3 replies to this topic

[romelako]

I just started playing a month ago and I think the general consensus in regards to the current state of druids is that it's very tough to heal through the enormous amounts of burst.  I think this is mainly because of the sheer mechanic of the Druid, being very HoT-based and requiring actual buffs and time to be able to heal someone efficiently.  This makes the Druid's job especially hard when facing Mages and Shamans.

The reason I wanted to post this topic is to hopefully get some insight on what Druids are doing now (or have been doing for that matter) to do well in arenas, despite being the underdog in healer choices.  I'm not very good at the game, only being able to achieve 1750 in 2's and 3's.  I watch players like Cottage and Hotted and try to mimic and analyze their play as much as possible, but it's very hard to know what's going inside their heads if all they're doing is calling out CC targets and heals.

So here are my questions:

• Lifebloom: I'm assuming you want to keep refreshing this until you cannot anymore or your partner is getting focused so it can bloom?
  
• When choosing CC targets, are we always supposed to have at least one person CC'd at all times?  Or do we want to CC only if a kill can be set up or for defensive purposes?
  
• Heart of the Wild or Nature's Vigil?  Seems as if HotW is best for trying to set up kills but the 6 min cooldown seems pretty steep.  Likewise, Nature's Vigil helps a lot (especially with tree) and is on a 3-minute cooldown but removes offensive potential.

I'm currently running Warrior/Druid and we cannot break out of the 1700 bracket, sadly.  I think it's mainly due to synergy issues and miss-timed CC's, but I could be wrong.  I believe this is a pretty strong comp just because of the CC potential of the druid because of symbiosis.  However, against Shaman or Mage teams, it's very hard to keep a warrior up.  Any tips?

Thanks in advanced for reading my topic!

[trumpcards]

Lifebloom: you want to keep it on the target that might be taking the most damage.  the hot portion is substantial and if you get cc'ed the bloom portion will be very useful.  you mentioned that you have hard time healing vs mages/shamans but note that lifeblooms heal on purge/spellsteal so it's still useful to spam lifebloom if they're spamming dispel.

CC: basically cc'ing dps = less pressure for you to heal through & less peels the enemy team can put on your team.  cc'ing healer = going for a kill on a dps.  if you can afford to cc without falling behind in healing you should.  when to cc is totally situational but just be creative with it.  e.g. warrior avatars without trinket - ns clone > healing through his damage.  or your dps goes for a strong opener then cycloning a dps that can spam peels, offheals, or dispels.  

honestly druids get it easy when it comes to cc's, you have displacer pounce, disorienting roar/bash, cyclone, typhoon, and even fae silence if you play 2s,  you just need to do what you can so that the other team has 0 pressure and is always stuck in a 2vs1 or 3vs2 situation because one of them is in a clone.

Heart of the Wild: even though this is more of a 2v2 talent than it is a 3v3 talent, you should note that it also buffs you with 6% passive int/stam.  I've had some amazing burst support using HotW but the use of it is extremely rare in 3v3.  If you're not geared enough yet I'd suggest using nature's vigil to heal through things like warrior/demo lock bursts.

Tips to break 1700: try to pay attention to diminishing returns on your cc's.  try to cc both targets at once every time you burst.  pay attention to enemy interrupts or spell reflect/groundings (juke them with something like soothe between casts).  sometimes you can even clone a dps that's getting low so you have more time to cc the healer (but make sure you communicate this with your team).  i think breaking the 1700 bracket is just about having a better understanding of what is happening in an arena game (what cooldowns the enemy has, what cooldowns your team has, what kind of cc chains you can pull off, etc.).

[romelako]

Are you bursting in Cat Form or with Wraths when using HotW?

[trumpcards]

sometimes wrath/moonfire is better, for example when you want to assist against a warrior or priest who can shockwave/fear you in melee.  i do prefer bursting in cat form though, because the combo points I build up can amount to another maim if needed, plus ferocious bite can sometimes crit for ridiculous amounts of damage.