Resto Druid 8.3 FAQ

Patch 8.3 will not go down in history as a hall of fame Druid patch. Our raid azerite is poor, a justified Mythic+ nerf takes ~2% off our raid throughput and the Disc / Glimmer front-runners were barely touched. More positively, our utility will see some use in Ny’alotha and the damage patterns suit Druid well. They also do a round of tuning after Heroic week and we could very well feature. We remain Mythic+ kings and and are a fun, dynamic spec to play. If you are not playing in a world first guild and enjoy your Druid you should see no reason to swap off it. Balance will play out similarly to Eternal Palace.

Essences

8.3 Essences deep dive: https://questionablyepic.com/essence-preview-8-3/

For raid we’ll likely run Lucid Dreams as our default major. Worldvein Resonance and Crucible of Flame might see niche use but there’s a giant buggy question mark over the former. Pick Conflict & Strife, Ever Rising Tide and Unwavering Ward in your minor slots. For fights that are heavily spread you might consider Well of Existence in your third slot instead of Unwavering Ward.

For Mythic+ we’ll start with Formless Void major combined with the Crucible of Flame, Conflict & Strife and Ever Rising Tide minors. You’ll use Formless Void to copy Essence of the Focusing Iris (if one is available in your party).

Corruption

Corruption is a new 8.3 system that replaces Titanforging with a chance for each item to roll one of eighteen different affixes. If you aren’t a massive high roller you’re unlikely to get the specific corruption effects you want on week one. Fortunately they’re all pretty close in strength and outside of a few outliers you are mostly happy to use any from a range. The “Corruption Score” below is the amount of HPS you get per corruption at 60k HPS. Higher numbers are better. You’ll likely want to minimize how much Corruption you are wearing while still meeting the throughput checks of the fight. It’s reasonably safe to go up to 39 and Resto Druid does handle the effects well.

Data: 2000 of any given stat for the % stat increases, 1.6 secondary stat weights, 2.4 Leech weight, 13000 int, 85% of healing breakdown scales with int, 60000 HPS, 22% effective crit chance. 
Note: Void Ritual numbers are if you are the only one to have it. The multiplier for having 2+ friends with it appears to be 1.2 but we don’t have a confirmation. It is awful at 1.2.

Flash of Insight doesn’t appear to be available to us which is unfortunate because it’s very good.

You can also proc an array of DPS Corruption effects.

It is very likely you’ll be asked to throw a few of these on at some point in progression, especially if the healing throughput checks remain as low as they were on the PTR.

Stats

Raid: All stats remain good for Resto Druid and you are likely to pick your highest item level choice almost all of the time. You can use wowanalyzer.com and QE Live to fine-tune your stat line. The particular stat distribution on an item is of the lowest importance and it sits under the Corruption effect, leech, sockets and item level in the order that you care about them.

Wowanalyzer.com remains our best way of creating custom stat weights that match your playstyle and stat  line. It’ll be ready to go when the patch goes live.

Mythic+: Post-nerf Mastery still remains the most potent dungeon healing stat. When pushing high keys you’ll likely still want to drop some for a stat that adds DPS.

Azerite, Trinkets & Special Gear

Azerite

With the poor state of our traits on raid gear we’ll be forced into the residuum pool for the foreseeable future. Hood of the Slithering Loa is arguably better than Stygian Guise too but they’re similar enough that you’re likely to roll for it last. You are likely to run a mix of heroic Azerite until you can start rolling for dungeon pieces. Questionably Epic Live will be updated to 8.3 before the patch goes live and it’ll help you make the  best of your intermediate sets.

The above is designed for general strength. Specific fights might favor specific trait combos.

Trinkets

There is a detailed write-up on each of the new raid trinkets here, complete with rankings. In particular we’re looking at Forbidden Obsidian Claw and Humming Black Dragonscale. Alchemist Stone is also excellent and will hold you over until Mythic raid trinkets at the very least. Trinkets can not corrupt (at least, currently). There isn’t a massive damage trinket this time around like we had in Eternal Palace with Aquipotent Nautilus and Leviathans Lure.

Other Stuff

In 8.3 Mechagon becomes a Mythic+ dungeon. That means we can get very high item level versions of the Mechagon set rings. These scale ridiculously and picking up a “damage an enemy from behind” and “heal 5 allies” set will obliterate all competition. This does require you to keep a Moonfire on the boss (or wrath every 15 seconds). The “heal an ally below 50% life” trigger ring might also see some play when you’re not able to spend any extra mana.

Quickfire Questions

Which professions are best going into 8.3? Alchemy and Leatherworking are both solid. Engineering gives you the ability to trade azerite early but a raid helm drops off the second boss so likely won’t see use for long. Jewelcrafting is poor since the Mechagon set rings occupy both slots.
Will our talents change? Tree of Life, Spring Blossoms and Flourish will remain the standard setup. There might be some niche use of Inner Peace. Cenarion ward and Abundance remain flexible.
Can gear still roll regular sockets and Leech? Yes it appears so.
When does Residuum reset? With the patch, not with the start of Season 4.
What is the neck level cap? There isn’t one anymore. The last big upgrade is at level 80 (your last +3% stamina node) but it continues to level past that (including essences).