In Mists of Pandaria, I am really liking the idea behind the new talent system, it simplifies things so much and as a bonus, you can swap out talents in battlegrounds or raids!  Although, I am not sure if I would enjoy not being able to spend points we currently earn every other level up to 85.  It was always something I looked forward to when I levelled a character, and I definitely will miss that aspect of levelling come Mists of Pandaria.

Let’s get down to the nitty-gritty:  talents for the restoration druid!

WoW: Mists of Pandaria

Tier 1 / Level 15 talents: Feline Swiftness, Displacer Beast, Tireless Pursuit:

Feline Swiftness- Increases your movement speed by 10% and by an additional 20% whilst in Cat Form.

Displacer Beast- Teleports the Druid up to 20 yards in a random direction, purging all periodic damage effects and providing stealth for 10 sec. Attacking or taking damage cancels this effect. Using this ability activates Cat Form. (Instant, 3min CD)

Tireless Pursuit- Removes all roots and snares, and increases movement speed by 70% while in Cat Form for 15 sec. Does not break prowling. Using this ability activates Cat Form. (Instant, 3min CD)

For PvP, Displacer Beast could provide to be useful when you need to get out quickly.  This will unload all dots that’s running on you and make you stealth.  I wonder if we’d be able to shift to cat and enter prowl within those 10 seconds of being stealthed.  Probably not, I would imagine shifting to cat would break stealth, but then you should be able to prowl immediately if you can avoid getting into combat when your stealth breaks.

This is similar to Night Elf rogues using Shadowmeld to drop out of combat to stealth immediately.  A poor man’s vanish, if you will, I have also used this same method to get my druid back in prowl in cat.

I’m not sure about Tireless pursuit because historically, druids used to be able to power shift out of snares, roots and traps.  We were recently nerfed so that we no longer can shift out of traps, only snares and roots.  I don’t like the idea of having what made druids unique with this ability be reduced to a ‘oh shit’ button with a three minute cooldown.

Keeping Restoration druids specifically in mind, your job is to keep yourself alive while healing other people.  It’s your job to get your butt out of sticky situations like having a rogue happily backstabbing away at you.  I am really liking Displacer Beast, this is sounding like an awesome move to use in PvP, over Tireless Pursuit.  This is mainly because I find myself getting tanked a lot in battlegrounds, if I could vanish away from multiple people trying to kill me, this would really save my hide.

I’m interested to see how this talent will play out in PvE.  Feline Swiftness might be useful as a healer when you need to get somewhere quickly.  Or Displacer Beast, when you need to get out of a bad spot asap, or use this as a self defensive cd, akin to Barkskin, but to drop dots or debuffs in raids.  A new Cloak of Shadow for druids if you will

Tier 2 / Level 30 talents: Nature’s Swiftness, Renewal, Cenarion Ward:

Nature’s Swiftness- When activated, your next Cyclone, Entangling Roots, Healing Touch, Hibernate, Nourish, Rebirth, or Regrowth becomes instant, free and castable in all forms. The healing and duration of the spell is increased by 50%. (Instant, 3min CD)
Renewal- Instantly heals the druid for 30% of maximum health. Usable in all shapeshift forms. (Instant, 2min CD)
Cenarion Ward- Protects a friendly target, causing any damage taken to heal the target for 2660 every 2 sec for 6 sec. Gaining the healing effect consumes the Cenarion Ward. Usable in all shapeshift forms. Lasts 30 sec. (Instant, 40yd range, 30 sec CD)

I’m not at all excited about this tier.  I have always used Nature’s Swiftness for brezzes and on rare occasions with Healing Touch when I need a large emergency heal.  For PvE, you probably would take Nature’s Swiftness, or Cenarion Ward that is similiar to Living Seed.  This could be useful for tank healing and should be considered if Nature’s Swiftness doesn’t dazzle you.

For PvP, Renewal or Cenarion Ward would be very nice.  I usually end up rolling Lifebloom and a couple of HoT’s on people who are being tanked in battlegrounds, myself included.  Renewal could be used as a ‘oh shit’ button and the fact it’s usable in all shapeshift forms is great!  I could shift to kitty and run away when I’m low on health and use it then shift back.  Bear works too, as you get larger health pools in either forms, I’m not sure if you would retain the health gain when you shift back to caster form.  Assuming we do, this could potentially be a great talent to have for PvP.

Cenarion Ward can also be useful in PvP when you need extra healing, but again, this will only work on people who’s getting attacked.  Like tanks in PvE, you want to use this on yourself, or people who is being tanked.

Tier 3/ Level 45 talents:  Faerie Swarm, Mass Entanglement, Typhoon:

Faerie Swarm- This is a more powerful version of Faerie Fire. Not only does it reduce a target’s armor, but it also reduces their movement speed by 50%. 

Mass Entanglement- Roots all enemies within 12 yards of the destination for 8 seconds.  Damage caused may interrupt the effect.  Cannot be cast while in Bear or Cat Form.

Typhoon- Usable in… all specs!  A super knock-back spell that pushes your enemies back by 30 yards.

Mass Entanglement looks pretty attractive for large battlegrounds and PvP.  It could also assist in add control in PvE in a pinch where you see a bunch of mobs heading directly for you.  Pop it and pray the tank will have picked them up when the roots expire!  Faerie Swarm has a lot of potential for PvP being able to put a movement debuff on the target from a range is very powerful. Typhoon will see more usefulness in PvP, but depending on the boss fight it might prove useful in PvE as well.

Tier 4/ Level 60 Talents:  Wild Charge, Incarnation, Force of Nature:

Wild Charge- Grants a movement ability that varies by shapeshift forms.  Example:  In caster form, fly to an ally’s position and your next healing spell costs no mana.  Bear Form:  charge to an enemy and immobilize them, granting you 30% haste.  Moonkin Form:  bound backward and gain 20 Lunar or Solar Energy whichever is more beneficial to you.

Incarnation- Activates a superior shapeshifting form appropriate to your spec for 30 seconds.

Force of Nature- Summons three treants to assist you in combat, available to all druid specs.

For PvE,  I would most definitely take Incarnation for Tree of Life, since it is a vital healing CD that you can use every 3 minutes.  Alternating that with Tranquility,  you can rotate those every 1.5 minutes, so it’s definitely too valuable not to have for raiding.  Wild Charge might be nice for PvP but I have a feeling Force of Nature will be used instead, if Incarnation isn’t taken.  Too little information is available on how the treants will heal your targets, so I will have to speculate that Incarnation is still the best choice out of all three talents for both PvE and PvP.

Tier 5/ Level 75 Talents:  Demoralizing Roar, Ursol’s Vortex and Bear Hug:

Demoralizing Roar- Currently reduces physical damage caused by enemies by 10%. It has been redesigned to be an AoE disorienting all enemies within 10 yards for 4 seconds.  Using this ability activates Bear Form.

Ursol’s Vortex-  Conjures a vortex that pulls all enemies within 15 yards to you, usable in all specs.

Bear Hug- This ability stuns the target and does a DoT (10% of your health for every one second for three seconds)  to your enemy. It activates Bear form.

Most of the abilities cater to Bears/Cats and the one ability that doesn’t require a form brings enemies to you which isn’t something you’d want as a healer.  Go for Demoralizing Roar because the AoE Disorient could get you out of a tight spot.  Ursol’s Vortex can be useful with Mass Entanglement in PvP, pulling your enemies to you and then popping mass roots so you can get away.  This could be useful when you have multiple players trying to kill you, or mobs for that matter in PvE, to insure your mass roots will get them all.

Tier 6/ Level 90 Talents:  Heart of the Wild, Master Shapeshifter, Disentanglement:

Heart of the Wild- dramatically increases your ability to perform combat roles outside of your normal specialization.

Master Shapeshifter- Improves your effectiveness at briefly switching forms.  Your melee abilities increase your spell damage by 10% and your non-instant spell casts increases your attack power by 10%.  Both effects stack 3 times and last 15 seconds.  Each ability used will consume each application of that effect.

Disentanglement- Shapeshifting now removes roots in addition to healing you for 20% of your maximum health.  This heal cannot be recieved more often than every 30 seconds.

Heart of the Wild allows you to perform your offspec better should the need arise, for example going Hero Bear when a tank dies to keep your raid from wiping.  I’m not sure how different this is from Master Shapeshifter.

Disentanglement looks quite nice, and could be useful for both PvP and PvE, with obvious reasons for PvP  like when you need a health boost while you are escaping.  This would mean you need to shift in a pve setting, for instance, as a bear tank to make use of this, albeit at a dangerous risk of being killed tanking.   I’m not sure if it would really be an ideal talent to have for some druid specs and roles, so I would use this with caution in a pve setting.

Master Shapeshifter depends on how often you shapeshift, and if you actually use your new form.   In PvP, I do go cat and bear when I need to run away, or stun someone, so this may be more useful for PvP and, maybe PvE.  But to be honest, I’m not sure how different this is from the Heart of the Wild talent.  Both talents have similiar intent, except MSS expires after you have used up all three stacks in 15 seconds.  It doesn’t say how long HotW will last and has a 6 minute cooldown, with no CD imposed on MSS yet.  Assuming they both share similiar CD times of 6 minutes and 15 seconds of use time, people may get more use out of MSS than HotW.  With MSS, you get three stacks that you have to use within 15 seconds, and most gcds are around 1 second.  You could probably fit in more spells with MSS within those 15 seconds, so in this line of thinking, I’m inclined to say MSS would be the best choice, with the full intent of maximizing performance in your offspec form.

Out of all three, I would choose Disentanglement for PvP and Master Shapeshifter for PvE, so I can provide more dps if I need to or act as an emergency bear, if it is actually as effective as the spell claims to be.

All in all, I’m psyched for the new expansion.  There are interesting talents that I’m excited about because they provide unique and new ways I could play my druid for both PvE and PvP.  The talents I have talked about so far, are of course subject to change as Blizzard continues to tweak things.  Psyched!

Aidrana

Having played since late BC, Aidrana enjoys raiding in her spare time. When she’s not busy raiding, she either geeks out in other games or devotes her time to making awesome pictures in Photoshop. She also loves to paint in traditional mediums and writing about her work even as it progresses. She thinks she’s caught the writing bug, and hopes to get better at it