I woke up this morning to a crisp chill and a great question posted on Twitter by @Knurd (of Raid Hunter).
@patyomatt What makes you think we are headed back to flash heal spamming?
Granted he answered his own question after doing a bit more reading, but I’m still going to explore the topic in a little more detail (because Twitter is EXCELLENT post fodder).
In my previous post, I mentioned that I’ve started to Flash Heal more often than Greater Heal. Until I’m proven otherwise, I firmly believe that Priests will be trending towards Flash Heal and here’s why:
Down ranking gone: The current technique right now is that we use down ranked heals to minimize spell impact on our mana pool and to reduce over healing. We’ll use a rank 3 Greater Heal to restore the same amount of health as a near max rank Flash Heal. We save a couple of hundred mana at the cost of 1 extra second of cast time.
With down ranking removed, we can no longer utilize this technique. A Greater Heal costs 1000~ mana with the appropriate talents in place. A Flash Heal costs 600~ mana. It’s no longer a question of efficieny or bang for buck. It’s a question of what’s cheaper, which is Flash Heal.
High health tanks: Tank buffer has increased by a ridiculous amount. Their health has increased by 50% which turns them into pseudo-raid bosses. At the same time, they won’t be taking massive hits on some encounters. There’s no reason to bust out the massive 10000~ Greater Heal to restore 5000~ health unless they drop dangerously low. But by then, you’re going to be praying to the RNG gods that the mobs miss or they parry or something so that your bomb heal lasts. Might be better off getting the heals off quickly instead of going for the bomb heal. Leave the bomb healing to the Paladins.
Overhealing: It sort of ties into my last point, but 80% of the Greater Heals you cast will result in massive over healing because that crafty Resto Shaman next to you blew his Nature’s Swiftness Chain Heal, or the Paladin manages to Holy Shock crit, or the Druid happens to… do his Druid thing.
Mana Management more important than ever: If you have a hard time handling your mana resource now as a player, you’re going to be in for it in the expansion. During my forays into Naxxramus, I was hitting the floor with my mana pool. It was getting dangerously low while the bosses were in the single digit percents. I had to learn really fast when to burst heal and when to ease off the pedal to restore my mana.
Obviously, we do have access to our specialized heals. This is just a comparison between our direct heals based on my beta experience. I have no doubt another Priest will come along and come up with new ideas for Wrath.
Keep the mind open and let the healologists do their work. Now is not the time to shoot down ideas. It’s time to generate them.
Image credits: ckgd2