Furry Feathers and Flora: Ins and Outs of Rebirth

As a frequenter of WoW.com, there are sometimes a few articles that make me think (although most of these days with beta and that, most of the articles are focused on that). Raid Rx and Matt Low recently talked about 5 reasons why you don't get healed, and went on a little about how Rebirth can be used more than just simply getting someone alive again. For this blog, I'll be referring to Rebirth as its common abbreviation BR (battle res).

Rebirth is a powerful tool that can give attempts on bosses a second chance in beating the encounter. It allows a near-instant (or in some cases, instant) way of bringing someone back to life. When a Druid casts it, the player will be brought to the location where they casted it, not their current location when the player accepts the res. This means that you have to keep an eye on when you cast it, and where. For example, you don't want to use BR when an ooze is exploding on Rotface, or BRing someone on the edge of the platform on LK before it crumbles away, etc. Essentially, you definitely need to move away from the fire before you even decide to BR someone.

The second thing that's noteworthy about the BR is that when the person comes back up, they'll be at low health and mana (if they use that resource). If they don't accept the res straight away, they'll need to announce when they'll accept it, so healers can be on the ball to heal them back up so the player doesn't bite the dust again. Also, it is the Druid that BR'd's responsibility to either Innervate, or call out for someone to Innervate the low-mana player.

So you've got multiple Druids who can BR, who should do it first, and not waste an important cooldown such as BR? While it's not set in stone, depending on encounter or whatever (Halion phase 3 for example, where Druids are preferred to be in the Twilight phase due to their AoE healing superiority), however you'll generally find the priority list of BRs will come from:

1. Balance Druids (as ranged, they'll be less likely to be in fire, and can also reach anyone with relative ease)
2. Kitty Druids (also DPS, so they can take a few steps back, cast the BR and get straight back into combat after, missing a bit of DPS is better than missing a heal)
3. Trees (they'll be the first to know when someone bites the dust, but still they should be behind the DPS, as they'll probably be busy keeping tanks alive, and by ressing someone it could cause someone else to not receive their heals and then die)
4. Bears (these will barely ever have to BR, being last in priority, but it doesn't mean that they can't res. Either the off-tank can momentarily take the Druid's target, or the Druid can pop all their survival cooldowns, let healers know and quickly shift out and BR and go back into bear form after).

It also helps, I find, if you macro your Rebirth to also spam raid chat with a message to tell people that you are BRing at that particular moment. It allows other Druids to cancel their BR so that multiple BRs aren't wasted in waiting for a raider to jump up. If you begin to cast it and decide against it, for reasons of moving out of the fire or that someone's taken spike damage, again let the raid know in some fashion, so that other Druids can step up to the plate.

Another call of judgement for both Druids and raid leaders alike are who to BR, and when to do it. Usually you'll need to BR someone as soon as possible, although some encounters or at some points in an encounter, you'll need to wait a few seconds. These can include high incoming DPS phases, where it's almost likely the ressed will get killed straight away again, on Festergut when the target won't get any Inoculation before the abomination farts, or on Lich King at 11%. If the faeces hits the rotating device before there's a chance to react, then it might be better off to save the BR for the next attempt anyway.

As for the person receiving a BR, please please please can you let the raid know, or do a countdown (allowing time for lag on Vent/TS/Skype) on when you'll pop back up. Also, keep an eye out on where you'll be popping up at too - jumping up in a Marrowgar Coldflame quickly brings many raid leaders' and druids' palms to their faces as you overdramatise your demise and go back to watching the ants on the floor. Seriously, for me the game turns into slow motion. For a final point, if you do die and think it's time for a little break of alt-tabbing or going AFK, let the raid know so that a BR isn't wasted.