***THIS GUIDE IS NOW UPDATED FOR 3.3***
-Glossary:
I may use these abbreviations during the guide.
LHW = Lesser Healing Wave
ES = Earth Shield
SP = Spell Power
CH = Chain Heal
HW = Healing Wave
MP5 = Mana Regen per 5 seconds.
INT = Intellect
STAM = Stamina
DPS = Damage Per Second
HPS = Healing Per Second
AoE = Area of Effect
ilvl = Item Level
HoT = Heal over Time
I've been playing Restoration Shaman since the release of World of Warcraft with only a couple of short breaks. I think in the current version of the game it should be classed as a support healer, when played perfectly you will find it a challenge to get out the same kind of effective healing out as a similarly geared and skilled Druid or Priest, but it is possible!. On the flipside, however, you offer some great buffs that will help secure that raid spot. As soon as Chain Heal began auto-targeting players with the lowest health it became the most dominating skill for Resto Shamans. This continued all the way through TBC and in Sunwell, with full Haste gear and a Shadow Priest in your group, you could push out some ridiculously high HPS with AoE healing. In Wrath of the Lich King, however, Blizzard's intentions for Shaman healing have changed dramatically. Talents, gear and the way the other healers have been designed push it much more into a mixed role healing category. I'll go into more detail on this later. The purpose of this guide is to give you an idea of the direction to take your Shaman if you want to improve your raid performance or if you are a beginner with the class. This is not going to be full of math - I am not a theory crafting nut. I think the best way to approach character optimisation is to just play and adapt to what is going on around you, particularly when playing a healer.
So the first thing you need to approach is your Talent Spec. I'll start by linking the talent build that I use now. View it HERE. The major difference between this spec and what you used is that you take Healing Way instead of Elemental Weapons. The reason for this is the new buff to Healing Way making the use of Healing Wave significantly more viable. If you do not want to use Healing Way (it's extremely heavy on mana). Then you can stick with the old spec which still is not bad. View it HERE.
I'd write a lot more on spec but there really isn't much to say. Totemic Focus is more of a PvP talent, most of the time you will drop a few totems every couple of minutes and your use of Healing Wave will justify selecting that talent instead. If your tanks are not awful you will never have to worry about healing threat so Healing Grace is useless. Once again this is much more of a PvP talent. If there was a fight with a nasty unavoidable silence you might justify Focused Mind (say Gruul in TBC), currently there is no fight requiring it however and you will only take this talent in PvP. Healing Way[ is now taken because you can do extremely fast and large heals with the new buff. To wrap it up, take the first build I linked for general use and you can't go wrong.
My stats and how they integrate with playstyle are something I have been wrestling with endlessly since the release of WotLK. At the start I maxed out my Intellect because on paper it was definitely the best all-round stat for a Shaman. After getting decent gear and realising mana was never going to be an issue I switched to full Spell Power to test that out. I continued with that for quite some time until the change to Priest and Druid AoE healing which I believed would allow Shamans to begin using Chain Heal once again. In Naxx up until this point, it was impossible to land a Chain Heal before people were healed up by Priests and Druids spamming Circle of Healing and Wild Growth. So with the nerfing of these skills I gemmed a lot more Haste, switched some gear and gave it a go. It worked for a while but during Ulduar, particularly with the huge buff to Prayer of Healing for Priests, it became pretty poor again and I maxed Spell Power until the end of Ulduar. Now in 3.2 once again things have evolved and Haste and Chain Heal are far more viable. This is because you can't cap your LHW at the Global Cooldown anymore due to the change on Tidal Waves and because Healing Wave and Chain Heal are both buffed. This has meant that Haste has become an essential stat for shamans.
3.2 turned many things on their head, mainly this is due to the buffs on Chain Heal and Healing wave and the altering of Tidal Waves with LHW as stated above. When you are starting out many of the old principles still apply. You will need a basic level of Int, Spell Power and Crit before you can start stacking up on Haste. This is not a situation where it is Haste at the expense of all other stats. The amount of Int you need will depend on your mp5 on your gear but basically you just want to be able to sustain your mana over at least 6 minutes of constant spamming. The fights that run longer than this usually offer a mana break at some point. With high end gear I think that 25% Crit (on your profile) with 2500 Spell Power (with Earthliving) and a solid amount of regen are needed before you can start with Haste. If you notice I do not use only Haste items, I try to balance all my other stats and use the "extra" ilvl I have purely for haste. Using high ilvl items is something I will always promote because no stat is "bad" for a Shaman anymore really.
-Crit: Crit is important for 3 reasons.
- It will apply the 10% physical damage reduction buff on tanks that you critically heal which is very important. So unless you are running a Disc Priest (Holy Priests usually do not spec it) or a second Shaman you will most likely be the only person in the raid able to apply the buff.
- It will give you mana regeneration through Improved Water Shield and since your main spells are going to be Lesser Healing Wave and Riptide, critting these spells is going to provide a large amount of your mana regeneration
- To increase your HPS. Since Ancestral Awakening was changed in 3.1 those Lesser Healing Wave and Riptide Crits are going to provide a lot of effective healing without requiring you to re-target people. I actually found that the amount of effective healing I gained from this talent in 3.1 was massive. Also don't forget it makes your heals bigger which you cannot discount!
-Haste: The Chain Heal Stat.
This is another section re-written for 3.2. This is mainly because it's actually not "The Chain Heal Stat" anymore. Haste now counts towards all of your heals since your LHW is not going below a 1 second cast anymore. Healing Wave gains a massive amount from it due to the very long untalented base cast. In 3.1 you didn't need this stat because you mainly just used LHW and instants, i.e. very short casts so you wanted your heals to be bigger instead of faster (hence Spell Power stacking). In 3.2 everything can be made faster and in this game healing faster is much more likely to save lives as a Resto Shaman. So yes this stat is now a lot stronger, yes Chain Heal and Healing Wave are now buffed and viable. This is the stat you start pushing as high as you can as long as your other stats are high enough to keep up with your regen and heal size.
-MP5: Mana please!
Since Spirit is completely useless for Shamans, this will be your other source of mana along with Water Shield charges (from Crits and environmental damage). How much you use is entirely up to you. I currently sit at around 300MP5 (with Water Shield) in my standard pre-Trial of the Crusader gear and I find that keeps my mana up pretty well. The amount of MP5 you need is going to be dependent on the length of the fight and the amount of Haste you have since Haste is the only thing that will cause you to burn mana faster. Also remember that in 3.2 there is a LOT more regen on the gear so you will find it relatively easy to get enough Int and MP5 gear to keep your mana up.
-Balancing and Prioritising your stats:
There is no magic number of Intellect to get, it's just an all around good stat. Along with Spell Power it's just a stat you will naturally increase as your gear improves. The next stat you should be looking for on your gear is Crit rating for the reasons above. You should keep this at a solid level for regen, HPS and Tank Healing. If you can keep these stats at a generally high and balanced level then you can start pumping your Haste as high as possible. It's all about balance, if you have the regen to support it (from Int and MP5) then keep pushing your Haste higher and higher as it will be the best way to increase your HPS. At the time of writing I have around 32% crit, 2600 Spell Power and 830 haste self buffed (no totems). I have just about enough regen to support that but I'm probably going to go with a little bit more for furture hardmodes. It's all about balancing your stats and once you have good balancde stats to support your Haste, then you pump it !
-Stamina:
Last but not least never forget Stamina. You cannot heal people if you are face down dead on the floor.
Gemming became significantly more complicated in 3.2 because you now have more options:
20 Haste in Yellow Sockets.
12 Spell Power and 10 Haste in Red Sockets
10 Haste and 5 MP5 in Blue Sockets
However, if you really lack mana then you should gem more Int and MP5. Do not use the 23 Spell Power gem, 2 hybrid gems give 24 Spell Power so you lose stats by using this gem. If you feel that your other stats are good then you can ignore socket bonuses and go directly for Haste pumping (almost all 20 Haste gems).
- Your meta gem should be Insightful Earthsiege Diamond. It is by far the best meta gem. If you are lucky enough to get double Solace trinket or feel you just cannot use your mana then switch to Reviatlizing Skyflare Diamond.
- Consider Stamina or hybrid Stamina Gems in Blue sockets if there is a high risk of death from raid damage on a fight.
- If you are going to only tank heal then Haste is not quite as strong so you might want to consider Intellect and Spell Power gems.
- If you are lucky enough to be a Jewelcrafter or Blacksmith I would suggest using your custom gems for extra Haste!
- There will always be people using different Gems, the important thing to do is always to gem how you feel best suits the gear you have and the way you play. If you have an excess amount of mana don't use extra Intellect Gems, use Haste or Spell Power instead and so on ... There is no 100% correct way above all others.
For my enchants it's fairly straight forward. If you go to my armory (most likely now in Elemental Gear but it's the same stuff).
Notable choices are that I choose 10 stats over 8MP5 on chest because I think that Stamina is a worthy stat to have and you should always give it appropriate weight. On boots I recommend always using Tuskar's Vitality since you will no longer get runspeed from DK aura in raids. Survival is just soo important. With your head and shoulder enchants you have the option of Crit or MP5 as the secondary stat. You should always choose crit on this option though. Do not get 16 Int on bracers over 30 Spell Power, the enchant is significantly lower ilvl and it is a complete waste of stats. Stacking a particular stat for the sake of it at the expense of ilvl is not advisable for Resto Shamans since most stats are at least decent.
-General
- I think many people in guides are going to write a list of the absolute perfect set of gear to get but again with playing a Resto Shaman you just need to adapt according to what gear you have available and using the stat advice above.
- Always take advantage of set bonuses, the Tier 9 and Tier 10 set bonuses are definitely worth getting. There are no items that are going to boost you sufficiently in order to negate the bonus of these sets. They should therefore be your primary goal with your gear.
- Be very careful about getting too much Haste and not enough MP5 and Crit to keep your mana up. In Naxxramas you can do lots of 2 minute fights so you don't feel the effect of regen but in Ulduar it's an entirely different story.
- If your gear is really lacking in some stats, use your Gems to compensate, they provide a huge stat bonus and allow you to specialise a lot more than it might seem.
- Picking gear with no Stamina at all is unwise. You need to stay alive and a "glass cannon" healer is not the way to go at all.
- There are many different Relics to choose from now. It's entirely situational, use the one that you feel is directed towards the spell you use the most on a particular fight. The Triumph Badge one is a solid place to start. Some Shamans are now choosing to take Bizuri's Totem of Shattered Ice so that you can gain a lot of extra Haste. The problem with it however will be resists and the high mana cost.
-Trinkets
I'd like to give special mention to trinkets because while weapon is your most important item, there isn't much of a choice there. I've cut this section down for the 3.3 patch because frankly you want Solace. At least one if not two Solace trinkets. There is nothing better that you can get really, the Frost Emblem badge healing trinket is almost as good. If you are feeling a bit stuck then try the Intellect trinket from Triumph Badges or the Haste trinket from Halls of Stone.
Options! While progress raiding I carry a huge number of options. Your main Flasks will be either 125 Spell Power (Frost Wyrm) or 38 MP5 (Pure Mojo). You should however carry 1300hp flasks (Stoneblood) and a variety of elixirs such as Lightning Speed, Guru, Mighty Thoughts.
The same goes for your food. Depending on the fight you should be selecting MP5, Haste or Spell Power food.
-Minor.
I use Water Walking (for convenience), Renewed Life (to avoid carrying ankhs), and Water Shield (because it's amazing!).
-Core
Earth Shield -> The absolute core glyph of playing Resto Shaman. You should always have your Earth Shield up on a tank and it will give very good effective healing. Use this 100% of the time. This is the only Glyph I would say is an absolute must have right now.
-Optional
Lesser Healing Wave -> If you are planning to ever heal a tank you should have this glyph, I don't think I have ever been without it while playing Resto in PvE or PvP.
Riptide -> This one is used to be a Core Glyph but it's now a lot less used. If you are only spamming Chain Heal and not tank Healing, you might want to consider it over LHW.
Chain Heal -> You want to use this one in if you are using Chain Heal a lot (most of the time).
At the time of writing I am using LHW, Chain Heal and Earth Shield. Some fights you can use the Healing Wave glyph but these are pretty limited. Perhaps Healing Stream Glyph will be good on some AoE fight where you only spam Chain Heal also.
Well this is the most difficult thing to "Teach". I don't think I do this stuff perfectly myself at all but if you take some of the advice onboard your play will probably improve. This section has been completely re-written for 3.2.
-Spell Selection
There are far far more options now than you used to have in 3.2. All your heals are viable to be used and so you need to think a lot more about what heal to use in which situation.
Earth Shield should always be up on one of the tanks, if in the rare situation there is one tank and two Resto Shamans, put it on a healer or another caster with low hp for healing help and interrupt protection. A good example of this would be Razuvious, if the priest doing Mind Control is Holy they will have no interrupt protection so an Earth Shield will help them out. Another example would be on Phase 2 of Mimiron where you shouldn't have it on a tank, but on a healer.
Riptide has multiple uses. It's an instant heal in tight situations, for example a tank goes a bit low so you do a LHW then Riptide straight after to get as big a heal as you can in a short time. Where lots of people are taking consistent damage from AoE you want to try and use it as a HoT and therefore keep it up on as many people as possible (only do this if you Glyph it). Finally it's used to make your HW casts a lot faster and your Crit chance on LHW a lot higher. The thing is that you are now using Chain Heal a lot more so you will be getting the same buff from that. Rather than spamming Riptide on cooldown, this spell is more often used on someone you know will take some damage over time or just to quickly top their health.
Lesser Healing Wave is your main direct heal still. This spell has not become bad, often you will not be able to land fully effective Healing Waves and this spell will be the better choice. Due to the very high crit chance on with Tidal Waves, it's excellent for keeping tanks crit buffed. It's still ok for raid healing but chain heal will often be superior now.
Always have Nature's Swiftness ready for tight situations in conjunction with Healing Wave. Your Tidal Force cooldown is tricky to time. The best time to activate it is when you know that some heavy damage is going to be incoming shortly (to be honest, I often forget to use this ability in the perfect situation). I have now just put Tidal Force on my Nature's Swiftness macro so that this instant heal has a higher chance of being a crit.
So Chain Heal is much more viable now. With a lot of Haste you will be able to land good Chain Heals on a lot of fights. I'm finding that this is making up a significantly higher portion of my healing output than before so definitely try it out. The same goes for Healing Wave, you will use it more but you will not spam it because this will just not work. Use it when you know you can land a large effective heal and only use it with Tidal Waves up.
For your totems you are going to have Wrath of Air Totem down all the time. Most of the time you can use Healing Stream Totem because your raid will have Blessing of Wisdom and they do not stack. For Earth Totem I use Stoneskin the most for reducing tank damage. On fire you can use Flametongue but your Enhancement Shaman will have a better one and more often than not there will be a much better buff being used in the raid (Demonic Pact, Totem of Wrath). Always watch out for Elemental damage and see if you can provide a resistance totem to counter it without sacrificing too much. All other totems are highly situational: Tremor for Fear/Sleep, Earthbind to slow, Cleansing to remove diseases and poisons.
Think about the length of the fight in regards to using your Mana Tide. If you are going to be able to use it multiple times within the length of the fight time it so that you do. Save your Mana Potion for if you go really low on Mana only.
-Character Control and General Tips
- Keybind your skills. Using the mouse to click skills will slow you down and misdirect your attention from what is actually going on with the fight. This is a very important aspect of the game.
- Do not backpeddle (this means using your back key to move). We all occasionally take a couple of steps to adjust but doing it consistently (unless tanking to keep front to mob for avoidance) is going to mean you move a lot slower than you should be.
- Do not keyboard turn, always use the mouse to turn your character and camera, it is significantly faster and more accurate.
- How you position yourself in the room is very important. You want to be in range of as many people as possible and in a safe spot. If your tank is about to move be ready to adapt to that movement. I like to just settle into a particular position on most fights and get comfortable with playing like that, but you should always be ready to adapt.
- Be raid aware. 99% of bad players are bad because they do not think about what is going on around them, they die to damage they should not be taking and/or don't take notice of what their fellow players are doing. Tunnel visioning and playing only through your raid frames is a very easy thing to fall into as a healer and is a very bad habit.
- Never die with healthstone and potion unused. These are two lifesaving heals and you shouldn't die without them being on cooldown/consumed.
- Always keep the boss in your Focus target with a big cast bar in the middle of your screen so you can see when they are casting their abilities.
- Always keep Water Shield up. Whenever you get a free global cooldown try to refresh it, even if it's still on 3 stacks. Get into the habit of this because sometimes you will just not have time to refresh it and u need to take the opportunity when it's there.
Healing theory is close to impossible to explain. We do not use many healing assignments, it's all about feel and knowing when you can land a heal or not. Try to think about how your other healers are going to heal and adapt to make sure that your heals are as effective as possible. I hardly ever cancel heals on tanks because the damage they take will usually come in huge spikes and cancelling could mean that they die. Your character should be setup so that you can spam heal for long periods of time so do not be shy with your mana. Spam, spam, spam and make sure you get as much healing out as you can.
How you setup your UI is always going to be personal preference. I'll be making my UI available for download in the near future. For now though here are a few addons you might want to consider.
TotemTimers: I use this to monitor Totems and Shields. There may be better addons out there for this but I use this one.
Quartz: The standard castbar is pretty limited, this is the best one I have come across.
MiksScrollingBattleText: This is the best combat text I have found.
oRA: Raid Addon for Main Tank targets and monitoring a few other useful bits of info, far from essential though
Forte Xorcist: I used to use this to see timers on Riptide and to monitor my cooldowns and procs.
Raid Frames: Grid or sRaidFrames.
You can download my UI here
Conclusion
There is no one right way to do a lot of things in this game. This guide should explain you the mechanics of the basics and what you should be aiming for. I will be adding regular updates especially on how the usefulness of Chain Heal develops. If you have any questions or if you're looking for a more in-depth discussion please head over to our forums. Thanks to Hams for the Image work :)
Regards
//mek
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