Not at all? Holy Light has a higher +healing coefficient, not to mention a higher HP/mana AND HP/sec ratio than FoL. If you have Light's Grace up, and you're not overhealing significantly, its the ideal spell to use (especially since it would likely have a significantly higher critrate than FoL).

Yes, and my experience has been paladin offspecs are perfectly fine for primary healing of leveling instances. I respecced Holy at cap for raiding, so I can't say I've tried endgame healing as anything but an idealized spec.

I faced a similar problem as the OP. I am a resto at heart and love to heal and support groups in that method but knew that it was not a good build to level or quest with. I flip flopped back and forth through the levels with different builds from doing a full feral build, where I missed healing horribly, to a 0/33/22 build at lvl 64 to gain a lot of the Feral abilities to include HOTW, LoTP and ILoTP. This build afforded me plenty of feral abilities to quickly kill mobs solo, to heal decently with NS and to give me the ability to tank, dps or heal for groups as needed.

At 69 currently I am a 0/29/31 build and this gets me almost all the best feral abilities while also a lot of Healing abilities with a large mana pool, large rejuvs, lifeblooms and swiftmends. I have healed for lvl 70 instances with this setup with little problem. Its nice to have another off spec'd healer pop heals on some boss fights like the second boss in the Black Morass.

Try out the 0/33/22 build with concentration on Kitty DPS talents and the first 14 points in Resto tree in Feral abilities and you will probably be happy with the returns. Example:
Wowhead 0/33/22

I'm an off-spec Druid too, or rather as I like to say a "resto/feral hybrid". I was pure resto (0/0/51) for raiding prior to the expansion pack, but I knew from my experience leveling 1-60 that pure resto builds are terrible to level with if you spend substantial amounts of time soloing - I'm impressed you managed to stick it out this long. However, I like to heal and I like doing instance runs when I can.

My experience is that it is possible to heal TBC off-spec given the following assumptions:

- Mixed resto/feral spec - I'm building toward 0/30/31 (not quite at 70 yet). Because druid heals are slower, I've needed Nature's Swiftness in tight situations and I'd say that it has saved wipes on several occasions. I'm not sure you could get by without at least 21 points in resto.

- Put Feral points in to HOTW and Nurturing Instinct. The greater mana pool from HOTW really helps in the shorter 5-man bosses, and the +healing from Nurturing Instinct is helpful (I get about +50 in my resto gear).

- Make sure you have decent healing gear. I started with MC/ZG/AQ20 epics, and I've been replacing them whenever I find better gear, primarily from instances or instance quests. I take resto gear over feral gear when I have a choice.

- Have a back-up healer on instances that are not on "farm" yet. The extra healing can help prevent bad pulls and other mistakes from turning in to wipes and it is nice to have either another rez (especially one that is not on a long timer) for the inevitable death or two.

I main healed all the instances as ret leveling up and most of the 70's, Some are indeed relativily easy, ie Shadow Lab apart from first boss. My first run of Shattered halls really strained me, but a undergeared 69 druid as mt was a lot of the reason for that.

The difference between haveing a shadow priest in the group even if they never come out of form is night and day. Funnily enough it was the effort of trying to solo heal a Black Morass yesterday that in a fit of frustration I respecced back to holy. 4 Wipes to Boss 2 when I had killed him easily with a different group that included a shadow priest the previous day.

Thanks for all of the great replies.

My feel my spec should at least have Swiftmend, it has saved myself and my group more times than I can count. I was considering putting my other points into Balance. I have a decent amount of balance gear, some from pre TBC and some I picked up while in the TBC. Plus I think it would be fun.

Is anyone running with a Balance/Resto Build? Where the Resto tree gives you at least Swiftmend?

I was in exactly the same spot as you. I was 0/0/51 heading into TBC, and I thought I'd try and run with that. I found exactly the same as you, i.e. It was absolutely brain-numbing. I respecced to 0/20/31 at first, as I didn't (again like you) want to give up swiftmend. In the end another druid I know told me to bite the bullet and give it up, so I went to 0/30/21, and am now 0/33/21 at level 63. So far, and take this with a pinch of salt as I've only solo-healed Hellfire Citadel and Coilfang instances, I've been fine. Heart of the Wild made a massive difference to how long I could heal for.

Some have gone for 0/41/10 but I simply couldn't give up Nature's Swiftness - it's an absolute boon both for instancing and for solo work, and those "oh-shit" moments when you accidentally pull adds to yourself while questing.

I will head towards 70 aiming to end up 0/40/21, and then probably ultimately respec to 0/30/31 for the best of both worlds. Finally, like you, as I've got more +spell dmg gear it's been tempting to try something like 17/13/21 but what I've done instead is create a sort of hybrid +heal/+dmg gear set that allows me to chuck moonfires & starfires on early pulls, while still keeping +500 odd healing.

Hope that helps.

I'm running with a resto/balance spec now. I was full feral for a long time before BC and kept that spec to level to 70. I was comfortable main-healing everything up to 70. I did warn my groups that I didn't have instant heals and they should watch the aggro, and I drank pots here and there, but I didn't have any major problems. The first time I really felt stretched was main healing Shattered Halls. The large pulls meant a lot of party damage, my HOT's weren't that strong and I just didn't have the regen or quick heals I needed.

I recently respecced 27/0/34. I've found this a really efficient and strong healing spec - I use lifebloom a lot for touch up party healing, and I have strong healing touches for use on tanks. Swiftmend has also come in very handy in a lot of situations.

It's taken some getting used to but it's still possible to solo with decent efficiency, I just feel a lot more fragile than I did as feral. I do like the synergy between the balance and resto trees, and that it's easy to put together a nice off-healing/caster damage set for times when I go somewhere as a secondary healer. So if you're thinking you want strong heals while still being able to solo effectively, the balance/resto hybrid could be a good compromise.

A lot depends on your group. At 49/0/12 (druid), you can't be the healer that keeps a bad group rockin', but you can definitely keep a decent party up. Haven't tried Heroics yet, but was only healer in basically every instance, and it's definitely manageable. Main problem is dealing with damage scattered through the entire party: a Tranq. every 10th minute aside, there's really no way to deal with collateral damage quickly. If the party can survive long enough, HoTs take care of this, but quick bursts on everyone is a nightmare - so I advise everyone to drink healing pots and use bandages during such fights, and take extra care to avoid eating unneccessary damage.

Mana potions are a must for places like Black Morass - but normally I drink 2-3 there only, mostly during the bossfights. Guess it's the same for PvE healer specced folks though, I've yet to do an instance where I didn't have to Innervate the main healer at least once.

I am a 0/44/17 druid, and I main healed an arcatraz run that did not wipe. I have cooking and fishing, so I was munching on fishsticks the whole run, but it was as smooth an arcatraz run I have seen. Hardest parts were the Fire Demon boss and the infernal trash. Stupid meteor. As long as you have a good tank, anybody can heal a run if most of the incoming damage is focused on 1 person.

Edit: My guild never did much outside BWL and leather healing itemization is kinda meh in the level 70 instances but I still have over 1000+heal. My healing set has 2 pieces of the priest set in it, I wish there was a leather equivalent other then crappy moonglade.

As a shadow priest who's primarily focused and gearing as dps, my heal gear is lacking and the only healing talent I can say I have is silent resolve and meditation. I find that there are very few end game instances I can solo heal (especially since our guild has only 1 level 70 mage and very few of our rogues have imp sap so we're sol on humanoid CC's), but with 2 healers its cake.

I've decided to go the "best of both worlds" way. I've done all the levelling as holy, using a balanced healing/nuking/pvp healing/solo nuking build.

23 disc for imp divine spirit
33 holy for blessed resilience, full spirit guidance, surge of light, improved prayers, spirit of redemption et al.
5 shadow for full spirit tap

Shadow word: death and holy fire hit+dot give me plenty of spirit tap procs in instances, including a majority of boss fights. I can solo with about 550 damage and healing, heal with about 900 +heal, and whenever spirit tap procs I basically enter some kind of "god mode", whether it's damage dealing or healing or mana regeneration. Think "four digits spirit for 15 seconds".

I've had no troubles healing in karazhan with this build, but I've yet to test heroics.