I'd like to point out cloth hats from the JP vendors also share that model. But even so, it's cloth and you technically shouldn't wear it (that 5% int from leather spec's pretty big).
I'd like to point out cloth hats from the JP vendors also share that model. But even so, it's cloth and you technically shouldn't wear it (that 5% int from leather spec's pretty big).
Yeah, I know, but it's still badass. Right now, it's better than anything else I have - still leveling. I'll be sad when I have to replace it.
So what's the fastest leveling strat with a druid now?
I feel feral and balance are fairly equal with pros and cons. I found moonkin very useful when it came to handling multiple Cata mobs, but roots breaks easily now, so you can't dot and root.
Feral, however, has the advantage of quick groups for dungeons.
Anyone else noticing a big gap between resto longevity and say, holy paladins? Took a few stabs at Magmaw/Omnitron dudes today and I felt like I just wasn't lasting as long as I needed to in fights, even using an ultra-conservative playstyle.
I have mostly 346 gear at this point, with 6k spellpower/3k regen and a 91k mana pool, so I was one of the more geared healers in the raid. I also dropped pretty much everything out of my healing rotation apart from LB and Nourish - I would roll a single RJ on tanks only when they were below 60%, and I would cast a single SM + WG combo on the 'holy shit pop sac massive AoE damage' phases. Other than that I hardly touched raid healing unless I had a clearcast proc up and the tanks were fine, even to the point of letting dps sit at 5% rather than cast an expensive clutch heal. I also used Innervate on cooldown, starting at 75% mana.
Still ended up feeling like the limiting factor on our attempts, going completely out of mana when the paladin was still around 30-40k (and he was raid-healing). And from the looks of how the Omnitron fight was going, we were only 50-60% through.
I mean, it's one thing to simply stop spamming RJ and adapt to a new playstyle. But I'm feeling a bit gimpy, like there's no possible playstyle available that would result in success.
I'll be moving the Nature's Bounty Talent points into Nature's Ward and Perseverance. I just don't have the mana to cast Regrowth and even critting it's less healing than HT so that's what I spend my OoCs on. If the tank's getting hurt, Rejuv+Swiftmend does more for less.
I might go back if I get better, but as a new healer (all of 5 days /played on this character, haha) focusing on my surroundings as well as those hp bars is sometimes more than I can handle.
My napkin math shows Furor's better than Moonglow for mana, I like Nature's Grace now that it works with Regrowth, and I don't think Blessing of the Grove is worth it.
Arkkas, I dunno how updated your character is, but the armory says you're missing a lot of enchants. I also am not sure if it shows reforging or not. The only thing you can really do talent-wise is get rid of, say, Efflor and use the points to fill out Furor and grab 2/3 Genesis if you aren't raid healing. Though being FORCED into such a narrow spec seems wrong.
I really need updated armory pages for the paladin and yourself before making any judgements. Healing feels fine in five-mans, so I can't judge for myself. Spirit is similar to hit for healers, and Blizzard wants us to stack it until we hit a kind of pseudo cap where we don't feel like we're ooming too quickly.
Only other thing I can recommend is replacing the current meta with the +2% max mana one.
I think Nature's Swiftness needs a 2m cooldown and also make the spell free. Kinda lackluster right now.
One thing I do want to mention is that some druids pop tree at the start of the fight and spread lifeblooms. Then they just do what they can to keep those lifeblooms refreshed even after Tree fades. This basically nets you way more OoC procs. I don't think that's our intended style of play, but try it out.
81: Some shit for bear. (I'm feral but not a tank>)
83: As a worgen Druid, I already have Darkflight, 30% with Cat form, Travel Form, and Kitty Sprint. WHY do I need another useless movement speed cooldown? 40% for 10 seconds at that... come on Blizzard.
85: Can't be used while in stealth? Not sure that is very valuable anymore...
What the hell Blizzard. I get that we are already packed with utility and that we don't need to be made OP, so if were going to have useless 80+ skills, it should be FUN useless 80+ skills at least lol.
Now, to counter that: I have been re-leveling my druid and they have made it an absolute wonderful experience. The revamp of skills/talents has really opened this class up as far as leveling goes. Very well done. I like leveling characters more now than ever before, and my alt-disease will be worse than ever.
Rorus -
You made the same mistake with talent changes as I did last night, forgetting you need 30 points in resto in order to unlock Tree of Life. I spent 66g thinking I'd had a brilliant idea to drop NS for 3/3 Furor. :<
As is, the only points you can swap for Furor are balance points, namely Moonglow, and EJ math says Furor is only better than Moonglow if you have absolutely no spirit.
Thanks for the suggestions though. Gear-wise, I know some of my stuff isn't ideal, both due to lack of availability (apparently Purified gems are a bitch to discover?) and due to me limiting my own spending (no blue gems in blue gear, no enchants on 333s, etc). I do intend to throw Heartsong on my staff tonight though.
Here's our main pally. He was also kicking our disc priest's ass. Then, towards the end of the night, we had another paladin swap to holy so we could 4-heal and he was doing fine on mana as well. Meanwhile the disc priest and myself were trying to see if we could take shifts in the mana regen puddle, or find time to chug Potions of Concentration. I was even about to suggest having shifts for standing out and regenning, a la Classic WoW.
Either Blizzard has some more end-game balancing to do, or maybe healers really do feel the heat far earlier than anyone else if the group itself isn't capable of downing something. (Side note, I have heard 10-man Blackwing Descent is very over-tuned?)
Anyway,
HallowedFaith -
You think the 83 talent is bad, look at the range on it. You have to be standing directly on top of someone for them to get the buff, and I've had times while running with someone that they still missed it due to server lag or whatever. Add in the fact that it got nerfed to 40% which is hardly even noticeable.
Thrash also hits as hard as Swipe, which was disappointing (cause Swipe was feeling so weak for aggro at 80), though I'll admit I haven't touched AoE tanking lately.
I really liked Thrash for AoE threat while I was levelling as a bear tank. The rest of the abilities are terrible though, I agree.
Anyone experimented with HoT only healing? I saw a post on the official forums where this experienced druid posted screens of her casting Nourish less than 10 times in a whole dungeon, most of her healing coming from Lifebloom.
My 3 stack blooms for 21k, which is great for 3900 mana (HT: 16k for 5600). Rejuv and Swiftmend keep the tank from falling too low, and OoC procs on Regrowth get you Nature's Grace... seems interesting.
The roar only lasts for SIX seconds, not ten. And mushrooms are a mess. Their radius is three yards and the explosion animation is weirdly delayed, happening after damage went off.
I would also like to see Efflor changed so that resto druids can use mushrooms as AoE healing. Forcing us to use one cooldown for two functions (single target or AoE?) sucks.
My napkin math shows Furor's better than Moonglow for mana, I like Nature's Grace now that it works with Regrowth, and I don't think Blessing of the Grove is worth it.
Furor is only better in a scenario where you have no mana regen. The extra mana savings from Moonglow far outweighs the extra 5% to your total pool.
Yeah I think Blizzard dropped the ball with Druid skills because.. well.. to be honest I think it's because we are so damned awesome.
The talent tree changeover makes it much much easier to just up and tank with any amount of decent feral gear, especially since now everything comes with +12031091 STA!!!
We DO have instant flight form and stealth everywhere we go now, which is an advantage that no class can hold a candle to. Even healers and crit-chickens can take advantage of that.
I think all-in-all that Blizzard should retake at the new skills for Druid because I did my 5 levels and I don't feel like I gained anything from it at all. I'm ready to make myself more powerful for sure, (stat wise) but aside from that I am just kinda... bored with it. Where is my new shit? lol.
The thing is the new talents could have been awesome.
The dash was originally 70%, which would have been significant (if you actually managed to cast it on someone). The mushrooms were supposed to bring all sorts of strategy to bear tanking. Instead they just suck and are hardly worth hotkeying, due to how situational they are.
If they hadn't promised us anything good, it wouldn't be this disappointing, but we got our hopes up for something much better and all we got was poop.
PS: Glyphed aquatic form is faster than a mount in Vashj'ir. Yes, druids are totally awesome.
We need a new hot. A very weak one that is basically lifebloom without the stack nor explosion.
The core problem is that we are penalized, not rewarded, for healing a hotless target. Nourish needs a hot to match our peers. Now, think of a hot we can use.
Lifebloom? On the tank.
Rejuv? Almost as expensive as Healing Touch.
Regrowth? Again, very expensive.
Wild Growth? Has a cooldown and is AoE healing.
It's counterproductive: to make our efficient heal well, efficient, we have to use expensive hots. Otherwise Nourish is the worst mid-heal in the game.
So we need a cheap and weak hot to supplement Nourish. OR they can make Nourish on par with other heals and makes the 20% gravy. Maybe nerf to +10%.
I haven't had any problems with five-man content, so I wouldn't worry about it. The game is clearly still in some weird beta build, so I'm expecting a patch at least ANNOUNCED before January.
My problem was not being able to last as long I need to be able to on raid-healing intensive fights.
We're doing 10-man Bastion of Twilight tonight (and apparently we have the worst drake combo?) but I'm having a much much better time doing Rorus's strat, where you pop tree right off the bat and do absolutely nothing all fight except either Nourish or HT to refresh LB on 2 tanks.
It cripples my mobility, gives me hardly any free globals (which I'm mostly stuck using to heal myself), and is very boring and paladin-ish, but I'm cranking out a shitton of healing while keeping my mana pool much higher, soooo...
That is shitty and shouldn't be intended. I will seriously quit Resto if it is.
Agreed. I've only healed on the arena quests in Twilight Highlands and I did not like what I saw. Those fights aren't hard, but if I'm going oom when the only thing I'm doing is keeping lifebloom up on the tank and topping up the DPS when needed then something has gone terribly wrong.
I grabbed Nature's Ward over Furor. Might be a mistake, but rejuv still does solid healing. Getting a free one lets worry less about myself and sets up nicely for nourishes.
I'm enjoying healing a lot more now. I rolled post-Shattering so I don't have anything to relearn, I just go with what works for me.
Mana isn't a problem in heroics if you've got the gear (ignoring the feral stuff in your bag for tank/questing). At 328 equipped ilevel I've got 87k mana/5.2k sp self buffed with 2/3/36. Blue spellthread and gems on 346 pieces and rep librams, otherwise green gems and no enchants.
If you're raid healing it's a waste keeping Lifebloom on the tank - it's by far the most efficient heal we've got. Put it on whoever's lowest and actually let it bloom, Wild Growth + Nourish for everyone else, Rejuv + Swiftmend for dire moments/clusters.
Couple with tree and enough haste and you've got a really mobile setup; 32k heal for 3900 mana (before Mastery and crits).
Downside: Ember Shadowspirit Diamonds are going for 1600g on my realm, so not getting that for a good while.
Full bear needs Infected Wounds, Thick Hide and Natural Reaction plus Perseverance in Resto, and likes Fury Swipes and Brutal Impact. This probably means dropping King of the Jungle and/or Blood in the Water from your spec, which'll hurt your soloing efficiency a little. Your raid dps will be 90-95% even with that, so no great loss.
Most cat stats are good for bears, save haste. Prioritise Mastery, expertise, crit and hit in that order. If you're going full tank reforge haste and hit into dodge and gem stamina, agility and mastery, with the 2% armour meta and dodge librams.
Mangle whenever it's up, Lacerate to three stacks, Pulverize at three, Maul at 50+ rage for single target threat. For AoE threat Thrash whenever it's up, tab-Mangle, Swipe. Swipe isn't great so be prepared to Growl.
I've got 120k hp, 15 Mastery, 30.5k armour (54% dmg reduction) and 30% dodge at ilvl 330, compared to a full heroic warrior mate who's at 150k hp, 35.6k armour (57.7% reduction) and around 30% avoidance. Healers might whine (I'd definitely grumble to myself :P) but that should be fine.
Second edit: accessories (neck, rings, back, trinket) with str and dodge/expertise are okay if they're a higher ilevel than what you've already got, but you really want agi there.
No macros, and it's not in my spellbook anyway. I have Moonfire on the bar and it turns into Sunfire.
Actually technically it is a macro since I'm using Macaroon and it makes every button a macro. Don't tell me they screwed up Sunfire like they did Stampede.
It wouldn't surprise me if it's a macro thing since Cataclysm fucked up a lot of stuff in that regard. I keep bitching about Dark Simulacrum not working in macros as well.
I have healed my first heroic. Halls of Origination isn't that tough, but I have learned a bit.
1) Misread Nature's Ward: it only triggers if hit WHILE at or below 50%. Simply put, that does not happen often enough to be useful. Too dangerous to linger at a lot percent like that.
2)I like using my omen procs on Regrowth and then Swiftmending. It's a lot of healing for just 1000 mana, though I wouldn't recommend it without Efflorescence. Healing Touch is less, but only by a bit. And it's free.
3) I think Blizzard is actually smart enough to make it so being hit capped via spirit is roughly the same for regen. I need to do more challenging content before making that my final judgement, but my mana has been much better.
4) Regrowth is still a terrible glyph. I'd like it if they changed it so Regrowth was cheaper, healed for less and lasted longer. I want a cheap HoT, damn it.
I have healed my first heroic. Halls of Origination isn't that tough, but I have learned a bit.
1) Misread Nature's Ward: it only triggers if hit WHILE at or below 50%. Simply put, that does not happen often enough to be useful. Too dangerous to linger at a lot percent like that.
2)I like using my omen procs on Regrowth and then Swiftmending. It's a lot of healing for just 1000 mana, though I wouldn't recommend it without Efflorescence. Healing Touch is less, but only by a bit. And it's free.
3) I think Blizzard is actually smart enough to make it so being hit capped via spirit is roughly the same for regen. I need to do more challenging content before making that my final judgement, but my mana has been much better.
4) Regrowth is still a terrible glyph. I'd like it if they changed it so Regrowth was cheaper, healed for less and lasted longer. I want a cheap HoT, damn it.
Yes, it would be nice to have something to take advantage of our Mastery bonus a little more easily.
Posts
Also, the Helm of Temperance - the one that you get from Earthen Ring - is the coolest hat in the game.
It even looks good on my tauren. For the first time ever, my druid has her helm turned on.
Yeah, I know, but it's still badass. Right now, it's better than anything else I have - still leveling. I'll be sad when I have to replace it.
Feral, however, has the advantage of quick groups for dungeons.
I have mostly 346 gear at this point, with 6k spellpower/3k regen and a 91k mana pool, so I was one of the more geared healers in the raid. I also dropped pretty much everything out of my healing rotation apart from LB and Nourish - I would roll a single RJ on tanks only when they were below 60%, and I would cast a single SM + WG combo on the 'holy shit pop sac massive AoE damage' phases. Other than that I hardly touched raid healing unless I had a clearcast proc up and the tanks were fine, even to the point of letting dps sit at 5% rather than cast an expensive clutch heal. I also used Innervate on cooldown, starting at 75% mana.
Still ended up feeling like the limiting factor on our attempts, going completely out of mana when the paladin was still around 30-40k (and he was raid-healing). And from the looks of how the Omnitron fight was going, we were only 50-60% through.
I mean, it's one thing to simply stop spamming RJ and adapt to a new playstyle. But I'm feeling a bit gimpy, like there's no possible playstyle available that would result in success.
I'm specced http://www.wowhead.com/talent#00bZcZrfzIdcruouo:oVcobVc with 81k mana, so need to gear up a little.
I'll be moving the Nature's Bounty Talent points into Nature's Ward and Perseverance. I just don't have the mana to cast Regrowth and even critting it's less healing than HT so that's what I spend my OoCs on. If the tank's getting hurt, Rejuv+Swiftmend does more for less.
I might go back if I get better, but as a new healer (all of 5 days /played on this character, haha) focusing on my surroundings as well as those hp bars is sometimes more than I can handle.
My napkin math shows Furor's better than Moonglow for mana, I like Nature's Grace now that it works with Regrowth, and I don't think Blessing of the Grove is worth it.
I really need updated armory pages for the paladin and yourself before making any judgements. Healing feels fine in five-mans, so I can't judge for myself. Spirit is similar to hit for healers, and Blizzard wants us to stack it until we hit a kind of pseudo cap where we don't feel like we're ooming too quickly.
Only other thing I can recommend is replacing the current meta with the +2% max mana one.
I think Nature's Swiftness needs a 2m cooldown and also make the spell free. Kinda lackluster right now.
80+ skills for druid suck.
81: Some shit for bear. (I'm feral but not a tank>)
83: As a worgen Druid, I already have Darkflight, 30% with Cat form, Travel Form, and Kitty Sprint. WHY do I need another useless movement speed cooldown? 40% for 10 seconds at that... come on Blizzard.
85: Can't be used while in stealth? Not sure that is very valuable anymore...
What the hell Blizzard. I get that we are already packed with utility and that we don't need to be made OP, so if were going to have useless 80+ skills, it should be FUN useless 80+ skills at least lol.
Now, to counter that: I have been re-leveling my druid and they have made it an absolute wonderful experience. The revamp of skills/talents has really opened this class up as far as leveling goes. Very well done. I like leveling characters more now than ever before, and my alt-disease will be worse than ever.
You made the same mistake with talent changes as I did last night, forgetting you need 30 points in resto in order to unlock Tree of Life. I spent 66g thinking I'd had a brilliant idea to drop NS for 3/3 Furor. :<
As is, the only points you can swap for Furor are balance points, namely Moonglow, and EJ math says Furor is only better than Moonglow if you have absolutely no spirit.
Thanks for the suggestions though. Gear-wise, I know some of my stuff isn't ideal, both due to lack of availability (apparently Purified gems are a bitch to discover?) and due to me limiting my own spending (no blue gems in blue gear, no enchants on 333s, etc). I do intend to throw Heartsong on my staff tonight though.
Here's our main pally. He was also kicking our disc priest's ass. Then, towards the end of the night, we had another paladin swap to holy so we could 4-heal and he was doing fine on mana as well. Meanwhile the disc priest and myself were trying to see if we could take shifts in the mana regen puddle, or find time to chug Potions of Concentration. I was even about to suggest having shifts for standing out and regenning, a la Classic WoW.
Either Blizzard has some more end-game balancing to do, or maybe healers really do feel the heat far earlier than anyone else if the group itself isn't capable of downing something. (Side note, I have heard 10-man Blackwing Descent is very over-tuned?)
Anyway,
HallowedFaith -
You think the 83 talent is bad, look at the range on it. You have to be standing directly on top of someone for them to get the buff, and I've had times while running with someone that they still missed it due to server lag or whatever. Add in the fact that it got nerfed to 40% which is hardly even noticeable.
Thrash also hits as hard as Swipe, which was disappointing (cause Swipe was feeling so weak for aggro at 80), though I'll admit I haven't touched AoE tanking lately.
And yeah, totally situational mushrooms.
Anyone experimented with HoT only healing? I saw a post on the official forums where this experienced druid posted screens of her casting Nourish less than 10 times in a whole dungeon, most of her healing coming from Lifebloom.
My 3 stack blooms for 21k, which is great for 3900 mana (HT: 16k for 5600). Rejuv and Swiftmend keep the tank from falling too low, and OoC procs on Regrowth get you Nature's Grace... seems interesting.
I would also like to see Efflor changed so that resto druids can use mushrooms as AoE healing. Forcing us to use one cooldown for two functions (single target or AoE?) sucks.
Furor is only better in a scenario where you have no mana regen. The extra mana savings from Moonglow far outweighs the extra 5% to your total pool.
The talent tree changeover makes it much much easier to just up and tank with any amount of decent feral gear, especially since now everything comes with +12031091 STA!!!
We DO have instant flight form and stealth everywhere we go now, which is an advantage that no class can hold a candle to. Even healers and crit-chickens can take advantage of that.
I think all-in-all that Blizzard should retake at the new skills for Druid because I did my 5 levels and I don't feel like I gained anything from it at all. I'm ready to make myself more powerful for sure, (stat wise) but aside from that I am just kinda... bored with it. Where is my new shit? lol.
The dash was originally 70%, which would have been significant (if you actually managed to cast it on someone). The mushrooms were supposed to bring all sorts of strategy to bear tanking. Instead they just suck and are hardly worth hotkeying, due to how situational they are.
If they hadn't promised us anything good, it wouldn't be this disappointing, but we got our hopes up for something much better and all we got was poop.
PS: Glyphed aquatic form is faster than a mount in Vashj'ir. Yes, druids are totally awesome.
I expect these skills to change though, it's just a matter of time.
The core problem is that we are penalized, not rewarded, for healing a hotless target. Nourish needs a hot to match our peers. Now, think of a hot we can use.
Lifebloom? On the tank.
Rejuv? Almost as expensive as Healing Touch.
Regrowth? Again, very expensive.
Wild Growth? Has a cooldown and is AoE healing.
It's counterproductive: to make our efficient heal well, efficient, we have to use expensive hots. Otherwise Nourish is the worst mid-heal in the game.
So we need a cheap and weak hot to supplement Nourish. OR they can make Nourish on par with other heals and makes the 20% gravy. Maybe nerf to +10%.
That and now that I think about it the 80-85 spells are pretty lackluster.
My problem was not being able to last as long I need to be able to on raid-healing intensive fights.
We're doing 10-man Bastion of Twilight tonight (and apparently we have the worst drake combo?) but I'm having a much much better time doing Rorus's strat, where you pop tree right off the bat and do absolutely nothing all fight except either Nourish or HT to refresh LB on 2 tanks.
It cripples my mobility, gives me hardly any free globals (which I'm mostly stuck using to heal myself), and is very boring and paladin-ish, but I'm cranking out a shitton of healing while keeping my mana pool much higher, soooo...
Hey guys, we're paladins now!
Agreed. I've only healed on the arena quests in Twilight Highlands and I did not like what I saw. Those fights aren't hard, but if I'm going oom when the only thing I'm doing is keeping lifebloom up on the tank and topping up the DPS when needed then something has gone terribly wrong.
Mana isn't a problem in heroics if you've got the gear (ignoring the feral stuff in your bag for tank/questing). At 328 equipped ilevel I've got 87k mana/5.2k sp self buffed with 2/3/36. Blue spellthread and gems on 346 pieces and rep librams, otherwise green gems and no enchants.
If you're raid healing it's a waste keeping Lifebloom on the tank - it's by far the most efficient heal we've got. Put it on whoever's lowest and actually let it bloom, Wild Growth + Nourish for everyone else, Rejuv + Swiftmend for dire moments/clusters.
Couple with tree and enough haste and you've got a really mobile setup; 32k heal for 3900 mana (before Mastery and crits).
Downside: Ember Shadowspirit Diamonds are going for 1600g on my realm, so not getting that for a good while.
I am already leveling Feral, any suggestions?
Most cat stats are good for bears, save haste. Prioritise Mastery, expertise, crit and hit in that order. If you're going full tank reforge haste and hit into dodge and gem stamina, agility and mastery, with the 2% armour meta and dodge librams.
Mangle whenever it's up, Lacerate to three stacks, Pulverize at three, Maul at 50+ rage for single target threat. For AoE threat Thrash whenever it's up, tab-Mangle, Swipe. Swipe isn't great so be prepared to Growl.
I've got 120k hp, 15 Mastery, 30.5k armour (54% dmg reduction) and 30% dodge at ilvl 330, compared to a full heroic warrior mate who's at 150k hp, 35.6k armour (57.7% reduction) and around 30% avoidance. Healers might whine (I'd definitely grumble to myself :P) but that should be fine.
Second edit: accessories (neck, rings, back, trinket) with str and dodge/expertise are okay if they're a higher ilevel than what you've already got, but you really want agi there.
When I try to cast Sunfire it says the spell is not trained yet it most certainly is. Anyone else had this problem?
Ayliana Moonwhisper Ecksus Cerazal
Actually technically it is a macro since I'm using Macaroon and it makes every button a macro. Don't tell me they screwed up Sunfire like they did Stampede.
Ayliana Moonwhisper Ecksus Cerazal
Getting sidelined* because the fight has AoE sucks.
*By which I mean go Balance, which really isn't that bad.
Thank you, Blizzard. My faith wasn't misplaced!
1) Misread Nature's Ward: it only triggers if hit WHILE at or below 50%. Simply put, that does not happen often enough to be useful. Too dangerous to linger at a lot percent like that.
2)I like using my omen procs on Regrowth and then Swiftmending. It's a lot of healing for just 1000 mana, though I wouldn't recommend it without Efflorescence. Healing Touch is less, but only by a bit. And it's free.
3) I think Blizzard is actually smart enough to make it so being hit capped via spirit is roughly the same for regen. I need to do more challenging content before making that my final judgement, but my mana has been much better.
4) Regrowth is still a terrible glyph. I'd like it if they changed it so Regrowth was cheaper, healed for less and lasted longer. I want a cheap HoT, damn it.
Yes, it would be nice to have something to take advantage of our Mastery bonus a little more easily.