Resto UI Discussion
 

Thanks for the link to resto4life.com, I'll def be checking that out.

I've been trying out HealBot and love it so far. As for tracking HoT ticks it seems to be working well, with mini icons and timers on the associated heal icon. When any HoT is 3 ticks from ending timer turns red indicating 3 ticks to refresh. Haven't checked out grid though, maybe a better option.



-Luradanen | Kael'Thas

Grid offers you more options then Healbot and reacts faster, especially with an other mod called instanthealth.

Grid in combination with GridStatusHots is exactly what you are looking for. It shows how much time left on each HoT if you color-code it right (f.e. my Rejuvenation is purple, Regrowth light-green, Lifebloom dark-green etc). I also have it set so that when Lifebloom is about to run out (3 seconds left) the timer turns yellow so that I know I have to refresh it asap or it will fall off. Put Grid right next to your character so that big red stuff on the ground is noticeable from the corner of your eye and it becomes a lot easier to keep track of things.

All my WWS are expired but I can probably make a new report later this reset. Contrary to many people here I have stepped away from Regrowth (it used to be one of my main spells next to keeping Lifebloom up in TBC). For fast raid heals I use Nourish, mostly because of the casting time. Maybe for big spam on the raid Regrowth is better since you can get good use out of Nature's Grace and perhaps to Swiftmend the hot, but to be honest there hasn't been an encounter in WotLK of that nature yet. I use Regrowth mainly for main-tank spam, but that might change once I get my 4th T7 piece.

if you're really serious about resto, you absoutely need a good grid setup. HoT timers are described above. You need to be able to see exactly which of your 4 hots are up on who, and which are about to expire. GridStatusLifebloom is also absoutely invaluable. Sure I've healed without them and I have a 'feel' for the timing too. But no amount of instinct is gonna tell you that you have exactly enough time for a nourish, but not enough time for a RG, before needing to refresh your stack. I'm also a Clique fan. If you can't reach all your movement keys at the same time as all your healing and target selection keys, you are putting the raid at risk. Heals on the move are your strength, unmatched by any other healer. Make sure you pay to your strengths.

OoC is an incredibly useful spell that I don't think people get as much mileage out of as they could. A free cast does not count towards the 5sr, so you can e.g. proc OoC while refreshing LB, and if you see that there is not too much damage at the time, wait on your proc, refresh LB 10 sec later for free and again 20 sec later, giving you a whopping 15 sec of spirit-based regen, almost another pot. That example is a bit of a parlour trick, and not very practical, but each OoC proc can potentially get u out of the 5sr for a few extra seconds if you play your cards right, and its up to you to decide when and how. Remember to pop your Spirit World Glass if you think you can get out of the 5sr for an extended period. Remember that melee can proc it. I am famous for whacking on the boss with my branches. If you're lucky, you can even proc OoC while already out of the 5sr, getting several free big heals in a row, all while regening mana at about the same speed as you do drinking!

Sure the content right now is so easy that everyone uses their "success" to justify their current style as the right one, but I haven't seen any other healing class able to top meters, while giving away innervate to the mana-hogging priests and still having lots of mana reserve at the end for emergencies or spam overhealing.

yeah i thought about this too, but if i heal others i loose the boss as my target. do you heal with clique?

I cant heal with clique becaus i only got a 3Button mouse. For healing i target te player you needs help befor i cast the heals, because i can change targets while GCD is up and spam the heal when i targeted the next player.

I don't use Clique, so I find mouseover macros invaluable. For example:

/cast [target=mouseover,help][target=target,help][target=player] Rejuvenation

Alternatively, you can set Clique up to use shift or other modifiers if you find you need more options.

The addon instanthealth is no longer supported and no longer available via curse, at least as far as i can tell.

I'm curious if it still actually works currently? If so, can somebody post (or PM) a link to it please?

EDIT: I use grid. I use the old bufe setup, which used to be available here, but the video links no longer work.

EDIT2: To fix grammar - apologies for being somewhat unclear initially (though, truthfully, I didn't think it was bad enough to trigger an infraction).

I am actually mixing Grid with mouseover macros for faster reaction time. I think its the best set up you can have.

Aah, I forgot to mention I was using mouseovers, and Grid.

/cast [target=mouseover, help] [help] [target=player] Lifebloom
etc

I do have clique, but I only use it for swiftmend and nature's swiftness. Thanks to the macros, the keyboard is fine for targetless healing.

DoTimer: Shift+right clicking on any bar will let you exclude spells from the monitoring.

Yes, i use clique and keeping mobs on auto-attack is just one more benefit of clique or mouse-over style healing. I only use 2 of my mouse buttons for clique, left and right, with the ctrl, shift and alt keys all used in various combinations to bind all 7 heals, 2 dispels and NS+HT: 10 different spells. I'm a die-hard WASD player, so this setup lets me use my 3 middle fingers for full movement and my thumb and little finger give me access to all abilities with mouse free for targetting. I heal just like normal while my little stubble root-legs GTFO of various green and red things. I'm sure theres many methods and mods that can also be used to achieve simultaneous full movement and all abilities and targetting, but I strongly believe all druids need to be set up for it one way or another.

On this topic, I'm somewhat struggling to fit every useful heal in a sensible way on my mouse for Clique. I'm not comfortable with too many modifiers in emergency situations. How about a macro that would cast SM if available, or Nourish otherwise ?

I have seen macros able to test the "castability" of a spell in the past for ferals (testing for shapeshifting before powershifting or bear potting), and reusing this solution would allow for a more efficient use of the SM allocated button which is otherwise useless for 15s after the first clic : it would then become spammable.

I'm experimenting on my own, but alas I am clearly not a gifted macro programmer :-(. Input is welcome.

I don't think this is possible, since you can't test conditionals based on spell availability (which is different from stances) other than a brute force random /castsequence. What I have set up is binding mousewheel down for RJ and mousewheel up for SM, it works for me rather well.

Like touch-typing, there's a learning curve during which you'll be frustrated because you'll actually be less effective. But it will pay off in the end once your "finger memory" kicks in. Like the touch-typing home keys, your thumb and little finger will rest on the modifier buttons giving you a much faster reaction time. Run a few 5mans with good guildies during the learning period and let the mage die a few times as you hesitate a moment trying to remember where you put your swiftmend. Without going into particulars, there are plenty of combinations between ctrl, shift, alt + left/right mouse buttons for all 10 spells.

I still haven't found a real use for nourish. Most of the points made in favor or nourish are ones I'm not surprised to see. Its the same obsession with Flash Heal on a priest (which I just switched from).

First of all. If your tank is at 20%... let a different class blow their load with a fast heal. Unless you have SM or NS up you're wasting your mana and time. You're better off tossing the Regrowth.

Sadly so many are incapable of trusting their cast time or their other raid members. There are plenty of other people in your raid that can "oh shit" your tank. If he's down below 20% that often then you should fix other problems. Nine chances out of ten you or your other druid buds let hots fall off, a pally assigned to the tank is busy FoL weaving, a priest is too busy blowing his load by slaming the left half of his keyboard raid healing when a Shaman could do it more efficiently.

Mainly you should almost never be using Nourish. It was added to the game to allow bad healers to be bad at reactive healing. Maybe it can be used in a 5 man but frankly if you've let someone get to the point where .5 (.3 secs with decent haste) makes the difference between life or death, you've screwed up. If you're on the tank, learn to keep your hots up and queue heals. The only real place I've seen a boss take away enough life from a tank to take him to <20% is on Sarth with 2/3 Drakes (10 or 25). Even there you have a cast time on the boss where you can queue up a HT if you're on him while making sure to have hots rolling.

As far as usage and raid roles, 3 Stack LB's on all tanks in a raid. Rejuvs on them too. Regrowths in free time on highest damage intake targets. WG Weaves to help with raid healing. If you're doing much else you're doing someone elses job.

Healing Addons:
Quartz
For your, your targets, and your focus's cast bar.
Grid
Bring everything you need to know what's going on in your raid into one place. This takes some time setting up but you will be rewarded once you've mastered its use.
GridSideIndicators
Allows "corner indicators" on the top, left, bottom, right sides of a unit
GridStatusRaidIcons
Shows raid icons on units (with configurable opacity). A must have if you use any bossmod.
GridManaBars
Shows mana bar on units in grid... so you know who needs an innervate like a good druid.
GridStatusHots
Allows showing: Lifebloom Stack, Lifebloom Timer, Regrowth Timer, Rejuv Timer, WildGrowth Timer. Configurable for colors and thresholds for time left on each hot or number of lb's on the target.
Click2Cast/Clique
Cast spells on units by clicking... both work fine, Click2Cast is upgradable through Curses client
Pro Macros
Choose "?" Icon use this text:

#showtooltip <spellname>
/cast [target=mouseover,help][target=target,help][target=player]<spellname>

Raiding All Purpose Addons:
ORA2
Many raid uses
Deadly Boss Mods
While I was strictly BigWigs in Sunwell etc Deadly has really picked up the ball in Wrath and is my preferred mod now

My Grid Setup:
Corner Indicators on the Frame
Top-Left: Has Aggro (red) *Default
Top: Current Target (white) *Default
Top-Right: Lifebloom Stack (1=Red,2=Yellow,3=Green)
Right: Lifebloom Timer (<2 secs remaining=Red, 2-4 Seconds remaining=Yellow, Else=Green)
Bottom-Right: Wild Growth Timer (<2 secs remaining=Red, 2-4 Seconds remaining=Yellow, Else=Green)
Bottom: Rejuv Timer (<2 secs remaining=Red, 2-4 Seconds remaining=Yellow, Else=Green)
Bottom-Left: Is healing incoming (green) *Default
Left(Low Priority): MotW Missing (purple).
Left(High Priority): Regrowth Timer (<2 secs remaining=Red, 2-4 Seconds remaining=Yellow, Else=Green)

Frame Text & Center Icon
Text1: Name
Text2: Health Deficit (Incoming Heal Amount Disabled)
Health Bar: Health Deficit + incoming heal estimate
Center Icon: (Listed by priority) Raid Icon, Poison, Curse, Custom Aura's for fights

Grid ProTip - Setting up a custom Aura Icon
1. Right click on Grids Icon
2. Go to: Status > Auras > Add new Buff (or debuff depending)
3. Type in exact buff or debuff name case sensitive (ex. Frost Blast from KT in Naxx)
4. Hit Enter and verify it shows up under the appropriate heading in your Aura's menu
5. Verify its priority by changing it to 90 or 99 depending (usually these icons are high priority)
6. Next to show it: Right click on Grids Icon
7. Go to: Frame > Center Icon
8. Check the new buff or debuff so it is displayed when a unit gets it.