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Restoration Shaman Guide for WoW Forever

Heal as a Restoration Shaman in WoW Forever: a level 30 dungeon build and a Riptide raid build at 60, with Chain Heal play, Water Shield mana and totems.

ShamanRestorationPvEPvPHealerRaidsDungeonsLeveling

By stillsixty staffUpdated

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Variants

Overview

Restoration is the Shaman healer, and in Forever it heals with a plan instead of a single button. Riptide lands an instant heal and a 15-second heal over time on your target, and for those 15 seconds every Chain Heal you cast directly on that target is 25% stronger. Chain Heal then jumps to two more players. Riptide, Chain Heal, repeat: that loop is the heart of the spec.

The tree also fixes the Shaman's mana. Mindfulness lets half of your regeneration continue while you cast, and Water Shield gives you back 2% of your maximum mana every time you're hit or one of your heals crits. Add Mana Tide Totem, which gives every group member within 30 yards mana every 3 seconds for 12 seconds (about 350 mana in total at the talent rank, up to 1,160 at rank 3 from level 58), and you heal through long fights without chain-drinking potions.

Your totems carry the rest. In Forever the buff and healing totems last 5 minutes and friendly totems reach 30 yards, so Mana Spring Totem and Healing Stream Totem cover your group for a whole pull, and a single Call of the Elements drops four at once.

Healing Wave is still your workhorse. Improved Healing Wave brings it to 2.5 seconds, Healing Way adds 25%, and Purification adds 10% on top, so a max-rank Healing Wave is your largest single heal by far. The skill is choosing between it, the 1.5-second Lesser Healing Wave and a Riptide-backed Chain Heal on every global, and that choice is what this guide teaches.

Strengths

  • Group healing: Chain Heal heals three targets, and Riptide makes the first heal 25% bigger.
  • Strong mana tools: Mindfulness, Water Shield, Mana Tide Totem and a stronger Mana Spring Totem.
  • Instant emergency heals: Riptide on a 6-second cooldown, and Nature's Swiftness for an instant Healing Wave.
  • Totems that heal, restore mana and remove Poison, Disease and Fear for the whole group.
  • Reincarnation brings you back after a wipe, so you can resurrect the raid without a corpse run.

Weaknesses

  • Chain Heal only jumps within your own party when you cast it on a party member, so your group placement matters in raids.
  • No absorb shields, and your only heals over time are Riptide and Healing Stream Totem's small party-wide ticks. A tank taking huge spikes needs your full attention.
  • You have to stand within 30 yards of your totems for them to do anything.
  • Riptide is the tier 7 talent (30 points in Restoration first) and Chain Heal arrives at 40. Until then, your healing is Healing Wave and Lesser Healing Wave.

What's new in Forever

New in Forever
  • Riptide is the tier 7 talent, your 31st point in Restoration (requires 3/3 Healing Way): an instant heal plus a 15-second heal over time on a 6-second cooldown, and your Chain Heal on that target is 25% stronger. Trainers teach new ranks at 50 and 60, and it can land critical heals.
  • Water Shield (tier 3 talent): 3 water globes, each restoring 2% of your maximum mana when you're hit or when one of your heals crits. It lasts 10 minutes and replaces Lightning Shield.
  • Mindfulness (new, 3 ranks): 17%, 33% or 50% of your mana regeneration continues while casting.
  • Healing Way is now a flat 8%, 17% or 25% more Healing Wave healing. Purification adds up to 10% to all your heals.
  • Tidal Focus also gives 1% Hit per rank, and Natural Grace reduces the threat of all your spells by up to 15%.
  • Restorative Totems now boosts Healing Stream Totem by up to 50% and Mana Spring Totem by up to 25%.
  • Healing Focus gives up to a 70% chance to avoid interruption from damage, and Improved Reincarnation adds up to 4% maximum health.
  • Mana Tide Totem (requires level 40) restores mana to group members within 30 yards. Trainers teach new ranks at 48 and 58.
  • Buff and utility totems last 5 minutes (Strength of Earth, Mana Spring, Healing Stream and the like), and friendly totems reach 30 yards. Searing lasts 30 to 55 seconds by rank, Earthbind and Grounding 45, Magma 20 and Stoneclaw 15. Totemic Projection moves your totems up to 30 yards, and Totemic Recall refunds 25% of their mana.

Talents

The dungeon healing build for levels 10–30. Improved Healing Wave speeds up your main heal. Mindfulness and Water Shield keep your mana up through a whole dungeon. Healing Focus keeps your heals landing while mobs hit you, and Tidal Mastery turns more heals into crits, which refill your mana through Water Shield.

Split 0/0/21 · 21 points at level 30 · Open in calculator

Elemental

0 points

Enhancement

0 points

Restoration

21 points

Talent order

  1. Levels 10–14: 5/5 Improved Healing Wave. Healing Wave casts 0.5 seconds faster. At level 24 that is a 2.5-second Healing Wave instead of 3 seconds.
  2. Levels 15–17: 3/3 Mindfulness. Half of your mana regeneration continues while casting. This is where your mana problems end.
  3. Levels 18–19: 2/5 Tidal Focus. 2% cheaper heals, and it opens tier 3.
  4. Level 20: 1/1 Water Shield. 2% of your maximum mana back when you're hit or a heal crits. Three globes per cast, at most one every few seconds.
  5. Levels 21–23: 5/5 Tidal Focus. 5% cheaper heals and +5% Hit for the Lightning Bolts you cast while questing.
  6. Levels 24–25: 2/3 Healing Focus. A 47% chance to finish a heal that damage would have interrupted. The first point also opens tier 4. Mana Tide Totem requires level 40, so it waits for the 60 build.
  7. Levels 26–30: 5/5 Tidal Mastery. +5% critical effect chance on your heals. Every crit is a Water Shield globe.

Flexible points

  • Mobs run at you on the pull: take 3/3 Natural Grace at 21–23 instead of the last three ranks of Tidal Focus. Your heals make 15% less threat.
  • Tank keeps dying to melee spikes: move Tidal Mastery's last 3 points into 3/3 Ancestral Healing. Your heal crits then add 25% armor to the tank for 15 seconds.

Races

Best races

Horde: Tauren. Endurance adds 5% health, and War Stomp stuns up to 5 enemies within 8 yards for 2 seconds when a pack turns on you. Plainsrunning builds up to 30% movement speed when you have to run between groups.

Horde: Troll. Berserking speeds up your casting for 10 seconds every 3 minutes. Save it for the moment the whole raid takes damage.

Alliance: Dwarf (new). Mace Specialization gives +1% critical strike chance with all spells while you hold a mace, and every heal crit is Water Shield mana. Stoneform removes Poisons, Diseases and Bleeds from you and cuts Physical damage taken by 10% for 8 seconds.

All playable races

Rotation

Before the pull

Healing a pull

  1. Heal the tank with your highest-rank Healing Wave. Start the cast when the tank is at about 70%, and cancel it if they don't need it.
  2. When the tank drops fast, use Lesser Healing Wave (from 20). It's a 1.5-second heal.
  3. Heal the rest of the party with lower Healing Wave ranks. Rank matters: a rank you don't need wastes mana.
  4. Use Cure Poison from 16 and Cure Disease from 22 on anyone poisoned or diseased.

Mana

  • Mindfulness keeps half your regeneration going while you cast. Spirit on your gear matters.
  • Drink before every boss pull. You have no Mana Tide Totem until 40.
  • Water Shield globes fire on hits you take too. When a mob turns on you, you get mana for it.

Dungeon pulls at 20–30

Before 40 you have no Chain Heal, so group damage means several Healing Waves in a row. Stand where you can see the tank and the melee at once, and put Healing Stream Totem between them: its ticks are small, but they land on all five players every 2 seconds for the whole pull. When two players are low, heal the tank first with Lesser Healing Wave, then the other player with a mid-rank Healing Wave. If a mob turns on you, walk it back to the tank instead of running away; Water Shield turns its hits into mana, one globe every few seconds.

Questing as Resto

Healing gear also grants spell damage equal to a third of its healing, so your Lightning Bolt still kills. Pull with Lightning Bolt, Flame Shock the mob and finish it in melee with Rockbiter Weapon on your weapon.

Stat priority

Dungeon healing

  1. Healing Power
  2. Intellect
  3. Spirit
  4. Critical Strike
  5. Stamina

Healing Power adds to every heal, and at this level small amounts matter. Intellect is your mana pool, and Spirit is your regeneration, half of which Mindfulness keeps running while you cast.

Gear

What to look for

Any armor with Healing Power or Intellect. A one-handed mace or caster weapon with a shield or held off-hand is your setup. Forever's caster weapons roll healing on the level-up upgrades that physical classes get, so replace your weapon as often as quests allow.

Totem items

Keep Earth Totem, Fire Totem, Water Totem and Air Totem in your bags. You need the Water Totem for Healing Stream, Mana Spring and Mana Tide. The class quests are in the Shaman leveling guide.

Professions

Herbalism and Alchemy is the healer pair. You drink mana potions, Mageblood and flasks every raid, and Alchemy makes all of them.

Engineering is the alternative for utility in raids, with Mining to feed it. For gold while leveling, take Herbalism and Skinning.

Group play and dungeons

Your job is healing, totems and cleansing, in that order.

Totem stacking

Two Shamans in one group don't stack Windfury Totem or Grace of Air Totem. If another Shaman is in your group, you take the Water and Earth totems and they take Air and Fire.

PvP

Restoration is a strong battleground healer because so much of its healing is instant. Riptide and Nature's Swiftness heal without a cast bar, and Healing Focus keeps your Lesser Healing Wave going through hits. Grounding Totem absorbs a Polymorph or Fear aimed at you, Tremor Totem breaks Fear on your whole team, and Purge strips shields and Blessings from enemy players. Water Shield turns hits on you into mana, one globe every few seconds and three per cast, so recast it between fights while your team peels.

Play around interrupts. Earth Shock is your own interrupt on an enemy healer, but its school lock lasts only 2 seconds. When a melee player is on you, cast Riptide and Lesser Healing Wave instead of Healing Wave, and use Earthbind Totem to slow them while you step away. Tauren can War Stomp a group of attackers for 2 seconds to land a Chain Heal; Orcs clear Curses and Banes with Shatter Curse, and Dwarves shrug off Poisons and Bleeds with Stoneform.

Tips

Riptide, then Chain Heal

Chain Heal cast directly on your Riptide target is 25% stronger. Always Chain Heal the player you just Riptided.

One elemental shield

Water Shield and Lightning Shield replace each other. As a healer, Water Shield stays on at all times.

Downrank. Healing Wave has ten ranks. A tank missing 1,000 health doesn't need rank 10.

Keep Healing Stream close. It heals your party members within 30 yards. Place it where the melee stands, not where you stand.

Nature's Swiftness is your tank saver. Keep it for a tank below 20%, not for convenience.

Watch your totem range. Healing Stream, Mana Spring and your buff totems reach 30 yards. When the fight moves, Totemic Projection moves the whole set on a 1-minute cooldown.

Use Mana Tide early. The group gets the most from it before anyone has run dry.

Recast Water Shield between pulls. Three globes go fast when you're hit or crit often. Check it before every pull, the same way you check your totems.

Chain Heal needs a cluster. Its jumps only reach nearby players. Heal the player standing in the middle of the injured group, not the one at the edge.

Macros

Healing Wave on whoever your mouse is over, or on your target.

Mouseover Healing Wave
#showtooltip Healing Wave
/cast [@mouseover,help,nodead][] Healing Wave

Chain Heal on your mouseover, for raid frames.

Mouseover Chain Heal
#showtooltip Chain Heal
/cast [@mouseover,help,nodead][] Chain Heal

Riptide on your mouseover.

Mouseover Riptide
#showtooltip Riptide
/cast [@mouseover,help,nodead][] Riptide

Nature's Swiftness and an instant Healing Wave in one press.

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

Totemic Projection at your cursor: move your whole totem set onto the group.

Cursor Projection
#showtooltip Totemic Projection
/cast [@cursor] Totemic Projection

Changelog

  • Guide published with Level 30 and Level 60 Raid builds.

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