Shawner

Well, I disagree...and when we raid together I would love to compare notes...after that maybe I'll agree.

Helle

all I am saying is it's speed they need in endgame thats it and flash is still the fastes thing we have thats what mana pots are for when you get low. Speed I can cast 2 flash heals in 2.8 seconds and you can only cast one heal in that time. sad to say but were really locked in to that spell for bosses now trash mobs try what you want if people start droping then go to flash heal. this is form a priest that has done every boss in the game. ask any priest form oath, PoA or any other endgame guild and it's flash heals thats all we can do. tonight I had my tank with half his tire 2 epic set and he is the best tank we have and he still takes major damage I don't have time to stand and cast a slow spell and with the talent point I get 70% chance to avoid interuption. not so with any other heal spell. you play how you want but if you really want to know how to be a priest in end game it's just that

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If I am sleepy and lazy at the same time does that make me sleazy

Cloud34

As it stands right now, with a Master Healer build, as a 3.5 second cast, rank 4 GH has HIGHER HPS than Flash Heal rank 7. Now with the next patch which everyone seems to be ignoring, with a Master Healer build, with talents that gets reduced to 2.5 seconds, in addition to a 10% increase in effeciency. With talents, rank 4 GH already out HPS' Flash Heal rank 7- with a second chopped off the casting time in the next patch, the lower ranks of GH will start to as well.

Yes, as it stands now, as I mentioned in my very FIRST post, Flash Heal is aceptable in raids. But, as I've been trying to say, with the patch GH becomes much more viable.

I mentioned before I wanted to try a pure +healing/master healer, Heal Rank 1 build, but with the patch the whole strategy has become moot- abandoned.

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Golerth
Lvl 60 Dorf Priest

Helle

yes I can't wait till 1.10 comes out and priest have to pick what heal to use. I will be the first to jump on the test server to try out the new stuff

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If I am sleepy and lazy at the same time does that make me sleazy

Silchar

I am new to priestly ways and this is all great information. I am currently shadow in an attempt to level faster. Once I am able to start raiding, I will respec to be more usefull in a group.

Sajier

Well, this looks a bit outdated, so I figured I would add a bit to it, from a different perspective than most look at.

My build is a bit different than everyone elses, I tend to sacrifice some +healing for a larger mana pool. I understand the concept behind it, by using +healing you can use cheaper mana cost ranks for better mana efficiency. That is absolutely a valid way to do things, but I view it as having to be better balanced with mana pool then just going whole hog on +healing.

So here is me trying to prove out my theory:

Example 1:
According to the Priest FAQ on the WoW Forums, the formula for how much +healing effects a heal is as follows: +healing value * (spell cast time/3.5).

So for every +100, you gain +43 on a 1.5 second spell (Flash Heal).

Here is an example, not taking mana regeneration into account or any talents that effect healing or mana cost.

Priest A runs +400 to healing with a 6k unbuffed mana pool.
Priest B runs +200 to healing with a 7.5k unbuffed mana pool.
Priest C runs +300 to Healing and a 7k unbuffed mana pool.

When MT healing, using Flash Heal, Priest A will add +172 to each of his heals, Priest B will add +86 to Heals, and Priest C adds +129 to each heal.

Lets say they each are trying to do 600-700 point heals.

Priest A can use Flash Heal Rank 4(400-478 for 215 mana) for a 572-678 point heal for an average heal of 625/heal.
Priest B uses Flash Heal Rank 5(518-616 for 265 mana) for a 604-702 point heal for an average of 653/heal.

Priest C has to choose between Flash Heal 4 and 5 for this as he won't reach 700ish with rank 4 but with rank 5 he will be closer to 750.

If he uses Flash Heal rank 4(400-478, 215 mana) for 529-607 point heals, an average of 568.
If he uses Flash Heal rank 5(518-616 for 265 mana) for 647-745 point heals, an average of 696.


So Priest B uses 50 more mana per heal than Priest A but heals 130 more with each heal. Priest C uses either the same mana (but heals less) than Priest A, or uses the same mana (but heals more) than Priest B.

But, now take mana pools into consideration. Priest B will need slightly less than 1.5k more mana than Priest A in order to heal as many times as A.

Priest A can cast slightly less than 28(27.90)times, but we have to round down so 27 Heals.
Priest B can cast slightly more than 28(28.30) times, we round down to 28 Heals.
Priest C can cast Flash 4, slightly more than 32(32.55) times, but we round down to 32 Heals.
Priest C can cast Flash 5, slightly more than 26(26.41) times, but we round down to 26 Heals.

Priest A heals 27 times at 625/heal for a total of 16,875.
Priest B Heals 28 times at 653/heal for a total of 18,284.
Priest C with Flash Heal Rank 4 heals 32 times at 568/heal for a total of 18176.
Priest C with Flash Heal Rank 5 heals 26 times at 696/heal for a total of 18096.

So while Priest A is more mana efficient than Priests B and C, he doesn't do as much effective healing.

So to be as effective healing-wise as Priests B and C, Priest A needs at least 6.4k mana (for 2 extra heals), or and additional 100 +healing (to gain +43/heal).

I am not going to run the full numbers, but it is easy to take this out to a more extreme situation. If priest A is put in a situation where he must use higher ranks because of the damage output to the tank, he becomes even less effective.

If priest A is now having to cast Flash 7 (812-958 heal, 380 mana), his effective healing deficiency becomes even more apparent.

Priest A casts 15 heals at 1057/heal = 15855
Priest B casts 19 heals at 971/heal = 18449
Priest C casts 18 heals at 1014/heal = 18252

Conclusions:
+healing must be balanced with +int in order to create the most effective healing. While +heal does allow you to use lower rank spells, if you can't either cast more heals, or compensate with even more +healing, your total effective healing will not keep up with a balanced +int/+healing priest.

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Sajier/Sajaman/|TG-Irr|Sajier - WoW Shadow Priest and Resto Shaman, BF2/BF2142 Assault/Medic

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Sajier

Ok, now that that huge thing is done, I can post something else.

Several people have asked why my effective healing numbers are always so high, the reason is pretty simple, its a mod called Clickheal. This mod ties into CTRA and turns Emergency Monitor into a clickable heal bar. Basically, when someone's name pops up on EM, you can click their name and it will automatically cast the spell tied to that mouse button on that person. For me its Flash Heal on left click and GH on right click. I don't have to change targets from my Tank assignment, yet I can raid heal everyone easily. I don't use click heal for anything else but raiding as I couldn't get used to the click frames for grouping, but raid wise, it is amazing.

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Tarenth

I'm old school, but I'll add my two cents into this idea pot for the hell of it.

There are basically 3 classes of healers and priests:

1. Flashers
2. Stabilizers
3. Twitches

Flashers are basically what Sajier has described above. Your stat priority is basically:

1. Intelligence
2. Mana/5 second
3. Spirit
4. Damage/Healing

Flash heal is a HORRIBLE spell to chain heal someone with, but it is the easiest spell to get off in a hurry to keep someone alive and takes a little less attention and effort on the priest's part. A lot of end game priests are flashers due to the difficulty of getting off a 3.5 second big heal pre-patch 1.10. You want a large mana pool that'll take you a little while to burn through, enouch mana/5second gear to help you regen mana, and +spirit to help you some more with the meditation talent. +healing takes last place because flash heal gets crap out of the bonus you collect. However, spiritual healing out of the holy tree provides a lot of extra healing to your flashes. Flashers are more suited as trama priests. They should go in when someone is low and keep them up long enough to get a big heal from another priest.

Stabilizers are priests who look at the heal per mana efficiency and use the most efficient heals possible to keep healing as long as possible. Their basic stat build out is:

1. Damage/Healing
2. Spirit
3. Mana/5 second
4. Intelligence

Stabilizers tend to monitor hp bars by % and hp down then toss out heals and greater heals to get the most bang for their buck. The increased benefit from +healing means their heals hit harder and more frequently than flasher heals and have a better chance to keep someone alive. However, stabilizers do better with a smaller group for heals than flashers due to the attention it takes to toss 2.5 seconds heals out to multiple people. Also, if you play a stabilizer you will tend to overheal if you're competing with flashers to keep a raid up. Good news, you have a whole second longer to cancel your heal. You want to stack as much +healing as possible so you can use lower ranked spells of heal, greater heal, and yes even lesser heal. With enough +healing a stabilizer can spam the highest rank of lesser heal for 65 mana per 400-500 hp. Spirit takes second place because with a 2.5 second cast time your heals will ALWAYS get a tick of mana regen while casting. The more spirit you have the more mana you can regen. Also you tend to have more time to sit around and regen mana by tossing out occasional greater heals which can crit for 4000+ hp than spamming flash heal. Mana/5 second comes into play when you need to really spam cast towards the end of an extended fight or to quickly hit everyone up from the brink of death. You still get the regular mana tick while casting, but if you're sitting within the 5 second rule every little bit counts. Intelligence is the least important but still quite crucial to any priests. However by using heavy heals infrequently instead of spaming lighter heals you can keep a higher mana efficency and thus work with lower mana. Stabilizers are NOT trama priests. If someone goes low from a lucky crit you're going to need something faster to keep them up unless you already have a gheal cooking.

Example: Mirra has +450 healing with only 5k mana and +30 mana/5second. I can outlast a flasher with 8k mana and pull in less overheals and more hp healed along a greater duration. Of course if the main tank dips below 2000 hp and I don't have a heal already cooking I need to switch to flash heal to keep them up or bubble/gheal and hope I don't get slapped.

Twitches are those people who generally aren't used to healing. You can tell they're twitching because the moment you take damage they toss you a renew or expensive flash heal to get you back up to 100% and over. They tend to overheal a lot and go OOM quiet fast. Basically the people you want to scream "Lrn2heal noob!" at. Good for short term fights and trash mobs, twitches usually don't last too long in a raiding environment. You can tell a twitch because they stack as much intelligence as possible and sometimes ignore the merits of +healing, mana/5 seconds, and spirit. They also subscribe to the class > skill catagory of people who think priests are gods of healing and druids/paladins can't heal worth jack. No one has ever died at 80% hp, but good luck trying to convince them to not cast greater heal rank 4 to top you off the 200 hp you lost.

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My sanity is not in question...
It was a confirmed casualty some time ago.

beep

Beepster is a stabilizer with about 7500 mana and +350 healing and somewhere around 25 mana regen per tick (within 5 sec rule) and 100 or so outside.

My most commonly used heals (in order):
1. Renew
2. Greater Heal
3. Flash Heal

With the talents invested in reduced casting time for GH, it's a truly viable "main" heal for situations where damage isn't too unpredictable.

I use SmartHeal addon to pick the proper spell rank so that my GH's are tailored to the healing needed. Overhealing occurs when the target gets overlapping heals from others.

With this approach, I rarely run out of mana unless I have to do lots of flash heal cross-party healing or shielding.

Spec is 25/26/0.

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Beep


Those people who think they know everything are a great annoyance to those of us who do. - (Isaac Asimov)

Sajier

Thank you both for the responses, I haven't used SmartHeal, but I think I am going to look into it.

Tarenth,
I can your point on how using GH/LH lets more mana regen happen and the extra time to cancel heals, I do that all the time personally with GH and with Flash, and that is great, but don't take me pointing out the inconsistancies of a pure +healing builds as stating that all I use is flash heal, I use it more than GH on raids, but I know its value.

As Beep will atest to, I bounce around my heals alot based on how many HP he is down, or consistancy of damage (if I know Beep is dropping slow enough or consistantly enough, all I do is time it so my GH lands when he is about to hit 2k down, such is as on Giants in MC). On some fights, where damage fluxuates a lot (Mags, Domo, Kuri in AQ (because healing fluxuates), Hakkar between tanks) Flash heals are extremely effective if used only as people start to drop.

What I do think is that +healing is great, but not at the complete cost of mana pool. Even GH doesn't gain the full value of +healing (+71 for every +100) and a 2.5 second heal in a fluxuating damage battle can cost you a tank if your timing is just off, or an unlucky couple of crits come.

Ideally, I think a combination of "flashers" and "stabilizers" is the best healing strat on raids, as the "flashers" fill the gaps for the bigger healers, so I think both are important and valid ways to heal.

I know I have a harder time with our normal healing strats than most because I came up as a rotational healer on raids, letting one priest dump a portion of their pool then giving way to another healer while they regened, as opposed to the everyone healing 100% of the time with smaller heals.

I am running Saj at about 7100 unbuffed mana with just under +300 healing (normally run Seal from DM not Marli's Eye like my roster is showing atm, so +299 healing), with about +25/5 regen. And I usually do ok on mana, except in very long fights, because I try to spot heal across the entire raid, even while MT healing, but I usually don't have trouble much thanks to mana pots. If all I am doing is watching the MT I usually don't even need pots, and can hold the MT on my own. I run with +4% on my heals, +6% to my mana pool and +20% of my spirit to my heals (24/27/0). I basically wanted to add to my mana pool while also gaining at least a portion of +healing % from the holy tree.

Do you guys think that this is inefficient?

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Sajier/Sajaman/|TG-Irr|Sajier - WoW Shadow Priest and Resto Shaman, BF2/BF2142 Assault/Medic

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Pistos

100s of ways to skin a cat

I personally like +healing, but I think that it needs to be balanced with good mana/5 and int gear. Going overboard in any one direction could bite you in the butt at some point. A good balance of gear is nice. I also carry some +healing and mana/5 gear that I don't wear normally in case I think a certain fight is going to need more emphasis one way or the other.

I also use renew all the time. Its the most mana efficient since it gets the full +healing bonus.

For trash mobs (even going through MC as quickly as we did the other night) flash heals are fine, or lower rank GHs. Mana was only ever an issue when we were pulling but still rezing and buffing behind the lines. Drinking on the fly works great as long as you aren't fighting beasties that like to make sure everyone is in combat all the time (ie. surgers, fire guys with flame blossom). I know that getting in the habit of using mana efficiently is good practice. But a little overhealing doesn't really matter during trash mob fights.

Boss fights, however, Renews and lower rank GHs are much better as long as you're healing the MT or OT. If you're healing dps or casters then you're mana efficiency probably is gonna suck no matter you do.

The other things we don't do as a guild that we may want to start trying is a healing rotation. During trash mobs its not that big of a deal but during a big boss fight it could help with having enough mana at the end when the mob is going crazy and beating on the tank with everything they have. Our pallys always do a good job of putting of JoW so we can wand for mana. Having 4 healers (2 wanding, 2 healing) and switching when the 1st 2 get down to 2/3 mana or so then letting the second set go to about 1/2 mana, then switching back again, etc. Obviously this isn't going to work for every fight. But for some fights (Ony for example) it could come in handy. Something to think about. (EDIT: Between the time I started writing and finished Sajier had posted something about healing rotations too.)

By the way, I'm only really talking about raid healing in the above. In a 5-man (depending on the group makeup and the amount of zerging we're doing) I generally can get away with just using renew, shields (highly mana inefficient), flash heals and wanding like mad to kill stuff faster. For 5-man instance bosses I've just gotten into the habit of spamming shields as soon as they are ready on the tank and casting renew. My mana pool is big enough that it really doesn't matter that I'm "wasting" it. Of course that isn't a recommended way to do it unless you know you're not gonna run out of mana.

Yotion

Reading this forum has helped me better understand how other TG priesties roll during raids. I have had frustrations in the past on how we as a collective (priests) have done things. Nothing to the point of tearing the hair out of my head but questioning why why why has come to mind in the past I soon learned after only running a few MC raid runs how TG handled the healing duties of priests. The overhealing was dreadful and it seemed like there only needed to be 3 priests there because the other ones weren't even a blip on the map. It was hard for me to swallow how 2 priests could be responsible for about 60% of the healing with there being at least 10 overall healers there. With all that being said, we did accomplish our goals so it was water under the bridge and everyone had a good attitude and smile on their face. It was scary to me how much better we could be with a lil more focus. For the most part my frustrations have left and I have learned who I can lean on. It is awesome to see the communication going on in here and the discussions of a rotation of sorts. I think all these ideas are great for us and applaud TG's efforts to continue to better itself.

My spec is 26/25/0 and have found it fits me best. I have the attitude of everyone having their spec "fit" them best and encourage diversity to mend with their playstyle. I have gone the +healing route at one time having close to +600 healing and found my mana pool suffered some so I am now back to a comfy +63/5 regen, a mana pool around 7k and healing around +400. This has been to be a good all around fit for me.

I have found myself adjusting my heals to the others around me. By this I mean that if I see other priests or druids for that matter spamming renews all over the place then I'll throw out more flash heals. I mix in GH when the damage calls for it. I have always been a heal across the raid kind of healer. Everyone in the raid is worthy of getting my mana all the time....unless of course the fight calls for me to be mt healer then he gets 99% of my attention. I fear that some of our healers are "party" only healers. Seeing some of the stats (I have ZERO mods that keep track of healing, damage, etc... so going off of others) at the end of raid runs leads to this conclusion.

Keep the discussions going as this is the way we keep our meatshields alive which in turn makes sure we all have a pulse when the dust settles

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Lub it on!!!

Tarenth

A healing rotation for those long hauls would be great, but at the moment our current 'spam the crap out of heals for the raid' seems to be holding its own. For Ragnaros we could experiment with it using 3 healers (2 doesn't cut it) and work on getting rotations down for the heavy damage fights.

Here's an idea though that I'v heard several priests swear by. Try and collect two sets of weapons to use during raids. A high spirit/mana regen weapon ([Will of Arlokk] comes to mind with +20 spirit) for standing around/wanding for mana, and a high intelligence/healing weapon (mmm..[Benediction] with +55 healing) for heals out the gate.

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My sanity is not in question...
It was a confirmed casualty some time ago.

Pistos

Tarenth, I was a big fan of the weapon switching. I have gotten away from it since I have Benediction. Because I put the +55 healing on it I hate to unequip it for a much inferior weapon for spirit regen. Of course if we're doing some kind of rotation that I could effectively get out of the 5 sec rule then it would be worthwhile.

As far as the rotation goes I think trying it with Ony (in Phase 1 esp, but probably also in Phase 3) would be a good testing ground. Maybe if the RL and MT aren't comfortable with us changing things up we should wait for a couple more Ony kills before we do it. For MC we usually have our healers split up to OTs and MT for boss fights. This is gonna make any more than a 2man rotation a little difficult. For trash mobs I think we should just not worry about the overhealing. The more and more we do it the fast the raid will be going so we're just going to have to learn to take turns drinking while others do the healing. Personally I thought the healers did just fine blowing through the trash mobs last week. We had a couple time where a tank went down it wasn't too bad (Beep - when you read this tell me if im completely off base). The biggest mana problem I was having was rebuffing the people who were rez'd.

The only other thing to mention is that the meters are a good thing to use to see how you're doing overhealing, etc. But the only real indicator of how we're doing as a group is what bosses are down. I think there are times when people (not necc. anyone here) get caught up in damage or healing meters at the expensive of the raid.

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Gigan - Shaman (Resto)
Pistos - Semi-retired Shadowpriest
...and other distractions of various levels.

Sajier

Just as a discussion point.

In ZG this weekend on the first day, Pistos and I were the only priests on, so in discussing the boss fights we decided we would do a rotational healing just so we always had someone with mana. For the Bat, I went first and took myself down to about 20% of my mana pool, bat was at about 35%. Pistos took over and finished the fight, ending with me back to full mana and him at 50 or 60% mana. Extremely efficient and also allowed for one person to regen, and spot heal the raid, while the other focused on the MT.

This is the type of healing I have usually been involved in, and its definitely effecient because it maximizes the regeneration.

On Rag, we have moved to 3 priests, rotating (every 2 seconds, an old EQ CH chain) rank 2 or 3 GH, and, in my opinion, it has been effective but dangerous. Timing gets thrown off when the priests get punted, and with some of the damage spikes that Rag throws out, I personally think that having 2 priests throwing GH and 1 throwing Flashes would be a safer healing strat. What this also would allow is that the "Flasher" could step into the rotation when one of the GHers needs a mana break as the Flasher gets more opportunity to wand.

I personally think 2 healers with 1 wanding, and the 1 wanding being able to step in when one gets to 50% mana and Mana Pot is on cooldown, would be a very effective healing strat for most bosses, especially Rag.

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