Do we know at this point if reforging can be undone (and then redone)? If we do end up primarily concerned about efficiency early in Cata, we could easily end up wanting just enough haste to get as many ticks of regrowth as we can, then wanting crit (or spirit). Not sure anything will compare that favorably to gemming for int almost exclusively, but I can see ending up doing reforging shuffling quite frequently with gear upgrades if that's possible. Will be interesting to see if they manage to make mastery rating powerful enough to make it anything other than an OK stat for druids that gets reforged away from by default to something that doesn't care what health our target is at.

The more I think about the ToL self-slow, the more I end up thinking that's going to make there be a pretty major difference in the utility of ToL depending on whether or not you have engineering for rocket boots to give some burst mobility to get out of a fire once in that 45 seconds. That would be rather annoying if that aspect remains.

I had a similar comment when I first saw the trees. It is a problem right now, since there are no new useful talents in the Balance tree that we'd want to take, so we're basically wasting points to try to get to Splendor. And forcing 16 in Balance just takes away from potential choice in the Resto tree.

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I've been paying more attention to Moonkin than Resto so far, but a few things:

WG is on a 10s cooldown now.

Known Tree of Life spell effects are: LB stacks twice on one cast, Regrowth instant cast, and +2 targets for Wild Growth. Overall I think these are a good focus for feedback. They are currently both underpowered and awkward. Specifically:
--LB stacking twice is just unwieldy when it has a max stack of 3 and can only be applied to one target. Now I can stack it in 2 GCD's instead of 3. Also, if rolling it on the tank (which may well become common again), there's no benefit at all.
--Regrowth instant cast is totally antisynergistic. The primary benefit of instant cast is being able to cast while moving, and Tree form snares us by 50%. The only other benefit is casting speedup, but Regrowth is 2s base vs. a 1.5s GCD--again, very minor gain.
-- +2 targets on WG is probably okay, but feels potentially weak. Since you can only cast WG 5 times during the shift, it's not a really good reason to shift. But if the other bonuses are improved so that there's a clear benefit to shifting when things get rough, this might be a fine perk.
Also, I am highly skeptical of the ToL snare being really workable.

The ToL ability can be cleaned up with some iteration, and other things are going in the right direction. The WG cooldown doesn't change much really, so I guess I'm indifferent to it. Lifebloom only on one target I think I approve of. It gives it a better niche compared to Rejuv and gives us back some ability to focus on tanks, which was lacking all through WLK. More importantly, they can safely revive the spell from the completely neutered state it was in for much of WLK.

Rejuv is getting knocked down to 12s (not surprising, since they tried to sneak that one in during WLK). I'm not really a fan in principle, it reduces our unique emphasis on delayed healing/HoT's. But there will probably be little real effect on the ground.

I'm not aware of any fix to Tranquility so far. That was a problem spell in WLK.

On a totally random note, I just noticed they knocked down all our armor bonuses. Moonkin Form armor, and base Resto Druid armor (e.g. ToL or Imp. Barkskin). That's too bad, it was always kind of a neat random perk.

Yes, it's very early to really be looking at specific talents and synergies. That said, early on is the best time to seek changes...

1) The push for homogenization doesn't take into account that healers function as a team, while DPS are, for the most part, playing individually. Even when the DPS have to work together to burst something down, it's still each player utilizing their own burst ability. The big concern here is...

2) HoTs. Will coupling the return to efficiency (which is a great move) plus the homogenized toolkits result in HoTs being used more because that's just what we happen to have (or to prop up nourish) than for their own intrinsic value? If a target is in danger of dying, a HoT doesn't cut it. If a target isn't in danger of dying, the only reasons to use a HoT instead of a direct heal are if it's more efficient or to combat a gimmick (i.e. damage aura pulses effectively healed by the HoT)--but it seems that each other healing spec is purposefully being given a particularly efficient heal, while our HoTs are losing emphasis.

3) Our mastery will need very careful balance. Naturally, a target low on health is a prime contender for a direct heal: to ensure survival, because slow-but-efficient direct heal will be effective, and (for shaman) to utilize their mastery. If the bonus kicks in too high, however, it might as well be passive. I admit, I don't really understand the logic behind our bonus--HoTs, by nature, (outside of the infrequent-but-heavy-raid-damage gimmick) are not the primary tool for low health targets. The numbers can always be balanced to make the bonus worthwhile, of course, but the question is why? Neither of the options I've considered seem appealing: a very high bonus that we can only expect to apply to one or two ticks, or high threshhold for the mastery to kick in but a low effect. Alternatively, a game in which players are regularly kept at 30% (or 10% or 40% or whatever the threshhold for a significant effect will be), but then healing just becomes DPS, with the addition of "burst" on a specific target, called a tank. There could be another direction they intend to take it, of course.

4) Yes, we will be balanced around being in caster, which is effectively a buff compared to how we're currently balanced around being in tree. Assuming they increase our coefficients to account for being the only healer without a bonus stat-->spellpower talent (or remove those across the board) and work out the aura we share with only prot pallies (it may also just be removed). But what did we really gain? Offensive spells while healing...? Disc get a stacking buff that they can eat for mana, shaman can trade 25% of the mana for a shock for a 120% heal *plus* get mana back from LB, pallies seem to be retaining haste for judgments (plus the effect of the judgment). We, as of yet, don't seem to get any synergy, just a low proc chance to burn a gcd for some damage. CC while healing? Sure, but it could have just as easily been allowed in form. All we really gain is a cooldown (which also could have simply been added without removing the form)...moving on from the dead horse, however: what about the cooldown itself? Two stacks of lifebloom at a time, sure, except it doesn't seem that we'll be spamming lifebloom (if we use it on anyone but the tanks, anyway). Regrowths while moving, except we move at 50% anyway (for now)--seems pretty pointless. Additional targets for our 10 second cooldown AoE HoT. And bonuses to damage spells. We don't need a throughput cooldown--in the situations in which we can predict widespread damage we can pre-HoT. Mend and NS both, plus rapid-fire nourishes, for burst. All that we lack from the "standard" kit is a tank save, which could be added in a druid-centric way. For example, have it buff a target with a reverse-ignite effect: over x seconds, all incoming damage enters a pool while only y% of the stored damage is dealt to the target each second, followed by a period of z additional seconds over which the remaining stored damage is evenly distributed (incoming damage during the z is assessed normally). Add in a healing taken bonus, if you're concerned about how the incoming dps actually increases during z. The point is, a tank save designed around giving HoTs time to tick (and lifebloom time to expire)--and I came up with it off the top of my head in less than two minutes. I'm sure the Devs could think of something much cooler.

The sky isn't falling. We were fine in vanilla, fine in BC, fine in WotLK, and we'll be fine in Cataclysm. The question is if we'll still be fun as well, for those who're drawn to the class for its unique niche. Maybe it's just a case of the grass being greener, but it does seem like we've gotten the short end of the stick so far. A cooldown with a steep penalty and (at best) questionable utility (it's far better for damage than healing, it seems--which could change, of course), free damage from a low proc chance and lacking synergy, what's effectively just a model change affecting only our role among druids (folding the passive tree bonuses into caster), an interesting addition to regrowth that's underwritten by the reduction of its triggering ability (that is, the restriction on its crit bonus), and a nerf to revitalize (more mana, but far fewer procs overall)--oh, and nature's splendor got moved down, without additional healing-friendly talents above it (yet) to get us there (especially with grace being removed). Admittedly, nourish refreshing lifebloom is pretty interesting...except it's underwritten by the added restrictions to lifebloom. The T8 talented bonus for rejuv is nice as well...except they're also reducing our use of rejuv.

Whereas disc priests get synergy from their damage (the effect on penance--or has that been removed?), holy gets benefits both for weaving heals and repeating heals, plus life grip and a mid-level heal for both, pallies picked up a unique AoE heal and a mid-heal *and* shock becoming a very efficient regrowth-lite, shaman get awesome looking synergy for shocks (25% of the cost of a shock = damage plus a 120% heal...?) and LB (spare gcds = mana?), a second AoE heal, a second mini-swiftmend-PLUS-a-buff (unleash weapon on top of riptide), andthe counterpart to our mastery...except it makes much more sense for direct heals (again, I'm not worried about it being effective--they can just mess with numbers--but with it being logical regarding the trigger conditions).

I agree that we don't need spells added to our kit, like Pallies obviously do. Maybe we've been spoiled, due to already having the toolkit, but new healing spells aren't the only things getting passed around. Again...the sky isn't falling, but nor are we gazing up at a meteor shower, beautiful sunset, or awe-inspiring cloud system. Overall, it just pretty much looks like our healing ability isn't changing, but rather just being moved away from efficiency and HoTs toward direct (tank?) healing.

Looking on overall HPS this is minor grain but in critical situations (someone is near death) 2s difference in moment when heal actually lands can save someone live.

I can't answer your other questions, but I would imagine that Lifebloom will function exactly like Grace does now for disc priests. As soon as you put one stack on a target, it's removed from any other target.

Well, I think the implied question is--will it bloom (probably not)?

As a totally random reply, they have majorly boosted all non-plate armour. Compare them on www/cata.wowhead.com, check the ilvl 277 Heroic Icecrown sets, the armour sum of the 5 pieces:
Plate: 11.197, Mail: 6.265 to 8.308, Leather: 2.821 to 6.085, Cloth: 1.500 to 4.867. Also, most caster gear has had their stamina increased. Massively increased, with a capital M. (Mages going from 21k to 32k HP unbuffed.)

Eyeballing these numbers and the talents in the calculator, you seem to be looking at similar armour level right now as you did before.

In moonkin form, I'm at 47.75% damage reduction just wearing mostly ilevel 251 gear (an old set from months ago when I transferred to the Alpha server), at level 82.

Out of moonkin form (still balance spec), I'm at 29.35% damage reduction.

When I'm resto spec and out of tree form, I have the 47.75% damage reduction like I have in moonkin form (skipping imp barkskin) - which could potentially be a bug - but it makes it hard to see what a resto druid's durability will actually be until they fix the tree form talent to really be less buggy.

After having read the changes (lifebloom on one target, Rejuv becoming a Renew), I guess I am not seeing where the "umph" in our arsenal is. Holy priests, the healer closest to us, can heal tanks now, and have a hot with the same power as Rejuv (only chakra gives them better spamming ability for that hot). They also have a ton of burst aoe. Is Efflorescence supposed to be our version of that? Any beta druids care to comment? Perhaps Blizzard is aiming for a design where most casts are single target spells?

Incidentally, I sort of saw the lifebloom restriction coming, being able to refresh on nourishes would give druids something like 70% of beacon power on tanks, except a lot of that HPS works if you move.

Lifebloom is very very weak now (but cheap at 174 mana @ 80). At 1761 intellect (3788 SP on live), lifebloom tics for 807 with crits of 1211 (1847 on live). The bloom is also bugged (hits for around 70k or so non-crit, 115k crit)( -- edit: the bug on bloom only seems to affect self-casts), and nourish is not extending lifebloom with 2/2 empowered touch. Also, the restoration mastery is supposed to increase the effect of hot spells up to a percentage, based on the current health of the target, however after lowering my health to nearly nothing, there was no increase in healing. Regrowth crits are also not proccing Efflorescence. The only heal that's actually working like it's supposed to is healing touch. Makes it kind of hard to test right now.

Just pulling from Lissana's site (talented, but no gear). Here are raw-heal numbers with no haste and no crit (ignoring NG, Seed, and Effloresce).

Spell HPM HPET

Rejuv 7.4 7666

Lifebloom*1 14.9 3379.3

Wild Growth 1.0 2475.7

Tranquility 7.9 1937.5

Regrowth 3.9 4252.5

Healing Touch 4.6 3882.6

Nourish+1 10.9 1690.2

Swiftmend 11.2 5156.0

assuming coefficients are such that scaling keeps these in about the same relative positions (but HoTs have quadratic scaling with Haste),

Nourish + Lb*3 is very cheap (130 MPS) but also very weak (2600 HPS).
Every other spell is considerably stronger (at least twice the HPET of Nourish), but (except for Swiftmend and Tranquility) have significantly lower HPM.

Full duration Rj will catch up with Nourish's HPM at about the point you hit the 1s GCD.

Assuming Mana is really a constraint, you'll cast Nourish or Rejuv when people are stable. When things aren't stable, any other spell will boost your healing. The choice of which spell to use will depend on the damage pattern.