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Raid healing as a druid can either be entirely boring, or extremely exciting. It all depends upon the roll that you are asked to play as the raid progresses, and the type of boss encounter you are faced with.

Overall raid healing usually consists of spot healing non-tank-type raiders that take incremental damage, without maintaining aggro. I am specced with Empowered Rejuvenation along with Glyph of Swiftmend and Glyph of Rejuvenation. So, my most effective spot-heal is Rejuvenation followed by a lovely Swiftmend as-needed.

On the rare occasion that I am assigned to heal the Main Tank or Off-Tank, spell rotation is very important to maintaining full hots on my primary target, as well as secondary target, in addition to applying direct heals to my primary target.

The most effective spell rotations take into account the decreased cast time for direct heals and Global Cooldown thanks to spell haste. Once you work out a steady rotation, MT healing should work almost like clockwork. I tend to get into a groove and almost keep steady time with the Global Cooldown, like the beat of a song.

The MT casting rotation that seems to be working best for me is:

• My primary healing target picks-up his mob and generates aggro.
• As my target drops to around 60% of his HP I first apply a nice, healthy Regrowth.
• Follow with a plump little Rejuvenation and a quick stack of Lifeblooms.
• I then throw in a Healing Touch or a Nourish and/or a Swiftmend if the cooldown is up to finish off the rotation as needed,
• then start again with a Regrowth.

Timing usually works out to where the Rejuvenation is ready to be refreshed as soon as I start my next rotation.

If there is another secondary healing target close by, I typically maintain the same hots on both my primary and secondary target within the rotation, and add in a Wild Growth.

The upcoming change to Wild Growth will add additional healing to Nourish, which will more than likely change my choice of spells and somewhat change of some strategies and MT/OT placement within the raid to aid both and improve use of our mechanics.

One major challange I have run into lately is the fact that I have yet to come across a Grid add-on that denotes Wild Growth. I currently have GridStatusHots that indicates most of my other up-time hots, but not Wild Growth. Hopefully an additional indicator becomes available before the Nourish change since right now Wild Growth is the only whack-a-mole heal since I have no idea who the hot lands on.

The largest part of being an effective raiding resto druid is figuring out what works best for you and your group. Some raids might consist of tanks with less defense, dodge, parry, etc – that might take more damage than initial rotations make up for. It is a trial and error to work out what works best for your gear level at the moment. The best part is, gear improves, tanks take less damage, and healing becomes less stressful over time.

Happy Healing!

Are you a raiding resto? What healing rotation works best for you? Reply and share your learnings, or shoot me an e-mail at MissRawr1337@gmail.com.

In my years playing World of Warcraft, raiding as both a DPS and a healing class, I have made many mistakes, and learned many things along the way. From those growing opportunities, I have compiled a short list of things that every raider should know.

Do Your Homework
Learn where you guild is in progression, study the encounters, know your roll as well as that of others, watch videos, share your insite with raiders in preparation for the encounter well in advance of the raid.

Get Your Buff On
Every single raiding guild in WoW outlines what they expect from their raiding members. 99.9% of them detail that they expect for raiders to show up prepared with consumables. This includes self-buff foods, flasks and elixirs, as well as reagents. If your class isn’t a buffing class, go the extra mile to build campfires for those that need to cook on the fly, and brag about your ubar Cozy Campfire buff for the raid.

Don’t Count on Heals
Anyone other than the main tank and off-tanks shouldn’t count on getting heals. When you do, it is nice and very well appreciated. However, when learning new encounters, progressing in content that is at first challenging, healers are stretched for mana. So, the other raid members who might pull aggro, stand in green goop, etc… need to fend for themselves for awhile. For the sake of your healers, level your First Aid! Carry bandages and use them! Rather than standing around waiting for a heal, pop a bandage and get back to business!

AFK, WTF?!?!
As the raid is forming, go take care of business. Raids take anywhere from 2-10 hours and the last thing anyone wants to do is sit around waiting for your to tinkle, walk your dog, take a shower, unload your mom’s groceries, or any of the other hundreds of “BRB”s I have seen in my day. You have 24 other people (39 back in the day), who are counting on you to be there 100% of the time. If you can’t manage outside influences, think twice about offering yourself up as a dedicated raider.

Take Feedback as a Positive
If you are faced with a situation where you are given a directive from the raid leader, do it. Get clarification when needed, but it is always best to leave the judgment up to those that the guild trusts to make those calls. Don’t take it personal, don’t think that you aren’t doing a good job, just improve the roll you are playing. Use feedback constructively.

Don’t Let Loot Ruin a Relationship
Plan ahead, know which loot drops of which boss and focus on the items that will benifit you the most. If you don’t get an item that you have planned for, don’t sweat it. It will drop again. Congratulate the raid member that received the item and let it go. If the content is on farm, you will see it drop again.

Talk Less, Listen More
Ventrilo is a wonderful tool that is almost necessary to aid raiding. However, logging onto vent doesn’t mean that raid members are welcome to join the Hello Kitty Knitting Club Hour. We are there for a goal. When the first pull starts, vent should become quite and open for raid calls and feedback.

Keep Perspective
Always keep in mind that the overall goal of the raid is to challenge and beat encounters. Often times people get wrapped up and transfixed by shiny numbers, bars going up and down and mashing buttons. And, too often people become meter-whores. Meters are a wonderful tool to gauge improvements and identify areas that need improvement. But, unless an issue is being addressed during the raid, meters need to stay out of the raid. Anyone who is so enthralled by the meters should be looking at them on their own screen. Meters should never be broadcast during the middle of a raid. Save the feedback and backslapping for after the raid.

Feed Your WoW
Nothing will ever grow unless it is nurtured and encouraged. Study your raid WWS report whenever possible, even the raids you don’t attend. Find out what works, what is eating your mana, what is that other guy doing, what buffs is he using…. study it from all angles and improve your play. Most importantly, if you see something that a fellow raider can improve upon talk with them about it constructively.

Give for the Greater Good of the Guild
Great guilds are not born, they are made by their members. The best raiders are not just raiders, they are great members of their guild community. It bodes well to plan ahead for future progression goals and farm materials and consumables in advance. Helping to provide items for the guild not only shows favorably for you, but also encourages others to do the same.

All told, raiding has been an adventure in online etiquette, communication and time management. Through learnings and perseverance (and ibuprofen), progress has come with effort. Any raider should equal and/or surpass the effort of his fellow raiders. Challenge and learn from one another. After all, this is a social game – improve your raiding community by example.

The largest challenge since dinging 80 and joining in the already well progressed raiding has been mana regeneration. Considering most Heroic Naxxramas boss encounters (and sometimes trash), last onwards of 10-minutes, I first found myself innervating and potting very early. Through hooking up some Leatherworking craftables and a few Heroic instance drops I was lucky enough to get my spirit and MP5 up to somewhere sustainable.

Then, I hit the spirit jackpot. Within two days I landed the Majestic Dragon Figureine and then the Spirit-World Glass. Both are specifically spirit trinkets, which with the first’s on-use, and the second’s 10x stack bonus, puts my spirit over 1200. In turn, my mana regeneration after the 5-second rule is averaging 1100 per second.

As we all know, real life should always take priority over in-game life. Lucky for me, my RL (real life) holiday is going to be consumed by WoW – thanks to the ex having the ankle-biter for a majority of the holiday. So, raiding pushes on right through the madness of the season.

Typically raiding ceases when entering the holidays, Christmas, 4th of July, or any other major day-off when we all eat massive amounts of food and pass out. But, with good planning, and an overabundance of guild members at the moment, we should be able to puddle right on farming content we have already completed.

Along those lines, this has been a productive week despite RL holiday preparations. My guild, Insomnia, now officially has Heroic Naxxramas on farm after a full-clear three weeks in a row. We also completed Sarathion on Heroic, while leaving a Drake up to complete the achievement, Twilight Assist. Lastly, we downed Heroic Malygos for the first time with a full-guild raid. So, needless to say, we have some steam powering us into farming through the first of the year.

Equally as important, I received a nice little early Winters Veil present from Blizzard today when I completed one of my Brunnhildar Village daily quests when what from my Hyldnir Spoils appeared but a cute little, fuzzy wuzzy White Polar Bear mount, which I can turn into a reindeer! Personally, I am not one that collects mounts, vanity pets are more my thing. But, it was a nice little surprise – something worth rhyming about. lol

I hope your Winters Veil is progressing equally as well as mine.

Happy Hunting!~

I am still very new to the WoW Blogging community, and luckily I have been well received by those that I have solicited feedback from. Thankfully, I am able to repay the favor, as well as pay it forward.

Recently it seems that a tagging outbreak has occurred through various blogs that I follow. We are all taking the time to note and thank those that were some of the first to comment and make mention of our blogs, and also take a minute to mention blogs that stand apart, and those that inspire and delight us.

When/if your blog is mentioned, it is asked that you do the same on your own site. And, so on… (It is like the strange chain e-mail that your mother sends you attached with a note regarding her certain demise if the instructions aren’t followed. Only, no strange fortune here… just blog-love.)

So, here we go:
The first reader to comment on my site was Deekow. He and I began blogging right around the same time, so our Author Introductions were listed close together on Blog Azeroth. Thus, he followed my blog and I followed his. Kinda like we held each others hand in the beginning. Thanks, Dee!

1. Resto4Life – everyone and their druid knows and loves Phae. Her love for the game and the druid class goes much deeper than noticed at first glance. She also does an amazing job behind the scenes supporting and encouraging fellow-bloggers with Blog Azeroth. No matter how many times we all thank her, it is never enough,
2. Leafshine: Lust for Flower – More than just another druid blog, Leafshie’s whit and humor shine through in his original posts. Additionally, his accent is sexy as all get out – check him out visiting with Twisted Nether.
3. Speaking of Twisted Nether, our buds reining over the world of internether are also purveiors of their personal blogs; Bre has Gun Loving Dwarf Chick,
4. and Fimlys has Asleep at the WoW. I thorually enjoy their blogcast, and additionally I keep up with their in-game adventures on their site.
5. Musings of a Raider is a witty telling of personal adventures and minor triumphs told by a dedicated raider, such as myself.

All of these sites, and many others that I follow can be found on my complete blog roll. I am sure any of them would love to have you stop by for a visit.

So, I hope you find the time to refresh and revisit the list of blogs that you read, or planned on reading at one point or another. There are loads of knowledgeable and hilarious people out in the WoW blogging community. Most will not only give you their personal opinion and share their WoW adventures, but many will do so in a way that others enjoy reading.

Happy Blogging!

Questing in WOTLK has been quite a different experience from that of vanilla WoW, or even The Burning Crusade. In the past, it was an arduous process of reading, killing…. reading, killing… etc. This time around however, the quests have amazing stories coinciding with pinnacle completions and exciting tie-ins with instances and various zones and factions.

I have yet to finish question in each of the Northrend zones, but here is a quick list of the amazing quests that have captured my attention thus far:

Aladin Ain’t Got Nuttin’ on these Digs
One of the very first quest chains that sent me outside of the confines of Warsong Hold didn’t just send me trucking along via land mount. The NPC cast me upon a magical magic carpet that glided through the air, over the invading scourage, viewing the amazing landscapes and landed smack dab in the middle of a mini-questing area. Right then and there I knew that Wrath had some exciting rides in store if the carpet was so far at the beginning of my journey. And thus far I was right.

Arthas’ Frozen Heart
While questing in Icecrown I was directed to blow-up the Citadal. Though the effort was failed, the blast sent me barreling down under the Citadal into a forgotten wasteland filled with faceless nightmarish creatures and loads of Saronite *wink*. Upon gainig my barrings, I arrived to the aid of a small ghostly boy named Mattias Lehner. The boy’s quest was rather disturbing. As he spoke he expressed how scared he was and how he knows that the Lich King is watching.

Through finishing the series of quests that Mattias sends you on you arrive to the conclusion that Mattias is in fact an an anagram of Arthas Menethil, and that the child is an anomaly of Arthas’ frozen heart which he cast away when he merged with the Lich King.

The overall story was very creepy and somewhat sad to know that Arthas’ inner-child is left roaming Icecrown, hiding in plain site and helping others understand what lead fate to Arthas’ frozen thrown.

Dominatrix Vrykul
Upon beginning the quest line to earn faction with Sons of Hodir, I was asked to first gain the trust of a group of Vrykul women in Brunnhildar Village.

One of the first quest allowed me to put my domm corsette and whip some men into submission. The caves outside of the village are filled with men that are beaten and downtrodden. Scared into working for the Brunnhildar women, these men often fall to exhaustion. The quest asked that I find those loafers and zap them. Although, sometimes zapping clearly was not enough. lol Somewhere deep inside it felt good to stick it to those Nordic-80’s-hair-band-looking guys.

On a side note, the Brunnhildar Village quests were rather amusing for me specifically, as a druid. When you enter the village and do quests to aid in gaining respect, you are disguised as one of the villagers themselves. It seems that someone forgot to take into account druid flight form when planning the disguise. While in the village I became superwoman in flight form. Not only was I flying, I was swimming through the air with the greatest of ease. Now, if I only had a red cape!

They Like Me, They Really Like Me!
The series of quests with the Brunnhildar Village of vrykul women and Thorim at the Temple of Storms weave a story of betrayal, rectifying the past, and making piece with the Sons of Hodir.

Upon reaching Neutral with the Sons, their king tasks you with earning more respect by aiding an old warrior in battle. I just have to mention this specific vehicle quest because the graphic has you riding in the giants hand. It was rather King Kong-ish, and gave me quite a tickle.

I hope that your adventures in Northrend have been enjoyable thus far. Mine certainly have been!

Which WOTLK quests have captured your attention thus far?
Share stories and screenshots of your Greatest Hits with me at MissRawr1337@gmail.com. I will make sure to add them in Greatest Hits: Volume Two!

Stompalina hit 80 about a week ago now, nearly a month after a majority of my guild. The late start on raiding has required a bit of planning and preparation on my part to ready me for jumping right into raiding. Here are a few points that have helped me obtain my goals this week:

Gear Check
In my quest to research gear I came across a wonderful listing of pre-raid gear posted by our friends at Elitist Jerks. And, knowing what an organized freak I am, I reworked the listing into one that can be sorted by instance/boss/etc – here. The listing is a great resource for scoping out instances with gear upgrades, along with important quest rewards and gear obtained by collecting Emblems of Heroism – all of which are helpful in preparing for raiding.

Game Face
Another important piece of the raiding puzzle left to be reconfigured and prepared is my raiding UI (user interface). As with most add-ons, WOTLK totally put the shut down on compatibility for my pretty raiding UI. Since release I have been slowly resetting my raiding UI with new add-ons that are wrath-compatible, and keeping them current is now very easy-breezy with the Curse Client.

Setting up your UI for raiding is important, not just to look pretty, but to maximize your on-screen real estate. As a healer, it is easy to get bogged down in looking at bars going up and down. Unfortunately, that is only half the battle of being a good healer. The other half is being aware of your surroundings and being about to react quickly. To further maximize view perspective, there is a simple macro that adds additional camera area between you and your character. It is a must for any raider!

/script SetCVar("cameraDistanceMax",30)

Skirmish Raiding
PVP raiding is an excellent way to get back into the swing of raid healing. Once you get used to the fact that you are destined to die (a lot), you can use the raid to set up your raid frames, as well as use and test your key bindings and clique combinations for both offensive and defensive spells. Additionally, PVP is an opportunity to work on personal-defensive reaction times (barkskin, war stomp, etc). Keeping yourself alive with quick reaction time is just as importing as shiny green numbers.

Secondary Skillz
As lame as most people think it is, cooking and fishing are a vital part of the game. And, to fully be prepared for raiding, most people are required to provide self-buffs including food. Unless you have a crutch buddy who is willing to cook for you every couple of days, it is almost absolutely necessary to level cooking to provide your buff food. The new cooking dailies are quick and nearly painless to get done on a frequent basis. The best part about the new cooking quests is that you are able to select the newly obtainable recipe that benefits you the most from the get-go by using your Dalaran Cooking Awards.

All in all, I have put about a week now into gearing up via craftables and drops, and I entered Heroic Naxxramas tonight with my guild. It was nearly painless, and I was able to contribute with much needed healing. From here, I still have a bit of catching up to do, but being prepared and dedicated lends itself to being able to post the numbers needed to be a successful raiding guild in Wrath.

It seemed like it took forever, but I finally reached 80! There were quite a few things that slowed, and at some points nearly stopped my leveling this time around. But, all told, I intentionally took my time leveling, enjoying the story lines and learning more about the lore along the way.

For the most part my T6 equivalent gear has not been replaced, and I have picked up a complete set of feral gear from quest rewards and leatherworking craftables. I also picked up a plethora of achievements along the way. So, now what?

Preparing for Raiding
Currently I am a healer in a raiding guild, so my primary focus will be getting up to speed with my gear by running heroics and topping out the rep needed for the gear I have selected with the primary factions.

Researching gear ahead of time is a wise use of time while leveling. There are many valuable resource sites available to aid in gear selection.

• MaxDPS
• WoWwiki
• Kaliban’s Class Loot Lists
• MMO Champ

Doing a little legwork gives a clear path for rep grinds and prioritizes gear needed. I usually lay out a little spreadsheet in docs.google.com for easy access which lays out the slots/item/rep/materials needed to fill the upgrades I am looking for.

So, now that I know what gear I am looking for, now it is time for…

Heroic Onslaught
Pick-up groups, guild runs, and 10-man Naxx as often as resets allow. We all know that gear drops don’t usually come as easy as we hope, so take the opprotunity during these runs to get to know your guildies, friends and server-co-habitants – establish relationships and expand your circle of friends.

Dailies!
Doing daily quests consistently will increase your rep with the necessary factions quicker that just sporting their handy-dandy reputation tabard. And, it puts much needed cash in your backpack! Handling the same handful of quests in an efficient pattern around Northrend will come faster and faster each day as doing the quest becomes second nature, and as your gear level increases.

Stockpile
Beyond 10-man Naxx, raiding consumables will be necessary on a very consistent basis. Stock up by farming materials during off-nights and watching the auction house for good buys. Shop Smart, Shop S-mart!

Happy Hunting!

Every time I tell anyone that I am leveling as resto I get the sad “Ick!” response. “Why do you torture yourself?” There are many reasons why I have leveled Resto from as early as level 40-ish. Here is a short selection of exactly why…

1. Questing goes to quickly. Having less DPS makes leveling last longer!
2. Customizing my UI to utilze both healing and DPS and being able to quickly switch between multiple friendly and combat targets is important for both leveling and instances.
3. Roots FTW!
4. The typical “oh-shit” buttons comes to you easier when they are used more frequently than the rare occasion instance near-wipe. Getting used to using that specific keybind, or click combination is important to keeping yourself out of sticky situations.
5. Learning to keep yourself alive through quick heals (with little DPS to speed things along), is just as important as learning to keep other people alive in instance and raiding groups.
6. PUG instance groups, as well as in-guild runs are ALWAYS looking for a healer. Getting into instances along the way to pick-up gear and become healing-focused is good experience in preparation for actually challenging heroic dungeons and raid instances.
7. Primary short-term gear goals and selections are healing focused with a focus on Spirit and Intellect.
8. Popping HOTS and ubar-paw buffs on random people leveling in the same area makes good friends. Most are gracious, and some people remember the random favor when it comes to PUGging a healer for their next instance encounter.
9. Moonfire OMG!
10. With the new gear spell power change, gear works for both healing and DPS. Carrying one set of gear leaves loads of room for all of the quest items, gathering materials, water, etc…

I know that everyone is certainly looking forward to the incoming dual-spec update coming down the pike. I will more than likely take that opportunity to make a Balance/Resto spec for soling and a solid Resto spec for raiding.

No matter what, my druid is a healer at heart. I enjoy being well versed in the delicacies of keeping others cranking out the DPS or tanking with their faces to keep them off me – in addition to staying on my toes.

Nothing causes me to cringe more than asking a healing class to heal and them responding with, “I am not a healer.” In order to truly play your class well I feel that you almost HAVE to put yourself in situations that you are not entirely comfortable with and making them work for you. Leveling as a healing spec does just that. Sure it might take longer to kill a target, but I can usually kill 2-3 things at the same time by keeping myself healed. And, after all…. isn’t the tree dance just worth it?