tips appreciated. I took 2 months off wow, and I bit rusty. I let the tank die last night in Blood Furnace. My fault for not paying attention. Still not sure how he took damage so fast.
It's a handful trying to keep 3 pets and the tank up. Especially with those bombs in BF. One warlock (felguard) pet, and 2 hunter pets. And Paladin tank. I know you can double tap the F keys to select the pet, but I still click the portrait. Because my left hand hits the 1 or 2 key for healing.
Actually my main purpose of this thread is to gripe about totems. :). I really wish they would streamline totem use for shaman. It would make them a more popular class. Sometimes the tank takes damage so fast, I don't have time to lay totems. Or sometimes I get caught in a totem cooldown after the tank takes a huge hit, and have to wait a second before I can heal him. Very annoying. I really wish totems didn't activate global cooldowns.
So my question is how do you guys lay totems while main healing a 5 man? I'm still elemental/resto, so I don't have the talent to increase range to 30 yards yet. And I'm a terrible judge of distance. So I have to run up, lay totems, then run back. sometimes I don't have time for this, and one time I was in range of those bombs... I ended up taking a lot of damage.
Anyways I actually did pretty good BF after early on when I let the tank die. Though a couple hunters pets died later on. I usually don't focus much on hunters pets, but I try to keep them up if I have time. And then 2 people died on the final boss fight. I'm not sure what happened. I think the warlocks enslaved demon broke on the final boss (or maybe the demon broke when the warlock died?). Next thing I know a warlock and hunter are dead. Problem is healing the tank takes most of my time, it's hard to find time to heal the others sometimes... Not to mention healing myself sometimes...
- Forums
- World of Warcraft
- Class Discussion
- healing advice
healing adviceFollow
thrashering wrote:
It's a handful trying to keep 3 pets and the tank up. Especially with those bombs in BF. One warlock (felguard) pet, and 2 hunter pets. And Paladin tank. I know you can double tap the F keys to select the pet, but I still click the portrait. Because my left hand hits the 1 or 2 key for healing.
I don't know the answer to your totem question (can you lay any before the pull or is that a stupid suggestion?) but for this, you can set Healbot to include pets so they're a bar like any other. The checkbox is on the Healing tab in the Healbot options; I'm sure other mods have something similar. Personally my hand-eye coordination... well let's just say I learned to play video games during an age when all you had to focus on was two sticks and a dot. I'd never be able to keep up with healing everyone if I actually had to select them instead of just clicking.
The tank needs to move the mobs away from the bombs so everyone doesn't take the AoE damage from them. If you have a rogue he can disarm them after the fight or you can designate someone to go blow them up once you're out of combat and can heal them effectively.
For dropping totems you do it when you can. Before the fight is great if the party is actually pulling. If the party is charging in and fighting on the mobs then drop the totems that work for you (wrath of air & mana stream work well) and stand back to keep everyone up. When they complain about not getting windfury then you'll have time to explain. 20 yards is not very far at all so dropping it outside the mob aggro radius is most likely useless when the fights moves away.
For dropping totems you do it when you can. Before the fight is great if the party is actually pulling. If the party is charging in and fighting on the mobs then drop the totems that work for you (wrath of air & mana stream work well) and stand back to keep everyone up. When they complain about not getting windfury then you'll have time to explain. 20 yards is not very far at all so dropping it outside the mob aggro radius is most likely useless when the fights moves away.
Pets LOVE Chain Heal. Most of the time I don't even target pet health bars, as a juicy Chain Heal with the MT as main target takes care of most splash damage.
My normal healing rotation for a pull is:
1- One or two caster totems
2- Healing Wave rank 1 x3 on the MT -- stacks healing way and lets him/her know I'm ready for the pull
3- Follow tank half-way while dropping 1-3 other totems -- gives the tank time to establish agro, and party time to CC.
4- Heal as needed -- usually a downranked HW followed by CH
Depending on the fight--and with a good tank and/or enough CC--you don't need to stay at range. You do sacrifice some threat reduction (110% threshold as opposed to 130%), but with some totems--especially tremor--it's worth it to make sure it's placed correctly, even if it means you're stuck healing in melee range for a few seconds.
My normal healing rotation for a pull is:
1- One or two caster totems
2- Healing Wave rank 1 x3 on the MT -- stacks healing way and lets him/her know I'm ready for the pull
3- Follow tank half-way while dropping 1-3 other totems -- gives the tank time to establish agro, and party time to CC.
4- Heal as needed -- usually a downranked HW followed by CH
Depending on the fight--and with a good tank and/or enough CC--you don't need to stay at range. You do sacrifice some threat reduction (110% threshold as opposed to 130%), but with some totems--especially tremor--it's worth it to make sure it's placed correctly, even if it means you're stuck healing in melee range for a few seconds.
My rotation is similar to the poster above.
- Assess the pull
- Pop-trinkets
- Drop caster totems (typically WOA, and Mana or Health)
- Earth Shield the tank (if he has 5 or less charges I tell them to remove the buff, so my refresh will take)
- Drop melee or misc. totems
- Drink real quick if it's going to be a long fight
- Depending on how damage mitigation occurs, I heal as necessary.
Note, keeping the party up is not your sole responsibility. Everyone needs to do their part to minimize unnecessary damage. Sometimes you're fighting DPSers egos by asking them to let tanks get aggro first, bandage themselves in combat, etc. Party (or raid) healing assessment is bigger than just one (or a few) toons, everyone needs to do their fair share. It's about balance.
However, if the healing burden is falling on just you, then know your personal limits and only agree to do what you can personally handle.
Just this last Saturday I left a raid group when I heard that the tank wanted to make heroic ramparts his first heroic experience. He was Arms specced with a dozen or so points in prot, and he was going to wear his "mostly blue tanking gear". After a few lines of realty checking in party chat, we went our separate ways. Lol, the trash alone would rip him apart, let alone the aggro issues that he party would have. Some runs are simply not meant to be.
Edited, Dec 17th 2007 12:30pm by gmarkish
- Assess the pull
- Pop-trinkets
- Drop caster totems (typically WOA, and Mana or Health)
- Earth Shield the tank (if he has 5 or less charges I tell them to remove the buff, so my refresh will take)
- Drop melee or misc. totems
- Drink real quick if it's going to be a long fight
- Depending on how damage mitigation occurs, I heal as necessary.
Note, keeping the party up is not your sole responsibility. Everyone needs to do their part to minimize unnecessary damage. Sometimes you're fighting DPSers egos by asking them to let tanks get aggro first, bandage themselves in combat, etc. Party (or raid) healing assessment is bigger than just one (or a few) toons, everyone needs to do their fair share. It's about balance.
However, if the healing burden is falling on just you, then know your personal limits and only agree to do what you can personally handle.
Just this last Saturday I left a raid group when I heard that the tank wanted to make heroic ramparts his first heroic experience. He was Arms specced with a dozen or so points in prot, and he was going to wear his "mostly blue tanking gear". After a few lines of realty checking in party chat, we went our separate ways. Lol, the trash alone would rip him apart, let alone the aggro issues that he party would have. Some runs are simply not meant to be.
Edited, Dec 17th 2007 12:30pm by gmarkish
I did heal Ring of Blood. But I had a little trouble keeping a 67 pally up. But I wasn't entirely focussed on healing, I started out with some guildies doing dps and off healing. I ended up main healing. His equipment probably wasn't that great. Then one of our officers came. 70 warrior decked out in pvp purples (and some 5 man stuff). I forgot to note his armor, but his health was over 11000. healing was a breeze after that.
As for before, it was pally tank. I'm always a little leary of laying totems too close to mobs because I'm worried totems will pull aggro (something that would happen in solo play in my early levels). Maybe they changed it by now. But it seems that the totems have a higher aggro radius than myself. So I'm a little scared to lay totems too close to mobs before the fight begins.
Anyways I just dinged 70, debating respeccing to restoration now. I already have enough for standard flying mount. So questing will be easier as I can bypass a lot of unecessary fighting. So I don't think it will be too bad being resto- hopefully. I need to figure out a good build.
Guild was asking me if I was keyed for Kara. I still have no idea what that all entails. They want me to heal for Kara, but I'm nowhere near prepared. Right now after getting the healing mace from ring of blood, my healing is at 630 (and that's with a healing potion). My mp5 is around 150 I believe. Anyone have tips what dungeons to get gear and key for Kara?
Although I noticed they brought in another 70 shaman after that conversation. I told them it would take me a while to get geared and keyed. I'm not sure how long it will take. Depends on how much I play my alts :)- and how motivated I am to do serious end game stuff. As for my healing, I seem to do decent with good parties. With pugs, sometimes I suffer. I can only do so much. And when things start to get hectic, occasionally I make mistakes.
Edited, Dec 21st 2007 2:22am by thrashering
As for before, it was pally tank. I'm always a little leary of laying totems too close to mobs because I'm worried totems will pull aggro (something that would happen in solo play in my early levels). Maybe they changed it by now. But it seems that the totems have a higher aggro radius than myself. So I'm a little scared to lay totems too close to mobs before the fight begins.
Anyways I just dinged 70, debating respeccing to restoration now. I already have enough for standard flying mount. So questing will be easier as I can bypass a lot of unecessary fighting. So I don't think it will be too bad being resto- hopefully. I need to figure out a good build.
Guild was asking me if I was keyed for Kara. I still have no idea what that all entails. They want me to heal for Kara, but I'm nowhere near prepared. Right now after getting the healing mace from ring of blood, my healing is at 630 (and that's with a healing potion). My mp5 is around 150 I believe. Anyone have tips what dungeons to get gear and key for Kara?
Although I noticed they brought in another 70 shaman after that conversation. I told them it would take me a while to get geared and keyed. I'm not sure how long it will take. Depends on how much I play my alts :)- and how motivated I am to do serious end game stuff. As for my healing, I seem to do decent with good parties. With pugs, sometimes I suffer. I can only do so much. And when things start to get hectic, occasionally I make mistakes.
Edited, Dec 21st 2007 2:22am by thrashering
Playing an arms/prot warrior as my main, I love tanking when there is a shaman in the group. Having the WF/GoA and SoE totems rock! Add in earth shield and it makes tanking a lot easier. I also play a lvl 54 enhancement shaman and understand a bit about totems. As a tank and shaman, my preference would be to lay down totems first and have me (the tank) pull the mob(s) to me. This way all the shaman would have to do is focus on healing.
I'm glad to hear that chain heal also heals pets. I was wondering that when I first started reading this post. So thanks to Viduus for that bit of info. I hope this helps.
I'm glad to hear that chain heal also heals pets. I was wondering that when I first started reading this post. So thanks to Viduus for that bit of info. I hope this helps.
Somthing else you might consider to heal faster is to maybe try keybinding abilities/spells to your mouse. Check out this link for a rogue post on what the OP calls "the Mouse of DOOM". Just read the OP, you don't need to scroll down farther.
http://wow.allakhazam.com/db/class.html?wclass=4;mid=1190056079204849580;num=84;page=1
As an enhancement shaman I have bound to my mouse wheel; SS, ES, FS, and purge. That is barely scratching the surface of what the Mouse of DOOM can do. You could easily bind various levels of HW, CH, and LHW to your mouse wheel as well *** totems and have a quicker and more efficient way of casting your spells and abilities. This way all you would have to worry about is clicking on your party members portrait or cycling through them on your keyboard and let your mouse wheel do the rest. No more "clicking" on icons or making sure I hit the right number to cast/attack.
By the way, I do this with my main and all my alts. Once you set up one toon to use the mouse of DOOM, each of your toons will be set up also. You just need to change around the icons on your action bar so they are bound the way you like them.
This is just something that works for me. Hope this helps.
http://wow.allakhazam.com/db/class.html?wclass=4;mid=1190056079204849580;num=84;page=1
As an enhancement shaman I have bound to my mouse wheel; SS, ES, FS, and purge. That is barely scratching the surface of what the Mouse of DOOM can do. You could easily bind various levels of HW, CH, and LHW to your mouse wheel as well *** totems and have a quicker and more efficient way of casting your spells and abilities. This way all you would have to worry about is clicking on your party members portrait or cycling through them on your keyboard and let your mouse wheel do the rest. No more "clicking" on icons or making sure I hit the right number to cast/attack.
By the way, I do this with my main and all my alts. Once you set up one toon to use the mouse of DOOM, each of your toons will be set up also. You just need to change around the icons on your action bar so they are bound the way you like them.
This is just something that works for me. Hope this helps.
which instances should I be running to get geared up for kara? You don't have to spell out what items/bosses etc. Just to get a general idea please. I try the armory, but I get like 3 pages of upgrades. Most of which doesn't apply to me (raids, pvp which I won't be doing yet). It's kind of confusing.
And come to think of it, I don't think that pally tank was protection. He could have used that shield throw thingy if he was. Explains why he was taking damage so fast at times I suppose, and aggro was shifting between pets often. In hindsight, I think I did a decent job in absence of a real tank. In fact when I first came on they asked for a tank or healer. And asked if I could tank. I told them I couldn't tank in mail.
Edited, Dec 21st 2007 3:46pm by thrashering
And come to think of it, I don't think that pally tank was protection. He could have used that shield throw thingy if he was. Explains why he was taking damage so fast at times I suppose, and aggro was shifting between pets often. In hindsight, I think I did a decent job in absence of a real tank. In fact when I first came on they asked for a tank or healer. And asked if I could tank. I told them I couldn't tank in mail.
Edited, Dec 21st 2007 3:46pm by thrashering
33 posts
either chain heal for the pets .... or don't heal them at all -- the person who has the pet should be responsible for keeping them alive (unless they are assigned to off tanking or something)
Kellindross wrote:
Somthing else you might consider to heal faster is to maybe try keybinding abilities/spells to your mouse. Check out this link for a rogue post on what the OP calls "the Mouse of DOOM". Just read the OP, you don't need to scroll down farther.
http://wow.allakhazam.com/db/class.html?wclass=4;mid=1190056079204849580;num=84;page=1
As an enhancement shaman I have bound to my mouse wheel; SS, ES, FS, and purge. That is barely scratching the surface of what the Mouse of DOOM can do. You could easily bind various levels of HW, CH, and LHW to your mouse wheel as well *** totems and have a quicker and more efficient way of casting your spells and abilities. This way all you would have to worry about is clicking on your party members portrait or cycling through them on your keyboard and let your mouse wheel do the rest. No more "clicking" on icons or making sure I hit the right number to cast/attack.
By the way, I do this with my main and all my alts. Once you set up one toon to use the mouse of DOOM, each of your toons will be set up also. You just need to change around the icons on your action bar so they are bound the way you like them.
This is just something that works for me. Hope this helps.
http://wow.allakhazam.com/db/class.html?wclass=4;mid=1190056079204849580;num=84;page=1
As an enhancement shaman I have bound to my mouse wheel; SS, ES, FS, and purge. That is barely scratching the surface of what the Mouse of DOOM can do. You could easily bind various levels of HW, CH, and LHW to your mouse wheel as well *** totems and have a quicker and more efficient way of casting your spells and abilities. This way all you would have to worry about is clicking on your party members portrait or cycling through them on your keyboard and let your mouse wheel do the rest. No more "clicking" on icons or making sure I hit the right number to cast/attack.
By the way, I do this with my main and all my alts. Once you set up one toon to use the mouse of DOOM, each of your toons will be set up also. You just need to change around the icons on your action bar so they are bound the way you like them.
This is just something that works for me. Hope this helps.
This works great for me as well; I have Healing wave as mouse wheel up, lesser as mouse wheel down, shift mouse wheel up as chain heal, etc etc
Also, you can make macro's to mouseover-heal.
For instance:
#showtooltip Chain Heal
/cast [target=mouseover,help,exists] Chain Heal [target=player] Chain Heal
This macro is a freakin lifesaver. I never have to switch targets off tank, to cast any heal I want -- just replace "Chain Heal" with Lesser Healing Wave or Healing Wave.
I downrank some as well to have better mana efficiency.
Edited, Dec 23rd 2007 11:39pm by GWynand
Scholar
21 posts
Here is generally my way of doing things. I'll go as indepth as I can.
This is gonna cover more than just regular healing.
----Pre Battle----
1.) Lay WoA totem, cast Earthshield on the tank.
2.) Lay my usual assortment of Totems, Mana Spring, GoA/WoA, SoE/Earthbind BEFORE the tank aggros. If you are unable to set your totems before the battle, then set 1 in between each large Healing Wave.
3.) Before the tank initiates cast Water shield on myself, and cast a rank 1 Healing Wave on the tank 3 times to stack healing way buff, and hopefully get a lucky crit in for Ancestral Healing.
4.) I usually pop my trinkets here depending on the fight. Beginning is always a good time, as it is the hardest phase for a shaman.
----Battle Starts----
4.) A split second before the tank hits, cast Gift of the Naaru on him. With enough +healing this HoT spell can help quite a bit, especially if you are forced to change targets from the tank to another member. Mine heals for around 3200-3500 depending on how many buffs i have on myself.
5.) Make sure I still have water Shield on myself.
----Tips----
Healers have a hard time in Raids/Pug Groups due to getting blamed for most things. A lot of people do not realize that the tank has a lot to do with your heals also. You have to have a tank that can survive at least 5 hits from a single target. More is obviously better. And you CAN dwindle that number down to 4, depending on how geared your are. But any lower and you can be in big trouble if the tank gets critically hit once or more.
Shamans have the disadvantage of no reliable HoT, so all of our heals are direct meaning we can only do a set amount ever 3/2.5 seconds. If your tank cannot survive 5 hits, you are going to have a very very hard time during that party.
----Battle Again----
6.) Chain Heal/Lesser Healing Wave is what you will use on the party. Chain heal is very mana efficient as long as it hits 2+ allies. If it doesn't , then do not cast it at all. Unless you are very confident that your tank can survive a few hits unhealed, then do not be afraid to cast Healing Wave on an ally, if not Lesser Healing Wave is the only way to go, save for Chain Heal (But again only if it can hit multiple targets). If your tank is getting beat on you most likely do not have the time to cast a 2.5 second heal on a single target.
7.) Make sure i still have water shield on myself.
----Chain Heal (Tank)----
This is what most people do with Chain Heal. Use the Tank as the center, and let it fly. Very useful on pets, and to some extent your allies. Although in reality your teammates should be no where near the tank unless they are melee. If they are near the tank and they are ranged, make sure to tell them to back up. Warlocks/Mages/Shadoe priests have very large threat generation. The further back they are from the mobs, the longer the transition time if the Mob switches targets from the tank to one of your Range Allies. This lets you place a Earthbind totem to help them as quickly as possible.
----Earthbind Totem----
No matter what anyone says, this totem is your #1 friend. Wrath of Air is nice, Searing totem is just plain cool. But nothing does as much for you as this one totem. I suggest you put it in an easy access spot on your menus (Or better yet, hotkey it). While Earth Elemental replaces this totem to some extent as your O @$%^ button, nothing can ever replace a totem that does so much for the party.
If you ever find yourself pulling aggro, first thing you do is set an earthbind totem. Back up about 5-10 Yards depending on how close the mob is to you. Wait for earthbind to take effect, and RIGHT before the mob hits you, rush forward.
Now you might be thinking "what an idiot, don't go towards the mob" but this is the BEST course of action. Why? If you go to far back the mob will go out of the range of earthbind for one. For two, your tank is probably on the OTHER side of that mob, and in a dire situation you always want to run to the tank so he can get the aggro off of you quicker. If your thinking "He will just hit me twice and I am dead". This could be true actually, but on most mobs that can 1 hit you, if your tank loses aggro your entire party is gonna wipe anyways.
Shamans have a great advantage over clothies/Leather, in that we can survive a couple hits. The mob will most likely hit you once, but that Mob WILL have to turn around. That combined with the earthbind will give you enough time to take 1 hit and then get out of melee range before he can hit you again.
Any good Shaman will tell you that this strategy WILL save your life (Alot).
(Just please remember that some Mobs are resistant to Earthbind, so knowledge of the mob really helps.)
----Frost Shock----
You can use frost shock to some extent the same as Earthbind, although I definitely prefer Earthbind. This tactic is called Kite the target. Basically you just keep yourself out of range, and just keep him slowed enough so he cannot get to you.
The problem with this is you have to be facing that mob, and there is only one direction you can go, backwards. If you turn around, you will not be able to cast frost shock anymore because he is not in sight. So after 6 seconds he will be right back on you.
This should only be used in desperation. Always use Earthbind before this, as it is more reliable.
----Battle Continued----
8.) Recheck totems, Totemic Call + Replace the ones if they are about to expire.
----Totemic Call----
Do not EVER let your totems just die out in a fight. Always call them back with Totemic Call right before they expire. This will maximize your Totems, thus increasing your Mana Efficiency.
Mods can help with this a lot.
----Battle----
9.) Make sure I still have water Shield on myself.
10) Look at my Mana, if I fall below 40%, immediately cast Mana Tide Totem (Unless of course you can tell the battle is about to end, then that would be pointless)
----Boss Battles (Heroism)----
Heroism is something I see many Shamans having trouble with. "When should I cast it?" "What if I cast it to soon". In most boss fights there are no "Set" times to cast Heroism, most not all. Bosses such as Shade of Aran in Karazhan do have things you can base Heroism off of, Water Elementals. Others, Prince for Example, has a period of time where he does massive damage, AKA Phase 2. You want to DPS him as quickly as possible during this phase, so casting Heroism is a good idea.
If your boss fight has no real set time, such as the above battles. I usually cast heroism it around 40%.
MAKE SURE YOU WATCH THE THREAT METER WHEN YOU CAST HEROISM. I have seen many a Shaman just throw out Heroism thinking "O hey a nice DPs boost now would be great", not even thinking about their party members and their threat. A 30% increase in Casting speed is A LOT, and will most likely send your top DPSers off of the charts (AKA pull the aggro of your tank thuse wiping your party)
----Ending----
Eh, I wrote this up pretty quickly. So if you have any questions, or if someone sees I left something out, sorry :(.
This is gonna cover more than just regular healing.
----Pre Battle----
1.) Lay WoA totem, cast Earthshield on the tank.
2.) Lay my usual assortment of Totems, Mana Spring, GoA/WoA, SoE/Earthbind BEFORE the tank aggros. If you are unable to set your totems before the battle, then set 1 in between each large Healing Wave.
3.) Before the tank initiates cast Water shield on myself, and cast a rank 1 Healing Wave on the tank 3 times to stack healing way buff, and hopefully get a lucky crit in for Ancestral Healing.
4.) I usually pop my trinkets here depending on the fight. Beginning is always a good time, as it is the hardest phase for a shaman.
----Battle Starts----
4.) A split second before the tank hits, cast Gift of the Naaru on him. With enough +healing this HoT spell can help quite a bit, especially if you are forced to change targets from the tank to another member. Mine heals for around 3200-3500 depending on how many buffs i have on myself.
5.) Make sure I still have water Shield on myself.
----Tips----
Healers have a hard time in Raids/Pug Groups due to getting blamed for most things. A lot of people do not realize that the tank has a lot to do with your heals also. You have to have a tank that can survive at least 5 hits from a single target. More is obviously better. And you CAN dwindle that number down to 4, depending on how geared your are. But any lower and you can be in big trouble if the tank gets critically hit once or more.
Shamans have the disadvantage of no reliable HoT, so all of our heals are direct meaning we can only do a set amount ever 3/2.5 seconds. If your tank cannot survive 5 hits, you are going to have a very very hard time during that party.
----Battle Again----
6.) Chain Heal/Lesser Healing Wave is what you will use on the party. Chain heal is very mana efficient as long as it hits 2+ allies. If it doesn't , then do not cast it at all. Unless you are very confident that your tank can survive a few hits unhealed, then do not be afraid to cast Healing Wave on an ally, if not Lesser Healing Wave is the only way to go, save for Chain Heal (But again only if it can hit multiple targets). If your tank is getting beat on you most likely do not have the time to cast a 2.5 second heal on a single target.
7.) Make sure i still have water shield on myself.
----Chain Heal (Tank)----
This is what most people do with Chain Heal. Use the Tank as the center, and let it fly. Very useful on pets, and to some extent your allies. Although in reality your teammates should be no where near the tank unless they are melee. If they are near the tank and they are ranged, make sure to tell them to back up. Warlocks/Mages/Shadoe priests have very large threat generation. The further back they are from the mobs, the longer the transition time if the Mob switches targets from the tank to one of your Range Allies. This lets you place a Earthbind totem to help them as quickly as possible.
----Earthbind Totem----
No matter what anyone says, this totem is your #1 friend. Wrath of Air is nice, Searing totem is just plain cool. But nothing does as much for you as this one totem. I suggest you put it in an easy access spot on your menus (Or better yet, hotkey it). While Earth Elemental replaces this totem to some extent as your O @$%^ button, nothing can ever replace a totem that does so much for the party.
If you ever find yourself pulling aggro, first thing you do is set an earthbind totem. Back up about 5-10 Yards depending on how close the mob is to you. Wait for earthbind to take effect, and RIGHT before the mob hits you, rush forward.
Now you might be thinking "what an idiot, don't go towards the mob" but this is the BEST course of action. Why? If you go to far back the mob will go out of the range of earthbind for one. For two, your tank is probably on the OTHER side of that mob, and in a dire situation you always want to run to the tank so he can get the aggro off of you quicker. If your thinking "He will just hit me twice and I am dead". This could be true actually, but on most mobs that can 1 hit you, if your tank loses aggro your entire party is gonna wipe anyways.
Shamans have a great advantage over clothies/Leather, in that we can survive a couple hits. The mob will most likely hit you once, but that Mob WILL have to turn around. That combined with the earthbind will give you enough time to take 1 hit and then get out of melee range before he can hit you again.
Any good Shaman will tell you that this strategy WILL save your life (Alot).
(Just please remember that some Mobs are resistant to Earthbind, so knowledge of the mob really helps.)
----Frost Shock----
You can use frost shock to some extent the same as Earthbind, although I definitely prefer Earthbind. This tactic is called Kite the target. Basically you just keep yourself out of range, and just keep him slowed enough so he cannot get to you.
The problem with this is you have to be facing that mob, and there is only one direction you can go, backwards. If you turn around, you will not be able to cast frost shock anymore because he is not in sight. So after 6 seconds he will be right back on you.
This should only be used in desperation. Always use Earthbind before this, as it is more reliable.
----Battle Continued----
8.) Recheck totems, Totemic Call + Replace the ones if they are about to expire.
----Totemic Call----
Do not EVER let your totems just die out in a fight. Always call them back with Totemic Call right before they expire. This will maximize your Totems, thus increasing your Mana Efficiency.
Mods can help with this a lot.
----Battle----
9.) Make sure I still have water Shield on myself.
10) Look at my Mana, if I fall below 40%, immediately cast Mana Tide Totem (Unless of course you can tell the battle is about to end, then that would be pointless)
----Boss Battles (Heroism)----
Heroism is something I see many Shamans having trouble with. "When should I cast it?" "What if I cast it to soon". In most boss fights there are no "Set" times to cast Heroism, most not all. Bosses such as Shade of Aran in Karazhan do have things you can base Heroism off of, Water Elementals. Others, Prince for Example, has a period of time where he does massive damage, AKA Phase 2. You want to DPS him as quickly as possible during this phase, so casting Heroism is a good idea.
If your boss fight has no real set time, such as the above battles. I usually cast heroism it around 40%.
MAKE SURE YOU WATCH THE THREAT METER WHEN YOU CAST HEROISM. I have seen many a Shaman just throw out Heroism thinking "O hey a nice DPs boost now would be great", not even thinking about their party members and their threat. A 30% increase in Casting speed is A LOT, and will most likely send your top DPSers off of the charts (AKA pull the aggro of your tank thuse wiping your party)
----Ending----
Eh, I wrote this up pretty quickly. So if you have any questions, or if someone sees I left something out, sorry :(.
Recent Visitors: 126
All times are in CST
Anonymous Guests (126)
- Forums
- World of Warcraft
- Class Discussion
- healing advice
© 2024 Fanbyte LLC