Cataclysm Healing Priest Theorycrafting

Carnathagia · 09/27/10, 6:45 PM

Purpose

This thread is for collaboration on Priest theorycrafting for both Holy and Discipline specs. The goal is to have an accurate model of healing and spell mechanics to facilitate theorycrafting. Corrections or additions to formulas, theorycrafting observations, healing modeling discussion, and additional testing results should be posted here. General Priest discussion or questions should not be posted in this thread.

Spell Coefficients and Formulas

To calculate the value of a spell, the formula (BaseValue + Spellpower * Coefficient) * Modifiers is used.

Level	80 Base Value	85 Base Value	Coefficient	Modifiers
Shield	3498	3906	0.418	Imp. PW:S, SD, TD
Renew*	1096	1224	0.131	SH+IR+GoR, TD
Heal	2340:2719	3136:3644	0.3624	SH+EH, TD
Flash Heal	4680:5439	6272:7289	0.7248	SH+EH, TD
Greater Heal	6239:7250	8361:9717	0.9672	SH+EH, TD
Binding Heal	2952:3795	4752:6110	0.543	SH+EH, TD
Prayer of Mending*	2661	2971	0.318	SH, TD
Prayer of Healing	2711:2864	3633:3837	0.400	SH, TD
Holy Nova*	1518:1765	1696:1972	0.196	SH, TD
Divine Hymn*	3590	4009	0.429	SH, TD
Penance*	2107:2380	2352:2656	0.268	TD
Circle of Healing	1591:1757	1776:1962	0.2	SH, TD
Desperate Prayer	4384:5173	4896:5776	0.571	TD
Lightwell*	2576	2878	0.308	25%
Serenity(Heal)	4655:5463	5198:6100	0.604	TD
Sanctuary(PoH)*	268:319	299:355	0.03	SH, TD
Smite	584:655	653:732	0.714	TD

*Per tick value
SH = Spiritual Healing, 15%; Imp PW:S = Improved Power Word: Shield, 20%; TD = Twin Disciplines 6%;, IR = Improved Renew, 10%; GoR = Glyph of Renew, 10%; EH = Empowered Healing, 15%; SD = Shield Discipline, 20%+

The direct relationship between the base values and the coefficients of (most) spells means that we can derive a formula for comparing Spellpower as a rating; that is, a measure of how much Spellpower is needed to gain a 1% increase to healing.

(BaseValue + Spellpower * Coefficient) * Modifiers = BaseValue * (1 + Spellpower / BaseValue / Coefficient) * Modifiers.
At level 85, dividing the base values by the coefficient gives us ~9345. Therefore, your Spellpower will give your spells additional value equal to Spellpower / 9345. Using Heal as an example, with 6000 spellpower:

2824 + 6000 * 0.302 = 4636
2824 + 6000 * 0.302 = 2824 * (1 + 6000 / 9345)
6000 / 9345 = .642
2824 * 1.642 = 4637

With 6000 Spellpower, Heal gains 64.2% additional value.

Since it takes 93.45 spellpower to gain a 1% increase to your spells (93.45 / 9345 = 1 / 100), it can be said that it takes 93.45 Spellpower 'Rating' to equal a 1% increase. This makes it easier to directly compare the throughput value of Spellpower with other ratings to determine basic stat weightings.

The spells that do not follow this convention are Binding Heal (100.01) and Holy Word: Sanctuary (105.32); these spells will not scale as well as our other healing spells, though only slightly.

Statistic	Rating	Increase	Adjusted
Disc Mastery	179.28	2.5%	71.71
Spellpower	93.45	1%	93.45
Haste	128.06	1%	128.06
Holy Mastery	179.28	1.25%	143.42
Disc Critical	179.28	.86%	208.47
Holy Critical	179.28	0.5%	358.56

Character Stats

Intellect
Intellect increases your Spellpower by 1, Spell Critical Chance by .001541, and Mana by 15. The first 18 Intellect will not give mana, and the first 10 Intellect will not give Spellpower

Spirit
Spirit increases your Spirit Regen according to the following formula:
Spirit Regen = Sqrt(Intellect) * Spirit *.016725

Mastery
Mastery rating conversions.

Level	Rating/Mastery
80	45.9059
81	60.2784
82	79.1556
83	103.9860
84	136.5379
85	179.2799

Mastery adds 1.25% additional healing to direct heals with Echo of Light for Holy, and 2.5% additional absorption for Discipline.

Critical
Critical rating conversions

Level	Rating/Critical %
80	45.9059
81	60.2784
82	79.1556
83	103.9860
84	136.5379
85	179.2799

Critical heals are 150% of the value of a non critical heal. Divine Aegis adds 10% additional healing as an absorption shield per point, increased by your Shield Discipline mastery.

Healing = Average Heal * (1 + Critical% * (0.5 + Divine Aegis * Shield Discipline)

Haste
Haste Rating Conversions

Level	Rating/Haste %
80	32.79
81	43.0559
82	56.5397
83	74.2755
84	97.527
85	128.057

Haste increases your casting speed according to the following formula:
Base Cast Time / (1 + Haste *.01)

Haste rating decreases the period length between ticks from channeled spells and heal over time effects according to the same formula, replacing the Base Cast Time with the channeling time or tick period. Durations are determined from the period times the number of ticks. You get k more ticks for a hot/dot that has m ticks at 0% haste if your haste is higher than (2k-1)/2m.

Haste rating converts to a 1% increase at a much quicker rate than other secondary stat ratings, but does so without providing any increase in efficiency. Generally, it lets you spend your mana faster, and is devalued any time you aren't GCD locked.

Originally Posted by Hegen

We end up accumulating a certain amount of haste. Now if we get close to one of the haste levels beyond which we gain another renew tick, then the next N haste rating points have extremely good returns on efficiency.

So, when looking for efficiency, we need to look at where current our haste rating is. Regemming two slots for haste to get another renew tick is an awesome deal.

Haste rating is additive, haste buffs and percentages are multiplicative.

To calculate the number of ticks for a given haste:
Int[Base # Ticks * (1+ Haste *.01) + 0.5]

To calculate the Haste Rating needed to reduce spell cast time from base cast time to any desired cast time you use:
((Base Cast Time / Desired Cast Time) - 1) * Rating Conversion * 100

With the removal of Enlightenment and 3% Haste buff, the reduction of Borrowed Time (14% at max rank), and the change to Darkness (3% available in Tier 1 Shadow), we have new caps and plateaus for Haste rating.

Condition	50% (GCD)	37.5% (Renew x 6)	12.5% (Renew x 5)
85	6402.9	4802.3	1601.1
85, 1/3	6212.7	4627.9	1458.4
85, 2/3	6026.2	4457.0	1318.6
85, 3/3	5843.4	4289.4	1181.5
85, 5%	5488.2	3963.8	915.0
85, 5%, 1/3	5307.0	3797.8	779.2
85, 5%, 2/3	5129.5	3635.0	646.0
85, 5%, 3/3	4955.3	3475.4	515.4
85, BT	4043.9	2639.9
85, BT, 1/3	3877.1	2487.0
85, BT, 2/3	3713.5	2337.0
85, BT, 3/3	3553.1	2190.0
85, 5%, BT	3241.5	1904.4
85, 5%, BT, 1/3	3082.7	1758.8
85, 5%, BT, 2/3	2926.9	1616.0
85, 5%, BT, 3/3	2774.1	1475.9
80	1639.5	1229.7	410.0
80, 1/3	1590.8	1185.0	373.4
80, 2/3	1543.1	1141.3	337.6
80, 3/3	1496.2	1098.3	302.5
80, 5%, 1/3	1358.9	972.4	199.5
80, 5%, 2/3	1313.4	930.8	165.4
80, 5%, 3/3	1268.9	889.9	132.0
80, BT, 1/3	992.8	636.8
80, BT, 2/3	950.9	598.4
80, BT, 3/3	909.8	560.8
80, 5%, BT, 1/3	789.3	450.3
80, 5%, BT, 2/3	749.5	413.8
80, 5%, BT, 3/3	710.3	377.9

Regeneration

The formula for Spirit Regen is unchanged from WotLK. Combat Regeneration was changed to a percentage of your spirit regeneration plus a base amount. Meditation increases the percentage of spirit regen you retain during combat to 50%. All values are mana per 5.

Spirit Regen = Sqrt(Intellect) * Spirit *.016725
Combat Regen = Spirit Regen * Meditation + Base Regen

Base Regen for an 85 Priest is 1029 [Get more base regen values]

Holy Concentration
Holy Concentration increases the percentage of spirit regen you retain during combat to 70%.

Combat Regen = Spirit Regen * (Meditation + Holy Concentration) + Base Regen

Rapture
Rapture returns (0.5 per point + 1%) of total mana when PW: Shield is used or removed. There is a 12 second internal cooldown on this ability, but multiple Shields consumed at the same instant will give returns for each Shield before the cooldown is implemented. In order for Rapture to cause your Shields to be mana neutral, you will need:

Condition	Mana cost	3/3 Rapture	2/3 Rapture	1/3 Rapture
none	3912	156480	195600	260800
1/3 MA	3795	151800	189750	253000
2/3 MA	3638	145520	181900	242533
3/3 MA	3521	140840	176050	234733
IW	3325	133000	166250	221667
1/3 MA, IW	3208	128320	160400	213867
2/3 MA, IW	3051	122040	152550	203400
3/3 MA, IW	2934	117360	146700	195600

mana pool. 3 points in Mental Agililty and Inner Will buff will see us with close to mana neutral shields around the first tier of raiding with raid buffs.

Shadowfiend
Shadowfiend returns 3% of your maximum mana per attack. It will deliver 10 * (1 + Haste*0.01) attacks during its duration.

Hymn of Hope
Hymn of Hope will restore 2% total mana per tick for 4 ticks and increase your mana by 15%. The first tick does not benefit from the mana increase, but subsequent ticks do.

Inner Will and Mental Agility
Inner Will reduces the mana cost of your instant cast spells by 15%. Mental Agility reduces the mana cost of your instant cast spells by 3%/7%/10%. Though technically not 'Regen', these effects stack additively to give 25% mana cost reduction to instant cast spells.

Discipline Talents

Improved Power Word: Shield
This talent gives 10% additional absorption per point, for a total of 20% absorption at 2 points, which is not reflected in the tooltip. Whether this is a change that didn't get a tooltip update, double dipping by Power Word: Shield by this talent, or a bug is not known.

Atonement
Atonement causes your Smite to heal the person with the largest HP deficit within 8 yards of the target for 50% per point (100% at 2/2) of the damage done. The healing done will cause Divine Aegis on your critical Smites.

Originally Posted by Hegen

There are issues with larger boss hit-boxes, kiting bosses, melee leaving melee range when dangerous abilities hit or kick/knockback effects, etc.. Atonement should only be used to save mana (but requiring less overall healing to be done), not to provide healing without which players would die.

Originally Posted by Koilie

You will spend more mana than you will get back using smite, but you will get some of it back. The mana return is kind of just a bonus. With the time on evangelism increased to 20s it's a bit easier to maintain your stack.. Often times targeted healing is not required and smite becomes beneficial to use as it's heal will choose a low health target after the cast is completed.. Having a 5 stack up when a boss unleashes a particularly nasty ability can be quite handy. Squeeze as many spells in as possible while the bonus healing is active. And of course smite is faster than heal as its healing is directly related to the damage dealt, it can be very powerful during encounters where you receive a bonus damage modifier.

Divine Aegis
Divine Aegis absorbs are 30% of the critical heal amount * Shield Discipline. It will continue to stack when refreshed with whatever value it held previously. It caps at 20% of caster's total health. Multiple Divine Aegis' from different Priests will not stack, but instead create 2 separate buffs, which can each stack up to 20% of the casting Priests' health. All heals from Prayer of Healing create Divine Aegis equal to 10% per point of the amount healed.

Grace
Grace is 4% per point per stack, reaching a maximum of 24% additional healing on your primary target. This stacks multiplicatively with other healing bonuses for a very substantial increase to Disc single target healing.

Holy Talents

Chakra
Chakra has a 30 second cooldown, a 30 second duration, does not trigger a GCD when used, and can extend in duration indefinitely with State of Mind.

Heal Chakra increases the Critical chance of Heal, Greater Heal, and Flash Heal by 10%, and allows these spells to extend the duration of Renew on your target (currently not functioning). With the Revelations talent, it changes Holy Word: Chastise into Holy Word: Serenity, an efficient, instant cast direct heal that increases the Critical chance of Heal, Greater Heal, and Flash heal by 25% for 6 seconds on that target.

Prayer of Healing Chakra adds a 15% multiplier to Prayer of Healing, Prayer of Mending, Holy Nova, Divine Hymn, Renew, and Circle of Healing. In addition, the cooldown of your Circle of Healing is reduced to 8 seconds. With the Revelations talent, it changes Holy Word: Chastise into Holy Word: Sanctuary, which creates a ground targeted healing zone with a 15 yard radius that heals all targets inside over time. The heals from Sanctuary do cause Echoes of Light and can Critical.

Originally Posted by revulva

There is some strange interaction happening between the Glyph of Prayer of Healing and Holy Word: Sanctuary. When I cast PoH, my HW:S healing increases about 5x, from 416/2 sec to about 2500/2 sec. If I crit the PoH, it increases proportionally. This "buff" to HW:S lasts as long as the Glyph of PoH buff is up.

Lightwell
Lightwell is the most efficient healing spell in the World of Warcraft, and the biggest throughput increase for 1 talent point of any healer. Many of the drawbacks of this spell have been addressed. It is now clickable from 20 yards without deselcting your target, does not need to be channeled, and can't be reused until your current Lightwell Renew has run its duration. It does still require your fellow raiders to use it for themselves, and its use cannot be macro'd. Begin training your raiders early in proper Lightwell use. The following macro can be helpful:

#showtooltip
/cast !Lightwell
/ra Use the Lightwell to heal yourself!

Surge of Light

• At very high smite/heal usage you will average just over 1 proc per minute.
• At very high smite/heal usage it is only very marginally better than 2/3 mental agility in terms of mana efficiency.
• At very high smite/heal usage 2/3 points in Darkness for 2% haste delivers better burst throughput.

Overwriting procs

C = number of proccing casts (heal & smite)
N = average number of proccing spells used before spending Surge of Light, N = 0.8 as we must chain cast to fit these spells in.
Pc = proc chance: currently 0.06 per cast
P = total average number of procs (C * Pc)
Pl = procs Lost
Pr = procs remaining (P - Pl ) This is the value we most want.

A proc is lost whenever the spell following a proc also procs. Therefore for a single spell immediately after a proc Pl = Pc * N
For a series of casts, procs lost is therefore Pl = 0.06 * N * P as procs lost is proportional to the total number of procs occuring.

Thus we can derive the following formula for total usable procs
Pr = (C * Pc) - (Pc^2 * N * C)

At 5000 spell power casting 20 proccing spells (C) per minute, the priest gets 1.1424 usable procs per minute.

If the priest is playing very badly so N = 2 they will still get 1.056 procs per minute or 92% of the previous case.

The mana saved is what would have been used if we were not spending a GCD on the SoL procs. This means we have to normalise for different cast times.

At 85 Smite costs 3088 mana with a 2 secs to cast. So for every surge we save: 1.5/2 * 3088 mana. In one minute we save 1.1424 * 3088 * 1.5/2
2645 mana or 220 mp5.

This priests average flash heal is 10539 healing. If you were not casting a SoL we assume you are casting Smite as it gives the biggest delta for surge of light.
Smite for this priest heals for 4458 pre-crit. Normalizing for cast time we get 1.5/2 * (10539 - 4458) * 1.1424 = 5210 extra healing or 87 hps.

Spreadsheet
Cataclsym Healing Priest Theorycrafting Spreadsheet - updated 11/22
Google Docs Version [limited functionality]
This spreadsheet calculates the effects of your spells and models customizable healing rotations.
This is still a work in progress. Bugs and errors should be reported to me via private message on these forums. Changes and additions to formulas or modeling should be posted in this thread.

Theorycrafted Spell Values and Stat Weightings

Holy 6/32/3
Tier 11 359 gear set
Reforged for Stat balance
Gemmed, enchanted, raid buffed
Glyphed PoH, Renew, and Lightwell

Stamina	5223	Health	128410*
Intellect	4816	Mana	100254
Spirit	2774	OOC Mp5	4328.2
Spell Power	6760	Combat MP5	3338
Critical Rating	789	Critical %	18.06
Haste Rating	750	Haste %	14.48
Mastery Rating	857	Mastery	12.78

*off by 5-10 HP

Single target spells

	Healing	HPS	HPCT	HPM
Serenity	13806		10537	11
Renew5	19439	1484	19439	5.99
Heal	10770		4932	5.81
Binding Heal	33499		25567	5.81
Greater Heal	28728		13156	5.17
Flash Heal	21540		16440	3.74
Shield	8685		6629	2.96

Multiple target healing spells

	Healing	HPS	HPCT	HPM
Lightwell	295305	56346	676155	47.81
Divine Hymn	135261	19357	19357	18.25
Prayer of Mending	41771		31881	15.03
Prayer of Healing	61584		28202	11.50
Circle of Healing	26274		20053	8.10
Holy Nova	14460		14460	6.24
Sanctuary	41133	2355	94181	5

[*]Healing rotations use 1 Shadowfiend with Hymn of Hope, two Mana Tide Totems, and 98% replenishment uptime.

Single target rotation - ~11047 HPS for ~254 seconds

Stat	Burst	Sustained
Intellect	0.82	2.73
Spirit		2.80
Spell Power	0.71	0.60
Critical	0.27	0.23
Haste	0.50
Mastery	0.57	0.48

Multi-target healing rotation - ~20048 HPS for ~273 seconds

Stat	Burst	Sustained
Intellect	1.49	5.42
Spirit		5.72
Spell Power	1.29	1.17
Critical	0.48	0.43
Haste	1.41
Mastery	1.04	0.95

Disc 33/8/0
Tier 11 359 gear set
Reforged for Stat balance
Gemmed, enchanted, raid buffed
Glyphed Penance, PW: Shield, and PoH

Stamina	5223	Health	128410*
Intellect	5538	Mana	111853
Spirit	2774	OOC Mp5	4566.9
Spell Power	6760	Combat MP5	2797.9
Critical Rating	789	Critical %	19.17
Haste Rating	750	Haste %	11.15
Mastery Rating	857	Mastery	12.78

*off by 5-10 HP

Single target spells

	Healing	HPS	HPCT	HPM
Penance	23831	13244	13244	8.27
Heal	12360		5495	6.67
Binding Heal	35655		26420	6.18
Greater Heal	32972		14659	5.93
Shield	15483		11473	5.28
Flash Heal	24722		18319	4.29
Renew4*	11636	1078	8622	3.59
Smite	9311		5175	3.01

*Renew5 has similar efficiency to Flash Heal, and is generally not worth using.

Multi-target spells

	Healing	HPS	HPCT	HPM
Divine Hymn	114326	15884	15884	15.42
Prayer of Mending	35306		26162	12.70
Prayer of Healing	57958		25768	10.83
Holy Nova	12667		12667	5.47

Single target healing rotation - ~13113 HPS for 274 seconds

Stat	Burst	Sustained
Intellect	0.94	4.20
Spirit		3.36
Spell Power	0.77	0.80
Critical	0.47	0.48
Haste	0.41
Mastery	0.24	0.25

*The stat weights for Discipline do not take Borrowed Time into account.
*Atonement is not used

Updates
- Corrected Shadowfiend [Elimbras, Hegen]
- Added Haste Caps for instants. [grisu]
- Updated Atonement to 60% per point.
- Change Atonement back to 40% per point.
- Added Haste Tick formulas [Havoc12, Elimbras]
- Added Surge of Light theorycrafting [Ellyh]
- Updated Atnoment back to 50% per point.
- Reduced Prayer of Healing cast time updated.
- Updated Rapture.
- Updated spell data table
- Updated Haste caps.
- Added Spellpower 'Rating' [Ninahagen]
- Corrected additional Penance ticks
- Updated base and coefficients for Heal, Gheal, Fheal, Bheal, PoH
- Added Grace changes
- Removed Holy Word: Aspire, changed PW: Barrier
- Added Chakra, Lightwell, Rapture under talents
- Added Glyph of PoH+Sanctuary interaction [revulva]
- Added Atonement comments [Hegen, Koilie]
- Added Holy and Disc Spell Info and Stat Weights

grisu · 09/27/10, 11:57 PM

Shield (3906 + SP * .418) * Imp PW: Shield * Twin Disciplines * Shield Discipline

Take Twin Disciplines out of the equation. Patch 12857: Twin Disciplines no longer increases the damage absorbed by Power Word: Shield.

Lightwell: not influenced by Twin Disciplines either. Formula seems to be (not 100% sure about that, did some testing with my 2 priests on beta though and it seems to be pretty accurate): (3310 + .354 * SP) * 1.15

Elimbras · 09/28/10, 9:38 AM

Originally Posted by Carnathagia

Shadowfiend
Shadowfiend returns 3% of your maximum mana per hit. It will deliver 10 / (1 + Haste *.01)[confirm] hits during its duration.

This would mean the number of hits decreases with haste, which is weird ;-). Actual formula is more likely 10 * (1 + Haste*0.01)

(Haste leads to weapon speed WS = baseWS / (1+Haste.01), and hence, in a time frame T, the number of hits are T*(1+Haste * .01) / (baseWS) = base#Hits * (1+Haste*.01).).

Hegen · 09/28/10, 11:06 AM

Originally Posted by Carnathagia

Shadowfiend
Shadowfiend returns 3% of your maximum mana per hit. It will deliver 10 / (1 + Haste *.01)[confirm] hits during its duration.

Did you test this? It would suggest a fundamental change of the shadowfiend implementation. It really used to be swings, not hits. Also, the amount and interval of swings varied in 3.3.3 (not taking into account possible heroism effects).

Zigizi · 09/28/10, 12:07 PM

Does the increased healing effect of Archangel boost the absorption of PW:S and PW:B?

Carnathagia · 09/28/10, 5:11 PM

I rested and confirmed the formula above for Lightwell, and that it and PW: Shield are unaffected by Twin Disciplines.

Talent	Spellpower	Tick Value	t1/1.15-t2/1.15	sp1-sp2	coefficient	base
Holy	189	3883			0.3542	3310
Holy	1935	4594	618	1746	0.3541	3310
Holy	2887	4974	949	2698	0.3516	3310
Holy	4976	5833	1696	4787	0.3542	3310

For the Shadowfiend, the mana gains are per attack (and now listed as such), and I corrected the botched amalgamation of a formula I had up for number of hits.

Update:
It appears that Lightwell has a 1.25 modifier separate from Spiritual Healing. Correcting the table above gives (2878 + SP * .308) * 1.25 * 1.06. I'll update this with additional testing.

grisu · 09/28/10, 7:09 PM

Originally Posted by Zigizi

Does the increased healing effect of Archangel boost the absorption of PW:S and PW:B?

No, it still absorbs the exact same amount right now.

On another note: Atonement
- will critically heal when you deal critical damage with Smite (and only then), so to get the correct crit-percentage for Atonement you'll have to take the 5% from Critical Mass/Shadow Mastery into consideration
- is not influenced by Archangel, so when you activate Archangel, you actually heal less (with Atonement) than when you just keep up the 5 stacks
- is not influenced by Grace (I still receive 120% of Smite-Dmg even with 3 Stacks of Grace). Since Atonement is considered Healing by the Priest (i.e. Bogen's Atonement Heals Bogen for 0.(5347 Overhealed), it should profit from it though (at least in my logic)

Zke · 09/28/10, 10:08 PM

So, with new talents and stuff the GCD Haste cap for Disci priests is gonna change right?

From the 3.3.5 compedium:

Originally Posted by Hegen

Haste
Regarding haste, you gain 6% from Enlightenment, and an additional 5% from Wrath of Air, plus 3% from Swift Retribution/Moonkin Aura, leaving you with only 4.67% or 154 haste rating to gain from gear to reach the hard GCD cap on PW:S (given Borrowed Time). This is why as a general rule you should aim for 4.67% of haste (or 154 haste rating), but think about whether you need more. Obviously, if you don't have all of the haste buffs, more haste makes sense until you hit the GcD cap.

My doubt is,
If it was 4.67/154 haste to gain from items, now that:
- Borrowed time changes. from 25% haste to ---> 14%
- Englightment fades. from 6% haste to ---> 0%

The haste GCD cap should be now: 4.67 : 154 = 21.67 : 714.59 ----> 715 haste points for a total of 21.67%
(if Wrath of air and Moonkin aura will still give 5% and 3%)

Please correct if i'm wrong.

Imua · 09/28/10, 11:05 PM

I think that the spell haste buff is now 5%, and it's consolidated, so that either moonkin, spriest, and shaman can all provide it, but it doesn't stack.

So the only spell haste buff you'd get is 5%, so you'd have to get that extra 3% from your items.

Bottom line: disc priests are going to need alot more haste (well, everyone is going to) to reach that hard cap for PW:S

grisu · 09/28/10, 11:06 PM

To calculate the Haste Rating needed to reduce spell cast time from base cast time to any desired cast time you use:

((Base Cast Time / Desired Cast Time) - 1) * Rating Conversion * 100

Since you don't get the 3% from Improved Moonkin Aura/Swift Retribution any more, and the conversion is 128.057 at 85 you get:

((1.5 / 1.05) - 1) * 128.057 * 100 = 5488.2

with Borrowed time:

((1.5 / 1.14 /1.05) - 1) * 128.057 * 100 = 3241.5

Hegen · 09/29/10, 3:14 AM

Originally Posted by Zke

- Englightment fades. from 6% haste to ---> 0%

You have access to 3% from Darkness in the shadow tree, though (for a price).

Carnathagia · 09/29/10, 10:50 AM

Originally Posted by grisu

To calculate the Haste Rating needed to reduce spell cast time from base cast time to any desired cast time you use:

((Base Cast Time / Desired Cast Time) - 1) * Rating Conversion * 100

On that note, for level 80 players still doing WotLK content before Cataclysm releases but after the 4.0 class changes go through, the new haste caps will be:

Major Haste
((1.5 / 1.05 ) - 1 ) * 32.79 * 100 = 1405 rating

Borrowed Time
((1.5 / 1.14 / 1.05 ) - 1 ) * 32.79 * 100 = 830 rating

Zke · 09/29/10, 11:24 AM

Originally Posted by Hegen

You have access to 3% from Enlightenment in the shadow tree, though (for a price).

Not enough points to go there unfortunately.
EDIT: Maybe i've elaborated a spec with 2/3 points in that talent.. let's see in these days.

Btw, so the GCD cap will be 830 according that 3% from moonkin/retri doesn't exist anymore..

But that amount of haste ( i mean ONLY to cap GCD) count only for 4.0 before cataclysm or even with the expansion? is it that 3241 haste rating with Borrowed time told by grisu?

Weerel · 09/30/10, 9:19 AM

There are two ways for discipline priest

Don't use Archangel
So we have to use build like this Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft
In this case we use standart priority system since LK:
PW:S->Penance->PoM->Heal
Very simple and stable healing

Use Archangel
In this case we need build like this Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft
What do we got?
advantage: we can use Archangel asap. So we have 15% increased healing for 18 sec. and restore 15% mana every 30 sec.
disadvantage: we have to use 5 smites for 5 stacks of Evangelism in order to use Archangel.

What is the result after all?

Let us consider that we cast mostly Heal or Greater heal.
So we can cast 4 Heals instead of 5 smites if the haste less or equal smite haste soft cap. More then 4 otherwise, with maximum amount 5 in case of heal haste soft cap.
After all we loose 4(5) Heals in 30 sec rotation (limitation of Archangel cooldown)
during 18 sec healing buf we can cast from 18/2.5 = 7.2 (with no haste) to 18/1 = 18 Heals (with haste soft cap for heal)
This is equivalent to 0.15*(7.2..18) = 1.08..2.7 extra heals.
Additionally we use Atonement to do additional heal when cast smite.

Also there are minor effects affecting healing:

Train of Thought decrease cooldown of penance as we have to cast smites
5 smites instead of 4 heals gives additional 6% chance to proc Surge of Light (free flash heal)

So result is:

5smites	Atonement healing
vs
no haste	4-0.15*18/2.5 = 2.92 Heals
haste soft cap for smite	4-0.15*18/1.25 = 2.16 Heals
haste soft cap for heal	5 - 0.15*18/1 = 2.3 Heals

As we can see the optimal haste is soft cap for smite.
So we need compare 5 smites with N heals, where N in range 2.16..2.92
As a result (I use spell coefficients posted above)

Atonement healing

Healing = 5 * (653:732 + SP * .714) * Twin Disciplines * Atonement = 5 * (653:732 + SP * .714) * 1.06 * 1.2 = 4153:4656 + SP * 4.54

Heal

Healing = N * (2614:3036 + SP * .302) * Emp Healing * Twin Disciplines = N * (2614:3036 + SP * .302) * 1.06 * 1.15 = N * (3186:3701 + SP * 0.368)

Greater Heal

Healing = N * (6969:8097 + SP * .806) * Emp Healing * Twin Disciplines = N * (8495:9870 + SP * 0.983)

Final results. Spell power needed to get advantage when using Archangel.

	No haste	Smite haste soft cap
Heal	1628	810
Greater Heal	13400	6380

Here I simplify. Suggesting that we use only Heal (with hard mana problem) or use only Greater Heal (with no mana problems at all).
In reality we have to combine Heals and Greater Heal. In case of using Archangel better to replase Heals with Smites and use Greater Heal as much as possible during Archangel buff.
In that case we can over heal with Archangel even with any amount of spell power.

As conclusion I can say that choose of Archangel build depends on spell power, haste and mana regen.

Mana efficiency.
When use 5 smite for Archangel we spend 75% base mana and got 15% total mana
When use 4 Heals we spend 36% base mana
When use 4 Greater Heals we spend 108% base mana
In any case Archangel saves a lot of mana. It allow to replace heals to more strong and expensive. for example Heal to Greater Heal, Greater Heal to Flash Heal.
So I believe that Archangel build provide more suitable healing for single target.
As for raid shielding style, I don't know what to say. Maybe Archangel is not so useful.

Zigizi · 09/30/10, 9:56 AM

Originally Posted by Weerel

So I believe that Archangel build provide more suitable healing for single target.

You make it sound like the Archangel heal and the Heal spell are interchangeable. Given the random healing nature of Atonement, it still isn't a suitable build for keeping a tank topped off. I think the Atonement build will be interesting, but it will have to take on a raid-triage role, rather than the traditional role thought of as single-target.

You also mention using "Surge of Light" in an Atonement/Archangel build, but I believe that most disc Atonement/Archangel specs are going to have to spec for Twisted Faith in the Shadow tree, and won't be able to get both that and SoL.

I also think the Atonement Archangel build will take on a very strict rotation, in order to maximize healing given the effects of Glyph of Smite and Archangel.