Restoration Druid Guide for WoW Forever

Restoration is the heal-over-time healer, and Forever gives it the tools it always lacked. Rejuvenation, Tranquility and Wild Growth can all land critical heals now. Swiftmend heals for a full HoT's worth without eating the HoT, and Nature's Splendor stretches Rejuvenation to 15 seconds and Regrowth to 27. You blanket the tank and the party in HoTs, then spend your big casts only where they're needed.

At level 30 you heal dungeons with Rejuvenation, Regrowth and Healing Touch, with Nature's Swiftness as your emergency button. At 60 you add Wild Growth, a party-wide HoT on a 6-second cooldown, and a Tranquility that comes back every 2 minutes instead of 5.

Strengths

• Efficient tank sustain: two long HoTs on the tank and an instant Swiftmend that leaves both running.
• Instant heals everywhere. Rejuvenation, Swiftmend and Wild Growth are instant and on a 1-second global cooldown with Gift of the Earthmother, so you heal while you move.
• Wild Growth heals a whole party every 6 seconds.
• A raid-wide buff in Gift of the Wild, Innervate, and Rebirth, a resurrection you can cast in combat.
• Forms for every problem: Bear Form to survive a hit, Cat Form to solo, Travel Form to get anywhere.

Weaknesses

• HoTs are slow. When a tank takes a spike, you need Swiftmend or Nature's Swiftness ready.
• Healing Touch is a 3-second cast even with Naturalist. Casting it in a crisis ties you down.
• Wild Growth and Tranquility heal only the target's party, not the raid.
• No shield, no instant big heal outside Swiftmend and Nature's Swiftness.
• Every HoT you place early can go to waste if the damage never comes. Rolling HoTs on the tank is right; rolling them on the whole raid is not.

What's new in Forever

Best races

Alliance: Night Elf. Shadowmeld works in combat: it discourages enemies from attacking you, with a 2-minute cooldown. A healer who pulls aggro on a big pull has a way out. Elune's Light adds 10% critical strike chance to your heals for 15 seconds, which stacks with Improved Regrowth.

Alliance mana: High Order Skyborne. They need a Heroic or higher Forever pack. Read Ley Line doubles your health and mana regeneration: for 15 minutes when you find a ley line, and for 15 seconds anywhere else. Wind Blessed adds 1% Haste to every cast.

Horde: Tauren. Endurance gives 5% more health, which keeps a healer alive through AoE damage, and War Stomp stuns up to five enemies within 8 yards for 2 seconds when a pack runs at you.

Horde alternative: Windshaper Skyborne. Wind Blessed's 1% Haste is a small gain for every cast, but Tauren's health and War Stomp save more pulls.

All playable races

• Night Elf: Shadowmeld, Elune's Light, Quickness (+1% dodge, 2% movement speed), Wisp Spirit.
• High Order Skyborne (Alliance, new): Read Ley Line, Wind Blessed, Elemental Insight for 5% damage against Elementals, and Walk on Air to glide for 10 seconds.
• Tauren: Endurance, War Stomp, Cultivation to grow a duplicate of an herb once per herb, and Plainsrunning for up to 30% more movement speed while you keep moving.
• Windshaper Skyborne (Horde, new): Wind Blessed, Elemental Insight, Walk on Air and Skysight for 10% more movement and mounted speed.

Herbalism and Alchemy is the Restoration pair. Alchemy makes your flasks and mana potions, and a healer drinks more of them than anyone. Tauren can Cultivate a duplicate of an herb, once per herb.

Enchanting is the gear profession: it crafts the Idol of Swiftness, which takes 3 seconds off Swiftmend, and it disenchants every piece you outgrow.

For gold, level with Herbalism and Skinning and quest in Cat Form. Switch to Alchemy or Enchanting at 60 once you have the gold for materials.

Your job is to keep the tank alive first, the party second, and yourself third.

• Let the tank build threat before you heal. Healing threat goes to every mob already in combat with your group. A big heal in the first seconds of a pull, before the tank has hit each mob a few times, pulls those mobs onto you.
• Stand within range of the whole group. Tranquility and Wild Growth need the party close.
• Dispel. Remove Curse removes one Curse or Bane, and Abolish Poison cures a poison every 2 seconds for 8 seconds.
• Crowd control. Hibernate sleeps a Beast or Dragonkin, and Entangling Roots roots a runner. Both hold only until damage breaks them.
• Rebirth the tank or the other healer mid-fight. It needs a seed reagent (Ironwood Seed at 60) and has a 30-minute cooldown. Use Revive for everyone after the fight: it's cheaper and needs no reagent.
• Innervate yourself first. A healer who runs dry costs the whole group. On a long boss with a second healer, give it to whichever of you is lower: it's 20 seconds of 400% extra regeneration, all of it while casting, on a 6-minute cooldown.
• Buff before every run. Mark of the Wild lasts an hour. From 50, Gift of the Wild covers the whole party or raid in one cast; you learn it from Book: Gift of the Wild, and it needs a reagent: Wild Berries at rank 1 and Wild Thornroot at rank 2.
• Cure Poison or Abolish Poison? Cure Poison removes one poison now. Abolish Poison removes one now and keeps cleansing every 2 seconds for 8 seconds, so it handles a mob that keeps reapplying its poison.
• Protect yourself when a mob breaks loose. Nature's Grasp roots the next mob that hits you in melee (1-minute cooldown, castable in any form), and Barkskin cuts Physical damage by 20% for 15 seconds without slowing your casts. Tell the tank, step toward them, and keep healing.
• When the tank dies mid-fight, Rebirth them at once if the fight can still be won. It's a 2-second cast with a 30-minute cooldown, so spend it on the tank or a healer, never on a damage dealer the group can finish without.
• Drink between pulls, and say so. A tank who pulls while you're at 30% mana is a wipe you can see coming.

Dungeon HoT habits

• Keep Rejuvenation rolling on the tank through every pull, and add Regrowth once the tank drops under 80%.
• Save Swiftmend for the spike. It doesn't eat your HoTs, so it's always safe to press when the tank drops fast.
• Tranquility heals only the party within 20 yards. On a pull where the whole group takes damage, step into the middle before you channel.

A Restoration Druid is hard to kill and harder to stop. Keep Rejuvenation and Regrowth on yourself before the fight starts, and heal with instants while you move: Rejuvenation, Swiftmend and Wild Growth never stop you running. Every shapeshift breaks Polymorph, roots and snares, so a snared Druid shifts to Travel Form outdoors or Cat Form indoors and walks away. Barkskin cuts Physical damage by 20% and stops pushback on a Healing Touch you have to land. Save Nature's Swiftness for the moment a teammate's health bar is about to empty.

Tools that win fights

• Entangling Roots a melee attacker and step away. You can root one target at a time, and damage can break it.
• Nature's Grasp before the fight: the first enemy that hits you in melee is rooted.
• Hibernate a Hunter's pet. It sleeps Beasts and Dragonkin for up to 40 seconds at max rank, and any damage wakes them.
• Cure your team. Abolish Poison clears a Rogue's poisons as they land, and Remove Curse clears Curses and Banes.
• Dash in Cat Form for 50% more speed for 15 seconds (60% from 46) when you need to reach a teammate or break away from a melee player.
• Innervate a teammate caster who's out of mana when you aren't.

Stand at maximum range from the fight, behind a pillar or a teammate if you can. Every second a melee player spends running to you is a second they aren't hitting your team.

Barkskin before Tranquility. Barkskin no longer slows your casting, and it stops damage from pushing back your channel.

Train every Rejuvenation rank. Rejuvenation is your most-cast spell from 4 to 60, and trainers teach a new rank every six levels.

Refresh Regrowth before it runs out, not after. A 27-second HoT with a high crit chance on the direct heal is too valuable to let lapse on the main tank.

Cast Wild Growth after the damage lands, not before. It front-loads its healing, so a cast on injured players heals far more than one that lands on full-health players.

Mark of the Wild on the whole group. It lasts an hour and includes Improved Mark of the Wild for free.

Rejuvenation on your mouseover target, or your current target if you aren't pointing at anyone.

#showtooltip Rejuvenation
/cast [@mouseover,help,nodead][] Rejuvenation

Nature's Swiftness and Healing Touch in one press, on your mouseover or your target.

#showtooltip Healing Touch
/cast Nature's Swiftness
/cast [@mouseover,help,nodead][] Healing Touch

Swiftmend on your mouseover target, for the moment a raid frame drops.

#showtooltip Swiftmend
/cast [@mouseover,help,nodead][] Swiftmend

Innervate on yourself without changing targets.

#showtooltip Innervate
/cast [@player] Innervate

Rebirth on your mouseover target, so you can resurrect a fallen tank without losing your healing target.

#showtooltip Rebirth
/cast [@mouseover,help,dead][] Rebirth