Druid Builds

[Kevin]

I don't know about other druids, but I have been using this a lot, in both forms. That is, I use it in both the 'omg heal now' form (rejuv, swiftmend) and the 'rejuv now, count ten, swiftmend later' form.

Let's give an example, I was solo-healing a 4-man stealth group taking down Mor Grayhoof, the summonable tier 0.5 boss. He calls up a hurricane that does some pretty nasty DOTs to those standing in its effect. I threw rejuvenation on the rogue, another one on the bear tank, did a healing touch; by that time, the rogue was down to about 1/3rd life, so I hit swiftmend on the rogue. Bam! Near-full.

It's not quite as mana-efficient as pure Healing Touches rank 3 and 4, but it gets the druid a lot closer to being able to cover the bases like a priest can.

I'd say swiftmend is the talent of druids who enjoy the healing game, since you have to think about it pretty consciously. It's also quite useful for PVPing druids.

Thanks for the feedback! This (and some of the stuff I got from Voiceman in an in game chat) is some of what I'm looking for here.

I've imagined it could be a very nice talent not only for 'oh, crap' but also for FFA healing (be that in a 5 man where you are solo healing or in a raid).

I think what complicates it for me is that I look at my paladin as my pure healer now. It's not an easy task to boost paladin DPS. Even people who understand that paladins can tank generally don't feel they want to deal with some of the extra down time that can come with a pally tank vs a druid or a warrior. So really that toon is pretty much going to be a healer and as mentioned I'm seriously considering a respec to make him a better buff bot since he likely will only be healing and buffing and I can't really spec him to be any better of a healer than he is now.

Also while I did say that I do want to improve my healing abilities what has me still not being able to answer the swiftmend or no swiftmend question is how much healing do I want to do. If I get swiftmend I can't even pretend to be anything but a healer because even though it may not be a lot 10 more points in feral over just the base 20 can easily be a 20% DPS increase. Sure the DPS may not be huge but those 10 talent points are enough to make up for several pieces of gear, etc. And taking out natural weapons and omen of clarity like I will be is another very noticable drop in DPS.

I think maybe, what I'm looking for, that this discussion has brought to light, is to make my druid as good of a healer as my paladin again for when I want to or need to heal with her. Right now she isn't. The paladin is a better healer than the druid because of how they are spec'd both have a very similar 'level' of gearing so that isn't where the difference lies. I think I want to boost healing enough to get back up to my paladins level. I think that getting the faster heals, the cheaper heals, better use out of my spirit, and natures swiftness will do that. Of course that may make me retire my paladin but Blizzard just hasn't figured that class out. The other thing of course that getting some healing talents will do is make healing more effective playing a hybrid role which I've often been lucky enough to get to do.

I'm glad to hear that swifmend is as good as I was hoping it would be when it was announced, that it really does make a druid a better healer (where innnervate just made the raid healing better not the druids healing).

I suppose I should just farm up even more gold (I still don't have her epic mount yet though) and test both builds out. But since I don't have a lot of money on Stormrage right now and I am saving for the epic mount I keep discussing the question instead of just testing it. :)

Ah well I'll keep thinking about it. :)