Cupid

Those 30 minute games is what I dread. Sure druids are known for their overlasting, but I will go restokin when I have better gear, just right now I have a measly 250 +damage in my healing gear (can possibly get higher if I switch to full +healing gems, though I was more thinking I need the extra stamina and resilience over flat out +healing/damage).
This is actually why my rogue partner suggested we'd start off in arenas as feral/ShS, but I don't see that working out that well.

 

Spookeh

Same situation, I levelled and raid as feral, did pvp as feral to get tanking items. have now outgrown S3 dragonhide's use in pve mostly, so am building a resto set for 2v2 with a pve rogue. have no great ambition for high ratings, but would like to get geared for it.

Started with: 5piece honor S0 gear, SSO neck and weapon, S3 ring, 2min trinket, and random pve drops elsewhere. enchanted and blue gemmed, gives 220 resil, 8k hp, 1300 heal


Arena points priority: S4 Gloves, S4 Offhand -> whatever i have rating for later
Honor priority: S2 Weapon, S4 Belt, S4 Neck, S2 Shoulders, and maybe S3 boots bracers if rating still low

Do heroic Ramparts and Arcatraz, save the badges for Kharmaa's Shroud of Hope, roll on the heal/resil epic gems (Steady Chrysoprase and Durable Fire Opal- no longer unique equipped)



Feral + SHS could work. i did it for most of S3, never got very high though partly due to my rogue being entirely pve. its one of the few good partners for a feral- you can both stealth, and burst hard on opening. unfortunately blind and cyclone share diminishing returns

1- i would advise both making /party say macros for all your CC's, eg /p Cycloning %t!! /cast Cyclone.
put them on a bar which is not your caster bar, so you can cast them directly from a form, much quicker than cancelling form first then casting.

2- open by sap targetA, then both nuke targetB, blind targetA when they trinket the sap, and keep nuking B. if your initial burst fails to drop 1, you may have lost. it makes for fast games at least..

3- the feral should be the first one to open, once rogue saps the other target. if the feral gets focused, he can bear form tank physical dps for a long time

4- if they target the rogue, it frees you to throw some heals. don't be afraid to empty your mana doing this, then run off, hide, innervate, exit combat, and drink. tell the rogue though, so he can evasion / vanish if needed.

5- CYCLONE. ROOT. HIBERNATE.

6- against X/druid, open on X, wait for the druid to appear, then CC X and nuke druid. look for motw/thorns on X to see if there's a druid. you have the movement speed bonus, resto doesn't, you're faster than him in cat than he is in cheetah. (lol)

7- you want several weapons you can swap between which are hotkeyed- if you don't have a pvp weapon then you want a tank weapon (against physical dps) and a dps weapon (against casters) you want a heal weapon, enchanted +81 heal. you want a spirit stick (Weapons - Items - WOWDB) enchanted with +20 spi for when you innervate.

8- the rogue should be the first source of CC, sap blind stunlock etc. you need your mana for powershifting out of snares, general shifting, healing, and CC. he has no mana problems. he can't heal, so make him CC at least

9- Barkskin: This spell is usable while stunned, frozen, incapacitated, feared or asleep. (sweet! spam the button when stunned etc as then it will not even cost you a GCD)

10- hunter's flare is your bane

 

eatmycrit

Long time reader, first time poster. First off, I'd like to say thanks to everyone who contributed to this thread, making it, in my eyes, the "bible" of resto druid PvP. I currently run restokin (me) and rogue in 2v2's, and am struggling to make it well beyond 2k rating. I feel like we have the gear and the skill, individually, but something just doesn't click like it should. I did a fair bit of researching on this combo, but can't really find much information beyond the obvious. Does anyone run this combo and have any relatively advanced tips we should use to help us get beyond the 2000 mark? For instance, I find cycloning a target when they're low on health to stop heals and let my rogue regen energy, then cyclone the healer and burst the dps target down works wonders. We primarily have trouble against Shaman/Warrior, Rogue/Mage and Warlock/Rogue, and have yet to win against a mirror match.

Also, with the addition of patch 2.4, I find my Natur Enemy Castbar mod doesn't work like it used to. I used to be able to track things like enemy's Divine Shield, Ice Block (any hypothermia), sap, etc. Does anyone know of any mods that will currently track these (and simlilar) spells, their durations, cooldowns, diminishing returns, etc.? I've done a fair bit of looking around, and I was told Afflicted2 was what I was looking for, but it just doesn't seem to do it for me.

Lastly, has anyone experimented with using Staff of Natural Fury (Equip: Reduces the mana cost of shapeshifting by 200) in a macro for every shapeshift you do? For instance:

/equip Staff of Natural Fury
/cast Dire Bear Form (I'm pretty sure this isn't the command, but you catch my drift)
/equip Gladiator's Salvation

If somehow that would work, you could save thousands of mana in a long fight, and it could quite easily make or break some matches.

Any input would be appreciated, thanks =D

My armory link is The World of Warcraft Armory in case you think I should alter my gear choice at all. Currently debating Idol of the Unseen Moon to replace my Idol of the Emerald Queen. A recent poster recommended this, anyone else have a say?

 

Meddler

When you're in combat changing weapons or idols results in a GCD, consequently you won't be able to use the above macro to equip the Staff of Natural Fury and shift in one press. What this effectively means is that to take advantage of the shapeshift reduction cost without costing you a lot of stats using the Staff all the time is that you'd need to equip it, wait out the GCD and then shift. If you can do this during a cast e.g. cyclone, equip staff during the cast, shift, there can be benefit in doing so, though you'll later need to swap back when shifting out of course (or wanting to cast anything in the form you shifted to efficiently). Given the lack of free time during PVP and the need to shift quickly however making solid use of the Staff's pretty tricky - I'd probably keep one around for occasional use myself since it's only a bag slot but wouldn't expect it to get very regular use.

 

malthrin

So, I did something a little different this weekend in the Resto part of my 13/11/37 spec: Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft

Preface: I play Druid/Warrior. I found myself very, very rarely using Regrowth - I would only use it when a Shaman/X or Priest/X was trying to burn my Warrior down through my heals by spamming dispel. So, I figured if I need to stand back and bomb big heals, why not actually use my big heal? I dropped 2 points Nature's Focus, 1 point Subtlety, 4 points Imp Regrowth, and took 5 Naturalist and 2 Emp. Touch. As a side bonus, Empowered NS+HT crits for 10k pre-MS definitely won us a game or two.

 

CasT

I am not saying that your specc is wrong I have wanted to specc that way my self many times but I see it this way.

1. I am too sucky to play offensive and get away with it, hence I have no more than 8 points in balance. Gotten caught in caster form trying to cyclone/ IS when getting away was the key.

2. Unless you prowl many times in each game 10% extra armour is better spent. If you get caught in prowl, you do that by rogues. Therefore I go bear when that is established that we meet rogue teams and hang by the far sight debuff. Very efficent tbh. Almost every team you will meet will try to hit you with something.

3. HT sucks. It just screams pummel/kick/Counterspell/spell lock/earth shock/ etc. I really never even use regrowth. Another thing is to use Natures swiftness offensive. To cyclone DPS is a nice way to lower incoming DPS and getting some breathing space. Letting your HOTs do their thing.

4. 20% on HOT's is alot. You should reconsider getting that talent EMP. rej. If you don't belive me. Get recount Recount - WowAce Wiki and see the numbers your self. Even if you spam HT i don't think you'll get close to the amount healing as LB will. And you'll get more space by playing on your hots.

But thats just my thoughts.

Do not matter how much you play, you will never get the carrot.

 

malthrin

I'm not sure you understood what I was saying. I'm not using HT as my main heal, far from it. However, there are very rare circumstances where I find myself using Regrowth on top of hots, and it occurred to me that HT would be better than Regrowth in those situations.

Regarding Feral Instinct vs Thick Hide: I'm kind of up in the air about this. My PvP set is incomplete, because I had just hit 70 at the beginning of S3 and I am too lazy to grind up all the gear. My PvP set has ~225 resilience and ~2050 +healing. The positive effect is that I don't miss the last 3 points in Empowered Rejuv because my hots already tick for much more than a full PvP geared Druid. The negative side effect is that I'm quite squishy, so I took Feral Instinct to stop Rogues from getting openers on me. As I get the rest of my PvP set in S4, I will probably switch to Thick Hide.

 

khel

How valuable do you guys find the Kodohide 4set bonus? (0.2s cast time reduction on regrowth) I am considering getting 2 pieces of wyrmhide and 3 pieces of kodohide just for the extra resilience, since the healing loss isn't *that* severe.

 

CasT

IMO it's useless. I "never" cast regrowth and feel that 1.8 is still long enough to be interrupted. I don't however feel that wyrmhide is anything for me. But if you have access to 2pcs T6 the 35 resilience would be a nice since tier 6 lack resilience.

Do not matter how much you play, you will never get the carrot.

 

Spookeh

If you went with the S4 wyrmhide gloves and shoulders, instead of S4 kodohide, you'd gain:

-14 armor
-16 int
-2 stam
29 crit
3 resil (3+35 = 38 more resil)
-64 +heal
38 +spell
-6 mp5
-regrowth set bonus


Essentially, 38 more resil, 64 less heal. seems a nice trade. The regrowth 4p is crappy.


all set pieces, going from kodo S4 to wyrm S4, ignoring sockets because they're the same:


edit:
also if you're not rated >1550 and can't any S4 apart from gloves, then you're best going with S4 kodo gloves, and S2 wyrm shoulders and chest. shoulders and chest are the lowest amount of heal lost, yet still give +37 resil.



summary:
If you want the +35 resil bonus twice from kodo + wyrm, and have enough rating to get full S4, the best slots for wyrm are shoulders and gloves.
(+38 resil instead of +64 heal)

If you want the +35 resil bonus twice from kodo + wyrm, but are using S2 chest/shldr/leg/helm + S4 gloves, the best slots for wyrm are shoulders and chest.
(+37 resil instead of +48 heal)

 

Nitz

And here I bought the kodohide gloves.

 

Kz

I'm not sure if it's been mentioned already -- but an easier (and arguably better) alternative to buying S4 gloves [Brutal Gladiator's Kodohide Gloves] is gemming the Sunwell Trash gloves [Tranquil Majesty Wraps] with two +10 Resilience gems.

Overall, you lose:
-52 Armor
-1 Resilience
-19 Stamina
-11 Intellect
-2MP/5
.1 cast time off Cyclone

and gain:
7 Healing
30 Spirit(!)

 

Zeckls

First off, I'm not completely sure where I should post this but after searching for quite a while I decided this would be the most relevant place.

Well, off and on for the last month and a half I started to dabble in PvP with my Priest as Disc. It was never all that horrible, despite my lack of PvP gear, which resulted in a complete lack of survivability but the fees to respec quickly became a nuisance. It was simply a money sink I don't feel like supporting. So, instead I decided I'll roll another toon and completely dedicate them to PvPing. After lurking about and reading the PvP forum as an entirety quite extensively I am fairly certain I want to roll a Resto druid. I tried out a rogue for a while but quickly decided that a DPS class just isn't for me. Healing is definitely something I feel comfortable with doing so I'm sticking with it. Furthermore, from what I gathered druids are quite capable in the two brackets I'd be interested in play, 2v2 & 3v3, and they appear to have a handful of classes they excel with: Warriors, Warlocks, and Hunters for example.

To move onto my question, am I deluded myself to think that playing a Resto druid relatively similar to playing a Disc/Holy priest? I know I don't have much experience in a PvP environment with Disc/Holy Priest, but I've pretty much gathered the basics of it. I'm expecting some quite drastic differences, otherwise the game as a whole wouldn't be as great as it is, but do you understand what I mean?

On a slightly relevant side note, any worthwhile professions for a PvP Resto druid? Enchanting seems nifty for the ring enchants, but what to pair it with?

One more thing, in what order would you go about obtaining the gear? s4 Gloves seems like a logical starting point for Arena points followed by the off-hand. I'd save up BoJ's for the cape, that's the easy choice. But, how about for honor? I'm more or less at a loss.

 

Meddler

I don't have enough priest experience to comment on most of your post, can take a stab at the last couple of points though. If you can afford to skill it up enchanting is generally considered one of the best options simply for those +20 healing ring enchants. Engineering has been a popular choice, particularly for Rocket Boots, but from the sounds of things that's being nerfed come 2.4.3. I'd personally probably opt for jewelcrafting for the JC only gems and depending on what sort of gear you've got access to the trinkets, but it's no big deal for the 2nd slot really.

Honour wise the PVP trinket, S4 neck, S4 belt and S3 ring can all be grabbed with honour without any rating so make for obvious first choices since there aren't any common PVP replacements for those. You can also get the arena offhand from memory without any rating requirement and that's a solid ammount of resilience.

Beyond that it'll really depend on whether you're able to work your arena ratings up at all, if so grab the rest of the S4 set as it becomes available, if not you'll then have to decide whether you need to buy S3 bits to improve your rating or whether stockpiling them for a future date when you can use them's more worthwhile. Unless you make swift progress grabbing the S2 shoulders for honour's almost certainly worthwhile too, since the only replacements require at least 1950 rating. The S2 shoulders, paired with the S4 gloves also give you access to the 2 set bonus, so it's probably worth making that a priority. Two pieces of the blue reputation PVP set will also grant another +35 resilience bonus which should be well worth the effort for slots like helm/chest if you don't have easy access to PVE tokens to hand in/don't love grinding honour for gear you'll hopefully replace in the moderate future.

 

Juli

Disc priests are a utility class in the vast majority of arena setups, and druids are closer to a pure healer.

The play style of a resto druid is very different from a disc priest. You will do more healing as a resto druid than playing offensively with mana burns, dispels, and running in range to fear. You will do more kiting than you do currently (because you actually have tools to get away from physical snares and poison beyond stoneform). You will have CC diminishing returns to juggle and watch, where a priest basically fears on cooldown or in coordination with teammates' CC. Resto druids also easily get into long matches in many comps, where priest teams tend to either win relatively quickly via mana burns or burst, or the priest runs out of mana before the match gets a chance to drag on.

I personally like disc priest much better, but I enjoy making people's lives miserable with mana burns and dispel and have come to despise the 45 minute+ games that occur when partnered with a hunter/rogue/warlock/warrior against another druid team (espeically mirror matches). The only thing I really miss about druid when I play priest is the ability to remove poison and physical snares. It's also worth mentioning that disc priest is VERY gear dependent and not very fun if you just get squashed every match. I used to respec shadow for raids/disc for arena (sometimes twice per week to fit with schedules) and I feel it is worth it.

 

Zeckls

Grinding honor is quite easy, and I don't mind it much at all. Looks like doing something like grabbing Guardian belt, neck, and Vindicators ring then s2 Shoulders + Weapon sounds about right? I'll have to pick up the trinket as well because life without is quite painful. Looks roughly like a weeks worth of work. I'll probably grab the s2 pants as well, mostly because grinding the arena points for the gloves + off-hand will take longer than grinding the honor items.

JCing? Is it really worth while? Looking at the specialty gems, you get an extra 4 +heal and an 18 stam gem, if I want it for whatever reason. Seems a bit... lacking, for such a costly profession. I might go Alchemy, for the stone. Seems like a viable second trinket. It's 31 passive +heal over the Battlemaster's Perseverance, so I figure I can probably just interchange between the two. Well, let's look at it in another perspective. 27 +heal(31 from stone over Perseverance -4 fromg gem) or 1750 HP for 15 seconds when things go badly.

Anybody have a preference?

 

trismegistus

Granted since epic gems are ubiquitous via SSO Faction; JC is not as viable for a PvP profession as it used to be. It is still valid for Raiding for those who care or people who like to gear up for all possible specs.

The Alchemy trinket is quite expensive in terms of mats and since you cannot use potions in Arena, I would daresay it is not the best choice for a PvP profession.

If you already have Enchanting, I don't think it is worth leveling a second profession over any other at this point. If you need gold or want to prepare way in advance for WotLK then take up JC/Alchemy/Engineering. I'm sure all three will give you an early advantage of some kind. If you don't have enchanting, then you can get +40 heals with this profession or +8 stats (counting both rings).

 

Zeckls

Enchanting was an obvious bet for a first profession, +40 heal is pretty hard to beat. My problem is I don't see 4 +heal, which is all that JCing provides, to be worthwhile. I was just curious if anything else was remotely useful in comparison. I'm assuming from your reply, in a PvPing sense, JCing is indeed the 'second' best, so there is not.

Thanks though.

 

doogless

Engineering is currently one of the best PvP professions, but from reports on the PTR the rocket boots are (finally) getting nerfed - and they're basically the whole reason to have that profession.

I'd probably just pick up a gathering profession and call it a day.

 

Herrera

You can never go wrong with enchanting/JC as pvp-er.

Totem of the Crusader
Tools: Earth Totem
Increases mounted speed of all party members by 20% while in range of the totem.

 

Currylaksa

Eeeek, unless the trash drop rate has been generous for you, few people will actually gem double mystic into arguably the best PvE progression glove for a resto druid. Also I'm not sure if it is an "easier" alternative, since S4 gloves are the easiest to get

 

malthrin