Nice breakdown Dersu. Not quite the way I'd do it but there are so many ways to build a support druid team that I can't really argue with it
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[Edited shortly after posting to add Meditate. Second edit to add link to Howling Wind testing thread.]
Pretty_Entity, there isn't really a magic formula, but here is how I would think about it:
Nature's Touch
Everyone needs to have this, preferably a strong one. It doesn't have to be maxed, but between all the druids in your support team who regularly show up to fights, you need to be able to heal more total hp than the mob is capable of dealing out, at a faster rate than the mob. The question here isn't how many skill points you have, it's how many hp you actually heal.
Nature's Embrace
At least one member of your team needs to have a strong Embrace that gets cast on the tank. Depending on bosses and the rest of the party, you might want one or more of the other druids to have this. You definitely want this on your tank. If you're fighting a lot of bosses who have a fire cloak or otherwise cause damage to the hitter when being hit, then you want to be able to cast this on your dps team to prevent kamikaze deaths. This will also help reduce deaths from AoE DoT (area of effect damage over time) skills.
Nature's Breath
As with Embrace, at least one team member should have a strong Nature's Breath. Again, depending on bosses and the rest of the party, you might want one or more of the other druids to have this. This will help mitigate AoE, DoT and add damage. Just make sure that if your tank is on the front of the boss and everyone else is on the back, that you target someone in the back team so that effective radius surrounds the team rather than the tank. Having a strong Breath can supplement a weak Touch. For example, when my support druid was level 60, he only had about a 550 point touch, but he also had about 200+ breath and a decent embrace. Combined this was enough for him and my at-the-time level 125-ish druid to duo kill 4-star grimwall juggernauts.
Shield of Bark
Only one member of the team needs this, as long as they reliably show up at fights.
Wards
As with Bark, only one member of the team needs each of these, as long as they reliably show up at the right fights. But how you split them up really depends on what levels your druids are, and what they are doing when not bossing. If you're fighting a lot of golems, then you want ward of giants. If you're doing grimwall golems, or anything on lava, you want Ward of Giants and Ward of Fire on the same druid. Eyes? Assassins and your choice of Magic and Giants. Ghosts? Slash and Magic or Giants. Trees? Giants.
Spring of Life
I haven't ever used this. The only use cases I can think of are in Shalemont and Stonevale where you're running with people who might not have idols, and the levels are low enough that you still have an effective spell with not a lot of points invested in it, and where your spring of life is immediately followed by a heal spell from one of the other druids.
Howling Wind
[Edit: this might be useful after all. See
http://www.onethumbmobile.com/celticher ... 84#p116528.] This is a "nice to have" rather than a necessity. Tests posted in other druid threads are inconclusive on how much this really helps. If you have points to burn and time in your casting rotation, go for it.
Abundance
To be reliable in preventing the health debuffs cast by dragons (solstice dragons, which are now gone; Aggragoth; and the grey wraiths and Chained Minion/Prince/King/Emperor) you need a 7-point abundance. One of your team needs to have this. Whether you have more than 7 points in it depends on your play style and how many hp and how much armor your tank has.
Abundant Aura
From what I've seen, this is also a nice to have. Unless you're coordinating your team really well and are able to have a pre-fight huddle where the whole group gets their buffs, it's more of a supplement to the fight than a necessity. Especially because you need to be touching the cast target. The only workaround I've seen for this is to cast on yourself, making sure that your intended target (probably the tank, but maybe those stubborn rogues who refuse to put points into VIT) is within the effective radius. Note that for solo or duo play, the combo of even a weak abundance and basic abundant aura can mean an extra 150 hp, so don't dismiss it.
Calm
Every druid should have this in their bossing hotbar. If aggro switches to you from someone else, self-cast this immediately and most times the mob will retarget. Even if you only have one point in it and no rings equipped. Note that this only works if another character is actively hitting or otherwise engaged with the mob (warcry, taunt, etc.). If you're the only one fighting it, your add support team needs to wake up.
Strangling Vines
One member of the team, preferably one who doesn't have to spend a lot of time recasting, should have this maxed. Keeping vines on the boss may be enough to counter the mob's heal-over-time.
Lightning and Storm
These are optional for a group support druid. There are good reasons to invest points in them, which I won't go into here. But if your team is busy rotating through a cycle of heals and buffs, they are unlikely to have time to constantly switch targets.
Meditate
I have sigils on both my druids so I always forget about this one. You need to have enough energy regen to keep up with the spells you're casting. If you don't have enough in-combat regen and are melee attacking the mob, you're being really irresponsible to your team. If you don't have enough energy regen lux to keep up with the demands of your spells, you need to invest enough points in meditate to keep up, and you need to leave the auto-attack to the team members are there for that.
Other Thoughts
- You should be able to build a really strong support group with only three druids. With my dps-oriented main (135) equipped with his heal rings, and my support druid at level 105, the two of us were almost able to keep a level 140 tank warrior alive on Ythair the 140 dragon.
- AoE buffs and heals only work on group members. If you need to drop someone from the group, make sure it's not someone with a vital group-only skill. My main is good for bark, natures touch and damage spells. It's easy to drop him from the group if we need to make room for someone else. Just make sure that everyone in the fight knows to leave a clear line of sight from the out of group druid to the tank, and that they still take care of adds.
- Train your add crew to kill the adds as they spawn, rather than when they get called in by the boss.
- Train your add crew to pull the adds away from the druid zone so their AoE doesn't interfere with the heals, buffs and meditation.
- If, as Pretty_Entity originally posted, you are still planning to redo skills at level 70, really think hard about which bosses you're going to be fighting. A maxed vines at your level is going to barely scratch most bosses. You might be better pouring points into heals over wards, if you even have the wards.
This has gone on much longer than I originally intended so I'll stop here. Let me know if I forgot any spells, or if you have any further questions.
