How To Improve As Restoration Druid — Dragonflight 10.2.6

Last updated on Mar 20, 2024 at 15:00 by Torty 65 comments
General Information

On this page, you will find out how you can improve at playing Restoration Druid in World of Warcraft — Dragonflight 10.2.6. We list the common mistakes that you should try to avoid and the small details that can greatly improve your performance.

1.

Correctly Managing Mana

You should consider Mana as your most valuable resource. The preferred result is being as close to 0 Mana as possible at the end of the fight. Not using the entire Mana pool and going out of Mana too early are huge throughput losses that might have resulted in deaths during progression.

Excessive use of inefficient spells will drain your Mana pool quickly. Cutting down on casting Regrowth Icon Regrowth without Clearcasting Icon Clearcasting buff or at low Abundance Icon Abundance counts, casting too many Rejuvenation Icon Rejuvenations during low damage periods, and wasting Innervate Icon Innervate casts are the first things you should look into when trying to fix this problem. It is important to understand that expensive spells on cooldown are your most efficient ways of healing (Efflorescence Icon Efflorescence and Wild Growth Icon Wild Growth). Try to conserve Mana for periods of serious damage instead of trying to top the meters at irrelevant, low-damage points of the fight. Not having enough Mana to burst a couple of last big raid hits can be a fatal mistake, even the difference between a kill and a wipe. You can use Tranquility Icon Tranquility early into the fight to conserve some Mana, assuming it will be up again for your assignment. The same goes for Convoke the Spirits Icon Convoke the Spirits / Incarnation: Tree of Life Icon Incarnation: Tree of Life and Flourish Icon Flourish.

On the other hand, ending the fight with 30% Mana or even more can be just as big of a loss and potentially as dangerous to your raid's survivability. You should carefully allocate all of the excesses to various difficult phases of a boss. More healing usually translates into higher average Health on your raiders, which can save people from some non-lethal misplays. In cases where, due to one reason or another, you are still unable to burn through all of the Mana, you should consider putting more Moonfire Icon Moonfires and Sunfire Icon Sunfires on enemies. This can be especially helpful on extra mobs with tight windows to kill or during burn phases. There can rarely be too much damage.

2.

Soul of the Forest, Reforestation, and Convoke the Spirits Usage

Since Soul of the Forest Icon Soul of the Forest is a talent you will have in every spec, you should learn how to use it optimally. The best way to utilize it is by pairing it with Wild Growth Icon Wild Growth. For this to work, you will have to delay Wild Growth casts by a couple of seconds. A prevalent mistake many players make is putting Wild Growth on cooldown and then having to use Soul of the Forest buff on Rejuvenation Icon Rejuvenation or Regrowth Icon Regrowth.

Some raid specs will also run both Reforestation Icon Reforestation and Convoke the Spirits Icon Convoke the Spirits, which will restrict Swiftmend Icon Swiftmend usage since you will want to line up both Incarnation: Tree of Life Icon Incarnation: Tree of Life proc and Convoke cast. Ensure you continue using Wild Growth while waiting for the Swiftmend to proc Tree right before Convoke cast.

3.

Using Cooldowns Enough

Restoration Druids are a specialization that relies heavily on the performance of their cooldowns. One of the most common mistakes is having low counts of Flourish Icon Flourish and Convoke the Spirits Icon Convoke the Spirits casts. You should aim to fit as many of those as possible within reason. 1 Tranquility and 2 Flourish casts in an 8-minute fight as opposed to 3 and 5, respectively, is the difference between being last and first on the meters.

4.

Having High Uptime on Important Spells

Efflorescence Icon Efflorescence and Lifebloom Icon Lifebloom are two extremely efficient spells that you should aim to keep up at all times, where they will be doing effective healing. It is one of the easiest areas anyone can improve on, especially with multiple WeakAuras that will remind you when those are not up. Make sure to check Wago.io and import one to your liking.

5.

Maximizing Damage Output

A pervasive mentality among all healers is that your damage output is irrelevant and that you should only cast healing spells. While it is true that the group's survivability is your number one priority, the idea that "healer damage does not matter" is a misconception for a few reasons.

The first reason is that damage is damage. Whether it comes from the tank, a DPS, or a healer, all damage contributes equally toward killing the boss. If you neglect your damage, you are hindering your group's chances at a kill by lowering the overall damage output.

The second reason is that Restoration Druids naturally have many free globals from being unable to cast healing spells constantly. Even in Mana-starved scenarios, you can always either cast Wrath Icon Wrath or Shred Icon Shred. There is never a good reason to stand still and do nothing.

While not being as noticeable in raids, the difference between 0 damage healer in a Mythic+ dungeon and a healer that actively uses his damage abilities can be up to 10% of the total group DPS. It is important to remember that enemies only die when their Health reaches zero, not based on the amount of time your allies spend at 100% Health. In some situations, you can afford to heal your group between the pulls instead of during them.

6.

Changelog

  • 20 Mar. 2024: Reviewed for Patch 10.2.6.
  • 15 Jan. 2024: Reviewed for Patch 10.2.5.
  • 06 Nov. 2023: Updated for Patch 10.2.
  • 04 Sep. 2023: Updated for Patch 10.1.7.
  • 10 Jul. 2023: Reviewed for Patch 10.1.5.
  • 01 May 2023: Reviewed for Patch 10.1.
  • 20 Mar. 2023: Reviewed for Patch 10.0.7.
  • 24 Jan. 2023: Reviewed for Patch 10.0.5.
  • 11 Dec. 2022: Reviewed for Dragonflight Season 1.
  • 28 Nov. 2022: Updated for Dragonflight launch.
  • 25 Oct. 2022: Updated for Dragonflight pre-patch.
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