Hello friends.
TL;DR: find your class in the list because it’s a very long read, or check the first line for healer specific stuff. Rogue and Demo lock not mentioned due to personal bias and disgust.
Freebie tips to make your games easier. No need to sit through a 30 minute specific Skillcapped video. These are all simple yet game changing. As a healer I see most people don’t really do most of these, which actually make the game a lot more difficult. I’ll try to make it a short read as much as possible, and won’t include all specs. I’ll sort by class so it would be easier for you to find something useful for yourself instead of reading all of this wall of text.
I will firstly add some tips and tricks for Healer specs, since I play 3 different healers as well:
All healer specs:
- Dispel Destro warlock’s Immolate on cd. They need it as a modifier for shards and damage and will not do any damage before they have it on multiple targets. If you have an Aoe Dispel like Priest or Evoker, even better.
- Dispel Flame shock from Elemental Shaman, same as Destro from above
- Try to hold your trinket for more-important defensives to combine the trinket with. Trinket > Spirit link, Trinket > Void Shift, Trinket > Cocoon is usually better. If you are mostly free in the game you can use them anyway, but think of these as Last Resort options to save a person. Make sure to never trinket without having anything to do with it. If you trinket for something else, you will have to Pre-use these defensives before CC happens.
- Try to play on Pillars as much as possible to avoid CC and ranged interrupts. If your team pushes in to win, it’s okay to come with them, but overall try to make your position as far away from open field as possible, unless you are sure you can contribute to the win without getting hit by CC resulting in a loss
- Don’t panic commit big defensives when you can outheal the damage. No game should start with Cocoon / Void shift first global. Press less-meaningful defensives, and know that you can oftentimes just outheal the damage as some specs like Mistweaver.
All Warriors:
- Fear Demo’s tyrant when he spawns it, negates half the burst duration
- Fear teams which are stacked together as soon as possible in a game
- Intervene your healer early (so you eat the Sap instead)against a Rogue team then go get combat fast, you can Berserker rage the Sap
- Press Disarm / Intervene the moment you see a Rogue Shadow Dancing
All Shamans (mostly DPS):
Pay attention to the game for these.
- Press Grounding totem when you see your healer get pet stunned by a Hunter to ground the Freezing Trap
- Press Tremor totem when your healer gets hit by Sleepwalk by Evokers or any kind of Fear effect
- If you are close to a pillar and you use Lightning Lasso, go behind the pillar during the channel to not get interrupted
- When using Static field totem and moving it, throw your AoE stun totem in there / AoE root totem to make it even more annoying and provide a setup for yourself and your team
- Spec Curse removal against other Shamans to remove Hexes instantly
- Have a Focus kick macro for Wind Shear (very basic, but at lot of people don’t do this)
- Eat kicks for your healer by getting kicked on purpose with Hex casts, can even fake them (if you are DPS spec Shaman)
- When getting chased by melees on platform maps, jump from the edge, turn around and use your air jump ability to get back on the platform. Most of the times the melees would have jumped down to chase you and will have to take the long way back
All Hunters:
- Save your AoE Root trap for other pet classes
- Hug pillars and abuse your CC if melees are chasing you
- If a melee is getting too annoying, drag him behind a pillar and Root / Freezing trap him, can’t get dispelled and loses uptime, especially if no trinket
- Into Rogue Mage in 2v2, open the Mage from stealth while having a Freezing trap behind you, which will instantly trap the Rogue. Right after, use your 40% wall because the Rogue will likely trinket, and you won’t die with the wall + roar of sacrifice
- Against Holy priests, when they use Spirit Angel form, place a trap beneath them and they instantly get trapped when coming out of the Angel form
- On platforms when chased by melees, jump down and Disengage back up to the platform by turning around and using it, usually leaving the melee to fall down and have to walk the long way back
All DPS Druids:
- Play Curse removal talent vs Shamans
- Tank kicks for your healer with Cyclones, even better if you fake them
- Mass Root Demo warlock’s pet army, especially on Tyrant
- If your healer is Free, don’t camp Bear form. You are just a training dummy and a mana dumpster for your healer if you do, because your team cannot get pressure.
- Press Barkskin on high HP if you are the kill target and your healer isn’t free.
Windwalker monks (Ring of Peace tricks apply to Mistweaver as well):
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Don’t forget where your port is, and keep changing it based on where the fight is. Don’t waste 5 defensives instead of just porting and lining some burst damage
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Don’t press all your defensives at once. Try to cycle them appropriately based on how much damage is coming your way and how free your healer is
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Place your port on a Warlock’s port to chase them down more easily
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Use Diffuse magic into bursting Demon Hunters / Ret paladins. Most of their damage is Magical, even though they are melees.
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When people are close to eachother, you can place your Ring of Peace to knock somebody next to another person to get a multi-Leg sweep
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When against a Priest team, (especially Holy priests who have no Dome or Shadow priests) and you are hitting the non-Priest target, you can use Ring of Peace in behind the kill target before Leg Sweep to block the incoming Priest Grip to save the teammate.
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Ring of Peace can be used to block an Intervene or a Warrior Charge / Demon Hunter’s The Hunt as well.
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Against Rogue teams, put a Ring of Peace on top of yourself the moment your healer gets sapped, to negate the Rogue opener
All Mage specs:
- Alter time on high HP
- If you did Alter on low HP and get topped by your healer, cancel the Alter time because you will return to low HP
- Use Frost nova on Melees behind pillars
- Ring of Frost Demo Warlock / BM hunter burst
- Use Alter time when up on Platform maps, jump down, and pop it to go back up in case you are getting chased down
- Have a focus interrupt macro, destroys healers like Mistweaver, Holy Priest, Resto druid etc.
- Use Greater Invisibility as a short duration 60% dmg reduction wall when bursted in moments
- Get kicked on Magic schools you don’t need at the moment to freecast. For example, tank a kick as a Frost mage on Ring of Fire, then profit with freecasting Frost spells.
Ret paladin:
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Use your stun on healers most of the time, because otherwise it gets dispelled. ONLY stun kill targets instead if the healer is already in a CC and cannot dispel (example being your hunter Freezing trapping the healer, Warlock Fearing it etc)
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Have game awareness. Play Blessing of Sanctuary and make macros to remove Silence / Stun / Fear effects from your healers.
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Always remove Root Beams from Moonkins on your healers as fast as possible via Freedom / Sanctuary.
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If you are against a Priest team of any kind and you Bop yourself / Bubble, line of sight the Mass dispel or interrupt it. The same goes for any other class that receives Bop / Magic Bop from a Paladin and is against a priest, should avoid the Mass dispel.
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Press Shield of Vengeance / Divine protection on higher HP when people are bursting for more value
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Against casters on bigger maps, use the pillar more. The more you stay open field and have no burst, the more likely it is that you will lose.
DK DPS specs:
- Have a focus kick, focus stun and focus Strangulate macro
- If necessary, you can use Blinding Sleet on multiple targets defensively to make sure nobody on the team dies in scary moments
- Spam Chains of Ice on bursting Melees and use the pillar to avoid damage.
- If playing with a caster that is getting zugged by melees, Spams Chains + Death Grips on the melees to annoy them and peel them off your caster
- Don’t automatic IBF if you aren’t bursting and get stunned while not even being focused. Can come and bite you later on, especially if you become the kill target afterwards
Destruction and Affliction warlock (not listing Demo, braindead spec, sorry):
- After you put your Gate and Port at the start of the game, get distance from them so you can get value for escaping
- If zugged down by melees, Port first, Gate after, then Port again is the mobility rotation most of the time. There are other variations but this is the more generic one. If the map is small and you didn’t have time to get distance, Gate first, Port after.
- Don’t stack with your healer. You ruin their game with AoE CC and melee kicks on them as well.
- Have a focus interrupt macro for enemy healer
- If your healer is in long CC, after you Port, use the pillar to avoid line of sight and dmg
- Prioritize living and mobility over damage. Both specs are squishy if dmg is tanked too long, specially by heavy melees.
- Practice Fake casting as much as possible for Precognition
- Use Fel Domination into Summoning a Fel Hunter in key moments to kick a healer a 2nd time in a row
- On Platform maps, put Gate / Port on top, jump down and port back up to avoid dmg.
Demon hunter:
- Play undispellable Incap talent into Sub Rogues / 1 shot damage classes to negate the burst windows. If the guy trinkets, stun him right after
- Pay attention to your healer and play Reverse magic most games to instantly remove Fears, Root beams, Paladin stuns, Sheeps, Freezing traps. To ensure you get it off, Glimpse with Vengeful retreat and Fel rush to your healer to remove it as fast as possible
- Try playing Rain From Above into melee cleaves ( DO NOT PLAY INTO CASTER CLEAVES). It does a lot of damage and negates their dmg on you as they cannot reach you
- Play reduced AoE Fear talent into Demo Warlock to fear every Tyrant go + the demon army, Tyrant has same CD as the Fear like that
- Never position badly behind a pillar just to get rooted and sit afk there since there won’t be any dispels
- Don’t trinket offensively in most scenarios as you can easily die on the next stun
- Don’t AoE stun your kill target if it isn’t the healer, as otherwise it will get dispelled, unless the healer himself is in CC already
- Don’t press your stuns ever if in Solo Shuffle and paired with a Sub Rogue in a round > you sabotage their game with stun DR’s
- Don’t Incap anything ever when you have an Affliction warlock, you remove their dots. Same goes for when playing with a Hunter for incapping healer > you DR their traps.
Shadow priest:
- Use Mass dispel to remove CC from your healer. Sheeps, Fears, Paladin stuns, Freezing Traps, and many more.
- Don’t Void Shift before Dispersing. Can literally lead to a target switch into losing the game.
- Press your Life Grip when teammates are stunned and getting bursted, or when your healer is about to get Pet stun > Freezing trapped by a Hunter.
- Void Shift the guy who has something to press to not die from the HP loss. Never ONLY swap your healer or only your DPS.
- Mass Dispel Ele Shaman’s Flame shocks on the team or Destro’s Immolates. NEVER Mass Dispel against Affliction warlock, you will instant kill yourself.
- Use your Silence / Stun ONLY on healers, because they are dispelable. In rare scenarios where your teammate has already CC-ed the healer or you need to use them on DPS to survive 1 extra second, then its okay to use them on DPS.
- Abuse your Purge. Can strip Hots from Resto Druids and Evokers off the kill target instead of spamming dmg sometimes to make the kill even easier.
Devastation Evoker:
- Use Living flame to offheal when you don’t have a lot of damage and can Hover to cast while moving
- Don’t Nullifying Shroud in the opener against Rogues, it will get sapped off (Applies to healer Evoker as well)
- Don’t play Nullifying Shroud into Mages, they will spellsteal it and have the buff for themselves, making the game much harder (Applies to healer Evoker as well)
- Use your interrupt on more priority spells, due to the long cooldown
- Use your Rescue to save yourself if necessary. It’s more important that you got away than moving your teammate from where they wanted to be.
- Use Oppresive roar to combine with CC from teammates, or to get a very long Sleep Walk off (Applies to healer Evoker as well)
- Try to avoid damage as much as possible when you do not have your big offensive CD’s up. Devastation Evoker’s burst is crazy, but outside of that other classes are scarier.
That is most of what I had in mind here, could write more but I think this is enough. Hope it is helpful to anybody trying to climb Rated Arenas in any Bracket. Thanks for reading and good luck!
