Druid Heal!

There’s a lot of QQ around on forums and blogs all over the internet because of the lifebloom changes. I will wait and see to form an opinion, the changes aren’t even on the PTR yet! But that doesn’t mean we can’t do the math. Warning calculations! I have thought long and hard about the lifebloom changes and I thought lets calculate some stuff to make it more clear for me and maybe you!

First a few things

Disclaimer: this is just an investigation into how this would work for us druids IF these changes are applied. The mana cost of lifebloom is increased by 100% but it could also be a lower value. I hope I didn’t make any errors, if you find one tell me!

- when you let the lifebloom bloom you will get your base mana per application back, so I assumed this would be the base mana before talents and bonusses;
- the base mana for a lifebloom is 14% * 3496 = 489 mana;
- the mana cost for a lifebloom with the T7 2 set bonus and Tree of Life is 489 * (1 – 0,05 – 0,20) = 367 mana, which would mean 734 with the proposed changes;
- calculations are made with Nature’s Splendor and the Glyph of Lifebloom resulting in a 10 second HoT;
- the healing from a lifebloom at 1911 spellpower is 329 and a 2.763 bloom (including all talents etc etc, doesn’t matter much for the calculations because these numbers are the same for both situations), Regrowth costs 720 mana and heals for 6.190 initial and 548 per tick, Rejuvenation costs 447 and heals for 1547 per tick and Nourish (with 3 HoTs and T7 4 set bonus) costs 547 mana and heals for approximately 6.829;
- I took the base numbers: I did not take into account crit because it would make the calculation complicated and its not needed for comparing the differences, assuming a crit now will be the same as after applying the changes.

Lets get cracking!

Assume the following spells are cast on a MT pre patch 3.1 untill the lifebloom needs to be refreshed (yes I use Nourish, quite happy with it):

Lifebloom (0) > Lifebloom (1,5) > Lifebloom (3,0) > Rejuvenation (4,5) > Regrowth (6,0) > Nourish (8,0) > Nourish (9,5) > Nourish (11,0) > Lifebloom (13,0) healing for 42.163 hp.

This will cost you 1101 mana to stack lifebloom and 367 to refresh, 447 mana for the rejuvenation, 720 for the regrowth and 1641  mana for the Nourish. Total cost: 4.276 mana.

Now assume the following spells are cast on a MT after the changes in patch 3.1 untill the lifebloom blooms:

Lifebloom (0) > Lifebloom (1,5) > Lifebloom (3,0) > Rejuvenation (4,5) > Regrowth (6,0) > Nourish (8,0) > Nourish (9,5) > Nourish (11,0) > Bloom (13,0) healing for 49.465 hp.

As you see the only difference is that I let the Lifebloom  bloom instead of refreshing. This will cost you 2202 mana to stack lifebloom and 1467 return from the bloom, 447 mana for the rejuvenation, 720 for the regrowth and 1.641 mana for the Nourish. Total cost: 3.543 mana. Now it seems you are better of, you heal more (the lifebloom blooms and blooms times 3) and you spend less mana. But the catch is you need to reapply the lifebloom stack where in the old situation you can continue casting nourish (regrowth and rejuvanation still running):

Old situation at refresh:

Lifebloom (0) > Lifebloom (1,5) > Lifebloom (3,0) > Rejuvenation (4,5) > Regrowth (6,0) > Nourish (8,0) > Nourish (9,5) > Nourish (11,0) > Lifebloom (13,0) > Nourish (14,5) > Nourish (16,0) healing for (42.163 + 14,645) 56.808 hp. The mana cost is 4.276 (see above) plus 1.094 is a total of 5.370 mana.

New situation after bloom:

Lifebloom (0) > Lifebloom (1,5) > Lifebloom (3,0) > Rejuvenation (4,5) > Regrowth (6,0) > Nourish (8,0) > Nourish (9,5) > Nourish (11,0) > Bloom (13,0)/Lifebloom (13,0) > Lifebloom (14,5) > Lifebloom (16,0) healing for (49.465 + 2.961) 52.426 hp. The mana cost is 3.543 (see above) plus a 3 stack Lifebloom minus the refund (assuming you let it bloom again) is 735 mana for a total of 4.287 mana.

Now lets look at some differences:

old : HPM = 10,58   HPS =  56.808/17,5 = 3.246
new : HPM = 12,23  HPS = 52.426/17,5 = 2.985

So it seems the healing per mana increases and the healing per second is down. So we will be more efficient, but we have lower output over time. But this does not take into account the possible overhealing involved. You cannot time the damage a tank gets in 10 seconds (on some encounters you can like Loatheb and Maexxna) so the bloom on a lifebloom could all be overhealing. This could make you decide to refresh the lifebloom, but at a cost: you don’t get the mana return from your applications. This will result in a total mana cost of 5.370 (old mana cost) plus 4 times 367 (the mana cost was doubled so add 4 times the old mana cost of lifebloom) makes a total of 6.838 mana.

new: HPM = 56.808/6.838 = 8,3 HPS= 3.246

If we can time our blooms at the right time we have a new powerfull tool at our hands. However most of the times this will not be the case. Our main heal has just been made more expensive and we will have to choose who to roll it on. No more rolling on multiple targets, more use of other spells.

Got something to share drop me a note or leave a comment!

Edit: I recalculated and found some errors, updated post. The outcome remains the same.

Here are the changes notable for restoration druids in Patch 3.1 (remember NOT FINAL):

Glyphs

• Glyph of Rebirth – Players resurrected by Rebirth are returned to life with 100% health. (Old: Increases the amount of health on a character brought back to life via Rebirth by 100%.);
• Glyph of Wild Growth  – Wild Growth now affects up to 6 targets;
• Glyph of Nourish  – Your Nourish heals an additional 6% for each of your heal over time effects present on the target;
• Glyph of Barkskin – Reduces the chance you’ll be critically hit by melee attacks by 1 to 0% while Barkskin is active.

Skills

• Abolish Poison now ticks every 3 secs for 12 secs. (Previously ticked every 2 secs for 8 secs).

Talents

• Improved Mark of the Wild (Tier 1) now also increases all of your total attributes by 1/2%.
• Intensity (Tier 3) now allows 17/33/50% of mana regeneration to continue while casting. (Previously 10/20/30%)
• Improved Regrowth (Tier 6) renamed Nature’s Bounty. Increases the critical effect chance of your Regrowth and Nourish spells by 5/10/15/20/25%. (Previously increased just regrowth crit by 10/20/30/40/50%)
• Replenish (Tier 9) renamed Revitalize;
• New Talent* Improved Barkskin, Tier 10, 2 point talent – Increases the damage reduction granted by your Barkskin spell by 5/10%, and increases resistance to Dispel mechanics by 30/60% while under the effect of Barkskin.

The notable changes are the buffs to Nourish! The new Talent Nature’s Bounty Nourish becomes a very good heal although the same talent is nerfed for Regrowth (from 50% crit to 25% crit). But it should mean that nourish will crit for about the same values as regrowth only without the HoT, which gives us a cheaper spell then a full (glyphed) regrowth! So instead of renewing regrowths will most likely cast Nourish when Regrowth is up. Another buff is the Glyph of Nourish: +6% for every HoT present, which is Imba with the T7 4 set bonus + 5% per HoT, effectively making +11% per HoT! Which could mean a max of +44% to Nourish (Regrowth, Lifebloom, Rejuvenation and Wild Growth). More crit and more healing to Nourish, 3.1 is the Nourish Patch for us Druids…

The other changes were already known (revitalize, intensity) or aren’t notable (sorry people, this is a PvE blog). I will update this post when there’s more to tell!

Want to compare stats of your old gear with the gear in patch 3.1? Or do you want to know how the changes to mana regen will affect your druid? See my mana regen calculator / gear compare calculator!

Update: I have Raaff on the PTR (Raaffie on Brill test realm), and the calculators seems correct with my values of Spirit/Intellect and MP5!.

Blizzard has put some of the druid changes for 3.1 on their forum:

1. Savage Defense – this is a new passive ability. When a druid in Dire Bear form deals a melee critical strike, the druid gains a damage shield equal to 25% of their attack power. The next hit completely removes the shield regardless of how much damage was done.
2. Survival of the Fittest has had its bonus armor reduced to compensate for the above increase in damage mitigation.
3. Faerie Fire (and similar debuffs) now reduces armor by 5%. See Sunder Armor in the warrior update below for additional details.
4. Thorns and Nature’s Grasp can be cast in Tree of Life form.
5. Survival Instincts now works in Moonkin form.
6. Replenish – to avoid confusion, this talent has been renamed “Revitalize.” It now also works with Wild Growth.
7. We are also looking at increasing the sustained (not burst) damage of feral druids in cat form.

It seems our feral friends are getting some nice buffs!

Changes notable for trees:
- Thorns and Nature’s Grasp castable in ToL, nice but not really needed in PvE.
- Replenish has been renamed, yep it did cause some confusion. Now it works with WG, still not taking the talent: it sucks (very low proc)!

That said, nothing to worry or to be excited about. Next blue post please!

Which spells are we going to use in WotLK? What will be my main spell? What will be the difference between raids and other dungeons?

Ghostcrawler (a Blizzard Developer) wrote an interesting note on the beta forums:

In our minds, your go-to spells when healing anything bigger than a 5-player group are Rejuv, Regrowth and Lifebloom. You are probably not benefiting your raid the most if you are chaining Healing Touch on the tank while the paladin is trying to keep everyone up with Beacon of Light.

Healing Touch, Swiftmend and Wild Growth are all very useful spells. But they are intended to be used in smaller group or when something unusual happens in a raid. If the entire group takes a lot of damage at once, that’s a good time for Wild Growth. If a melee dps class is very wounded and you don’t have time for the bloom and Swiftmend is on cooldown, go for the Healing Touch.

If any class is the “fill in the gap” healer, it’s the Holy priest. Their strength is in versatility — they have single-target heals, group heals, instant heals and hots. The standard (but by no means only) way to heal a raid is to have a Holy paladin on the tank along with a Resto druid, have a Resto shammy AE heal the group, and then put the Holy priest wherever you need them. We are also trying to get the Disc priest into a role similar to the paladin, but based more around damage avoidance than efficient, quick heals.

Nourish is supposed to be a Flash Heal — fast but expensive. It may be too fine a line for a class that already has Swiftmend and a (much improved) Regrowth.