Hey guys. My name is Daduke and I am new here. I've been poking around these forums for a few days while studying for finals and I am glad I found you guys. I can already tell that this is going to be a great source of information for me.

Anyways like I said I need support, for I am about to due the thing that pretty much everyone says not to do.


Level my druid Daduke as resto.

*gasps*

I am well aware that it is not the best spec to level with, I am not stupid, everyone and their mother tells me it is slow, which is fine, etc, I just...grr I need support! I know others have done it. :(

Back when world of warcraft first came out I leveled a holy priest to lvl 60. He was full holy. Everyone said that it was stupid, not to do it, that it would be slow, etc and you know what? It was somewhat slow but more often then not I got invited to any instance I wanted to because I was a holy priest, being picked over shadow priests or (at the time since i was allaince) paladins. It was tough but it was worth it in the end because I did something that wasnt the norm. I have a history for doing that. I leveled a combat rogue back before the revamp when combat rogues were seen as crappy, I leveled a paladin as prot back when they couldn't tank, I don't know why its what I like to do. Now I am wanting to level a druid resto and everywhere I turn people keep telling me how stupid and how much of an idiot I am for doing it.

I've already leveled a feral druid (not past 40 though) and yeah its fun and great for soloing, but im not going to do that here. These are the most common arguments I hear:

1.) You will suck at soloing

2.) Without some one to team with your leveling will be slow and painful

3.) Any healing class can heal lower lvl instances, so just go feral.

4.) You won't be able to pvp

5.) Just level as feral till you get 70 then respec.

This is my answer to those questions:

1.) I am currently only playing with my rogue friend. We both have mains that we raid kara with and see our rogue/druid combo as fun atm.

2.) Again, I am leveling with my rogue friend (no one seems to get this aspect. No matter how many times I say it they always seem to skip over it)

3.) I am well aware that for example, a shadow priest can heal SM, but I do not wish to be like other level 70 healers/tanks that JUST specced for it and don't know what the hell they are doing and wipe the group. Also, since druids have a 20 minute combat rez, I feel that I need to have SOMETHING special about me that would make a group pick me over a shadow priest or ret paladin healer, that would be that im resto.

4.) I always found healers to be the devil in bg's. THey tend to make their team win, and since I am not on a pvp server, I won't have to worry about pvp unless I join a bg.

5.) If I want to be a healer, but go feral until 70, I forsee these things happening: More often then not I will be forced to dps in groups so I won't get any healing experiance and when I do finally hit 70 and respect, I won't have the gear nor will I have the proper knowledge on how to heal as a druid which in turn will get my groups killed and me not invited back.

This isnt something I have decided spur of the moment. I have put a lot of thought into this, I just need support from others who have done this task. Like I said I will have someone to level with at all times and plan on doing a lot of instances so...yeah.

I do have a question though, if someone could please answer. I plan on pretty much going full resto tree and being a ToL druid, but now I am faced with a somewhat difficult choice. Do I take 5/5 naturalist next or 5/5 natures focus? 70% chance to avoid spell interruption or faster healing touch and more damage? I will take both eventually, the problem is which do I do now. Which will make me a better healer now?

Thanks in advance friends. I hope to learn a lot from you guys. Also, if you could, please refrain from saying that feral is the only way to go...I really am tired of getting that response from everyone. :(

A good person to ask is www.resto4life.com she leveled resto and is a wealth of info for resto druids.

I leveled Resto too. It wasn't bad and shouldn't be bad especially as you have a Rogue partner. Keep him healed, debuff and nuke. As you level mix in some +spell dmg cloth gear. Remember to put a Rejuv on your partner just before he engages the mobs so you won't have early heal aggro.

You'll find it pretty easy to get groups for instances as a healer too. It was always easier for me on my Druid than on my Hunter.

Remember this is a game don't let the idiots dictate to you how to have fun. The xp bar isn't a fun meter.

I levelled my currently-level-60 druid to mid-50s as full resto, and had very little trouble. However, I have a tendency to move ahead to the next zone almost as soon as quests are available to my level, so things started getting tough once I hit Silithus.

I respecced balance, and my levelling is going insanely easy now.

y idea behind this is, while I'm levelling, I'm only going to choose healing leather gear (and the occasional cloth piece if its THAT good). Most healing gear is still pretty suitable for a boomkin, so when I do reach 70 (or maybe even before that, as soon as I get lifebloom), I'll respec to resto again and have good resto gear as a result.

This is my second druid, levelled SOLELY for the purpose of having a resto druid in addition to my feral druid (who spent a lot of time raiding pre-BC as a resto druid), so I think i'll have the healing thing down pat once she hits 70. :D

Personally, I wouldn't put any points into HT talents until I went FULL into everything else I could. HT is useful at times but your HoTs are way more important MOST of the time.

If you have a rogue buddy, leveling will be incredibly easy. When I leveled my warrior, I made friends with a druid that was leveling resto, and we powered through zones ridiculously quickly. I'd pull 3-4 mobs at a time while he kept hot's on me and dropped occasional mf / sf's on the mobs.

If you plan on letting the rogue do a majority of the killing, dont even worry about naturalist. Natures Focus is incredibly helpful if for some reason you do pull aggro and need to get a regrowth off on yourself. As K said, don't worry about HT much... your hot's are stronger and cheaper.

With the lower amount of xp needed per level and the boost to quest xp it probably shouldn't be too bad to level resto.

As far as pairing up with a rogue, an added bonus is that you would both have stealth.

Pairing up with any high damage class would definately be worth your while though.

Thank you guys for your support. It is nice to hear from other druids that went resto as well and did fine. I think the thing most people werent getting was that I will only be playing with my rogue friend, which is a high dps class. I put a point into naturalist by accident so i'll have to respect but yeah it should be good!

I am probably going to end up putting all my points into resto, but the difficult thing is figuring out which talents are more important ot get first, as i do want ToL when I hit 50. I dont suppose anyone can draw me up a good 41 point resto druid talent spec to follow until i hit lvl 50 and then go back and get my missing talent points? ^_^

*edit*

I just did this up really quick. Would this be a good 41 spec to follow to 50?

http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=0ZZxVcxcsMe0t

I want the most efficent talent spec to follow to 50 so i can get ToL. I do plan on going back down after this and getting the other talents, is this okay or should i get other talents instead? I am kind of unsure about the HT talents...should i be getting those first since I can't use them once I get ToL? I am a little confused on how healing will be after ToL is gained.

TBH, ToL doesn't really shine incredibly until you get Lifebloom and a decent amount of spirit / +healing. Until then you can only cast Regrowth and Rejuv, swiftmending the latter. And ToL sucks for questing cause of the reduced movement speed. You will find yourself shifting in and out a lot, or just staying in human form.

Personally, I'd think a few points in balance would make things fun for you (enough to get insect swarm) so that you could at least dot things while the rogue killed them (the 2% reduced hit chance on mobs will help with the rogue's survivability as well). Those points in balance would also increase your survivability (Natures Grasp and 100% chance to avoid interruption while casting roots). I realize this isn't what you are planning on, but just thought i'd throw it out there. You may find that you are standing around doing nothing a lot while the rogue kills things (they are good at not taking too much damage what with stuns, evasion, etc), and want to throw up a dot or two out of pure boredom :P

I can't access talent calculators (I'm at work), but you will most likely want to pick up the talents that increase HoT's. I'll try to remember to put together a good 41 point resto build when I get home.

Thanks mate. I might pick up balance just to get the nature swarm, I dunno, but I appreciate the help with the talent point. I wouldnt be using ToL unless I was in an instance though.

Yeah, there's no reason to be full resto until you start doing the level 70 dungeons, IMHO.