Restoration Druid Healing Rotation, Cooldowns, and Abilities (Legion 7.3)

Table of Contents

• +Introduction
  • 1. Class Overview
  • 2. Patch 7.3 Changes
  • 3. Patch 7.2.5 Changes
  • 4. Patch 7.2 Changes
  • 5. Contents
  • 6. ChangeLog
• +Easy Mode
  • 1. The Basics
  • 2. Talent Choice
  • 3. Stat Choice
    • 3.1. Raid Healing
    • 3.2. Tank / Mythic+
  • 4. Basic Playstyle
    • 4.1. Raid Healing
    • 4.2. Dungeon Healing
  • 5. Cooldown Usage
  • 6. ChangeLog
• +Spell Summary
  • 1. Introduction
  • 2. Main Resource
  • 3. Basic Abilities
  • 4. Important Procs
  • 5. Cooldowns
  • 6. ChangeLog
• +Builds and Talents
  • 1. Talent Choices
  • 2. Tier 1 (Level 15) Talents
  • 3. Tier 2 (Level 30) Talents
  • 4. Tier 3 (Level 45) Talents
  • 5. Tier 4 (Level 60) Talents
  • 6. Tier 5 (Level 75) Talents
  • 7. Tier 6 (Level 90) Talents
  • 8. Tier 7 (Level 100) Talents
  • 9. ChangeLog
• +Artifact Traits and Relics
  • 1. Artifact Progression
    • 1.1. Patch 7.2 Artifact Points
  • 2. Relic Choice
  • 3. ChangeLog
• +Netherlight Crucible Relic Paths
  • 1. General Optimization Advice
  • 2. Tier 2 Upgrade Priority
  • 3. Tier 3 Upgrade Priority
  • 4. ChangeLog
• ×Rotation, Cooldowns, and Abilities
  • 1. Rotation / Playstyle
    • 1.1. Raid Healing
    • 1.2. Dungeon Healing
  • 2. Cooldown Usage
  • 3. Optional Read: Mastering Your Restoration Druid
    • 3.1. Understanding Your Spells
    • 3.2. Procs and Mechanics
      • 3.2.1. Mastery: Harmony
      • 3.2.2. Clearcasting Procs
      • 3.2.3. Ysera's Gift
      • 3.2.4. Living Seed
    • 3.3. Detailed Cooldown Usage
      • 3.3.1. Tranquility
      • 3.3.2. Ironbark
      • 3.3.3. Artifact Ability
      • 3.3.4. Innervate
      • 3.3.5. Tier 1 Talents
      • 3.3.6. Tier 3 Talents
      • 3.3.7. Tier 4 Talents
      • 3.3.8. Tier 7 Talents
  • 4. ChangeLog
• +Stat Priority
  • 1. Basics
    • 1.1. Raid Healing
    • 1.2. Tank / Mythic+ Healing
  • 2. Getting a Better Understanding
    • 2.1. Statistics Explanations
  • 3. ChangeLog
• +Gems, Enchants, and Consumables
  • 1. Gems
  • 2. Enchants
  • 3. Consumables
  • 4. ChangeLog
• +Macros and Addons
  • 1. Macros
    • 1.1. Generic Macros for Druids
      • 1.1.1. Rebirth
      • 1.1.2. Nature's Cure
      • 1.1.3. Displacer Beast
    • 1.2. Specific Macros for Restoration Druids
      • 1.2.1. Mouseover Macros
  • 2. Addons
    • 2.1. Generic Addons for Druids
      • 2.1.1. ElvUI
      • 2.1.2. Boss Mods: Deadly Boss Mods or Bigwigs
      • 2.1.3. GTFO
      • 2.1.4. Omen Threat Meter
      • 2.1.5. Parrot or Mik's Scrolling Battle Text
      • 2.1.6. Weak Auras
      • 2.1.7. Recount / Skada / Details!
      • 2.1.8. Grid and GridClickSets (Optional)
      • 2.1.9. TellMeWhen
    • 2.2. Specific Addons for Restoration Druids
  • 3. ChangeLog
• +Gear, Legendaries, and Best in Slot
  • 1. Tier 19 & 20 Set Bonuses
  • 2. Legendary Items
  • 3. Loot Competition
  • 4. ChangeLog

General Information

On this page, we list your Restoration Druid core abilities and how they should be used together (rotation) in World of Warcraft Legion 7.3. We also explain when to use your various cooldowns. Then, we go deeper and present all the subtleties that you will need to know if you want to excel at playing a Restoration Druid.

The other pages of our Restoration Druid guide can be accessed from the table of contents on the right.

About Our Reviewer

This guide has been reviewed and approved by Torty, a theorycrafter in the Dreamgrove Discord server, author of this Restoration Druid spreadsheet, and currently raiding in Pure.

1. Rotation / Playstyle

Your exact healing playstyle as a Restoration Druid will depend on what targets you have to heal, which is normally very closely related to the environment in which you are healing (raids or dungeons).

1.1. Raid Healing

When you are healing the raid, you should do the following.

• Maintain Efflorescence under the melee group.
• Keep Lifebloom on an active tank. Refreshing it with less than 4.5 seconds left in order to proc the final Bloom and not lose any ticks is recommended.
• Use Clearcasting procs on one of the tanks.
• Use Cenarion Ward on cooldown.
• Use Flourish and Essence of G'Hanir as often as possible (no need to use them together).
• Apply Rejuvenation to the active tank(s) and members of the raid who are taking or will take damage.
• Use Wild Growth when at least 6 members of the raid are damaged and you have some Rejuvenations up.

1.2. Dungeon Healing

When healing in a dungeon there are a few tasks you should perform.

• Keep Lifebloom on an active tank. Refreshing it with less than 4.5 seconds left in order to proc the final Bloom and not lose any ticks is recommended.
• Use Clearcasting procs on one of the tanks.
• Use Cenarion Ward on cooldown.
• Keep Rejuvenation on the tank and on members of the group that just took damage or are about to take damage. Keep up both Rejuvenations on targets on which the damage is too high for a single one.
• Use Wild Growth when at least 4 members of the group are damaged.
• Use Tranquility, if group is still taking heavy damage (it does 100% more healing 5-man content).
• Use Swiftmend on a player that just took heavy damage. If they are not in immediate danger, you should apply Rejuvenation to him first.
• Use Regrowth as an emergency heal.
• During downtime, use Moonfire and Sunfire on enemies to help with the damage.
• If you have more free time, shift into Cat Form (if you have the Feral Affinity talent) to do more damage; if you do not have this talent, cast Solar Wrath instead.

2. Cooldown Usage

As a Restoration Druid you have a few healing cooldowns by default. Additionally, your Artifact weapon grants you one more, and you can gain others depending on your talent choices. Your non-talent cooldowns should be used as follows:

• Tranquility should be used during heavy raid damage or when you are assigned to use it by your raid leader. It is recommended not to stack it with anything else. Casting Wild Growth before Tranquility is recommended to increase the benefits from Mastery.
• Innervate should be used as many times during the fight as possible. Refresh Efflorescence, cast Wild Growth, and spam Rejuvenations during Innervate.
• Ironbark should be used to reduce the damage a tank is taking during critical moments (such as when important boss abilities are about to be cast). In the absence of such situations, you should just use it on players who are taking damage. You may be assigned to use this at a specific time, as part of a rotation with other healers and the tanks' own cooldowns.
• Essence of G'Hanir should be used during heavy raid damage, when your Tranquility is on cooldown. Ideally, you should use it together with Wild Growth. Depending on the situation, you can also couple it with Velen's Future Sight or Flourish.
• Flourish should be used as close to on cooldown as possible.

We cover the cooldowns that are obtainable from talents, as well as a few additional details regarding your other cooldowns in our detailed cooldowns section.

3. Optional Read: Mastering Your Restoration Druid

While playing correctly as a Restoration Druid does effectively rely on using the above spells as we recommend, there is more you need to understand to maximise your performance.

3.1. Understanding Your Spells

In order to make the best use of your heals, it is important that you familiarise yourself with their strengths and weaknesses.

Rejuvenation is an instant cast periodic heal which will make up a very high amount of your healing throughout most fights. It also provides a small initial heal. It is not very costly, and as long as it will not overheal, it is always Mana efficient to use it.

Wild Growth is a spell that heals up to 6 low health raid members over 7 seconds. The HoT heals for more damage initially and for less and less as it goes on. Wild Growth is very expensive, so its usage should be restricted to when there is a lot of burst damage that you have to heal.

Swiftmend heals the target for a moderate amount. It is instant cast, and it has a 30-second cooldown. It is an excellent way to react to sudden spikes of damage.

Lifebloom is a healing over time spell that can only be on one target at one time. You should always keep Lifebloom up on a target who is taking constant damage, such as the tank. When Lifebloom expires, it heals its target for a large amount. This also happens if you refresh it with 4.5 seconds remaining or less, which you should aim to do.

Healing Touch is a relatively cheap heal with a long cast time that heals for a moderately high amount.

Regrowth is an emergency heal. It has a high Mana cost and a low cast time. It heals for a large amount instantly and a smaller amount over 12 seconds.

Efflorescence creates a healing zone that lasts for 30 seconds, healing up to 3 players standing in it every 2 seconds.

3.2. Procs and Mechanics

As a Restoration Druid, you have quite a few things that you must keep track of and react accordingly to. Other than using the appropriate spell for the type of damage that is being done, this is really all there is to playing to your maximum potential.

3.2.1. Mastery: Harmony

Your Mastery, Mastery: Harmony, increases your healing done to a target for each HoT that you have on that target at the time. The amount by which your healing is increased depends on how much Mastery you have.

3.2.2. Clearcasting Procs

Each time your Lifebloom ticks, you have a 4% chance to get a proc from Omen of Clarity, making your next Regrowth, cast within 15 seconds, cost no Mana. You should use these Regrowths freely, as soon as you receive them, to avoid the procs overwriting each other.

3.2.3. Ysera's Gift

Ysera's Gift is a passive ability that heals you for 3% of your maximum health every 5 seconds. If you are at full health, then a random nearby injured ally is healed instead.

This effect is entirely passive and does not require you to do anything, but we felt it was worth pointing out.

3.2.4. Living Seed

Living Seed requires a mention as well, even though its benefit is entirely passive and you will not really have to keep track of it in any way.

When you critically heal a target with the direct healing portion of Swiftmend, Regrowth, or Healing Touch, you place a buff on them, lasting 15 seconds. When the target is attacked, the buff is consumed and the target is healed for 25% of the amount healed by the spell that triggered Living Seed in the first place.

As we said, this happens passively, but you should still be aware of its existence.

3.3. Detailed Cooldown Usage

In this section, we explain in depth how to use your cooldowns.

3.3.1. Tranquility

Tranquility is a channeled spell that heals all raid members for a large amount of health over 8 seconds. It is an extremely powerful spell. It is best used during times of very heavy raid damage.

You should use Tranquility when you can channel it for its full duration (or at least very close to its full duration).

3.3.2. Ironbark

Ironbark should simply be used on the tank, when they are taking a large amount of damage, or on another player who is targeted by a powerful boss mechanic.

3.3.3. Artifact Ability

Essence of G'Hanir, your Artifact ability, increases the tick frequency of all your HoTs by 100% for 8-12 seconds (modified by your Eternal Restoration artifact trait). It is an amazing healing cooldown, which doubles the power of your HoTs. It should be used during heavy raid damage or group damage (in a dungeon). Make sure you have Wild Growth up for it, as well as having a few Rejuvenations applied. You will need to increase the amount of HoTs you have up before using this ability, and then tone them back down once it is over.

3.3.4. Innervate

Innervate is not strictly a defensive cooldown, but it is still a very important part of a Restoration Druid's kit. It has a 3-minute cooldown and it places a 10-second buff on a friendly healer (which includes yourself), during which time all spells cast by the target cost no Mana.

This ability allows the target to save up a large amount of Mana (provided, of course, that they cast a lot of spells while it is active), while also benefiting from their own passive Mana regeneration throughout that time (meaning that at the end, they will have more Mana than what they had when they started).

Innervate is best used 10 seconds before you plan to use Flourish or Essence of G'Hanir. You want to refresh your Efflorescence during it, so you also want to time Innervate when Efflorescence has fewer than 10 seconds left on its duration. You want to cast Wild Growth and as many Rejuvenations as your Haste allows. Timing it together with any Haste procs or Heroism/ Bloodlust is a very good strategy.

3.3.5. Tier 1 Talents

If you have chosen Cenarion Ward, you should use it on cooldown on an ally that is taking significant damage (such as a tank).

3.3.6. Tier 3 Talents

Guardian Affinity provides you with the Frenzied Regeneration active ability, which is not on the global cooldown. Therefore, if you have just taken a large spike of damage, you can shift into Bear Form and use Frenzied Regeneration to heal yourself back up quickly.

3.3.7. Tier 4 Talents

If you have taken Soul of the Forest, then you will benefit from a sizeable healing increase to your the first Regrowth, Rejuvenation, or Wild Growth you cast after using Swiftmend.

The effect is most useful when used in conjunction with Wild Growth, and if the raid is taking a lot of damage, empowering your Wild Growth casts by using Swiftmend first is highly recommended. The rest of the time (when you trigger this effect but do not need to use Wild Growth), you should just let it buff your next Regrowth or Rejuvenation.

Incarnation: Tree of Life should be used as many times as possible during the encounter, whenever you feel it will benefit you the most. What exactly to do during Incarnation: Tree of Life depends greatly on the situation that you used Tree of Life for. Generally, the best thing to do is to use Wild Growth on cooldown.

3.3.8. Tier 7 Talents

Flourish extends the duration of all your HoTs by 6 seconds, and it is an extremely powerful effect when you have HoTs up on many players. You should try to make as much as of this talent as possible throughout the fight, although by far the best time for it is after you have used Wild Growth (since it will extend the Wild Growth HoTs too).

4. ChangeLog

+ show all entries - show only 10 entries

• 28 Aug. 2017: No changes needed for Patch 7.3.
• 12 Jun. 2017: Revamped both raid and dungeon healing playstyles, and made various other tweaks and fixes.
• 28 Mar. 2017: No changes needed for Patch 7.2.
• 09 Jan. 2017: Checked and confirmed for 7.1.5.
• 25 Oct. 2016: Updated Living Seed description to account for Patch 7.1 changes.
• 07 Oct. 2016: Fixed a typo.
• 31 Aug. 2016: Removed a mention that you need to let Lifebloom expire in order to benefit from its large heal, and added that it can be refreshed with 5 seconds remaining or less.
• 29 Aug. 2016: Updated for Legion's launch.
• 23 Jul. 2016: Added a mention of how to use Cenarion Ward, if you have chosen this talent.
• 18 Jul. 2016: Updated for the Legion pre-patch.