Resto
Balance
Feral
Wild Growth (WG) is the druid restoration 51-talent-point spell. It is an AoE heal that you cast on another person: it does not automatically center on yourself, like Tranquility does. Also unlike Tranquility, Wild Growth can be cast on other raid members (as well as mobs and bosses, in fact!), rather than only your party. It has a 6-second cooldown and a 7-second duration, with a total of 7 ticks of healing applied during that time. The ticks occur quickly at first, and then slow down towards the end of the spell duration.
Because it can be cast upon other raid members or enemies and its area of effect is centered upon your target rather than yourself, Wild Growth requires a bit of finesse to use effectively; if you miscast the spell, its cooldown will prevent you from having another chance for 6 seconds, and in the healing world, that could mean deaths.
Here is the diagram style I will be using to illustrate WG. The little colored circles are people, and the big blueish circle is your Wild Growth's area of effect. It has a 15-yard radius centered on the person (or pet or enemy) you cast the WG on; the whole circle is 30 yards in diameter. Yay geometry!
If you cast WG on yourself, only those people within 15 yards of you will receive the HoT: yourself included. Everyone else is left out and is sad. Or angry. Maybe that's why I made them red.
If you cast the spell on someone else (you have a 40-yard range to target with), then they, and everyone else within 15 yards of them, is eligible for the spell (assuming they are friendly targets in your raid/party). Now here is the tricky part: only 5 total people/pets can receive the WG heal within that circle, including the target of the spell. Your WG will automatically choose the 5 people/pets who are currently lowest in health (by percentage). Everyone else will, again, be left out.
Remember: this is not based on who is furthest away or closest. If they are in range of the person you cast the spell on, they are eligible, and will receive the heal if they are one of the 5 who need it the most at that moment in time. This means that it may not put a heal on your actual target: WG may instead splash on 5 people and/or pets that are lower in health than your target.
Due to this, you can choose your target carefully, selecting them not because they actually need the heal, but because they are within range of the most people who ARE in need of the heal. These targets are commonly referred to as "Bridges."
If no good Bridge is available, you can move and make yourself the Bridge. This will let you cast your WG upon yourself, and have it splash heals on the people who are in your 15-yard range.
Notice in the above diagram that there are 5 other people hit by the WG, though you targeted yourself. This means that either:
- you were the highest health out of the 6 total people in the area of effect, and so the WG applied its heal to the 5 others within your splash range and you simply served as the Bridge; or
- you picked up the Glyph of Wild Growth that is now available in patch 3.1, and so your WG can hit 6 people :)
Hope this helps!
11 comments:
Wow. Thanks for this! I was always mystified by who WG 'chose to heal'. I think I'll be a little less bored on raids, since I'll be madly learning how to optimize my 'bridging'
Very precise and easy-to-follow explanation of a mechanic that escapes a lot of beginner Trees.
/salute
"Your WG will automatically choose the 5 people who are currently lowest in health"
as a % value or as a raw hp value? I wish it was % value, otherwise tanks will rarely get it :(
the most common use is to target the MT and heal the melee group who are in the vicinity
@Anonymous:
I *believe* it is percentage-based, and have read others say it is percentage-based as well. It certainly acts percentage-based in my experience, always targeting the people with lower health bars, but I don't think it's ever officially been announced if it's one way or the other.
It is also possible to have the target be the mob you are fighting to center the spell on the melee, you do not have to target a friendly for this spell. Also, since this spell can pick pets, when a mage has his clones out, it can (an often does) pick them if they are in range, leaving you asking, where did my spell go?
The target of WG can also be a baddie. You don't have to choose a raid member. On fights where I can DPS between heals I use WG right along with my offensive spells, like the 25man Thaddius fight.
Yes, I was going to add that you can target a boss and WG will cast on those around it, making them a handy bridge during large hit box fights.
Another important thing to note is that your target does not always get the Wild Growth if there are five people around them in range with lower health. I have had it not HoT on the tank because they were, for the moment, at full health, while melee close to them were not.
Also, be aware it will go on pets instead of more important members if the pets are closer with less health.
I edited in to include that mobs/enemies/bosses can be targets :)
wow, this guide was very helpful.
im a resto druid and have been healing heroics for quite some time, have decent gear but am too intimadated to heal raids.
i feel more confident that i can heal efficently in raids now. ty
if there are any useful addons or other guides which can help me id greatly appreciate the link.
e-mail is Link4233@gmail.com
/salute to all the trees out there Phantomhour, The Venture Co.
Im a good resto druid, its definetely % based and also you can cast on freindly/enemy totems as well
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