My Werewolves don't have Rabies or use the synergy bug, but...
Wolves don't suck, especially if you play Hardcore with them. When you have 3 meat shields instead of 1 Grizzly then you, your Mercenary and OakSage/HoW take less hits. Another way to use them is as multiple decoys allowing you to handle multiple packs of enemies with ease. Wolves are also great for removing corpses, whereas Grizzly will keep wacking the same fallen no matter how many times it keeps getting up. Wolves also move faster to new enemies than Grizzly. In the few areas they die fast then I want a fat Grizzly, which means good points in DireWolves to fatten up my Grizzly anyways. I use both.
Darksight will cast Blind, which may be fine for some, but I personally don't want Blind overriding my Merc's Decrepify or AmpDamage, which cranks up my damage by the thousands. Decrepify/AmpDmg also helps remove some PIs, which Blind would ruin. As for crowd control, my HolyFreeze mercenary and wolves/grizzly team handle that fine.
As for OakSage or HoW, if you're Softcore and twink than either one can work. I lean slightly to OakSage. I think you'll find HoW more valuable to a Hunter or Werebear as a Werewolf typically already has over +500%AR and +600%EDmg after Fury and Strength bonuses alone.
As for the Mercenary, it's hard to go wrong here as he's not crucial to your build, unlike some other builds. I went with HolyFreeze not only for the crowd control and HC safety, but he also makes it much harder for enemies to flee from me and comes with a little cold damage for PIs.
As for which skill to max first, IMO, even if you're Hardcore untwinked you should max Fury first so you can continue to tear through Nightmare.
IK Maul with IK pieces is really good. It does have a 225 STR requirement, but the beauty...
Immortal King's Stone Crusher
Ogre Maul
'Shael'
Two-Hand Damage: 260 to 358
Required Strength: 225
Required Level: 76
Mace Class - Fastest Attack Speed
Indestructible
Item Version: 1.10 Expansion
Item Level: 99
Fingerprint: 0x9a5366cd
+238% Enhanced Damage
60% Increased Attack Speed
200% Damage to Demons
350% Damage to Undead
37% Chance of Crushing Blow
Indestructible
***Partial Set Item Bonuses***
Adds 211-397 fire damage
Adds 7-477 lightning damage
Adds 127-364 cold damage over 6 seconds
+204 poison damage over 6 seconds
You never need to weapon-switch to handle any PIs, even PIs that AmpDmg cannot break and it still has CrushingBlow. The above is 5frame like Ribcracker, but the damage is better. I went this route somewhat since it left my weapon-switch slots free, rather than filled with elemental damage stuff or spending skill points on rabies/fireclaws. The bonuses on the other IK items can be quite nice too. I still have over 4000 life even with over 250%MF before weapon-switch. A Hel can drop the Requirement to ~180 as you only need to use 1socket for IAS to hit 5frames. But I'm guessing Rabies druids using synergy bugs have less issues with PIs so other weapons are favored. Ribcracker and Tombreaver are also great weapons. A good 4frame Tombreaver is the only weapon I might consider switching to now.
You cannot use Passion's Beserk in Werewolf form and it's not worth it to unshift to do so.