Ok, let’s start off with a bit of a nerf, cuz hey, that’s always fun.  They are nerfing revitalize

Revitalize is now a 2 Ranks talent, down from 3 Ranks. Now has a 20% chance to proc at all ranks, now regenerates 1/2% of your total mana (down from 3%) and cannot occur more than once every 12 sec (up from 6 sec).

So, I guess we’ll get an extra talent click to burn somewhere but, that’s significantly less mana return… 3% per 6 seconds as opposed to 2% per 12 seconds.  It saddens me

Here is the skin for our PVP set if you’re interested:

They also released a lot of Cataclysm loot, which I’ll be combing through and posting about later in the week.  I’m getting pretty excited for Cataclysm!

Brez me!

Yeah, that got sorta… I guess nerfed.  You can read the blue posts for yourself here.  Basically, you can use one battle resurrection or soul stone per fight on ten man, and three on 25 man.  So having 2 druids and a lock in 10 man doesn’t give you three screw-ups.  I don’t like it but I’m sure we’ll all cope

RAF?

So, as one of the things to pass the time between now and cataclysm, I recruited-a-friend two of my guildies for some super fast leveling fun.  Holy crap is it fast, and in turn fun!  The 300% experience is amazing, and for ever 60 we do, between the two of them, they can grant me another level 60.  Here is us doing a trio of druids:

This of course means I wont be able to tap into 3/3 Moonglow which saddens me a little.  I like making my spells cheeper

I haven’t made any changes just yet, since mana really isn’t an issue at 80.  But as we look towards 85, you may see me making this adjustment

I don’t hate it… looks a lot like some of the previous druid sets… I certainly like it better than our t-10!  I don’t know if the different colors are for different races (how it’s shown) or different specs, or diffent sub-tiers.  If anyone knows, leave a comment!!

Blueposts:

Healing
Deep Healing Mastery
We like the shaman version. The druid one is problematic for a couple of reasons. Conceptually, a hot is often the last thing you think of putting on someone who is grievously wounded. Second, at the moment the bonus is only calculated on the initial application and not the ticks. If we can fix that problem, then the druid mastery would be better. It’s also possible we’ll just redesign it.

New Restoration Mastery

New Resto druid mastery: Increases the potency of your heals on targets upon which you have a hot.
It benefits both hots and direct heals equally while still supporting Resto being a healer that cares a lot about hots. It encourages layering different spells while disincentivizing Rejuv blanketing.

Examples:

1) You cast Regrowth on someone who has a Rejuv = bonus healing.
2) You cast Nourish on someone who has a Lifebloom = bonus healing.
3) You Swiftmend a Rejuv = bonus healing.
4) You cast a Rejuv on someone who does not have a Regrowth, LB or WG on them = no bonus healing.
5) You cast Rejuv on someone who has a Rejuv = no bonus healing. (You merely refreshed Rejuv.)
6) You cast a Wild Growth = bonus healing on those with preexisting hots.

Rejuv, then LBx3. Rejuv falls off, and LBx3 is refreshed by Nourish. Will the LB ticks retain the mastery benefit?
Yes. There was a hot on the target, so Nourish benefits (from the mastery in addition to Nourish just working that way).

If someone gets low and they don’t have a HoT on them already, are you really going to want to put on a HoT, THEN a heal?

Probably not.  My impression is that some of you are going from the extreme of “Rejuv everyone in the raid” to “Rejuv nobody but the tank.” The reality will probably be somewhere in the middle. Some targets will have hots on them and some won’t. The more hots you can keep up, the better off you’ll be, but you’ll have to balance that against the mana cost of doing so. I don’t think it’s as simple as “always do X.”

Druids aren’t the only ones who’ll be shapeshifting…

Alchemists will be too?!?  Since I’m an alchemist on both of my druids I guess I think this is kinda cool… basically you can shapeshift into a drake mount, and carry a passenger on your back.  Weird right? (image from MMO)

click to enlarge	General The first screen you see when you open HealBot is the “General” tab. From here you can disable HealBot, choose to put it on your mini-map, ect. Nothing really exciting here that needs to be changed!
click to enlarge	Spells The second tab of HealBot is your spells tab. This is where you assign heals, cures, etc to different mouse click and key combinations. If you have an on-use trinket, you can use this to auto-cast it with certain spells. I have my Sliver of Pure Ice on auto-trinket to maximize the mana I get back from it. Also, you can assign a macro (instead of a spell) to a click so you could include your trinket or other non-spells into HealBot this way. Holy Nova (for example) is not cast on another player, but so that I could cast it more quickly I just assigned a key combination to a casting macro in HealBot on my priest.Also on this tab is “SmartCast when out of combat” which I choose to use for quick buffing and resurrecting while out of combat. You can enable it using the check box.
click to enlarge	Skins – Healing Next, we are going to look under the Skins tab, in the subsection “Healing”. This is where you choose who to have on your HealBot bars. You can see right now I have “Focus” selected because I set Valithria Dreamwalker as my focus target when healing that fight, and want her included on my bars. I usually have the boss set to focus, but it only includes friendly targets on HealBot so it’s not a problem to just keep this checked. I choose to ignore pets when raiding, but on my leveling characters running mostly 5-mans I have that checked.
click to enlarge	Skins – Healing – Raid Under the Healing subsection, is another subsection called “Raid”. This is where you can choose what raid groups to show. Sometimes we have D/C or on-call people sitting in group 8 and I can choose to not show them here.
click to enlarge	Skins – Icons The Icons section on the Spells tab lets you show what spells are currently rolling on your targets. I have mine set to show druid HoTs, but only the ones cast by me. I have found that I frankly don’t care what everyone else is doing, I keep HoTting the raid, and I don’t want it all junking up my bars. But it IS very helpful to see what HoTs I have rolling on what people, and since the icons fade as the spell gets close to fading, I know who needs a refresh. Also, HealBot does pickup rejuvenation cast by your t-10 bonus, so you can see that too!You can also choose to show raid marks from this screen. Since DBM and other raid mods often put raid-symbols on people for a healing-related reason, I find it is useful to show these marks on my HealBot.
click to enlarge	Skins – Bars This is where you setup what you want your bars to look like. Here is what mine look like: As you can see I choose to have long and narrow bars, and I choose to show the mana bars of my raid members. But you might like a totally different style, and this is where you change that
click to enlarge	Cure – Debuff Under the Cure tab in the “Debuff” subsection you can setup HealBot to show you people with debuffs. I have it set to check the raid for poisons and curses, as taht is what I can remove… and of course have a quick key setup for the appropriate curing spells. Make sure you actually check the box to “Monitor to remove debuffs” and “also in combat” or it won’t do you much good in a raid
click to enlarge	Cure – Custom You can also choose to monitor debuffs that aren’t curses, poisons, etc. One example of something I choose to monitor is “Mark of the Fallen Champion” so that I defiantly make sure I don’t forget who has it, and they get a lot of my healing focus. You can add any debuff you think will be helpful on this tab, and also select a color for your custom debuffs.
click to enlarge	Buffs I hate people who have to be told to buff. Or people who have to be told to rebuff the guy who died. You know, THAT druid? So I use the “Buffs” tab to check the raid for MotW. I also check for Thorns on the tanks using the “Name” option. HINT: when entering the names of people to check, separate them with commas and do NOT use spaces. If you use “SmartCast when out of combat” (on the Spells tab) then you can one-click buff people in need.

If you have any other questions, or if I missed something that you’ve been wondering how to do, leave a comment and I’ll try to update this post to include your question!

So… About a podcast…

A friend and I were kicking around the idea of doing a podcast.  We would basically discuss what’s new in the blue-posts but… that just doesn’t seem like enough.  If anyone has any brilliant ideas for what to talk about, leave a comment, your suggestions are appreciated!

OMG 10 Man!

I’ve been threatening to make a 10 man guild for a long time now… cuz well… I love running 10 man content, and it seems like it’s going to be totally viable in Cataclysm.  Plus, so many guilds are falling apart right now, maybe I can snag a few people?!? So… I’m doing it!  Interested?  Check it out!!

Well… That’s just not the case. See for yourself!  [view tree]

I know this is just preliminary but already I have so much I just don’t like.  I mean, to get down to the second level of the resto tree I have to WASTE three clicks, which is a lot when you consider we have even fewer clicks now.  And yes, they are wasted…. don’t argue, they are.

And a lot of the talent trees (ours included) still have those “increase spellpower” must-have clicks on them.

Please, try again, I’m not happy.

Plus, there are so few choices you almost can’t screw up.  I mean… really… let’s just take it to the next level… here is my proposal for even more idiot proof talent trees in cataclysm:

So… anyway I haven’t been posting much lately… last week was the first week since April (OMG guild drama) that we’ve actually gotten into ICC 10 and focused on H-LK.  Got to phase three in our first week!!  I’m psyched.  Anyway… focusing on that, once that’s down what will I do?!?  Probably spam my blog everyday

P.S. WTB Beta invite!  Anyone able to help with that?  If so, drop me a line

So as you know Ruby Sanctum opened up yesterday  I have a video for you but I haven’t talked over it yet… give me a day or so, that takes a little more time!  But I wanted to mention some quick tips here for people who are still working on this:

1.) Make sure you add these debuffs to your healbot (or whatever you use): Mark of Combustion and Mark of Consumption

2.) The above can be dispelled as either magic or a curse, so…. in short WE can dispel it.  BUT be careful not to dispel it on top of the raid, make sure the debuffed raider gets out first, and FAST

3.) Avoid all sorts of bad stuff on the ground including the circles dropped by people you dispell, the fires, and the circles that tell you where the meteors are gonna land.

4.) Inside the portal… the 2 balls connect, so just find a ball, and follow behind it.  That makes this part SOOOOOOO easy.  Honestly, just follow a ball, have everyone do it, it negates all thought.

5.) Resto druids are better inside than out in p3, there is AoE damage and we can heal while moving.

I did the video below with our tank, Cosain (his website) so you can see the switching perspectives.  When we go into p3, you’ll see that I’m inside the portals and he’s outside so you get a look at both.  Basically outside is a copy of P1 and inside is a copy of P2.  Enjoy!

After getting everything in order I went raiding with my baby-alt druid and her guild downed LK25 for the first time, and later that night downed Heroic Sindragosa 10 man for the first time.  I was happy to be restored in time to be a part of that, congratulations Pandemic  Plus, you’ve been waiting a long time for a heroic Sindy video.  I know… my original ten man fall apart after getting drakes, the ten mans in my new guild were almost non-existent, and then I got hacked.  Who’d have though that the video would finally come in the form of my alt-druid?

So anyway… before I give you the video let’s get back to my tragic story.  I got an email today reading this:

Account Name: XXXXXXXX

Reason for Closure: Terms of Use Violation — Exploitative Activity: Abuse of the Economy

This account was closed because one or more characters were identified exchanging, or contributing to the exchange of, in-game property (items or gold) for “real-world” currency. This exchange process negatively impacts the World of Warcraft game environment by detracting from the value of the in-game economy.

Even if this behavior is the result of a third party accessing the account instead of the registered user (for example, a friend, family member, or leveling service) then the account can still be held responsible for the penalty because of the impact it had on the game environment.

We’ve found the above behavior is many times directly related to groups responsible for compromising World of Warcraft accounts; we take these issues very seriously. To better understand our position against exploitative activity and the risks involved, please review this article:http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/basics/antigold.html

The exploitative activity that took place on this account violates the World of Warcraft Terms of Use. We ask you take a moment to review these terms at http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/legal/termsofuse.html. Any recurring subscriptions on this account have been suspended to prevent further monetary charges.

For any disputes of this action, please visit the Exploitative Activity FAQ and Contact page here: http://us.blizzard.com/support/article/exploitfaq

Regards,

Blizzard Entertainment
www.worldofwarcraft.com

Well… my-oh-my am I surprised.  I am aware that it is possible to hack an authenticator, but that is really really really uncommon.  Also, I armoried myself and my characters still have all their gear.  They haven’t been stripped like they were when I was hacked.  I didn’t do anything weird last night.  I didn’t send or receive any gold, and I only listed about 5 gems on the AH.  I have absolutely no idea what I could have done to trigger this…. *shrug* So, naturally I sent in a mail and got the standard “We received your mail and will get back to you” reply.  I guess we’ll see huh?  It’s like they want me to quite WoW

Heroic Sindragosa Instructional Video

Well the good news is that in the one day I did have my account back I got this video, so here it is

To summarize:

When you have unchained magic, get 20 yards away from everyone to explode, run back, and DON’T cast.

Be pro at LoS in the air phase or you’ll get one shot

In the second phase, fight the temptation to cast while you have unchained magic!!

And on a personal note, I hope this account thing gets resolved sooner rather than later.  It makes me a very sad tree.

Now I’m in the process of gearing up this new tree.  Actually it’s not going too badly considering I don’t have the endurance to really badge grind, and with all the raiding on my main I don’t get to raid much on the new tree.

Anyway, to the subject.  If you’re a new tree and you want to put out numbers, dear god don’t stack spell power.  Please, just don’t.  What you need to focus on is hate and regen.  Gem spirit, gem haste… spellpower is absolutely useless when you’re OOM.

Rule #1 of being a good tree: Always be casting!  From the 10 seconds before the pull till the boss dies, you should never stop casting in any fight.  Now, if you aren’t able to do that because of mana, then you need to fix your problem. SPIRIT my friends. Its great when you’re geared, but its godly when you’re not.

LoL Min Maxing:  I have an issue with this term being used for healers… more spell power does not = more healing.  Yes, for damage that may be true, but it’s not true for us.  Hell half of it is just going to over healing anyway.  Healers have to be more balanced than that.  Regen, haste, mana pool, spell power… all important.  I understand if you DPS on your main it’s hard to wrap your head around the idea of having balanced stats.  I know that in a lot of fights when things go your way, you can do fine will all SP.  But on the really hard fights or  when things mess up and you are recovering, that sort of thing… trust me on this one, you don’t wanna be THAT tree who is now useless. I’d Brez but I don’t have mana, can I borrow someone else’s innervate? If you’re that tree, I don’t like you.

LoL Gear score:  The same person playing the same character on the same fights in the same raid will do better with better gear.  As someone who started ICC with a 3500 GS and still out healed the others, I rather think GS is retarded.  They probably sucked.  But hey, you can’t tell they suck from GS, nor can you tell I don’t.  Please, don’t be a GS Nazi, I don’t like them either.  You can always kick people later muhahaha.  In my experience an under-geared alt of a good player will pwn an geared main of a bad player any day, be it in dps, healing or tanking.

/endrant

Happy Tree-ing

Deathbringer Saurfang gains blood power a lot faster on heroic.  Your tanks need to be spot on with their taunts, and nobody can get hit by blood beasts.  Five seconds after the beasts spawn the raid will be slowed by 80% so bear that in mind when choosing kiters/stuns/etc.

So… healers… you’re going to have to deal with healing a lot more marks than you are probably use to.  Plus, if someone with the mark does die he gains 20% life (not the 5% in normal) so it will be a wipe.  We tried to delay the first mark as long as possible.  We ran with 6 paladins so the first 6 bloodboils could be HoPed off.  We would save HoP if it was on a mage (iceblock) a rogue (cloak) or another pali (self bubble) and use it on people in the third round of bloodboil.

We then had an order for all marks.  Pali 1 beacons the first ranged mark, Pali 2 beacons the second ranged mark, Pali 1 pulls off the tanks and heals the third ranged mark along with the first (beacon), Priest 1 heals the forth ranged mark…. you get the idea.  A lot of it was RNGish too, because a shaman’s chain heal is defiantly OP if you get several marks in melee.  As a druid I was HoTting everything with a mark, or a blood boil, or a tank.  Between my hots, pali’s splash heals, judgements and chain heals, melee was fine with no specific healers assigned to them.

I have healbot setup to show “Mark of the Fallen Champion” as a different color, and all bloodboil victims were marked by DBM which also shows on my healbot.  Having those things very visible helps a lot, especial at the end when you may be rolling HoTs on 9-10 people.

Save all cooldowns till that last few percentages when you have a lot of marks.  Our priests all hymned in turn, including our shadow priests.  We also blew divine sacrifice near the end of the fight.

If you have other tips, please leave them in the comments, I’m sure people would love to hear what you did!

Unlike the other healers, Restoration druids will not be receiving any new spells. They have plenty to work with already, and our challenge instead is to make sure all of them have a well-defined niche. A druid should be able to tank-heal with stacks of Lifebloom, spot-heal a group with Nourish and Regrowth, and top off lightly wounded targets with Rejuvenation.

Really?  Come on Bliz…  I’ve been waiting all day for that.  After being wowed and amazed that priests would get something as cool as a life-grip (cooler than death-grip, saver of the stupid!) and that shaman would get an AOE hot that lasted 10 seconds and had a 10 second CD… after that, I find I’m getting… drumroll please… nothing.

All heal-over-time spells (HoTs) will benefit from crit and haste innately in Cataclysm. Hasted HoTs do not reduce their duration, but instead add additional HoT ticks. Haste will also benefit Energy generation while in cat form.

Yeah, okay this is a general change to mechanics (not just a druid change), but I admit it will favor us the most.  And yeah, it takes what we love about rapid rejuvenation, and gets rid of what we hate… I really have no complaints about that.  Actually I think it will be rather powerful.  Makes me even more smug about my hots.  Yes, I approve.

Tree of Life is changing from a passive talent to a cooldown-based talent, similar to Metamorphosis. Mechanically, it feels unfair for a druid to have to give up so much offense and utility in order to be just as good at healing as the other classes who are not asked to make that trade. We are exploring the exact benefit the druid gets from Tree of Life. It could strictly be better healing, or it could be that each heal behaves slightly different. You also will not be able to be banished in Tree of Life form (this will probably be true of Metamorphosis as well). Additionally, we would like to update the Tree of Life model so that it feels more exciting when you do decide to go into that form. Our feeling is that druids rarely actually get to show off their armor, so it would be nice to have at least one spec that looked like a night elf or tauren (and soon troll or worgen) for most of the time.

Tree of Life is ugly, and I don’t like it.  So the idea of being less hideous… thats seems good.  But does this mean we will no longer give a healing buff to the raid?  What about the armor buff we got with improved tree?  And the spirit to spell power boost?  So may questions, so little answers.

Restoration druids will have a new talent called Efflorescence, which causes a bed of healing flora to sprout beneath targets that are critically healed by Regrowth.

Um… K.  What do the pretty flowers do? Heal the target?  Heal everyone standing on them?  Increase my healing on people standing within them?  I mean… I’m okay with a “bed of healing flora” but I’d love more specifics.  Makes me wonder…

Barkskin will be innately undispellable.

I don’t really PvP enough to care… sorry.

Druids will lose Abolish Poison with the dispel mechanics change, but Restoration druids will gain Dispel Magic (on friendly targets) as a talent. All druids can still remove poisons with Cure Poison and remove curses with Remove Curse.

Yep… okay… dispelling magic on friendly targets… useful.  Though as far as poison was concerned abolish > cure so… oh well.

Restoration

• Healing
• Meditation
• HoT Scale Healing

HoT Scale Healing: HoTs will do increased healing on more wounded targets. The mechanic is similar to that of the Restoration shaman, but with HoTs instead of direct heals. In Cataclysm, we anticipate druids using a greater variety of their spells so there is a distinction between healing and HoT healing.

Well… okay.  Better HoTs on the dyeing… except HoTs don’t really thrive on saving the low in health do they.  I mean, we’re better at sustaining health high, then ninja-saving people with low health.  Ugh I just don’t know… I hope I’m wrong and these changes are more exciting that they seem at first glance.