A Feral Druid's Illustrated Primer - healing

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Feral (Healing)

Ok, as a feral druid you probably know a lot of what to wear and how to behave when in your cuddly kitty form or your even cuddlier bear form. How about when you are in your cuddly elf form? Or your very cuddly (?) tauren form?

Well, there are actually a lot we can do while not quadrupedal, we can heal, we can nuke 'em down with our pretty sparkly spells, we can use our weapons to bash some mob's head in, we can do our famous NE dance, and we can discuss the pros and cons of different detergents when it comes to their ability to remove bloodstains from leather. Among many, many, many, many,...,many other things...

So your group does not need a furry tank or sneaky cat? What do you do? Say "well, thx a lot for the invite, guess I am out of here then..."?

BEEEP! Wrong answer.

You say "Ok, I heal then", pull out your prepared heal bag and impress everyone by keeping them alive and well through the massive onslaught of nasty mobs of all sizes and flavors.

Easy? No. Possible? Yes.

Btw, I warn you already, I just know this will be a long post, so grab a cup of tea and some cookies, cuddle into your favourite comfy chair and enjoy!

Your talents

Even if you are feral to the bone and can't even remember how you look like in caster shape, chances are you have taken a few points in the Resto tree. If not, consider if you shouldn't make some small alterations in your spec.

First out is Omen of Clarity. This is actually one of the best spells ever for a feral. Since it procs (and it procs often!) on melee damage and nothing else it actually seems tailored for a cat or bear. How often do you melee while healing anyways?

However, Omen of Clarity requires at least 10 more points in the Resto tree. So what else to take in there?

Well, for starters, you have to pick at least 5 points in Improved Mark of the Wild or Furor. 5 points in total in those two opens up the next tier, which contains Naturalist, another spell with a very nice effect for a feral.

In the next tier there is Intensity, which, besides the very nice instant Enrage-rage it gives, also is very good for the healing druid since it allows some of your Spirit-based mana regeneration to continue even while casting.

Actually, I like all five of these talents very much in my feral specc, guess that is why I have taken them all and have a total of 19 points in the Resto tree. Not bad for a feral druid, eh?

To balance things off a little, there is the Nurturing Instinct talent deep in the feral tree, but this is more of a pvp spell since you will rarely try to heal in dungeons or raids dressed in your tank or dps gear. And I guess your healing gear is rather devoid of Strength?

Talking of which...

Your healing gear (stats)

As a feral, you probably haven't had first tjing on any of the healing drops you've encountered in your dungeon runs, but maybe you have gotten lucky and run with some healers that didn't need the stuff that dropped. Or maybe you have bought yourself some rep items, or have collected some quest rewards on the healing side.

I will not dwell on where to get healing gear, but I will spend a little time discussing the stats you want to be looking for on the gear.

When you are healing, regardless of class or specc, you have two goals:
1. heal as much as needed
2. heal as long as needed

You start the fight with a full mana pool. Well, maybe since you are feral and thus dressed in the Real Healers’ hand-me-downs and probably very untalented in the mana-increasing department, it may be more appropriate to call it a mana bathtub.

Anyways, as you start healing you pull the plug on your bathtub, and the sweet blue mana starts going down the drain. When the tub is empty you are out of mana but hopefully your friends will have killed the mobs by then.

In longer fights, however, you might face the shiny bottom of your tub glaring back at you when the mob is only half-dead, and if that happens all your friends will most likely be very dead pretty soon.

Luckily there are some ways of getting more heals out of that tub of yours, and those ways are:

1. Increase the size of your tub
2. Increase your mana regeneration
3. Increase your healing bonus
4. Downrank your healing spells (actually it’s dubious if this qualifies here, but I will leave it and comment on it)

Tub size
The amount of mana you have at your disposal is dependent on how much Intellect you have. Now, while a large tub is pretty neat to have it will run dry eventually if you keep using the mana in it. So, while tub size is important, it is more important to make the mana in it last longer and/or heal for more.


Mana regeneration
What if someone didn’t turn off that bathtub tap, but instead left it dripping? As we all know in this era of energy saving awareness, a water tap left dripping can fill a whole bathtub in a surprisingly short time. Same goes for your mana regen, only in your case, you want that tap to be dripping as much as possible.

There are two stats that will help you pry that tap open, and that is mana/5 and Spirit. Mana/5 will give you the stated mana regeneration at all times, regardless if you are casting or not. Spirit will give you mana back only when you are NOT casting, and after a cast you will have to wait 5 seconds until the Spirit-based mana regen kicks in.



You can get 30% of that Spirit-based mana regen going even when casting if you choose the talent Intensity in the Resto tree. Besides the mana regen bonus it has a nice effect for a Feral too, so it’s not a total waste even if you rarely heal.

A Resto druid will have a whole bunch of other nifty Spirit-based talents and thus a reason to stack the Spirit high, but a Feral won’t, so if you have to choose between mana/5 and Spirit go for the mana/5.

There is one occasion when a lot of Spirit is useful for a Feral as well, and that is when you use your Innervate on yourself. However, since it’s possible to switch weapons in mid-fight you can create a macro that will swap your regular healing weapon for one with more spirit on it for the duration of the Innervate, to maximize the mana regen.

#show Innervate
/equip Serpentcrest Life-Staff
/cast [target=Yourname] Innervate
/equip Shard of the Virtuous

Click the macro once to swap to your Spirit-weapon and to cast Innervate on yourself (or whomever you have named as target), click it twice to swap back to your regular healing weapon. (Now isn't that a nice oxymoron... a healing weapon...)

For more in-depth info on mana management for druids please head over to Resto4life and read Phaelia's excellent article there.

Healing bonus
By choosing gear, gems and enchants that add +healing you will get more healing done for every mana you spend. More healing will keep your friends alive for a little longer, and will ease the strain on you.



The amount of extra healing each spell will get depends on its cast time, its duration, and whether is direct or over time. For example, your Rejuvenation will get 20 % of your heal bonus per tick, each application of your Lifebloom will get about 7 % of your heal bonus per tick and with about 40 % of your heal bonus applied to the final heal, your Healing Touch will get 100 % of your heal bonus.

Downranking
This means to not use the top rank of whichever spell it is you are casting. Lower ranks cost lower mana and thus you have more mana left after the cast. Of course, lower ranks heal for less but this can be offset by stacking a lot of +healing.

The sweet combination of downranking and stacking +healing was utilised by ingenious players back in the old misty pre-TBC days, and it led to them being able to heal almost indefinitely without running out of mana. This was not the way things were supposed to be in Blizz’s opinion, thus nowadays downranking a spell is penalized so that the healing per mana remains about the same regardless of which rank you use.

Downranking can still be useful on occasion though, if for example a rank 9 Healing Touch will be overhealing too much, you might perhaps wanna consider using a rank 6 or 7 instead and save some mana. I am not that big a fan of downranking, since when healing as a Feral without the handy Resto talents, you will probably need your heals as big as you can get them anyways.

Your threat

Your party have pulled a group of mobs and the fighters are busy taking them down. You are busy keeping your friends alive, staying at the back, trying to be inconspicous.

However, when you are healing your buddies the mobs start to dislike you. All of them start to dislike you. More and more. Suddenly one of them decides he's had enough and comes running towards you, intent on smashing your face in.


What do you do? Well, you are a druid, you can always drop into bear to get a little more thick-hided to live through the beating until the tank can come taunt the mob away from you.

But while you are in bear form none of the others in your party will get healed. They may not need to be healed, but then again, they might.

Luckily, there are some cool ways of lowering the amount of threat your heals create.

Make friends with an enchanter in good standing with Honor Hold and persuade her to enchant Subtlety on your back.

Carry around some trinkets that you may switch to if you have problems with your threat generation. Be aware that you can't swap trinkets while in combat, so you must have them equipped at the start of the fight.

Good trinkets for this is Hypnotist's Watch, a quest item from a Hellfire Peninsula quest, or Jewel of Charismatic Mystique, a drop from the 3d boss in Shadow Labyrinths. They are on a 5 minute cooldown so you better not have to use them too often.

While you are on your friends-making tour, find an Alchemist to make you some Shrouding Potions as well. Keep in mind though that these nifty pots share the cooldown with mana and other potions, so using one potion will keep you from using another until the 2 minute cooldown is up.

Your threat (Plan B)

But what if lowering your threat isn't enough? Well, you can always throw up the Barkskin which lowers the damage you take and let's you keep healing uninterrupted even when being beaten on.

And a Herbalist might be good to know as well, since if you are nice to her she might give you some Fel Blossoms, that will shield you, like a priest's shield, for a little while.

These moves might buy the tank enough time to come pick up those nasty mobs again, but if all else fails, do drop into bear and let the others fend for themselves for a while, at least until the mobs stop hitting you. A dead healer is good to no one, and in bear you can take a beting better and heal yourself at the same time if you can kick in your Frenzied Regeneration.

Your picnicbasket

Even if you are a casual druid mostly intent on tanking or dps-ing you may wanna keep a little picnic bag at the bank for those extra special occasions when you dabble in the healing way.

Remember that nice and friendly Alchemist? Now is the time to be even nicer to her.

Mana potions is a staple for any healer, you never know when it may save your lives. Keep a stack or two in your bag.

Elixir of Draenic Wisdom is a Guardian Elixir that will increase your mana pool and (if you have the talent Intensity) your mana regen too.

Bring along some Elixir of Healing Power as well, since it's a Battle Elixir you can use this and the Draenic Wisdom at the same time.

Fishermen and -women skilled in the art of cooking are also a good addition to your friends list, since they might give you some Blackened Sporefish or Golden Fishsticks. Or you can always buy them from the AH.

If you have the talent Intensity (it's the third time I've mentioned this talent in this article, it must be a good one!) the Fishsticks will give you about 7 mana/5 compared to the 8 mana/5 from the Sporefish. So the choice is basically between 44 healing and 20 stamina.

Gems and enchants

Lastly, a thought about enchanting and gemming your healing gear when you are Feral:

Your healing gear will most likely be blues with maybe a few BG or heroic shinies thrown in. Is it justifiable to put expensive enchants and rare gems in blue gear?

In this case, I’d say it is. As Feral, you are not going to be first in line when the sweet epic healing gear drops. You will probably be stuck with your healing gear for a long time until all the dedicated healers have geared up, and if you want to make a significant contribution when needed, you better make the most of the gear you have.