More Great Healing Stuff

Posted on Saturday, October 31, 2009

Miss Medicina posted a really neat idea and questionnaire over at her blog. I found her totally by accident, but I like her blog style, and she tries to be very inclusive in the information she puts out. I really liked the questionnaire, and since I am one of LTB's primary healers, I figured I would fill it out and post it for myself. It is an ambitious and excellent project, and good for anyone who plays WITH a healer to read as well. It helps us all learn the mechanics of healing, and the different classes involved. I apologize that this is totally WoW-centric, but it's just excellent information.

What is the name, class, and spec of your primary healer? Bloodsun, Discipline Priest

What is your primary group healing environment? (i.e. raids, pvp, 5 mans) 5 man Guild Heroic runs, 10 man Guild raids. Also PvP, building up to possible Arena play.

What is your favorite healing spell for your class and why? Penance. Instant start, 3 crit chances for procs, and the best heal/mana ratio in my arsenal.

What healing spell do you use least for your class and why? Holy Nova. Too damn mana expensive.

What do you feel is the biggest strength of your healing class and why? Response time. With Prayer of Mending, Penance, and boosted shields (my Guild LOVES my shields) I can save people from the very brink of annihilation.

What do you feel is the biggest weakness of your healing class and why? Less effective group healing. But that's not what the spec is really designed for. But there is nothing like getting 5 Divine Aegis procs off of one group Prayer.

In a 25 man raiding environment, what do you feel, in general, is the best healing assignment for you? While I am supposed to be best at single tank heals (and Disc does excel at this) for my play style I do raid heals and instant saves. I usually have a druid nearby in our 10 mans, so I can get an innervate if I need mana and my fiend is on cooldown.

What healing class do you enjoy healing with most and why? Druids. While we tend to overlap a lot, they can blanket HoT's all over, and these can heal someone to full when I pop a shield on them. Also, battle rez has saved our bacon way too many times...

What healing class do you enjoy healing with least and why? Shammies and Pallies. Totally because I do not have a lot of knowledge about how their procs or trees work. I plan on using this questionnaire to alleviate this problem somewhat.

What is your worst habit as a healer? Blanket shielding on all teammates when they may not need it. While I have learned better-safe-than-sorry with my Guild, it is a mana heavy spell (I was pretty irked when they nerfed the mana cost reduction in the Disc tree) and makes my resources dwindle faster than they should.

What is your biggest pet peeve in a group environment while healing? When I have to suddenly save or heal someone who had no business needing healing. It means they pulled aggro or are standing in a fire or something stupid, and I have to waste time, mana and focus to save their butt.

Do you feel that your class/spec is well balanced with other healers for PvE healing? For healing, yes. In PvP I think we suffer in comparison to other classes for mana regen. Just try mana draining a resto druid... But aside from that, shields and penance make a huge difference in PvP. And there is NOTHING more satisfying than watching an enemy with low health kill themselves by whacking on your Reflective Shield!.

What tools do you use to evaluate your own performance as a healer? Is everyone alive (aside from the DPS that pulled aggro)? And did I have to call "out of mana" and basically be useless in the fight? We use Recount and healing meters, but only to judge for ourselves how we did. I will NEVER top the healing charts, and don't even try. And when Guildies are happy I'm there to heal, or we survive a fight when horribly outnumbered in PvP, I'm clearly doing something right.

What do you think is the biggest misconception people have about your healing class? That we suck as healers because we're usually low on Recount or meters. Even with all of Northrend's positive publicity for Discipline, people still do not understand mitigation. We don't *have* to heal as much as the other classes, because we prevented you from taking that damage in the first place.

What do you feel is the most difficult thing for new healers of your class to learn? Stat boosting. Or what to focus on. I had to completely redo my gems, enchants, etc with all my new gear to get my Int and Crit up to where I wanted them. Spirit used to be THE stat for healers. Figure out how to best stack and plan your gear and enhancements.

If someone were to try to evaluate your performance as a healer via recount, what sort of patterns would they see (i.e. lots of overhealing, low healing output, etc)? I would have low overhealing. If I see that another healer is taking care of someone, I switch targets or alter my focus. I have moderate output, but if the damage absorbed or mitigated were tracked that number would be really high for me, since I specced Bloodsun to have the best shields possible, and I use them. Liberally.

Haste or Crit and why? Crit. I personally do not see enough change in performance for the amount of Haste I need to stack. With my build, I average 35% or better Holy crit chance with my decent-level gear. With an Arcane mage, Elemental shammy or Boomkin around I have had that boosted to over 40%, which means a LOT of extra Aegis procs and powerful heals.

What healing class do you feel you understand least? Again, Shammies and Pallies. I have never played either class much (my shammy is Enhancement and I can't get a Pally past 12) so their mechanics are lost on me. I need to fix this.

What add-ons or macros do you use, if any, to aid you in healing? Healbot. Just because of my familiarity with it. I also recently picked up a Razer Naga, and the 12 button pad and accompanying UI interface mod have made things much easier for me. Also Omen so it growls at me when my aggro is getting up there.

Do you strive primarily for balance between your healing stats, or do you stack some much higher than others, and why? Serious stacking of Int. Big mana pool, higher crit chance. Crit is my second stat to push. Stamina follows this for PvP. When Spirit is fixed for mana regen issues I'm not sure what I'll do...

So these are my answers for Bloodsun (the vengeful god with the fabulous hair). Follow the link at the top to see the original post, and for links to other sites where healers have responded for their class/character. Hope you enjoy the read!