Spells
Resto Druids specialize in Heal over Time effects and this theme runs through most of our spells. This section can be long but the explanations are thorough, and the tricks spread throughout are valuable. If you are picking up a Resto Druid for the first time, I’d recommend reading the reference sheet for a much quicker explanation of each spell. Resto is an incredibly rewarding spec to master and I would strongly recommend it to prospective healers. Our spells have strong synergies with one another and you’ll build large windows of healing through our powerful cooldowns. Some of the below spells are technically talents, but we’ll be taking them in every build (except where noted).
The Hots
Rejuvenation
Primary Role: Key builder in your ramp sequence. Can also be used as a filler HoT.
Rejuvenation is a key piece of your “ramps” (we’ll cover what this means a little later). Generally you’ll cast a lot of these in a row before Flourish, or during Tree of Life. You can also cast them on damaged targets in between your big cooldowns, and this tier you can get away with casting a ton of them. Think of this as a medium-sized HoT that you’ll combine with other buttons to do huge healing.
Wild Growth
Primary Role: Powerful, efficient AoE heal. Also features in your ramp sequence.
Does a lot of healing on six targets on a very short cooldown and it’ll go on random injured allies near your target. It’s incredibly efficient and you can cast it very often to react to raid wide damage. If you are having mana trouble, cast this more often and Rejuvenation / Regrowth less. Wild Growth is an amazing spell. You’ll often combine this with Swiftmend to get a big boost from Soul of the Forest.
- You should know: Even though Wild Growth is cast on an ally (like every other heal) it won’t necessarily hit that target. It instead will pick the six lowest health targets within 30 yards of them. This tends to be a good thing in most cases, but it’s worth knowing.
Lifebloom
Primary Role: Single target healing
Limited to one target at a time (two with Undergrowth). Aim for very high Lifebloom uptime – often on yourself for Photosynthesis value.
- You should know: If you recast Lifebloom on a target with less than 4.5 seconds remaining it will proc the bloom portion of the heal. This is one of our maintenance spells since it does good healing and gives us free Regrowth casts through Omen of Clarity.
The Direct Heals
Regrowth
Primary Role: Spot heal. Also a powerful filler spell after a Flourish ramp or whenever you have a lot of Rejuvenations active.
Regrowth is a direct healing spell that we’re going to make cheap or free through the Abundance talent and Omen of Clarity procs. You can also cast it whenever someone is on the brink of death.
Swiftmend
Primary Role: Emergency heal, Reforestation generator
Instant heal on a 15 second cooldown. Removes a HoT from the target in the following order: Regrowth, Wild Growth, Rejuvenation. This is a strong emergency heal, but in raid you’ll primarily be using it for the Reforestation procs if you’re taking that talent. Every third Swiftmend cast gives us Tree of Life for 9 seconds. We’ll discuss this more in the next page of the guide but you’ll end up casting about three Swiftmends a minute.
The Cooldowns
Tranquility
Heals ALL allies within 40 yards and leaves a stacking hot on them for 8 seconds. This is a decent cooldown that we’ll usually assign alone as opposed to combining it with any of our other cooldowns.
- Tip: Tranquility benefits from your Mastery, so throw out a Wild Growth before you cast Tranquility to give it a boost.
Flourish
Primary Role: Major healing cooldown
Extends all HoTs by 8 seconds and doubles your tick rate for 8 seconds. This increased tick rate is a buff on yourself which means any HoTs you apply after you cast Flourish will also benefit. This is actually your strongest healing cooldown and on a short 90 second cooldown. In raid you can easily have 20++ rejuv buffs active when you press it which will generate a ridiculous amount of healing. In Mythic+ Flourish can get you through any healing check.
Convoke the Spirits
Primary Role: Healing cooldown
Convoke is a special kind of spell. It casts 9-12 Druid spells over 3-4 seconds and it’s random which you get. This is a huge source of RNG but on average it’s a very good cooldown. With both Convoke talents you’ll also get a Flourish cast about 85% of the time across two casts. You’ll often combine Convoke with Flourish.
Defensives
Barkskin
Primary Role: Personal Defensive
Reduces the damage you take by 20% for 12 seconds. This is off the global cooldown, so get into the habit of casting it whenever you’re in danger. You can also look at dangerous overlaps in a fight and get into a habit of always pressing your defensive there.
Ironbark
Primary Role: External cooldown
Reduces the damage your target takes by 20% for 12 seconds and buffs your HoTs on the target. Use this whenever tank damage has gotten too high for your HoTs, or if another key ally is in trouble. You can cast this on yourself if Barkskin is on cooldown, or if you need both (what are you getting hit by!?). Try and get into the habit of casting this quite frequently since its cooldown is very short.
Passives
Ysera’s Gift
A free heal on you, or a raid member every 5 seconds. It doesn’t benefit from Haste or Versatility, isn’t increased by your Mastery, and cannot critically heal. It’s just free healing.
Omen of Clarity
Omen of Clarity rewards you with some free Regrowth casts for having Lifebloom up. You are likely to see 2-3 procs a minute, and if the raid is in reasonable health you can cast the free Regrowths on the tank to put up another HoT for your mastery. Aim to make use of as many procs as possible.
The Other Stuff
Efflorescence
Primary Role: AoE maintenance healing
Targeted healing effect that heals allies in the green circle. It lasts for 30 seconds and you’ll want to aim for 100% uptime (here’s a WeakAura to help). It’s very efficient. It’s large enough to hit both the tank and the melee group in most fights and that is often the recommended strategy. Haste increases the rate at which Efflorescence heals, which also adds more Spring Blossom HoTs across the raid (if talented). Increasing your Efflo uptime can have a big impact on your healing.
- You should know: When running Spring Blossoms, the Efflorescence heal will prioritize targets that don’t have the Spring Blossoms hot but Efflorescence is otherwise NOT a smart heal (and so could heal an ally at 90% life instead of one at 10%).
Innervate
Allows you, or a targeted ally to cast spells for free for 12 seconds. In raid it’s up to you and your group to decide if this is best on yourself or another healer.
- Tip: Efflorescence and Wild Growth are both reasonably expensive spells that should be fit into your Innervate duration. Rejuvenations are better value than Regrowths unless the Rejuvenation will mostly overheal.
- Tip: Try not to time your Innervate as the big damage hits. Instead cast it 10 seconds beforehand to get a blanket of Rejuvenations out before the damage hits. Getting your HoTs out before damage hits is one of the keys to playing Resto Druid well.
Nature’s Cure
The Resto Druid dispel. Dispels are on an 8 second cooldown, and remove all negative effects on the target. As a Druid we can cleanse anything that isn’t a disease, and dungeons in particular have many status effects that you can dispel. Make sure this is keybound and used frequently.
Ursol’s Vortex
A frequently forgotten about utility spell that has many applications in dungeons (and a few in raid too). It forms a cyclone at the targeted location which pulls back in mobs that escape as well as slowing them down. You can get pretty creative with its use but some examples include:
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- Keeping mobs away from the tank in Mythic+ dungeons (especially with the Necrotic affix when the tank is trying to reset stacks).
- Stalling boss adds.
We also have some damage spells like Moonfire, Sunfire, Solar Wrath, and more depending on our talents. You should use any downtime to chain-cast Solar Wrath at the active priority target. It costs zero mana.
Extra Info
Overwriting hots (nicknamed “Pandemic”)
If you recast a hot that has less than 30% of its duration left on a target the remaining duration will be added to the refresh. So if you refresh a Lifebloom with 3 seconds remaining, that three seconds will be added to the 15 second fresh Lifebloom (for an 18 second total duration). This applies to all heal and damage over time effects which means there’s no cost to refreshing HoTs early within this zone. 30% is a little hard to remember so here are some proper numbers:
- Lifebloom: 4.5s or less remaining.
- Rejuvenation: 4.5s or less remaining.
- Regrowth: 3.6s or less remaining.
Mastery: Harmony
The Resto Druid mastery has been through a few iterations since the stat was introduced, with its current version one of the best. Mastery: Harmony increases all healing done to the target by 4-20%+ for each HoT on them. This means that if you have a Lifebloom and a Rejuvenation on the target and 20% mastery, all healing you do to the target will be increased by 40% (20%x2). This includes the HoT themselves too so even a single rejuv will benefit from mastery.
- There are currently ten spells that count toward it: Lifebloom, Rejuvenation, Regrowth (HoT), Wild Growth, Cenarion Ward, Cultivation, Spring Blossoms, Germination, Tranquility (HoT) and Adaptive Swarm.
- HoTs from trinkets or other non-druid sources don’t count toward Mastery.