Help a Baby Bear out ... Bear Healing build/role in raids... rotations/thoughts/tips

[kegene]

Like the title said ... looking for some starter advice/discussion on healing role and general rotations in raids/groups. Trying to learn and better my play.

I'm a returning player who has been gone for quite some years ( 100ish warden and 80/90's minstrel/champ).
When Beo was first released I played one solo into the 30's.

Just came back to legendary server and rolled a Beo (new server, new start, new class)....
I've found myself at lvl 50, in a Kin that runs rift/hele etc... T1 runs go mostly smooth. T2 Rift is a little frantic.

I searched on the forum here, but didn't find much that wasn't very old, so wanted to get a pulse on what others are doing as a starting reference point.

Current Spec
Gear: mostly teal crafted lvl 50 gear. Still running that axe from my class quest.

Trait Tree: Yellow, tried to pick things that helped with healing (skipped takedown, raging blows, fear)
THinking of adding in the Blue Hearten wrath generation skill, but usually I am mostly ok on wrath.

Deeds: Zeal, innocence, discipline, honour, fortitude most are above 6 ( still grinding this)
This gets my health right at 10k w/o buffs.
physical mitigation to 60% but my tactical is down at 30%.
May adjust some to get tactical mit up some.


General Rotation:
Pre-combat: Rush and Biting to get wrath to 100. then start in bear form. Mark of Grimbeorn on someone ( still not sure who is best to mark). Usually our raid has 2-3 bears, so not sure if this stacks, or we should all have different targets.

Normal Combat: thrash, natures mend, rush non stop. bee's if wrath is 70+, interrupt if needed. Mark of B on target.
rejuvenating bellow if multiple fellows green bars are not 100%, encouraging roar if only 1 needs topped off.
Anytime Wrath is 100 I'll do Cleanse / Relentless Maul for DPS and top off.
If RM drops me to below 20 wrath, I'll switch to man and melle back up to 100 wrath.

Emergencies: Frantically click any healing skill that is avail and try not to die. =)



SO How do you fine bears trait for healing? What general rotations do you use?
THanks in advance.

[dsltn07]

Depending on the run and group, if you have a main tank primarily taking damage you want to mark them and use encouraging roar 3 times on them for the T3 HoT. Maintain this by reapplying roar before the HoT drops. Bellow can then be used to top off fellows. Hearten also helps with marked tank maintenance as the wrath cost is refunded, with blue hearten trait it will generate 30 wrath. Keep your yellow bee debuff up at all times unless you’re struggling to heal/out of wrath. Remember to periodically return to man form and use biting/mend/hearten/ferocious roar, this will generate +110 wrath over the next 10 or so seconds for you to use. If the fellow/raid is in trouble or takes a large AoE hit, then maul can be your friend, but it can be interrupted and will cancel at or below 20 wrath.

Focus on healing first, then debuffs. Your dps will be severely lacking to the point it’s not worth troubling with. If you’d like to get into melee use slash traited yellow for +outgoing healing and thrash for a bit more wrath maintenance. You can fear ranged mobs and I would trait takedown if you have the points for a little breathing room if something bothers you.

[Estelrandir]

dsltn07 said it very well:

• if possible, be in melee for slash´s +15% outgoing healing and easier wrath generation
• t3 hot from encouraging roar on tank
• heal before debuffs. Dps play no role

To the equipment: probably there is no heavy armor with outgoing healing (not sure for lvl 50), thus the essence gear would help you better, where you could slot outgoing healing essences.

You can also use will jewellery with outgoing healing to boost it instead of might jewellery.


To more bears - honestly, I never played in the group with more bears, so I can´t say what is stacking and what not. But even with two beo healers one should communicate who takes responsibility for the main tank. Then this one has his mark on main tank. If there are two tanks, the other beo can take the second tank. If not, you can choose a dd and rather use vicious claws to grant him +15%dmg.

[ColMcStacky]

What both Estelrandir and dsltn07 both said is very true.

As for healing rotation in a group, I don't know what others do, but here is what I generally do:

1. Pre-combat: Mark tank with Mark of Grimbeorn. Start combat at 100 Wrath and in bear-form. If you can, try to have the t3 HoT from Encouraging Roar on the tank already.
   
   
2. Bear-form rotation: At start of combat, get ready for the tank to take a big hit, and then hit Encouraging Roar. Next, either Bees and/or Armour Crush, then Rejuvenating Roar, then another filler skill, then Encouraging Roar again. Drop to man-form.
   
   • I tend to save Relentless Maul as a cooldown heal, only using it when the group is taking heavy AoE damage, my other heals are on cooldown and the tank will die without help, or something else is running amuck. Unless I need heals myself, I almost always use Nature's Bond on whoever is most desperate for heals just before Relentless Maul, as that will nearly double the healing the tank receives, at the cost of your own self-healing.
   • Keep in mind, Nature's Bond has a 40m range, unlike every other heal you have which are 20m. As such, you can use Nature's Bond on a target out of range, then heal yourself if you want to heal them without moving. 70% of the heals you receive will be transferred to your Nature's Bond target, so you can keep someone up who is kiting this way relatively easily, at least while the mark lasts.
   
   
3. Man-form rotation: Start with Nature's Mend if immediate healing is needed. If not, then do Slash followed by Nature's Mend. Then either Hearten or Ferocious Roar (depending on cooldowns), then either Biting Edge or Slash (depending on the Slash buff duration and amount of Wrath you need). By this point, Nature's Mend is back off cooldown. Use it, and return to bear-form.

This rotation goes by fast enough that your debuffs have a pretty substantial uptime (although they won't be used 100% off cooldown) and your Slash buff doesn't expire before you use it again (unless you're breaking rotation). You maintain your Wrath this way so you don't bottom out easily, and most of your heals are going to be used off cooldown to make sure you don't fall behind.

It's not perfect, but it works for me in any content I've run so far. Keep in mind, sometimes you have to break rotation, and it isn't a bad thing. Because of fight mechanics, positioning, stuns/dazes/whatever, etc., you sometimes can't heal. Also, sometimes you need to use buffs or cooldowns, swap heal targets, save heals for a bit, etc., and it makes it so you can't stick to this rotation. If that's the case, then it means you're learning how to play the class better than just following what some random guy on the internet said.


As to your situation with a raid having multiple bears, are all of them healing? If so, I would put one Mark of Grimbeorn on either tank, as the tank will get the most benefit out of the mark with its proc chance at a percentage heal since they are (hopefully) taking the most damage. This holds true in any situation really. You want to mark whoever will be taking the most damage in the group. This mark does stack however if the fight only requires one tank, so multiple Beorning healers can mark the same target without issue.

To more bears - honestly, I never played in the group with more bears, so I can´t say what is stacking and what not. But even with two beo healers one should communicate who takes responsibility for the main tank. Then this one has his mark on main tank.

I don't know about everything, but I know for a fact that Armour Crush and Debilitating Bees don't stack with each other, they get overwritten. This happens regardless of which one is more potent; the weaker one can overwrite the stronger one if one Beorning doesn't fully trait either of these. Mark of Grimbeorn and Mark of Beorn both stack last I've checked, but this was before the class update. This may have changed since. Sacrifice doesn't stack I'm pretty sure, it overwrites the older one regardless of how it is traited in my experience. Nature's Bond does stack. I'm not sure about anything else.

[kegene]

Thank you.
This gives me a great start to improving my play.
I also recently learned that I was capped at 60% on my physical mitigation, and tactical was only 35%.
Starting to deed up some tactical mitigation as well.