[Restoration][Patch 5.4]Shaman Healer PVE Guide

[CraZyFelix]

New to the US server but was a hardcore raider in TW server, sad to see there is no good Resto Shaman guide here, decided to make one, first time posting here, referred to the "Restoration Guide to MoP" by Table

1. Basics

1.1 Introduction
FOR THE HORDE!

Basic Spec - 3,3,1,2,1,2

1.2 Stats Priority

Low ilvl (<550, or without legendary meta gem): Haste Soft Cap 7613> Spirit> Crit> Mastery
High ilvl: Haste Soft Cap 15316> Crit> Mastery> Spirit

Soft Cap with Ancestral Swiftness Talent (for healing rain): 7613(+2 ticks) & 15316(+3 ticks)
Soft Cap without Ancestral Swiftness Talent (for healing rain): 10118 (+2 ticks) & 18207 (+3 ticks)

1.3 How to Raid

LFR level:
1. Water Shield and Earthliving Weapon
2. Keep Earth Shield on the Tank you will be healing most (multiple earth shields from multiple shamans cannot exist on the same target, please communicate with your fellow resto shammy)
3. Put down Healing Stream Totem on cd
4. Put down Healing Rain on the most crowded space
5. Use Riptide and Healing Wave when you want to
6. Pray to RNGesus
7. ???
8. Loot

Normal SoO:
1. Watch Youtube video guide of the boss
2. Read your spell book (Default key: P)
3. Prepare some Tome of the Clear Mind in your bag, for glyph and talent change
4. Use Flask of the Warm Sun
5. Have 2 level 600 Professions, and use their respective benefits
6. Use Unleash Elements before you cast Healing Rain, EVERY SINGLE TIME
7. Plan out when to use healing cooldowns, they are Healing Tide Totem, Spirit Link Totem, Ascendance (mostly RL’s job)
8. Use Empower/Reinforce if you selected the Primal Elementalist talent (the buff DO benefits totems)
9. Use your Astral Shift/Stone Bulwark Totem, also eat Healthstone
10. Don’t forget your Ancestral Swiftness is a two part talent, it does have a great active, use it for instant heal which Shaman lacks
11. Pace out your Riptide and Chain Heal, make good use of your Tidal Waves passive
12. Your Chain Heal target should have a Riptide buff if possible
13. Using Call of the Elements to reset the cooldown on your Healing Stream Totem is useful
14. Your Ascendance affects your existing spell, cast Healing Rain BEFORE you use Ascendance can save you some precious cast time (Ascendance doesn’t copy Healing Tide Totem)
15. When you think you have nothing to do, cast Healing Wave

Heroic SoO:
1. Read Dungeon Journal (Default key: Shift-J)
2. Use Potion of the Jade Serpent
3. Why are you here, go read an in depth guide of the raid.

1.4 Races
Alliance: Change to Horde (both races are fine)
Horde: Orcs is good for burst healing; Goblin’s 1% haste is nice; Pandaren is good when fed; Tauren looks nice and reliable

2. Talents

Tier 1 - Survivability Tier
Nature's Guardian
- Don’t be lazy, learn to use Damage Reduction ability, skipped
-
Stone Bulwark Totem
- Good for boss fights that have sustain damage instead of burst damage

Astral Shift
- Standard defensive CD, suitable for most bosses, recommended

Tier 2 – Utility (very situational)
Frozen Power
- Very situational, nearly useless

Earthgrab Totem
- Good if the fight has mobs that can be rooted, again, situational

Windwalk Totem
- Best of the tier most of the time, also situational but can be used more often, this tier is not so important anyway

Tier 3 – Totem
Call of the Elements
- Useful for resetting CD on Healing Stream Totem(more heal), Grouding Totem/Tremor Totem(Utility), Stone Bulwark Totem (Survivability)
- CANNOT reset totems with 3 min cooldown

Totemic Restoration
- Useful when extreme burst healing is needed, but most of the time other healers should use their cooldowns too, so mostly useless

Totemic Projection
- Save it for PVP

Tier 4 – Stats
Elemental Mastery
- Useful when burst healing is needed, shouldn’t be a problem for shaman, with all the cooldowns, and the effect of Mastery, less effective compared to Ancestral Swiftness
- Can be combined with Empower and Healing Tide Totem to achieve ridiculous burst healing

Ancestral Swiftness
- Due to the frequency of people stacking in SoO, Haste (and soft cap for Healing Rain) has become the most important stat for Restoration Shaman, this talent is the most important talent in my opinion
- It also gives shaman a form of instant healing spell, which Shaman really lacks (Riptide doesn’t count guys -.-)

Echo of the Elements
- The chance is too low, also, the extra healing will mostly become overheal, weak compared to the other talents in the same tier

Tier 5 – Healing
Rushing Streams
- Greatly enhance the effect of Healing Stream Totem, good talent for most fights

Ancestral Guidance
- Further improve the burst healing power of Shaman, use according to boss, refer to other SoO guides

Conductivity
- Weak compared to the other talents on the same tier, only useful when the fight doesn’t require movement at all, however can save a lot of mana in those fight, situational
- There can only be ONE Healing Rain at a time, the first one will disappear when the second one is casted

Tier 6 – Output
Unleashed Fury
- Situational, good when the boss requires a lot of single target healing
- The buff DOES NOT affect Healing Rain, you will get two buffs when Unleash Elements is used, only one will be consumed for Healing Rain, however other single target spell will consume both buffs

Primal Elementalist
- I prefer using this to improve all my Healing Stream Totems together with the Glyph of Fire Elemental Totem, and use Earth Elemental Reinforce to enhance my Ascendance, or as a small sustained damage reduction with benefit

Elemental Blast
- Completely useless, ignored

3. Glyphs

Glyph of Healing Wave
- for very low ilvl, <515
Glyph of Fire Elemental Totem
- if you can manage to use it on cd, together with Empower, I suggest buff every Healing Tide Totem with it
Glyph of Healing Stream Totem
- amazing buff
Glyph of Chaining
- the cd is now neglectable, good for most fights that is chaotic
Glyph of Cleansing Waters
- only when the fight requires a lot of dispel
Glyph of Spiritwalker's Grace
- Situational
Glyph of Riptide
- Completely changes the style of healing, useful when carpet healing is needed but the raid is scattered, beware of mana when used
Glyph of Water Shield
- Only useful when Water Shield is triggered at least 2.63 times every minute on average
Glyph of Totemic Recall
- for absolute hardcore raiders and requires a lot of skill, can save you mana, especially when the special effect of Courageous Primal Diamond triggered, throw down a magma totem and recall it later can give you free 12660 mana, making good use of this will allow you to compress your spirit and reforge it into other stats, if you don’t think you can do it, better of use other glyphs, just reforge spirit to the amount you need
Glyph of Eternal Earth & Glyph of Glyph of Telluric Currents
- Maybe better to just recast your Earth Shield, and it sort of forces you to use these two in pairs, not as strong as other useful glyphs, not recommended

4. Gearing

4.1 Stats

As most fights in SoO require stacking, the soft cap of Healing Rain has become the single most important stat for Restoration Shaman, thus the Stats Priority at the beginning goes that way.

4.2 Pre-Raid

Go farm timeless isle, then use Justice Points & Valor Points to buy gears, then LFR, then flex, good luck, remember your daily sacrifice to the RNG God

4.3 Enchants (I just copied from the older guide :P, since there has been no change)

Shoulder
Greater Crane Wing Inscription
Crane Wing Inscription

Back
Enchant Cloak - Superior Intellect
Enchant Cloak - Superior Critical Strike

Chest
Enchant Chest - Glorious Stats
Enchant Chest - Mighty Spirit

Bracers
Enchant Bracer - Super Intellect
Enchant Bracer - Mastery

Gloves
Enchant Gloves - Superior Mastery
Enchant Gloves - Greater Haste

Belt
Living Steel Belt Buckle

Pants
Greater Pearlescent Spellthread
Greater Cerulean Spellthread

Boots
Enchant Boots - Pandaren's Step
Enchant Boots - Greater Haste

Weapon
Enchant Weapon - Jade Spirit
Enchant Weapon – Windsong

Off-hand
Enchant Off-Hand - Major Intellect

4.4 Gems

Red sockets:
Potent Vermilion Onyx
Reckless Vermilion Onyx

Blue Sockets:
Sparkling River's Heart
Misty Wild Jade
Energized Wild Jade

Yellow:
Quick Sun's Radiance
Smooth Sun's Radiance

Meta:
Revitalizing Primal Diamond
Ember Primal Diamond
Burning Primal Diamond
Courageous Primal Diamond

4.5 Consumables

Flask
Flask of the Warm Sun
Flask of Falling Leaves

Potion
Potion of Focus
Master Mana Potion
Potion of the Jade Serpent

Food
Mogu Fish Stew
Pandaren Treasure Noodle Soup

4.6 Professions

Alchemy - Mixology
Blacksmithing - Socket Bracer & Socket Gloves
Enchanting - Enchant Ring - Greater Intellect
Engineering - Synapse Springs
Inscription - Secret Crane Wing Inscription
Jewelcrafting - Sparkling Serpent's Eye/Brilliant Serpent's Eye
Leatherworking - Fur Lining - Intellect
Tailoring - Darkglow Embroidery/Lightweave Embroidery

4.7 Trinkets

10M: Prismatic Prison of Pride + Thok’s Acid-Grooved Tooth or Prismatic Prison of Pride + Dysmorphic Samophlange of Discontinuity

25M: Prismatic Prison of Pride + Thok’s Acid-Grooved Tooth for concentrated raid heal; Prismatic Prison of Pride + Nazgrim’s Burnished Insignia for scattered single target heal

5 Macros/UI

5.1 Addons

DBM
- Can’t raid without it

Grid
- Useful for healers, you also need to install multiple addons to make good use of grid

Totem Timers
- Great UI for Shaman

ExtraCD
- To monitor your buffs

Quartz
- Enhance your casting bar

5.2 Macros

I am only listing out the ones I use, go google the others

#showtooltip
/cast [nopet] Earth Elemental Totem
/click [pet] PetActionButton7

Click twice for Reinforce

#showtooltips
/cast [nopet] Fire Elemental Totem
/click [pet] PetActionButton7

Click twice for Empower

Will be improving it, please let me know what you want to see in this guide. I am "not allowed to post any kinds of links, images or videos until you post a few times.", not intending to do that, sorry for any inconvenience, you can Google those UIs and stuff.

[st33l]

More shaman, less L2R

[Sabbie]

Without links, references this is just a really ugly text post I understand you cant post links yet, but the layout just does not feel new user friendly at all (which is what this should be targeting).

Please add more descriptions and reasoning.

Example:

1.4 Races

Alliance:
Draenei:
[Gift of the Naaru] (Heals the target for 20% of the caster's total health over 15 sec) - Not a terrible Heal over time spell but comes with a very long cool down.
[Heroic Presence] (Increases your chance to hit with all spells and attacks by 1%.) - Pretty much useless for a healer.
[Gemcutting] (Jewelcrafting skill increased by 10.) - Doesn't provide much for a healer if your not a JC or profession is maxed.
[Shadow Resistance] (Reduces Shadow damage taken by 1%.) - Not a noticeable passive.

Pandarean:
[Quaking Palm] (Strikes the target with lightning speed, incapacitating them for 4 sec, and turns off your attack.) - Not a terrible skill for leveling or soloing.
[Bouncy] (You take half falling damage.) - Can actually be a decent passive if you take fall damage at all in a fight.
[Epicurean] (Your love of food allows you to receive double the stats from Well Fed effects.) - Main reason to want to be a Panda, can give yourself up to 300 extra int or spirit.
[Gourmand] (Your Cooking skill is increased by 15.) - Doesn't provide much for a healer if your cooking is maxed.
[Inner Peace] (Your rested experience bonus lasts twice as long as normal.) - Useless for raiding.

Not going to do anymore but you get the idea. Your post should have as much information as possible, to inform those who have absolutely no idea what everything is. Once you have access to posting links add links to EVERYTHING you can. With a bit of cleaning up you can make a very informative guide.

Hope this helps, good luck.

[Tiberria]

Honestly, the entire post is just poorly written and has a lot of opinionated and flat out wrong information in it.

The notion that Totemic Projection is only useful for PvP is just idiotic. There is a huge amount of value/utility in being able to directionally place SLT, in being able to move MTT and Stormlash in range of the entire raid on heavily spread fights, and in moving HTT and HST if needed. Totemic Restoration is not "mostly useless"; it is very useful to get more potential HST/MTT uptime from being able to use both when they are off CD instead of often having to wait to avoid clipping another water totem. The output gain from Call of the Elements is very marginal (works out to about 1% at most), so there is plenty of justification for using one of the other talents.

You bring up races and don't even mention Trolls, when they have what is generally considered to be the strongest racials in the game. Your stat priority discussions are generally useless; you don't flesh them out, you don't mention the option to go with an HST breakpoint between the 2 HR breakpoints, you don't bring up Spirit comfort levels.

Most of your guide is also condescending. Like telling people to read their spell book and dungeon journal and watch boss videos is just puerile.

[Chillzor]

Possibly the worst guide thread i've ever read, and im not even being dramatic... seriously, go google macros? Are you kidding me

Not to mention other stuff that Tiberria brought up already

[CraZyFelix]

Yea, was drunk yesterday, I don't even know why I wrote this, but seriously do you use every macro from one guide? or you go search for macros you want, or learn how to write macro stuff that is useful for yourself. BTW, reading the dungeon journal is very useful, even better than installing DBM. HST breakpoint is not a good breakpoint, esp when your latency affects it, better to go for other stats first. For the totem stuff talents, let's be honest, it all depends on the bosses, people should refer to the respective guide.

And yea I guess i forgot about troll.

[Bllets]

HST breakpoint is not a good breakpoint, esp when your latency affects it, better to go for other stats first. For the totem stuff talents, let's be honest, it all depends on the bosses, people should refer to the respective guide.

Why exactly is the HST breakpoint not a good breakpoint? latency affects it, but then you just add some haste compared to the exact requirement, you can always test ingame if you get the extra tick.

Sure it depends on the bosses which talent you use, that is kinda the point with the new talent system. However saying one is useless and the other one is "mostly useless" is just a terrible.

And macros should be in a guide, a guide saying to google them is not a guide, but a reference point. Might as well just have wrote http://lmgtfy.com/?q=Shaman+resto+guide at the start and tell people to click at the Icy-Veins guide.

As most fights in SoO require stacking, the soft cap of Healing Rain has become the single most important stat for Restoration Shaman, thus the Stats Priority at the beginning goes that way.

The soft cap for HST actually improved my healing more than the soft cap for HR in the more difficult fights on 10man.

[maizensh]

Why exactly is the HST breakpoint not a good breakpoint? latency affects it, but then you just add some haste compared to the exact requirement, you can always test ingame if you get the extra tick.

I don't know about the OP, but I never aim for HST breakpoints.

The main reason is that I usually recall HST (due to running with 8k spirit). Lets say you aim for 9100, then you have about 100ms to recall the totem after the last tick. This is unreal and latency messes with it further, so you will generally miss the last tick if you recall. On the other hand if you're going for 7613 then it leaves you a lot of time to recall (more than one second).
If you're not recalling HST then aiming for breakpoints is fine I guess, but it will also require higher spirit. I generally prefer to have less spirit and more raw throughput.

[Deleted]

This guide is so bad written, misleading and wrong.
If you want start playing resto, DONT FOLLOW THIS.
If you played resto even just one month, in a raid environment, you can understand why is wrong, so you are fine.

[Bllets]

I don't know about the OP, but I never aim for HST breakpoints.

The main reason is that I usually recall HST (due to running with 8k spirit). Lets say you aim for 9100, then you have about 100ms to recall the totem after the last tick. This is unreal and latency messes with it further, so you will generally miss the last tick if you recall. On the other hand if you're going for 7613 then it leaves you a lot of time to recall (more than one second).
If you're not recalling HST then aiming for breakpoints is fine I guess, but it will also require higher spirit. I generally prefer to have less spirit and more raw throughput.

It obviously comes down to playstyle, but saying going for it is "not a good breakpoint" is not correct either. Much better to explain the possibilities and let people decide which way to prefer to play their resto.

Same thing with Mastery vs. Crit.

[maizensh]

It obviously comes down to playstyle, but saying going for it is "not a good breakpoint" is not correct either. Much better to explain the possibilities and let people decide which way to prefer to play their resto.

Same thing with Mastery vs. Crit.

Yes, I agree. I don't know what he meant, but it's a poor choice of words by the OP.
If you're saying something is bad you should explain why it doesn't work for you (especially when it works for so many people), instead of wavering it off.