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Perhaps the most useful and relied on class in Dragonflight, or World of Warcraft in general, is herbalism. After all, so many other classes rely on them, from alchemists needing them for potions to the inscription relying on herbalism to create the majority of their items.
However, similar to all the other classes, herbalism also has three different specializations that players can choose from, and which one is the best for you depends on several factors. Some of those factors are those that you might not have even thought of before. Before you get started on that, you might want to consider how to remove Gryphons.
To help you pick the best herbalism specialization for you, we’re here to go through all three specs, along with their pros, cons, and what type of players the spec is recommended for.
Best herbalism specs
- Bountiful Harvests, Arboriculture (35 Points for Maximum Perception)
- Botany, Cultivation (40 Points)
Early point distribution for Herbalism
- Levels 1 – 40: All points should go into Botany.
- Invest in Cultivation, which you can unlock at Botany (10 Points) and Conservance (30 Points)
- Pick a second tree after hitting Level 50. Choose either Bountiful Harvests or Mastering the Elements.
Bountiful Harvests
The very first herbalism spec we’ll be talking about is Bountiful Harvests. This spec is the best for players who want to increase the quality of their herbs. When a player with the herbalism class and bountiful harvests spec gathers herbs, the quality of said herbs is instantly increased.
In addition to that, the players themselves are also given several skills, and they can also invest in different trees that focus on specific herbs, which are Horticulture, Arboriculture, Fungiculture, and Floriculture. All of these improve Skill, Deftness, Perception, and Finesse.
If we had to recommend one specific tree to invest in, however, then we’d definitely go with Arboriculture, as it offers +25 Perception while the other three offer +25 Deftness. Deftness is good and all, but Perception is definitely more useful. Of course, you don’t necessarily have to invest in just one and can instead invest in all of them.
How Good is it?
Is this a good spec for players to choose though? Well, economically speaking, it really isn’t. This is because upgrading herbs from quality 1 to quality 2 requires you to have five of those quality 1 herbs to give you just one quality 2 herb.
Similarly, upgrading quality 2 herbs to quality 3 requires five of those quality 2 herbs, giving you only one quality 3 herb. Seeing as how quality 1 and 2 herbs go for nearly identically prices at the auction house, and a quality 3 herb doesn’t sell for nearly enough to make up for the number of quality 1 and 2 herbs you use, it just isn’t economical if you’re looking to make money off of this spec.
However, if you’re instead selecting this spec because of you either wanting the bonuses it gives you, or because you want a steady supply of quality 3 herbs, then we would most definitely recommend you give this spec a shot.
Botany
If you don’t want to waste too much time walking around gathering herbs for hours on end in Dragonflight, then the botany spec is for you. Not only does it improve your ability to gather herbs (which increases the quality and quantity of the herbs you gather), but it also allows players to gather herbs while mounted.
Most players, however, only invest 40 knowledge points in botany to unlock the ability to harvest herbs while mounted, and don’t go any further than that, despite the fact that this spec has much more to offer to players.
After unlocking harvesting while mounted, players have two paths they can take.
Cultivation
Although the idea of being able to grow and collect special seeds might not sound all that appealing on paper, we assure you it’s more than worth it when you get into the specifics of it. After all, the fact that cultivation gives you the ability to collect Rousing Essences inside Self-Grown Herbs already makes it worth it as is.
But rousing essences aren’t the only thing these special seeds can grow for you. On the contrary, players are also able to also use a specific speed (agitated rousing seedling) that spawns a rare elemental mob called enraged sprout that you can then kill, raid, and then herb.
Not only that, but the cultivation tree also gives players +25 Perception, which gives more ability to get rare side gathers.
Conversance
The second tree this spec offers players allows for you to improve your looting of plant based elemental monsters. However, the biggest downside to this is that these types of mobs are rather rare in the Dragon Islands.
The tree also offers a total of +25 Finesse, which might make it a little bit more appealing for some players. However, we don’t personally recommend it.
How Good is it?
Of course, the ability to harvest better quality and quantity herbs, all while being mounted is a huge time saver for players who don’t want to spend more time than they need to. However, the often overlooked cultivation tree is what makes this spec so worth it for us.
The special seeds that players are able to collect and grow give a variety of advantages to players, such as rare herbs and different rousing essences.
Mastering the Elements
If the potential to collect rousing essences with botany was the only thing that caught your attention, then perhaps you should pick mastering the elements instead. After all, it pretty much maximizes your ability to collect them, specifically Rousing Air, Rousing Decay, Rousing Frost, and Rousing Order.
You can also unlock the ability ‘Overload Elemental Herb’, which allows you to overload any of the five elemental herbs, which are
- Decayed Herb
- Frigid Herb
- Infurious Herb
- Titan touched Herb
- Windswept Herb.
Perhaps the best advantage players get from this spec is that they gain +20 Deftness and +5 Skill for picking all five types of elementally-charged herbs. Additionally, it also increases the number of rousing essences they’re likely to get when harvesting elemental herbs.
Recommended point distribution for Mastery of the Elements
- Levels 1 – 40: Complete the tree
- Invest 20 more points into picking herbs
How Good is it?
If you’re serious about collecting rousing essences, then this spec is the most recommended one for you. Not only that, but the ability to overload elemental herbs can really come in handy, even if you’re not specifically out collecting herbs.
Don’t get what we mean? Well, if you craft materials a lot, then you might have heard of rousing order, which is a crafting reagent that’s pretty rare. However, if you were to overload titan touched herbs, you’ll be more likely to score more of them at once.
Final Thoughts
As mentioned above, we can’t give one herbalism spec the title of best spec for everyone, as which spec is recommended for you really depends on several factors. However, the botany spec with an invested in cultivation skill tree just might be the best herbalism spec in general, at least for a majority of players.
World of Warcraft: Dragonflight
- Platform(s): PC
- Genre(s): Massively Multiplayer, Massively Multiplayer Online, RPG