Preservation Evoker Battleground Blitz Guide — Midnight Pre-Patch (12.0)

In Battleground Blitz, the primary role of Preservation Evoker is to support your team with incredible healing output and help your team win team fights. In addition to healing, you are also quickly moving from node to node if your teammates need help. With spells like Emerald Communion and Dream Breath, you have multiple ways to help your team recover when you start to fall behind in healing. You can also help your team move around the map with Rescue. There will also be maps where you will be expected to flag carry. Preservation Evoker are extremely mobile thanks to Hover and Unburdened Flight. Most specializations will not be able to catch up to you once you pass them. You also have Fury of the Aspects, that should be used during the initial team fight when everyone on your team has cooldowns.

Healing is not the only thing you can do as a Preservation Evoker. Damage is another vital part you play in battleground blitz. Here are the ways you can deal damage:

1. Use Fire Breath off cooldown. This deals damage and puts a DoT on the target. The longer you channel and do damage, the weaker the DoT is. Ideally, you will channel this to rank 3 and make the DoT weak because it is dispellable.
2. Deep Breath deals a large amount of damage to the team and stuns anyone it hits with the Terror of the Skies talent. However, it is also great for avoiding crowd control when the enemy team is pushing towards you. For example, if you are flag carrying on Warsong Gulch, you can use this when the enemy team starts to swap to you and immune all crowd control.
3. Azure Strike does not deal the most damage, but it is instant and is perfect for slowing enemies and killing Shaman totems.
4. Disintegrate is a channeled damage spell that deals a moderate amount of damage. This is normally used when you get an Essence Burst proc.
5. Living Flame is your filler damage spell that deals a decent amount of damage from range. Use this if your other damage spells are on cooldown.

Here is the talent build you will be using to maximize your damage output:

• Nullifying Shroud
• Unburdened Flight
• Dream Projection
• Obsidian Mettle
• Emerald Communion

There are 3 PvP talent slots and 5 talent options that are strong choices for Preservation Evokers. Nullifying Shroud causes Verdant Embrace to give you a 4 second buff that makes you immune to the next crowd control on you. This is important for when you are in a team fight and need to keep healing. Unburdened Flight makes it so Hover makes you immune to movement speed reduction effects. Finally, you will be choosing between Dream Projection and Obsidian Mettle for the last PvP talent slot. Choose Dream Projection if you are playing against specializations that have DoTs that are dispellable. If you are not playing against an Affliction Warlock, Elemental Shaman, or Shadow Priest, play Obsidian Mettle. Finally, if you feel you need the extra cooldown for healing or mana, Emerald Communion is a strong option to have.

For an in-depth guide to Preservation Evoker talents, read here:

In Battleground Blitz, without the Arena Dampening effect, healers, when left alone, are able to sustain against many players with relative ease. The way to counter the high throughput of healers in Battleground Blitz is with the effective use of crowd control.

Evoker has many tools in its kit to aid with this:

• Sleep Walk
• Landslide
• Deep Breath
• Azure Strike slows multiple enemies

• Obsidian Scales is one of your primary defensives. This reduces the damage you take by 30%. If you use the Obsidian Mettle PvP talent, it will also make you immune to interrupts, silences, and pushbacks. This will heal 100% of any damage you take while it is up over 8 seconds. It is important to use this right before you start taking damage and not after, or the heal will not be strong.
• Deep Breath deals a large amount of damage to the team and can be used to do damage. However, it is great for avoiding crowd control when the enemy team is pushing toward you. For example, you will want to use this to avoid a Priest's Psychic Scream when they run towards you.
• Preservation Evoker's mobility is an incredibly important defensive. Here are some spells that you should master to help keep your team alive:
  • Hover launches you forward and increases your movement speed. It also makes you immune to slows with the PvP Talent Unburdened Flight.
  • Rescue swoops you to an ally and allows you to bring them to a location. Use this to help your teammate reposition and get away from the enemy team.
  • Wing Buffet/ Tail Swipe are the Dracthyr racials that will help you get away from the enemy team targetting you. If you take the Walloping Blow talent turns these two spells into slows as well.
• Cauterizing Flame removes all bleeds, points, curses, and diseases from a teammate. This is a crucial spell when you play against specializations like Feral Druids, Assassination, Rogues, or Warlocks.

1. Intellect;
2. Versatility;
3. Haste;
4. Mastery;
5. Critical Strike.

The stat priority for Preservation Evoker is the same in Battleground Blitz and Arena. If you want an in-depth explanation and suggestions on gear, read our gearing section here:

If you get either Warsong Gulch or Twin Peaks as a map, you will likely be flag-carrying. If there is a Balance Druid on your team, they will probably flag carry instead. If you are the flag carrier, get the flag as soon as you can and utilize Hover and Deep Breath to avoid slows/crowd control. At the start of these maps, you should do the following:

• Identify which player will be carrying the flag. This can be either you or a Balance Druid.
• Coordinate with the other healer whether they will be healing offense or defense. Offense will be trying to kill the enemy flag carrier and defense healer will be healing your team's flag carrier.

If you do find yourself healing offense, you can still make crucial decisions by using Sleep Walk to control the enemy team. Sleep Walk should be used on the enemy healer if your team is using offensive cooldowns and trying to get a kill. If you are playing against melee, Landslide can stop them in their tracks. Use Rescue to help teammates cross the map if they are being slowed.

On resource race maps, your primary goal is to keep your team alive at whichever base is decided to be fought over. There is not much room for you to make plays or defend bases by yourself. The best healers will be able to heal through the team fight and ensure the team fight is won by their team. Trade Emerald Communion when your team gets low and focus on maximizing Dream Breath healing.

Similar to resource race maps, your goal is to keep your team alive in the big team fights. The goal on this map, unlike normal Rated Battlegrounds, is to team fight at one node and try to cap both bases. This results in long 7v7 team fights, and the winner will more than likely pull ahead quickly. Trade Emerald Communion when your team gets low, maximize Dream Breath healing, and dispel crowd control.

Note: Capping the flag will make the inactive bases active, and both teams will have to recap the nodes. Use this tactic if your team is falling behind on points or lost the team fight.

Ranged DPS specializations will always be the best orb carriers on Temple of Kotmogu, so do not grab the flag unless it is a dire situation and you have to. The most important part about this map is to win the initial team fight and quickly gain momentum by grabbing 3 orbs and standing in the middle of the map. When the enemy team starts to resurrect, leave middle and kite around the center. Here are some tips for this map:

• Players take more damage the longer they hold the orb. This means that, eventually, the Orb carriers will die. Ideally, your team will only hold 2-3 orbs at a time so that you do not easily wipe when you have high stacks.
• Make sure you die on the correct side of the map! You and your team will resurrect depending on where you died. If you die on purple side, you will resurrect on blue side and vise versa. Ensuring you and your team resurrect together is crucial, this will allow you to regroup faster and quickly wipe the enemy team that will be weak.
• There are leaves at every orb; if you are low on Mana, make sure you grab one!