I Guess I Need to Finish Levelling my Holy Paladin…

/start rant

Last Thursday I finally listened to Final Boss podcast on Resto Druids and it was kind of a bummer. I cannot lie, I still live in the moment when I was in the guild Fallen Heroes and Resto Druids were king. We were running all the Wraith content then and we always were running a Resto Druid, a Pally, and a Priest for sure.  But Resto Druids were always needed and wanted. In my current guild, we do not have many options and are running with three Resto Druids like I mentioned in my last post and a Holy and Disc Priest, so it not like we are going to be subbed as healers, but should we be? We are healing well and maybe we are not at the point that this matters but is our core healing team the problem? Are we the reason we have only downed 2 bosses in BRF and 4 in Highmaul? There is always the excuse that “oh the tanks are taking too much damage” or “we do not have enough DPS” but what if the real reason is “we do not have the right kind of healers.”   I think that it would be best to see if the raid leaders/guild leaders can take a look at the logs all together and see what we are lacking. It could be all three of the major issues or a combination of them.

The hindrance of having three Resto Druids was a bit noticeable when we ran BRF on Saturday. We ended up getting Gruul and Beastlord Darmac down on the first try which is really great. Then we moved onto Operator Thogar. We are doing pretty well on the fight but seem to lose it on the raid splits. I am the one chosen to follow the tank over to the one side and heal them. Normally I believe this roll of single tank healing would fall to a Pally, someone with great burst healing that will not let the tank die while he is being smashed in the face by a boss and tons of mobs. I am able to do it, basically I HoT the tank up and Regrowth/Heart of the Wild spam, but as I think about it, it would be way more effective for a non-HoT healer with great single heals to do this role.

I have two Holy Pally’s, one for the Horde side and one for the Alliance side that are almost level 100 and I am now seriously considering finishing leveling them and then trying one out in raid. I am for sure going to play the Pally on the Horde side; I am just not sure about what to do on the Alliance side. I love my Druid, I really do, but there comes a point in when progression is important and I want to do the best I can for the guild.  I have never been one to change a class. I have been playing a Resto Druid almost since the beginning and it is the only character I have seriously raided with. It would feel weird not to have her around. I do not like being at the crossroads like this and as I said before, maybe in Normal things like this are not important and you really only need to get up to Heroic and Mythic for it to matter, but I really am not sure.

In the end, I think I get jealous that I am not at the higher content yet. I know jealously is ugly but I really miss not being able to take a few nights a week and raid with a consistent group. I love the feeling of downing bosses and hitting the achievement of being in a high-end raiding guild. But that is not the situation we are in right now, and that is OK. I would just like to progress a little more. So for now, I will continue to raid with my Druid changing up my talents a bit with the advice from Jarre and Affinity and I will level my Pally and see what happens.

What do you think of Druids currently? Are we viable?

/end rant!

Happy Healing!

Adventures in Blackrock Foundry

I know it has been a few days (week or so) since my last post on either blog but boy things have been busy. Work is busy, home is busy, kids are busy and at the end of the day I just want to relax and play some video games, hence why no posts! We have been raiding on Saturday nights though and the past two weeks we have ventured into BRF. The guild ended up getting Gruul and Beastlord Darmac down!

I am really enjoying the difficulty of BRF, and I know that it has caused some tension in other guilds and trash is REALLY annoying at times, but it feels like a step in the right direction. The guild has seemed to pull together more and put forth a great effort at getting these bosses down. Not that we were not doing the same thing in Highmaul, but it feels that this time we are pushing harder than before. The new gear that we are getting helps a lot too. I would like to be able to say that I have been trying to get into other groups and run some Heroic Highmaul but that has not happened since I have been getting sucked into other games….dang you Alien: Isolation and Age of Wonders 3…

Gruul

I am so glad that Gruul is back. I loved this fight a long time ago, and this space makes it that much better. When we fought Gruul before, I felt that the space was bigger and it allowed for more movement of groups. This time, we are in a more compact zone and we had to pull together and make sure we were listening to the queues called by the raid leader. This might also be the first time I have ever seen a group put in Tranquility rotations, but this is also the first time I have ever ran with more than two Resto druids (we currently have three). But, the Tranq rotations really helped keep us focused and made sure we did not over-tranq one another. Two things I love about Gruul is cave-ins and his smash. These allow the raid leaders to see who is paying attention and not getting hit by the bad and really helps players tune into what they need to be paying attention to. Raid awareness is KEY in BRF and I think that this will be a continuing trend.

Beastlord Darmac

We did not get him down the first week, but we did get him down in week 2! This fight can sometimes be a mess, especially with all the fire in the end. I like that DBM does let you know what direction he is pointing in to breathe the fire. I just watch for the red circle so I do not get hit with that nasty fire. I hate fire, mostly because I run through as a Tree and we are flammable! The fight is complex in that it takes a bunch of different tactics and puts them into one area. This was a great test for our group and after a few tries we got it right. I like this complexity here! I even had to use Soothe which is a spell I have not used in a LONG time.  Again this focuses on raid awareness!

Three Resto Druids!

Our normal healing group (lately) has been three Resto Druids and two Priests.  This is a much different healing group that I am used to from the past. I always have ran with a Pally or a Shammy and I honestly think that this is making us become better healers since we are missing some of that direct healing. We have to heal in different ways to make sure large amounts of damage are not killing our tanks. I am not saying that Druids are not good at healing, but it is a different type of healing (HoTs) and I am thankful we are running with Priests at least to help us balance out. There are a lot of times where our HoTs are keeping the group alive but some of the heavy hits are tough. But every week were are getting better and better at complementing one another and ensuring that we are able to heal the fights. I cannot wait to get back in there!

Happy Healing!

Raid Analysis: Part 2

On Thursday I talked a bit about my own personal healing and the numbers I am pulling. I made some notes that I need to make sure I am casting Lifebloom more often and watch overhealing. Today, I would like to look at what gear I am wearing and see just how effective it is in comparison to what AskMrRobot inforgraphics are saying about how I should be preforming when compared with other Resto Druids with the same ilvl. First, here is a link to my current gear and spec. I know that I do not have the best gear, we have only completed a few bosses in Normal Highmaul. But I have been running LFR BRF and do have some gear from the random garrison missions in BRF. I am running with the 4 piece bonus, which I am enjoying, though I need to look at the benefits of the bonus a bit more.

As I mentioned last time, I am enchanting my weapon with Mark of Shadowmoon but I am unsure if I need to keep using it. It might be more beneficial if I were to change to the haste enchant. I am also about to make Stone of Fire; need only 4 more Savage Bloods! I think this trinket is actually pretty nice. Sure, it has versatility on it and that is not my favorite stat, but the amount of intellect it gives and the increase from mana pots is really nice! In checking the logs, the intelligence proc was up 30% of the time, which I think it pretty good when it comes to a procing trinket with a high internal cooldown. ( The Strength, Agility or Intellect proc chance is 35%. The stat proc lasts for 15 seconds and the internal cooldown is 55 seconds.) I want to check out the logs again once I upgrade the trinket to the Stone of Fire.

Now to take a look at some of the AskMrRobot infographics. I think this is a really neat tool that can help a player see how they compare to others at their ilvl. First, the picture below on the top is what healers on The Butcher should be doing at my iLvl. So the 95th percentile of resto druids are doing 41k, way higher than I am! Right now, I am hitting just in the green at 74th percentile, which is good, but I am happy to see there is room for improvement. The picture on the bottom is the over all for the Twin Ogron. I ended up doing 22k on the Twins which is pretty good when comparing it to the normal for my ilvl but when I first saw that number I was shocked since it was so much lower than what I can pull on other bosses.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The first infographic is talking about how this fight went overall and how I compare. I am going to use two very different fights and show how I did in both. The picture on the top is The Butcher and the picture on the bottom is Twin Ogron. This section shows how well I performed in the fight. For The Butcher It takes into account potion use, avoidable damage, cleave, and HPS. For the Twins it looks at potion use, interrupting shout, HPS, avoidable damage, and enfeebling roar. For The Butcher, it is pretty easy to make sure you use a potion, and since I am ranged, to avoid cleave and the other avoidable damage. Most ranged can get those numbers. For HPS, I scored a 7.4 out of 10. This number reports back to the picture above and shows where I am on the scale. As for the Twins, I did a little less hot. Of course I remembered to use a potion (or I would be OOM fast) and I avoided the interrupting shout. HPS is down from The Butcher which might be accounted in the fact that I am running from fire about 50% of the time. Or I am avoiding fire way less than 50% of the time with only a score of 4.7…..ouch… I also got a score of 0 for running in for enfeebling roar. I maybe ran in one time, no good. As you can see the complexity of the boss is much different for me as a healer in Twins than it is for The Butcher. Raid awareness is much harder for the Twins, and something I need to work on, but that fire…it is horrible!

 

The next section on the infographic just shows how much HPS was done for the fight. As stated above, I did 33k on The Butcher and on the Twins I did 22K.

The third section of the infographic asks “Is that good healing?” On the top is the number for The Butcher and on the bottom is Twins. This shows how the healing looks in comparison to people in Normal Highmaul.  My numbers are looking good, but there is room for improvement. I think that if I increased my raid awareness (like avoiding the fire in Twins) I will be able to increase these a bit.

 

To me, this is the most important graphic. I want to know how I am doing in comparison to other Resto druids at my ilvl. Resto Druids are great healers and with our HoTs we are able to saturate the raid in heals. For the Butcher, 74th percentile is pretty good. There is not a lot of movement for me that fight. I just need to ensure I keep Lifebloom up and use Nature’s Vigil more often. I also think I need to watch when I am doing Tranquility as I wasted it on this fight and it was mostly used as an overheal. As for the Twins, 68th percentile means I could show a lot more improvement. When looking at the logs (below) I again did not cast Lifebloom enough and it seems that there were not enough people in the range of Tranquility. Per usual, my overhealing is high on Rejuv and Germination, but it is not too bad on other spells. This lower percentage could be due to the fact that I am moving around a lot more and there is a wide variety of damage due to the moving fire.

 

 

Looking at the logs from both of these fights makes me wonder two things:

1. Should I even be using the Glyph of Rejuvenation and Glyph of Healing Touch? The Glyph of Rejuvenation provides the following benefit:  when you have Rejuvenation active on three or more targets, the cast time of your Healing Touch spell is reduced by 10%. The Glyph of Healing Touch says when you cast Healing Touch, the cooldown on your Nature’s Swiftness is reduced by 2 sec. But when look at the numbers, I only casted Healing Touch 5 times in The Butcher and 5 times in Twins. Both of these glyphs seem like a waste if I am not using Healing Touch often. Though I am not sure what glyph I would switch to. Should I try to use Healing Touch more often (though it does make me nervous since it does have a high mana cost) or should I use different glyphs? What glyphs do you use?

2. When does everyone use Incarnation: Tree of Life or do you even have it? it took me a while to even get on using it every fight and it seems that if you time it right you could be using it twice a fight at times. I have been trying to remember to use it every fight but there are times when I just do not use it nor think that it is needed in the fight. I do use it in Brackenspore all the time when the Rejuv Mushroom is out and I can just sit there and spam the raid with Regrowth! But I am really unsure if Force of Nature or Soul of the Forest is better than Tree of Life. What are your thoughts on the talents?

As per last time, any advice would be great!

Happy Healing!

Raid Analysis: Part 1

On Monday I said I wanted to talk a bit about gear and rotation and since I have not done much in WoW this week (ie – this post here) I figured it was a good place to start. Over the weekend I worked out some gear and rotation issues I have been having and I felt like I was in a good place. Though, I am not perfect and would like to look at my logs as one big happy family and see where I am having issues. I am mostly going to look at The Butcher for this information and I am using AskMrRobot as my combat log analyser. They have great graphics, and show the information in a nice concise way.  ***I would like to also note that I am only discussing my own healing and no one else’s in this post.***

The first image below is the overall healing for The Butcher. Like I said in the first post, I am very ecstatic about that 33K HPS, even though at my current gear score I think I can be pulling more. I have noticed my numbers are on a general uptrend (ie: Brackenspore was also at 33K). The next number that I am not too proud of is the overhealing number. As a healer from BC, overhealing has always been a big issue. You want to heal and make sure no one is dying but if you heal too much then it is a waste. There is such a fine line for me when it comes to healing and making sure the group is surviving. We will get more into this number a bit later. The last number of note here is my active time. Why is it not 100% you ask? Well because I use the Draenic Channeled Mana potion in fights and this gives me a 10 second downtime for every fight. (I love this potion in fights and find that if used correctly I can get a ton more mana especially when using the Stone of the Waters. I almost can make the Stone of Fire!). Then there is moving and the general “well no one is taking damage so I am not wasting mana,” standing around.

The next image is one that is more descriptive per spell. As you can see most of my overhealing comes from Rejuvenation, though I am not too shocked by this number. In many instances, especially in this fight, i try to roll HoTs (Rejuv and Germin) on a lot of the raid. With The Butcher, the melee DPS (or the DPS in melee position) take a lot of continuous damage.  The same can be said for the overhealing with Germination. Wild Mushroom, Wild Growth and Tranq are bound to have some overhealing, though Wild Growth might be a bit high and in this fight it seems that I did Tranquility at the wrong moment. 73% overheal….oi! I am happy to see some ok percentages for Multistrike since I do not focus on that stats.

One major issue I have is my Lifebloom. 22.3% uptime is not very good. I do not expect 100% since i like the bloom going off, but at least 75% . I need to make sure that I am rolling this on the tank that has main aggro on the boss.

I also need to make sure that I am using Nature’s Swiftness! I am using it more than i ever had before but I would like a higher uptime with it. It is such a useful spell but I hate to waste it at the very beginning of the fight where there might not be that much damage occurring.

Below is the graphic that shows the total healing done and lets me see how my mana is during the fight. I made it a little over halfway through before I used a Draenic Channeled Mana potion which let me finish the fight off until the end with pretty good mana. The big spike in healing is when I casted Tranquility. I know that casting Wild Growth is very mana heavy so I need to make sure that I am only using it where there is a group of players that are taking/will be taking a lot of damage. That will help me use less mana. Right now, I am enchanting my weapon with the mana enchant. I think I would like to take that off and try the haste enchant in order to see how it will affect my healing.

As I said before, I know I am not perfect and need some work. I need to focus on fixing my overhealing a bit, keeping Lifebloom up, and ensuring that I keep high raid awareness. I want to look more into what I am doing in order to hit the higher numbers and be a more effective healer for my team.

Any advice for me?

Check out Part 2 on Friday or Saturday to see some more analysis using some of AskMrRobots infographics!

Happy Healing!