III. Talent Specs
These are the main healing specs for raiding: 8-0-53 (recommended for new content) or 0-12-49 (recommended for farm content, mobility, DPS). You can also spec 0-5-56 and 0-0-61 but they are not recommended.
0-12-49
You get the ability to cast ghost wolf instantly, plus the improved strength and agility totems to boost the DPS done by Hunters (BM) and feral druids. It will give a group an extra 11.5 agility and an extra 12.9 strength. Cheeky's spreadsheet in the Hunter thread can allow your to calculate exactly how much the group's DPS would increase but if your hunters are doing around 1000 DPS, the improved strength and agility totems would boost the DPS of each hunter by about 10 DPS. A feral druid might gain 15-20 DPS. So if the group's DPS increases by 50 DPS, over a 10-minute fight they would do an extra 30,000 damage. The spec sacrifices nothing in healing. What you lose is survivability (by giving up Nature's Guardian and Elemental Warding). However, if that's not an issue, extra DPS never hurts.
Here's a sample of the
0-12-49 spec 8-0-53
This spec is the best for raiding, especially when you are first learning an encounter. The build is designed to reduce the damage taken by fire, frost and nature by 10% while maintaining all the core healing talents. Shaman put 5 points in Concussion and 3 in Elemental Warding.
Many bosses in SSC, Black Temple and Mount Hyjal do quite a bit of elemental damage to the raid. And let's not forget all the elemental damage in Kara. The less damage you take, the less time and mana you have to spend healing yourself. This also boosts your ability to survive.
Here is a sample of the
8-0-53 spec If you want both Elemental Warding and instant Ghost Wolf here's a
8-7-46 spec If you want both Nature's Guardian and instant Ghost Wolf you can try
0-7-54 0-5-56
This is a very common spec but it’s not the strongest use of talent points.
Five points in Ancestral Knowledge boosts your mana pool by 5%. It sounds like a lot but a closer look shows you get a poor return on the points spent. The extra mana will probably be only enough to cast one extra chain heal.
Existing mana pool: 10,000
+5%: 10,500
Boost to mana tide: 120/5 minutes = 2 mp5
The smaller your mana pool, the less benefit you receive. A shaman with 8,000 mana gains an extra 400 mana and only 1.67 mp5 through Mana Tide.
Here is a sample of the
0-5-56 spec 0-0-61
This spec allows you to pick up nearly every talent in the resto tree. However, 8-0-53 is still the best choice.
If you raid and PVP, you could try 8-7-46.
Here's a sample You don't have the talent to reduce threat from healing by 15% so be careful at the start of a fight or during transitions if the boss drops aggro. Also, this is not a pure PVP spec. If you want to get a high arena rating, there are probably better ways to spend your talent points.
So is there ever a reason to spec 0-5-56 or 0-0-61?
Yes, when you're raiding zones that have no raid-wide fire, frost or nature damage. The zone should also have no reason for you to need to move quickly outdoors.