The Destiny of Velious beta is over and all changes that are going to made out in the open, however one thing that I see missing still is the group utility that a warden so desperately needs to be wanted in raids. Before I continue I will say this wardens are beyond doubt the BEST solo healers for heroic content, we can solo extremely well and have the highest heal output potential of any healer, with our mythical buff we never run out of power unless its a extremely heavy power draining fight. I will also say that warden do have a a lot of death preventatives: Cyclone – 10 seconds absorb all stoneskin Infuriating Thorns – 12 second stoneskin that absorbs 3 hits Tunare's Grace – Death Intervention with 2 triggers (Group AE but only triggers on 1 person) Nature's Renewal – Death Intervention with 2 triggers (single target only) Tortoise Shell – Group wide AoE blocker Rebirth – self (none controllable) resurrection on death I am not saying that wardens are completely useless cause we aren't we are fantastic healers, however the problem is that we don't have a specific role in raids. Although we do have defensive buffs templars and defilers have much better defensive buffs (and debuffs although more defiler on that one) the main time that wardens are currently being used is when a third healer is needed in the main tank group. Now I'm sure many of you are thinking well you can't get a main tank position, how about healing a dps group. This one is simple the only groupwide offensive buff a warden has is plus WIS and AGI, we have Instinct but this is only single target and only useful for a tank or scout every other healer class has better group wide offensive buffs avaliable to them: Defiler: Group Aura of Haste : 20% attack speed to group (AA) Shroud of Armor : 5% Crit Bonus to group (AA) Single Vehemence: Increases STR of group (buffs dps for fighters) Invective: Proc disease damage on combat hits Ritual of Alacrity: increases ability reuse, ability casting speed and ability recovery speed by 33.3% (AA) Fury: Group Energy Vortex : Reduces fury's healing amount by 50% and increases the critical damage of all spells by 10% (AA) Fae Fire : deals damage on any attack Forest Spirit : Increases INT and WIS of group (buffs dps for mages and priest) Single Animal Form : Increases attack speed, melee damage and melee attack skills on a mage or priest ally (AA) Lucidity : Increases INT (buffs dps for mages) Primal Fury : Procs increased DPS, Haste, ability casting time, STR, AGI, WIS and INT. Spirit of the bat : Increases AGI (buffs dps for scouts) Thornskin : Does piercing damage when target is hit. Inquisitor: Group Act of War : Procs divine damage on any hit Divine Recovery : Increases Ability Recovery Speed and Ability Casting Speed of group + potency (AA) Fanatical Devotion : When Inquisitor damages a mob can proc divine damage for group (AA) Fanatism : Increases haste, INT, AGI, STR, WIS, Ability reuse + 10% MA (with red adorn) Tenacity : Increase DPS (groupwide with red adorn) Single Chilling Invigoration : When target takes damage does cold damage (AA) Mystic: Group Aura of Haste : Adds 20% haste to group (AA) Spirit of the Mammoth : Increase STR of group (buffs dps for tanks) Spiritual Warding : Procs MA (myth buff) Stampede of the Herd – Hitting target will cause extra crushing damage (AA) Single Ancestry : Adds a trigger chance of 3% (AA) Bolster : Increases all attributes of target Ritual of Alacrity: increases ability reuse, ability casting speed and ability recovery speed by 33.3% (AA) Templar: Group Aegolism : Increases melee stats + haste defense, parry, deflection and aggression (with myth buff this also makes groupwide) Blessings : Increases trigger percent chance by 20% relative to its base value (AA) Divine Recovery : Increases Ability Recovery Speed and Ability Casting Speed of group + potency (AA) Single Divine Light : Reflects 4% of damage (myth buff) Virtue : Increases STR and WIS (buffs dps for fighters and priests) Warden: Group Favour of the Wild : Increases AGI and WIS of group (buffs dps for scouts and priests) Single Infuriating Thorns : does piercing damage when target is damaged Instinct : Increases melee stats, procs piercing damage on melee hits + increases MA and accuracy (with red adorn) + hate gain/loss depending on class (AA) Spirit of the bat – Increases AGI – (buffs dps for scouts) Thorncoat – Procs piercing damage when target takes damage. I have only added the offensive part of each buff but as you can clearly see wardens are at a detriment compared to the other classes with group buffs, including the other defensive buffers. This fact means we aren't getting spots to heal dps groups in raids. We could heal off tanks of course however the offensive healers, inquisitors, furies and mystics can do it just as well and bring good utility to the group. We know Spirit of Druidism is being added for Velious but this just won't be enough to get us a raid spot especially considering that on many encounters wardens do very little dps and quite a few won't even take the aa. What wardens want to know is are the developers aware of this issue (you should be after all the discussion on beta boards but you never know) and if so what are your plans to change the situation?
It's the same as it's been for a long time. In a raid that's min/maxing after the raid force is well-geared, they don't have any reason to take a Warden because other healers heal as well, and we don't buff anything that's useful. Agreed, if Instinct was groupwide, you'd want a Warden for every raid.
