Herbalism Guide
In this Herbalism Guide, we aimed to cover everything about Herbalism with everything you need to know, covering all of the herbs, and specialization trees, with a few tips and tricks along the way.
Base Herbs:
There are four base herbs in the Dragon Isles and in the first part of our guide we are going to go over everything we need to know. You can track all of the herbs you gather throughout the Dragon Isles with your Herbalism Journal.
Each base herb has seven versions, which are the base of the herb, Decayed, Frigid, Lush, Titan-Touched, Windswept, Ire, and Overloaded. We will cover all of these versions in this Herbalism Guide.
Primary Reagent is the amount of skill it requires to reach the maximum quality of that herb while gathering.
Hochenblume
This herb is the most common of the four and can be found in all the regions across the Dragon Isles.
Primary Reagent Difficulty: 120
Bubble Poppy
The Bubble Poppy herb can be found along rivers, coasts and inside caves.
Primary Reagent Difficulty: 140
Saxifrage
Saxifrage can be found in locations like mountains, cliffs, open plains, or in volcanic regions.
Primary Reagent Difficulty: 140
Writhebark
The Writhebark herb can be found nearby an abundance of trees or foliage.
Primary Reagent Difficulty: 140
Decayed:
You will be able to track which herbs you have come across that were decayed with your Herbalism Journal, they will appear with the word ‘Decayed’ before the herb name. There are five types of decayed herbs, the four base herbs, and also an ‘Overload’ version.
When a herb has been exposed to the essence of Decay, it will become a decayed herb. These herbs are a good source for Rousing Decay, however, once the herb is gathered it will leave a debuff on the player.
It is a 10-minute debuff that will cause nature damage over time and slow your movement speed. The debuff states ‘Jumping will jostle your stomach and hopefully rid you of this awful pestilence quicker’ so we recommend you try jumping to get rid of this debuff.
However, if you decide to specialize in Decayed herbs you will actually gain a buff and other perks from gathering decayed herbs.
Frigid:
There are five types of Frigid herbs, the four base herbs, and also an ‘Overload’ version, this can be tracked in the Herbalism Journal.
Rich Soil and Seeds:
Around the Dragon Isles, you may come across a small dirt patch. This is called ‘Rich Soil’ and it is used to plant seeds that will grow into a herb that you can gather from.
While you are gathering and leveling up your herbalism skill, you will come across a drop called ‘Roused Seeding’ this seed can be planted into the Rich Soil. From this seed, you can grow any base herb.
You can learn more different types of seeds than can be obtained from gathering and used with these Rich Soils through the Specialization tree ‘Botany’. The seeds are under ‘Cultivation’ and when you first unlock this tree it will increase your chances of obtaining these seeds. If you decide to put more knowledge points into this tree you can learn to obtain Propagating, Decayed, and Agitated Seeds.
Lush:
Lush is different from the other types of herbs as it only has four instead of five, this can be tracked in the Herbalism Journal.
Here is an example of the differences between the Lush version of the Writhebark herb and the base version.
Lush herbs are just bigger versions of the base herb, they are visibly bigger in-game compared to the base herb version. You also have a higher chance of gathering additional materials from these nodes.
Titan-Touched:
These herbs can be difficult to come across, usually, it will require you to have dragon-riding to reach these herbs and are most often found in the Waking Shores or Thaldraszus.
Once you have gathered from this herb you will obtain Rousing Order and also a buff which will increase your speed by 15% and if you decide to specialize in Titan-Touched herbs, you will also have your secondary stats increased by 3%.
Windswept:
There are five types of Windswept, the four base herbs, and also an ‘Overload’ version and these can be tracked in the Herbalism Journal.
This type of elemental herb can be found in windy regions like the Ohn’ahran Plains. It will have a wind particle effect around the herb when you come across them in the open world of the Dragon Isles.
Once you have gathered from this herb you will receive Rousing Air but also a gust of air will knock your character in a random direction, twice. If you decide to specialize in Windswept herbs, the air will actually slow your fall when falling further than 40yd.
Ire:
Ire has very specific requirements to be able to find this herb. You will need to turn war mode on to be able to see these herbs in the Dragon Isles. Ire has five types, the base herbs, and also an ‘Overload’ version.
The Ire herbs will appear with a red ring around them in the open world. Once you have gathered from this herb you will also obtain Rousing Ire. Which goes hand in hand with PVP gear and content.
Overload:
Overloaded herbs are very different as you cannot find this out in the open world, first you must obtain an action called ‘Overload Elemental Herb’, you can obtain this by the specialization tree in Mastering the Elements. It will require you to unlock the tree and then you will have access to this action.
The Overload Elemental Herb action will give the elemental herb a boost, your elemental herbs are Decayed, Frigid, Titan-Touched, and Windswept. They each have a specific interaction when using this action on that specific element. Once you have used the action it does have a 12 hour cooldown. However, this can be reduced by gathering other herbs in the Dragon Isles.
In this part of the herbalism guide, we quickly go over each interaction the elemental herbs have with the Overload Elemental Herb action.
Decayed – When using the Overload Elemental Herb action on this type of herb in the Dragon Isles, it will spawn a Withering Writhebark. Once you have defeated this creature, you will obtain some loot, herbs, and Rousing Decay.
Frigid – After you have used the Overload Elemental Herb action on the Frigid element, it will spawn another flower encased in ice. You will be able to attack this block of ice and it will spawn smaller herbs encased with ice around the block of ice that has spawned. You will then be able to gather from these smaller herbs and blocks of ice.
Titan-Touched – If you decide to use the Overload Elemental Herb action on the Titan-Touched type, a portal will appear which will teleport your character to another herb nearby.
Windswept – When using the Overload Elemental Herb action on the Windswept type, it will launch your character into the sky, give you a slow fall, and spawn a handful of herbs in the sky. Navigate your character through the herbs and collect as many as you can on the way down. Once your character reaches the bottom the herbs you have not managed to collect, will despawn.
Specializations
In this part of our Herbalism Guide, we are going to cover all of the specializations. Specialization trees are new to the game with Dragonflight and can be quite overwhelming and confusing at first glance. In our Herbalism Guide, we are going to break down every part of the tree.
The three main trees for this specialization are:
Stats:
Stats are a very important thing to consider in Dragonflight Gathering as this can impact how many items you obtain, what items you obtain, and the quality of the items. Stats are mainly increased and managed by specializations, you will be able to choose which path to go down and each path could give you something different, for example, you could either go down the deftness or perception route, so it is important to know what these bonuses give you before investing your knowledge points.
- Skill – Your skill increases the quality of the items you gather. It is a sum of your base gathering level and bonuses from equipment and specializations.
- Finesse – Increases your chance of gathering multiple of that item.
- Deftness – Increases your gathering speed.
- Perception – Increases your chances of gathering rare reagents.
Bountiful Harvests:
Bountiful Harvest improves your overall gathering. When you first unlock this tree it will grant you +5 skill points and any additional points you put into Bountiful Harvest will give you +1 skill per point. So if you choose to put 40 points into Bountiful Harvests you will be getting 45 skill points in total.
There are small milestones you will surpass the more points you put into this tree. It will unlock the next part of the tree, grant you Finesse, perception, and the main part of the tree which is refining herbs.
Refining Herbs:
Investing 20 points into this tree will grant you Refining Herbs which will allow you to convert your stage 1 herbs into stage 2. This is done through the Herbalism Journal under Refinement. From here, you will need to select which herb you would like to use, the options being the four base herbs from the Dragon Isles. It will require you to gather 5 of the same base herb at stage 1 Quality which will be refined into one herb at stage 2.
At 40 points into Bountiful Harvest, it will unlock refining herbs to stage 3. This will require you to gather 5 of the same base herbs at stage 2 Quality to then upgrade into one herb at stage 3.
Sub-specializations:
Branching out from Bountiful Harvests will dive you deeper into herb specific skill points and other stat bonuses.
Bountiful Harvest branches out into four different paths, Horticulture, Arboriculture, Fungiculture, and Floriculture. These are to give bonus stats to each of the base herbs. Horticulture for Hochenblume. Arboriculture for Writhebark. Fungiculture for Bubble Poppy. Floriculture for Saxifrage.
When you first unlock this part of the specialization tree, it will award you a higher chance to gather additional herbs. Similar to the main part of this specialization, Bountiful Harvests, each point you invest into this part of the tree will grant you +1 skill, however, this will only add when you are gathering from that specific herb you decide to focus.
The small milestones for these trees will grant you extra stats including, skill, deftness, perception, and finesse. Completing the tree will grant you a total of +60 skill when gathering that specific herb.
Botany:
Botany has many small milestones, giving you extra stats along the way, every point that you invest into Botany gives you +1 Finesse. Once you have completed the tree with 40 points you will unlock gathering herbs while mounted. This makes gathering a lot faster and more efficient in the dragon isles, as to unlock this you will be gaining plenty of deftness, perception, and finesse along the way.
Sub-specializations:
Conversance – Investing your knowledge points into this sub-specialization grants you +1 Deftness per point. Conversance will grant you stat bonuses for when you gather from plant creatures in the Dragon Isles.
When first unlocking Conversance, you will be able to harvest from plant creatures in the Dragon Isles.
At 20 points you will be able to obtain element drops from the plant creatures.
At 40 points you will gain +25 Skill while gathering from Lush herbs.
Cultivation – Each knowledge point you apply to this sub-specialization will grant you +1 perception while gathering herbs. Cultivation is different compared to other trees as it has bigger milestones than small ones. The small milestones provide stats, mainly focusing on perception.
Unlocking Cultivation will allow you to gather seeds that are used to plant in Rich Soil. You obtain one herb plant from each seed.
At 10 points you unlock the ability to obtain Propagating Seeds, when these seeds are planted they will burst into multiple different herbs that you can gather from.
At 20 points you unlock the ability to obtain Decayed Seeds, this seems to be the rarest herb type to come across in the Dragon Isles which makes them important as they provide Rousing Decay. Be aware as these will grant you a debuff dot.
At 30 points you unlock the ability to obtain Agitated Seeds, we recommend forming a party as these seeds will spawn a rare mob which you are then able to gather from. Gathering from this mob will give you multiple herbs of the highest quality,
At 40 points, it will increase your chances of finding seeds.
Mastering the Elements:
When unlocking Mastering the Elements, you will be able to use a new action called ‘Overload Elemental Herb’, use this action on herbs that are elemental empowered to unlock extra interactions. When using this action it will go on a 12 hour cooldown, however gathering other herbs in the Dragon Isles will lower the cooldown, roughly 30 minutes per herb.
We have covered these overload herbs in the herb section of our Herbalism Guide.
Investing knowledge points into Mastering the Elements will give +1 skill per point, for the milestones you will be able to unlock the sub-specializations for this tree, stat bonuses for deftness, and skill. Once you have completed the tree and invested 40 points, you will be able to gather more elements from the element-empowered herbs across the Dragon Isles.
Sub-specializations:
Windswept – If you choose to specialize in windswept herbs, each knowledge point will add +1 Skill when gathering from windswept empowered herbs. You will obtain a total of 50 skill points to windswept herbs when completing this tree. The milestones will also grant you other stat bonuses like +15 finesse and +15 perception while gathering windswept herbs.
At 20 points, the amount that gathering windswept herbs to reduce the cooldown of Overload Elemental Herb will increase.
At 40 points, windswept herbs will grant you slowfall the next time you fall further than 40yds.
Frigid – Similar to the windswept tree, investing knowledge points into the Frigid tree will grant you +1 skill when gathering Frigid empowered herbs. Maxing this sub-specialization tree with knowledge points will grant you +50 skill points for Frigid gathering. The milestones will give you additional stat bonuses for Finesse and perception.
At 20 points, the amount that gathering frigid herbs to reduce the cooldown of Overload Elemental Herb will increase.
At 40 points, when you overload Frigid herbs, it will grant you a buff which will be a frost protective layer around you and will freeze nearby targets for a short while when they attack you.
Titan Touched – Investing knowledge points into this sub-specialization tree will grant you +1 skill when gathering Titan-Touched herbs. Maxing out the tree will grant you a total of +50 Skill. The milestones in this tree will grant finesse and perception.
At 20 points, the amount that gathering titan-touched herbs to reduce the cooldown of Overload Elemental Herb will increase.
At 40 points the portal will now stay open for a longer period of time and will grant you access to pass through them again, returning to the original spot.
Decayed – Just like the other sub-specializations, when you put a knowledge point into Decayed, it will grant you +1 Skill for gathering Decayed empowered herbs. The milestones will also grant you Finesse and Perception when gathering these herbs.
At 20 points, the amount that gathering decayed herbs to reduce the cooldown of Overload Elemental Herb will increase.
At 40 points, after gathering from a decayed herb it would usually give you a debuff. However, after reaching 40 points into this tree, when you are affected by decay and deal damage to a target, it will apply a damaging debuff to your target which will slow their casting, attacking, and movement speed for a short period of time.
Hope you enjoyed our Dragonflight Herbalism Guide, feel free to check out our other guides on WoW below!
Dragonflight Gathering made simple
WoW Dragonflight Reputation Guide
Best Addons for Mythic Plus and Raiding in Dragonflight
If you are interested in more about specializations for other professions, we recommend these sites below!