We all know that there are a whole slew of buffs available when you group in World of Warcraft.  Not everyone knows which ones are the must have buffs, which players really need, and which they just think they need.  As a player just starting to group for instances or raids that hasn’t created groups before it’s important to know which classes should you look to get for the buffs they provide for your group.

Which buffs are important really depends on the make up of your group or raid.  To make it easy to see which buffs are best for whom, this guide is broken down to sections for each of the major class types: melee DPS, caster DPS, healers, and tanks.

Since each group is different, how you balance in the best buffs for your group is really up to you.  Some groups will focus on getting the most DPS so that they can speed through the instance or raid, while others will focus on buffs that ensure the healer and tank are maximized.  It comes down to personal preference, the buffs available, and which classes are best geared to go without buffs.

Best Melee Buffs

An example of a stack of raid buffs on a tank

Battle Shout / Blessing of Might – Coming from either a Warrior or a Paladin this buff provides up to 688 Attack Power.  While many players will ask for Kings instead, this boost provides more DPS and should not be over looked.

Windfury Totem / Improved Icy Talons – Coming from either a Shaman or a Death Knight this melee haste increase is something you don’t want to be without if you have a melee heavy group.

Blessing of Kings – a 10% boost to all stats makes this a solid buff to everyone, keep in mind though that it is not the best in all situations. Think about rogues and hunters for example where a Might buff would be better even though it only provides a single buff it is a bigger buff to your single best stat.

Leader of the Pack / Rampage – This buff gives a 5% boost to critical hit chance and comes from either a fury Warrior of a feral Druid.  The Druid’s version is always up while the Warrior’s is only up for 10 seconds after each crit.  The difference isn’t that big though as the Warrior will usually have it up within seconds after a fight starts and it should not fall off if they are at all geared.

Best Caster Buffs

Arcane Intellect – Mages provide a huge boost to your intellect.  This gives you more mana and more crit.  If you are caster heavy this is a huge buff for both the DPS casters and healers.

Moonkin Aura – Having a balance druid in your group buffs all spell casters with an additional 5% chance to crit.  Combine this with a battle rez, innervate, and the myriad of other benefits of having a boomkin in your group and this becomes a must have buff.

Wrath of Air – Shamans are the only class that can provide this buff, but if you are a spell caster heavy group it really improves your overall DPS.

Blessing of Wisdom / Kings – Depending on the type of caster that you are either BoW or BoK provides an increase in your lasting power while casting.  The class that the target is determines which is the better buff to use. 

Replenishment – This can come from a number of different sources but mainly is provided by Retribution Paladins, Shadow Priests, or Survival Hunters.  This buff provides a solid stream of mana back that makes it far easier to keep casting.

Best Healer Buffs

Blessing of Wisdom / Kings – The same as for DPS which provides the most benefit really depends on your class.  As a druid I always take kings and spirit is better than MP5, but other classes vary.

Arcane Intellect – Mages provide a huge boost to your intellect.  This gives you more mana and more crit.  If you are caster heavy this is a huge buff for both the DPS casters and healers.

Divine Spirit – Given by a Priest this ability greatly increases your spirit and therefore your mana regeneration, allowing you to heal for a longer period of time.

Replenishment – As with Caster DPS mana is a huge issue, and therefore having someone that can provide replenishment is just as big for healers as for DPS.

Best Tank Buffs

Fortitude – A huge buff to stamina for the group, this buff increases everyone’s health by a substantial amount which makes keeping everyone alive all that much easier. Critical for tanks as it provides some extra health, which is always needed.

Blessing of Sanctuary –This Paladin buff provides a straight 3% decrease to damage taken in addition to a stamina increase.  What more could you want in a tank buff!  The only downside is that only protection paladins can buff it, so unless you have a paladin tank in your raid, the other tanks won’t get this.

Blood Pact / Commanding Shout – This gives a boost to overall health and comes from a Warlock or Warrior.  Which to use comes down to which is available to the group and which is easier to juggle in.  If a warrior can do it then the warlock can use a spell buff instead, if the lock can use it, the warrior can provide attack power.

Most under rated buffs

Horn of Winter / Strength of Earth – This buff provides a large amount of strength and agility making it a top pick for any melee class.  Many players over look its importance but it adds a lot of DPS as base it adds 155 of each stat.  If the Shaman has improved totems it is up to 178 of each.

Trueshot Aura / Unleashed Rage / Abomination’s Might – Each of these buffs provides a straight 10% boost to attack power, which is a huge amount to any melee class.  Trueshot Aura comes from hunters and is one of the only group buffs that they provide, which makes having one a good thing with a melee group.  The other two forms of this buff come from enhancement Shaman and Blood Death Knights.  The buff is often overlooked by players, but really shouldn’t be.

Heroism / Bloodlust – These shaman buffs provide HUGE temporary boosts to your group.  They are not really over looked though, as so many groups go out of their way to find a shaman just for this buff. 

Food Buff - Far too many people overlook the power of the food buff available, especially the all inclusive fish feast. A fish feast can be placed by any person with high level cooking and allows everyone in the raid to get a solid buff.

Overall

Just check out the difference in health from normal to raid buffed!

As shown from the list of best buffs above, the buffs that stack up best in a group makes finding a few key classes / specs critical for your groups or raids.  If you are doing simple content that you over gear you probably can take any classes that you want, but if you are doing difficult content for the group it will be worth your while to pay attention to the buffs available while building your group. 

The best classes to provide buffs really depend on your group though, so there is no overall best for all situations.  If you are a melee heavy group you should be looking to include a paladin, warrior, shaman, death knight and druid.  These five classes interact extremely well and provide buffs back and forth.

If you are a caster heavy group you should be looking for a mage, balance druid, shaman, warlock / death knight, and shadow priest.  These four together buff each other extremely well and provide solid damage increases.

Also something to note about buffs is that one of the rarest classes, the shaman, provides a huge number of critical buffs to almost any class.  This really makes finding one for your ongoing groups and raids a key component to successful runs. On a personal note, I have always found it odd that this class provides so many useful group benefits, yet there are so few players that play them.