Post Patch 4.0 Musings - Resto Shaman

I am bored.


I really am.  Of all the changes made to every class (some catastrophic, others not so much) i find that the shaman falls into the category of not so much. 

What i did before the patch:
On me - water shield and earthliving weapon.
On tank - earth shield.
I am missing a few totmes.  but that's ok.  my elementals are there.  my bloodlust is there.  i'm missing the tidal something waves spell that gives my spells crit in emergencies. but that's fine.  now its a little more built into a talent so that if my guy's low on health, i do some auto-crits anyway.   that takes the thinking out of that. They played around with my healing waves a bit.  now i dont even use lesser healing wave.  or that instant spell they gave me that ate up my mana (kinda like what every healer gets now, right?).  No, now all i use is riptide and healing wave.  greater healing wave is new to me and is added for those ohsht moments where i forget that we're in a dungeon. 

i am glad they took away a few buttons and gave me a few more that i'll never use.  but whatever. now i am back to healing almost exactly as i did in the previous patch.  the names of some spells might have changed, but the whole shaman healing mechanic remained relatively unchanged.

Before Patch:
Earth shield the Tank (or whoever).
Riptide for insta-heals (trigger tidal waves).
Cast tidal wave hasted Healing Wave x2
Riptide for insta-heals
Cast tidal wave hasted Healing Wave x2
repeat repeat repeat.

Sometimes i add in a chain heal if i feel like changing things up a bit.
Earth shield the Tank (or whoever).
Chain heal on lowest dps with most strategic position (trigger tidal waves).
Cast tidal wave hasted Healing Wave x2
repeat x2139482303.

After the Patch:
Please see above.



So what did change?

What i noticed first and foremost was that i never run out of mana.  actually, i am healing on my shaman at level 70 last week (currently 74) and i almost never go below 90% mana even at the most demanding of times.  my mana regen is almost off the charts.  its completely crazy. 

Second thing i notice is there's a lot less DKs tanking now.  THANK ELUNE!!!!  and when i do get a DK, they're actually tanks and not DPS wannabee making our lives harder bs crap shit bitch yadayada people who cant be assed to wait in queue. 
Oh wait, this post is about my shaman.  sorry.

Honestly, besides the addition of Greater Healing Wave and the removal of that one CD i almost never used and cant be assed to look it up, NOTHING has changed in regards to Shaman Healing.

Oh and my talents got wiped and several new talents were added, things were removed, etc etc etc.  if you want more resto shaman healing detialed stuff, find a resto shaman blog.  as far as i can tell, the talent trees were blah and the new healing mechanics are even blaher.  See why im bored now?