Just in case you missed it, the Matticast crew talked about the imminent patch 4.2 drop. Things like the valor cap, the new Encounter Journal, class changes and the Legendary quest.
Healing changes
You can find more detailed information in the latest patch notes. But here’s what they are at a glance.
All healing critical strikes now heal for 2 times a normal heal (+100%), up from 1.5 times a normal heal (+50%).
Priests
As a result of the critical strike change, Crit appears to have become attractive. It’s possible to see some 50k absorbs. Otherwise, no additional changes have been made to Priest healing at this time.
That’s not a bad thing.
Druids
Symbiosis (Mastery) has been removed and replaced with Harmony. Harmony increases direct healing by an additional 10%, and casting direct healing spells grants an additional 10% bonus to periodic healing for 10 seconds. Each point of mastery increases each bonus by an additional 1.25%. Healing Touch, Nourish, Swiftmend, and the initial heal from Regrowth are considered direct healing spells for the purposes of this Mastery. All other healing from druid spells is considered periodic.
Paladins
Many healing spells have had their mana costs adjusted.
Illuminated Healing (Mastery) has been adjusted slightly so that if a paladin refreshes an existing copy of his or her own Illuminated Healing on a target, the new absorption amount will be added into the old absorption amount and the duration will be reset. The total absorption created can never exceed 1/3 of the casting paladin’s health. Paladins are now Val’anyr!
Shamans
Improved Water Shield has been redesigned and renamed Resurgence. When Water Shield is active, Resurgence causes critical direct heals to restore mana (Resurgence rank 2 is roughly equal to 150% of the old Improved Water Shield value when a Healing Wave or Greater Healing Wave critically hits, and scaled down accordingly for faster or multi-target spells).
Mana Tide now grants 200% of the caster’s Spirit, down from 400%.
Glyph of Unleashed Lightning (new Prime glyph) allows Lightning Bolt to be cast while moving. Handy in tandem with Telluric Currents.
Legendary Thoughts
Start the quest if you like to check it out and such. But don’t force your guild to give it to you. It’s for the casters this time around.
Lack of Spirit Cloth Gear
Yeah, I’ve seen a whole ton of discussion about this around. There aren’t a whole lot of drops and it seems that most of the stuff is going to either come from faction vendors or Valor vendors.
Look, they didn’t forget anything. This was done for a reason. We can still rely on reforging to get the additional spirit if necessary. Prioritize Spirit trinkets to help offset the loss. The Jar of Ancient Remedies is something you’ll want to keep handy (as in, don’t sell it or get rid of it otherwise).
It was my fault.
I used and abused spirit mechanics too much and they the nerfed drops because of me :(.
Firelands raid bosses
It seems that reputation for Avengers of Hyjal are only obtainable from the Firelands raid instance. You can get up to Honored with taking down trash (I just got up to Friendly after about 2 hours and chain dropping battle standards).
You can find the Firelands raid instance out in Mount Hyjal. Just head to the big, flaming castle in the southern part of the zone. No attunements are needed. Feel free to zone right in. Recommended boss order is to start with Shannox, Beth’tilac, Lord Rhyolith and Alysrazor before finishing out the last three.
Need to know where to get started for healing?
- Beth’tilac
- Lord Rhyolith
- Alysrazor
- Shannox
- Baleroc
- Majordomo Staghelm
- Ragnaros
The issue is not that we won’t have enough spirit. The issue is that there is little room for customization with cloth gear as it stands. If you’re a holy paladin, you can practically build an entire 378 gear set without using any T12 (not that you’d want to). If you’re a priest, you better like the stats you get on tier, because you don’t have any choice.
Yes, we can take DPS cloth and reforge to spirit. Let me tell you how thrilled I am about that.
Time will tell what the regen situation is going to look like, but I just don’t like having fewer gearing options than every other healer right out of the gate.
Yeah, I know what you mean about the lack of variety. I can’t fathom about the reasoning. Maybe there’s only so many combinations or whatever that can be made. Or maybe we’re just that hated. Who knows? But, I’m not worried about it at all. Perhaps too much cloth gear floating around as is and they wanted to curb it. I don’t know.
It’s called an oversight plain and simple. There’s no logical reason whatsoever for the lack of spirit cloth. Yes, we can fill most slots with spirit gear but at a MUCH slower pace. Combined with Holy’s obvious scaling problems, and several cd’s that are hardly worth pressing, my priest is not feeling very warm and fuzzy these days.
Whats particularly annoying is that blizzard seems to think if they buff our crap spells (sanctuary, DH) we’ll somehow become op. Meanwhile druids, even without Tranq, are still superior in regards to throughput.
Maybe Blizzard will release 4.3 so quickly that the lack of gear choices from a 7 boss raid won’t matter so much. Maybe we’ll get Ulduar 2.0 🙂
Wishful thinking I know… 🙁
can’t zone in until the portal is avil to you, which is 7 days of dailies …
Firelands the raid can be entered. Firelands the questing hub needs more time.
How were you able to enter? After doing all the quests and opening the portal, it wont let you in
There is exactly 1 choice for most slots for spell spirit from all sources in 4.2. So much for getting to make choices.
The galling part is all the other healers get gear from raids. Look at the plate lists or mail lists or leather lists and you will see gobs of spirit gear for our healing brethren. Cmon, Holy Pallies are the only spec in the game that uses Spirit plate and all 3 Priests can use Spirit Cloth!! What gives? Should Priests just take a break during Firelands?
It is just further confirmation that Blizzar really does love Paladins. Probably those same guys who whined at developer meetings and made them keep Lay on Hands…
😛
Don’t forget the awesome change to bacon for holidans, 100% of holy light now transfers woot!
Prob too late, but after killing the 1st 6 bosses, I’d say do the Gatekeeper guy before Alice the Firebird. Alice is a fun fight but there is a lot more to it. Gatekeeper basically just fell down for us, and in 25 man it is about 10x easier. (We did it 10… oops)
Just FYI.