Resto Healing in WoD

[Pandacho 286]

I'm just a bit worried about what u said: Im using very few HR and CH....I would like to know if you use HR on CD and how many CH? Because its a lot mana expensive imo.

 

I use Healing Rain:

1) on The Butcher on melee camp on CD

2) on Brackenspore when raid is stacked on mushroom

3) on Twin Orgon when raid is stacked before Quake and on Enfeebling Roar

4) on Ko'ragh on Range camp when we are stacked together and move from Suppression Field. It's a bit tricky here because of timings: you have to watch DBM tracking bar for the next cast to avoid casting HR right before your camp have to move.

5) On Imperator on Range camp. Here you have to watch DBM tracking bar for the next cast of Destructive Resonance to avoid casting HR right before your camp have to move.

 

Chain Heal.

Well, it's a bit complicated to explain because I just see when to use it :) With a bit of simplification, it's something like this: when I have 2-4 Riptided targets and they are between 70-85% HP, I will cast CH. I will cast direct heal on target with 50-65% HP or if I don't have 3+ targets for CH. But it's really a simplification.

If you are afraid of spamming, use Glyph of Chaining. It will put your CH on 3 sec CD.

[Pandaids 2]

My heals currently suck at Imperator lol any advices ?

[Pandacho 286]

My heals currently suck at Imperator lol any advices ?

Any logs, any details?

[Pandaids 2]

I'll provide logs as soon as possible.

 

Details? Hmmm...I was keeping HR on cd during ranged movement, riptide on 2 or 3 people, and UL with lots of healing wave

 

Not enough CH I admit, but the 3min CD's were used at least twice each one...

[Regal 21]

My heals currently suck at Imperator lol any advices ?

So, as I mentioned before, I had that same problem.

I wouldn't say I top the charts now, but I have found some tricks to avoid the bottom and be more useful.

This is a fight where I'd say use High Tide. After trying both out several times, the only time you'll really need to heal is in burst situations, so a CBT can be much harder to time. 

Spot healing with riptides and a couple HW not only helps you save mana, but sets you up for that nice 6 target CH after a force nova or during the add spawn.

It's during the 3rd and 4th phases that you'll really shine in healing. 

I've heard that it's recommended for healers to go into this part of the fight with around 60% mana, but I'd suggest aiming for 80% on a shaman because you'll really help out the raid if you can keep healing through these phases which have a lot more damage. 

Also, keep a close eye on DBM or whatever mod you use so you know when you're going to have to move.

I didn't realize how much healing I was actually losing by not healing when I move.

I use UL on cooldown for the movement speed buff and it's a decent enough spot heal just to keep someone alive for that extra second before you get off a big heal.

Use the Spiritwalker's Grace Glyph to reduce the cooldown of it. Yes the duration is lessened but you don't need 15 seconds. The fight is pretty much a stand, move, stand, move sequence. So there's plenty of time to cast, but since you have to react and move immediately, you don't want to waste that cast! 

You can activate Spiritwalker's Grace DURING another cast so it won't cancel when you move.

Also, make sure you don't have Riptide glyphed for this fight. The instant initial healing is much needed and helps keep your numbers up.

 

I hope that helps, but if that's not your problem (or anyone else who may see this later) then please post some logs and I'm sure we can all review them and help you out :)

[Regal 21]

BTW. If you're reading this and HAVEN'T looked up the set bonuses for Blackrock Gear, you need to do that.

Because it basically is telling us, take High Tide and spam Chain Heal.

I mean, I'm sure CBT will still be a great choice, and I'm not saying it'll be worse than HT.

However, it is clear that we're going to be casting Chain Heal much more frequently. 

The way the talents look, CBT favors healers using HW and HR where High TIde is favoring those who use Chain Heal

[Pandaids 2]

Spamming CH is the best thing og being a Resto Shaman lol Im happy thats comming back

[Boreall 2]

https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports/QJd48cAvy2htKr7T

 

I'm not sure if these logs will help anybody but this is from a particularly successful raid for me. The only fight I didn't do well on was Normal Tectus (facepull, instinct kicked in and I ran out but they killed it anyway)

 

Other than that I was 90%+ Percentile every fight with many ranking legendary. I hope it could help anybody knowing what abilities I use when.

 

Live long and prosper fellow Restos <3

 

EDIT: https://www.warcraftlogs.com/rankings/report/8NVd2TPtQrb3DBYW#boss=1721

 

Here is Heroic Imp and Mythic Karg. Still did well though not as well.

Edited January 4, 2015 by Boreall

[Vomitory 0]

We had a big thread here recently with the math that Stoove did. Shortly, he explained that crit is almost useless in WoD due to changed mechanic.

Post #16 in this thread. 

Or I can copy it here:

 

Stoove, on 29 Oct 2014 - 9:13 PM, said:

I said that it was the "main feature" because of the changes that we've seen to Crit recently. Before, the main attraction of Crit for Resto Shaman was the Ancestral Awakening which procced from Crits; it made a serious contribution to our ability to splash/AoE heal. We've lost AA, and as a result Crit's previous attraction has taken a dive. Now in terms of throughput, Crit is genuinely inferior to Haste and Mastery; the remaining advantage over them being that Resurgence gives us mana return. Since we don't need mana return, and the other two stats are just generally better in terms of throughput, I don't see a good motivation to take Crit any more.

 

I realize I'm a tad late on this, but... what. Why would we not need mana return? Spirit is not even close to enough MP5 and probably wouldn't be in full MWF gear either. I haven't dug deep but its vague trying to find haste caps for totems so I can see stacking haste as a good idea, but I literally laughed out loud when I read that.

 

On another note though, does anyone know if mastery has an unspoken "I'm not going to scale anymore" cap like it seemed to in SoO's tier? After 54%~ it was almost wasteful, but potent heals could mean mana conservation if done properly in most situations. But that makes me feel like haste would be the better option for more Healing Stream ticks/Healing Rain ticks (and if you use High Tide, faster Chain Heal casts).

Edited January 7, 2015 by Vomitory

[Vomitory 0]

Echo of the Elements has a proc rate of 6% according to our old pal Ghostcrawler (skimmed through comments on WoWhead), unsure if this is still WoD compliant but I thought I'd post this anyway in case someone has more up-to-date information. Spent almost 10 minutes casting on myself and random players in Warspear trying to get it to proc and not once did it. Personally I will not be switching from Ancestral Swiftness, but that's just me.

[Pandacho 286]

Echo of the Elements has a proc rate of 6% according to our old pal Ghostcrawler (skimmed through comments on WoWhead), unsure if this is still WoD compliant but I thought I'd post this anyway in case someone has more up-to-date information. Spent almost 10 minutes casting on myself and random players in Warspear trying to get it to proc and not once did it. Personally I will not be switching from Ancestral Swiftness, but that's just me.

 

It procs in fight and not even near 6% :)

Logs from yesterday Ko'ragh HC kill - uptime of EotE - 88.6% - 46 procs for 9 min. fight:

https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports/cNR9Dm3HyJd74bFL#type=auras&source=13&ability=159105

[Pandacho 286]

 Spirit is not even close to enough MP5 and probably wouldn't be in full MWF gear either. 

 

Sorry, but I would argue with this statement. I went from 647 to 660 ilvl in last couple of weeks and yesterday I had to re-enchant my weapon from Spirit to Mastery in the middle of HC Highmaul run. Today I'm going to switch my cloak from Spirit+Multi to Mastery+Multi.

I still have to use EB talent to not OOM in the last 30 sec. of the fights ( I checked the HC fights without EB talent and was OOM on the Butcher (HC), Ko'ragh (HC) and Imperator (N) in the last 20-30 sec). With EB and without Spirit wep enchant I don't experience any mana problems in N and HC Highmaul.

So I wouldn't say that we have to stack Crit for mana return because Spirit mana return isn't enough.

[Pandaids 2]

Guys, wheres Mythic guides ?? I started last night and having lots of issues during Twin Orgon fight.

 

What would you guys suggest for talents ?

[Starrfyre 7]

For Mythic Twin Ogron I've gone for AS, RS, EB and HT. Glyph of Riptide works quite well on this fight too, especially with the amount of movement. I would also suggest glyphing SWG so you have it on a 1 min CD - works wonders

 

But its about what works for you so try everything :D

Edited January 7, 2015 by Starrfyre

[Pandaids 2]

Dang !!!! last one on recount....13% and priests druid and paladins, 18-20-21%.....come on !!! Serious ??? I suck that much ??

[chiznitz 4]

Dang !!!! last one on recount....13% and priests druid and paladins, 18-20-21%.....come on !!! Serious ??? I suck that much ??

 

I've been down this road.  You aren't going to touch them in HPS unless you have the mana to overheal for no reason at all.  Our mastery is what saves lives and raid leaders will need to understand that we do not shine until someone needs a life saving heal that crits and fills their bar back up.

 

It sucks, I'm less geared than our other healers so it makes it even worse.  As long as you feel like you are playing well and saving lives/downing bosses the meters do not mean much. 

[Pandaids 2]

Sad...some trys I was more than 10% behind the others...result: replaced after 1 hour of raid =(

 

Totally thinking about reroll Monk healer

[Pandacho 286]

Pandaids, can you please make a new thread with your armory and logs, if you still need specific help?

 

Sorry to interfere here in this way, but I personally wrote to you two 3-4 pages PMs with parsing your logs and tips and answered you in this thread at least 3 times with specific advices. Was it any help?

 

 

I makes me feel uncomfortable seeing this great thread turns into another sad discussion about how shamans are sucks and other healers op.

[Karanir 15]

I realize I'm a tad late on this, but... what. Why would we not need mana return? Spirit is not even close to enough MP5 and probably wouldn't be in full MWF gear either. I haven't dug deep but its vague trying to find haste caps for totems so I can see stacking haste as a good idea, but I literally laughed out loud when I read that.

 

On another note though, does anyone know if mastery has an unspoken "I'm not going to scale anymore" cap like it seemed to in SoO's tier? After 54%~ it was almost wasteful, but potent heals could mean mana conservation if done properly in most situations. But that makes me feel like haste would be the better option for more Healing Stream ticks/Healing Rain ticks (and if you use High Tide, faster Chain Heal casts).

 

I would like to address this. 

 

WoD has changed the healing dynamics compared to previous expansions. Firstly, Spirit from gear makes up a much lesser proportion of our mana returns compared to previous expansions. If you want a more indepth discussion on this, you can refer to Hamlet's absolutely fantastic post on this:

 

http://iam.yellingontheinternet.com/2014/12/22/healing-theory-warlords-spirit-update/

 

Secondly, stacking spirit is not going to massively increase your mana regen. What will massively increase your mana regen is: 

 

• Using the right spell for the right situation. Example: Not spamming Healing surge or Chain Heal if it's not needed. 
• Coordinating with other healers to use healing throughput cooldowns so that you can stop healing and regen mana. This is needed for long fights like imperator 
• Understanding the strengths of the healers you have and synergising with them. For example, I have a resto druid and disc priest in my raid. If I see that rejuv is ticking on someone already, and there is no incoming widespread damage (which is more common now), I'll just let the rejuv top the guy off instead of putting a direct heal on him. If I see that my disc priest has already shielded a person, I know that I don't have to emergency heal. For me, I see my role as going all out when people are low and burst heal them, then after that I'll hold back a bit and let the hots/passive healing do their part. 
• Choosing the right talents. For example, Elemental Blast and Conductivity will help out in mana. 
• Using mana potions and getting the raid to use healing tonics. Just FYI, if everyone in the raid uses 1 healing tonic, it does comparable healing to a Healing Tide Totem. Healing tonic heals for 68K per person. 

[Karanir 15]

Sad...some trys I was more than 10% behind the others...result: replaced after 1 hour of raid =(

 

Totally thinking about reroll Monk healer

 

Pandaids, 

 

I've read your posts. The points that I would like to share are: 

• Post logs and armory in a separate thread. We are here to help. 
• Healing throughput isn't a good indicator of the skill or contribution of a healer. There are many other complex factors involved. 
• You have to understand that there is such a thing as healing noise. Some healers like druids look good on meters because their rejuvenation brings people from 80% to 100%. But I always point out to my raid leader that I am the one that burst them up from 20% to 60% and that it was I that saved their lives. I am the surgeon that saved their lives, the other healers are nurses that do basic medical treatment to bring them back to full health. I make the difference when it matters most. 
• In my opinion, shammies require a bit more skill to play compared to classes like druids or disc priests. There are more things to monitor (3 riptides, healing stream up all the time, positional requirements, preparation for chain heal through unleash life and skillful riptide usage, etc). But I do enjoy the more complex and interesting playstyle. 

[Regal 21]

 

Pandaids, 

 

I've read your posts. The points that I would like to share are: 

• Post logs and armory in a separate thread. We are here to help. 
• Healing throughput isn't a good indicator of the skill or contribution of a healer. There are many other complex factors involved. 
• You have to understand that there is such a thing as healing noise. Some healers like druids look good on meters because their rejuvenation brings people from 80% to 100%. But I always point out to my raid leader that I am the one that burst them up from 20% to 60% and that it was I that saved their lives. I am the surgeon that saved their lives, the other healers are nurses that do basic medical treatment to bring them back to full health. I make the difference when it matters most. 
• In my opinion, shammies require a bit more skill to play compared to classes like druids or disc priests. There are more things to monitor (3 riptides, healing stream up all the time, positional requirements, preparation for chain heal through unleash life and skillful riptide usage, etc). But I do enjoy the more complex and interesting playstyle. 

 

 

 

 

I would like to address this. 

 

WoD has changed the healing dynamics compared to previous expansions. Firstly, Spirit from gear makes up a much lesser proportion of our mana returns compared to previous expansions. If you want a more indepth discussion on this, you can refer to Hamlet's absolutely fantastic post on this:

 

http://iam.yellingontheinternet.com/2014/12/22/healing-theory-warlords-spirit-update/

 

Secondly, stacking spirit is not going to massively increase your mana regen. What will massively increase your mana regen is: 

 

• Using the right spell for the right situation. Example: Not spamming Healing surge or Chain Heal if it's not needed. 
• Coordinating with other healers to use healing throughput cooldowns so that you can stop healing and regen mana. This is needed for long fights like imperator 
• Understanding the strengths of the healers you have and synergising with them. For example, I have a resto druid and disc priest in my raid. If I see that rejuv is ticking on someone already, and there is no incoming widespread damage (which is more common now), I'll just let the rejuv top the guy off instead of putting a direct heal on him. If I see that my disc priest has already shielded a person, I know that I don't have to emergency heal. For me, I see my role as going all out when people are low and burst heal them, then after that I'll hold back a bit and let the hots/passive healing do their part. 
• Choosing the right talents. For example, Elemental Blast and Conductivity will help out in mana. 
• Using mana potions and getting the raid to use healing tonics. Just FYI, if everyone in the raid uses 1 healing tonic, it does comparable healing to a Healing Tide Totem. Healing tonic heals for 68K per person. 

 

Thank you for your posts!

I think you bring up an excellent point.

It's been difficult for me to stop looking at meters and use logs to review my performance instead of compare myself to other healers. 

There are a lot of groups, guilds and PUG's, with leaders that rely too heavily on the meters. I've more recently been hearing raid leaders disregard DPS meters due to fight mechanics, but not enough of them who are willing to keep a shaman who's lower on HPS. 

To be an effective healer in WoD, I believe we need to know how the other healing classes work in order to synergize properly for the tough fights. That may mean being lower on the healing meters, but if people aren't dying, then the healers are accomplishing their jobs!

Even as a well geared shaman (661 ilvl right now), I still can have trouble "out-healing" other healing classes. But that shouldn't be the point! And I wish I could make raid leaders understand that. :/

[Pandaids 2]

Karanir, ty for your posts !!

 

I`ll try some logs asap, I promisse !!

 

And I would like to make RL to see the points that you said ! Because when they check recount and see me with 16% HPS and the others, 23-24-25%, you can imagine their thoughts hahaha

 

I`ll open my personal topic soon, tyvm again

[Karanir 15]

Pandaids, 

 

If you are facing the threat of being replaced, my suggestions to you on how to handle it are: 

 

1.) Explain to your RL the general concept of healing and how to use healing meters correctly. In particular, point out that it’s different from DPS. Some points are: 

• It is not about the overall healing done at the end, it is about healers reacting correctly to the fight. For example, I am a good healer if I plan my healing CDs and mana well to respond to spikey damage. In contrast, a lousy healer will just spam heals regardless of the situation.
• Each healer has it's own niche. Due to healing noise, some classes look better on meters. This is okay and recommended. For example, if I see my druid buddy put rejuv up on players at 80%, I will just let rejuv do it's job. I won't snipe the heal. Instead, I will see if someone else is low that needs my attention and top him off.
•  Certain healing assignments will result in lower healing done. But sometimes your job is more important than meter whoring.
• Healing meters are only useful in identifying very serious healer issues. They can’t be used to distinguish between healers. In fact, if I see a druid outheal me by 20% on a fight, I wouldn’t immediately conclude he is the better healer.

 

2.) Explain your strengths in theory

 

Tell them that your heals are XYZ% stronger when people are at low health.

• An UL + HS combo can top up your tank by 200,000+ health
• Healing Rain is the most powerful AOE stacking spell in the game
• Chain Heal is the most powerful AOE spell in the game. This requires some skill to setup with skilful use of riptides and monitoring of position, and timing it with unleash life.
• Windtalk totem on Koragh

 

3.) Explain your strengths with logs.

 

• Use Warcraft logs, show them the healing done over time. This is the most important thing. Show them how well you burst heal to counter those dangerous periods of high damage. Explain your role in smoothing out the damage.
• Identify how you did your healing assignments better than other healers. For example, on brackenspore, perhaps you did tonnes of healing to the blue mushroom up longer due to your mastery scaling, and good use of UL + Direct Heals?
• Identify how you saved more people than the other healers (due to your skilful use of Healing surge, or instant chain heal, for example)

 

4.) Finally, post your logs here and let more experienced healers help you out.

 

• I’m sure many raid leaders will be even more convinced that you are a great player if you have been “peer reviewed” and verified that your fundamental skills are strong and that you are doing your job.
• My raid leader says that a Stoove Seal of Approval™ on a healing log is enough to convince her to give a healer a raid spot.

 

5.)  Have a good learning attitude.

• You need to use data (Warcraft logs) to identify areas of improvement. This is crucial because sometimes it “feels” like we are doing it right, but we really aren’t. The data will tell you the truth.
• Be humble and accept that there is a lot of room of improvement for everyone to grow. Be willing to accept feedback from others and work on mistakes.
• Repetition is the mother of skill. To improve typically requires deliberate effort. You can’t step into a raid just being “aware” and suddenly improve. Typically, what I do to improve when I spot a personal shortcoming is that I will practice it many many many many times before the raid. For example, if I am not good at keeping riptides up. I will literally practice looking at my riptide cooldown icon and raid frames and just cast riptide over and over again. You can do this in LFR because you can just ignore all mechanics and focus on healing. As you repeat doing this over and over again, you will derive insights. Is my icon obvious enough? Do I need a sound alert? Who are the best targets for riptide? After you practice this for a while, you will get it into muscle memory, and you can then do this naturally without thinking in a raid.
• If you try to go into a raid just being “aware” that you should use riptide better, you probably won’t improve a lot because raids are  just so hectic and there are already so many things that demand your attention.
• Finally, let me end off by saying that Resto Shamans are completely fine. They are complex and hard to master. But as long as you put in effort into learning the class, you are perfectly fine in raids. 

[Pandacho 286]

With the last Hotfix for Haste (6.0.3 from 12/1/15 - The Haste stat is now 11.1% more effective. For example, characters at level 100 now receive a 1% increase per 90 Haste (up from 1% per 100 Haste), what happens to our stat weights?

Stoove? :) In your table Haste has only 0.01 weight difference from Mastery until ilvl 660 (0.02 after) - does it changes?

[Karanir 15]

The value of mastery was derived from assuming a 50% health deficit right? We may need to revisit this assumption, seeing as we have more real life data from raids now.

I am having some issues deciding between haste and mastery now. Is it still worth while to go mastery for the 'emergency heals' if it's potentially being overtaken by haste?