at the start of big pulls whenever it's up, but don't use it on the pull right before a boss.

Boss
Simple version is, once you've got Roar and Rake up as descriped under "opening", you should be at fairly low energy. Use Tiger's Fury, then Shred to 5 combo points. Rip and Mangle. Rake will probably have fallen off by now - reapply it, and shred to 5 combo points again. This time, refresh Savage Roar.

From here you will most likely end up doing two Rips then one Roar, and repeating until the boss dies.

Remember:
Keep Roar up at all times, at all costs.
Keep Mangle up. It's 30% more damage from all your major damage abilities.
Keep 5-point Rip up.
Keep Rake up
Spam Shred for combo points
Use Tiger's Fury whenever it is up, as long as you have less than 30 energy or so.

Berserk

- Berserk is best used between 6 and 15 seconds after Tiger's Fury. It prevents the use of Tiger's Fury while it is up, and will remove the +80 damage effect if used immediately after TF, so you want to use it in the window between TF's effect wearing off, and the ability coming off cooldown again.

- Try to Berserk with about 80-85 energy, depending on latency. You'll regenerate another 10 during the global cooldown, and can then start spamming abilities with close to 100 energy.

- While Berserk, you should mostly use Shred. Refresh Rip, Rake, Mangle, and Roar should any of them expire, but otherwise continue to spam Shred, even once you reach 5 combo points. You should not use Ferocious Bite while Berserk, but after Berserk wears off is often a good time to Bite.

- On a fight less than 3 minutes long, you should save Berserk until the end if the boss has a low-health enrage, to help power it down during the dangerous phase quickly.

- On a fight more than 3 minutes, use Berserk as soon as the tank has a safe aggro lead. This should allow you to use it again before the end of the fight.

- Because Berserk only affects yellow damage, and Bloodlust/Heroism only affects white damage, it doesn't particularly make any difference whether you use Berserk at the same time as Bloodlust or not. It's nice if you can pop it while you have trinkets and any other procs up, however.

Pro-tips 1 - On Clearcasting procs, always Shred. Always. Unless Mangle is actually down, then mangle.

2 - Always make sure Savage Roar is up *before* using bleeds, as their damage is calculated at the moment they are applied, not on the fly. If you Rip without Roar up, then Roar, Rip's damage does not increase. If you Rip with Roar up, and Roar falls off, Rip's damage stays the same. Mangle, however, will change the damage of bleeds if it is applied or falls off after they are already ticking.

3 - If you find yourself with 5 combo points, plenty of time left on Roar, and Rip still at at least half duration or so, you can use Ferocious Bite to dump combo points. Do it with as little energy as possible to avoid wasting any. Early on you won't be able to do this at all, as your crit improves you'll be able to fit it in occasionally, although it still won't be frequent. On fights with a crit-increasing gimmick such as Loatheb, however, you can do it practically every cycle.

4 - If you find yourself in a situation similar to the above, but in which you do not have enough time on one of your timers to comfortably use ferocious bite without crashing your cycles, just hang out and only do enough to keep yourself from hitting full energy. Refresh mangle or rake if they drop, or just Shred to keep your energy under about 80. Wasting a couple combo points is a far lesser sin than wasting energy regen.

5 - Take a deep breath and relax. The path to the greatest DPS is not to spam abilities, but to wait patiently. Don't Shred unless you get up over 60-ish energy. If, while waiting to get there, a timer comes up for renewal, renew it. If you just mash Shred every time you have 42 energy, you can end up waiting several seconds for enough energy to reapply a rake or a mangle, and suffer a DPS loss. Careful planning and lots of practice on target dummies are important.

6 - With the 4T8 bonus, it becomes much more common to refresh Roar with only 2 points. This frees up a lot more CPs for Ferocious Bites without really costing you much.

Manglespam build
Mangle spamming is bad for raid boss DPS in 99 situations out of 100, as its DPE (damage per energy) is much lower than Shred's. If your role in your guild involves DPS with any frequency, it's a good idea to be specced for Shredding Attacks.

However, as a fresh 80, when your crit rate is particularly low, it can be difficult to get enough combo points to keep all your timers up all the time. With the 2t6 bonus and Improved Mangle, Mangle is reduced to 29 energy. This increases its DPE to very close to Shred's numbers, but at only about 70% of the energy, granting a lot more combo points, allowing better Rip and Roar uptimes, and resulting in better overall DPS.
This setup absolutely requires 2t6.

Part 3 - How should I gear?
As mentioned at the top of this FAQ, the best answer to this question is given by two utilities:
Toskk's DPS calculator
Rawr
Elitist Jerks druid forum
MaxDPS is absolutely terrible for feral druids, as it still uses mechanics from level 70.

Feral druids use "rogue gear" - leather with agility and attack power as the primary stats. While the itemization is not "ideal", that's not actually important - what's important is whether we can USE the available gear well enough to be as effective as other classes, and the answer to that is yes.

Stats
Agility - Our best DPS stat currently between heroic gear and late Ulduar gear. At worst (unbuffed, in greens and regular instance blues) it's about equal to strength, and scales until it's a fair amount better. It can be used for tanking as well as DPS, so if you want to use a piece of gear for both roles, agility is the stat to use. It's also the stat you'll find most on gear, and the stat you'll want to gem and enchant for in most cases. Caveat: See Armor Penetration

Strength - At very low gear levels without raid buffs, strength can be mathematically slightly superior to agility, however it is not a scaling stat, and is soon left behind. Since it does not appear on leather gear and we can gem for either strength or agility (and agility has a slight edge in raid buffs, plus can be used for tanking as well), the only place you might find it is on accessories such as rings, and on a few weapons. It's not a stat to seek out, but it's not terrible either - it's usually our second or third best DPS stat.

Armor Penetration rating - Armor penetration was buffed by about 25% in 3.1, however it also gained a penalty to the amount of armor it reduces (the dreaded Blizzard "up to" in its tooltip). At 100% armor penetration, you are not actually reducing 100% of a raid boss's armor. It becomes the best DPS stat if you have enough of it - the models disagree, but it's somewhere between 250 and 450 plus a Grim Toll, and a fairly high level of AP and crit on top of that. Since it stacks with itself, if you don't have much it is worse than strength and agility, if you have a ton it becomes very good. Armor penetration is capped at 100%, or about 1232 rating.

Hit - Hit rating gets passed by almost all other stats, even perhaps haste rating at some gear levels according to calculators. It should not be gemmed for, although it is still useful to have a reasonable amount on gear to smooth your cycles.

Expertise - Expertise has exactly the same effect (reducing the number of attacks that fail to land, only by reducing dodges rather than misses) as hit, and the same conversion, and so it has exactly the same DPS value up to the dodge cap. If you're the sort that obsessively hit caps, don't forget to expertise cap too.

Crit rating - Increased in usefulness thanks to Primal Gore, crit rating now comes in a little better than hit/expertise and haste.

Haste rating - Despite a buff to the stat, other feral changes mean it's still one of the worst stats for us. It increases white damage only, which for ferals is a third or less of total damage. However, it also increases the number of procs from both Omen of Clarity and weapon enchants like Berserking and Mongoose. Mathematically it can exceed hit just slightly in 25-man raid gear, but hit makes cycles easier, and so is still preferable if you are under the cap and have to choose between them. Attack speed is calculated as 1 / (1 + haste%/100). e.g. with 9% haste, your attack speed is 1 / 1.09 = 0.917. Yes, ferals can attack more than once per second.

Stat conversions
1 Strength = 2 AP (2.87 AP with talents and full raid buffs)
1 Agility = 1 AP + 0.012% crit (1.44 AP + 0.014% crit with talents and full raid buffs)
1% hit = 32.79 hit rating
1% -dodge = 4 expertise = 32.79 expertise rating (8.2 rating per 1 expertise)
1% crit = 83.3 agility = 45.91 crit rating
1% haste = 25.22 haste rating
1% armor penetration = 12.32 armor penetration rating

Gems
Meta: Relentless Earthsiege Diamond (+21 agility/3% critical damage)
Red: Delicate (agility), later Fractured (ArP)
Yellow: Deadly (agility/crit rating) or Glinting (agility/hit rating)
Blue: Shifting (agility/stamina), later Puissant (ArP/stamina)
Prismatic: Enchanted or Nightmare Tear (all stats)

Unless a piece of gear has a particularly good socket bonus, it's best to primarily socket pure Delicate gems, and use one Enchanted or Nightmare Tear to activate the meta.

The only options for Armor Penetration gems, should you reach a gear level where that is the stat to use, are Fractured (red, pure ArP) and Puissant (purple, ArP/Stam), there is no yellow gem with armor penetration.

Enchants
Helm: Arcanum of Torment (Knights of the Ebon Blade Revered)
Shoulders: Lesser/Greater Inscription of the Axe (Sons of Hodir Honored/Exalted)
Cloak: Superior (+16) or Major (+22) Agility
Chest: Super (+8) or Powerful (+10) Stats
Bracers: Striking (+38 AP) or Greater Assault (+50 AP)
Gloves: Major Agility (+20 agility) or Crusher (+44 AP)
Legs: Nerubian (+55 AP/15 Crit) or Icescale (+75 AP/22 crit) Leg Armor
Boots: Icewalker (+12 hit/crit rating) if not hit capped, or Superior Agility (+16)
Weapon: Massacre (+110 AP), Berserking (Proc: +400 AP for 15s), or Mongoose (Proc: +120 agility/2% haste)

The Hit Cap And You
One of the biggest falsehoods that gets perpetrated on the druid forums is that the first thing you should do is stack hit to the cap. This is not exactly true.

Feral druids do not suffer a huge penalty from misses or dodged attacks in PVE DPS. Our white damage is a modest portion of our DPS compared to most classes, and we don't have damaging procs like rogues' poisons or DK's Blood-Caked Blade. Our missed specials only cost 20% energy. We are not GCD-limited or on a fixed rotation, so we don't lose much time. Mathematically, hit and expertise rating are simply not as good, point-for-point, as agility.

This doesn't mean that hit rating is bad. Hitting more often DOES increase DPS reasonably well. Reducing misses smooths your cycle out, allowing you to pay less attention to whether or not your last attack connected, which makes DPS easier. It simply means that if you have a choice between exactly-equal amounts of hit rating and agility, you should probably take the agility.

Set bonuses
Tier 6 2-piece - Reduces cost of Mangle by 5. A minor DPS increase (less than 1%), except in the particular case of a Manglespam build, for which it is essential.

Tier 6 4-piece - Increases Rip damage by 15%. This is the best DPS set bonus available, at around around a 2.5% total increase. If you can achieve it without sacrificing too many stats (particularly if you have the three Sunwell pieces of tier 6), it will last quite a distance into Naxx25 before it's replaced.

Tier 7 2-piece - Increases the duration of Rip by 4 seconds. This is a decent set bonus (around 1-1.5% dps increase) that you should strive to achieve early on. It extends your Rip to 20 seconds in conjunction with the Glyph of Rip, allowing plenty of time to build combo points, refresh other timers, and perhaps even squeeze in a Ferocious Bite in between Rips. Keep this set bonus until you can get 4T8.

Tier 7 4-piece - Decreases the cooldown of Tiger's Fury by 3 seconds. This essentially increases the energy from Tiger's Fury over the course of a fight by 10%, which turns out to be a 1.6% increase in total energy regeneration. As approximately two thirds of your damage is yellow damage, this is about a 1% increase in total DPS.

Tier 8 2-piece: Allows Rake and Rip ticks to proc Clearcasting. According to Rawr, this is a pretty strong set bonus, but not vital. Definitely break 4T7 for it, but try to keep 2T7. Keep until 4T9.

Tier 8 4-piece: Increases the duration of Savage Roar by 8 seconds. A useful cycle simplifier, it usually requires a little adjustment, but allows 2-point roars to be viable, freeing up points for extra ferocious bites.

Tier 9 2-piece: Increases Rake's duration by 3 seconds. Essentially adds a single extra tick to Rake. A pretty good DPS increase, and makes it easier to keep a higher uptime. Often worth breaking 4T8 for just because T9 gear has a significantly higher ilevel, and therefore much better stats.

Tier 9 4-piece: Increases the critical strike chance of Rip and Ferocious Bite by 5%. A minor DPS increase. Only really worth breaking 2T9 for because the extra stats on T9 gear will overcome the DPS you lose. Pick it up incidentally.

Part 4 - Pre-raid Gear

So you're a fresh 80, and need to gear up to do heroics and raids? Here's some gear to look out for. These are by no means the only items, but they are some of the best. I have provided at least the top two options for both regular and heroic where possible. Some items may become better or worse depending on your current stats - it is still strongly recommended to use Toskk's calculator or Rawr to help you build your gear set.

Pre-heroic:
Helm
Headguard of Retaliation - Utgarde Pinnacle quest "Vengeance Be Mine!"
Hood of the Furtive Assassin - Halls of Lightning

Neck
Necklace of the Chrono-Lord - Culling of Stratholme
Severed Noose of Westwind - Icecrown quest "The Admiral Revealed"

Shoulders
Shoulderpads of the Infamous Knave - Trial of the Champion
Trollwoven Spaulders - Leatherworking BOE
Shoulderguards of the Ice Troll - Gundrak

Cloak
D!*%% of the Undefeated - Trial of the Champion
Embrace of Sorrow - Halls of Stone
Cloak of Bloodied Waters - BOE (drops in Heroic Gundrak)

Chest
Drake-Rider's Tunic - Utgarde Pinnacle
Exotic Leather Tunic - Utgarde Pinnacle quest "Junk in my Trunk"

Bracers
Drake-Champion's Bracers - BOE (drops in The Oculus)
King's Square Bracers - BOE (drops in Culling of Stratholme)

Gloves
Gloves of the Argent Fanatic - Trial of the Champion
Handwraps of Preserved History - Culling of Stratholme quest "A Royal Escort"

Belt
Belt of Fierce Competition - Trial of the Champion
Trollwoven Girdle - Leatherworking BOE
Ley-Whelphide Belt - BOE (drops in The Oculus)

Leggings
Leggings of Brazen Trespass - Trial of the Champion
Mind-Expanding Legguards - Kirin'Tor Revered
Chain Gang Legguards - BOE (drops in Heroic Violet Hold)
Azure Strappy Pants - Frenzyheart Revered

Boots
The Darkspeaker's Treads - Icecrown quest "Mind Tricks"
Rhino-Hide Kneeboots - Zul'drak quest "One of a Kind"

Rings
Urka's Band of Zeal - Trial of the Champion
Stained-Glass Shard Ring - BOE (drops in Heroic Ahn'kahet)
Bjarngrim Family Signet - Halls of Lightning
Ring of Scarlet Shadows - BOE Jewelcrafting
Signet of Bridenbrad - Icecrown quest "Light Within the Darkness"
Band of Motivation - The Oculus quest "The Struggle Persists"

Trinkets
Banner of Victory - Trial of the Champion
Fezzik's Pocketwatch - Icecrown quest "The Last Line of Defense"
First Mate's Pocketwatch - Howling Fjord quest "The Jig is Up"

Weapon
Staff of Feral Furies/Silvery Sylvan Stave - Argent Tournament (25 Champion's Seals)
Stave of Shrouded Mysteries - Kirin Tor Revered
Hewn Sparring Quarterstaff - Halls of Lightning

Idol
Idol of the Wastes - Dragonblight quest "My Old Enemy"

Pre-raid:

Helm
Conqueror's Nightsong Headguard - 58 Emblems of Conquest
Mask of Distant Memory - Heroic Trial of the Champion
Mask of the Watcher - Heroic Oculus
Shroud of Darkness - Heroic Violet Hold

Neck
Broach of the Wailing Night - 19 Emblems of Conquest
Ancient Pendant of Arathor - Heroic Trial of the Champion
Necklace of Arcane Spheres - Heroic Violet Hold

Shoulders
Valorous Dreamwalker Shoulderpads - 60 Emblems of Valor
Shoulderpads of the Infamous Knave - Trial of the Champion
Trollwoven Spaulders - BOE Leatherworking
Spaulders of the Careless Thief - Heroic Nexus

Cloak
Hammerhead Sharkskin Cloak - 25 Emblems of Valor
Ice Striker's Cloak - BOE Leatherworking
D!*%% of the Undefeated - Trial of the Champion
Cloak of Bloodied Waters - BOE (drops in heroic Gundrak)
Cloak of the Gushing Wound - Heroic Violet Hold

Chest
Conqueror's Nightsong Raiments - 58 Emblems of Conquest
Darkheart Chestguard - Knights of the Ebon Blade exalted
Crystal Infused Tunic - Heroic Nexus

Bracers
Armbands of the Wary Lookout - Heroic Trial of the Champion
Wristwraps of the Cutthroat - BOE, 60 Emblems of Valor
Dragonfriend Bracers - Wyrmrest Accord Exalted
Advanced-Tooled Leather Bands - Heroic Halls of Lightning

Gloves
Gloves of the Blind Stalker - 28 Emblems of Conquest
Gilt-Edged Leather Gauntlets - Heroic Utgarde Pinnacle
Gloves of the Argent Fanatic - Trial of the Champion

Belt
Belt of the Twilight Assassin - 28 Emblems of Conquest
Belt of Fierce Competition - Trial of the Champion
Trollwoven Girdle - BOE Leatherworking
Sharp-Barbed Leather Belt - Heroic Utgarde Keep

Leggings
Leggings of Wavering Shadow - 39 Emblems of Conquest
Gored Hide Leggings - Heroic Gundrak
Leggings of Brazen Trespass - Trial of the Champion
Ravenous Leggings of the Furbolg - Heroic Utgarde Pinnacle

Boots
Treads of Dismal Fortune - Heroic Trial of the Champion
Boots of Captain Ellis - 40 Emblems of Valor
Boots of the Neverending Path - Argent Crusade Exalted
Boots of the Whirling Mist - Heroic Halls of Stone

Rings
Urka's Band of Zeal - Trial of the Champion
Hemorrhaging Circle - Heroic Gundrak
Band of the Kirin Tor - Dalaran vendor (8500g)
Stained-Glass Shard Ring - BOE (drops in Heroic Ahn'Kahet)
Mobius Band - Heroic Culling of Stratholme

Trinkets
Darkmoon Card: Greatness - Darkmoon Faire, Nobles deck
Banner of Victory - Trial of the Champion
Mirror of Truth - 40 Heroic Badges
Meteorite Whetstone - Heroic Utgarde Pinnacle
Incisor Fragment - Heroic Drak'tharon Keep

Weapon
Marrowstrike - Heroic Trial of the Champion
Staff of Trickery - Heroic Violet Hold
Titansteel Destroyer - Blacksmithing BOE
Staff of Feral Furies/Silvery Sylvan Stave - Argent Tournament (25 Champion's Seals)

Idol
Idol of Mutilation - 25 Emblems of Triumph

Part 5 - Coming Soon

Current 3.2.2 PTR changes affecting feral DPS:

* Armor Penetration: The amount of Armor Penetration Rating required for 1% penetration has been increased on the PTR to 13.996 from 12.316.

This means that for all but the best-geared druids, agility will become a slightly better DPS stat than armor penetration once more. Armor penetration may yet re-pass agility in Icecrown, depending what gear is available there and whether any other class or game mechanics changes occur.

* Predatory Strikes: This talent now also causes the druid’s finishing moves to provide a 7/13/20% chance per combo point to make the next Nature spell with a cast time below 10 seconds instant cast.

Has very little effect on feral DPS, beyond the survival benefits of being able to cast an instant healing spell if needed.

All Credit for this guide goes to Demoneater of the Druid Forums. To see the original post click here. This is also where the most updated version of this guide can be found)