Take <# hunters>+<# paladins/priests/druids/shamans-that-aren't-enhancement>+<#warlocks>+<#mages>

Then figure out if you have enough shadow priests to stack with all of them. Every single one of the classes I mentioned can benefit from VT.

We run with 2, and usually have 2 hunters, 6 healers, and 2 SPs in groups 4/5. The 7th / 8th healer usually end up in the tank group, and are the best geared (highest regen) healers in the raid.

We've only dabbled in 25-mans at this point, but I usually try to have a paladin, priest, and resto druid (myself) in my Kara groups. I am usually the raid healer and have found that my HoTs are especially effective on giving the healers a buffer on the tank and also for certain boss situations (garrotes on Moroes, beacon damage on Curator, etc). I tend to spam LBs on squishies who need a heal and, if the priest or pally heals over it, oh well.

Our other guild resto druid is usually a MT/OT healer and does an amazing job at that also, but I've noticed tends to oom a lot more quickly than priests/pallies. Our long cast times are a real pain, too.

I'm excited to see what will happen in the 25-mans, and I still forsee druids being of major use with providing the MT healers with a buffer, especially with the new LB stackage.

I'm the only resto-druid (full resto, tree and all) in our raids and I'm currently trying to find out what my place in the raid is supposed to be. While clearing the trash to Hydross and Morogrim I discovered that I could keep three stacks of Lifebloom going on three tanks for the duration of the pull. At three stacks it ticks for around 560 hp a second which seems pretty good to me.
Healing random raiders on trash is of course also an alternative.

The question on my role on bossfights has also been brought up recently. Should I dish out HoTs wherever I expect it to be needed or do I stick to the main tank. Keeping HoT's flowing and having Natures Swiftness buffed and ready so that I could instantly counter a big damage spike on the MT has been suggested as an alternative.
This has lead me to wonder if I should respec and go with Lunar Guidance and Moonglow instead of Tree of Life. The question is what would benefit the raid the most: A druid with HT Boost healing the maintank or a Tree of life druid casting HoT on everyone and their dog? We're usually able to field 2-3 paladins, 3-4 priest and 1-2 shamans.

I am surprised not to see more talk about the Lifebloom change in 2.1.

My perception as a tank is that it's really, really, *really* good to have a druid maintaining a rolling 3-stack. It complements other HoTs and flash of light spam really well, it can often fade and respond to burst damage very conveniently (e.g. reverberation), and it's not even that bad efficiency-wise to maintain it constantly. Heck, judging by the theorycraft, it's even extremely low-agro.

I'm not really sure whether that changes how you allocate raiding healing duties (my guess would be not too much, as the druid still has time to drop at least some heals on other people), but it strikes me as a very powerful MT-heal now.

I just hope it doesn't get nerfed.

I'm curious, why the emphasis on Paladins as single-target healers? IMO, Paladins are not only well-suited to raid healing, but probably the BEST at raid healing.

Why? Flash of Light.

Let's be honest, Paladins even with the change can spam FoL for ages. This is higher HPM and HPS than Priests using downranked GH, and generally faster at patching. Shaman are pretty good in some situations with Chain Heal, but don't have close to the mana efficiency of Paladins when in the situation of constant spamming that raid healing can require sometimes. Tree Druids are great at raid healing also, but sticking HoTs on everyone can take a while--I'd put a Tree and a Paladin on raid healing together, personally.

In many cases, the damage being sustained by the raid is low enough to be healed up efficiently by FoL. This means that, for instance, Priests will be using GH1...which means, of course, that the raid will get patched up significantly slower. I would never put Priests on raid healing over an "active" Paladin unless it was really needed.

You want at least 1 Paladin on MT duty, along with 1 Priest using well-timed large heals. I personally find Tree Druids to be highly benificial on MT duty, as the heal-up ticks can lend heavily to the mana efficiency of the cancel-casting Priests on the MT.

However, I really don't understand why one would shun a Paladin from raid healing. Sure, they're good single-target healers...but the raid is a collection of single targets in most situations. Paladins can patch up raids faster and more efficiently than any other class. Frankly, Priests are too slow at patch healing to be efficient and Shaman less mana-efficient unless they are making good use of chain heal. Also, it feels to me that Shaman make more natural single-target healers as Healing Way is on the target where's a Paladin's Light's Grace is on themselves. This is an important thing to remember.

Don't get me wrong, I love having a Paladin on the MT with me as a Priest... however, we almost always assign 2 of our Paladins to raid healing and they do an amazing job at it.

Chain heal will heal for more to more people than flash of light ever will. If you have four paladins and have BoL on the whole raid, then this is mitigated somewhat, but most raids probably run with 3.

I'm sort of surprised you can say "shaman are good in some situations with chain heal." It is the best AE heal in the game, and 2-3 resto shaman can heal virtually any damage hitting your raid on any encounter.

Pallies are ok raid healers, however, if you are in a situation where chain heal hits at least 1 person after target shamans become the best raid healers by far. As I saw mentioned (either in this thread or another) nothing patches up a raid faster then a couple resto shaman throwing some chain heals.

Shaman can MT heal, even better now with the change (fix) to healing way. I can basically spam rank 7 or so all day long and never go OOM with proper cooldown usage and pots. However I do not think it is our strong point.

This is just incorrect. The power and effiiency of chain heal is ridiculous. Please don't tell Blizzard though, because they will nerf us. Shaman can't be good at anything in thier minds.

Lifebloom is superior to Flash heal in mana effeciency, and HPS. (Especially when your lacking Blessing of Light)

When I see pallies raid healing, they often have to resort to Holy Light because of the large amount of raid damage if TBC encounters.

It is excellent for it - just wait AFTER the cave in when people group up again. Chain heal everybody up.

Shamans are far worst than paladins at single target healing and better at raid group healing - seems obvious to maximise their strengths. Of course paladin can do it, but why would you want too?

There is nothing particularly wrong with throwing out the needed Holy Light, however. Our typical "patcher" specialist Paladin gets about 40% of his healing from HL, but he got off ~130 FoL on our last Mag fight, compared to 28 HL.

Isn't Lifebloom only better HPS counting the final tick? Sometimes you need quicker healing.

Don't get me wrong, I'm certainly not discounting the roles of Shaman or Druids in raid healing. They are quite good at it. My point is simply: Paladins are quite good at it also, and serve for a nice mixed role in raid healing also. There seems little reason to stick to one class when you could easily mix them for max benifit.

Paladin/Paladin/Priest/Shaman on the MT(s) with a Paladin/Shaman/Druid on raid-healing is a pretty good setup, for instance.

Personally, I'm not a fan of the risk that entails. Multiple Cave Ins in a row, or not adaquately healing people up right before a Ground Slam can lead to easily preventable deaths. "Waiting" isn't usually the point of raid patch healing--keeping everyone at 100% for as much of the time and as quickly as possible is. Again, not saying it isn't viable but dismissing the usefulness of Paladins isn't terribly accurate either.

It's quite possible to be "stalked" by Cave Ins, or have multiple adjacent Cave Ins, really. I see it happen quite regularly. But, that's just an example, really. Don't need to fixate on the details of one specific encounter.

From my personal experiences, I feel that Paladins are considerably more felixble than many people actually give them credit for.