One thing I’ve always loved about Grid is that I can set up my frames to change to – OH-GOD-LOOK-AT-ME-I’M-BRIGHT-PINK – pink when someone has a nasty debuff. The rapid colour change to something bright and obvious immediately prompts me to bomb them with heals, run away from them, run to them, etc etc.


But with the release of TOC, it seemed that most (if not all) of the custom debuffs weren’t working. This was especially annoying for debuffs such as Jaraxxus’ Incinerate Flesh, which absolutely must be healed through to remove it, or the raid will take massive damage. If you can’t spot the person with the debuff, you lose precious seconds. Boss mods will announce their name, but having to scour through 10 or 25 people to find them (particularly bad in PuGs where you don’t know people’s names and classes) makes things very difficult. PLUS, if you can’t see the debuff drop off (either through being removed properly, or cloaked, iceblocked, etc), you’ll likely throw out 2 or 3 completely wasted heals to a target that no longer has the debuff. I know, because I did.


If you’re a Grid user and you haven’t tried GridStatusRaidDebuffs before, I really can’t recommend it highly enough. The reason I didn’t use it before was because I preferred to just set up my own custom debuffs; but the fact that TOC debuffs didn’t work, coupled with the fact that there seem to be more and more debuffs that I need to be aware of, pushed me to give it a try.


The one major problem for me though was icon placement. The icon needs to be large enough to see easily (since there are often 2 or 3 major debuffs in a fight and you need to be able to see which one your target has), but NOT obscure your frame information. And that’s exactly the problem I had: the icon was great, but it was sitting right over the top of my Lifebloom text, and obscuring the health bar. Bad.


To get around this, grab a module named GridIndicatorSideIcons – so you can place your icons at the side of your frame, not in the middle.





As you can see, the icon is clear, but it doesn’t obscure my HoT counters, texts, health, or any other information.


Perfect!



How to copy it:


1. Grab GridStatusRaidDebuffs here (Curse).

2. Grab GridIndicatorSideIcons here (WowAce).

3. Under Frame > Icon (Sides) > Left Icon, scroll down and check the box “Raid Debuff” (this will make sure that the GridStatusRaidDebuffs are placed on the left side).





4. To adjust the size and positioning, go to Frame > Advanced > Icon (Sides) and use the slider bars to resize and nudge the icon into the position that you want.





Note: if the icon is still showing in the middle of the frame, you may also need to go to Frame > Center Icon and uncheck Raid Debuff, and Status > Raid Debuff and uncheck “center icon”. Make sure the “enable” box is checked.


Your raid debuffs should be a lot easier to track, without obscuring your HoT counters or other information – it should make life a lot easier!

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Meta gems

In my mind, there are two standout choices for meta gems, the Ember Skyflare Diamond (ESD) and the Insightful Earthsiege Diamond (IED). Of those two, the IED is almost always the better choice, despite what people will tell you.

Here’s why.


Why the Ember Skyflare is hardly ever right

I’m bound to start some fights with this one, but it’s a genuine problem that I see all over the place, and very few people understand the mistake they are making. That’s not saying they’re dumb or “noobs” or anything – if nobody explained it to you, it’s quite logical to consider the ESD to be the best because it has our favourite stat – spell power.


I certainly don’t consider myself an expert on every facet of druidism; I learn new things all the time, and I’m constantly looking for ways to improve. So if you’re using the Skyflare – please don’t take this as a criticism – I would just like to make sure people are open to all of the information and don’t simply adopt a choice because it seems logical.

The catchcry of the diehard ESD fan goes like this:

I never have any mana problems, so why would I want a mana restore meta?


Makes perfect sense, right? Remember, too much regen is a waste – so if you have all the regen you need, why pick up a meta gem that gives you even more mana back? That would be a waste – might as well pick up a small amount of spellpower instead.

Wrong!

So what’s the problem with the above statement? Nothing, if it’s true. The problem though is that most people say “I never have mana problems” but when you look at their Armory – often they are wearing double mana regen trinkets. Some even admit to using mp5 flasks or regen food. You can’t really claim to “never” have mana problems if you are still using regen trinkets – or you wouldn’t be using those regen trinkets at all – you’d have swapped them out for throughput (spell power) trinkets long ago.




This is not a criticism of people who use pure regen trinkets. I just want to try to explain to people that the reason that you perceive yourself to be immune to mana troubles is due in part to the fact that you have those mana trinkets.


That’s not a bad thing. If you’re still using regen trinkets, I assume it’s because you believe you need them for adequate longevity in a fight. So you do need regen – it’s just a case of adjusting our thinking to make sure we’re getting it in the most efficient way. If you team regen trinkets and consumables up with the ESD and justify the spell power meta by saying you “never have mana problems”, then that’s not really true.

Follow me?



Expanding on metas and trinkets a little

It’s all about trade-offs.

The ESD gives you +25 spell power and +2% Intellect.

The IED gives you +21 Intellect and a chance to restore 600 mana on spellcast. This has no internal cooldown, and due to resto druids’ ever-casting style, can be equal to anywhere from 40mp5 to 100mp5, depending on the fight.

For druids with around 1000 Intellect, the Intellect on these two diamonds basically cancel (although the ESD will scale slightly). So let’s discard that and focus purely on the ESD’s spell power and the IED’s mana return.

So you’re effectively weighing 25 spellpower against 40-100mp5 (let’s say 60mp5 average). This is key.

I found some examples of people at Elitist Jerks who are better at explaining than I am!



Trismegistus:
I think the point here is the stats that are available in slot. The two major sources of MP5 are Meta and Trinket.


Let’s compare the four stats on these two gems.


[Insightful Earthsiege Diamond] – +21 Int and [assumed] 75MP5
[Ember Skyflare Diamond] – +25 Spell Power and [assumed 1000 Int] +20Int


If we look at the available trinkets, they offer significantly more Spell Power than this meta, but the MP5 is much lower. It is therefore better to sacrifice the Spell Power from the Meta slot and use it for MP5 because it is the best slot on the entire gear sheet for that stat.

Boevis:
The proc is actually 5% chance to restore 600 mana which works out to be 100 mp5 if you cast every 1.5 seconds, 75 mp5 casting every 2 seconds, or 50 mp5 casting every 3 seconds.


Considering the HoT nature of druids (and the everpresent haste on gear) it’s going to trend toward the upper values. In comparison, 25 spell power is fairly weak when you take into account what trinkets you could swap out, 100 spell power trinkets are easy to find ([Darkmoon Card: Illusion]) and the best ones easily exceed 100 [Illustration of the Dragon Soul], while the best mana regen trinkets are likely [Soul of the Dead] or one of the 3 high Spirit ones.

Bregalad:
if I trade off ember skyflare for IED, I’m getting 70+ mp5 at a cost of only 25 spellpower (the int roughly cancels for most trees). There is no place on your gear where you can get a 50+ mp5 effective result that only costs you 25 spellpower. It’s only on special procs for trinkets/rings etc. that it even gets as close as my example. On regular gear, you typically give up almost 3 spellpower to get 1Mp5. That’s a tradeoff you generally don’t want to make unless you already have IED and regen trinkets and *still* can run out of mana on hard fights.


IED is the most efficient tradeoff, so it’s the first thing you should do in the regen department.

(Note: since these comments were posted, new items have come into the game and there are better trinkets available – but the underlying principle remains the same – particularly if you’re not raiding hard modes and TOC25, for example)


So in short, the IED is better “value” because you’re getting ~60mp5 for a trade of 25 spell power, which is something you can’t get in any other slot. Provided, of course, that you still have a need for more regen. If you are gearing straight spell power, have spell power trinkets, and still find you are comfortable with your mana, then opt for the ESD.


If you’re using the ESD and you still have pure regen trinkets, that’s not an efficient trade. You would be better having the mana restore meta and spell power trinket than a (weaker) spell power meta and (weaker) mana regen trinkets. Even better, grab one of the yummy +Spell Power/+regen trinkets out there.



Better options than ESD + regen trinkets


If you’re still using pure regen trinkets for everyday encounters, but you’ve opted for the ESD, it makes more sense to change to the IED and replace your trinket/s with throughput (spell power). Obviously, some hard mode encounters may demand more regen, so you might swap gear around and put in a regen trinket – there are special cases. Plenty of people keep particular trinkets on hand for hard modes. But if your standard gear for your standard weekly raiding includes pure regen trinkets and the ESD, you should consider swapping in the IED and a throughput trinket.

If you find you have plenty of regen and you want to dump some of it, you should leave the IED til last – because it is simply the best value, the best bang for your buck. Swap out regen trinket firsts, and DEFINITELY stop using regen flasks and food.

Here are a few of the spellpower trinkets available:



• Embrace of the Spider (Naxx 10)

• The Egg of Mortal Essence (40 x Emblem of Heroism)
• Darkmoon Card: Illusion (crafted)
• Forethought Talisman (Naxx 25)
• Titan-Forged rune of Audacity (25 x Wintergrasp Mark of Honor)
• Scale of Fates (Ulduar 25)
• Illustration of the Dragon Soul (Sartharion 25)


Or, even better, go for a balance of spell power and regen:



• Je’Tze’s Bell (world BOE drop)
• Sif’s Remembrance (Thorim 10 Hard)
• Show of Faith (Yogg 25 Hard)
• Solace of the Defeated and Solace of the Fallen (Trial of the Crusader 25)


To have a look at all of your trinket options, try a Wowhead filter: http://www.wowhead.com/?items=4.-4&filter=minrl=80;maxrl=80


Once your normal gear and your usual content dictates that you don’t need regen trinkets, gems, consumables etc – feel free to swap to the ESD. Just make sure the IED is the last thing you ditch – because it really is the best value for regen.

If you need regen – the IED should be your first port of call.

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Lately I’ve noticed a lot of questions on the druid forums, plus a little general confusion surrounding gems choices. The topic of “how to gem” is something that has been done many times, almost to death, really – but it’s one of those fundamental topics that people will always ask about, because (as with my article on stats) there will always be new druids on the scene who want to know how best to gear themselves.


This won’t be an all-encompassing article on every option available to us; rather, it will be a quick rundown of which gems are best for each socket colour, when to gem for socket bonuses, and which meta gems to use (in part 2).

By all means you can experiment with your own gemming, but these are widely accepted as the best choice for resto druids.




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How to gem

I’m going to quote another druid here – Ikagawa of Uther, because he said it perfectly:

Everything should be straight SP except for a few caveats.


1. If you need more regen, then use SP/Spi or SP/Int hybrids.
2. If you have a nice socket bonus, use a hybrid gem to activate it.
3. If you need to activate a meta, use hybrid gems to activate it.

If you follow this advice, you can’t go far wrong. Spellpower gems are your first choice, even in non-red sockets. Then, if you need more regen, if a socket bonus is particularly good (usually 5+ spellpower), or if your meta gem calls for different colours, use the hybrid (orange and purple) gems (orange gems count as both a yellow and a red gem, purple gems count as both a blue and a red gem).


It’s that simple – prioritise spellpower gems in all sockets, UNLESS:



• you need more regen

• you need to match a good bonus
• you need to activate a meta gem



Easy!




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Matching socket colours


If you need to match socket colours, here are the gems to use for each socket type:



Type	Red	Yellow	Blue
JC only	Runed Dragon’s Eye +39 Spell Power	-	-
Epic	Runed Cardinal Ruby +23 Spell Power	Luminous Ametrine +12 Spell Power, +10 Intellect	Purified Dreadstone +12 Spell Power, +10 Spirit
Rare	Runed Scarlet Ruby +19 Spell Power	Luminous Monarch Topaz +9 Spell Power, +8 Intellect	Purified Twilight Opal +9 Spell Power, +8 Spirit
Perfect	Perfect Runed Bloodstone +16 Spell Power	Perfect Luminous Huge Citrine +8 Spell Power, +7 Intellect	Perfect Purified Shadow Crystal +8 Spell Power, +7 Spirit
Uncommon	Runed Bloodstone +14 Spell Power	Luminous Huge Citrine +7 Spell Power, +6 Intellect	Purified Shadow Crystal +7 Spell Power, +6 Spirit


As mentioned above, these are simply the “standard” gem choices, and are generally considered the best gems for resto druids.

I suggest Druid Heal’s section on gems if you are looking for further options.


In Part 2 I will examine meta gems, and the common mistake people make with them.

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Berinna is currently levelling to 80 and asked:

What stats do resto druids look for?


This is a very common question – but it bears revisiting because there are always new druids out there, wanting to know what stats they should aim for. There are a number of great blogs and resources to help, and I’ll link some of them through this post and at the end. Here are my thoughts on what you should aim for.



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The super basic rule of thumb

Make sure you have enough regen so that you don’t go OOM, enough haste to be at or near the softcap, then wallow around in spellpower like a pig in muck.





At the most basic level, this is what you need to know. You need enough regen to be able to get through your current encounters without going OOM (and rendering yourself useless to the raid), enough haste to suit your role and your group size (more on this later), and then you can start piling on more spellpower for more healing throughput (more spellpower will give you bigger direct heals, and larger HoT ticks).


Here’s how I look at stats and what to grab:

1. Am I struggling for mana? If so, swap in some more hybrid gems (Spellpower/Int and Spellpower/Spi), grab regen trinkets, use a mana restore meta gem, etc. As a last resort, use regen consumables.

2. Do I have adequate haste from gear? If not, consider talents, a haste to cloak enchant, and examine gear that you have access to that has more haste. As a last resort I would use haste consumables or hybrid haste gems.
3. If yes to both of the above – start stacking spellpower (including regemming to pure spellpower if appropriate).




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My personal stat preference

My personal stat preference goes like this (your mileage may vary):




Although, at the moment, you might notice that my haste is very low – so I might temporarily prioritise haste over spellpower. Once I’m satisfied with my haste, I can go back to prioritising spellpower.




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The nitty gritty

Regen

Enough regen is enough.


People often ask, “How much regen do I need for (raid dungeon)?” and they’re usually chasing a static number – XYZ unbuffed or XYZ raid buffed.

I’ll be perfectly honest – I wouldn’t have a clue what my current regen stats are without looking. I could probably tell you that my Int and Spirit are about ~1000, but my in-combat regen – no idea. Because it’s not really about a number; it’s about whether you have enough regen for what you are doing.

I realise it’s a little frustrating to ask “how much do I need” and get an answer that amounts to, “you need as much as you need”. Duh! Just give me a number to aim for!

Really though, there are so many factors that will determine how much you need:



• Raid size, difficulty, and damage – how hard are you going to have to heal?

• Raid make up – do you have replenishment? Wisdom?
• Talents – eg, do you have Revitalize?
• Number of healers
• Your assignment
• Your gear level
• Your tank/healing targets’ gear level
• Your items – eg, do you have proc/use items that grant mana or reduce the cost of your spells? This includes trinkets, idols, cloak enchant, meta gems, etc.
• Do you save your innervate for yourself, or do you have a mana-hungry hunter whining at you every 5 minutes on vent? (not mentioning any names..)


..and so on. It’s difficult to assign a number because there are too many things that will vary from person to person. Instead, you’ll need to experiment to find your own comfort levels. Basically – the answer to “How much regen do I need” is “enough to get through the fight”. It’s vague, but true.

Oh, and it’s worth mentioning something that should be common sense but is often overlooked: too much regen is a waste. If you have mana regen coming out of your ears, and you are finishing encounters with 3/4 mana, your regen is too high, and you could afford to lose some and boost your spellpower instead. Many healers like to have insane regen as some kind of “just-in-case” buffer – so they never have to worrry about mana, ever – but if you take it to the extreme, you’re really doing yourself a disservice and sacrificing throughput for a safety net that is probably rarely needed.

Don’t stack nutty regen, there’s no need to finish fights at 3/4 mana.



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Haste

Haste varies, especially according to who is in your group. Many people aim for ~350 to 400ish to be comfortable.

Haste is another stat that depends heavily on your talents and especially on your group size and composition. Another vague answer for you, I’m afraid – but in this case we can calculate various levels of haste needed, taking into account your talents and the raid’s make up. Phew!

Haste affects our healing in two ways:

1. by reducing the cast time on our direct heals, allowing us to cast our big heals faster; and

2. by reducing our GCD, allowing us to cast more instant spells within a particular period of time, without twiddling our thumbs waiting for the GCD to be up.

So by increasing our haste, we can fire off our direct heals faster (great for saving the day!), and as raid healers we can toss out more instant heals and cover more of the raid.




The amount of haste that you need will mostly depend on your spec, your group size, and group composition.



• Spec: Talents such as Gift of the Earth Mother (GotEM) and Celestial Focus give you passive bonuses to increase your haste and reduce your GCD. If you have GotEM and Celestial Focus, you will need less haste than someone who does not take these talents.
  

  • Note 1: Nature’s Grace also gives you temporary bursts of haste after you crit, but it is not a passive bonus with 100% uptime, and will depend heavily on how much direct healing you do.

  • Note 2: Opinion is divided on whether resto druids should take CF; I’ve merely included it as an option.
• Group composition: Who you have in your raid will impact on your haste:
  

  • Retribution Paladins have an aura that gives 3% haste
    (Swift Retribution).

  • Moonkin Druids have an aura that gives 3% haste
    (Improved Moonkin Form).

  • Shamans can provide a totem that gives 5% haste
    (Wrath of Air Totem).

  Note: The haste bonuses from Swift Retribution and Improved Moonkin do not stack.
  
If you can usually rely on having these buffs in your group, then you can afford to have less haste on your gear. For this reason, it is usually easier if you are running 25 man raids, because there’s a good chance you will have these three people in your raid; there’s less chance in a 10 man group. So if you are primarily running 10 man raids, you may need to consider higher unbuffed haste to compensate for not having those classes at the ready.


If you would like to calculate your haste requirements to reach a 1.0s GCD, with or without talents and buffs, here’s a nifty calculator.




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Spellpower

Spellpower is the bread and butter of the resto druid.

There’s really not much to say, here; spellpower makes our heals land for more, and our HoT ticks larger. This increases our HPS (heals per second) because we’re able to heal for more over the same period of time. And, importantly, it means that your heals will land for more, but for the same mana cost.

When you have enough regen and haste to be comfortable, it’s time to build on your spellpower.




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Intellect and Spirit

Although they are valuable, there’s no need to “stack” these stats.


Intellect:

• gives us a bigger mana pool

• increases our regen
• increases our chance to crit
• gives greater returns from Replenishment and meta gems
• scales with buffs

Spirit:

• increases our spellpower through ToL

• increases our regen
• scales with talents (eg Living Spirit)
• scales with buffs
• Note: Innervate no longer scales with spirit; there is no need to “stack” spirit for bigger innervates.

Most of your gear will come with intellect and spirit on it (some may come with mp5). You should accrue enough and shouldn’t need to “stack” them by using pure intellect or pure spirit gems. Basically: they are valuable stats, but you will get enough just by picking up normal gear, and you shouldn’t have to worry about them too much.

If you want to supplement your intellect and spirit a little, you can use hybrid (orange/purple) gems, but you shouldn’t gem with pure intellect or pure spirit gems. You should get plenty of intellect and spirit from your gear.



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Mp5

Mp5 is good, but not as good as spirit.

Mp5 isn’t a bad stat to take, but spirit scales with raid buffs and our Living Spirit talent, and boosts our healing in Tree form. Mp5 only increases your Mp5, and is not affected by buffs such as Blessing of Kings. Mp5 is also usually more expensive in terms of stat allocation on gear (so you’re often losing out on other stats in exchange for high values of mp5).

I wouldn’t actively stack either stat, nor would I shun Mp5 entirely, but I would generally prefer to take spirit over Mp5.




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Crit

Crit is marginally better than it used to be, but still at the bottom of the list.

Crit benefits our direct healing spells, and can also affect Rejuv ticks if you have 4pc Tier 9. However, it is generally regarded as a sub-par resto druid stat because the majority of our healing does not come from direct healing, and larger Rejuv ticks can often simply go to overheal.

Some people choose to stack crit, particularly if they are assigned to healing tanks; but we already have a decent amount of crit on Nourish and Regrowth through talents, and you’ll likely pick up a fair amount of crit from gear, without trying.



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Resources and further reading

If you’d like to read more about stats and how druids value them, here are a few sites that may help – particularly for haste and crit.


Elitist Jerks
Falling Leaves & Wings
Earth Shields & HoTs
Nerf this Druid
Druid Heal
Restoration Druid

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A couple of days ago, Turpster posted a video on WoW.com explaining how to do the Argent Tournament jousting quests.

Ever so slightly annoying is the fact that I had actually planned to update my jousting for beginners guide, and make a video of it – just a day before he posted his. Darn it. So now I look like I’m riding around on his coattails.

But I don’t care, I’m gonna do it anyway!

Not exactly as polished as his, though

My small criticism of Turpster’s video is that while it does go through each of the abilities and explains what they do and how they all tie in together, it doesn’t really show you how to move around while you joust – there’s a bit too much close up melee mashing, and the inset Turpster screen often obscures your view of what’s going on. I think being zoomed in to almost first person mode doesn’t really help you get an idea of what is happening. Basically, what he’s telling you to do and what you’re seeing on the screen don’t match up very clearly.

I wanted to show the method that I think the majority of people use, showing the positioning and movement (zoomed out), plus give a few tips that I have picked up from others.





Three methods for three skill levels

There are probably a number of ways to do this, but here are three methods catering to various skill and experience levels.

Note: For all methods, you need to begin by facing the center of the ring.


Method 1 – for absolute beginners
(or for those who just can’t seem to win!)
1. Get 3 stacks of Defend up.
2. Talk to the NPC.
3. As he runs away, throw a Shield-Breaker, and then run towards him to close range (or he will charge you). If he took off any of your Defends, reapply.
4. When you are in melee range, spam Thrust.
5. Whenever the NPC runs away, throw a Shield-Breaker and then follow him to get back in range and to stop him from charging you.
6. Get back into melee range and continue to spam Thrust.

This method can be summed up as “never let the NPC get range on you to charge or shield-break, and slowly whittle them down with melee attacks.”

It’s slow, but it is pretty much guaranteed to get you through the quest in once piece.


Method 2 – Intermediate (the common method)
1. Get 3 stacks of Defend up.
2. Talk to the NPC.
3. As he runs away, spam Charge until it goes off.
4. Swing around in an arc, and throw Shield-Breaker as you move back around to melee range.
5. Get back into melee range and spam Thrust.
6. Whenever the NPC walks away from you, back up and spam Charge until it goes off, then repeat steps 4 and 5.

The basic idea here is that anytime the NPC walks away, you want to Charge and Shield-Break them to remove stacks of their defend. Charge also does bonus damage. Then once his shields are down, you can spam Thrust as much as you can until he walks away again.

Optional: some people prefer to begin by throwing a shield breaker and THEN charge the NPC. This will nett you more damage, because you’re removing one Defend with Shield-Breaker before you charge, which then makes your Charge do more damage. So this is a good way to do it.

However, I don’t do it this way because of my high latency – I can’t time a shield breaker AND a charge before the NPC decides to charge me instead. On the other hand, it is extremely easy to mash my Charge button, then shield break afterwards. It is still a very effective method, and you’re only missing out on a small amount of damage at the very start.

If you have high latency, or you’re not so great with keybindings, charge+shieldbreak is probably going to be easier for you than shieldbreak+charge, and it won’t make a huge difference.


Method 3 – Advanced (very fast method)
1. Get 3 stacks of Defend up.
2. Stand behind the NPC to talk to him.
3. As soon as you have hit “I am ready to fight”, hit Thrust.
4. Back up a few steps as the NPC runs away, throw a Shield-Breaker, and then Charge.
5. As you charge, hit Thrust again, to do additional damage on the way past.
6. Swing around in an arc, and throw Shield-Breaker as you move back around to melee range.
7. Get back into melee range and spam Thrust.
8. When your Charge cooldown is almost ready, run away from the NPC, then do a 180 degree jump-turn, and Charge him. Hit Shield-Breaker on the way back around, as above. Get back into melee range, spam Thrust, and repeat this step.



Remember to try to keep your stacks of Defend up as much as you can. One mistake Turpster makes is that he says you should “mash” your Defend button – don’t do this. It will put your Charge and Shield-Breaker abilities on cooldown. If the NPC removes one or more of your charges of Defend, reapply – but don’t mash this button otherwise, there’s no need.

I’ve made a very quick and dirty video showing how to charge/shield break at the start, as well as jump-turning and charging. It’s not as shiny and pretty as Turpster’s, but it shows the basics, I think. Try to ignore the pet birds in the background, and be gentle about my blatant keyboard turning in some parts (I actually use a weird hybrid method of half keyboard, half mouse turning).





Another excellent video can be found here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jIE8RiFqpSI&NR=1.
It’s nice and clear, easy to see exactly what the player is doing, and he steps you through everything.

And another:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_hSCvj6uBsY
This one is in slow-motion to show you exactly what to do, and shows you the jump turns also.

The above two videos put my little one to shame.. but I made mine to help people who have problems with charging and moving around. When I was first learning, I was frustrated by how wide the turning circle of my mount was – which usually caused me to have my Defends taken off, and I would take a lot of damage. I didn’t realise I could use this sweeping circle to my advantage to hit the NPC with Shield-Breaker on the way back (something that I hadn’t tried until blog commenters mentioned it). It’s something that beginners may like to graduate too after using the “safe” method.

It’s a very amateur clip – but hopefully it helps someone




If you have other tips – feel free to comment and I will add them in.

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• Resto guide – now with Wowhead links!
• Resto druid guide up!

Disclaimer: this writeup comes from experimenting with Grid and Healbot earlier this year (up to about March). If there have been improvements since then, they will not have been included in this post. If you know of a particular improvement that has since implemented, please let me know and I will edit in a comment to reflect the change. For example, if I say that Grid doesn’t let you put your tanks together, and you know that there has been a change or a new module to change this, let me know and I’ll include it.

However, with the many features constantly being added and improved upon, it would be too much work for me to keep updating the post as each addon evolves. Much like my “How to get 50 mounts before WotLK” it will be fairly static; it won’t be a dynamic, evolving “guide”, but a comparison of the addons in their current forms.

(This is basically to prevent comments in 3 months’ time telling me I’m wrong because Grid CAN do XYZ and Healbot CAN do XYZ… which I bet will still happen!)

Also, once again – these are my personal opinions of the various features and drawbacks of each addon. I have endeavoured to be as fair and objective as possible. Please do not take any negative criticisms against your preferred addon as an insult to you and your choice! Any nasty comments will be deleted. Feel free to disagree – but be constructive, please.

Also, I’m going to have to say it before I hit post: Yes, I do know about VuhDo and I may give it a try sometime – I just haven’t had time to have a look.






So – in the category of:

“Out of the box” functionality
WINNER: Healbot

Out of the box functionality – meaning how quickly after installing the mod you can jump into healing with it – is a huge factor for many people when deciding between different addons. Many people are happy to spend hours tweaking their UI to be perfect, but others prefer to hit the ground running with addons that are ready to go as soon as they are installed. You can have the most super awesome mod in the universe, but if the default looks terrible and it’s difficult to set up, then many people will steer clear.

It’s very cut and dried between the two addons in this case: for a healer, Grid has limited functionality out of the box – at the very least you will need to change the size of the boxes to be able to fit names properly and see health information. Fine for DPS/cleansing classes, but not good for healers. In fact, I think the addon would benefit greatly if the author was to add a couple of pre-packaged layout frameworks, one for DPS (similar to the current default) and one for healers, with the bar-like format that many healers prefer. This would make it much easier for healers to use “out of the box”, and prevent a lot of people from being scared off by Grid’s overwhelming customisation options.





On the other hand, Healbot comes out of the box looking pretty darn shiny; and while there are a bunch of things that I personally would want to adjust to suit my own personal style (can’t stand the way it fades bars – I only like faded bars for people who are out of range), I could easily use Healbot in its default state and do a respectable job. I wouldn’t be able to do the same with Grid in its default state.








Customisation
WINNER: Grid

Grid wins in this category, but not by as great a margin as most diehard Grid users might think.

Grid does have options that Healbot doesn’t, for example corner dot indicators, extra icons, extra texts, and of course the flexibility to change the placement, size and colours of each. Healbot really has everything you need to build a good frame display, it’s just that Grid goes further and gives you many more options so that you can truly customise the display to suit your own personal taste.

However, for many of these options, you will need to install additional Grid modules. While this makes for a far more customisable set of frames, the downside to this, obviously, is the need to find and install the modules you need, and keep them updated. As Healbot’s options are all built-in, you only ever have to keep one addon up to date to have them working.





The big benefit here is that if you have some kind of catastrophic UI failure (we’ve all been there), you’re more likely to be able to get back on the horse as a Healbot user, because you won’t have to spend time doing the simple things like changing the size of the bars to make the raid’s names visible. From running with Healbot users and listening to them, there seem to be a few random minor problems with the addon, whereas Grid seems to be more stable on a daily basis; but if you lost everything, it’s going to be much easier to recover Healbot than to recover Grid, particularly if you rely on a lot of the additional modules.

Basically, Grid gives you tonnes of display flexibility in exchange for a bit of hassle setting it up and keeping it running. Healbot gives you all of the basic things you need to see – health, buffs & debuffs, heals, HoTs, and so on – and you can customise these to a point – but you don’t get all of the extra bells and whistles that Grid gives you.

But Healbot has definitely come a long way and is surprisingly customisable. I think a lot of die-hard Grid fans would be shocked at what you can do with Healbot – it’s definitely not the clunky, boxy, rigid set of frames that I expected.





Navigation and ease of use
WINNER: Healbot

Ease of use ties in with the previous category, logically. Grid’s extensive customisation options mean you also have to navigate…. extensive menus. Depending on what you prefer, of course, I found Healbot’s tabbed windows to be much easier to navigate than Grid’s drop-down style. But then, I think this is due in part to the fact that some of Grid’s options (to me) seem to be put into the wrong categories, and I often wish I could get in there and rearrange things a little.

Once you’ve been using Grid for a while, you’ll know where to find each option in the menus; but even as a seasoned user, I still often find myself getting a little lost in the long list of options in each section. With so many options to customise, it’s only natural that there are lots of boxes to check and fields to fill in, but I do think that Grid’s menus may need a bit of a tidy up so they are less overwhelming. I’d love to see give tabbed menus a try. Whether or not they would be just as overwhelming if they tried to cover the same options, I’m not sure; but surely a whole tab devoted to say, HoTs, would be a nice logical way to customise your frames.





Aesthetics
WINNER: Grid

I feel that Grid wins this category because it just gives you so many more options to customise the look of your frames, meaning that you can have a really slick looking setup according to your tastes.

BUT Healbot has come a long way, and does have quite a few customisation options. It has a couple of options that Grid doesn’t: the ability to display your frames in a single column (old-school style on the left or right of your screen), and the ability to show health bars as green progressing through to red according to health deficit, as a slow colour change. Grid allows you to set thresholds for the health bar to change colour and warn you (eg 85% or below = yellow, 50% or below = red) but many Healbot users enjoy that gradual colour change.

Overall though, Grid just has more bells and whistles, more options to change fonts, colours, icons, indicators, and other layout elements, making it more flexible and giving it the potential to be as attractive as you want to make it.





Information display
WINNER: Grid

Both mods display their information nicely, but I think Grid edges ahead, both because of it’s level of customisation, and because it has the ability to present more information in the same space.

Grid can show various triggers as:

- frame colour
- border colour
- corner indicator (and with extra modules, extra indicators on the sides and more in the corners)
- icons (and with extra modules, extra corner icons and side icons)
- texts (up to 3 texts, I believe)

It also has a better custom debuff system but I will go into that later.

Healbot does frame and border colour, two texts, and icons, but doesn’t have any corner indicators or as many options for changing colours etc. As far as I’m aware it has no options for adding extra texts and icons.

I’d like to stress that both mods will show you everything you want to see; they both display all of the important information that you need. Grid just gives you more options to display it in a way that you want, meaning that if you react faster to colours, you can set it up so that colours are one of your main triggers. If you work better with icons, Grid has the standard center icons but also corner and side icons. Grid makes it very easy for you to set up your frames in the way that YOU will interpret the information fastest – which might be completely the opposite of how someone else likes to see information – but you get the flexibility to choose.





HoTs
WINNER: Grid

In the past, the general opinion that I heard about Healbot was “fantastic healing addon.. Although probably not so great for druids.” During my time experimenting with Healbot, I found this to be true, for one main reason – the most important thing that druids should look for in a UI, in my opinion – HoT tracking.

I have to say that if I had to list what was most important for me to see in a frame mod, the health bar/deficit would be first (obviously), and HoTs would be second.

Grid’s HoT Trackers (GridStatusHoTs and GridStatusLifebloom) do a brilliant job. They allow you to put numerical, coloured counters in the center, sides or corners of the health bar, so that you can track each HoT. The timers can be a set colour, or can be assigned to change colour as the timer runs low; in the case of Lifebloom, you can also assign colours to stack numbers, so a single stack might be a red timer, and 3 stacks a green counter.

All of this information is displayed clearly, but does not obscure the rest of the information on the frame. This is where Healbot falls down in its HoT tracking; in my experience I found that trying to display the HoT icons on the bar meant that the name and health information was obscured. Making the icons smaller (to be able to see the bar) results in not being able to identify the spells very well (as the icons get smaller) and trouble reading the timers, as the texts of the counters are ultimately linked to the size of the icon. Similarly, if you increase the size of the font, it can also obscure the icon itself, making it hard to see if you’re looking at Regrowth or Rejuv, for example.





Healbot’s HoT icons look great. But in practice, they make the health information difficult to see (on a moderate sized UI), and scaling them down makes the HoT hard to see. You have to try to find the happy medium between icons that are large enough to see which spell they are (in turn allowing for decent sized timers), and still being able to see the person’s frame under those icons. With Regrowth, Rejuv, Lifebloom and Wild Growth all up on someone’s frame at once, I found it difficult to see the health bar, and this would make me very nervous in a raid. Grid’s timer information never obscures health information, so you can still make judgments on when to throw an extra emergency heal.




As you can see, Grid’s HoT timers do not obscure the rest of the information in the frame. I found Healbot’s timers to either be so big they obscure the frame, or too small to read the text. The alternative then is to increase the size of the frame to allow for good sized icons without obscuring the other information – but this ends up making your raid frame quite large. I like my frames to be neat and compact.

Also, Healbot lays down the HoT icons in the order cast, not in a specific placement, which means that you can’t even get used to Regrowth being say, the one on the left each time – you still need to rely on being able to see the icon properly, as the icons will be in random order on each person’s bar. I find that Grid’s layout, with set positions for HoTs (that you choose according to your own prefences) makes it easier to interpret timers because you can rely on each spell always appearing in a set position. You can use icons if you want, or simply use colored dots or texts, plus the option to have these colors change over time. You can use the standard green/yellow/red, or choose any colour you like; you can also choose the time thresholds for these color changes to occur, to allow for your own style. Healbot does not have this depth of customization.

If I had to pick one major fault (for druids) with Healbot, HoT tracking would be it. I can honestly say that I could manage swapping from Grid to Healbot if the HoT tracking was improved. It’s definitely on the right track, but needs some changes so that HoT information is better displayed. Because we have 4 different HoTs at our disposal, often on many people at once, we need to be able to view and interpret tracking and timer information extremely quickly, to be able to make snap decisions. If the icon is obscured, the display order is random, and the text is difficult to see, then this reaction time suffers. This is a big problem. You don’t want your HoT displays to slow down your reaction time.

Any HoT tracking is better than no HoT tracking; but I strongly feel that Grid’s tracking options give you a much clearer view of your spells at any given time, they don’t detract from the rest of the information, which allows you to process the information faster. A druid with no HoT timers can perform well; but a druid with great HoT displays can really maximise his/her output and fine-tune their timing down to miliseconds.

Basically – if you’re serious about excelling as a healer and you’re doing difficult content, then you need a really good HoT timer to streamline your performance and improve your reaction time. Healbot is almost there – but Grid just does it better.





Buffs
WINNER: Healbot

This is another category where both mods can show you what you want to see, but in this case, Healbot has some cool features that Grid doesn’t.

Both will show you buffs present and buffs missing, depending on what you prefer to see. For example, I prefer to see a pink dot on every frame, denoting Mark of the Wild, and if someone is missing a dot, they need the buff. It’s just what I’m used to seeing. Other people prefer to only have a dot showing on someone who is missing the buff, which you could argue is more logical, since it is easier to see one person out of 25 who has a bright pink dot, compared to one person with no dot, out of a sea of 25 people. It’s just personal preference.

But Healbot goes further and has alerts for when a buff is about to run out – including sounds. I thought that was a really cool little feature. Most of the time I buff by default, and don’t need a reminder, but perhaps there are shorter duration buffs like Thorns that you forget to rebuff. Or it’s a special fight and you need to remember to give people Amp Magic or Shadow Protection.

Of course, Grid does have a little more customisation in that you can assign buffs to corner icons and whatnot, but I don’t think this is particularly noteworthy in this case. If your frame can show you a buff (or a missing buff) it probably doesn’t matter too much how it does it.





Debuffs
WINNER: Tie

Standard debuffs (curses, poisons, magic etc) are basically identical in both mods, aside from (once again) a little more flexibility in display options with Grid. Both will show you debuffs as a centre icon, border, or frame colour. Grid goes a little further and lets you have corner/edge indicators and corner icons (with extra modules). But both mods will show standard debuffs fine.





Grid edges forward a little for me personally with its custom debuffs. Healbot still allows you to display custom debuffs (for example, by changing the frame colour or adding a border), but if you want to use frame colour as your indicator, you can only use one colour for ALL custom debuffs. Most people would probably say, “so what?” but this is something that I am particular about, so it stood out for me

I like to be able to colour particular custom debuffs particular things (and sometimes with a particular priority). This is especially important in fights where there may be multiple custom debuffs that I would like to track. For example on XT002, I might colour Gravity Bomb bright pink, and Light Bomb bright green. I need to know who has each, but I also need to be able to discern between the two very quickly. Of course, many people just use icons, but I ditched that method long ago when I found that some curse icons looked like poisons (and vice versa). I find it much easier to react to colours than pictures.

So really it is an extremely trivial and TINY edge that Grid has over Healbot – and it will ONLY matter to you if you like to use frame colour AND have separate colours for each debuff.

Apart from that it is basically a tie.





Mouseover macro/Clique compatibility
WINNER: Healbot

Both mods are compatible with click-casting and mouseover macros.

In the case of Grid, you will need to download and setup another addon, Clique, for this functionality. I have seen many Healbot users criticise this fact in the past. In reality though, many Grid users don’t use click-casting, so this doesn’t matter to them at all.

If you are a click-caster, then Healbot comes ready to go – with no extra modules or setup required; you simply have to assign your spells accordingly. Many people see this as a big plus.






Summary

Healbot was once considered by many to be an “ezmode” healing addon that chose ranks of spells for you, which earned it a bad name as a mod that created lazy healers. Things have changed. It is now a powerful, feature-packed frames mod that shows you all of the things that Grid can show you. It is far easier to use “out of the box”, has easy to follow menus, and is easier to keep up to date. Its main failing for druids is the clunky HoT display; but I am confident this will be improved over time.

Grid simply offers many more options for customising your frames, according to how you want your information to be displayed. It has far superior options for HoT tracking, which is essential for druid healers to excel in their healing. It requires some setting up before use, and quite a lot of tweaking to suit personal taste; adding more modules will also mean more and more extensive dropdown menus, but this is the tradeoff for seemingly limitless options for customising the look and layout of your frames.

I think one of the most common arguments against Grid is that “you need to install so many extra mods to go with it!”. In reality, I think I have 3 extra modules – which is hardly a big deal at all. You could potentially have hundreds of extra modules installed – which would be a bit of a nightmare to keep updated manually – but what non-Grid users need to keep in mind is that while it may seem like a pain to have to use addons for an addon, this is where Grid gets its massive level of customisation.

And on the flip side, I don’t want a whole lot of non-druid addons included by default. Why would I need totem timers, or rune tracking? That would just be bloat, and extra options in my menus that I don’t need to see. With Grid you can “build your own mod” by picking and choosing your addons accordingly.

Many non-Grid users see this as a negative. Grid users understand that it means that the mod only includes options that we choose to use.





Really, I could write about these mods all day – I’ve barely scratched the surface of both. But I do hope I’ve given people a basic idea of some of the main features of each. The best way though is to give them a try and see what suits you. I believe more druids prefer Grid for their frames, but many use Healbot and swear by it.

If you want a mod that requires only minimal setup and shows you all of the information you need, with click-casting built in, Healbot is great.

If you prefer to tweak and customise your UI to exactly how you want it, including HoT timers, extra texts and icons, and custom debuff options, then Grid excels.

There is no right or wrong mod to use – it’s all about whatever helps you best.

Happy healing!

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Here’s a little tip for everyone, but it’s particularly good for druids because of our Teleport: Moonglade spell.

There is a vendor in Moonglade named Lorelae Wintersong. She sells the recipe for Runed Arcanite Rod.





This enchanting rod is required by all enchanters to be able to progress to higher levels of enchanting. The problem is that it is ONLY sold in Moonglade. Nowhere else in the world. It is also a limited item, on a short respawn timer (meaning it may not be available when you go to Moonglade to get it). So for many enchanters, it is a bit of a pain to get.

We druids, on the other hand, have the advantage of being able to port to Moonglade whenever we please.


Remember: In WotLK, a lot of people are rich and lazy.

Many people have tonnes of gold and nothing to spend it on.

They are also lazy, and would rather pay exorbitant prices on the AH than have to go get something for themselves. This is particularly true of people who decide to reroll professions and then power level them. They don’t want to travel all over the place – they want to be able to stand in Stormwind or Orgrimmar and power level their new profession as fast as possible.

If a new pattern or formula requires someone to go halfway around the world, that’s a pain. If there’s one up on the AH for 30g (maybe even more), they’ll just snatch it. It’s not worth the time and effort to travel to get it themselves. I have done this myself a number of times; I’ve paid 20g for a stack of meat to level cooking, or ridiculous prices for cloth and herbs… all because I don’t want to have to keep flying back to town to train the next levels.

In the case of the arcanite rod – some people don’t even HAVE the Moonglade flight path. I’ve even helped friends get the pattern – when I’ve overheard them complain about having to go “all the way to Moonglade”, I’ve offered to port and grab it for them. It’s a real hassle to get that pattern if you’re not a druid.

As a level 10+ druid, you can take advantage of this inconvenience!


Make a quick 15-20g+, casually

I suggest any time you are about to hearth and log for the day, port to Moonglade first, grab the formula, then hearth afterwards. If you’re levelling, grab it whenever you head to Moonglade for training. I grab one whenever I port there, for whatever reason.

It will cost you 2.2g (less with rep), and will probably sell from 15g upwards (personally if I was a non-druid I would likely pay up to 100g if it meant I didn’t have to mess around getting to Moonglade).

For those of you at 80 with high incomes, this may not be worth your time.. but considering that this is easy for any druid of level 10 and up to do, if you have 2g to invest, you can quickly turn that into a lot more. Very handy for that first mount and training costs.. especially for crazy rerollers like myself, with no “main” feeding cash to the new druid.

And those of you who are saving 5000g for epic flying may be looking for tips on how to squeeze as much gold out of the game as you can. This tip might be worth 10g or it might be 100g, depending on your server – but regardless, with Teleport: Moonglade at your disposal, it will only take you 2 minutes of your time.

Particularly helpful for lowbies, but also for the thrifty, seasoned druid. Every little bit counts, right?





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I used to hate the jousting quests that are part of the Argent Tournament. For a while, I skipped them.. but it bugged me that they gave me so much trouble. I was irritated that a daily quest would take so long to do and often I would fail and have to start over.. yuck. So I stopped doing them for a while, and sulked.

But, being extremely stubborn and not wanting to be beaten by a quest, I wanted to finish what I started. A friend offered me a few pointers and the difference was amazing. I went from being absolutely smashed by these mobs (and being very embarrassed and sullen about it) to finishing fights with 90% health.

So – here are some tips for how to make it a little easier if you’ve been having problems with it. This is not a quick method, but it is “safe”, if you’re trying to get the hang of it. (Note: please see comments for some readers’ suggestions for how to speed things up)



Before you talk to the NPC, start with three stacks of Defend
ALWAYS start with 3 shields up. Quickly renew your shield if your opponent removes your stacks, so you don’t lose too much health.





Most importantly, don’t get distracted and let them drop off! Renew them periodically even if no stacks have been removed. It’s easy to forget to renew them if you are doing well or concentrating on your opponent’s shields. Your opponent will tear through your health if you have no shields up.

As soon as you engage, break his shield and close range
After you talk to your NPC, he will turn and turn towards the center of the ring. As he runs away from you, toss a Shield-Breaker, but run after him as you do it – so that he never gets far enough away to be able to charge you and remove your shields.

Stay in melee range as much as possible
Stick to that guy like glue. Simply put, the “safe” way to joust is to keep Thrusting merrily away at melee range, and anytime the NPC runs, toss a Shield-Breaker and then run after him ASAP to get back in melee range. By doing this, your opponent can never get range to charge you and remove your shields, but you’ll take a shield or two from him and gradually whittle him down.

Every now and then I will back up slightly (in all my keyboard-turning glory) or run away a tiny bit to get range to shield break again (if you reduce his shields to yellow or red, you’ll win faster by doing more damage). Remember though, this opens you up to being far enough away for him to charge you and reduce your shields. If this happens, just refresh to green again.

Doing it this way often means that the mob can never remove even one of your shields, which means you should lose very little health over the course of the fight. But don’t get complacent – make sure you renew your shields before they expire and drop off. If they run out, the mob will damage you very quickly while you try to get the shields back up.

Why I don’t usually bother charging
Charging is pretty cool and a bit of fun. Wheeeeeee, zooming across and wheeling around. The problem though is that once you have charged past your opponent, you have such a wide turning circle that it takes you a few seconds to sweep around and run back to him (unless you jump-turn, and I’m guessing if you’re having problems, you’re not confident doing this). In that time, you are vulnerable to being charged yourself, meaning that you’ll lose a shield stack, and for a few seconds he’ll be able to damage you harder. So it’s not as “safe” than just meleeing and shield breaking him.

Of course, if you are reducing his shields with extra charges, you’ll be killing him faster, so it won’t matter too much if your shield drops a stack from a charge; but if you’ve had troubles with jousting in the past I would recommend just sticking with this safe “melee method” until you’re a little more confident.

That’s it!
To recap:

- always start with full shields
- whenever the mob runs from you, shield break and run after him
- stay in melee range as much as possible, keep Thrusting
- if you get a chance to toss extra shield breaks, this will help you DPS faster
- don’t let your shields drop


Oh, and don’t forget to re-equip your normal weapon when you’re done. It’s pretty embarrassing to pop out of cat form after killing Chillmaw, and have a huge Tauren-sized lance in your hand because you didn’t realise (in flight or kitty form) that it was still equipped. HEY EVERYONE LOOK AT ME! I’M REALLY DUMB! (*flashing neon arrows*) :/

Hope this helps – good luck!


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If you’re having trouble with seeing other druids’ HoTs on Grid, here is the fix – thanks Quast of Shu’halo:



1. Make sure you have the latest version.

2. Open the gridstatushots.lua file in your interface/addons/gridstatushots folder with notepad.

3. Search for the following line:

local bname,brank,btexture,bcount,btype, bdur, bexptime, bismine = UnitBuff(unitid, i)

4. On the line directly underneath it paste:

if bismine == “player” then
bismine = true
else
bismine = false
end



Tested just now in Ulduar – other druids HoTs are no longer showing on my Grid.

PHEW!


Possibly Related Posts:

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I’ve been feeling a little fidgety about 3.1. On one hand, I’m a hardcore farmer at heart. I love nothing more than seeing a bank full of potions, food, and consumables, all ready to go. On the other, I know there are changes coming in 3.1 that will mean I shouldn’t pile up entire bank tabs of flasks. So I haven’t.

But I feel like I should be doing more. That I haven’t prepared properly. It’s making me antsy. I don’t like it! So, I sat down and thought about all the things that raiders would need to sort out before 3.1 is released. I thought I would share, in case others might get some use out of it.



You can grab a printable shopping list style version here. Yeah, I’m weird





1. Stock up, but don’t go nuts




Food Have a stack or two of normal food/water just in case you’re without a mage. Will you be using Feasts? Who will be carrying those? (they are BoP) Even if you are using Feasts in your raid, take a stack of your chosen food as a backup. Have enough food in your bags for the first raid; plus enough in the bank for a couple of days. AH prices could be brutal at first, and supply could dry up temporarily – don’t get stuck without any!



Flasks, elixirs, potions and scrolls

Again, have enough in your bags for one raid, and enough in your bank for the first few. Don’t be caught short.

Don’t go crazy stocking up on flasks & elixirs – in 3.1 herb nodes will drop more herbs meaning they will be cheaper and more plentiful. Have some saved, but not a whole bank tab full.

Remember that changes to mana regen plus the fact that you will be learning fights may mean you will use more mana pots than usual. Consider taking more than you normally would. You may also prefer to take some regen consumables (eg mp5 flasks) to begin with. While learning Naxx I used mp5 flasks, but once I got used to the instance and could manage my mana better, I swapped to spellpower. It might be good to have some options in your bags.

If you’re a 10 man raider, you may not have access to full raid buffs, so you might like to take a stack or two of scrolls just in case. Fort can make a big difference.



Money Make sure you have enough money on your character to pay for a few nights of wiping! You may not get much time to farm or do dailies, and you don’t want to be stuck with no cash, or have to borrow. Now’s the time to do a few days’ worth of dailies, or sell off some old bank items to pad your wallet a little.


Glyphs

Have you considered the glyphs you’ll be using in 3.1? Buy or get a friend to craft you the ones you’ll need. Take a couple of each just in case you decide to swap a couple of times. For example, I might use Innervate at first, but decide that I’m doing ok without it, and swap to something else. Or I might struggle for mana and think “boy I wish I had an Innervate glyph right now!”

Not sure which combo to use? Here’s some help:

World of Matticus
Restokin
Nerf this Druid


Armor and weapon enhancements Take these with you into the raid, so that as soon as you get an upgrade, you can immediately enchant and gem the item without having to port/hearth and come back to the raid. This saves time and frustration, nobody likes waiting around for people to enchant their gear! Consider the items you might need – enchant scrolls/mats, leg armor, spell threads, cut/uncut gems. Buy them now while they are cheap! The prices are sure to peak at release, if only temporarily.

Bring a spare meta gem in case a new headpiece drops for you.

Go to Sons of Hodir & Wyrmrest and purchase a spare shoulder/head enchant to keep in your bags.


2. Mods, UI, macros

Mods & UI

Which of your mods are stable for 3.1? Which ones will need to be replaced? Do it now, don’t wait until 3.1, you could end up with a mess.

Check Curse and WoWInterface to see if your essential mods have been updated for 3.1. If you update your mods now, you’ll have time to tweak them, instead of wasting time later.

Is your UI what you want it to be? Now’s the time to jump in and fix it up – when Ulduar comes out you may not have time. You want to jump in with a UI that is functional and won’t cause you frustration while you’re trying to learn fights. Check out No Stock UI for ideas on how to streamline your screen real estate.

Macros

Do you have all of your macros in place? This is something else that you need to get into place before 3.1 so that you don’t have to mess with it on the day.

Useful pages to help with macros:

World of Matticus – A Guide to Mouseover Macros
Wowwiki – Useful macros for druids
The Druid Wiki – Macros and Addons


3. Talent point wipe and Dual Spec

Your primary spec

Do you know how you intend to spec in 3.1? Plan it now, so you don’t have to fumble with it when you log in on the day.

Which glyphs will you need for this spec?



Your secondary spec Make sure you have 1000g put aside for dual spec. Plan your second spec – balance or feral? Another healing spec? Hybrid? Tanking or kitty dps? Raiding or just for fun?


If your dual spec will be for raiding:

• Caps – hit, defense, etc. Does your offspec set measure up?




• What holes are in your gear? What do you still need?




• Examine gear lists and mark down your wishlist items.




• If you don’t get your preferred item in the next couple of weeks, is there a heroic or badge item you could get as a backup?




• Gem and enchant everything in advance.




• If the consumables required for your second spec are different, make sure you pack them!




• Create an offspec outfit in Outfitter/Closet Gnome/Item Rack (etc) so that you can swap to that gear quickly during the raid.




• Which glyphs will you need? Take some extras just in case you want to juggle different ones.




• Do you know your rotations? Go test them on the capital city target dummies.




• Set up your macros etc in advance, and practice them.




• Ask people for some tips and advice on playing that spec.



4. Delicious epics

Loot wishlist

Look over the loot lists (eg on MMO Champion) and identify possible upgrades as well as noting the items that you’re not interested in. Make a wishlist. Consider set bonuses and whether or not you want to keep them, or how you would juggle items around.

Get RatingBuster so that you can judge items on the fly. Looting is what takes the most time in raids – if you know what you’re looking for beforehand, and have RatingBuster loaded, it will save a lot of time.

Load up on high ilvl gear (duh)

It kinda goes without saying that everyone wants the highest level gear they can get their hands on – but I’m talking about the first boss in Ulduar, Flame Leviathan, who is fought almost entirely from vehicles. The vehicles’ hp scale with the ilvl of your gear, irrespective of whether it is the right gear for your spec. For example, I would be better off wearing a level 226 feral ring than a level 213 resto ring, because it will give my vehicle more health.

So grab as much high level stuff as you can to fill up your gear slots. Work out what your Leviathan set is, and make an Outfitter/Closet Gnome/Item Rack outfit for it so that you can change quickly for that fight.

DON’T throw out your 213/226 gear if you want 10 man achievements!

If you are primarily a 10 man raider or you’re interested in completing the 10 man achievements, make sure you don’t throw away your ilvl 213 and 226 gear as you pick up upgrades. The achievement “Herald of the Titans” requires that you not wear any items higher than 226:

Defeat Algalon the Observer on Normal Difficulty without anyone in the raid wearing any equipment with an item level higher than 226.

Keep this in mind when you pick up your new equipment.


5. Strats

Strats Read over the basic strats to see if there is anything you will need to pay particular attention to and what that will mean to you. Will there be heavy tank damage? Heavy raid damage? AOE dodging? Silences? Poisons and curses? Crowd control? Will you have a special role in the fight? Strat sites that you may find helpful: Strat Fu Wowwiki MMO Champion For a druid specific article, read WoWInsider’s Shifting Perspectives‘ preview of Ulduar.



6. For officers and raid leaders

Items to make your raids run smoothly

Consider bringing some extra materials or reagents for items that your raid members may need. For example, I often get asked to make pots but the person doesn’t have any vials.Consider those frequently-made items and if you can spare the bag space, perhaps bring some along to ensure people don’t waste time hearthing to gem or enchant their gear, or make consumables. Most people should bring these items to be prepared, but there’s always someone who gets caught short, and if you can help them out, it will speed up your raid.

For example:

- raw blue gems
- enchant mats
- leg armor
- thread + a few eternals
- vials
(note: thread and vials are available from mammoth mounts also)

One person can be assigned to be the pack mule (I like this job), and ensure that they have a few stacks of gems, enchant mats, vials, spare flasks and pots, feasts, flares, essential reagents, repair bots, etc. This may be unnecessary 99% of the time but I like to be prepared.

An officer or two should also be assigned to carry abyss crystals. Make sure you state the policy on these too – are they free for all? Paid? DKP? Only for BiS items? Only for particular ranks in the guild? Arguments will slow you down.

Loot

Do you have your loot system sorted? If you use DKP, have you set/adjusted your prices? Are you resetting before 3.1?

Are there any contentious items that may cause problems – items that may need to be exclusions or exceptions to the DKP system?

Have you discussed how to handle offspec loot now that dual specs will mean people can make better use of that gear to help the raid progress? What are the priorities?

If a fragment of the legendary mace drops, do you know how to handle it? It’s very hard to decide who should get it at the moment, since we don’t know the stats or other possible procs, but as the fragments can drop from even the first boss, you should at least have a vague idea of how you’ll handle it. MMO Champion’s page on the mace can be found here.

Achievements

What’s your raid’s focus? Killing stuff ASAP? Trying the hard modes straight up? Doing some of the achievements straight away, or ignoring them? Work this out beforehand. If you intend to do some of the achievements in the first week, make a list of them and their requirements so you don’t have to spend time looking up the possible achievements. Mark the ones you intend to go for and the ones you intend to ignore or come back for later.

Communicate to the raid team which achievements you will and will not be attempting, so that nobody gets upset because they thought you’d be doing them all in the first week. Set your priorities and goals, communicate them clearly, and stick to them.




Are there particular steps you are taking to prepare for patch 3.1?



Possibly Related Posts:

• Cataclysm talent update, armor specialisation
• Blizz dev chat on Twitter – druid question roundup
• Cataclysm: the brand spankin’ new 31pt talent trees