Sorry for singing.

Player Versus Player combat. The epitome of a good time in the world of warcraft. Well, for some anyway. There has been a lot of complaining over the druid class lately, mostly concerning their "dominance in 2v2". My main problem with this statement is that I don't actually think that druids DO dominate the 2v2 bracket. Why do I say this, with the overall lead in healer representation is druids on teams between 2000 and 2500 rating?

Well, I suppose that there are a number of top-rated resto druids in the 2v2 brackets, but there are also a good number of paladins and priests (sorry shamangs, you are just not efficient outlast healers, and Blizz should give you some love in that department). I would say that season 1, the best 2v2 team bar-none was pally+warrior. Season 2 introduced arena drinking and druids arose to their seat of power along side paladins, perhaps even higher because paladins weren't used to having to apply JoJ in the beginning. Season 3 is just more of the same.

Paladin+warrior is a team that can (and does) beat druid+warrior more than half the time if equally geared and skilled. Essentially, this is the match-up where the paladin's infinite mana pool and ability to keep the druid within the warrior's reach simply outdoes any and all utility the druid can bring to the table. "oMGWtFBbqCyClOnEisOP!?!?"

Nah, cyclone can't save a judged druid from a warrior. SURE, it can keep the warrior from killing you right then...RIGHT THEN... but aside from the extra 6 seconds of life, you're still doomed if JoJ is on you. Many top-rated druid will counter with "just don't get justiced". Well, that's not so easy sometimes against really good warrior+paladin teams. Intercept, mace-stun (luck), hammy-piercing-rotations, eventually the pally walks over to you with hammy on him and gets you.

Roots? HA. BoF lasts entirely too long in my opinion, and it can be cleansed/dispelled. Priest and paladin teams simply cannot be rooted. At least, it's not wise to in most cases. Although, there is something funny about using rank1 moonfire for 20 mana and seeing a priest or paladin spend 200 removing the dot portion. Sadly, these teams are usually bad enough that we don't need to oom the healer, so that tactic is fruitless.

Really, in 2v2, another matchup that druids really can't deal with as healers is the double dps teams. If they can really dish out the dps, then druids can't really compete with just HoTs alone. Mage+rogue is a prime example. Warrior charges the mage (or worse, gets sapped and waits for 5k damage to land on him) and gets rooted, then poly'd. At least poly will keep him healed a while longer whilst we hope the rogue gets flushed out. However, the damage that rogue+mage can drop in the first 5 seconds of a fight is simply staggering. Even without wound-poison active (which would be amazing but ultimately will never be the case because of Vile Poisons), no one paying attention to me, and me spamming healing touch, they can blow through that healing. Not to mention poly used as an interrupt, then silence once I've gotten back to caster form, then Blind if I'm not paying attention.

Really, druids don't have everything in 2v2, they just happen to have an advantage over teams with limited mobility. For instance, druid+warrior walks ALL over any team whose dps isn't 1) ranged or 2) mobile as a rogue. That is: enh shamangs, warriors NOT teamed with Blessing of Freedoms, rogues who don't have imp sprint, rogues who don't have BoF, rogues who don't have shadow step, and feral druids of any team makeup. It wouldn't really matter if feral druids WERE super-mobile, they don't have wound poison or mortal strike so against any team with a healer, the druid's dps < the healing...always.

Why do paladins rule 5v5, dominate 3v3, and simply own in 2v2? Drain teams are more likely to work in 2v2. I know that's how we play our spriest+warlock against pally+warrior. We can burn down a bad warrior, but equally geared, we just ignore the warrior save for UA and a few dots to keep him damaged to spread the pally's healing and drain mana + mana burn the pally (who's curse of tongues'd). Eventually, the pally ooms and dies. However, in 5s, pallies have a heal that takes 1.5 seconds to cast and crits more often than not AND heals for around 2000 AND costs 90 mana on most casts. Druids have something similar to this, except it critically heals 3000 up front, has a 1000 healing hot (not much), takes 2.0 seconds to cast, and costs 900 mana.

Wait, what? That's right, 900 mana versus 90 mana. Well that's just maddeningly unhelpful. What about Holy Light versus Healing Touch? Holy light heals for about 500 less than healing touch, but takes 2.5 seconds versus healing touch's 3.5 seconds. The only redeeming factor is that healing touch costs 100 more mana.

Yikes, well those are almost all the paladin's heals, whereas druids have Rejuv and Lifebloom. Lifebloom, at my best, will tick every second (yes, every second) for about 550 on a 3x stack. Rejuv will tick every 3 seconds for about 600. Rejuv isn't great, but it helps, and it can be swiftmended, which makes it a staple on my hotbar. The thing about lifebloom is that it costs 220 versus a paladin's flash of light averaging between 90-180 mana. It's true that I can cast lifebloom on the move, but it's also true that if I want that full 550 a tick, I need to spend 680 mana up front, then 220 for every cast after that. Really, the 3x lifebloom is more important than getting a regrowth/rejuv/swiftmend cast thrown in there, because the most detrimental thing I can do is let that 3x stack fall.

Damn, these posts are too long. Long story short, druids are powerful against many makeups in the 2v2 bracket, simply good against many makeups in the 3v3 bracket, and a waste of space most the time in the 5v5 bracket because of spread healing and mana-inefficiency, plus mobility is nigh useless in the smaller arena settings. Dear paladins: QQ more please, here have a cyclone whilst I'm JoJ'd.