[Restoration] Spiritual Guidance through the Cataclysm

[Airowird]

The problem with Haste is that it can cost a LOT of mana when you need to use spells like GHW.
Haste might give twice the HPS as Mastery on average, but if you need twice it's number in Spirit to counter the mana spent, there really is no point. On top of that, Mastery equals Haste at ~50%, but it increases in value for emergency-situations.
As for crit: the gain is overal relatively decent, it provides about 30-40% of spirit in mp5 (depending on spell choices) and crits proc both Ancestral Healing (saves a LOT of healing on a tank) and AA, which nearly doubles the value for crit on those spells.

Also:
With the new Purification changes, Shamans actually have the biggest single-target HPS output with GHW, although it is the least efficient big heal. With a crit/mastery focus, you need less Spirit to keep up your healing (compared to Haste, which 'costs' ~2 Spirit when casting normal GHW, 3 with the TW buff). Add Ancestral healing & Mastery working best when ship hits the fan, tank healing is something Shamans can do extremely well now.

[Radikaal]

This is the best resto guide ive read so far, good job. It should help ALOT of shamans perform better, and should be mandotory for every raiding shaman that wants to perform good to read!

Good to see someone mentioning haste is not so godly as many seem to think aswell and why this is. Ive ran with 0 haste (yes 0) in all normal 10 raids having a really easy time and having no trouble keeping 10-11k hps in the long 10mans fights (even before 3.0.6) being one of the tank healers with some helping on raid when needed, while having alot of mana to spare for emergency healing in the long fights, heroic 5mans has always been very easy to heal, 1 boss down hc 10man, and we got other hc bosses to 25% and that failed not due to healing but other stuff and i feel like im not being hold anything back by this because mastery really shines in heroic modes because people are so low on hp often, and crit saves alot of mana on the long fights. And as for tank healing, crit/mastery builds with earthshield glyph and talents has always been great for this, i would not be suprised if shamans now after the buff is the best tank healers with this build.

Althought im going to try and reforge haste to extra +1tick on healing rain now and drop around 2% crit and ~1 point of mastery, the earthliving cap i don't see worth in 10man really since its so low on total healing done there. Thanks for providing the numbers.

[Sapphirinia]

Im not going to argue about intellect being important because we all know that and you would be silly to have gear without it already with int. Minus the occasional spirit/healing trinkets. But one reason i decided to look up new shaman guides is that on some of these raids fights, the one that made me think about haste was the first boss group in bastion of twilight where theres some crazy damage happening and at some points you can see the tanks health going down so fast that is just looks like its going from 75% to 5% repeatedly and that the only reason theyre surviving is that theres 3 healers constently spamming heals on that tank. Every fraction of a second mattered in preventing the tank from dying and causing a wipe. I felt like i couldnt cast fast enough. My ilvl is currently 357 and gearscore is about 8600+ and the problem that happens now isnt the heal being big enough, or criting enough, these raids deal big damage sometimes and its not always because someones in something bad. I decided after downing 5 random cata bosses that i would look into reforging more crit. I actually started taking off spirit even, just to see the haste go up some. My spirit was at about 4200 before i started reforging stuff to haste. I had reforged to haste before when possible and stuck one or 2 gems with haste in my gear, but mainly chose spirit as my main priority over the haste. Now my haste is at 13% and my spirit went down but i think its a matter of balance. If i start to oom too fast then its out of balance and will change some back to spirit. But, i think haste has its importance in the cata content. Especially being able to cast the cheaper hw instead of hs more often.

[Tengenstein]

When should Shaman be using Staffs over the 1h+shield setup?

Biting Wind + elementium stormshield Vs Chelley's staff of dark mending?

[Airowird]

If you're talking about http://www.wowhead.com/compare?items=56357:55070;59525

The staff is slightly better for raiding simply because you're still using a lower level weapon.
But 1H + Shield is usually preferred for the Offhand enchant, more options in upgrading or reforging towards preferred stats.

If you really can't get an epic weapon, the staff is a decent option, but a reforged Incineratus (from Magmaw) or the blade from V&T would probably result in similar results without having to spend tons of gold on a BoE raid drop (or save your guild tons by not giving it to you).

[Tengenstein]

the problem is the staff dropped and the peeps who want it are a Fire mage, a Resto shammy, and an OS boomkin.

And i have no idea how to sort it out. might just make them duel for it.

[Sebadoh]

the problem is the staff dropped and the peeps who want it are a Fire mage, a Resto shammy, and an OS boomkin.

And i have no idea how to sort it out. might just make them duel for it.

Mages don't use Spirit anymore.

[Airowird]

Mages don't use Spirit anymore.

If it dropped, it means you're raiding, so if you're killing anything in BWD, it should go to the boomer, as they can use the spirit and shams should go for shiv & shield.

Ofcourse, you could always just sell it for guild income, as it's not mainly useful to any of those players (useless spi, sub-optimal setup or OS).

[Airowird]

Fixed some minor rounding in the Haste caps math (several caps were 1 rating higher than actually required in-game)

I'll also be updating Mastery with the 4.1 changes once that patch comes closer.

[Chaosphere]

Hi all, my first time posting here so please be gentle

I've been resto since pre-Wrath and through cata raiding I've worked up a decent gear set (incl. 4 piece T11 bonus - armory here http://eu.battle.net/wow/en/characte...osphere/simple).

I've read all the posts here and also alot over at elitist jerks (those that I can without going cross-eyed) and I am genuinely using all of the advise here already with the exception of Tellurgic Currents (which I will be trying out this week), however I am still finding that my mana just gets utterly nuked and I'm almost always calling for an innervate while fellow healers (priests and pallys) still wearing mostly blues are outhealing me with way more mana left at the end of the fights.

I have a few questions if I may, I will prefix this by saying that I am predominantly a raid healer 2ndary specced into enhance for the increased mobility:

1. To pick up TC I'm tempted to drop 2 points in Blessing of the Eternals rather than sacrifice the extra healing from Nature's Blessing (for 5 mans primarily) - anyone in a similar raid situation as me that has some insight?
2. I have read elsewhere that it is a good idea to balance your crit and your haste percentages to help stop the haste-oom-factor, is this correct? And if so is this with or w/o Wrath of Air/Flametongue totems up?

Thanks in advance for any help

Chaos

[Hexaddict]

@Chaosphere - You shouldn't be going OOM with those trinkets you have imo. Personally I'd drop back down to the 916 haste breakpoint and revel in the huge gains in crit and mastery you'll get.

Now onto the real reason I'm posting - recently tried out the Glyph of Stoneclaw Totem in last week's raids, not expecting much due to it being considered a PvP talent and was amazed with the results. What's not to love about a solid 17k absorb for only 930 mana? Of course, it comes with the loss of an Earth Totem and if your group is lacking buff-wise it may not be a good idea; however with our current 10-man setup as having two paladins (one providing the armor buff) and a Death Knight/Hunter pet both providing the Strength/Agility we aren't losing anything. Admittedly, it isn't going to do much if you're taunting Chimaeron with your Unleash Elements:Rockbiter effect, nor should it be used as an excuse to stand in bad graphics - but its capabilities on fights such as Nefarian(Electricity Crackle things) and Heroic Maloriak(Fire phase, Arcane Storms, Phase 2 Acid Debuff thing) are immensely beneficial.

It was a no-brainer to keep it over Glyph of Healing Wave. Not only does the Glyph of Healing Wave do very little over the course of an encounter(0.09% of healing according to the most recent log); but also consider this - if nobody is taking damage and you are using it as a top-off heal for yourself, then the chances are another healer in your group is already casting an efficient heal on you if you need topping up. And if you're using Healing Wave when the group is taking intense AoE damage, then... you've probably come back in time three years from the next expansion.

[Airowird]

Updated for Patch 4.1

Also added a lovely spreadsheet
(Warning: contains LOTS of numbers, most of which you probably won't need, but are part of the greater math)

[Crittable]

Updated for Patch 4.1

Also added a lovely spreadsheet
(Warning: contains LOTS of numbers, most of which you probably won't need, but are part of the greater math)

Thanks for keeping this updated. I did notice one thing though... in your talent section, when you are mentioning Elemental Precision... all interrupts are "supposed" to hit now. I know they have been having problems with a certain few interrupts, one of them being Wind Shear specifically, but it's "supposed" to always hit. I am just wondering if there is still a need to have the benefit to Wind Shear noted in this talent description.
The only true benefit that I see from this talent as a healer is that lightning bolts will always hit and increases the amount of return from Telluric Currents. I was using it for quite some time and it truly is an amazing talent coupled with TC, but I find that I rarely need it now and went back to my enhancement subspec.

[Airowird]

I was debating wether to update it now or wait till I had more info, untill the "supposed" part kicked in, which made the choice clear for me.
Once they fix it & I get enough data on the usefulness, I'll update that bit, need to change titles as well anyway.

[Chaosphere]

Totally agree, I find that my interrupts and LBs miss very rarely, with higher incidence for heroic modes (down to the lvl increase of the bosses) but I still prefer the greater mobility that instant Ghost Wolf gives.

[Hexaddict]

I've made a basic spreadsheet to help level 85 Resto Shamans with their stats, trinket choices, and item usage. At the minute it's pretty basic, but nevertheless should be helpful to any shaman out there no matter how much skill or gear they have. Put a link to it in your front page post if you wish - I will be updating it and you can see the details at my EU forum post here: http://eu.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/2098121441

[Bovinity]

The problem with Haste is that it can cost a LOT of mana when you need to use spells like GHW.
Haste might give twice the HPS as Mastery on average, but if you need twice it's number in Spirit to counter the mana spent, there really is no point. On top of that, Mastery equals Haste at ~50%, but it increases in value for emergency-situations.

I never liked the logic of, "Haste means you spend more mana." You hear it a lot, but it really doesn't mean anything, the spells don't cost more and the HPM on the spells doesn't go down at all (in fact, HPM goes up in the case of HoT's at breakpoints, not that Shammies worry about that as much as Druids) you just get the same spells off faster.

[Airowird]

Sure, Haste doesn't really decrease HPM, but it's the only stat except Spirit that doesn't increase it either.
In my spreadsheet, I've instead opted to go for mana per minute casting, basicly being 12x mp5, but considering mana gained & spent while casting. And in this, Haste isn't that useful, because in order to increase the healing you do over a fight, it costs mp5. It's the only stat with a negative mp5 value attached to it, which is what makes it so ... double-edged.
If you average stuff out, you COULD argue that over a larger delta, Haste increases HPM due to HoTs (which I also did in the spreadsheet), but as you said, Shamans rarely care about that stuff, especially since there are no 'tick gain' points in the 1000-2000 range, which is where most Shamans are currently sitting with their gear.

So to fix the incomplete logic: "Haste means you spend more mana over the duration of the same 5min fight." This is something other stats do not have when aiming for HPS. Ofcourse, this is also why Haste is 40% cheaper to get when comparing rating values.

[Airowird]

Should now be updated for patch 4.2.0, all I need to do now is bug one of our mods to fix the title

[Okiki]

Thank you for this. It will definitly help with my upcoming shaman