Resto shaman PVE: glyph of Riptide?

[rda]

I am trying healing, and I am doing this with PUGs (I know it'd be different with a guild, I was a pretty hardcore raider before, I know how it works, I just can't maintain any kind of schedule now and so don't want to let any guild down).

A simple question for fellow resto shamans: is glyph of Riptide more or less mandatory, or at least mandatory for high throughput? The vast majority of the time people die to mechanics, not to lack of healing, but I have to say I am a bit concerned about my numbers as well - yes, specs are different, and fights are different, but I want to be sure I am doing it right - are you using glyph of Riptide? It seems to be great for High Tide at least, which would be welcome, because other talents on that last row seem pretty mediocre. How stressful is it on mana?

If you aren't using glyph of Riptide, your raid down bosses just fine AND your numbers are good, what's your usual cycle? Is it the obvious: keep Earth Shield on tank, keep Healing Stream on, Riptide - Healing Wave - Healing Wave - repeat, switch to Healing Surge / cooldowns in case of high or unexpected damage? When I am doing this, I find that my mana is perfectly fine, but my numbers aren't.

Thanks in advance for any help.

[Deleted]

I'm not a big fan personally, normal riptide heals 138% SP as intial then 180% as the hot for 7.29% of mana. Healing wave on the other hand heals 412% of SP for 10.35% of mana. Using the glyph turns riptide from being one of our most efficient heals to being less than half as good (riptide without initial heal is only 180% of SP for 7.29% mana). I guess if you're not struggling for mana it might be worth it on a very mobile fight but I still prefer regular riptide + chaining + high tides + Unleash life Chain Heal.

More about chain heal: with unleash life and high tides, chain heal hitting 6 targets is both our most powerful AND most efficient non-cd heal.

[rda]

More about chain heal: with unleash life and high tides, chain heal hitting 6 targets is both our most powerful AND most efficient non-cd heal.

That's kind of what I was saying - Chain Heal will only hit additional targets if there's Riptide on them, and given that I can't control what it hits past the first target, it looks like getting any reliable use out of High Tide would require 3+ running Riptides, which is pretty much impossible without glyph of Riptide.

I hear you on mana and Unleash Life.

It looks like I have to check what top parsing shamans are doing in, I don't know, normals. I didn't want to do this, because top parses are always gimmicky in that something went perfectly right and thus parse ended up as a top, but well... it looks like I have no other option. That, and measuring things myself, obviously.

[aiko464]

I think glyph of riptide is needed for raiding on most of the bosses. The instant heal of riptide is pretty much insignificant in my opinion. And in general im not really using riptide that much for its healing but I use it to make my chain heal more effective. Having your riptide on the lowest health targets boosts you chain heal so much in combination with high tides that it makes up for any of the healing done with riptide.
Most of the bosses in highmaul have certain phases where alot of healing is required, Tectus: Tectonic Upheaval and Brackenspore: Infesting Spore for example, short phases where you have to put out as much healing as you can. The best way to do this is with chain heal, excluding raids cds and all, if you then limit yourself the maximum potential of your chain heals because you can not put a riptide on targets you would prefer. (You can manage your riptides all you want but you will never get it perfect) you healing with chain heal with drop and your output will not be optimal.

Considering a cycle there isn't really any when it comes to healing. But before large damage phases pre-riptiding a few people so you can just keep spamming chain heal is pretty nice. This is all quite mana intensive, but it works for me.
I do not know if you are able to put up any logs? That would really make looking for things you are doing wrong alot easier

[rda]

I do not know if you are able to put up any logs? That would really make looking for things you are doing wrong alot easier

Damn, you are right, I should have done this from the beginning. I will try some things and if I still can't figure it out, I will come with logs.

[Deleted]

I could imagine that having riptide up on a lot of targets would be useful in larger raid sizes, I usually raid with around 15 players so unglyphed riptide is sufficient for me.

[shammypie]

losing 30% of the value of the heal is not worth removing the cd. If you feel you are lacking in riptides try out echo.

[Orcbert]

Echo of the Elements simply made it not needed. The few times before where I would sacrifice the initial heal to spam it are now really not there. EotE is a little RNG dependent, but I can hold onto it for a while if I know I'll need it soon. Plus the double insta-cast small heal is pretty nice in itself.

Going forward there may be a few specialized encounters where the glpyh + High Tide will be good for the ability to CH a specific group of targets over and over. I was actually going to play around with Butcher and see what happens later today since my groups for soaking cleaves are about 5 people each.

[Barrun]

I'm gonna quote a post from a few months ago regarding this same topic since it seems to be coming up frequently and is a good topic of discussion. You're spot on that its mandatory for high throughput, GoR is mandatory in my opinion if you want to perform to the class' maximum potential. Anyone who thinks EotE is a viable alternative should re-evaluate their play; the only time EotE is viable (raid setting) is if an EM boosted HTT can't be put to use, which is never the case for a progression fight. I've parsed orange on 4/7 Mythic using the glyph, including two #1's, take it as anecdotal but until I see a case against it my mind is set on Glyph of Riptide being mandatory.

I still firmly believe EotE is trash for raiding and Glyph of Riptide is essential so I want to try and demonstrate why so I came up with what an approximately 60 second interval of combat would look like using EotE, tallied the overall healing and mana costs, and broke down what logs would look like. I gave EotE some favor in granting it 5 PPM, and assumed it proc'd at the exact time RT's cooldown reset. To simplify things a little I used Rushing Streams instead of Conductivity and I included EB since that's without question going to be necessary for tier 17. Below is roughly what a minute log would look like, I tallied the total healing done and multiplied it by 3 to get an approximation for total healing done and mana consumed over 3 minutes. Some of the cooldowns such as EB lining up at the end of 1 minute and the next overlap a little but it should be fairly accurate regardless. Sorry for the formatting in advanced.

0:00 HST 2007% SP
1:50 Healing Rain 1728.756% SP
3:50 Earth Shield 706.75% SP
5:00 Elemental Blast
7:00 Riptide 172.5% + 225% SP
8:50 Riptide 172.5% + 225% SP
10:00 Healing Wave 515.625% SP
12:00 Healing Rain 1728.756% SP
14:00 Riptide 172.5% + 225% SP
15:50 Unleash Life 131.25% SP
17:00 Chain Heal 2145.506% SP
19:50 Elemental Blast
21:50 Riptide 172.5% + 225% SP
23:00 Riptide 172.5% + 225% SP
24:50 Healing Rain 1728.756% SP
26:50 Chain Heal 1650.389% SP
29:00 Riptide 172.5% + 225% SP
30:50 HST 2007% SP
32:00 Elemental Blast
34:00 Riptide 172.5% + 225% SP
35:50 Healing Rain 1728.756% SP
37:50 Riptide 172.5% + 225% SP
39:00 Earth Shield 706.75% SP
40:50 Healing Wave 515.625% SP
42:50 Riptide 172.5% + 225% SP
44:00 Riptide 172.5% + 225% SP
45:50 Healing Rain 1728.756% SP
47:50 Elemental Blast
49:50 Riptide 172.5% + 225% SP
51:00 Riptide 172.5% + 225% SP
52:50 Unleash Life 131.25% SP
54:00 Chain Heal 2145.506% SP
56:50 Healing Rain 1728.756% SP
58:50 Riptide 172.5% + 225% SP

Looking at a 3 minute interval to account for HTT (11250% SP every 3 minute):

HTT: 11250% SP, 11.736% overall healing
Riptide Initial Heal: 39(172.5% SP) = 6727.5% SP, 7.018% overall healing
Riptide HOT: 39(225% SP) = 8775% SP, 9.154% overall healing
Healing Rain: 18(1728.756% SP) = 31117.608% SP, 32.462% overall healing
HST: 6(2007% SP) = 12042% SP, 12.562% overall healing
Earth Shield: 6(706.75% SP) = 4240.5% SP, 4.424% overall healing
Healing Wave: 6(515.625% SP) = 3093.75% SP, 3.227% overall healing
Chain Heal: 6(2145.506% SP) + 3(1650.389% SP) = 17824.203% SP, 18.594% overall healing
Unleash Life: 6(131.25% SP) = 787.5% SP, 0.822% overall healing

Total Healing = 95858.061% SP for 1155.3% base mana

Now looking at a similar sequence but using Glyph of Riptide and no EotE I came up with what follows,

0:00 HST 2007% SP
1:50 Healing Rain 1728.756% SP
3:50 Earth Shield 706.75% SP
5:00 Elemental Blast
7:00 Riptide 17.25% + 225% SP
8:50 Riptide 17.25% + 225% SP
9:00 Riptide 17.25% + 225% SP
10:50 Unleash Life 131.25% SP
12:00 Healing Rain 1728.756% SP
14:00 Chain Heal 2145.506% SP
16:50 Chain Heal 1650.389% SP
19:00 Elemental Blast
21:00 Riptide 17.25% + 225% SP
22:50 Healing Rain 1728.756% SP
24:50 Healing Wave 515.625% SP
26:50 Unleash Life 131.25% SP
28:00 Healing Wave 670.313% SP
30:00 HST 2007% SP
31:50 Elemental Blast
33:50 Healing Rain 1728.756% SP
35:50 Riptide 17.25% + 225% SP
37:00 Riptide 17.25% + 225% SP
38:50 Riptide 17.25% + 225% SP
40:00 Healing Wave 515.625% SP
42:00 Earth Shield 706.75% SP
43:50 Healing Rain 1728.756% SP
45:50 Elemental Blast
47:50 Unleash Life 131.25% SP
49:00 Chain Heal 2145.506% SP
51:50 Chain Heal 1650.389% SP
54:00 Healing Rain 1728.756% SP
56:00 Healing Wave 515.625% SP
58:00 Elemental Blast

Looking at a 3 minute interval to account for HTT (11250% SP every 3 minute):

HTT: 11250% SP, 11.924% overall healing
Riptide Initial Heal: 21(17.25% SP) = 362.25% SP, 0.384% overall healing
Riptide HOT: 21(225% SP) = 4725% SP, 5.008% overall healing
Healing Rain: 18(1728.756% SP) = 31117.608% SP, 32.983% overall healing
HST: 6(2007% SP) = 12042% SP, 12.764% overall healing
Earth Shield: 6(706.75% SP) = 4240.5% SP, 4.495% overall healing
Healing Wave: 9(515.625% SP) + 3(670.313% SP) = 6651.564% SP, 7.050% overall healing
Chain Heal: 6(2145.506% SP) + 6(1650.389% SP) = 22775.37% SP, 24.140% overall healing
Unleash Life: 9(131.25% SP) = 1181.25% SP, 1.252% overall healing

Total Healing = 94345.542% SP for 1190.1% base mana

The second sequence utilizes "frontloading" Riptides as I've explained in other threads, it allows for a lot more flexibility of when you use what abilities while easily getting the most out of High Tide. The second sequence is far less rigid and the throughput pattern is much more realistic as there are moments of high throughput and moments of low throughput, while with the EotE sequence those variations are of a much lesser magnitude. The rigidity of the first sequence also causes for some frustrating timing issues of having to post-pone certain high priority abilities for other ones, while the second sequence those problems hardly exist. Also note that the second sequence doesn't account for having EM or AS, while the first one is more overall healing for less mana the difference is near negligible and any difference that there is doesn't make up for the gains sequence two would get if EM or AS were included. Mastery must also be considered, as the second sequence is much less rigid and you're allowed for freedom to cast what you want, when you want, sequence two would without question gain more from mastery than sequence one.

[rda]

I'm gonna quote a post from a few months ago regarding this same topic since it seems to be coming up frequently and is a good topic of discussion. You're spot on that its mandatory for high throughput, GoR is mandatory in my opinion if you want to perform to the class' maximum potential. Anyone who thinks EotE is a viable alternative should re-evaluate their play; the only time EotE is viable (raid setting) is if an EM boosted HTT can't be put to use, which is never the case for a progression fight. I've parsed orange on 4/7 Mythic using the glyph, including two #1's, take it as anecdotal but until I see a case against it my mind is set on Glyph of Riptide being mandatory.

Barrun, thanks a lot for the thoughts and the quote.

I am killing it now. Seriously. I theorycrafted some, tested some, did two fights without glyph of Riptide, three fights with it - I am a convert. Glyph of Riptide all the way. Precisely because it allows for so much freedom during rotation and works even when you skip a beat. My numbers went up 25%, no joke - of course that was because my execution was imperfect before, but that's the point, I am sure it is still imperfect now, yet the healing is way larger.

[Saverem]

I wouldn't use the glyph for mana conserving fights like Butcher. AoE heavy fights would make it pretty good along with High Tide.

[Barrun]

I wouldn't use the glyph for mana conserving fights like Butcher. AoE heavy fights would make it pretty good along with High Tide.

If getting anywhere near the max potential out of a shaman the contribution to overall healing from the initial Riptide heal (on Butcher) is fairly negligible so the loss in efficiency from the glyph is by consequence also negligible. For the Butcher it's best to time a Chain Heal to got off right after his cleave happens which you can see on his cast bar, two Chain Heals between each cleave means you're gonna be oom very early into the fight. By using the glyph on that fight you can load up Riptides on the targets that are gonna get cleaved during times you shouldn't be casting Chain Heal so that your global cooldowns are available for the precise moment when you do want to cast Chain Heal(s), ultimately if executed properly it'll provide higher throughput and better efficiency by being able to take full advantage of High Tide and being able to cast Chain Heal when you want it for maximum mastery gains and least chance of over-heal.

Slightly off-topic but worth mention, Glyph of Chaining is absolutely amazing, the extra range increases the chance it'll chain to lower health targets which means more love from our mastery and less chance of over-heal. I see a lot of people not using this glyph when there's only a few fights where I don't think its optimal. The only fights I don't use the glyph are Brackenspore, Butcher, and Tectus (Mythic), on other difficulties of Tectus I would recommend it though. Give it a try and I promise you your numbers on Ogron/Koragh/Imperator/Kargath will jump by quite a large margin.

[Koor]

I'm undecided yet on the glyph of riptide. While I see its potential to provide a higher burst, it seems that mana cost is significantly higher.
Is it possible to use it with conductivity? Since riptide doesn't extend HR, and we'll use more GCD's for riptide, it looks like using the glyph forces us to use rushing streams? Then we loose mana (and time) on additional healing rain casts.

[Barrun]

I'm undecided yet on the glyph of riptide. While I see its potential to provide a higher burst, it seems that mana cost is significantly higher.
Is it possible to use it with conductivity? Since riptide doesn't extend HR, and we'll use more GCD's for riptide, it looks like using the glyph forces us to use rushing streams? Then we loose mana (and time) on additional healing rain casts.

The mana cost isn't any higher and you aren't necessarily forced to cast it more than if using EotE, you just get to choose when; the contribution to your total healing from the initial heal of Riptide should be pretty insignificant so the loss in efficiency is negligible. The beauty of the Riptide glyph is that you don't always have to have Riptide on any/many players, you can completely let it fall off if you aren't going to be casting any Chain Heals for a while; it allows for so much flexibility that it doesn't really affect Conductivity. If you manage it properly it isn't at all problematic, load players up on Riptide, put down Healing Rain, then you have some time to cast CH/HW to build up the duration of your HR; the opposite can also work, put down HR, cast some HWs during a low damage period then throw out a few Riptides right before the heavy damage and let loose with the Chain Heals, you should have enough duration on your HR such that a Chain Heal here and there can keep it going. Only fights I use Conductivity on however are Butcher/Brackenspore/Imperator, I see how it could be clunky on Twins/Koragh though since you're more likely to be spending GCDs on Riptide but personally I've had better results with Rushing Streams on those fights; Ogron in particular, still conflicted about Koragh though.

[Koor]

The mana cost isn't any higher and you aren't necessarily forced to cast it more than if using EotE, you just get to choose when; the contribution to your total healing from the initial heal of Riptide should be pretty insignificant so the loss in efficiency is negligible. The beauty of the Riptide glyph is that you don't always have to have Riptide on any/many players, you can completely let it fall off if you aren't going to be casting any Chain Heals for a while; it allows for so much flexibility that it doesn't really affect Conductivity.

Ah I see what you mean now, I was feeling "compelled" to cast more riptides with the glyph since maintaining 3 or so is possible without it. Interesting, I'll try that.

Looking at my logs, without the glyph usually the initial heals from riptide are, on average, 7% of my healing, so loosing 75% of those is about 5%. In return we get flexibility in timing, and potentially stronger high tide boosted chain heals, which may account for more than 5% if played right.

[Shockeye]

Barrun makes some superb arguments in favour of the glyph. I'm personally on the fence about it, so I will try out some more. When I was running with it, I was in the same mind-set as you, Koor, with feeling obligated to keep it up on everyone just because I could - the notion of letting Riptides totally drop off seems very strange to me.

I've read many posts that argue for Echo instead, but that's too RNG dependent and the merits of GoRT seems about maximum control, which RNG is the opposite. Glyphed RT allows an element of pro-activity to a spec which has always been solely reactive, so I think the change there is hard to manage when one is operating on habit (heck, I'm having a hard time training myself to get out of the Unleash+HR combo!). RT a handful of most at-risk targets before big damage and then CH under the boost of High Tide when the damage comes is a huge change for Resto Shaman, an area that has generally belonged to Disc Priests with shielding before damage. Echo is still, to me, far too clunky to use effectively in a controlled scenario.

I rather like the suggestion of utilising Conductivity more. I use that in dungeons and have become rather fond of those extended rains, so without the talent the duration of the spell seems so short.

[Lothrik]

I suspect Glyph of Riptide is worth using on any fight that has predictable spikes of AOE damage that persist for less than 15 seconds.

It also likely has some niche benefit if you're doing extreme single target healing as a Resto Shaman, as maintaining Tidal Waves can be problematic if you're constantly pumping out Healing Wave/Surge. It's definitely not a situation where you want your casting choices restricted by your Riptide cooldown. Example: Healing mushrooms on Brackenspore and trying to get a Healing Surge crit so the mushroom will pop. Not getting any crits and having no Tidal Waves buff sucks.

If major AOE damage lasts longer than 15 seconds you'll probably run into issues with the riptide HoT tapering off, forcing you to either recast multiple glyphed riptides during the damage spike, or just ignore the fact that your Chain Heals are rapidly losing efficiency. Both situations are quite horrible to end up in.

If the damage isn't predictable you'll end up playing a guessing game where you try to prepare Riptides in advance for damage that may never even happen. If you're going to essentially be on triage duty you might as well have your Riptide do useful burst healing (ie: be non-glyphed).

Luckily most raid encounters have tons of predictable AOE damage that lasts less than 15 seconds, so Glyph of Riptide is likely very viable. I haven't given it much consideration honestly and have just been resorting to Glyph of Chaining for most fights. I really wish the increased jump distance was baseline.

Ultimately though I wouldn't worry about Riptide so much. If it's unglyphed, use it for triage and Tidal Waves. If it's glyphed just use it for Tidal Waves, unless you're blanketing Riptides specifically in preparation for incoming AOE damage. Don't just cast it for the hell of it, know why you're using it and where it fits in your rotation will become obvious. Treating glyphed Riptide like a psuedo-Rejuvenation is silly.

[Caziel]

I spent some time looking through warcraftlogs for shamans in top guilds that had ranked on fights. The "consensus" spec that emerged was:

1. Not to glyph Riptide (majority).
2. Ancestral Swiftness (majority).
3. Elemental Blast (almost all).
4. High Tide (almost all).
5. Rushing Streams vs. Conductivity fight dependent (gleaned from # of HR casts and amount of HST healing).

It looks like a majority of the top shamans are going unglyphed riptide + AS/EB/HT, and just switching to Conductivity whenever HR is stable in one place for a long enough time.

However, one caveat in looking at top-ranking performances for shaman is that they only seem to happen when healing rain and/or healing tide are good (large raid size, stacked, etc.), which might explain Ancestral Swiftness being the top choice in these cases.

[slipn]

I have tried this glyph on the butcher and my hps went down by quite a bit. I'll admit that I'm not the worlds best shaman but using it with high tides brought me down quite a bit. I'm not sure if we don't have the stats for it yet or if its just a thing from the past that doesn't have its uses anymore.

I don't have any numbers on hand to back this but its just my personal experience with it. 7/7H 1/7M resto shammy

[RH92]

I wish they rework Improved Riptide so it can work with the glyph.