Become Everyone’s Best Friend With Resto Spec

Resto Shaman Build

Secondary healers like Druids and Shamans are great fun – while you’re not being everyone’s best buddy by stopping them dying, you’re able to step in and do some DPS, and not to mention level at an “ok” rate when you’re out of grouping situations.

The other good thing about being the secondary healer is that everyone doesn’t expect you to hold everything together. If your main healer drops, and the rest of the group soon follows, it was his fault… right?

With all my professions of a resto Shammy being able to do other stuff while he’s not healing groups, let me be clear – the restoration Shaman is NOT going to handle solo PvE well, and is a bit of a slouch on leveling speeds.

Because of that fact, this build is fairly specialized and doesn’t offer much in the way of options to tweak for different play styles.

Either you use this build to heal groups in PvP or in instances, or you just love the Resto Shammy and don’t care that you’re leveling a little slow.

Key tip: Resto Shamans are the king of chain heals, which means the Shaman will be in charge of healing groups of players at a time, particularly larger raid groups being hit by AoE’s.

Your healing wave spells are great and all, but Druids and obviously Priests trounce your single target heals. Chain heals are also great for PvP in battlegrounds or larger arena fights, but obviously you lose your biggest draw card in 2v2.

This build will be a good general purpose healing build for PvP or instances of any size. If you’re a raiding junkie I’d investigate optimizing your chain heals by picking up the appropriate gear and making every talent point count.

The Restoration Shaman Build

Row 1 (Improved Healing Wave, Totemic Focus)

Nothing fancy here, IHW gets maxed with 5 points to reduce your cast time half a sec. Leave totemic focus alone.

Row 2 (Improved Reincarnation, Healing Grace, Tidal Focus)

We don’t need reincarnation for PvP, and it shouldn’t be your main focus in groups to rez, so leave it be, 0/2. Healing Grace, max it with 3/3 – great for managing your threat levels, especially when you start spamming chain heals. Tidal focus also gets 5/5, especially handy again in groups where you’re doing a lot of healing – you’ll save 5% mana per cast with this maxed.

Row 3 (Improved Water Shield, Healing Focus, Tidal Force, Ancestral Healing)

I leave IWS – I know some people think the pay off is worth the chance at gobbling a water shield orb, but I’m not convinced 3 points are worthwhile here – especially when chain heal isn’t on the menu.

Healing Focus – an easy one & doesn’t really need explaining, 3/3 reduces pushback suffered from damage by 70%.

Tidal Force is another no brainer – increase the crit chance of your core healing spells including chain heal by 60% for a limited time and great as part of an “oh sh*t” macro if and when things get a little crazy.

Ancestral Healing is part b to the “oh sh*t” button I referenced above – give your target an extra 25% armor for 15 seconds after a crit heal.

Row 4 (Restorative Totems, Tidal Mastery)

One of the most commonly used totems in a raid is the mana spring totem. Your priest loves it, the mage loves it… everyone loves it because the benefits help us all out at the end of the day. Max out 3 points to get an extra 20% mana out of your spring, or if you have your healing totem out, and extra 45% healing.

Tidal Mastery, max it out at 5% to get those lovely crit heal percentages up.

Row 5 (Healing Way, Nature’s Swiftness, Focused Mind)

Healing Way gets no love on this line, I’m just not big on the Shaman’s healing wave spells and think points are best kept for other uses.

Nature’s Swiftness is another great panic button to include on a macro. 1/1 gives you an insta cast healing spell.

Focused Mind is great for PvP and reduces Silence or Interrupt effects by 30% which can be the difference between saving your friend’s skin and not. Max it with 3 points.

Row 6 (Purification)

All on its lonesome is Purification — you can’t miss its 10% bonus to all heals. Nuff said -5/5.

Row 7 (Nature’s Guardian, Mana Tide Totem, Cleans Spirit)

Nature’s Guardian is a bit of an optional one for me. If you don’t find yourself in PvP very often I can see the wisdom in dropping it in favor of some other resto lines here. If you engage in PvP its a must, max it. If you don’t, it can still be handy in tough fights and makes you just a little bit more survivable.

Mana Tide Totem, a great pick for you raiders, it can add a huge mana regeneration boost in the thick of battle, drop a point in here for sure. If you never raid, drop it.

Cleanse Spririt is handy in all sorts of situations and takes down a poison, curse and disease effect at the same time with an insta cast. 1/1 here too.

Row 8 (Blessing of the Eternals, Improved Chain Heal, Nature’s Blessing)

More critical healing love comes from BotE — 2 points gives you a 4% boost, and gives you an 80% boost to the chance of Earthliving to apply on your target when they’re under 35% health. 2/2 here, please.

Improved Chain Heal, 2 points here gives your chain heals a 20% boost, need I say more?

Also max out Nature’s Blessing with 3 points, which with Ancestral Knowledge maxed out gives you an awesome boost to every heal you do (15% of intellect added to each heal).Row 9 ()

Row 10 (Ancestral Awakening, Earth Shield, Improved Earth Shield)

AA is left alone in this build — again I’m not keen on optimizing non chaining heals, and even with riptide getting this bonus I’m not keen on it. Leave it out.

Earth Shield is awesome with just 1 point and can be good to use on your primary healer or tank. Improved Earth sheild doesn’t convince me and I leave it out to give us some points in enhancement which make a real difference to our heals.

Row 11 (Tidal Waves)

Tidal Waves is a good talent to make your single target heals more useful. Giving your next two healing wave spells after Riptide or Chain Heal a 30% faster cast with a 20% healing bonus is definately worth the 5 points. Fill it up and move on to Riptide.

Row 12 (Riptide)

Finally at row 12 we Shaman’s get a good healing over time (HoT) spell! Riptide would be great alone, but with the bonus it gives your Chain Heals to the same target, its really an invaluable and kick ass addition to the resto line.

Round out your Resto with some Enhancement thusly:

Ancestral knowledge 5/5 – great for that extra mana and crit ability.

Thundering strikes 5/5 – ditto.

Improved Shields 2 or 3 points here out of 3. If you go 2 points, place your last point into Shamanistic Focus for the cheaper shock spells (good for you PvP’ers out there to conserve mana).

There you have it, a great Resto build for Shaman’s who love PvP and raiding – its easily tweaked if you’re a raiding fanatic, but what I have here is solid even if you are.

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Shadow Spec With Some Holy

Are you ready to crack those DPS problems that keep you from joining raids or PvP events?

Over the past month I have been fiddling around with the shadow talent tree hoping to boost my stats. The problem I ran into was with every increase in this talent tree I lost something big in another area.

Back and forth I went trying to come up with the right combination until I finally settled on something that I feel is perfect for people who want a flexible shadow priest. A shadow priest who can handle the DPS requirements of raids, take out PvP opponents with burst damage, and of course level up quickly.

Keep in mind additional rows will open up after every 5 talent points used.

Row 1 (Spirit Tap, Improved ST, and Darkness)

The 1st row is built around increasing your spell damage and regenerating mana. Any Priest knows you need a substantial amount of mana when healing others, so this will be important. Make sure you use 3 talent points in the Spirit Tap. I recommend skipping over the Improved Spirit Tap and focus on filling the Darkness ability with all 5 points.

Row 2 (Shadow Affinity, Improved Shadow Word: Pain, and Shadow Focus)

Add all 3 points to the Shadow Affinity and gain a 25% decrease in threat from Shadow spells. Also, fill the Shadow Focus with all 3 pts. You want to decrease as much mana cost as possible and this removes 6%.

Row 3 (Improved Psychic Scream, Improved Mind Blast, and Mind Flay)

You will need to fill the IPS if want the Silence ability (which I recommend). Plus, putting the lone point in Mind Flay will allow you to slow opponents by 50%  – great for PvP priests.

Row 4 (Veiled Shadows, Shadow Reach, Shadow Weaving)

The two important abilities here are Shadow Reach and Weaving. Placing 2pts in Shadow Reach will give you an extra 20% range on Shadow Spells. Putting 3pts in Shadow Weaving will add a 100% chance to increase your Shadow damage by 2% for 15 seconds.

Row 5 (Silence, Vampiric Embrace, Improved Vampiric Embrace, Focused Mind)

Adding the 1pt needed for Silence allows you to keep an opponent from casting spells for 5 seconds, again great for PvP, especially against enemy spell casters.

Vampiric Embrace and Improved Vampiric Embrace should both be filled as well and will keep your health ticking along nicely during solo play or to top up after copping a few whacks in a tough dungeon. During a 5 minute period, any Shadow spell damage will revert 15% health to you and 3% to party members. The IVE allows a 67% health reimbursement. Then of course Focused Mind should be filled to reduce mana costs on all Mind spells by 15%.

Row 6 (Mind Melt, Improved Devouring Plague)

I’m not big on 4% critical strikes for Mind Melt, so unless you’re really heavy on PvP, I skip it. Fill up the Improved Devouring Plague talent… you will increase the total damage duration by 15% and deal a 15% instant strike of the total damage caused over time.

Row 7 (Shadowform, Shadow Power)

It’s very important to add the talent point needed for Shadowform. It adds 15% damage, decreases 15% damage to you, and reduces threat by 30%. However, the big boost is a 100% crit hit with Shadow Word: Pain, Devouring Plague, and Vampiric Touch. Fill the Shadow Power as well so you can increase your Mind Blast, Flay, and SW: Death spell crit damage by 100%.

Row 8 (Improved Shadowform, Misery)

You definitely want to add the 2pts needed for IS. It allows you to remove movement impairing effects 100% of the time you use the Fade ability. Good for PvP, and good for running away from monsters… not that you’ll be doing any of that with this build… right? Improved Shadowform is also great for PvP when you’re trying to get a cast off on a melee class like a rogue or enhancement shaman who hit you with a flurry of attacks, no more watching your casting bar stay still!

Row 9 (Psychic Horror, Vampiric Touch, Pain and Suffering)

You will have to fill each one of these abilities in order to hit the next row. You’ve got a good fear spell here, and then Vampiric Touch and the nasty Pain and Suffering both boost your shadow damage.

Pain and Suffering is especially nasty for Shadow Priests as it refreshes your Shadow Word Pain ticks for even more damage.

Row 10 (Twisted Faith)

Place 5pts. here so you can increase your spell power by 10% of your total Spirit. There is also additional help to your Mind Blast and Flay by 10%. Combining spirit heavy gear with this talent can result in some really nice boosts to spellpower, so consider giving that a go if your bank account is up to the challenge.

Row 11 (Dispersion)

There will be times that this can be extremely useful – its a real “get out of jail free card, and can be intensely annoying to PvP opponenets. Its also gotten me out of more certain deaths than I care to recall.

Add a point here to finish out the tree and reduce your damage taken by 90%, regenerate mana over 6 seconds at 6% of total per second and eliminate several movement impairing effects.

Specialize Your Shadow Priest From Here

What to do with the other 20 points?

When you’re finished here you can go back and add the extra 20 points to your Shadow tree, or give your Priest a nice boost in other areas. Since I’m not sure what you use a lot, this will be up to you. In the end though, having a Shadow talent pool like this will help you become one of the better DPS dealers in your guild, make you survivable in groups and very hard to kill in PvP.

My personal pick for the last 20 points is putting it all into holy healing talents to make me useful in small parties, but if you’re into PvP I think its pretty hard to go past putting the rest into the balance.

That’s all there is to it. If you’re really mad keen on leveling quicker check out my Horde Leveling Guide front page for info on some commercial guides… They’re not really necessary, but are admittedly a nice luxury to have.

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Holy Priests – How to Build the Ultimate Group and Raiding Spec

Holy and Discipline Priest Build

When it’s time to be in a large raid group, or quest with a group of friends, getting the most out of your Holy talent tree is important. It’s the only tree where you can maximize your health regen and at the same time increase places like spirit, mana, and movement speed in your favor.

And now that you can duel-spec with the patch 3.1 changes, it will be important to keep the Holy talent tree set up for specific runs.

I’ve played my priest a lot, and actually respecced the guy so many times I’m almost embarrassed – but in the process I’ve worked out what really works in a hard-core raid.

This is it.

Row 1 (Healing Focus, Improved Renew, and Holy Specialization)

As a healer you probably know how important it is to be able to heal without interruption. This is why you should place 2pts in Healing Focus and gain 70% reduced pushback during any healing. Right now, don’t worry about the Holy Specialization. Instead, fill the IR and increase the amount you heal by 15%.

Row 2 (Spell Warding, Divine Fury)

I played back and forth with these 2 forever. When it comes down to it, just add 5pts to each run and move on. You reduce the amount of damage you take from spells by 10% with SW, and reduce casting times for 4 different abilities by .5 seconds.

Row 3 (Desperate Prayer, Blessed Recovery, Inspiration)

Well, you definitely need to add 1pt to the DP because it gives the caster an instant 263 to 325pt heal. The other 2 abilities I just skip for now because they don’t give me immediate results.

Row 4 (Holy Reach, Improved Healing, Searing Light)

Even after only adding 2 points in the 3rd row, you should have opened up the 4th. Here it’s important to maximize Holy Reach out because you gain 20% extra range on 6 different healing spells. IH will need to be full as well so you can get the 15% reduction in mana cost for 5 different abilities. I skipped over Searing Light for now, but only because it increases damage from spells and isn’t a healing setup.

Row 5 (Healing Prayers, Spirit of Redemption, Spiritual Guidance)

Healing Prayers is another mana reduction, and when full it will take away 20% of the mana cost for Prayer of Healing and the Prayer of Mending. The Spirit of Redemption is a great weapon when you’re in a group or raid. It allows you to run out of health, but heal others for 15 seconds, and then die. You never know who will need more help. Obviously you need a little fight in you during your adventures and the SG will do this easily. Add all 5pts and receive a 25% increase of your Spirit to spell damage.

Row 6 (Surge of Light, Spiritual Healing)

Okay, you have two options here. I personally try to stay away from Smite and Flash Heal when I’m at the higher levels, but if you use them a lot you’ll want to fill Surge of Light. I say skip it for now and fill the Spiritual Healing. It increases the amount of health you heal by an additional 10%. Plus it opens the next level.

Row 7 (Holy Concentration, Lightwell, and Light Resilience)

One of my favorite abilities in the Holy talent pool is the Lightwell ability. It is kind of like the equivalent to a portal, and members of your group or raid can click on it to gain additional health. They will receive 801 health over a 6 second period. It’s a lot nicer then shuffling through each person. Plus, you can skip over the other two and still reach level 8.

Row 8 (Body and Soul, Empowered Healing, and Serendipity)

I like the body and soul ability, but it’s not needed right now. I pass on it when trying to keep some of the talent points, and only add 2pts to Empowered Healing. The idea here was to keep 5pts in the row, and filling up Serendipity with 3 did the trick.

Row 9 (Empowered Renew, Circle of Healing, Test of Faith)

This is probably one of the most important rows to fill up. The Circle of Healing is my 2nd favorite trick, because it can heal 5 party members at the same time. Keep in mind they have to be within a 15 yard radius of you though. Test of Faith gives you a 12% increase in healing abilities towards any friends that are below 50%. Then of course, the ER does pretty much what it says.

Row 10 (Divine Providence)

You will notice that you don’t need to fill this up with 5pts to reach row 11, like other trees. Just use 3pts. It will still give you a 6% increase on several healing abilities, but we don’t need the other 4% possible.

Row 11 (Guardian Spirit)

As a player this isn’t my favorite thing to use, unless I throw it up on a tank or something. Whoever you heal gets a 40% increase in HP. There’s a few other things as well, but if you haven’t paid attention to it before, I won’t spoil everything.

20 Points Away! Do you go Shadow, or Discipline?

Personally, when I’m healing raids I’ll use up the rest of my points on Discipline to up my survivability a tad. The last thing your group needs is their primary healer getting killed (don’t you HATE that feeling?), so I tend to err towards Discipline.

Will that in mind here’s a bonus Discipline suggestion for super dedicated raid healers who want to keep that whole dying thing to a minimum:

Unbreakable Will 5/5, Silent Resolve 3/3, Improved Power Word Fortitude 2/2, Martyrdom 2/2, Meditation 3/3, Improved Power Word Shield 3/3.

All of the effects under these talents will boost your survivability by either making you harder to kill, or by reducing threat. The combo of which should help you stay alive that extra 10 or 20 seconds you need.

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