New Healer - Needs General AdviceFollow

So I've just kind of posted a bunch of general stuff. My apologies if you already know some of what is below. The druid 202 sticky has some good advice as well. Some of it is getting a bit dated, but for the most part its pretty good.

What is your general rotation?

This will vary a bit from druid to druid, but some general advice for 5-mans would be to get a couple of HoTs going on the tank first (I usually start with RJ (Rejuvination) and RG (Regrowth) myself), this should hopefully make the tank health a little less jumpy. After that spot heal with your casted heals. At 80 you'll get Nourish (which will be the high HPS "spam the tank" kind of heal) but until then Regrowth and Healing Touch will do alright. Actually a glyphed HT (Healing Touch) with 5 points in Naturalist makes a great "flash heal" in the 70's, but is usually re-spec'd out of when you gain access to Nourish.

So, RJ + RG on tank, RG for "big heal," Glyphed HT for "little heal" is what I did in the 70's at least.

What HoT is a priority to get up?

I prefer to get the swift-mendable HoTs rolling first (RJ + RG), for the simple fact this gives me the option of using swiftmend in emergencies; but this is a play-style preference on my part. RJ also procs Revitalize as well, if you have that talent.

Does stacking blooms really help? and other LB questions

Yes and no, each has benefits. In general, you can either stack and bloom, or roll the stacks.

If you choose to stack and bloom, each additional stack will do more healing, and the size of the bloom will increase. However the HPSC (healing per second of casting-time) will remain the same. So each cast increases healing by the same amount (this makes 1-3 stacks + bloom essentially the same in HPM and HPSC), until you start 'rolling the stacks' (see below :D). Stack & bloom gives a fairly weak heal, but at a low mana cost. I tend to use this method at times when I don't need heals right now, but will likely need it soon.

If you choose to roll the stacks (never letting it bloom), you can increase the HPSC to the point it is competitive with RG and RJ. This strategy can pump out quite a bit of healing on a target. However the HPM (healing per manapoint) isn't very good, and you can quickly go OOM if you aren't careful. I usually reserve this method for "soft enrages" in boss fights or other times where I need increased healing on a single target for a short amount of time.

In general Lifebloom is one of the hardest spells for a druid to use effectively, since it almost requires you to know what is coming 10-30 seconds in the future to use it to its full effectiveness, and is fairly weak if not used properly. Just to give you an idea how difficult it can be to use, I'm still working on this problem myself, and I've had the spell for almost a year now. That being said, LB is quite effective in the right hands.

I don't often notice myself using Wild Growth - Should this be up more?

WG (Wild Growth) will have more healing potential then all your other non-cooldown spells if it hits 3+ targets. If you have 3+ targets that need healing, and you can hit them all with a WG, it's usually advisable to cast it.

As for Grid, I don't know of a website that will show this all from a druid perspective, unfortunately. As a "blah blah, personal experience" kind of thing; I ended up downloading the DruidStatusHoTs (or whatever it is called) option as well. I pegged one HoT (RJ, LB, RG, WG) to each corner and have them change colors from green to yellow to red based on how much time is remaining. I found the colors easier to track then numbers personally, but I'm no expert at grid either...

Other stuff

Other things that might be helpful:

Not a big issue now, but a big problem druids can have when they hit 80 is prioritizing spellpower and other throughput stats too highly over mana regeneration. Since in a raid you'll likely be casting every second you can usually increase your output more by prioritizing Mp5 and other regen stats over spellpower/haste/crit etc.

There's a section in the sticky about glyphs, but I remember using Healing Touch and Swiftmend when leveling. Regrowth has potential if you use that as your big heal before 80. The new rapid rejuvination glyph may end up being fairly useful for 5-mans as well. The Rebirth glyph has wipe-saving potential, although the spell itself is on a long cooldown. There isn't really a "must have" minor glyph IMO.

Druids have quite a variety of spells, hence there are quite a variety of healing methods out there. Healing in 5s, 10s, and 25s can be quite different. In each case different spells have different amounts of healing potential. Most of all experiment and have fun. I enjoy druid healing because of the way it allows you to pre-HoT and get ahead of the potential damage before it hits. Makes healing a bit more strategic and a bit less reactionary. ;-)

Edited, Dec 8th 2009 9:58am by someproteinguy

Great replies thank you.


Overall I really like Druid healing. My Pally quickly became a Tank/DPS when my first attempt at Pally healing ended horribly. Pally healing really was whack-a-mole and felt very reactionary. This feels much more strategic and planned out. My problem has been in learning the best plan... So thank you for your advice.

I might try that HT Glyph because currently I'm running with the ReGrowth (20% more heal if RG is already ticking) and something else (I forget at the moment)...

I have looked at Druid 202, but like you said some of it is getting dated. I also don't know if at this point it's a realistic goal to try to start raiding on my druid. I can't imagine getting to IC with him - it would just take too much time.

Setting up Grid to show HoT timers

Setting up a nice clean Grid layout


I have modified my own setup slightly, but these guides give you a pretty useful look at how the options work.