Improved Water Shield has been changed to - You have a 33/66/100% chance to instantly consume a Water Shield Orb when you gain a critical effect from your Healing Wave or Riptide spells, and a 19.8/39.6/60% chance when you gain a critical effect from your Lesser Healing Wave spell.
This was my breakdown from last week's 3 drake Sarth kill (10 man).
I use the LHW glyph obviously but don't go too heavy into the popular crit building. I'm still gearing myself around haste/mp5 and focusing on int. I have a few pieces that I swap in that are haste/crit/sp (crit over mp5) but don't have anything that's crit/mp5 without haste (except my bracers that I just haven't replaced yet).
I run around 23k mana unbuffed (1255 unbuffed int) - around 27k raid buffed I suppose.
I'm still not and never will be a MT healer. I obviously assist with MT healing in a situation like 3 drake sarth (10) where healing is critical on all tanks, and it's not a prime CH encounter. I personally feel using a shaman as solely an MT healer is a complete waste of resources. 25 man 3 drake my breakdown looks completely different as LHW is used to spot heal and CH becomes the primary cast.
With CoH and WG being nerfed CH with high haste and mp5 / replenishment will be king for raid healing.
Leave true MT healing to the pallies / priests while the druids roll their hot stacks.
(Holy Priest / Holy Pally / Resto Shaman used on the 3 drake sarth 10 kill. Actually used the priest to primarily DPS and spot heal. End breakdown was priest with 400k, pally with 900k and me at 1.16 million I believe).
2315 SP
388 / 407 in combat mp5 (depends on which boots I wear)
1255 INT
22,941 Mana
539 / 544 Haste
22.52 / 21.45 Crit
I only see myself replacing ring/cloak/belt/bracers to optimize for Ulduar, but base stats won't change too much. A little more haste, a tad more crit, slightly lower mp5 and a little more SP + will swap over to BS for 32 more int over 37 SP from Inscrip shoulders.
Then there's fights like PW. I see everyone talking about LHW spam and keeping up the MT with HW/RT rotations. Yeah, they're fun tools to use but what's optimal and what's fun because it's new are just two different things in my opinion. Leave the true MT healing to pallies and do the job of keeping multiple targets up. Use LHW as a buffer, ES to boost those LHW buffers and let haste carry your CH (just imo).
This is our PW this week. Only 5600 hps, I have last week's WWS that's around 5900 HPS but it won't load atm.
There's the breakdown (plus shows every source and exact amounts of mana replenishment - pretty cool site). The rest of the parses are sketchy - but PW was pretty lag free. We battled with 5-10 second cast lag most of the night along with along problems (sigh, HAT rogues creating 29,000 CP's on the server).
End result: I just don't think we're MT healers!
I realize we can get the job done, especially in 5's / 10's, but I've seen too many shaman lately talking about MT healing in 25's - go back to the basics! CH the raid - spot with LHW - use RT in whatever fun manner you want.
If I was trying to say Shamans can't MT heal, then I would have given thorough reason as to why they can't. I said it's a waste of resources to use Shaman as a primary MT healing force when our tools are made for multiple targets - and of course this is speaking solely for 25's. I gave a breakdown of the hardest 10 man fight in the game to show that I do indeed know how and am more than capable of switching into MT mode when it's necessary.
My post is in regards to Shaman taking the 5/10 man mindset into 25s, when in the end it's just far less efficient than the traditional raid healing role (which we're still the best at).
If I was trying to say Shamans can't MT heal, then I would have given thorough reason as to why they can't. I said it's a waste of resources to use Shaman as a primary MT healing force when our tools are made for multiple targets - and of course this is speaking solely for 25's. I gave a breakdown of the hardest 10 man fight in the game to show that I do indeed know how and am more than capable of switching into MT mode when it's necessary.
My post is in regards to Shaman taking the 5/10 man mindset into 25s, when in the end it's just far less efficient than the traditional raid healing role (which we're still the best at).
Since when have 25% more armor been a waste of resources and far less efficient? Even only with a 50% uptime it's still a incredible buff to give your tank on a melee boss. Shamans might not be the best MT healers, but they sure can get the job done, and with correct gearing do it quite well. I don't care if Paladins are the most efficient MT healers, I don't matter if they have 10, 40 or 100% mana when the fight is over. What matter is that the MT healer(s) don't go OOM untill the boss tips over.
Shamans have a huge burst potential with RT HW HW CH HW HW and the is very helpful during soft enrages and the like. But anyway, even with min/max, it's not about doing the role your class is best at, but the role you like - given you do it without people dieing left, center and right.
Since when have 25% more armor been a waste of resources and far less efficient? Even only with a 50% uptime it's still a incredible buff to give your tank on a melee boss. Shamans might not be the best MT healers, but they sure can get the job done, and with correct gearing do it quite well. I don't care if Paladins are the most efficient MT healers, I don't matter if they have 10, 40 or 100% mana when the fight is over. What matter is that the MT healer(s) don't go OOM untill the boss tips over.
Shamans have a huge burst potential with RT HW HW CH HW HW and the is very helpful during soft enrages and the like. But anyway, even with min/max, it's not about doing the role your class is best at, but the role you like - given you do it without people dieing left, center and right.
You're essentially saying it's O.K. to be mediocre. I tend to disagree. I'm simply stating the mechanics of a healing style. Ancestral Healing isn't hard to keep up on a tank. That's where I leave my ES anyways for better spot heals with LHW. If I want an armor buff on the tank, I'll get it there while maintaining raid healing via CH. Once again, in a 25 man setting, if you're MT healing you're ignoring the primary mechanic that sets us apart from other healers in the first place.
If I was trying to say Shamans can't MT heal, then I would have given thorough reason as to why they can't. I said it's a waste of resources to use Shaman as a primary MT healing force when our tools are made for multiple targets - and of course this is speaking solely for 25's. I gave a breakdown of the hardest 10 man fight in the game to show that I do indeed know how and am more than capable of switching into MT mode when it's necessary.
The difficulty with this standpoint is that you have to start considering what other tools are out there. Except for range, Chain Heal doesn't really stack up well against even 6s cooldown CoH/WG for efficiency and provides comparable throughput with the very generous assumption that you can avoid sniping on the initial 2.5s cast. For spot healing, the FoL/BoL Paladin or SoL/FH Priest beats out the use of LHW.
Keep in mind that "Resto Shaman as the universal raid healer" is a BC-era peculiarity. The entirety of a Resto Shaman's multi-target healing arsenal is Chain Heal and AA.
The difficulty with this standpoint is that you have to start considering what other tools are out there. Except for range, Chain Heal doesn't really stack up well against even 6s cooldown CoH/WG for efficiency and provides comparable throughput with the very generous assumption that you can avoid sniping on the initial 2.5s cast.
I'd like to see some evidence that shows chain heal doesnt match the efficiency of a 6s CoH/WG.
As i organise assignments for raids i need to know where best to use the classes i have and it sounds like you have some very interesting information i'd like to see.
It obviously doesn't matter how efficient the heals are if you're not running out of mana, but the real drawback to Chain Heal is that over half of the healing is tied up in that initial 2.5s cast. With all the fast-casting heals being thrown around, it's almost certain to be sniped on a regular basis. Inarguably, some of the efficiency of Wild Growth will also fall prey to the same sniping issue.
Math means nothing when applied. Raid comps and healing assignments will be different depending on the guild and situation. If raid damage is high enough, there is no threat of being sniped. 1.9 second CH 3x per WG / CoH - And if Shamans suddenly take over MT healing, are you really putting pallies and priests solely on the raid? When I say spot with LHW, I mean spot heal the tank - top him off between the next breath, hateful, etc. Hell, bounce CH off the tank to top him while topping off DPS at the same time.
Everyone sits here writing out advanced math breakdowns on what's going to be efficient and what's not and what's going to work in x situation when they've only seen y.
Do the fights and heal the way your raid needs healing. If you're in a situation where your guild doesn't have a steady paladin, sure, you can take over MT healing. If you're in a balanced raid assuming 8 healers with 2/2/2/2 (pally, priest, druid, shaman) or 7 healers in which case I'd say 2/2/2/1 (shaman being 1) then the best role you could fill is raid healing with spots on the tank.
Basing healing on math and rotations is unbelievable. It's the most reactionary role in this game so play it that way.
Hell our last PW was 4 healered, and I casted an amazing 5 LHW's and maintained 5600 hps. The week before was 5900 with roughly the same breakdown. We'll probably go down to 3 healers this week to see what kind of raid dps we can push (25 man) and if I'm in, I still won't be casting LHW - My mana will sustain a 2 minute fight while casting CH at 1.9 seconds with 27k for replenishment - meaning more HPS and a successful kill. Could I pull it off with LHW? Obviously. Is is the most efficient - depends.
React to what's going on. Don't rely on 'napkin math' to figure out what's going to work best for you, and don't fall into a RT - HW - HW - CH - HW - HW habit. Treating healing like a DPS rotation is ridiculous.
You're essentially saying it's O.K. to be mediocre. I tend to disagree. I'm simply stating the mechanics of a healing style. Ancestral Healing isn't hard to keep up on a tank. That's where I leave my ES anyways for better spot heals with LHW. If I want an armor buff on the tank, I'll get it there while maintaining raid healing via CH. Once again, in a 25 man setting, if you're MT healing you're ignoring the primary mechanic that sets us apart from other healers in the first place.
I say as long as you get the job done it doesn't matter if you're a pally, priest, druid or shaman. And I just mentioned some of the benefits by having a shaman MT healing. And seriously, if you keep AH up on the tank, you can't really be as efficient as raid healer. And don't forget, not all guilds can find precisly the healers they need and might have to look at a nonstandard way of doing it.
React to what's going on. Don't rely on 'napkin math' to figure out what's going to work best for you, and don't fall into a RT - HW - HW - CH - HW - HW habit. Treating healing like a DPS rotation is ridiculous.
The purpose of "the math" as you term it is to analyze what the most effective distribution of responsibilities will be. For example, without "the math", many Shaman would automatically assume that Healing Wave was a more efficient way to tank heal than Lesser Healing Wave.
What "the math" shows us that probably isn't immediately apparent is that the BC-style methodology of having Resto Shaman spam Chain Heal and doing a bit of LHW spot healing probably isn't a wise couree in WotLK. Chain Heal was given essentially no new talent benefits and its efficiancy was compromised by the downranking nerf. On the other hand, almost all of LHW's newfound power comes from focusing on a single target.
The purpose of "the math" as you term it is to analyze what the most effective distribution of responsibilities will be. For example, without "the math", many Shaman would automatically assume that Healing Wave was a more efficient way to tank heal than Lesser Healing Wave.
What "the math" shows us that probably isn't immediately apparent is that the BC-style methodology of having Resto Shaman spam Chain Heal and doing a bit of LHW spot healing probably isn't a wise couree in WotLK. Chain Heal was given essentially no new talent benefits and its efficiancy was compromised by the downranking nerf. On the other hand, almost all of LHW's newfound power comes from focusing on a single target.
Oh, so I'm the one doing it wrong yet I've done every fight in the game and have made small changes accordingly for each encounter and gotten them done successfully and efficiently (with some of the highest parsed HPS while doing so?)
My point is you cannot base healing off of math. If you're in a guild that doesn't have the necessary classes to fill a proper healing roster, then sure, we can fill in as MT healers. In an optimal setting, assuming 2/2/2/2 or 2/2/2/1 (not counting fights where may be parsing for WWS i.e. Teron, Brut, PW, etc.), then a shaman's best role is on the raid.
CH didn't need talents to be successful. LHW and HW needed help to even make them viable. That doesn't automatically mean CH is bad and is no longer our bread and butter.
Get out of heroics and into an actual cutting edge raid scene and you won't see misappropriated shaman solo healing MTs.
*edit*
I'm not trying to be a total douche here, but everyone posting these ideal rotations and 'napkin math' to figure out which heal will give the most HPM vs. HPS and where to place classes haven't even done anything remotely difficult in this expansion or probably even the last. I'm clicking around on profiles and you're speaking from the experience of heroics (barely) and 10 mans.
I'm not saying that it's bad to figure up the math on things. I browse these forums for the rare tidbit of information that I may have overlook in my own personal calculations on things like gear, gemming, speccing, specific fight healing strats, etc. But more often than not people post these complicated algorithms that serve no real applicable purpose in a reactionary raid environment.
You do realize that good healers do not need math at all. They just have a good sense of judgment. They use the heal that gets the job done on a given scenario. Time and time again the rule stays true. You cannot mathematically compute max healing on a broad spectrum. On each individual boss fight you can semi calculate your healing efficiency, but then again you would have to have every other healer in your team doing a cookie cutter computation to improve efficiency and to make sure there is no cross healing and/or overhealing. However, good healers always cross heal.
Healing is an art. Not something you can figure with math.
Like real life, nothing goes according to plan. We all have those idiots who stand in fire//stand in front of a boss when they cleave. This is where your math counts for nothing.
You do realize that good healers do not need math at all. They just have a good sense of judgment. They use the heal that gets the job done on a given scenario. Time and time again the rule stays true. You cannot mathematically compute max healing on a broad spectrum. On each individual boss fight you can semi calculate your healing efficiency, but then again you would have to have every other healer in your team doing a cookie cutter computation to improve efficiency and to make sure there is no cross healing and/or overhealing. However, good healers always cross heal.
Healing is an art. Not something you can figure with math.
Like real life, nothing goes according to plan. We all have those idiots who stand in fire//stand in front of a boss when they cleave. This is where your math counts for nothing.
That's basically all I've been trying to say. You can't teach someone reaction time and proper decision making on a napkin using an algorithm.
If raid damage is high enough, there is no threat of being sniped.
,,,
Basing healing on math and rotations is unbelievable. It's the most reactionary role in this game so play it that way.
If, as you imply, you're not going to be overhealing, why would you not use what has been shown to be the most efficient? Raid healing is the least "reactionary" healing there is; the general goal is to strive to be as efficient as possible such that HPS is high enough and mana lasts through the encounter. Yes, there are exceptions, but they're fairly uncommon and not the real focus of this dicussion. The idea is how best to deal with regular raid damge, whether AoE or RSTS. In the latter, Paladins are absolutely amazing in being able to maintain tank healing while patching RSTS damage, while CoH/WG, even with a 6s cooldown, is great at providing even coverage of raid healing with both minimal mana and time expended. Yes, Shaman are very good at filling in more HPS spread around the raid in a "smart" manner, but the point of calculating AoE efficiency is to assign the best people to do it at first. If it doesn't work then you can try different things, but why start with what you know is less efficient?
Yes, theorycrafting has to be tempered with actual raid situations, but all you have provided is your own anecdotal experiences and personal feelings, with nothing substantial to back it up and from my view contradictory statements. You can talk about healing as an art, but that's not the subject of these discussions. You can't play WoW on these boards; you can calculate what's most effiicient in a nutshell. No one should blindly go about applying what they read here; it's all about where to start.
If, as you imply, you're not going to be overhealing, why would you not use what has been shown to be the most efficient? Raid healing is the least "reactionary" healing there is; the general goal is to strive to be as efficient as possible such that HPS is high enough and mana lasts through the encounter. Yes, there are exceptions, but they're fairly uncommon and not the real focus of this dicussion. The idea is how best to deal with regular raid damge, whether AoE or RSTS. In the latter, Paladins are absolutely amazing in being able to maintain tank healing while patching RSTS damage, while CoH/WG, even with a 6s cooldown, is great at providing even coverage of raid healing with both minimal mana and time expended. Yes, Shaman are very good at filling in more HPS spread around the raid in a "smart" manner, but the point of calculating AoE efficiency is to assign the best people to do it at first. If it doesn't work then you can try different things, but why start with what you know is less efficient?
Yes, theorycrafting has to be tempered with actual raid situations, but all you have provided is your own anecdotal experiences and personal feelings, with nothing substantial to back it up and from my view contradictory statements.
Well then post some WWS of you applying your knowledge of proper healing placement as a shaman in a raid environment so that maybe we can learn from your actual experience of healing in the style that you're stating. Until you show that your method is actually more efficient in hands on use, you don't actually have any more of a leg to stand on than I do when it comes backing up any statements being made.
It's in the positioning of the tanks - the melee doesn't take Ch bounces and I effectively heal the hateful tank while topping off the MT at the same time (not to mention keep Ancestral Healing up on 2 to 3 targets at a time). Our melee (if they even still do) don't really need to step in the slime anyways (that's not even how the mechanic truly works). We keep the hateful tank topped off pretty fast - fast enough to keep a stray hateful from hitting a melee anyways.
You can scroll to the bottom and see the breakdown of who my heals hit.
650k to first target (tank), 120k to the second (tank) and 28k to the third (tank/dps - just in case we're slow on our hateful tank). Every target after that is 6k or less, so my chains aren't hitting anyone but the tanks.
With the reduction in IWS, and the nerf too CoH/WG, does that push us out of single target roles on most fights just because no one else will be able to handle the job? Im concerned we will end up CH spamming again not becuase we CANT do single target, but because noone else will be able to raid heal effectively.
A good way to think about this is to imagine you can cast not just CH, but also CoH (6s CD) and WG (6s CD). How would you cast?
Chances are, you'd burn your CoH CD, then burn your WG CD, then if you needed more, you'd start in with CH. That would likely be the most efficient way to heal.
Well, your entire healing team for the raid works the same way. It has a bunch of cooldowns it can 'burn', and then some spammable spells to back that up.
The same is likely true of single target healing. Our healing team has cooldown abilities like Swiftmend and Holy Shock for immediate healing. We've got Holy Light for those really big deficits in tank health. And then we've - still - got our efficient spammable heal in LHW.
Why would you be casting CH in PW? All you do is heal your melee, reducing the cushion for the hateful strikes. Unless you are not having your melee step in the green goop to reduce their HP, which means you are taking a huge risk of a melee taking a hateful.
Hateful strike valid targets are only 2nd and 3rd person on threat list in melee range. If noone else is melee range it can be also used against main tank. It also give threath to three highest person on list. Melee will never eat those if they don't overagro. Slime is only for stupid people who don't understand mechanics well enough. It reduce all stats not just hp.
It's very good idea spam chain heal. There is three tank and it almoust certain that least two isn't topped. We put all three tank to same spot at front and melee step behind after first hatefull strike. This way chain heal can't even reach melee. Best part is that single shaman can give high uptime for armor buff to all three tanks.
As far as the CH discussion goes, my personal experience in naxx25man so far has been that its extremely innefficient i end up with 50%+ overheals on nearly every fight. Reason is we roll with 2 holy COH spammers and a druid spamming WG. In the 2.1 seconds it takes me to fire up chain heal 2WG ticks and 4 COH's have already gone off leaving me with almost nothing to heal and tons of overheal. we have a disc priest on MT healing, and he does the job very well, between ES PW:S and his penance spam i get a few LHW's off now and then but not much to speak of. Sapphiron and Grobbulus seem to be the only fights where i can ge in some good heals before everyones topped off. I use Riptide constantly because i can sneak it in before people are topped off, and TW'd LHW because i can sneak it in in 0.9 sec.
I predict that the CoH and WG CD will allow me to use CH more freely and effectively, since they will be able to pump out about half the healing in those 2.1 seconds leaving me more to heal. This will make CH more effective than it is now, for me anyway.
I'm finding the same thing as TeKniciaN. On any given night our CoH priests and resto druids are pulling down 10M healing with upwards of 40% over heals, while the resto shaman and paladins are lucky to hit 3. This will undoutedly change when the CD hits for those spells, and I think will change the healing dynamics of many raids.
However I was assigned to heal one of the back tanks on the Horsemen fight last night and was very pleased to find that I was more then adequate to fulfill that role. With ES, LHW glyph, Tidal Force, and all of our other tools single target healing seems like it's becoming one of our strong points. In general I like the changes so far to our healing utility, and I'm looking forward to see how things develop when the CD hits for CoH and WG.
First of all you need to compare your amount of healer with the amount pitbuller or sixthy is running patchwerk.
Of course you will land into an high amount of overheal, if you are running with 6-7 healer.
But the intention of spamming chainheal is also because of you have an high uptime of your 25% armor buff and together with your CoH priests (if inspiration specc) you will have nearly an 100% uptime.
While you are sad about your high overheal, i wouldnt worry, because the conclusion for me is:
you topped every tank in max. 2 seconds.
If you want to run with a high effectiv hps, you will be better with a single target heal like lesser healing wave, if you have an high amount of healer in your raid.
If you are running with 3-4 healer you will hit a higher hps with chainheal.
So ask yourself what you want: #1 at your healmeter or killing patchwerk in a smooth way.
12/13/08, 3:42 AM
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