Healer Rotation & Cooldowns

This rotation offers a general priority list for Restoration Shaman abilities, along with key cooldowns at the bottom. It's based on a standard build and is here to help while we work on a smarter, build-aware system. If you are very new to the game or this class, we added info on the new assisted rotation features at the bottom of this guide. Updated for the latest patch in World of Warcraft: Midnight Pre-Patch (12.0.1).

Single Target

Ensure Water Shield and Earth Shield are active before the encounter begins.

• Healing Stream TotemView detailsUse as an emergency heal or when at max charges.
• Unleash Life and Ancestral SwiftnessView detailsTo spawn Ancestors and buff your next heal.
• Chain HealView detailsUse on allies with Riptide for group healing.
• RiptideView detailsCast on cooldown.
• Healing WaveView detailsHeal injured players, prioritizing those with Riptide or Earth Shield.

Maintain Water Shield and Earth Shield. Use Healing Stream Totem for emergencies or at max charges. Cast Unleash Life and Ancestral Swiftness to enhance healing. Use Chain Heal for group healing and Riptide on cooldown. Heal single targets with Healing Wave, prioritizing those with Riptide or Earth Shield.

AoE

• Healing Stream TotemView detailsUse as an emergency heal or when at max charges.
• Healing RainView detailsPlace where allies will remain for its duration.
• Chain HealView detailsUse on allies with Riptide for group healing.
• RiptideView detailsCast on cooldown.
• DownpourView detailsUse for burst healing in Surging Totem radius.

For AoE healing, use Healing Stream Totem for emergencies or at max charges. Place Healing Rain strategically. Use Chain Heal on Riptide targets and cast Riptide on cooldown. Utilize Downpour for burst healing within Surging Totem's radius.

Cooldowns

• Spirit Link TotemView detailsRedistributes health and reduces damage for allies in its area.
• Healing Tide TotemView detailsHeals all allies within range, scaling with fewer targets.
• AscendanceView detailsBoosts healing effectiveness of Healing Wave and Chain Heal.
• Natures SwiftnessView detailsProvides an instant, Mana-free cast every minute.
• Unleash LifeView detailsAmplifies the next Healing Wave, Riptide, or Chain Heal.

Use Spirit Link Totem to redistribute health and reduce damage. Deploy Healing Tide Totem for group-wide healing. Activate Ascendance to enhance Healing Wave and Chain Heal. Use Natures Swiftness for instant, Mana-free casts, and Unleash Life to amplify your next heal.

New to Class? Try Assisted Rotation

Patch 11.1.7 introduced new features that make it eaiser to pick and play new characters. These new settings can be enabled from settings » gameplay enhancements:

• Single-Button Assistant
• Assisted Highlight
• Cooldown Manager

If you are new to World of Warcraft or a certain class, enabling Assisted Highlight and Cooldown Manager can help you learn which abilities to prioritize and use.

While the Single-Button Assistant can be a much easier and more accessible way to play the game, it does come with a slight performance hit due to a small GCD penalty, as you will have to wait 25% longer in between spells and abilities.

To see which specs are best with the Single-Button Assistant feature, you can check out our DPS Rankings which uses SimC to sim every class using this feature.