New Preservation evoker here. Is there good alternative for “'Verdant Embrace”? It seems to be quite strong instant single target healing and interacts with “Call of Ysera”.
'“Fly to an ally” might be problematic for certain mechanics IMO, e.g. tentacles for the last boss in Plaguefall, and frontals mechanics in M+ for upcoming Dragonflight.
I usually don’t pay too much attention about where the team members are, and mainly use the Raid Frame style party frame to see if people are in range, so “Fly to an ally” thing might just send me to those mechanics…
I’m wondering if there is alternative for this spell. It seems to be in all the recommended builds.
One thought if you want to use it is to echo another player and verdant embrace yourself. This can apply the heal to the player without having to fly to them. Although it does require an extra step.
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That’s cool trick, but it does require additional setup as you said.
Do people thing this “Fly to ally” thing useful in PvE content? or more like annoyance?
I’m using it as a self heal to avoid the flight headaches. I want the 40% buff it applies, and I want to stay topped off so my Mastery modifier applies to the people I heal.
/cast [@player] Verdant Embrace;
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Echo it on your target and cast VE on yourself. It’s a bit wasteful and requires an extra global, but it’s safe and your target will also benefit from lifebind for additional heals.
It’s essentially a weaker version of swiftmend, it’s primary function is actually the empowerment effect on your next dreambreath or living flame.
Frankly I kinda suspect the skill might get changed and the movement removed from the skill pretty quick, I see lots of extremely good healers getting themselves killed with it, so the utter carnage and complaints that are inevitable to follow from the masses getting themselves killed with it in the first few weeks and months should be something special.
Expanding on the prior post…
A combo I like with two macros:
- Hit the first one once to heal youself with the big 309.6% spell power VE.
- The second gets hit twice but both spells land on your target at about the same time, Echo hits first and applies it’s mod, for a big 793% spell power healthblast (before other modifiers like mastery to make it bigger)……
/cast [@player] Verdant Embrace;
/castsequence reset=2 Living Flame, Echo;
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Evoker being what it is, you are closer in range to your teammates than with other ranged healers. Usually when you cast v.embrace it’s to follow it with a dream breath so it just makes sense to be next to your target.
I played a bronze spec too and almost never used v.embrace so really there is not just one gameplay possible. You can toss some high heals with other spells
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This thread speaks to what i’ve been saying since beta. There are spells in the toolkit that just don’t feel worthwhile even having on your bars. You have to pick things in the tree to get to other things, and then take them off your bars to make more space because they’re basically useless.
I can’t even see how this explanation of yours would work though.
If you’re a mid-range class and your empower aoe heals are in a cone, then why would you want to swoop to another player and cast it? You would be too close to the people you’re healing and miss half of them.
I know a lot of people like the spec, and I found it much better to level with than devastation on beta (because of survivability), but there are abilities that I did not use in beta, and still haven’t used on live… So much so that I can’t bring myself to even spec in to the healer tree. It’s just not interesting with so much trash in the toolkit.
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Thanks for all the input. I wish they would either:
- split this spell into 2: only heal don’t fly to ally, the other one just fly to ally so that people who wants it can still have it.
- Or make this spell unimportant, so that we can ignore this spell completely. I’m worried that if I don’t use this spell, I may lose too much healing compared to other Evokers who use it. It is highest Healing Per Second instant spell + Call of Ysera interaction.
I don’t know what Preservation abilities you’ve found to be useless, but the main button you never press is Disintegrate. Aside from that, what else have you found to actually be useless?
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Like what? The only thing I don’t use in Preservation spec is disintegrate, and even that has a use if you spec into it for mana regen.
There isn’t much fat in the spec.
Just got myself killed for last boss in Junkyard when trying to save an ally with “Verdant Embrace” spell. Got caught in [Cannon Blast].
Will try this spec again in the future if this spell is “fixed”.
Exactly why I macro this to a self only heal. I actually find it works out quite nicely. Keeps me topped off for the mastery bonus, and gives me the buff.
I havn’t yet missed not tossing it on other people. Definitely don’t miss flying into whatever bad they’ve decided to stand in. What I would miss is Echo and Temporal Anomaly+Echo… Absolutely love those. Heck, really dig the whole kit.
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I have a love/hate relationship with VE.
I really wish they’d let you get the 30% absorb (like you get with Rescue) for 2 seconds or whatever after using it on another player or make you immune while gliding or something. I can’t tell you how many times in beta I would use the spell only to get immediately slapped by something and die, or I’d die mid-flight from flying over junk on the ground that apparently still ticked on me and slaughtered my face off. It was annoying, to say the least.
At the same time, strategically utilizing it to get across the battle field is kind of nice too.
But, ultimately, I wish they’d address the fact that you almost have to put yourself in harms way to get the most use out of the spell.
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The main reason verdant embrace is good is because of lifebind, lifebind is so incredibly strong, especially in M+, and it has already been causing me issues with zipping through stuff on the floor. I really hope we get a glyph that removes the “fly to an ally” part of the spell, make it more like swiftmend from druids or something.
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I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. This sounds like more of a you issue than anything. There’s not really any button bloat at all for either spec. And, at least for Preservation, there’s not a single “useless” spell that they have. Everything has a purpose and their spells often synergize with others.
You just gotta play around with the class more to get comfortable with it, as it’s unlike anything before it.
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I have a complicated relationship with it. I have it keybound twice as an @player and a @mouseover to avoid messy mistakes. The quick repositioning it allows is just as strong as its healing potential, but I don’t always want to reposition.
This is the real problem. People are immediately saying it’s bad but yet they haven’t actually had time to acclimate to it. If you use it on a player that just took a giant chunk of damage they most likely got hit by a mechanic so if you rush to them immediately you’re probably gonna get hit by that same mechanic. Instead, use a LF or Echo to get them stable, cast it on yourself like others have mentioned, and have echo do the healing.
An example I have used it on is during the chain bridges in the Sylvanas fight, just flat out charged through the chain at someone on the other en, which allowed me to spend that time empowering a heal and reduced my chance to fall by 100%!
This spell actually used to belong to mistweaver monks and was one of the more fun ways of healing in pvp. This can also get you out of harms way if Hover is on cd. When specced into making Dream Breath 40% more powerful, it becomes huge. But like some have said, there are many ways to play the spec, you can absolutely find a way to live without it.