How to be a Tree! Part Three: Gear, Gems and Enchants

All of the following is applicable as of patch 3.3.5.

In general, the following stats are desirable on any gear you pick up.

-Intellect and Spirit.

-Spellpower.
-Haste.

-Crit.

Due to our high haste requirements, pieces with haste are generally more preferable than pieces with crit. 

You will often see two types of stats on caster gear; gear with Intellect, Spellpower, Haste, and Crit, and gear with Intellect, Spirit, Spellpower, and Haste. The key trade in those pieces is Spirit and Crit. The pieces with only Intellect with crit on is typically aimed at caster dps (Boomkins in particular when on Leather gear). Because so much of our healing is based on our HoTs which, with the exception of the T9 four-piece bonus, cannot crit, crit rating is less useful. As spirit also feeds into our spellpower, the pieces with spirit on will often provide a greater increase in healing than pieces without spirit (even if the actual spellpower amount on the pieces are the same).

As mentioned in Specs and Glyphs, you will need approximately 850 haste without 3 points in Celestial Focus, and approximately 750 haste with 3 points in Celestial Focus.

Enchants.

The following enchants are generally best to use:

Helm: 

Arcanum of Blissful Mending (Spellpower and MP5) - Wyrmrest Accord

or, if mana regen is not an issue for you,

Arcanum of Burning Mysteries (Spellpower and Crit) - Kirin Tor

Shoulder:

Greater Inscription of the Crag (Spellpower and MP5) - Sons of Hodir

or, if mana regen is not an issue for you,

Greater Inscription of the Storm (Spellpower and Crit) - Sons of Hodir

Chest:

Powerful Stats (+10 to all Stats)

Gloves:

Exceptional Spellpower (+28 Spellpower)

Bracers:

Superior Spellpower (+30 Spellpower)

Leggings:

Brilliant Spellthread (+50 Spellpower +20 Spirit)

Boots:

Greater Spirit (+18 Spirit)

or

Tuskarr’s Vitality (+15 Stamina and Minor Run Speed Increase)

Belt:

Eternal Belt Buckle (Additional gem slot)

Cloak:

Greater Speed (+23 Haste)

Weapon:

Mighty Spellpower (+63 Spellpower to a one-hand weapon)

Greater Spellpower (+81 Spellpower to a staff)

There are also excellent profession-specific enchants which may be better than these enchants.

Gems.

Gemming priority is generally Spellpower, Haste, and Spirit.

-Runed Cardinal Ruby: 23 Spellpower (Fits a red socket)

-Reckless Ametrine: 12 Spellpower, 10 Haste (Fits a red or yellow socket)

-Quick King’s Amber: 20 Haste (Fits a yellow socket)

-Purified Dreadstone: 12 Spellpower, 10 Spirit (Fits a blue or red socket)

-Sparkling Majestic Zircon: 20 Spirit (Fits a blue socket)

-Ember Skyflare Diamond: 25 Spellpower and 2% Intellect (Fits a Meta socket)

Runed Cardinal Rubies are the most valuable gems for a tree and are the most desirable gem to use, particularly if you have already acquired enough haste through gear.

Until you start getting the Best in Slot pieces of gear, you will likely need to gem for haste as well. Personally, I prefer to use the Reckless Ametrine over a Runed Cardinal Ruby+Quick King’s Amber combo. This is because the Reckless Ametrine gems have 12 Spellpower and 10 Haste - two of these gems will get you 24 Spellpower, one more than a Runed Cardinal Ruby will get you. It adds up! So if you have two slots and were going to put in a Runed Cardinal Ruby and a Quick King’s Amber, try grabbing two Reckless Ametrine instead. Until you have enough haste, though, you may find you need to use a Quick King’s Amber regardless.

In my Resto gear, I like to pick up the socket bonuses where I can. If you find you can only pick up some of the socket bonuses, do try to get the ones with greater bonuses (ie, a +9 Spellpower bonus over a +5 one). This is often when I’ll use Purified Dreadstones - I’ll pop those into blue sockets to satisfy bonus requirements. The little bit of extra spirit is nice as it feeds into both our spellpower and our mana regen. I feel the Purified Dreadstone is more useful than the Sparkling Majestic Zircon, which is only spirit.

The Ember Skyflare Diamond is best for your meta gem.

That’s all on gear for now! Don’t forget to check out Spells and Strategies and Specs and Glyphs!

You can see the full guide altogether on the Guide to Healing page! I will try to keep that page updated with new patches and expansions along with the usual posts about changes on the normal blog.