WotLK Healing Compendium v3.0 [theorycraft, specs, etc] - Page 3

PowerBaton · 10/28/08, 1:04 PM

Really good work, keep it up constantius, about that "aura mod" for SoL procs, im using: Curse.com - ThankGod Update. Every HC, IHC and SoL sexy female tell you about proc, and there is flash on screen aswell.

Turgid · 10/28/08, 1:10 PM

Originally Posted by Onestandard

I'm interested in the rationale behind the assertion that Serendipity is a "must-have" talent now. I'm guessing the idea is that combined with SoL it results in free mana from a free heal? Otherwise, it's pretty much the same situational benefit of 2-piece T5.

I'd also question why Imp:Spi for Disc is a waste of points, seeing as spirit/regen in general has become more important for all mana users in Wrath.

Serendipity only refunds spent mana, so a SoL-triggered Flash Heal that cost 0 mana to begin with will refund 0 mana. Similarly, Serendipity refunds 0 mana from heals cast with Inner Focus or Clearcasting. The T5 2-pc would give you 100 mana whether or not the heal resulting in overheal actually cost any mana.

Divine Spirit isn't a waste of a point, just that the points in Improved Divine Spirit are.

YukinoHana · 10/28/08, 1:18 PM

Originally Posted by Turgid

The T5 2-pc would give you 100 mana whether or not the heal resulting in overheal actually cost any mana.

True. On the other hand, the 2-piece T5 only applies for GHeals, not flash heals, which is now a reasonable useful raid healing talent.

Turgid · 10/28/08, 1:21 PM

Originally Posted by YukinoHana

True. On the other hand, the 2-piece T5 only applies for GHeals, not flash heals, which is now a reasonable useful raid healing talent.

Correct. I wasn't trying to compare the value of the two, just clarify the differences in their mechanics.

Mokhtar · 10/28/08, 3:15 PM

Originally Posted by Melrose

With the CoH smart-targetting, it seems more important than ever to have Holy Reach.

I agree completely, let's not forget that holy reach increases radius by 20% but that means that actual covered surface (which is the relevant metric in this case) is increased by 44%, this is a big upgrade in my opinion.

Zyzzx · 10/28/08, 3:56 PM

Thank you for the time and effort you have put into this comprehensive guide, Constantius.

My question pertains to the relationship between Grace and Blessing of Sanctuary (BoS). The new buff system prevents them from "stacking" on a target. Given that, what (if any) mechanic resolves an attempt to grant Grace to a player already affected by BoS? IIRC, the buffs differ in two ways: BoS is a flat 3% damage reduction (and does not "ramp up" like Grace), and Grace grants a 2/4/6% bonus to healing done to the target by the priest. I would imagine that Grace would overwrite BoS, were it not for the fact that the initial cast provides a lesser bonus, potentially triggering a "more powerful effect" response. Any idea how the new system handles this?

constantius · 10/29/08, 9:21 AM

Originally Posted by Mokhtar

I agree completely, let's not forget that holy reach increases radius by 20% but that means that actual covered surface (which is the relevant metric in this case) is increased by 44%, this is a big upgrade in my opinion.

Here's the issue with that. How often do you have enough people spread out enough that the extra points actually matter? I can't think of a single fight in BT or HS excepting KJ where it would actually make a difference to me. And, having cleared all content on Beta atm (no Ulduar, but afaik, they never pushed that), I can't think of a single fight there where it would matter except possibly Sapphiron. And realistically, you shouldn't be using CoH on spread out people on Sapp anyway: Renew and FH are more efficient and timely.

Yes, it's a decent talent. No, it's not something I think is more powerful than the alternatives. You figure out a spec that retains CoH, 6/6 IHC, 3/3 Serendipity, 5/5 Holy Spec, and 2/2 SoL while obviously keeping Meditation that also manages to get 2/2 Holy Reach, and I'll talk.

My question pertains to the relationship between Grace and Blessing of Sanctuary (BoS). The new buff system prevents them from "stacking" on a target. Given that, what (if any) mechanic resolves an attempt to grant Grace to a player already affected by BoS? IIRC, the buffs differ in two ways: BoS is a flat 3% damage reduction (and does not "ramp up" like Grace), and Grace grants a 2/4/6% bonus to healing done to the target by the priest. I would imagine that Grace would overwrite BoS, were it not for the fact that the initial cast provides a lesser bonus, potentially triggering a "more powerful effect" response. Any idea how the new system handles this?

Honestly, no clue. Wreath (the other priest in Fusion) went Disc for a night, and experienced no issues getting Grace stacked, despite a full prot paladin in the raid casting BoSanc. Not sure if this is indicative of anything. Anyone else have any practical experience they'd like to share?

Ad 2.
If 1 int is 15 mana, than 15 * 0.25%*5 is 0.1875 MP5 per point of int from replenishment (which translates to 0.206 and 0.237 (based on build) as mentioned in section II ). Am I missing something? I am assuming 100% replenishment uptime, which obviously is not true, but the value 0.0125 seems to assume less than 10% uptime, which obviously is not case as well…

Ad 4.
It is possibly worth noting that this value assumes 41% return from shadowfiend. The numbers suggested in section Vb (25-30%) would result in 0.052 – 0.062 MP5 / point of int.

Ad 5.
According to calculations below this number assumes 50/50 split between GH and BH (47 chances to proc per minute). 50/50 split between FH and GH would mean (still according to numbers below – 42 FH/minute vs 10GH/minute) 26 chances to proc per minute, leading to 0.117 expected procs per 1% crit. That in turn changes our 1.3 free casts to 0.7 free casts, resulting in (1054 * 0.7 / 167 = 4.4 mana) 0.026 MP5 per point of int.

I was also unable to verify the summary of int value at the end of the section. Summarizing the values listed above, and multiplying by 1.1/1.265 would lead to 0.672/0.663. Moreover, if we replaced the replenishment value of int by 0.1875 we would get 0.865 / 0.872 (almost 2 times the value of spirit mp5 ).

Ad. 2: you're right, not sure where my number came from. I'll take a closer look at what I was theoretically thinking later when my head is less fuzzy.

Ad. 4: I haven't seen my Shadowfiend return less than 10 hits @ 4% each so far in 3.0.x. Max so far is 15, minimum 11. That is, of course, excepting cases where I'm stupid and launch him into AE of death.

In that case, modeling as ~ 40% is reasonable, I think.

Ad. 5: You're right that this was never anything but a hack model. We could debate this one forever. I'll run another pass at it and see what I come up with. Either way we do it, it's fairly small compared to Replenishment, mana pool, and shadowfiend. At 167 int per percent crit, it's not going to scale quickly at all.

The value at the end should have just been the sum of all of the factors, multiplied by the scaling factors allowed (BoK for holy, BoK+MS for disc). Of course, who knows. I asked for some feedback on the models, but this is the first I've seen. I'll see what I can integrate and get back to y'all.

I'd also question why Imp:Spi for Disc is a waste of points, seeing as spirit/regen in general has become more important for all mana users in Wrath.

As mentioned above, I just want to re-emphasize: no-one is suggesting a Disc priest skip Divine Spirit. Great, wonderful, spectacular buff. Love it to death. However, Improved Divine Spirit is the most laughable waste of talent points since Lightwell was our 31st point talent. Actually, scratch that. Since Holy Nova was our 31st point talent.

It's horrible. Unimproved, vanilla, completely baseline Flametongue Totem is almost TWICE AS MUCH SPELLPOWER as IDS. ToW absolutely destroys it. It's the most laughable excuse for a buff (talented, no less) that I can think of Blizzard pushing as a "fundamental part of a Discipline priest's arsenal". Honestly, it's a slap in the face. I tried to tell them on the Beta, multiple times, but all I got back was Koraa being his usual dense self. Hopefully the priest mini-review they're planning for the spring will fix it. Until then, don't spec it. Laugh at people that do, and then educate them. It's horrible.

Glasswizard · 10/29/08, 10:14 AM

Originally Posted by constantius

Yes, it's a decent talent. No, it's not something I think is more powerful than the alternatives. You figure out a spec that retains CoH, 6/6 IHC, 3/3 Serendipity, 5/5 Holy Spec, and 2/2 SoL while obviously keeping Meditation that also manages to get 2/2 Holy Reach, and I'll talk.

Holy Reach is on tier 4 in the holy talent tree, so if we can agree that in those first 4 tiers Holy Spec 5/5, Divine Fury 5/5, Inspiration 3/3 and Improved Healing 3/3 are must have talents, there are still 4 talentpoints left. Those can be spend on Holy Reach, Improved Renew, maybe Desperate Prayer. That's the competition we have here. Holy Reach doesn't really compete with CoH, IHC, SoL or Serendipity in my book.

RonRico · 10/29/08, 10:27 AM

Here's the issue with that. How often do you have enough people spread out enough that the extra points actually matter? I can't think of a single fight in BT or HS excepting KJ where it would actually make a difference to me. And, having cleared all content on Beta atm (no Ulduar, but afaik, they never pushed that), I can't think of a single fight there where it would matter except possibly Sapphiron. And realistically, you shouldn't be using CoH on spread out people on Sapp anyway: Renew and FH are more efficient and timely.

Yes, it's a decent talent. No, it's not something I think is more powerful than the alternatives. You figure out a spec that retains CoH, 6/6 IHC, 3/3 Serendipity, 5/5 Holy Spec, and 2/2 SoL while obviously keeping Meditation that also manages to get 2/2 Holy Reach, and I'll talk.

If this is your reasoning then I would recommend removing the statement...

A: It's really not necessary now that CoH is smart-targeted and raid-wide.

...from the first post because it really has nothing to do with why you consider it less valuable. It's bound to confuse people like myself who are trying to find out exactly what has changed since the patch. Just my 2 cents. Great guide and thanks for all the hard work.

faesomething · 10/29/08, 10:52 AM

I've been 51/10/0 since the patch and I've never seen an issue with grace stacking on anyone buffed with Blessing of Sanctuary or otherwise. As far as I can tell the new system allows buffs that "overwrite" each other to still exist on a target, but only the greater of the effects is counted. So in this case BoS (3%) will used until grace hits 2 stacks (4%) at which point grace will be counted. I'll spend some time tonight to confirm this if I can find a willing pali to help out. Anyone have a suggestion for a normalized damage source to use for this sort of testing?

Vvildcard · 10/29/08, 12:21 PM

My question pertains to the relationship between Grace and Blessing of Sanctuary (BoS). The new buff system prevents them from "stacking" on a target. Given that, what (if any) mechanic resolves an attempt to grant Grace to a player already affected by BoS? IIRC, the buffs differ in two ways: BoS is a flat 3% damage reduction (and does not "ramp up" like Grace), and Grace grants a 2/4/6% bonus to healing done to the target by the priest. I would imagine that Grace would overwrite BoS, were it not for the fact that the initial cast provides a lesser bonus, potentially triggering a "more powerful effect" response. Any idea how the new system handles this?

Confirmed: The Grace buff (all ranks) stacks with BoS. I believe this is because Grace also has a +Healing% component. I have definitely never had a stacking problem with the two.

I haven't tested to see if the damage reduction portion of the buffs stack.

Vvildcard · 10/29/08, 12:24 PM

Originally Posted by faesomething

I've been 51/10/0 since the patch and I've never seen an issue with grace stacking on anyone buffed with Blessing of Sanctuary or otherwise. As far as I can tell the new system allows buffs that "overwrite" each other to still exist on a target, but only the greater of the effects is counted. So in this case BoS (3%) will used until grace hits 2 stacks (4%) at which point grace will be counted. I'll spend some time tonight to confirm this if I can find a willing pali to help out. Anyone have a suggestion for a normalized damage source to use for this sort of testing?

Duel and use SW:P and/or Devouring Plague - they should tick for the same amount every time.

Celillenna · 10/29/08, 12:24 PM

Originally Posted by constantius

Q: What are the must-have talents for a Discipline priest?
A: Rapture, Grace, and Penance. To a lesser extent, Borrowed Time and Renewed Hope build nicely together with Improved PW:S and Twin Disciplines to provide for high-absorption shields that give secondary benefits. Enlightenment is also a remarkably nice talent to have, easily being the most valuable talent in the entire tree in terms of gear replacement (gaining 5% haste and 5% spirit is a *tremendous* amount of ilvl points saved, to be put into something more interesting, like crit).

I'm a bit confused as to why DA isn't listed as a must-have, since it's our "use crit" talent, and mentioned elsewhere in your post as something you assume disc priests will have.

metapseudo · 10/29/08, 12:24 PM

Originally Posted by constantius

Since 1 intellect = 1 spirit (effectively) for ilvl points spent, we really have no loss in gaining one versus the other. The exception to this rule is in considering gear that has no spirit on it, as those items are in much much higher demand, especially by dps casters (for cloth items) and by all casters and healers (for necks, rings, and trinkets, along with weapons). You will find it much easier to pick up spirit items than non-spirit, simply because of that competition. Thus, I am going to assume that any item you grab is a spirit+int item, just for sake of argument. When this is true, the minimum gearing you will be at, fully raid-buffed (25-man), in ilvl 186+ rare or epic pieces, will be 1000 intellect + 1000 spirit. This is, of course, assuming full enchants, and all raid buffs possible, along with consumables. So use 1000/1000 as our starting point.

I would like to point out that appart from less competition on items with spirit, assuming that ilvl computation stays same in wotlk:
- the more balanced stats the item have the better
- stamina value 0.5, spirit and intellect value is 1, mp5 value is 2.5, spell power is 0.85
- there are few items having both mp5 and spirit

Then from ilvl point of view it would be best to have an item with these stats in ratio
sta:spi:int:mp5:spell power = 20:10:10:4:12

That is of course theoretical and no such items exist. Still it is better from ilvl point of view to take the item having spirit, intellect a spell power then taking one having only intellect and spell power.

see: Item level - WoWWiki - Your guide to the World of Warcraft

dukes · 10/29/08, 12:55 PM

Originally Posted by metapseudo

I would like to point out that appart from less competition on items with spirit, assuming that ilvl computation stays same in wotlk:
- the more balanced stats the item have the better
- stamina value 0.5, spirit and intellect value is 1, mp5 value is 2.5, spell power is 0.85
- there are few items having both mp5 and spirit

Then from ilvl point of view it would be best to have an item with these stats in ratio
sta:spi:int:mp5:spell power = 20:10:10:4:12

That is of course theoretical and no such items exist. Still it is better from ilvl point of view to take the item having spirit, intellect a spell power then taking one having only intellect and spell power.

see: Item level - WoWWiki - Your guide to the World of Warcraft

Stamina value is 0.67 (which your link confirms).