Illidari Council combos are one example I can think of where you would want 10k hit points. I usually run at about 10.4k. I use all of my regular gear though since all of it has at least some stamina, only adding [Blackened Sporefish] and switching to [Boots of the Divine Light].

On a related note, I wholeheartedly believe that Boar's Speed to be the best pve enchant any healer can use on their boots. :]

I wonder what you use in lieu of Boots of the Divine Light usually.

I assume [Archbishop's Slippers] but I dunno about that choice. By and large gear with sockets are balanced ilvl wise around green gems. So on top of the socket bonus ( if you take it) you're gaining 4-6 points of a bonus for each gem slot( assuming BT gems). Yes Divine light has less spirit and more staminia but with sockets you should be looking at least 7 healing and 4 mp5 Vs 13 spirirt. which is close enough to even in my books and Light still has the stamina.

I guess I'm saying I'd wear Light fulltime, and only swap in bishops for fights where I know I'm getting an innervate ( so that would be BB and Council if anything for me, but both of those fights are staminia friendly. your options may be wider.)

When stamina isn't important I switch back to the old [Boots of the Long Road] with Vitality enchant. Honestly I don't worry about it too much anymore, but I used to try to maximize my mana regeneration when we were learning healing intensive fights.

I flat-out believe [Boots of the Long Road] are the superior item over [Archbishop's Slippers] and [Boots of the Divine Light]. They are the best balanced of the three; unless you desperately need stam for a fight, I wear mine always.

For healing stats, it comes down to:

[Boots of the Divine Light]:
24+10 spirit
29 intellect
80 healing
**2 Mp5

(assumes a [Dazzling Seaspray Emerald] and an [Sparkling Empyrean Sapphire])

vs

[Boots of the Long Road]:
22 spirit
26 intellect
73 healing
9 Mp5

vs

[Archbishop's Slippers]:
37 spirit
30 intellect
84 healing

Obviously the only reason to wear Divine Light over Archbishop's is for the stamina, and if you're doing that, you might as well enchant Boar's Speed on them and put a 15 stamina gem in as well to really make them *obviously* for a stam set. Comparing Long Road and Archbishop's, I'd take 7 Mp5 over 15 spirit almost always; 15 spirit is good, but it's not 9 Mp5 good. 15 spirit is only 10.5 Mp5 OO5SR anyway, so 7 static beats it. It *is* fairly close, though, so especially for those who aren't tailors, Divine Light are useful and interesting.

Unless I'm missing something, [Archbishop's Slippers] are basically for people who aren't tailors, and thus don't have [Boots of the Long Road]. I've always considered them to be an abysmally bad item for its level; they're certainly not ilvl 141 in my opinion, especially when Long Road are considered to be ilvl 128.

** added the 2 Mp5 I forgot, wups!

To Vihermaali:

I'm confused. Your melee are off killing doomguards, and your raid is *still* eating RoF? The entire point of a strat that has the melee out killing doomguards is to prevent raid-wide damage.

The only people eating RoF in a situation where the melee are out of range should be shadow priests and possibly Arcane Mages. You can easily place those people in defined positions (directly to the right and left work) and place a couple of healers within easy range.

If you're running into range of RoF to reach people, your healers aren't really spreading out enough to cover all circumstances, or the dps are being flat-out stupid. There's no reason for a hunter, fire mage, warlock (of any kind), elemental shaman, or boomkin to *ever* eat a RoF, unless someone is standing near them, but within range, and basically lands it on them.

Play smart. If your raid can avoid damage, why are you intentionally causing hassle for yourself? Stand still, heal the tank, wait 6 minutes, collect epics. If it wasn't for Azgalor's burst capacity, he'd easily be the easiest fight in the instance. There are *no* random elements to the fight. You have time to SS the Marked people (or BRez), and you can limit the incoming damage to one person if you so choose. It was a real mistake design-wise to limit the range on RoF. Making it 60 yards would have made the fight *much* more interesting, and allowed them to lower his melee damage a bit, thus making it less annoying. Silence, 60 yard RoF, Mark of Death, Doomguards, and ~ 5-6k melee hits on a tank -- that's an interesting and challenging fight.

My excuse is that I joined this guild in beginning of september, when they had only Illidian left unkilled. It was my first time in Hyjal/BT so I never questioned their tactics. No need to fix what is not broken, ya? At least thats what I think. If we were still learning the fight we could try doing it a different way, but not after 3 months of 1-shotting him. Not outrangeing RoF never turned out to be a problem.

You're comparing unsocketed Long Road to epic gemmed Divine Light =P

You could just put the 22's in the Long Road boots though. Most people wouldn't since you'd be overwriting blue gems most likely, but they'd still be better. Even with Royal Nightseyes in Long Road and 22's in Divine Light you'd be trading 26 healing for 13 mp5. Again though this isn't taking into account the stamina, just the raw healing power (which includes mana regeneration!)

22's in what sockets in Boots of the Long Road if I may ask? Or did you mean the T6 trash boots?

Wow I'm bad. Eggnog going straight to the head. :x

All the priests in my guild are tailors, and we have struggled with PMC-related mortality. :P In the end we basically told people that they need to be ABLE to wear gear that puts them over 8.5k... and they need to develop their own judgement about when to wear it.

It doesn't only depend on the fight, but also on the raid composition and your group's gear level. When we were halfway through KZ and people were in blues, I had to put on PvP gear to survive Illhoof sacrifices, but as soon as the other healers geared up it was no longer an issue.

I find stacking stamina gives me a bit more flexibility. I have Closetgnome setup with a few pieces of PVP gear swapped for my no-sta gear. I use the set for trash, which tends to be unforgiving in ssc/tk. I also use it for learning fights. I'd almost always rather have 2-3k more hp which has allowed me to survive a whirlwind, spitfire totem, etc. Once we have solved the mechanics of the encounter, I switch to my healing/regen gear.

I'm wondering how people are tracking POM, or if they track it at all. I have WoWInterface Downloads : MendWatch

I would like something a bit more compact that is an accurate tracker.

Thanks in advance.

Well, I had the lowest HP of the group (in PMC) and was the only one who would die to Sacrifice. DPS had no need to change their gear. I suppose it may have been coincidental that I had the lowest HP, and the true reason I died was that I was the only healer who was "awake", but in this particular group I don't think that was the case.

In any case the problem solved itself via gear and experience long before we stopped running KZ and moved on, which was my point: Stamina gear can temporarily help you get past a progression bump.

Could be because you were the one healing the others, so when you got sacrificed your group came up short one healer. Not even so much "awake", but assuming you're using 2 healers... one healer getting sacrificed is a 50% loss, then the other healer is forced to heal you or anyone close to dying. Obviously, the choice would be you... but what if it was a tank?

Hello. I am a holy/discipline human priest. I am spec'd 23/38.

I would like to hear other people's opinions on ways I can maximize my healing via my spec or healing rotations. Here is how I have my talent tree:

Under Discipline: Unbreakable Will 5/5
Silent Resolve 4/5
Improved Power Word 2/2
Inner Focus 1/1
Meditation 3/3
Mental Agility 5/5
Divine Spirit 1/1
Improved Divine Spirit 2/2

Under Holy: Healing Focus 2/2
Improved Renew 3/3
Holy Specialization 5/5
Divine Fury 5/5
Blessed Recovery 1/3
Inspiration 3/3
Improved Healing 3/3
Healing Prayers 2/2
Spirit of Redemption 1/1
Spiritual Guidance 5/5
Spiritual Healing 5/5
Holy Concentration 3/3

I have been happy with the holy/discipline spec so far but wonder if perhaps a fully holy spec would provide maximum results?


I also wonder if there are ways I can maximise my healing as compared to the heal rotations I currently use?

Here is my gear:

The World of Warcraft Armory

I am trying to get tier 5.

The main heals I use are Flash Heal Rank 9 and Greater Heal Rank 7. I also keep rank 4 of Flash Heal and Rank 1 for Greater Heal handy.

In SSC and TK I am using Flash Heal Rank 9 on tanks to top them off and I use it on the rest of the raid. At times I will use the Greater Heal Rank 7 as well when necessary. I try to time my heals to anticipate damage and interrupt as necessary so I am not wasting time/mana healing when another healer topped my target off. I also use renews and prayer of mending on tanks. Should I be using any other heals? I rarely use my down ranks because I am afraid that the heals will not be good enough to top them off and I am afraid that I will not look well on healing meters. Are other healers healing differently? I would just like to hear other opinions on how best to approach healing to maximize efficiency. I would love to hear any opinions on how I could approach things differently.

One idea suggested was shielding the tank and then using prayer of mending on pulls. I normally try to stay away from shielding the tank because it can impair their rage generation which is very important on the pull while they establish agro. Is shielding something I should reserve for times when we are using hunters to misdirect pull (or when I see the tank has popped bloodrage prior to the pull) usually I just hit prayer of mending before he pulls the boss. Should I hit shield then inner focus and then prayer of mending before each boss pull? Our tanks are really good and there has never been any problems on boss pulling so that is why I have never changed my ways of healing but if putting a shield on them before hand would do any good then I will do it. I am not an expert on this so that is why I am in here trying to get people's opinions.

During raiding time I do use Elixir of Healing Power, Superior Mana oil, Super Mana pots, and Elixir of Major Mageblood. I also have the Flask of Mighty Restoration but then I cannot use the Healing Power (In your opinion which would be better to use?). I did come across that you use blackened sporefish or golden fish sticks which on occasion I would use but from now on I will also use one of them for each boss fight.

Happy Holidays :o)

Your healing calculations on Boots of the Divine Light are wrong, I'm asuming you meant to put a 11heal/5int gem along with the 10 spirit gem in there, that would put them at 91 healing. BotDL is clearly the best option, if youre that desperate for mana/5s, throw 2x 4mana/5s gems in them and all of a sudden the differance is 22sta 2spirit vs 2 int 1 mana/5s.

Boots of the Long Road are very good item for their ilvl, which isn't suprising since it has its item budget points spread out over five relevant stats. In your comparison to Archbishop slippers you're leaving out the 11 heal 4int 4 sta differance though, overall they are fairly equal.

But yea, AS is a poinless item, just like the cloth healing bracers of Akama. Every time they drop and rot yet again I wonder why they couldn't have put something useful like a ring, necklace or trinket there instead.

I've switched from using PoMTracker to having Grid put a white dot on top of any person with the ProM buff. I find that a separate UI is distracting and oft-overlooked, and I care little for how effective the ProM is, that's what a stat tracker like recount or WWS is for. This also works very well when teaming with another priest, so that I don't overwrite another ProM. And it makes me happy to see the little white square jumping around =]

An excellent discussion on grid can be found on these forums here.

I fixed my post above; I assumed a [Dazzling Seaspray Emerald] in the calculations. Wups, and thanks for the catch.

My rule of thumb is to basically ignore small +heal differences in gear, and to focus mainly on mana return and basic stats, especially spirit and intellect. I've never had an issue with stamina killing me, and in full T5 with my non-stam items, I'm still running 9400 HP.

When you break 2200 +heal in a raid setting, do you REALLY need to care about another 20 or 30? It's ludicrous how much +heal we can stack as priests. Additionally, I haven't seen any real benefits to stacking another 200-300, as I know some people do. If Sunchips is reading, maybe he could give us a little precis on how +heal stacking works in his raids; I'm not sure what raid role he has, but he's one of the most visible (i.e. active priests on these forums) who follow that stategem for enchanting and gemming his gear.

Personally, I'm almost the regen advocate; I've never been a tank healer, so I really do care about as much mana as I can possibly get. It's paid off in my playstyle, though -- I have WWS parses of me trouncing resto druids and resto shamans in fights where they properly should be trouncing me. The priest class is *incredibly* versatile, and the reason I continue playing to this day is that with some effective setup, I *can* pull off things like that. CoH, PoM, Renews that tick for close to 800, Flash Heal when needed, and incredibly efficient GH:1 spam add together to make me a powerful addition to a raid.

It also makes me laugh when I see people *still* posting to this day about how priests are dead, and we should all re-roll shamans. That may have been true pre-buffs (i.e. 2.2), and pre-BT (i.e. before an instance that plays to our strengths came along), but it's certainly not true now.

I think it's funny how everyone has forgotten the best boots in the game: Two toed sandals

Following along the lines of stacking regen versus stacking +healing...

There was a discussion the other day in my guild between a Paladin, Shaman and Priest about how our Priests have inaccurately gemmed our [Gloves of Absolution] and [Bracers of Martyrdom]. All three of us Priests used [Teardrop Crimson Spinel] in both items.

My questions are as follows:

1. With respect to the Gloves (as that was the greater debate), how does [Royal Shadowsong Amethyst] equate to more +healing than [Teardrop Crimson Spinel]?
2. Why do people choose to stack regen when you can use consumables to compensate?

Some background on me...

I am a COH spec Priest, however my Armory profile will likely show my PvP spec/gear since my guild only raids 1-2 days in BT/Hyjal anymore. For the longest time, I was a "Spirit Stacker". After some thought, and reading these forums a fellow Priest and I chose to quit Spirit Stacking and gem for a more balanced gear set. My responsibilities in raids nowadays pretty much encompass every aspect of a healer. On some encounters, I'm MT healing (though rare) and on other encounters I'm raid healing or healing the OT.

Back to the questions...

1. I don't understand how someone can make the claim that a net 3mp5 is always better than 11+healing when I use absolutely no mana potions throughout all of BT or Hyjal anymore. Maybe I am mistaken, but I'm landing 3300 GH1 and can pretty much chain cast that heal with small 5SR breaks to take advantage of when the person I'm healing isn't taking damage. Now, of course I understand that realistically, I'm not chaincasting GH1 and my role usually lends me to COH, renew, POM, shield, and depending on the situation GH1/GH7/FH9, so of course my mana isn't always used by my most efficient heal. Nevertheless, how does someone justify 3mp5 is better than 11+healing or equates to more +healing (for a Priest).

2. I recall a while back that someone pointed out that a fellow EJ poster happened to have what could be viewed as an "anomaly" gear set. Essentially, this person had probably one of the most balanced sets in terms of +healing, spirit, and mp5. There was no obvious mindset toward stacking any one area. That short discussion got me thinking about my own gear (which is still heavily biased toward spirit) and how it supports my role. Like Constantius said above, Priests are one of the most versatile healing classes in the game. Sitting on 5 months of farming TBC content and with pretty much every item I could want, I started to realize that if I biased myself in one direction, I wasn't supporting myself to be as strong of a healer in another direction/role. For me, completely gemmed in +10 Spirit, I realized that I was giving up a lot of +healing (ideal for a COH Priest) and regen while casting. I am NOT a proponent of gemming everything in +heal/mp5 as I still believe Spirit is the single strongest stat for a Priest. So, if you look at my gear now, it takes on a more balanced approach and really supports the idea of Spirit > +Healing > mp5 (but without as drastic of a gap between the stats). Nevertheless, I just can't seem to understand how mp5 is still the highly touted stat among Priests that it is. Between food, mana potions, flasks, etc...it's pretty much impossible to go OOM. I don't think mp5 a bad stat to have some of (I wish I had properly gemmed my [Leggings of Eternity] with [Royal Shadowsong Amethyst]), but I still think stacking it is excessive and requires you to give up too much in other areas when you can compensate (if and when needed) with consumables.

What exactly am I missing?

If someone claims he is a holy priest that never runs out of mana I call him either a liar or a bad healer :-) If you heal properly you can run out of mana. It is very hard to judge what is the best stat for gemming: +healing, mp5 or spirit. Personal style and preference are major factors in that, even when counting all the theorycrafting in world.

Why do *I* prefer +11 heal & +2mp5 gems over other ones? For one, my while-NOT-casting regen is over 2 times bigger than my while-casting regen (460/225mp5). I have heavily spirit-filled gear and thus I make for the lack of while-casting-mp5 with +11heal&2mp5 gems. Those gems and not 4mp5 gems because I think +11heal > 2mp5. My +healing (unbuffed!) is only ~2k. You all can talk days and days about benefits of +healing and how its superior to other stats but I don't think I need more of it. Why is that? My normal overheal % is around 50 and when it goes down to 40% I think I have done a good job. With those amounts of overhealing stacking +healing is no good.

Why do people choose to stack regen when you can use consumables to compensate? Because they feel they have enough healing power but still can't chaincast spells long enough.

Every priest has their own healing style and should gem according to what benefits their playing style the most. When assigned to MT healing you are going to be using GHeal most hence it makes sense to push for as high +healing since you can down rank. When you are raid healing and using Flash Heal it makes sense to aim for higher mana regen since your spells benefits less from +healing.

Constantius you are suggesting that for every item there is an optimal way to gem it and earlier you suggested that there is only one spec (IDS) which is viable for a priest who wants to heal in raids. You should broaden your horizon and try to understand that there is more than one way to heal.

You could gem [Gloves of Unfailing Faith] with any combination of [Teardrop Crimson Spinel] and [Royal Shadowsong Amethyst] and still have the optimal combination for your healing style. Similarly you could either spend points in Inspiration or Spell Warding and still have the optimal spec for your healing assignments and gear combinations. There is no optimal spec or spell selection to cover all healing assignments and raid compositions. The best way to play is to approach each raid and boss on an individual basis.

No matter what healing class you are:
-If you never ever have any chance of going out of mana, what's the point of regen? Bigger heals will mean your heal target is less likely to die and give you more burst to recover from burst damage on the raid. You can never have "enough" HPS as it's always safer to run with more HPS.
-If you do have a chance to run out of mana, and want to maximize the amount of healing you can do using all your mana in a given fight, the value of healing VS mp5 or any other stat/effect that has anything to do with mana, the actual mana you have available is a very significant factor. Let's say you do 10 healing per mana. Increasing your mana by 5% will allow you to do 5% more healing, but so will increasing your heals to be 5% bigger. Then the 5% bigger heals also help in the first scenario so it's obviously better - but by how much?
Basically the deciding factor in this is not really "personal taste" or "style" imo, but more that it depends on so many things it's extremely complicated nobody really knows the good all-around answer, especially when that answer would change on different fights and on different group compositions.
For example on my paladin spreadsheet runnign with shaman+shadowpriest drops the value of MP5 from the best stat per itemization point to the worst. And considering there are many fights I simply can't run oom if I try with these unless I just spam HL on peopel that don't need it, the "screw mana get more HPS factor" makes it even harder to pick optimal gear. So again it's really not so much about taste and style imo, more about being extremely complicated.