Restoration Shaman Healing Easy Mode — Dragonflight 10.2
On this page, we explain how to easily play Restoration Shaman in World of Warcraft — Dragonflight 10.2, using the simplest rotation, talent tree, stat priority, gear setup, etc., without sacrificing performance.
Foreword
This section is intended for players who are new to the game or class, have no intentions of raiding Mythic difficulty, or simply want a more straightforward way to play their specialization without being overwhelmed by the numerous priorities and active abilities that need to be taken into consideration for optimal play.
The Basics for Restoration Shamans
Restoration Shaman is a healing specialization that excels at healing group damage and burst single-target healing. They have a variety of cooldowns to draw on that can suit any situation. In this section, we will be focusing on a setup that minimizes the number of buttons and reactivity necessary while still providing flexible and potent healing at your fingertips.
If you are completely new to Restoration and need more information on the abilities available to you, you can check out our Spell Summary page.
Talent Choice for Restoration Shamans
These choices balance ease of use and raw power. Although different talents might offer higher gains when played well, these same talents often result in healing losses when utilized by less experienced players.
The talents recommended below aim to present a setup that has very little
punishment for unfamiliarity or mistakes, and also includes the most used
utility. Shaman is especially reliant on using fight-specific
talents for its utility picks, and you should swap talents around when needed,
for example, to get Tremor Totem against Fear effects.
Be sure to use the 'Copy Export String' button to import our build when playing!
If you are looking for the absolute best talents for Restoration, which do not compromise on performance for ease of use, you can find a more in-depth analysis on our full talents page below.
Stat Choice for Restoration Shamans
Currently, you will want to prioritize stats as follows.
- Item Level
- Versatility = Critical Strike
- Haste = Mastery
While we provide stat preference lists, swapping gear to higher item level items — and their higher Intellect / total stats — should, usually, provide a larger upgrade than using lower item-level items with better stats. The exception to this rule are items with important tertiary stats such as Leech, which should still be used ahead of other items without them, unless the difference in item level is around 7 or above.
If you want to see the full explanation of the stat priority, as well as the absolute top choices for the priority, head to our full stats page below.
Basic Priority List for Restoration Shaman
- Keep
Water Shield and
Earth Shield active on yourself;
- Keep
Earth Shield active on a tank;
- Use
Healing Stream Totem on cooldown;
- Use
Riptide on an injured target whenever available;
- Use
Healing Rain on cooldown to heal groups of allies and damage enemies;
- Use
Chain Heal (with
Unleash Life, if available) to heal groups of allies;
- Use
Healing Surge to provide emergency healing;
- Use
Healing Wave (with
Primordial Wave, if available) to provide Mana-efficient single-target healing;
- Use
Lightning Bolt for single-target damage and
Chain Lightning against multiple enemies.
For a more detailed and optimized version of the priority list, check the full Restoration rotation page linked below.
Healing Cooldowns for Restoration Shaman
Healing Cooldowns are meant to allow you to provide a big burst of healing or survivability to your group. In exchange, each of them is typically only usable once every 3 minutes. Below is a short description of each cooldown taken in the above talent build and its basic applicability so that you can form an idea of when it is best to use them.
Healing Tide Totem should be used when incoming group damage is high
but spread equally over the whole group. It provides high-spread healing over
a period of time and can be used while moving, which allows you to use it while
doing fight mechanics or casting other healing spells. As it heals all targets
equally, it is especially useful in large groups when every player is evenly injured.
Ascendance is a healing multiplier which almost duplicates
and distributes your healing evenly among allies within 40 yards. It will do high
individual healing if you have only a few allies nearby but low healing if many
are within the 40-yard range.
Ancestral Guidance should also be used when incoming group damage is
high, but it notably heals only 3 injured targets at a time for a high amount and
at a decent range, allowing you to use it to counter high targeted damage or situations
where the raid is spread out. While you can use it with
Ascendance,
this is not recommended due to the high wasted healing produced.
Spirit Link Totem grants 10% damage reduction to and redistributes
the health of members inside the totem every second, keeping everyone inside
at equal levels of health percentage. This cooldown is best used when there
are allies taking deadly damage near other allies who are healthy, and is
often combined with damage reduction raid or personal cooldowns and
immunities, as the immune player will not take any damage from mechanics but
still contribute to stabilizing the group through the totem's effect.
Beginner Trinkets for Restoration Shamans
This section will be listing a few of the best trinkets, with a particular focus on passive effects, or which are fine to macro to other spells and use on cooldown.
Echoing Tyrstone (Dawn of the Infinite);
Coagulated Genesaur Blood (The Everbloom);
Pip's Emerald Friendship Badge (Amirdrassil);
Sea Star (Throne of the Tides);
Idol of the Lifebinder (Jewelcrafting);
Idol of the Spell-Weaver (Jewelcrafting);
Sustaining Alchemist Stone (Alchemy).
You can find more trinket options and other gear, including BiS lists made from dungeon, raiding, and PvP gear below:
Changelog
- 06 Nov. 2023: Updated with new talents and trinkets for Patch 10.2.
- 04 Sep. 2023: Reviewed for Patch 10.1.7
- 31 Jul. 2023: Updated with Ascendance's doubled radius in recent hotfixes.
- 10 Jul. 2023: Updated for Patch 10.1.5.
- 13 Jun. 2023: Clarified that Ascendance and Guidance should not be used together.
- 01 May 2023: Changed recommended talents and trinkets for Dragonflight Season 2.
- 20 Mar. 2023: Updated talents and rotation for Patch 10.0.7.
- 24 Jan. 2023: Reviewed for Patch 10.0.5.
- 13 Dec. 2022: Added Primal Ritual Shell.
- 11 Dec. 2022: Reviewed for Dragonflight Season 1.
- 28 Nov. 2022: Updated for Dragonflight launch.
- 25 Oct. 2022: Updated for Dragonflight pre-patch.
More Shaman Guides
Guides from Other Classes
This guide has been written by Seksi, member of Arctic Avengers and healing aficionado. You can find him answering questions and discussing Restoration Shaman gameplay on the Ancestral Guidance and Earthshrine Discords.
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