I was thinking about all of the healers the other day, and I realized that Resto Shaman is the only healer without a truly unique mechanic or identity that separates it from other healers.
Mistweaver: Renewing Mist and Fistweaving are very unique spells and playstyles
Disc Priest: Atonement
Holy Priest: Holy Words (and the CD reduction cycle tied to it)
Druid: Heal Over Time (HOT) playstyle, now with Grove Guardians (pet healing)
Preservation: Echo (spells cast twice at a lower spell power on echoed players)
Holy Paladin: Glimmer. They keep building upon this spell and how it interacts with the toolkit since it was added in BfA (see: Daybreak)
Resto Shaman has…what exactly? I can’t even say that it has totems, because it shares that with the rest of the class (the above examples are truly unique mechanics that spec has that no one else does).
Shaman shares a button that’s very similar to other healers, and that’s Riptide. It’s a two charge instant heal like Renewing Mist (Monk) and Holy Shock (Paladin). I feel like this is where Resto Shaman needs a little love. I think Riptide should be built around and integrated more into how it functions within the class in a uniquely Resto Shaman way. Not sure how, but that’s my $.02.
But totems are available to both Elemental and Enhancement.
Holy Words aren’t a part of Disc or Shadow’s identity.
Atonement isn’t a part of Holy or Shadow’s identity.
Glimmer isn’t a part of Ret or Prot’s identity.
Echo isn’t a part of Dev or Aug’s identity.
Totems don’t count for resto shaman. Sure it has its own unique totems for various CDs, but it’s a class theme, not a unique spec core mechanic or interaction.
See, I’m still not going to agree with you. Each unique totem specific to resto shaman don’t have any meaningful interactions with the rest of the kit. They’re fire and forget.
Healing Tide Totem is like Emerald Communion or Divine Hymn. It’s a big CD, but it doesn’t function within the core spec mechanic for those respective healers.
All the other healers have their core mechanic introduced at the top of their spec tree. The totems for resto are not, because they’re standard cooldowns.
Riptide needs some kind of meaningful interaction with the rest of the kit to be on par with its peers, Renewing Mist, Holy Shock (and I would even add Echo to the list).
Hell, even healing stream totem isn’t unique to the spec.
It’s not a mandatory or core spell to the kit. If the first talent on the resto tree was a cloudburst totem (replacing HST) I would agree with you, but it’s not. It’s an optional talent that’s not even necessarily competitive. I would actually see this as a big step up for resto shaman and I think leaning into CBT as a spec identity would be a massive upgrade over what the spec has currently.
But so long as it’s optional I refuse to see it as a part of the core spec identity. None of the aforementioned comparisons can be talented out for the other healers.
Every class shares a class tree and does the same thing.
My argument is that Resto needs something to differentiate itself from other healers that’s a unique part of it’s specialization that’s NOT shared with the other specs it has.
Also your straw man fallacy of pointing out the other first talent nodes for other DPS specializations, not even comparing it to other healers (as if it supports your point), is moot. Nowhere did I say that the first talent node needs to be where the unique spec identity is developed. But it certainly cannot be an OPTIONAL talent node. It also just so happens that most of the healing spec peers (which resto should be compared to, not DPS specs) generally develop their unique spec flavor in that first talent.
I’m pointing out that Riptide doesn’t having any real meaningful interactions with the rest of the kit, and I think it absolutely should. You’re stomping your feet saying totems are enough, but I disagree. I don’t feel that it’s a unique enough mechanic for the spec to justify it being the unique identifier that separates it from not only other healers but other specs within the class, like the other healers have.
This just in: Specializations within a class have different cooldowns in their spec tree that aren’t in their class tree.
Just because resto has it’s own totems doesn’t mean it has a unique flavor or spec identity. This point of yours saying Resto has it’s own totems, which are “good enough” in your eyes towards this end, nullifies your own argument above, where you say that some Resto Druid HoTs are available to the other specializations, thus it’s not a unique core mechanic. Resto Druid has it’s own unique HoTs, thus it IS it’s own unique spec flavor if we go by your metrics for what makes a spec unique within it’s tree.
Anyways, I get more meaningful debate out of a brick wall.
Resto druid has ALWAYS been the HoT healer. It’s the core mechanic that guides the specialization and it’s mastery. Yes, it’s the HoT healer. It’s a completely unique healing playstyle that no other healer comes close to. It’s completely disingenous to suggest that resto druid isn’t unique in it’s HoT style gameplay. The HoTs available to the other specializations do not play a meaningful role in their kits or regular rotations, either.
The other healers have much more identified and unique spec identities, both amongst themselves and within their own class.
Maybe if Resto Shaman had something unique and interesting about it’s toolkit it would be more featured in mythic raiding and better represented in mythic plus in 20+ keys. Hmmm.
Ya’ll seem fine with your totems, meanwhile all I see are complaints about how the class is outdated and needs reworks. Pick your poison I suppose. I think Resto could use a little bit more of a unique identity to differentiate itself from other healers.
You mean the completely optional talent, thus not a core mechanic or part of the specialization? And said optional talent isn’t even necessarily competitive now? How is THAT a key part of resto if it’s completely optional?
Preservation IS in a terrible place, but that’s less to do with it’s core mechanic (Echo) and more to do with silly range limitations.
Sure, with a half dozen talents tacked onto it it has some interactions with the kit. Not in the way renewing mist enables mistweavers or holy shock/glimmer enables holy paladin, despite being a very similar CD/charge.
This entire post is so unbelievably disingenous, lol.
Even with a half dozen talents, Riptide is functionally less impactful and has less interactions with other abilities than renewing mist and holy shock.
Yes, preservation has a slew of issues NOT tied to its core mechanic for why it’s not better represented in m+. One, the range limitation. Two, the existence and dominance of augmentation.
You wanna know what’s funny? It’s the SHARED UTILITY between preservation and augmentation that makes preservation a difficult pick. It’s ALMOST like having shared utility between DPS and support specializations makes it less desirable. ALMOST like having shared utility (cough totems cough) is a problem that exists in other classes and should be avoided by, oh, I don’t know, having more unique specialization mechanics… AKA the whole point of the post?
Literally every healer has flavorful buttons and CDs, but neither of those are core to resto shaman. Continuing to cite the optional CBT as the unique spec identifier is not working, so I’m not sure why ya’ll keep bringing it up. I AGREE that it’s unique, and I would love to see it be the core mechanic of the class. But so long as it’s optional and halfway down the spec tree I refuse to see it as a core mechanic.
AKA the whole point of the post?