Season of Discovery Restoration Shaman Healer Rotation, Cooldowns, and Abilities
On this page, you will learn how to optimize the rotation of your Restoration Shaman Healer, depending on the type of damage your group is receiving while doing PvE content in WoW Classic - Season of Discovery. We also have advanced sections about cooldowns, procs, and others in order to minmax your healing output and your mana efficiency.
Introduction
While they are extraordinarily powerful, explosives such as Heavy Dynamite
will not be detailed in the rotation. Usually, you will want to use them as soon
as the tank has solid threat on the target. The main exception is when you are
facing multiple or particularly dangerous (such as enraged) enemies at some point
in the fight. Saving explosives to carry you and your group through these moments
(and possibly do a ton of AoE damage in the process) is probably worth it.
Healers do not have a formal rotation. As such we will display a priority list instead:
Spell Priority
- Use
Riptide (followed by
Lesser Healing Wave or
Healing Wave if needed) as an emergency heal for players about to die;
- Keep your group-buffing Totems active and in range of group members at all times;
- Remove dangerous debuffs from group members as soon as possible. This includes
preparing for Fear effects with
Tremor Totem;
- Keep
Water Shield active on yourself and
Earth Shield on the tank;
- If runed, cast
Healing Rain if two or more people in your group are hurt and standing close together;
- Use
Chain Heal if two or more people in your group are still hurt and standing close together;
- Cast
Riptide (to activate
Tidal Waves) and various ranks of
Healing Wave to spot heal injured players or use your DPS spells according to the Elemental rotation, as the situation calls for.
Remember to use Shamanistic Rage whenever you will not waste its Mana
regeneration as doing so is the key to keeping a strong Mana pool through long fights.
Advanced Totem Usage
Tremor Totem and
Poison Cleansing Totem should be dropped
when slightly less than 5 seconds remains until the Fear or Poison application.
As they remove effects every 5 seconds, this will ensure that these harmful effects
are removed as soon they are applied, which is of particular importance for Fears,
so that allies do not have time to run out of the Totem's radius.
Downranking as a Restoration Shaman
In order to keep healing throughout a long fight, and to avoid overhealing in general, it is a good idea to downrank your spells when heavy healing is not necessary.
Spells that can be learned before Level 20 gain a smaller benefit from Spell
Damage and Healing, making them less efficient to downrank. Chain Heal
and
Healing Wave are both great downranking options if you need more Mana,
but with the added Mana sources in Season of Discovery this should rarely be needed.
Changelog
- 08 Jul. 2024: Updated rotation for Phase 4.
- 07 Apr. 2024: Updated rotation for Phase 3.
- 03 Mar. 2024: Adjusted Shamanistic Rage explanation after its rework.
- 19 Feb. 2024: Further Phase 2 specific rotation updates.
- 12 Feb. 2024: Updated rotation for Phase 2.
- 17 Dec. 2023: Completely reworked rotation, removing unavailable spells and adding in new tips such as Rockbiter + Shamanistic Rage.
More Classic Shaman Guides
More Season of Discovery Class Guides
Classic Dungeon Guides
Classic Profession Guides
Classic Reputation Guides

This guide has been written by Seksi, original vanilla player and multi-class player, currently playing on Gehennas Horde. You can find him on the Classic Warrior, Mage and Shaman Discords, as well as the Icy Veins Discord.
- Season of Discovery Hotfixes: March 4th
- Nightmare Dragons Update: March 4th
- Guild Reputation Set To Neutral Bug in Cata Classing Being Worked On
- Season of Discovery and Cataclysm Classic Hotfixes: February 21st
- New Cataclysm Classic Valor Cap Set to Week 2 Due to Bug
- Season of Discovery Naxxramas Soft Reset Issue Fix and Warning
- Cataclysm Classic: Hour of Twilight Is Now Live!
- Currency Conversions, New Caps and Ways of Acquiring Them Coming With Hour of Twilight Patch