Wednesday, January 21, 2009

The Day After the End of the World (3.0.8)

I jest! 


It wasn't even remotely the end of the world. In fact I found it COMPLETELY AWESOME that Wild Growth was on a cool down! I actually LIKED having one more thing to do. I LIKED that Lifebloom and Rejuv were NEEDED for raid healing and not just afterthoughts. 

Here are my thoughts on resto druid healing after 3.0.8

The Really Good: 

1. I used Wild Growth almost every time it was up. Screw the theory of "saving it until it is really needed". I say top them off while you have the chance! Of course you must be wise about when you actually DO need to save it, like for Vortexes on Malygos. But other than that, use it or lose it!

2. I didn't have any problems on Malygos's Vortexes. This seemed to be the "oh noes we are never going to be able to do that boss without AoEhealspam" issue. Even with the laggy crappy servers and other issues related to guild moral, it took us about 2 attempts to realize - no - no one was dieing in Vortexes because of true lack of AoE heals.

3. Still no mana problems! Any time a patch comes out that is going to change your healing style and bug the crap out of other things, this is always a worry (at least for me.) I can confidently say Darkmoon Card: Blue Dragon still works (and rocks). I can't say the same for Majestic Dragon Figurine, which I hear is bugged when related to HoTs. 

4. My effective healing was not nerfed to hell and back. I still felt competitive on the healing meters. Maybe it helps that my biggest competition was also nerfed. I still felt as though I fell in the same general overall healing rank area... thing... There was definitely less of a difference between the top and the bottom, which I also think is great. But I'm mostly being completely selfish and thinking about my effective healing right now : P

5. Blizz saw the light and shut down Wintergrasp! Wintergrasp related lag has been screwing over our raids for weeks now. Its hard to fight Thaddius with 20 second lag. No, this isn't directly related to healing, but I am a PvEer. I NEVER PvP. (Yakra made me join an arena team the other night for 3 matches.) I get very frustrated when things happen or don't happen, or Blizz makes changes or doesn't make changes, because of PvP. Wintergrasp being shut down is a refreshing turn of events. 

The Not as Bad as I Thought it Would Be:

1. I still didn't use nourish that much. Maybe I need to warm up to it. Maybe it was because I was assigned to tank heal most of the night. Maybe I just have never liked it and still prefer Regrowth. 

2. You can't cast Wild Growth during Malygos's Vortexes. WTF? I understand the cool down, but... it was giving me an "invalid target" error. Priests were having the same issue with CoH. We were able to heal through it. I cast Wild Growth right before the vortexes started and then hit people with Rejuv in order of closest to dead to less close to dead and hoped for the best. 

3. I don't know how I feel about the T7 set bonus change. When I first saw that it was coming, I was really excited because I love Lifebloom. But I was actually starting to use Rejuv like crazy since I got Idol of the Awakening. Like crazy is relative... I guess its not really "like crazy", but there have been plenty of fights where I have chosen it over Lifebloom and now I'm not sure which I will pick!

So, no, the sky did not fall, the earth did not open up and swallow us, it did not start raining blood. But I still plan on making a QQ outfit - so for serious! Even if you don't think I'm funny, clue me in on some items with neat names! (You can e-mail me is you prefer.) Also - tell me what YOUR first impressions were of the six second cool down and other extraneous and less important 3.0.8 changes. 

2 comments:

  1. So maybe it's just because I'm healing different content than you currently (H 5 mans and 10 man raids)but I find Nourish quite useful. The tanks I'm healing have 23-28k life and if they take a big hit I need something on them fast, especially if I don't know/trust the other healer(s). I'll def use it at least 1 time in any given boss fight, but not necessarily on trash. I personally like having another option.

    As for the WG cool down... I'm undecided. It really has yet to impact me, but I've also been more careful in how I use it. Honestly I didn't really Spam it before the cool down, but knowing it does have a cool down makes me feel more limited.

    -For the Horde
    http://www.wowarmory.com/character-sheet.xml?r=Mug%27thol&n=Fdaapproved

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  2. 1. The Majestic Dragon Figurine has been fixed! It does now proc off of every instant heal you cast =)

    2. I also came across the whole "Invalid target" thing during Malygos' vortex. Quite annoying. I put rejuvs on everyone before we went up (it was a 10 man) and everything worked out fine, but WG would have been a nice extra top-off. I hope they fix this.

    3. I also really don't mind the 6 second CD. In fact, I think that's how it should have been to begin with. All the people who QQ about it (like this person, who's not a druid but you get the idea: http://blue.mmo-champion.com/27/14498461266-thanks-for-the-nerf.html) can go and shove it :P
    Being able to spam WG was just plain silly and OP. It also made other healing spells fall to the wayside. It also made healing more boring (although I DO love the sound and animation of WG ^^) I'm glad it's on a CD, and I think that 6 seconds is a perfect amount.

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About Amy

I've been playing WoW since Easter Sunday 2005, coincidentally the same day I became engaged to my forever husband and tank Chad, aka Yakra. I have held the roles of druid class officer, healing role officer, and general secretarial type officer in two guilds. Currently, I am not playing WoW. When I'm playing, my blog, like my life, is casualcore PvE healing focused. (I love gear math!) When I'm not playing WoW... well, I can't quite tell you what this blog will be about since I have never blogged while not playing WoW! Expect to see reflections on being a married WoW player and on just being married, stories from my other RP adventures (LARPing and table top), and accounts of my life's most meaningful activity: teaching chemistry.





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