Restoration Druid Warlords Pre-raid Gear

Hi everyone, long time no see!

I'm still around, playing my Tauren Druid in a super-casual way. I had pretty much a whole year off the game after my second Sproutling was born, but I got back into things at the launch of Warlords of Draenor.

It shows how little I've actually been able to play since then, by the fact that I've only just reached level 100. It only took me, what, three months?

In any case, I now find myself in the position of trying to gear up a bit so I can try to raid with my guild now and then. In previous expansions, I prepared lists of gear and where to find it, but this time I am truly taking the casual way out and pointing you all to other places to get that information.

As a fresh 100, after I used my Munificent Spaulders and other gear tokens, I'm at iLvL 600. Heroics are at 610. To get into Highmaul LFR you need 615 and Blackrock Foundry LFR is 635.

Stat priorities

As Resto Druids, our stat priorities have not changed that much from previous expansions. From Icy Veins and Restokin:

Intellect > Spirit > Haste = Mastery > Multistrike > Crit > Versatility

Interestingly, the Icy Veins article has Spirit at a much lower priority. Because Spirit directly affects mana regeneration, it seems we should be prioritising Spirit items until we are happy with our mana regen in long boss fights, then move it to a lower priority.

Gear list resources

There's a bewildering number of sources for gear in WoD, from quest items to Apexis Crystals and even items from your garrison followers. Thankfully there are some great guides out there to help make sense of it all.

• Wowhead: Easy Ways to Hit the ilvl 615 Gear Requirement for Highmaul LFR - An excellent summary of all the different gear sources, Doesn't actually mention gear from Heroic dungeons or garrison missions.
• Icy Veins: Restoration Druid Healing Gear and Best in Slot - An enormous list of all gear, right up to Highmaul gear.

Bonus resource: Vixsin over at Life in Group 5 has put together a comprehensive resource for Resto Shaman: Resto Cheat Sheet: WoD Leveling and Pre-Raid (T17) Gearing.

Yes, it's designed for Resto Shaman who have different stat priorities, but I found it a very comprehensive guide to gearing, even if it's not quite the right items for Druids. It's worth a read just to understand concepts like Apexis crystals and follower rewards, and for the info on crafted items.

So there you go. Did I miss any resources that you find invaluable? Please let me know!

I'm off gear collecting now. I'm just very happy to be back enjoying the game so much - I hope you are too!

The Innervate Wait

Hi. My name is Aoifen, and I have mana problems.

But that's a long story. First, let me give you a small update.

A new team

Remember a few weeks ago I said that I was looking to start raiding casually after patch 5.2? Well, after that post, I was contacted by a reader (Squee! You have no idea how happy that made me, Aceral!) and invited to go along to a farm raid with <Nessa and Friends> on Barthilas. 

I had been looking around at a few other options, but this invitation was welcome in several ways. Firstly, Aoifen is on Barthilas already, so no realm or faction transfers would be necessary. Secondly, Aoifen is my raid-ready toon - Leesah is waaay behind and would require some hard work to gear up. Lastly, Nessa and Friends are at a comfortable level of progression for me - they are working through Heart of Fear normal and only raid two nights a week, one of which is a farm night in Mogu'shan Vaults at the moment - perfect for my gear levels and current aspirations.

So, off I went! After a couple of raids with them I was convinced and bid a sad farewell to <Vitare> (who are kicking it in ToT heroics, by the way - go Vitare!) and joined <Nessa and Friends>. 

Big ugly bug

The mana problem

Raiding is everything I love about the game, and at the moment, even farm raids are progression to me so I'm loving it! There's just one problem - I have been constantly struggling for mana.

I use a Flask of Falling Leaves and reforge anything that doesn't have Spirit on it, but I still find myself, halfway through certain boss fights, with potions on cooldown and waiting desperately for the next Innervate to be available.

Why was I struggling so much? My gear level wasn't great, in the high 460s. I managed to replace a couple of items through LFR, but because I don't get a lot of time to play, the Valor Points come slowly so I haven't replaced as many items with VP gear as I'd like. 

I was fairly sure that gear wasn't the whole of the problem - there was something in my play style that was using up all my mana.

So, I did some digging. Here's some advice I collected that might help a newbie Tree with mana conservation:

Calm down. 

At first, I was having a bit of a panic in boss fights and healing anything that moved. My overhealing was probably massive! Don't forget that there is another healer or two there in a 10-man raid, so you can afford to consider who actually needs to be healed.

Know the fights, 

specifically when the high-damage phases are coming, so that you can conserve mana to spend then. If you are running low, at least try to keep enough mana for a Tranquility for when the raid leader screams it at you! I find using Tree of Life form a great way to regain a bit of mana while healing more, as you can sprinkle around Lifeblooms and make use of the Clearcasting procs for some instant Regrowths.

Innervate early.

Innervate gives back 20% of your own mana, so use it as soon as you get below 80%. The sooner it comes off cooldown, the sooner you can use it again. If you find yourself in the enviable position of being close to the end of the fight with lots of mana, see if any of your fellow healers would benefit from it!

Use Rejuvenation and Swiftmend.

Hots are still a Druid's best friend. I hadn't been using Rejuvenation all that much, preferring to use Regrowth as a flash heal. This is most likely where all my mana was going! Rejuvenation has just had its mana cost reduced, and Swiftmend is a relatively cheap heal with a built-in AOE component. Training myself to not use Regrowth so much has helped a lot.

Make use of Clearcasting.

Clearcasting procs come from Lifebloom ticks, so make sure you keep it rolling on the tank. You might like to take advantage of a Clearcasting to get a free Regrowth or Healing Touch.

Don't forget to macro your trinkets,

especially if you have a spirit one such as [Heartwarmer Medallion]. There's a guide as to how to make macros in Clique on my Macros page.

Make use of Ironbark and Barkskin.

The less damage you take, the less healing you have to do. Don't forget that you can cast Ironbark on other people. I'm still trying to remember to cast it on the tank in high-damage phases.

There's a lot to remember, but all it takes is practice to get a hang of it all. My thanks to Icy-veins.com and Restokin's guide for teaching me what my spells do these days!

I'm still setting up Weak Auras to help me with this stuff, so I'll try to post up some codes soon.

Please, if any other raiding Resto Druids read this and can offer advice on any of the information in this post, let me know!

Happy healing!

Resto Cheat Sheet Updated

Since I haven't been raiding or playing Leesah all that much, I've been neglecting my Cheat Sheets. A few things were changed since the last time I looked at it, especially Mastery. I was reminded that I needed to look into this stuff by Windsoar's post about Haste and Mastery yesterday.

As always you can find the Restoration Cheat Sheet at: http://reviveandrejuvenate.blogspot.com/2010/02/restoration-cheat-sheet.html

And, as usual, it's a work in progress and will need to be updated when 4.1 appears. If you have any suggestions or corrections please get in touch.

Be Prepared

Well, there are only five sleeps to go now until the big day!

People seem to be holding their breath waiting, while at the same time trying to cram in as much alt-play as possible before the time comes when we can dust off our mains and start leveling.

As we start to level again, there's no harm in being prepared, right? That's where pre-raid gear guides come in.

So without further ado, I'd like to present:

R&R's Resto Pre-Raid Gear List

I hope it helps you as you level up and run dungeons on your Druid to recognise the gear that will be useful to you. Remember that this time, we will need to gear up through Normal and then Heroic dungeons before we start to raid.

My list has a score for each item based on a stat weight, to help compare between options.  It is not really designed to be a best-in-slot list as I haven't done any modeling and I wasn't in the Beta, but hopefully it should give some idea of which items have more desirable stats than others. I do plan to update my Moonkin gear list as well before long.

I realise there are already several other lists out there now - Restokin and Maedred both published theirs this week, as well as this one over at the PlusHeal Forums.  I had already done the Wowhead-work for mine, so I thought I might as well put it together and post it in the spirit of having as many resources out there as possible.

I hope you find the gear list useful - please send me any feedback you may have!

Patch Time!

Honey, I'm home!!

Okay so the place kind of exploded while I was away.  The patch hitting means that, thanks to my Gem changes post, I had the highest number of visitors I've ever had. Now that I'm back it's kind of gone back down to near normal, but I hope the new visitors found something useful here and will come back again! Make yourselves at home :)

Thank you very much to the people who sent me guest screenies of their favourite places to put up while I was away, including Rades, Tarinae, Anslym and Vidyala! 

Patch 4.0.0 is currently installing on my computer - it's a slow one, isn't it? In the meantime, I've been catching up on what to expect once I finally get to log in. First things first, although many of my addons have been updated, I will be turning them all off and rebuilding from scratch I think.

May I just send out a huge thank you to all the Druid bloggers who have been following and writing guides for the changes. Druids all over the world appreciate your efforts - you guys are awesome!

If you're looking for a few good guides on how things have changed for your Resto or Balance Druid, may I recommend:

• Keeva's 4.0 guide for Resto Druids on Tree Bark Jacket


• Restoration Druid has been talking about the changes in nice bite-sized chunks


• RestoDude has an awesome Resto guide as well.


• Lissanna and Beruthiel have answered a lot of Resto and Moonkin questions


• Graylo and Battlechicken both have great guides for Moonkin for 4.0.

Please note I have now updated my cheat sheets for Resto and Balance.  

For kitties, check out Primal Precision's post here.

The Inconspicuous Bear has some leveling tips for Bears, and plenty of other Bearish information.

Good lord, there's a lot to re-learn.

Introducing R&R Resources

Things have been a little quiet around here lately as I've been very busy with that other game called Real Life that some other bloggers have been talking about. Some exciting things have been going on there, too, but y'know, this is a WoW blog ;)

If you read this blog through a reader, you may not have noticed that I have been quite busy gathering some Balance and Resto Druid information into a new page:  the R&R Resources page.  You can find a link to it along the menu bar under the blog title.

In that page I've linked my existing Resto and Balance cheat sheets, and also compiled the fresh 80 gear lists into pages as well - one each for Resto and Balance.

You'll also find my profession charts, power auras information and also a shiny new Macros page which not only lists a few macros but also shows how to make one, and also how to make a macro work with Clique.

I've linked a few other blogs around the place that I find particularly useful, but if you know of a Resto or Balance druid resource that you think I've missed, please suggest it!

I plan to update the Resources page with new things so check back from time to time.  I hope you find something useful there.

Resto in the Seventies

No, this post isn't about bad hair and bell-bottoms (although Druids are pretty good at flower-power).

The new Cataclysm Beta build today brought with it the new 31-point talent trees, and they've already been posted up on MMO-Champion *Caution - Spoilers*. Since I'm not involved in Beta testing, I'm going to leave it to the experts like Lissanna at Restokin - check out her comprehensive coverage of the Beta changes, if you like spoilers.

But back to the live game.  There are likely to be at least two months before Cataclysm is released - probably more. In that time, there will be new or long-neglected alts being played, including Druids.

I know this because I recently received an email from a Druid called Avawynn:

I am now a level 71 Night Elf Druid with duel spec, Feral/Restro. I haven't played in a few months and now that I am back I feel lost?? I want to get back into the mode of healer, but I can't remember what is efficient and how I should go about healing again in dungeons. I have my tree of life form and I have my restoration spec filled out with all the necessary talents. Please help me :) I need my confidence restored. 

I have already replied to Avawynn (I love getting emails!) but I figure that during this lull before Cataclysm, there are some new Druid healers coming up through the seventies who might find a primer useful. So here we go.

Talents
Let's start with the basics. I'll assume that you either have Restoration as your main spec, or you have dual specs of which one is Resto, like Avawynn.

Your talent tree at level 70 might look something like this: 10/0/51 or it might look slightly different - either way I'll assume you have enough points in Restoration to take Tree of Life and Wild Growth or are very close to it.

Another option is if you are using the Glyph of Healing Touch to give yourself a fast heal before you learn Nourish at level 80. You could re-distribute the points to boost Healing Touch like this: 10/0/51.

Glyphs
At level 70 we have two major glyph slots available. The most useful glyphs for Resto at this stage are most likely [Glyph of Swiftmend] and [Glyph of Regrowth], unless you are boosting Healing Touch as mentioned above - then the Regrowth glyph can be replaced with [Glyph of Healing Touch].

Spells
In the early 70s healing can be difficult. You may get tanks who don't have all their tanking abilities yet, and who are possibly new to tanking. This means you are more likely to get damage all around the party as dps pull aggro or extra mobs that the tank isn't ready for.

Generally speaking:

• Keep Rejuvenation on the tank at all times. Don't clip the last tick.
• Top up with Regrowth when required
• Swiftmend if you need a big boost on a HoT-ed target
• Wild Growth if the whole party is taking damage. Wild Growth can be tricky if your party is spread out a lot - see if you can work out who to cast it on so that it hits as many people as it can in its radius of 15 yards. 
• Remember to heal yourself too!

At level 80, you will learn Nourish, which is our "flash-heal" spell. As I mentioned already, before level 80 you could try using Healing Touch with the Glyph of Healing Touch, which drops the cast speed and mana cost. This makes it a faster heal than Regrowth, but you don't get the HoT component. At level 80 the Glyph would be replaced by something else and you would start using Nourish as your "flash heal" type spell instead.

I personally don't use Lifebloom at all these days, except in very situational encounters - I think Rejuvenation is a more mana-efficient HoT to be using, even with the mana return.  Other druids may disagree, so make sure you experiment with different things to see what works best for you.

I think the best advice I could give is: Don't Panic!  Tranquility makes a great panic button, but it will eat your mana so use it sparingly.

Don't forget to Innervate yourself before you actually run out of mana if you can.

Gear
As you quest and dungeon your way to level 80, try to pick up Spellpower/Haste gear rather than Spellpower/Crit gear if you can. Generally the more haste you have, the more heals you can get out there. There's nothing to stop you wearing cloth gear in your healing set :)

I'm planning another post containing a guide to some of the dungeon and quest gear that's available along the way.

Addons
Healing in stressful situations is so much easier if you have raidframes + clickbind addons. Some suggestions are:

• Healbot Continued
• VuhDo
• Injector + Clique
• Grid + Clique (not recommended for addon beginners)

In Conclusion
If you're reading blogs then there's a good chance you're most of the way towards being a great healer :) Just relax, keep the tank and yourself alive and you've done your job. Practice makes perfect so keep healing! You can give yourself a branchy pat on the back of your trunk now :)

Further Reading

• My Resto Cheat Sheet is a quick reference to the information you need at level 80
• Resto Guide at Tree Bark Jacket
• Healing Guide Levels 40 - 80 at Restokin
• Injector - An Overview on Jaded Alt
• Setting up Grid on Tree Bark Jacket
• Setting up Grid for numerous purposes - Murloc Parliament - search for grid!

Restoration talents for Cataclysm - End of Alpha

EDIT July 9: **PLEASE NOTE** These talents are no longer to be implemented.  Blizzard have decided to overhaul the talent trees completely - see the post on MMO-Champion for more information.

So yesterday, I talked about the Cataclysm Balance talents that have been revealed before the Beta test begins.

Today I'm going to discuss the changes to Restoration.  I know there are a million other Resto druid blogs who have already done this in the last couple of days, but this is actually really helping me understand what the changes are, so bare with me, please.

I'll hide the ***SPOILERS*** after the cut. Promise no more spoilers tomorrow :)

Druid Catclysm Answers from Twitter

Time for another Twitter Dev chat with Blizzard. This time there were all sorts of answers about changes planned in Cataclysm. I'm going to go through some of the answers mentioning Resto and Balance Druids.  If you don't want to hear about the changes, stop reading now :)

Original source is on the WoW Forums.

Q. Is every healer supposed to be able to tank-heal efficiently, or will we still see specs excel in it more than others?
A. Each healer is intended to have a different niche and different strengths, such as Restoration druids with HoTs, or paladins at direct healing, Discipline priests at absorption/prevention, etc. That said, each healer should be able to keep up a tank and have some deeper “tank healing gameplay” as they do now. 

This sounds kind of interesting considering they aren't giving us anything new to play with... we'll have to wait for more information to see how they're planning on improving Druids' tank healing abilities.

Q: Will relics and wands be getting any new attention in Cataclysm?
A: With relics, the plan is to make them class agnostic. In other words, there might be a +strength relic that a death knight or paladin might want to equip. We think that will let us add more of them to the game without them being so specialized. They will feel more like wands.
 
How to make wands and relics a bigger part of gameplay is something we’ve had many, many discussions on. Ultimately though we’d rather see warlocks, mages and priests casting their spells, not zapping someone with a wand. In Cataclysm we don’t expect to see much wanding, even at lower level. 


Q: When you say you're going to make relics class agnostic, does it include druids' idols as well?
A: Druid, shaman, paladin and death knight. It’s possible we will still keep some that are very specific to certain classes and specs. Overall though we’re not happy with the current design where an ability procs a buff on you. If it’s an ability you don’t use often, then the item is terrible, so they end up feeling really passive already. At the same time, the fact that we have to offer so many prevents us from ever giving you the choice of which one to use. So we make the Resto druid or Enhance shaman version every new tier. It would be a more interesting decision if there was a crit + Intellect relic and a haste + Intellect relic, and you can choose which one to use. 

Eeenteresting. "Agnostic" relics obviously won't work for current relics - they all involve class-specific spells at the moment, such as Steamcaller's Totem and Idol of the Black Willow. Assuming they will be changing the proc effects to things like an increase in intellect (since spellpower is going away on everything except weapons), this makes relics just like an extra proc-based trinket slot, and we lose some of our special class-specific items.  I guess it's good that we won't have to disenchant the Libram that dropped for the 50th time when there's no Paladin in the group, but I'm still not sure I like the idea.

Q. Why are Restoration druids the only spec in the game not receiving a new spell?
A. Restoration druids are actually getting a fair bit. For one, Tree of Life is getting a whole new model (think Ancients of War) and will also “morph” some of your spells to do crazy things while in the form, such as cause Regrowth to be instant, or Lifebloom to apply two applications at once. Tranquility will be raid-wide. We’re also touching nearly every Restoration druid spell to make sure each has a niche and feels good. In general, playing a Restoration druid should feel a lot different (better!) in Cataclysm than it does today. 

Ancients of War, eh?  Those things are huge?! (see image at the top) This is the first we've heard about the new cooldown-based Tree of Life - and that our existing spells are getting tweaked.  Suddenly I'm not so sure our healing style will stay the same as it is now. Having spells do crazy things sounds good though, as long as they are controllable crazy things!

Q. What change are you most excited about?
A. Some of the new Balance talents for druids, like Solar Beam, which works like Freya’s spell where it instantly silences a target and they have to move out of the beam to get rid of the debuff. 

What's this? Were we already told about this Solar Beam thing? If so, how did I miss it?!  Sounds interesting, but very PvP... sounds a little overpowered to be applicable in PvE, unless they make the mana cost through the roof so that it's very difficult to use a lot.

Q: How will haste affect channeled spells. Will it be similar to DoTs and HoTs?
A: They will channel faster but their duration will remain unchanged. You will get more ticks on the same cast.

More lightning bolts for the price of a normal storm?  Awesome! So they're changing the way this works - at the moment the ticks are faster, but there are the same number of ticks, so the duration is shorter.  They're saying the duration will stay the same length but there will be more ticks. An interesting change, but I wonder why they made it. It means casters of channeled spells will be more mana-efficient since we won't be casting so many times. I'm wondering if this is the same with HoTs - at the moment Rejuvenation falls off faster than normal because of the Rapid glyph.  With the new change rejuvenation will be the same length but heal more ticks?  Yes please!

We're gradually being drip-fed more information - I think the Beta will be coming very soon.  As I said at the top, I've only covered Resto and Balance Druid stuff - there's way more interesting info if you read through all the answers in the forum post.

Cataclysm Druid Preview - the Blues Respond

Here's a collection of Ghostcrawler's responses on the Druid class changes post. 

Once again, if you'd rather not know, don't click to read more :)

Cataclysm Druid Preview

Blizzard has posted their plans for Druids in Cataclysm. I'll list the ones affecting Resto and Balance druids and give my initial reactions after the break, so if you don't like spoilers, you can stop reading here. There's diagrams and things though.. :)

BIG DISCLAIMER:  These changes are initial in-development plans.  They are in no way final!  In fact, many of them may not make it past the first Beta version!  Read with a pinch, in fact a whole handful of salt!

Magic with Macros

Macro Magic has Moved :)

http://reviveandrejuvenate.blogspot.com/p/macros.html

Please update your bookmark!

Power Auras for Healing

Updated 1/9/2011

Do you have an addon that you would feel lost without?  That you would feel like one of your senses was missing, like you had the sound effects turned off or something?

Power Auras Classic is such an addon for me.  I use it on all my toons.  It feeds me essential information about all sorts of stuff.

A little while ago I posted about my power auras for Moonkin. I thought I'd go through the process I used to create auras for healing.  These auras are for my Resto Druid, but they could be tweaked for any class's spells.

My first post about Power Auras shows some of the basic settings if you would like to make your own rather than importing mine.

At the end of the post I've listed a few links to how other healers are using Power Auras, to share a few more ideas, and make sure you check out the Power Auras Wiki for loads of information and ideas for every class.

Planning your Auras
Think about all the spells you use and which of them you'd like to keep track of. 

• Are there buffs are that you need to keep track of while out of combat?  Eg. Mark of the Wild, Paladin auras, food, flasks...
• Buffs while in combat? Eg. Nature's Grace, Clearcasting
• Debuffs in combat for specific fights?
• Cooldowns to keep track of?  Eg. Swiftmend, Nature's Swiftness, Wild Growth
• Is there a proc that could happen that means you need to fire off another spell to take advantage?
• Do you have a macro that is only available under certain conditions?  
• Notification for when you're low on health and/or mana?

Display
How would you like the aura displayed? 

• When the spell is available or unavailable (for the duration of the cooldown)? 
• A circular aura around your toon, or an icon that shows in an easily-visible location?
• Would you like the aura to have a timer?  Or to be a timer? (there doesn't have to be an icon at all!)

Location
The location of the auras is very important because you need to be able to see them easily in a combat situation, but not have them get in your way.  Make sure once you have made a few that you turn them all on to make sure none are covering others up.

My Healing Auras
Everyone likes their notifications in different ways, but I like to show auras around my toon for when my major spells are on cooldown, so that I can tell at a glace what is available for casting.

I've found colours are very important to me. I will easily forget what an indicator is for, unless it is coloured the same as the spell.  For example, I made my Swiftmend aura blue like the spell icon, to help me recognise that Swiftmend is on cooldown, even though I don't even have Swiftmend on my bars anywhere.  Don't ask me why that works, but it does.

So, here are the auras that I am currently using.  You can import them directly into PowA by opening the menu with /powa, then clicking "Import" and copying and pasting the import string.



Mark of the Wild / Blessing of Kings
The icon shows when I do not have Mark of the Wild or Blessing of Kings on me.

Version:4.22; b:0.8667; g:0.5137; icon:Spell_Nature_Regeneration; buffname:Mark of the Wild/blessing of kings; x:1; texture:29; alpha:0.8; PowerType:0; size:0.32; y:107; texmode:1; inverse:true

Wild Growth
Shows after I cast Wild Growth, and disappears when the 6 sec cooldown finishes.

Version:4.22; b:0.3804; icon:Ability_Druid_Flourish; buffname:Wild Growth; r:0.1608; bufftype:15; texture:17; size:1.51; y:-1; texmode:1; inverse:true

Swiftmend
Shows while Swiftmend is on cooldown.

Version:4.22; g:0.6078; icon:INV_Relics_IdolofRejuvenation; buffname:Swiftmend; r:0.0627; bufftype:15; texture:23; size:0.88; texmode:1; inverse:true

Nature's Swiftness
Shows while Nature's Swiftness is on cooldown.  I use Nature's Swiftness as part of a couple of macros. You can read about them in my Macros page.

Version:4.22; b:0.1725; icon:Spell_Nature_RavenForm; buffname:Nature's Swiftness; r:0.0824; bufftype:15; texture:28; alpha:0.45; inParty:true; size:1.19; texmode:1; inverse:true

Nature's Grace
This aura is shared with Balance spec, and shows when Nature's Grace procs.  It helps me catch up with the rhythm of faster cast times.

Version:4.22; b:0.1412; icon:Spell_Nature_NaturesBlessing; buffname:Nature's Grace; r:0.2431; texture:16; PowerType:0; texmode:1

Clearcasting
Also shared with Balance spec, this aura shows Clearcasting procs so that I can decide to cast Regrowth or a mana-expensive heal.

Version:4.22; icon:Spell_Shadow_ManaBurn; buffname:Clearcasting; texture:4; size:1.09; texmode:1

* New* - Low Mana Indicator
Shows when mana is below 50%.

Version:4.22; g:0.8078; icon:inv_elemental_primal_mana; r:0.0863; bufftype:10; texture:70; PowerType:0; combat:true; size:0.45; y:-111; texmode:1

* New* - Harmony
The Restoration Mastery, Harmony, requires a direct healing spell to be cast every ten seconds. This combination of two auras shows a rotating circle if the buff is not present, then a countdown while the buff is present. The circle will only show while in combat.  I totally stole these two auras from Beruthiel, and made them bigger. Thanks Beru!

No Harmony (circle spins)
Version:4.22; b:0.1686; anim1:11; icon:Spell_Nature_HealingWay; buffname:Harmony; r:0.0667; x:-160; texture:142; alpha:1; mine:true; combat:true; size:0.44; y:-13; texmode:1; inverse:true

Harmony countdown
Version:4.22; b:0.1686; icon:Spell_Nature_HealingWay; buffname:Harmony; r:0.0667; x:-160; texture:142; alpha:1; mine:true; size:0.44; y:-13; texmode:1; timer.h:1.73; timer.enabled:true; timer.cents:false; timer.y:-14; timer.x:-160






More Ideas for Powa

• Jasyla at Cannot be Tamed
• Garnaph at Restokin (all Druid specs)
• Keeva at Tree Bark Jacket
• Kae at Dreambound Druid
• Restodude's Auras
• Beruthiel at Falling Leaves and Wings
• Leveling Holy (paladin + some raid auras)
• Kahiaau at Green Bar Spec (all healing classes)
• Life in Group 5 (shaman)
• Planet of the Hats (shaman)
• Holy Nova Now (disc priest)
• Spot Heal (disc priest)

Fresh 80 Resto Gear Plan - Part 2 - Legs & the Rest

The Fresh 80 Resto Gear Plan has moved to a new page! 

http://reviveandrejuvenate.blogspot.com/p/restoration-druid-fresh-80-gear-plan.html

Please update your bookmark :)

Fresh 80 Resto Gear Plan - Part 1 - Head to Waist

The Resto Druid Gear Plan has moved to a new page:


http://reviveandrejuvenate.blogspot.com/p/restoration-druid-fresh-80-gear-plan.html


Please update your bookmark :)

Restoration Cheat Sheet

Welcome to the Restoration Druid Cheat Sheet!  This page is designed as a quick reference for Druids to easily find information relating to the Restoration spec.  It is mainly designed with mid-80s and new level 85s in mind.  The information was distilled from several sources, which you can find listed at the bottom of the post. 

I know there are already plenty of guides like this out there and it wasn't meant to copy or replace them, but as a Druid blog I feel R&R should help with making the information available, and the more the info is out there, the easier it is to find. I've included links to sources wherever I can.

I'll try to keep it up to date - the current version is current for patch 4.2 and last updated 20/07/11.

I would encourage you not to take any of it as gospel, but try different ways to see what works best for you. At the end of the post is a list of links to further information.

Spec

The most popular spec at the moment according to wowpopular.com is 7/3/31, although there are a number of popular variations.

Jasyla suggests other talent specs for post-4.1.

Glyphs
Patch 4.0.1 introduced a new glyph system, consisting of three types: Prime, Major and Minor Glyphs. The Glyphs are now learned, so they can be swapped between fights.

Prime Glyphs to choose from include:

• [Glyph of Swiftmend]
• [Glyph of Rejuvenation]
• [Glyph of Lifebloom]
• [Glyph of Regrowth]

Major Glyphs to choose from include:

• [Glyph of Innervate]
• [Glyph of Wild Growth]
• [Glyph of Rebirth]
• [Glyph of Healing Touch]
• [Glyph of Thorns]

At the moment I'm using Innervate, Wild Growth and Rebirth.  Healing Touch could be very useful when combined with a Nature's Swiftness + HT macro, if you find you're doing a lot of tank healing on heavy damage fights.

Minor Glyphs are your choice as none are particularly game-breaking, but [Glyph of the Wild] could save you mana while buffing and [Glyph of Unburdened Rebirth] saves you a bag space. [Glyph of the Treant] allows you to keep your old Tree of Life form, if you wish.

Haste 

There is no longer a Haste "cap", but because HoTs are now affected by Haste, there are a series of break points whereby we gain extra ticks of each HoT spell. For more information on how break points work, check out the links listed below.

Aim for at least the first break point for Rejuvenation: 915 Haste (rounded up). The first Lifebloom break point is 1220. Even my Leesah in her non-raid gear is managing to make the first break point for Regrowth of 1423, but the Wild Growth value of 2004 Haste is much harder to reach.

Some more resources on Hasted Hots, Dots and break points:

• Awesome summary post on Jaded Alt
• Quick reference chart on Cannot Be Tamed
• Type 'H' for Heals
• Cynwise's post about hasted Dots

Mastery
Mastery is the new stat for Cataclysm. Patch 4.2 brought Resto Druids a new mastery - Harmony. Direct heals such as Nourish, Swiftmend and Healing Touch gives us the Harmony buff, which gives extra healing from our heal over time spells. 

You can find a more detailed explanation of Mastery at Fun in Games, and there's also some great information at Jaded Alt.

Stats on Gear

Intellect > Haste (to breakpoint of choice) > Mastery > Spirit > Crit

In Cataclysm Spellpower is only found as a stat on weapons and enchants, but we now also get Spellpower from Intellect. Intellect also increases mana pool and gives a small amount of Crit.

Stack Haste to breakpoints. Beyond that is personal preference, but other stats take preference.

Spirit increases mana regeneration so we still need plenty of that to keep mana issues at bay.

Mastery increases our throughput, especially in a setting where we are throwing a lot of HoTs around. Stack as much as you can without your mana suffering.

Critical Strike Rating is more important than it was because our HoT ticks are now able to crit.

Trees do not need Hit.

Reforging

In general, reforge Crit and Spirit to Haste, without crippling your mana regeneration. If you're not able to reforge to Haste, Spirit or Mastery is preferable to other stats. 

Gems

Gem [Brilliant Inferno Ruby] in all sockets, except for two [Artful Ember Topaz] for meta activation.

In your meta socket use [Ember Shadowspirit Diamond].

(Gem information from Elitist Jerks.)

Enchants

• Head:  [Arcanum of Hyjal] - Guardians of Hyjal revered
• Shoulders: [Greater Inscription of Charged Lodestone] - Therazane exalted or [Felfire Inscription] - Scribes only
• Back - [Enchant Cloak - Greater Intellect] or [Lightweave Embroidery] (rank 2)- Tailors only
• Chest - [Enchant Chest - Peerless Stats]
• Wrists - [Enchant Bracer - Greater Speed] or [Draconic Embossment - Intellect] - Leatherworkers only
• Gloves - [Enchant Gloves - Haste]
• Leggings - [Powerful Ghostly Spellthread] - Tailoring consumable or [Sanctified Spellthread] (rank 2) - Tailors only
• Boots - [Enchant Boots - Lavawalker]
• Weapon - [Enchant Weapon - Power Torrent] 
• Off-hand - [Enchant Off-Hand - Superior Intellect]

What Spells Should I Use?

In patch 4.0.1 we didn't gain any new spells, but most changed in effect, duration and/or cast time.

Lifebloom can only be cast on one target at a time, so will mostly be used for tank healing - roll three stacks, try not to let it bloom. In addition, Lifebloom's duration can be refreshed by casting Nourish. We can also cast Swiftmend on a HoT-ed target to proc Efflorescence, a green area-of-effect healing spell.

Healing Touch becomes more efficient as a big heal, and Nourish can be used to refresh Lifebloom as required. Regrowth is faster to cast but less efficient - time it with a Clearcasting proc if possible.

Don't forget, our Tree of Life cooldown gives us some great bonuses for heavy-damage situations. Plus, it's nice to see the old tree from time to time!

For more healing advice check out Tree Bark Jacket or Fun in Games.

More Resources

• Elitist Jerks Resto Guide for Cataclysm
• Restodruid.info - Tree Bark Jacket's Resto Guide
• Restokin's 4.0.1 Healing Guide
• Restodude's Guide
• Cannot Be Tamed
• Plus Heal's Druid forum