Coliseum Champions: LOL.

.

Last night was my very first night raiding in Coliseum.

Let me tell you, it was really odd. Most other people had been there, so instead of me giving pointers to others, they were all giving pointers to me. I had read the strat, but it all seemed pretty complicated, so pointers were definitely appreciated.

The first encounter, the Northrend Beasts, was pretty fun. I actually found myself out of mana. I had to use a potion! o.O I quickly learned that I need to use my Innervate even sooner than I had initially thought, to make sure it's up a couple more times in any given fight.

Eventually we found ourselves face to face with the Champions. This encounter is such a hoot. There's just so much going on. It's so weird to have a PvP mindset here, too. The warrior shifted his attention to me at one point, and our raid leader, Tal, was like "Av, kite the warrior through the frost trap. No - no, the other way, the frost trap."

I'm sitting there, thinking "Ok, I can do this!! Wait. What's kiting. Oh, right. Ok - so - cheetah form will be good for this! Ok, go cheetah form. Wait. I can't go cheetah form, we're inside. Oh, that's a load of crap. But I can go cat and dash! Ok, great, cat form.... and then.... ok, now dashing.... ok, now where's that frost trap. Um. I'll just.... run him through this big white patch! Oh - wait, that's a BAD white patch. I'm slowed now. Oh, wtf. Oh! I'll use Nature's Grasp! Oh. He's immune. Oh, wtf." Meanwhile, Tal is probably facepalming his face off, while the warrior is whirlwinding me, while I frantically LB myself (which, in turn, shifts me out of cat-dash, sigh) and finally he shifts his attention elsewhere. Hahahaha. Oh, my god. So much fun.

I felt super useful despite the kiting tragedy, because I hibernated the hunter's pet, and I cycloned something at one point. Oh, and I rooted something, too! =D

It's just seriously awesome to be doing something other than throwing rejuv at everything. Hehe.

Overall, it was a blast. Our three hour raid was over before I knew it. This was awesome, because before I took my little break from wow/raiding, there would be raids where I'd look at the clock and think "Ugh, 2 more hours of raiding.... sigh." That's when I knew that maybe I needed a little break. =P

Can't wait to get back into it and raid again on Wednesday!

.

Resto druid raiding reqs for Ulduar: T8.5

.

A couple weeks ago I posted the T7.5 raiding reqs that I put together for the resto druids in my guild. That post has a lot of good information about what the function of requirements are, and why they work. It also lays out the basic information about gems and enchants, consumables, talents, glyphs, etc. I would highly recommend checking it out here.

With Ulduar coming in the next month or so, my guild has been preparing to update these requirements for the next tier. I recently put the resto druid reqs together and thought I would share them with you guys. These stats are based on the assumption that you will have a decent amount of 25 man heroic gear from Naxx, Malygos, or Sarth. Having Ulduar 10 gear is NOT required to meet these reqs.

I've just copy-pasted them straight from my guild website. Enjoy! =)

``````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````

Resto Druid Reqs

Woohoo, Ulduar!

Changes from T7.5 are in green.

Stats:

Bonus Healing: 1900 in tree form
Health: 15000
Mana: 16000
Mp5 while casting: 290

If you have the [Majestic Dragon Figurine], you can essentially add +180 spirit to your stats, which is basically +32 mp5. So you can figure that in while figuring out whether you meet the 285 mp5 cut off. Also, 180 spirit gives you about +30 extra spell power (give or take a point) in ToL form because of your ToL spirit aura, so you can factor that in as well.
Essentially, if you have the trinket, you can still meet reqs by having 258 mp5 and 1870 SP (in tol). If you're just barely meeting reqs this way, it means that you MUST wear that trinket for raids.

Similarly, if you have the [Illustration of the Dragon Soul], you can subtract 200 spell power from reqs yet still meet them.

Glyphs:

[Glyph of Swiftmend] is the only glyph that is required.

[Glyph of Lifebloom] is not really recommended anymore***. If you're planning on using the Regrowth Glyph or the Nourish Glyph, you should look at having the 5/5 Nature's Bounty (previously called Improved Regrowth - they changed the name for 3.1) talent. Pre-3.1, the talent gave you an extra 50% to crit on Regrowth. Post 3.1, it gives you a 25% chance to crit on Regrowth, and a 25% chance to crit on Nourish.

[Glyph of Innervate] is also good if you're having mana issues.

Two new glyphs come 3.1, [Glyph of Wild Growth] and [Glyph of Nourish], can also be considered. Depending on your healing style, both of these can be very powerful glyphs.

***We'll probably be letting Lifeblooms bloom more often than not due to the change in lifebloom, so having a longer duration on LB isn't really advantageous. After you get your healing rotation down in 3.1, maybe you'll find that you can roll LBs even with the double mana cost, and that the glyph helps you - at that point you can assess your glyphs.

Please see the T7.5 Naxx25 reqs for information on consumables, enchants, talents, gems, etc. Those requirements are still in effect.

Thanks guys! Let me know if you have any questions/concerns.

.

Resto druid raiding reqs!

.

Edit: Now with more tooltip!!

Our guild has always put together raiding requirements for various tiers of raiding. Raiding reqs are the minimum levels of stats, spellpower, hit cap, enchants, etc. that a guild member has to meet in order to be able to raid. Reqs help do a few things:

1. They give those new-to-end-game members a goal to shoot for. When you've just hit 80 and you're in mostly greens, it's a nice way to figure out what stats you need to improve on overall.

2. Reqs make sure that we can theoretically beat an instance. Ideally, if everyone meets the reqs that are put forth, we'll be able to get through the content.

3. They allow our Class Leaders to be extra picky and make sure that no veteran players are slacking off slightly and missing an enchant here or there, or using an old gem they haven't replaced. Typically this doesn't happen, because most of our veteran players are all min/maxers =)

For the most part (with a couple exceptions here and there), if you don't meet reqs, you don't raid, period. But if there's a situation of "either one person who's undergeared raids with us, OR, 24 people don't get to raid at all" kind of thing, then yeah, we'd probably let someone undergeared join us. This actually happened to me when the guild was in Black Temple - we were short on healers, and our raid leader whispers me and says "wanna heal BT?" I swear I almost fell out of my chair, I was so happy (I'd never raided anything but 10 man Kara with the guild.... hell, when I got to BT, I think Pete had to tell me to expand Grid out to show all 25 people >.<). Then of course afterwards, I beat myself up for being last in healing on WWS (errr DUH Averna, of course you're last, you're in KARA gear and blues/greens, they're all in like tier 87million or something). But overall it was such a thrill being able to raid with them like that.

Anyway, I digress. In coming up with reqs, it's kind of difficult to find that exact number of 'If you're over this, we will win, if you're under, we fail' though. Is 1600 spellpower enough? 1650? or should it be 1597? 1592? Or what if someone is a really good player and can get away with 1500? So a lot people have wondered, what are the baseline numbers that I *need* to have to get into a 25 man run? That being said, I put up my T7.5 raiding reqs for resto druids a while ago, and I thought you all might be interested in seeing them. These requirements are made *without* the assumption that you will be doing Naxx 10 man. Essentially, you should be able to meet these reqs with crafted gear, rep rewards, and drops from heroic 5 mans. Note that this is for all current 25 man content (T7.5): Naxxramas, OS, and Malygos.

````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````

Resto Druid Requirements

Keep in mind that this is the first time I've put a list of requirements together, so please feel free to PM me or talk to me in game about any questions you might have.

Note that all of these stats are IN TREE FORM.

Stats:

Bonus Healing: 1600 (which comes out to be 1477 spell power, if you're looking at your wowarmory and therefore don't have the tree buff on)
Health: 13000
Mana: 15000
Mp5 while casting: 260

Haste and crit are nice B stat bonuses to have, but there are no strict requirements on these.
For a benchmark: Over 310 haste and over 13% crit is quite good. Keep in mind that haste rating also affects your global cooldown, so haste *is* in fact applicable to instacasts like Lifebloom and Rejuv. If you're looking at different gear with haste and crit, haste is better to have than crit chance.

EDIT: If you have the [Majestic Dragon Figurine], you can essentially add +180 spirit to your stats, which is basically +32 mp5. So you can figure that in while figuring out whether you meet the 260 mp5 cut off. Also, 180 spirit gives you about +30 extra spell power (give or take a point) in ToL form because of your ToL spirit aura, so you can factor that in as well.
Essentially, if you have the trinket, you can still meet reqs by having 228 mp5 and 1570 SP (in tol). If you're just barely meeting reqs this way, it means that you MUST wear that trinket for raids.

Talents:

11 points in the Balance Tree to get to Nature's Splendor are required (5 in Genesis, 3 in Moonglow, 2 in Nature's Majesty, leading to 1 in Nature's Splendor)

Improved Mark of the Wild (2/2)
Nature's Swiftness
Swiftmend
Improved Rejuvenation
Empowered Rejuvenation
Living Spirit

Glyphs:

[Glyph of Swiftmend] is the only glyph that is required.
[Glyph of Lifebloom] and [Glyph of Regrowth] are recommended. If you're planning on using the Regrowth Glyph, you should look at having the 5/5 Improved Regrowth talent. I originally was requiring this but I'd rather not tell you guys how you should spec. [Glyph of Innervate] is also nice if you're having mana issues.

Consumables:

Food: Bring at least one stack of 20:

[Tender Shoveltusk Steak] or [Firecracker Salmon]
[Mighty Rhino Dogs] or [Spicy Fried Herring]
[Cuttlesteak] is also a good choice.

Spell power food is preferable, but Mp5 food or spirit food can be used if you find yourself consistently running short on mana.

Elixirs/Flasks/Potions:

[Flask of the Frost Wyrm] (preferable)
[Flask of Pure Mojo] (if you need the mana regen)
[Runic Mana Potion] (at least 15)
[Runic Healing Potion] (at least 5)

[Spellpower Elixir]
[Elixir of Mighty Mageblood]
[Elixir of Mighty Thoughts]
[Elixir of Spirit]

If you're using elixirs instead of flasks, you must have both battle and guardian elixirs.

Enchants:

All gear that can be enchanted, must be. Enchants should be +spell power, +spirit, and +intellect, with a focus on +spell power. Enchants that require Abyss Crystals will NOT be required (although after the patch, enchants in general should require less mats and/or less expensive mats, so keep that in mind as well), however, all enchants need to be WotlK quality. Obviously there are more enchants than you'll ever use here, but wowwiki has a complete list of enchants by slots HERE.

EDIT: An [Eternal Belt Buckle] WILL be required. Gem it with something appropriate (spell power, spirit, etc). Gems you put in this socket DO count towards your meta-gem requirement. These buckles can be found on the AH, plus a few people in guild can make them.

Gems:

Gems! Go for socket bonuses when appropriate (which is quite often). Here is a good list of what each color gem offers resto droods. Note that I list the blue, higher quality versions of these gems along with the "perfect" counterpart of the same gem, which is typically a LOT cheaper, and only a couple points short of the blue quality gem. Blue quality gems are strongly encouraged but not required. If you are NOT using the blue quality gems, you must use the "perfect" quality instead - anything under the quality of those is not acceptable.

Red: [Runed Scarlet Ruby] or [Perfect Runed Bloodstone]
Yellow: [Brilliant Autumn's Glow] or [Perfect Brilliant Sun Crystal]
Blue: [Sparkling Sky Sapphire] or [Perfect Sparkling Chalcedony]
Orange: [Luminous Monarch Topaz] or [Perfect Luminous Huge Citrine]

Green: You have a lot of options with green and purple gems. With these you can pick and choose what stats need a boost and gem accordingly. Some options:
[Timeless Forest Emerald] or [Perfect Timeless Dark Jade]
[Dazzling Forest Emerald] or [Perfect Dazzling Dark Jade]
[Seer's Forest Emerald] (very nice gem) or [Perfect Seer's Dark Jade]

Purple: [Royal Twilight Opal] or [Perfect Royal Shadow Crystal]
[Glowing Twilight Opal] or [Perfect Glowing Shadow Crystal]
[Purified Twilight Opal] or [Perfect Purified Shadow Crystal]

.

Raid healing

.

DPS players always talk about rotations they use, macros to keep up those rotations, etc. When healing as a resto druid, there's a very loose rotation you can use, but in general, *everything* you do is based on what's happening to everyone around you. I feel that healing is the epitome of adaptation.

My loose (emphasis on loose) rotation is something like this (say, if I'm tank healing and throwing some raid heals around when I can):

• Tank pulls.
  
• If the tank has low HP overall (which is rarely the case in our Naxx25 runs, but in 10s and 5s the tank might still be in the process of gearing up), I start with a Regrowth to bump him up right away and mitigate any initial damage.
  
• If the tank is fine on health, I might start with a Regrowth anyway, or I'll go with Rejuv, LB, LB, regrowth, LB (Rejuv first because it takes a bit to start to tick, so I want to get it on there right away).
  
• Refresh LBs as they tick down.
  
• Refresh Regrowth before its timer is up (for the glyph).
  
• Refresh Rejuv as necessary.
  
• If a DPS takes a spike in damage, I'll use rejuv+swiftmend.
  
• If the tank, or a necessary DPS takes a ton of damage, I'll use NS+HT. (Necessary = we're trying to beat an enrage timer, for example).
  
• And I use WG every single time it's up.

Ok, did you catch that last part?

Our guild ran a Naxx25 last Wednesday. These are the heals I used:




Wild Growth was almost a THIRD of all my heals. Note that it was also used wisely; only 10% of it was overheal. So it's not like I was running around spamming it every 6 seconds to no avail. 90% of the time, it was needed.
My first thought was, am I doing this wrong? Literally, I heard that stern booming disembodied voice in my head, the voice of, I don't know, the healy wow gods, or perhaps Ghostcrawler, and it's all like: "If you're using wild growth every time it's up, you're doing it wrong." With the reverb and what not? You know what I'm talking about. And then I'm thinking, what if that voice is right??

Blizzard did not intend to have us use WG all the time. They tried to dissuade us from this by implementing the 6 second cool down. And it seems they also don't want us to use every time the cool down is up, either. Blue says:

"At 6 seconds, you would still want to use CoH/WG in the right situations (though hopefully not *every* time they are up)"

But I'm finding a use for it...pretty much every time it's up. I mean hell, if people weren't taking so much freaking damage all over the place, maybe I wouldn't spam it. If it was less viable, or cost more mana, or *something*, I would definitely think about using it less.

Some numbers:

A 3 stack of lifeblooms cost 42% base mana.
A regrowth costs 29% base mana.
A wild growth costs 23% mana.

AND: If you've got good spell power and all your buffs, your WG is going to hit for close to 800 on that first tick, and then tick every second for a little less for seven seconds. The last tick is usually somewhere around 500 for each person. So it averages out to roughly 650 per tick. That's like putting 2 lifeblooms (because 2 LBs tick for about 650 a second) on 5 different people (yes, I'm ignoring the bloom, and the extra 3 seconds to LB from talents/glyphs. Just looking at the basic ticks). Which would take 10 GCDs to accomplish. And a ton of mana. Whereas WG takes ONE GCD, and like, no mana at all.

Of course this doesn't mean that you should, as a hard fast rule, put WG on everyone all the time every time it's up - there are situations where it's not the best heal.

And I'm not really advocating that it be nerfed, although I can see how it looks like I am. I mean, it already *was* nerfed with the implement of the 6 second cool down. I guess overall I'm just more surprised that my healing style is WG oriented, and I'm surprised at how good a heal it can be.

The rest of the chart seems pretty normal. Lifebloom, Regrowth, Rejuv, etc. I'm not a big Regrowth healer like some others, but since I've gotten the glyph, I'm working on it. For me, Regrowth is too slow, and I get antsy and impatient waiting for a 1.8 second cast >.<

So "am I doing it wrong"? Well...I don't really think so. I topped the healing charts for that raid overall, and for all bosses (and we have some really great healers in our guild, so I don't really *expect* to top the charts every time.. although one can hope =P). And more importantly, our raid didn't wipe once, on any boss, including Sapph and KT.

Interestingly, the other resto druid in the raid also had WG as his most-used heal.

Are other people finding themselves using WG more often than not, or are we both just an anomaly?

.

Naxxramas

.

Damn, I've let this blog fall to the wayside, haven't I. I've been too busy leveling to 80, leveling my abysmal fishing (yeah, it's at 250 something right now - and that's after hours of working at it... no Dalaran coins for me for a while), running countless heroics (at this point, there are literally no more upgrades that I can get through heroic badge loot - I've bought them all), trying to sadly, slowly, painstakingly get my Sons of Hodir rep up, and finally, finally! starting some Naxx 25s with my guild =D Which is exciting. Raiding and instances are one of the main reasons I play the game. I really, really enjoy healing people in pve. Pvp never really stuck with me, and solo leveling was fun only because at level, like, 42, I hadn't yet experienced a real 25 man raid; leveling was all I knew.

Which brings us here, now, to Naxx 25. HAI NAXX 25

Naxx 25 is easy. Yeah. It is. It saddens me to say this. I used to read the forums on elitist jerks and I'd hate the people who'd be all like "You only need like 3 or 4 healers, it's so easy, it's boring, anyone could do it." And now that I'm in there.. le sigh. There are no wipe fests! I actually ENJOY wipefests. It makes finally downing a boss all that more delicious. Maybe we'll have a couple wipes here and there due to stupid reasons, but overall, it's not. hard.

Now don't get me wrong - it's not like we've plowed through the instance in one night. We couldn't even get to Sapph and KT in two nights (granted, that was because of the MASSIVE LAG BOSS. God I hate that boss). It's just that you go through trash, doo do dooo, bah kill the shade! come across a boss, ok this is what she does, kill the adds, MC this guy, heal the MT, watch for the web wrap, don't stand in the void zones, don't get silenced, decimate! kill the zombies, and boom. Boss down. Moving on. Meh. Each boss can be done in one try. There are a crapload of bosses in there, sure, so overall, it can take a while. But rarely have we come across a boss in one of the wings that we've had major trouble on.

I guess this makes sense. If each boss was THAT difficult, people wouldn't be able to get to Sapph and KT unless they raided like 5 times a week. Very few people would get to see that end game content. O WAIT HAI BLIZZ I SEE WUT U DID THUR U NERFED STUF SO PPL COULD SEE IT sigh.

It's not at the point where it's so easy, I don't enjoy running it. I have a lot of fun healing the group, and I certainly do have to pay attention on each fight to make sure I'm doing my part. I guess I wish it was *slightly* more challenging. Then again, we still have to get through Maly25 and OS 3D 25, so that's something to look forward to :P

Oh, BY THE WAY. On Loatheb (healbot scrambled, cute, huh?) I've been a total IDIOT at healing. Put LBs on the raid, timing it right so that they bloom during the three seconds! Duh! /facepalm. Granted in 10 man, you just have to precast a HT, try for a quick swiftmend on someone else, and then quick WG on one group, and everything ends up fine and dandy. Haven't tried it on 25. But I'll be rocking the blooms.

EDIT: Loatheb is easy sauce with 7 healers. I think I put one HT precasted on one person the entire fight. I did put up some LBs and tried to time them right, but it didn't really seem to make a big difference. WG was also FTW. There was just so much healing going on, each person's individual heals were just a drop in the water. I guess overall that's good, because we were able to get him down on the first try. Sigh. wtb challenge.

.