- A beam of light flashes through the party trying to save as much as possible before all is lost…
Introduction
You are likely to see two different ways of healing as a shaman. One will spam Chain Heal so much it looks like they have few other abilities, while the other will stick more with single target healing such as Lesser Healing Wave. This is merely intended as a brief introduction to the world of restoration shamans.
Restoration shaman spells
Although a restoration shaman hasn’t got as many spells as a priest or druid, the order in which they are used can be quite important to increase healing efficiency. Fewer heals to keep track of is balanced by possible healing spell combinations to keep track of. The spells linked to below are the ranks used at level 80.
Earth Shield – An 8 charges shield normally placed on a tank. The heals from the Earth Shield are quite good and heal the target when (s)he gets hit so as long as you keep it refreshed on your target the shield will do the rest of the job on its own. If you choose to glyph it the heals from Earth Shield will be even bigger.
Riptide – An instant cast heal which provides some direct healing and then proceeds to heal over time for a short while. This ability does have a short cooldown so you cannot spam it on every player around you. This heal is particularly useful when used in conjunction with other heals such as Chain Heal and Lesser Healing Wave.
Chain Heal – A smart heal that will heal your targeted player and those around him or her in need of heals. If you choose to use Glyph of Chain Heal you can heal up to 6 players with this spell. As long as you have it talented, using this heal on a target with Riptide ticking on it will make the heal bigger on your target and consume the HoT. It’s worth noting that if you’ve seen pretty yellow patterns going made by a friendly target going from one player to another it is because a shaman is using this spell.
Lesser Healing Wave – A fast cast decent sized heal often used together with Riptide or Chain heal to increase its critical effect, as per the Tidal Waves talent. For a smaller heal it can be quite powerful. This is the main spell used by one of the two styles of shaman healer, generally suited to tank healing. Glyph of Lesser Healing Wave would be ideal for this.
Healing Wave - If you need to provide massive healing then this is the ability you’re likely to use. Using this after a Riptide or Chain Heal decreases the cast time, increasing the throughput of this spell dramatically.
Nature’s Swiftness - Using this ability makes your next heal an instant cast spell which is really quite useful when things aren’t going quite right and you need a big heal (Healing Wave) NOW. It is also good to use in conjunction with Chain Heal.
Reincarnation – OK, so it’s not actually a healing spell per se, even if you gain health by popping back up soon after you have died to continue healing and save the day! You may be more familiar with this ability being referred to as the reagent needed to use it; ankh.
Healing Stream Totem – It is a passive background heal which scales with spell power. It provides constant healing until it is destroyed and is best used in the tank party.
Gear stats
As with all healers spell power is quite a nice stat. Haste is generally very popular, especially for those who spend most of their time spamming Chain Heal. Mp5 is often more of a preference than a requirement, it depends entirely on what you feel you need or if you’d prefer to stack more crit and haste simultaneously. Intellect, on the other hand, can give both spell power (if talented) as well as crit besides the obvious boost to your mana pool. Spirit, on the other hand, is something you don’t need any of (not until Cataclysm anyway).
You generally don’t have many to fight with for mail gear. The elemental shaman will want some of the same gear as you because quite often you will find the same piece of gear an upgrade. Haste and crit items will in particular be nice for both, but there will be a fight for haste only items as well. Don’t be surprised if you see the odd paladin wanting the a couple of bits of your gear as well.
Mana regen
A shaman has quite a few decent options that increase his or her mana MP5. The Water Shield gives a good MP5 bonus as long as you remember to refresh it if it falls off or you’ve taken enough damage for the charges to be used up. Then of course you have the Mana Spring Totem which provides a nice constant mp5 burst to not only yourself, but everybody else as well. Remember that you cannot use both Mana Spring Totem and Healing Stream Totem at the same time as they are both water based.
The “I-need-mana-now” ability that restoration shamans have is called Mana Tide Totem. This totem grants mana not only to yourself but also to the people in your party. It is good to be in the group with other healers so they also get to benefit from this totem and they are likely to love you for giving them a nice chunk of mana!
Strengths and weaknesses
Mobility can be an issue as most of the shamans spells require them to be stationary while the spell is being cast. However, as you become more accustomed to healing, you will be able to better time your heals when standing still. A greater weakness is the complicated rotations needed to maximise healing output. Certain spells gain nice bonuses when used following particular spells. It is quite an interesting way of healing, but can be difficult to get used to, hence I’ve put it down as a weakness.
One of the main strengths I found as a shaman was the ability to do both well as a tank healer and as a raid healer. Some specialisation in regards to gear, glyphs and to an extent talents could be preferred, but they are likely to cope as any as long as they have some experience with it. Both the single target and AoE healing abilities are quite strong and compliment each other well.
I can’t really pass up the opportunity to mention totems, I mean they are what shamans are all about right? Well, some will think so anyway. You might even find the totems get you into a group faster they really are quite popular amongst other players! The various range of buffs they provide are quite nice after all.
Levelling
The options here are to level as melee DPS (enhancement), caster DPS (elemental) or healer. As with other healing classes who also have a caster DPS talent tree available, a shaman will often find themselves able to heal a lot of instances while levelling as an elemental shaman. Levelling as DPS is of course most efficient and you can throw heals on yourself as either elemental or enhancement spec without too many problems.
You generally might find it easier to obtain gear for enhancement as until level 40 you share leather armour with feral druids, rogues and hunters and after level 40 you continue to share mail armour with hunters. As an elemental or restoration shaman you might find yourself ending up using both leather and cloth when you’d rather use mail armour simply due to limited availability. Personally I alternated levelling as elemental and enhancement, but enhancement generally felt more efficient.
One of the most difficult things to grasp while levelling is the totems. You will get a lot of different ones and they can be both confusing and annoying to keep track of. Thankfully the totem bar Blizzard now provides is quite useful and it lets you easily swap between different totem set ups and have the one with your favourites at hand. If you want to level a shaman, don’t get discouraged when you feel you have totems everywhere and can’t seem to grasp which does what. Pick your favourites and you’ll get the hang of it as you go along.
Useful websites
Below is a short list of useful websites in regards to healing as a shaman
If you know of other useful restoration shaman websites, you are welcome to use the comments section to link to them.
Summary
As one of the more versatile healing classes and with a whole lot of totems a restoration shaman is generally quite popular for getting a spot in a group. They have somewhat limited amounts of spells available for healing compared to priests and druids, but the combination of spells available makes the shaman powerful.
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Last but not least we’ll take a look at the holy paladin.