World of Warcraft: Forever Restoration Druid Guide

Restoration Druids in WoW Forever specialize in a range of heal-over-time effects, which they can supplement with big single-target healing abilities like Healing Touch and Swiftmend. For those that have played Restoration Druid in other versions of Vanilla Classic, you can look forward to the addition of a new AoE Heal-over-time effect in Wild Growth!

As a Druid player you also get to play as a shapeshifter. Go Bear Form to tank hits, Travel Form for speed, and Aquatic Form for speed underwater. Druid themes are strong, and if you're looking for a nature-based class that can play as all four roles in the game, then this might be your pick. Once you roll Druid, you will never want to play anything else.

Starter Information

Beginner Guides

New to the game? Get started with our Leveling guide!

Leveling

Beta is a great time to experiment with different talents, but we have outlined two possibilities below to give you something to start with. You are able to respec your talent tree at a Druid trainer, with the cost going up every time you do so.

This is a generically useful build that will include a lot of Balance talents in order to improve our DPS reduce our downtime. In particular, Improved Wrath is both a big damage increase and will reduce the amount of time you spend drinking. After that, we will return to the Restoration tree to start filling out nodes, starting with Nature's Focus. This will improve how reliable our damage and healing casts are. Once we have Insect Swarm we will spend the rest of our points in the Restoration tree as they become available.

You can heal dungeons perfectly well with the World Content build (or even with a full Balance or Feral talent tree). This alternative is just offered in case you want to go with a 100% healing focused build, but it will be much worse at killing enemies by yourself. This build will forgo Improved Wrath so that it can get Gift of the Earthmother at Level 20 - a massive increase to how responsive our Rejuvenation is, and Swiftmend at Level 30 - an incredible single-target heal.

Here you will find some information on how to use all your spells to get the most out of your Restoration Druid toolkit and spellbook.

Your damage rotation during Beta will be very straightforward. You'll keep Moonfire active on any targets in combat with you, then you will follow it up with Wrath. If you are using the "World Content" build above, then you can include Insect Swarm in your rotation starting at Level 25.

In dungeon or group environments, keep Rejuvenation on the tank and anyone taking light damage. Use Healing Touch to add further healing to anyone who needs it. Remember to cast Thorns on the tank before the run starts. If you have spare time after healing, then you can cast Wrath or Moonfire on enemies to make the run go faster. If you are playing the full Restoration build linked above, then you should also include Swiftmend in your rotation whenever a target drops low.

Casting Rejuvenation onto a target into a Swiftmend 1 second later is an excellent and fast way to heal a target that has no HoTs on them.

At Level 10, you can return to your class trainer to unlock your first shapeshift via a quest: Bear Form. At Level 20, you will do the same again to unlock Cat Form. These quests are quite fast and are very immersive. We highly recommend them! Cat Form will let you Prowl, and Bear Form will let you Bash; and you can tank for groups with it too! Travel Form is simply learned from your class trainer at 30 and does not require a quest chain.

Prowl is a stealth-mechanic that greatly reduces how far enemies can see you. You aren't invisible though, so don't get too close to enemies. You are generally ok so long as you don't walk over them. The higher level they are, the less effective your stealth will be. You will mostly be using Prowl to avoid dangerous situations by stealthing past enemies entirely. Beware enemies with an eye above their heads - this is known as "true sight" and they will ignore your stealth effect!

At Level 14, you will also unlock a class quest to learn Cure Poison. You will be expected to have this in groups, so pursue it as soon as you are able. The quest is quite short.

If you are ever in a tough situation, it is worth knowing which crowd control (or CC) spells you have access to.

Entangling Roots is a single-target ability that immobilizes the target. This will stop them from moving, and it'll also stop them from attacking if nobody is standing next to them. Rooted targets will eventually break out when they take enough damage. It is therefore not very effective against caster or ranged enemy targets.

Bash is a single-target stun ability that requires you be in Bear Form. It is a little impractical to use often, since having to swap forms is slow and you won't have the Rage required to cast it immediately either.

Gear has changed a lot from Classic, and itemization is significantly different. With the level cap increase to 30, give us a few days to properly discover all the new gear added to the game before we flesh out the gear section.

Here's a quick brief about what each stat does. This will be very useful if you're coming to Forever from Midnight, or if you're new to the game.

1. Intellect
   • Increases your Mana pool. Increases your Crit Chance by a small amount. You will find this on a lot of your gear.
2. Spell Power / Healing Power
   • Increases how much Damage / Healing your spells do.
3. Spirit
   • Increases your Mana regeneration when you haven't been casting for five seconds. The Reflection talent will let some of this Mana regeneration continue at all times.
4. MP5 ("Mana per 5")
   • Restores mana every 5 seconds regardless of whether you are actively casting or not.
5. Critical Strike
   • Gives your spells a chance to heal for 50% more. Applies heal-over-time effects too.
6. Haste
   • Reduces your spell cast times. Does not affect the healing or tick rate of your heal-over-time effects.

For Beta, focus on equipping your highest level pieces in general. Favor Healing Power and Intellect where possible. This is not max level advice. It will change as we learn more about the game and what will be available at later levels.

• In-combat Potions and Flasks that give you in-combat benefits like extra power or restore health or mana.
• Out-of-combat food / drinks that allow you to restore health and mana. These are essential since you will need to drink to full mana after every few enemies. As a class with self-healing, food is somewhat less important but can still be convenient. Some food will also give you an in-combat buff for an hour.

Water is the most important thing to have in your inventory when leveling and doing dungeons. Examples include Refreshing Spring Water, Crisp Spring Water, Ice Cold Milk and Melon Juice but each starting zone can also have unique items that do the same thing. You will get a new type of water roughly every 5 levels. The Mage class can also conjure food and water for you.

Some food gives you experience bonuses which can make them an appealing choice while leveling. These foods usually require Cooking to make, which is a secondary profession that you can level up alongside your primary professions. You can make these even with quite a low cooking level. Here are some examples:

• Brilliant Smallfish - You can get the materials via the Fishing secondary profession.
• Herb Baked Egg - Requires Small Egg which drops off many enemies.
• Dry Pork Ribs - Requires Boar Ribs which drops off pig-like enemies.

Healing Potions are available from the earliest levels, either from enemy drops, treasure chests you stumble on out in the world, or via the First Aid profession. Examples include Minor Healing Potion and Lesser Healing Potion. Crafting them yourself via the First Aid secondary profession requires herbs which you can pick yourself if you opted into the Herbalism profession, or from the auction house if you did not. You won't need a massive supply, but it is very valuable to have 5-10 on you at all times.

Similarly, mana potions can save you during tough pulls where you accidentally pull multiple enemies or if get jumped while you were attempting to drink. These are crafted via the Alchemy profession instead, but also drop from enemies out in the world.

Flasks and Elixirs are not essential while leveling and if you are not an Alchemist, then you might not find them to be worth the expense. If you are an Alchemist, or want to prep for a dungeon you expect to be difficult, then look out for some of the following:

• Minor Arcane Elixir - Available right away. Increases your healing and damage by a small amount.
• Lesser Arcane Elixir - A more powerful version that you can use at Level 25.

Voulk

Guide Author

Follow Voulk

This guide is written by Voulk, a long-time Restoration Druid and healing theorycrafter who develops the QuestionablyEpic live healer gearing app. You can also follow them on Twitter and YouTube.

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