I’m finding that my HoT spells just don’t kick in quick enough to deal with this affix, forcing me to spam Regrowth which just ends up mana-starving me. It’s particularly frustrating on bosses that have high AoE damage. I’ve thought about experimenting with Flourish but it’s just on too long a cooldown to justify picking it up, same goes for Tree of Life. Anyone have any tips or suggestions?
I ran a chain of mythics last night all with the same group. We started at 8+ and finished at 10, and let me tell you, not one gcd went by where I wasnt casting a heal. Even between pulls. Luckily we had a boomkin and I was able to have an extra innervate. I was usin mana like it was goin out of style. On Council o’ Captains in Freehold, I was pushing 22k hps and still had one member die with the others dangerously low at 10 to 20%. I dont know if this was due to the heavy aoe or just people standing in fire, but it was stressful none the least.
Grievous is not the hardest affix to deal with, but its certainly my least favourite as a healer. once you fall behind its almost impossible to catch up without draining your whole mana bar.
I was running with ward, sotf, germ and stonebark, however in hindsight I should have swapped stonebark for inner peace for that shorter tranq cd.
Tranq = stack clear.
Asking your party to drink with you in between pulls to clear stacks also helps, as does having a tank who is consious of your mana bar. This is mythic 101 for dummies, but this level of communication is more crutial on grievous or bursting weeks since your job as a healer doesnt simply end when the last mod dies.
1 Like
Grievous just sucks for druids, Underrot is a rough dungeon, on the 2nd boss when he does his tantrum, it deals a ton of damage and puts everyone into grievous, and hots just are not enough anymore to heal people when they have a 5 stack of grievous.
I choose Germination and Abundance for this week or with pugs. I find that two rejuvenation allows me to offset the grievous and then some. Then people are topped off with wild growths or directly with regrowth. If I’m desperate to get someone other than tank up I’ll also pop Lifebloom on them and then Swiftmend. Keeps me going through my weekly +10
4 Likes
Yes, I’m finding Cragmaw to be especially difficult. Granted I have been pugging it, but this is the first time I haven’t been able to heal through the mistakes with this affix. They should rename it the Anti-Pug Affix.
I think the answer is to have a boat-load of off healing. Pally tank, Warlock, Boomkin talented into resto affinity, leaving one spot open for rogue of course because mandatory.
2 Likes
Prosperity, SOTF, Inner Peace and flourish. Dont be afraid to tranq and flourish on CD. Remember not to rely on our garbage HOTS, just RG spam is all you can do really. I stack crit instead of mastery on my resto, just so i can save the GCDs of hotting someone up before i RG them. A switftmend + RG can top someone for their entire health bar, so dont be afraid to let someone get low while maintaining someone else.
Does this still hold up in BfA? I’ll give it a shot tonight, Reaping waves were completely killing us, we totally blew the timer but managed to finish (+10).
Prosperity + Soul of the Forest feels mandatory for this affix, there was nothing I can do to save a Pally tank with 4 stacks of Grievous (my gear level is ~405) and my default talents.
1 Like
Did a +7 underrot last night with a druid healer. I’m not sure how he did it really. I healed between pulls when I could but feral can only cast so many regrowths with the mana we have with that spec.
Brutal.
The thread is from BFA. You have double Waking Dream. The standard CW-Cultivation-Sping-Photo should be more than fine for it.
If you want to play really safe, Guardian affinity.
2 Likes
Hey Drez! Can you do us all a favor and link your Druid on here. I’d love to see some of your logs. You know, see the master in action.
4 Likes
I ran with a group that did a shrine and they loved taking failure damage. Also a squishy tank too boot. The group fell apart when the tank bailed because everyone blew their interrupts at the same time on the second boss and the same scenario played out over the next 4 pulls. The grievous DoT wasn’t too bad and I was consistently topping them off for the most part.
I only changed out of CW for abundance because getting your group all hotted up with better regrowth healing works quite well.
Cragmaw is a fight where I would rejuv everyone then wild growth right before he starts the tantrum phase and runs everywhere. CD coordination is key to makin that fight smooth. Have dps use defensives on one tantrum and use tranq on the next one.
Little details such as this is what makes or breaks keys.
My druid is my main alt 406 up to +13 key. I am not an expert but I would recommend:
abundance
cultivation
inner peace
germination
I prefer this in general for M+ (I change up cultivation sometimes) but especially for grievous week. I try to avoid relying on long cool downs and prefer a more constant predictable healing schedule because that is how grievous works. If the worst affix is reaping then working around longer cooldowns is good becuse you can save them for the moment every 4-5 minutes that causes most of the problems. For example on my Priest I always spec Holy Word Salvation because it can be a life saver during reaping.
Anyway, double rejuv (germination) and abundance are great and relatively cheap on mana so I rejuv liberally. When in trouble have hots up and wild growth into tranq. Being able to do this every 2 minutes is great. If you are alchemist use alchemist stone to boost mana potions. Hopefully you can get your group to eat between every few pulls while you drink. Only few seconds here and there should be needed.
Of course a group that takes a low amount of unnecessary damage will often be the biggest factor irregardless of the affix.
2 Likes
Is this a joke?
Is this also a joke?
Care to expand on why you think it is a joke? I explained my reasoning. If there is a flaw in it I would love to know. I have no problems with being “wrong” if it means I can learn and get better.
That being said, I never have a problem pumping out tons of rejuv with germination in M+ in terms of mana. With more rejuv abundance makes regrowth relatively cheap which you might use more in certain affix as a druid.
I explained for grievous I prefer talents that work on a more constant basis since grievous is always active. If there is a more logical approach I am listening.
1 Like
I tried germination even last patch for grevious, and it burns though mana faster than anything. I think that is the main point.
The main drawback of the Germ build, in addition to being so costly as far as GCD usage goes, is that it drains mana pretty hard. Especially compared to the options right next door, photo and flourish (although of course, flourish in keys would also be a bad joke)
The whole point of Photo is that it’s not only high healing to the group, but it’s passive and constant. The reason for CW is having a decent CD for healing with low mana cost for it’s healing. The reason for spring blossoms is a free additional heal, which both is more healing in itself and more power to your mastery.
Maybe I am under appreciating photo. On a week like grievous I assume you lifebloom yourself to benefit the group since everyone has the grievous debuff. Without lifebloom on the tank doesn’t the tank in return need more regrowths to keep up? Would Cenarian Ward then be good as a replacement for lifebloom on the tank… but then at the cost of more expensive regrowths.
I really have had no issues with germ this entire exp pack but it is possible I was healing lower keys during the last grievous and and under estimating the mana cost at 10+.
Will be doing some m+ this weekend so this is all useful for me.
1 Like
Also, I imagine spring blossoms vs inner peace depends on the dungeon and group comp? Sometimes you can’t rely on most of your group fitting into your Efflorescence right? Is this even a question for grievous or is blossoms always better?
Edit: Now that I am thinking through this other build for m+ I can see how things work together in a more efficient manner. I have not really had a need for more mana efficiency and honestly have always been kind of blown away with how much mana I always have on my druid… but I have a feeling I would be feeling the pain with this affix this week if I was not getting this feedback so thanks for taking the time.
Mana expenditure should really be a concern on M+ with https://www.wowhead.com/item=163692/scroll-of-subsistence available for only 50s each?
I mean, you can always drink between pulls up to the point when the tank is requiring to be healed, and our mobility helps us catching up if the group moves a bit out of range.
Some pulls are harder than others, but playing in the most inefficient way shouldnt be draining 100% of your mana every trash pull.
For me a few seconds of drinking between pulls has always been enough to keep my mana above the 50~60% range