World of Warcraft®

The Healing Priest Symposium
A dialogue, discussion, and exchange of all things Healing and Priests.

Prologue

Hello everyone, my name is Ägis. I'm a healing priest here at Warcraftier looking to give back, help, and connect with the Cenarion Circle community! With my knowledge and experience, I believe this thread is a solid way to go about that.

Our mission here is to create a meeting place for casual, hardcore, and every player in between to come and exchange ideas, discussions, and questions! This thread should be a safe place of learning. To that end, as long as your questions are about Healing, Priests, or both, ask them freely. There should be no judgment, no ridicule, and no cruelty.

I realize this is a public place, and keeping the trolls out is neigh impossible. But I ask everyone to be kind, compassionate, and respectful. Everyone starts off new at one point, and even veterans need help from time to time. If you intend to be mean, please put yourself in the poster's shoes before you respond with malice. We're all in this together, as priests, as healers, and as people.

Introduction

Some of you may be asking yourselves "why should I come here? Why not just go find a guide on the web, or post in a thread specific to my question?" Those are awesome questions, and I encourage you to do those things in addition to posting, chatting, and having fun here! However, what if you can't find a thread specific to your question? What if the guides all seem too impersonal, or too full of terminology and subtlety? What if you want a more hands-on, personalized experience? Then welcome to our symposium!

Guides and question-specific threads also won't usually cater to the more nuanced of questions, such as those pertaining to mods and user interface. Your UI is the medium through which you do everything in WoW, and its importance can't be overstated. As such, this is also a place for those questions!

Lastly, this thread offers a unique advantage over other means of priestly learnings, and it goes back to the personalized experience. It's one thing to search World of Logs for ranking disc or holy priests, cross-reference their profiles and find out their stat priority, glyphs, etc. It's another matter entirely for one of those priests to have access to your profile, your questions, and your experiences and to provide you with consultation accordingly. That's the essence of this thread, the heart of it: helping each other to heal better, stronger, and dominate the world with bubbles and echoes of light.

Conclusion

TL;DR, be kind, post, learn, and enjoy!

Wow! That's rather impressive :)

I have no real questions at the moment, but would like to thank you for starting this resource. I have long thought on getting serious about my healing so I can be more of an asset to my guild, but haven't due to my chaotic scheduling. When that time comes I will certainly look this thread up again for some direction!

Thanks again! :D

What an awesome first post, thank you Caileanmor! So to get the ball rolling, I want to compile a preliminary list of resources. Ultimately, I'd like this thread to become a living, evolving compendium of all things healing and priestliness. So even if you don't have a question, but maybe a great resource you've come across, post it here with a brief explanation for everyone to use.

To start, I want to provide people with solid, fairly comprehensive guides. These were written up by Derevka, who keeps them well updated. They're user friendly, and are a great way to get your feet wet if you're new to healing priests!

Derevka's Healing Guide For Disc - http://howtopriest.com/viewtopic.php?t=1837
Derevka's Healing Guide For Holy - http://howtopriest.com/viewtopic.php?t=1613

Forums are a great place to search for specific information or just peruse! For this, I have a few recommendations. HowToPriest is great for priest-centric information, while PlusHeal is about all healing. Similarly, Noxxic is great for at-a-glance research, while MMO-Champion is a great and comprehensive resource that has been around for time immemorial. Here are links to those respective forums:

HowToPriest - http://howtopriest.com/viewforum.php?f=11
PlusHeal - http://www.plusheal.com/
Noxxic for Disc - http://www.noxxic.com/wow/pve/priest/discipline
Noxxic for Holy - http://www.noxxic.com/wow/pve/priest/holy
MMO-Champion - http://www.mmo-champion.com/forums/274-Priest

These next two resources are a little more advanced, so if you're looking to wade in to the tides of healing, continue on! The following link comes from Adinne who I imagine to be quite the math whiz. This calculator will help you determine what way to go with your stats and what altering your stats will do to your spells. Follow the links to navigate yourself to the calculator itself or the instructions if it's your first time using it.

Adinne's Healing Calculator - http://howtopriest.com/viewtopic.php?f=74&t=4328

Keeping with the theme of stat allocation, it can sometimes be daunting to reforge, regem, and enchant your gear for optimal throughput. For that, there's Mr. Robot! This nifty program will let you upload your toon, set stat weights, and then calculate the optimal way to reforge, gem, and enchant your gear.

Ask Mr. Robot - http://www.askmrrobot.com/

That should be a good start, please post with questions, resources, or ideas! Toodles for now beautiful people, and happy healing!

I think this will end up evolving into something of a blog-like thread, which is fine. Even if it helps only a handful of people, it will have been worth it! For today's post, I want to give people some guiding questions. It occurs to me people may not know what to ask, or even where to begin. In providing these questions, I hope to get people thinking in the right direction and maybe spark some spin-off questions, comments, or ideas.

These questions are my own and what I take to be advanced. I would ask these (and have) of applicants to Warcraftier. This means these questions are meant for heroic ready, raiding disc and holy priests. So if you're new, and these look like english but not, don't worry! As you research, learn, and practice they should start to make sense.

Also note that due to the advanced nature of these questions, there is some room for debate regarding the "correct" answer. Frankly, I hope they do spark discussion!

Guiding Questions

Discipline: To maximize your HPS you should align your mastery to crit (%)'s (i.e. 1:1). Explain why this is the prevailing school of thought in the disc community. If you feel this assertion is inaccurate, please defend your position. BONUS: Explain why this is technically still true, but no longer viable in 5.4. - Think about your spells and the synergy these stats have with your spells. Consider the same for the next question.

Holy: To maximize your HPS in a raid environment (especially 25 man), your stat priority should be mastery -> crit -> haste. Explain why this is the prevailing school of thought in the holy community. If you feel this assertion is inaccurate, please defend your position.

Disc/Holy: Encounters have a good deal of variation in 5.4. Builds that work well on one fight might not work as well (if at all) on another. Conversely, there may be multiple, equally viable builds for some encounters. Why might you change your talents and glyphs from one fight to the next? What possible factors give rise to build diversity in a single encounter? - This question is especially good for potential and current raiders.

Discipline: In 5.4 there were a number of class changes targeting healers. While other healing classes received buffs, disc saw several nerfs. Do you feel this was appropriate? In your opinion, was disc too strong? - This question is designed to get you thinking about your co-healers, because unlike DPS, healing is a team sport.

Disc/Holy: Does Renew have a place in the disc spell rotation? Does Power Word: Shield have a place in holy's? If you feel they don't, please explain. If you feel they do, describe a scenario where these spells would be useful to their respective specs (i.e. Renew to disc, PW:S to holy). - Think critically and creatively about your spell rotation.

Disc/Holy: Please explain the design purpose of Rapture and Holy Word: Sanctuary. Also, elaborate on our Tier 5 talents, explaining the synergy that exists between them and specific spells in our toolkit. - Understanding all spells in our toolkit, even the least visible, can only help you.

Disc/Holy: Divine Aegis and Echo of Light are "free" throughput abilities for disc and holy, respectively. While absorbs will usually beat out HoT's, explain why EoL has better conservation of raw healing than DA. While thinking of this also explain why, for disc, stamina is an indirect throughput stat. - Think about what's going on behind the scenes with these passive, although indescribably important abilities.

That should be a good start! Feel free to post here with any questions, resources, or ideas. Happy healing everyone!

I just want to first say a big thank you to Warcraftier for their support of CC. They are always willing to help the community in so many ways and it is very appreciated.

A simple questions but could you talk about your stat priority for Disc?

Thanks you for this thread!

Elvenmoon

Hi Elvenmoon, great question! Disc has one of the easier stat priorities, especially in 5.4. While I often hear other healers debating over the balance between haste breakpoints and their other stats, there's no need for that discussion as disc.

Stat Priority (and the one I personally follow)

Spirit to 11,000* -> Crit = Int** -> Mastery***

However, I do need to elaborate on a few nuances:

*I aim for about 11,000 spirit (+/- 100) because that's where I'm comfortable as a consequence of my legendary meta, trinkets, and play style. So, it's important to realize that this number will change from player to player. You should get it as low as comfortably possible, because you take the spirit you've dumped and reinvest it into your priority throughput stats. As to how you figure this number out, it's just trial and error.

For example, because Warcraftier is still engaged in progression, I keep my spirit about 1000 higher than I would normally. This provides a healthy buffer for those fights where people are standing in things they shouldn't, getting hit by things they shouldn't, and in general making your job a little harder. However, if you're group has everything on farm, then reducing your spirit is not only acceptable but advisable. Remember, excess spirit is wasted throughput!

It's important to note, too, that disc is insanely (even brokenly) mana efficient. That's why you see disc priests throwing away spirit like it's last season's style and they've been invited to Paris Fashion Week. So shed a little more spirit than those other healers in your group, take pride in your disc-hood, and let them be jealous! They'll best you in other ways, like raw throughput.

**I say crit is (=) to int more for simplicity than accuracy. I feel the consensus among top tier disc raiders is that crit supersedes int, and this is the model I personally follow and would advise others to follow. This might seem foreign, especially if you played during Cataclysm and the first tier of Mists where int was the indisputable priority. However, around the 520-530 item level mark, crit surpasses int.

I've not seen the math to prove this, only hearsay. However, from personal experience I can confirm that prioritizing crit will yield higher Heals per Second. It makes sense if you reason it out, as well. While int will ultimately yield higher numbers for other classes, it doesn't for disc as a consequence of our mechanics. Let me explain with math, with my non-math oriented brain (I apologize in advance to anyone I will offend with my calculations):

So, let's say we've done 10,000 heals and we'll adjust from there (given a perfect sample, and assuming each point of int will yield one healing and each critical heal is double the healing of a normal heal):

10,000 heals w/ 32,000 int and 30% crit:
7000 heals @ 32,000 healing = 224 mil
3000 heals @ 64,000 healing = 192 mil
Total: 416 mil raw healing

Let's then assume the same standards, but say we have 1000 less int and 1% more crit (which is, very roughly, what the trade off in game would be):

10,000 heals w/ 31,000 int and 31% crit:
6900 heals @ 31,000 healing = 213.9 mil
3100 heals @ 62,000 healing = 192.2 mil
Total: 406.1 mil raw healing

So, on paper per my baby math, int yields more raw healing than crit. However, as we've all experienced, nothing ever works out that nicely in the real world. As I mentioned, think of how disc heals: absorbs. Our absorbs almost never overheal, especially in Siege of Orgrimmar where there's such constant, considerable raid damage. However, a baseline heal will almost always overheal, given your co-healers are worth their salt.

So even though you yield more raw healing favoring int, you have to think like a team player. After all, healing is first and foremost a team sport. Your co-healers, be they shaman, druid, etc, are better at raw throughput than you. However, you're the kings and queens of absorbs. Your job is to mitigate incoming damage, which you do better with more shields.

TL;DR: Stack crit because you will create more DA's which will lighten the demand on your co-healers, yield you higher HPS, and reduce your overhealing. However, don't neglect int because it's still a powerful throughput stat and will only increase the power of your heals and absorbs.

***Mastery is an easy stat to explain, especially in 5.4, but it also has its nuances. If you're still raiding the first tier of MoP or Throne of Thunder, you want your crit and mastery (%)'s to be about 1:1. This is because of the beautiful synergy between crit and mastery and how they play into your mechanics. While crit will yield more shields, you need mastery to give your shields strength. In addition, as of 5.3, we have a split mastery which not only boosts the strength of our absorbs but our raw healing, as well. So, try to keep your crit and mastery aligned.

I ran out of room. I apologize to anyone who just wants a quick answer, but I definitely try to be thorough!

***(Continued): One final point about mastery, you won't be able to balance your crit and mastery percents 1:1 in SoO. This is due to the insane amount of mastery gear and the tragic paucity of crit gear. It's also why disc's T16 2-piece set bonus exists, to compensate for the lack of crit we get from gear. So, once you start gearing from SoO, just stack crit. You'll get all the mastery you need from gear alone!

Haste

Lastly, I want to talk for a moment about haste. I consider it the infamous party crasher, but there is an ongoing debate about its usefulness. I personally avoid it like the black death, but I'm all about trying to maximize my HPS, which you simply won't get with haste. This is due to the "tiered" returns haste gives us, versus the exponential returns crit and mastery will.

Some people have theorized that, with enough haste, you can get another cast of Prayer of Healing off during Spirit Shell, and while this argument has validity it lacks to mention some key points. First, you get nothing in this game for nothing. There's always a trade off, and in the case of getting enough haste to get that extra cast of PoH, how much crit and mastery have you lost? Enough to make the whole argument for haste very silly. For the 10sec that SS is up, you will be slightly more useful, given perfect circumstances (e.g. a boss mechanic doesn't make you move, you don't get interrupted, your target doesn't die). However, for the next 50sec, you're enormously gimped. You won't be creating as many DA's, those you do create will be weak, and so on until your SS comes up again and you pray for another perfect situation.

To further weaken the argument for haste, think about what spells benefit from it. Namely, anything casted. While your casted spells will cast faster, your instant cast spells won't benefit at all, except from a lower Global Cooldown. This means power hitters like your Tier 6 talents, Power Word: Shield, and Prayer of Mending will suffer, creating fewer, weaker bubbles in exchange for faster atoning and PoH casts. The trade off just isn't worth it, especially when you realize the bulk of your healing comes from instant cast abilities.

TL;DR: Haste may be situationally useful, but prioritizing crit/mastery is almost certainly better.

I hope that answers your question Elvenmoon, and as always, happy healing!

Hello everyone! Today, I'd like to start a several part series about add ons, mods, and user interface. While understanding how to heal as disc and holy is important, it's all for naught if you don't have the UI to do so. Your interface is the medium through which you actualize your healing potential, and so its importance can't be overstated.

My UI Philosophy

First, a bit about my personal UI philosophy. I believe a good healing interface is both elegant and simple. A perfect UI is visually appealing and creates synergy between the many parts of your interface, making it elegant. Simultaneously, it should be easy to master and alerts you to the information you need to know and trims away the information you don't, making it simple. These qualities are essential to an intuitive and well designed UI that allows for easy navigation while performing the most complex maneuvers. This is what I strive for, and the model I believe others should follow. So, what add ons will you need to make this vision a reality? Here is a list of possibilities.

The List

At the heart of healing is the guardianship of your team's health. A good group will trust their healer to watch over them, and a good healer will trust in him or herself to do so. This is most often done through a grid or frame that consolidates everyone's health into an easily manageable group. Combining this method with mouseover macros (a discussion for another day) or a mouseover-click mod will yield fast response times and near-omniscience of your team's well being. Grid or frame mods include:

Healbot - Built in mouseover-click feature, can be combined with mouseover macros.
Vuhdo - Customizable to the highest degree, includes a cluster finder* that as priests is next-to-necessary. It has many of the same features as HB and then some.
Grid- No built in mouseover-click feature, and requires a number of plug-ins to rise to the level of HB or Vuhdo. Plug-ins offer pick-and-choose customizability.
Default Blizzard Frames - You can't go wrong with the original; with a few mods and mouseover macros, these will do just as well as other, more comprehensive mods.

*Cluster finders do exactly what they sound like: find clusters of people per a set criteria. I make special note of them because they're essential given the current state of Prayer of Healing. While not as imperative if your team is stacked (e.g. H Norushen), cluster finders are indispensable if your group is spread. They help you select good targets to PoH (i.e. players that have at least two to four people around them) and avoid bad ones (i.e. players that have less than two people nearby). This helps maximize your return per cast of PoH, ensures you'll be able to blanket the raid with Spirit Shell, keep rolling Echoes of Light on your team, and is all around necessary if you're group healing as a priest. To date and to my knowledge, Vuhdo is the only mod that offers this feature.

While all classes have cooldowns, as priests we have a particularly large amount. You'll need a way to track these CDs, and for this I have a number of suggestions.

TellMeWhen - Solid CD monitor, I've not personally used it but know a number of players here at Warcraftier do and love it.
Weakauras - The most godly of mods, if you can imagine it, WA can probably do it.
ForteXorcist - Specifically for Warlocks, it has some functionality for all classes, especially for tracking CDs.

Staying in the vein of CDs and abilities, bar mods** are an awesome way to organize and streamline your UI. There are only a couple big names I know of and would recommend, but I'm certain some searching would turn up others.

Bartender - A fully comprehensive, customizable bar mod, this add on has it all but can be convoluted, unintuitive, and difficult to navigate.
Dominos - A much simpler bar mod, you won't get the customization with this that you would with Bartender.

**A little trick I learned some time ago: hide your bars. This might seem scary, especially if you're used to looking at your bars for upcoming CDs, but do yourself a favor. Find a CD mod to track your CDs, consolidate them in one place, hide your bars, and spend more time looking at the most important elements of the encounter (e.g. your team's health, encounter mechanics, or even the play field itself). It made a world of difference for me and I would recommend it to anyone!

Last on the list of essential add ons are the raid encounter or boss*** mods. There's only two that come to mind.

DeadlyBossMods (DBM) - Very generic, although comprehensive boss mod that will track the mechanics of virtually every encounter in game.
BigWigs - Has the same functionality as DBM, although is more customizable.

Once again, I ran out of room. My apologies!

***If you intend to raid, you have to have a boss mod. Long have I raided and of the many things I've learned, there are some lessons that stick out over others. Not least of which being that players without boss mods wipe raids. I've seen every excuse in the book, and never have I ever believed a single one. It's not a reflection of how well you play to do the encounter without a boss mod; you don't get a medal, you don't get an achievement. And even if you've gone ages without botching something up, you're bound to eventually. I'm afraid the statistics just aren't in your favor.

Moreover, while boss mods can't guarantee you won't mess up, you have that much more information to avoid doing so in the first place! It's only a benefit to have a boss mod, and the only excuse to not have one is ego or pride, neither of which I'm particularly fond. So please, there is much to be said of someone who comes to raid with a boss mod: they know their limitations and so are humble, are prepared for the sake of themselves and others and so are noble, and are an all around team player. This concludes my boss mod PSA announcement!

This list should be a good start! Feel free to post here with any questions, resources, or ideas. As always, happy healing everyone!

::::: quietly enters the room, the ominous yet inviting glow of shadowform begins to spread slowly over all the surroundings, like the rising of the tide :::::

Give in to the darkness, Agis.

The Dark One has shown his face... and so it begins. To arms, my brothers and sisters of the Light! Repel the heretic and dispel his blasphemies. Let slip the Angels of War that they might do justice on he that turned his back on the Light. Long live, long reign the the brightest stars, the fiercest flames, the many children of the Light that shadows never be allowed purchase! Show no mercy to the darkness in the hearts of the fallen, even our own. Be gone, herald of the shadows and places unspeakable! Your kind has no place in this shrine.

Also, Hi Blase! See you on Monday.

Happy Thursday everyone! We left off with the Mod Series, which we’ll revisit in due time. However, today I’m starting an additional series about priest spells and rotations*. This will also be a several part series, and we’ll probably go back and forth between this, the Mod Series, and any other ongoing collections we think up!

*Our ability choices and when to use them are a “rotation” only in name. Healing is not like DPS’ing; there’s no absolute order of spells to maximize throughput. Instead, you have to “feel out” your team’s health and respond accordingly. Healing is an art and should be treated as such. Handle your group’s life with finesse, be delicate, and be smart. After all, you and your co-healers are the only ones standing between your team’s success and a death by attrition.

Some Certainties

While there is no absolute rotation in healing, there are some certainties that lessen the ambiguity of spell order. These are class and spec specific, and in the case of priest healing are limited to a few abilities.

Disc

Penance - This should be used on Cooldown either defensively, or more probably, offensively. In fact, the importance of an offensive Penance really can’t be overstated. In as little as 1.5-2sec, you’ll heal your most injured team members 3 times for a considerable amount. It will also give you a stack of Evangelism, which you’ll need to keep Archangel up.

Power Word: Solace** - Much like offensive Penance, this spell should be aggressively used on CD to keep rolling stacks of Evangelism, take advantage of the smart heal, and to pad your mana pool from the 1% mana return.

**There is some debate in the disc community over using PW:Solace or Mindbender. I believe PW:Solace wins every time. However, it’s worth going over both sides of the debate. Those who favor MB believe it has superior mana yield. They also point out that casting PW:Solace every time it comes off CD can be a hassle. Neither of these points have merit, and I’ll explain why.

People often gloss over that PW:Solace and MB both replace spells. Then they forget, or even worse, ignore the ramifications of this. PW:Solace replaces Holy Fire while MB replaces Shadowfiend, both of which have profound consequences. Let’s imagine you’ve taken MB. This means you no longer have SF and that you also don’t have PW:Solace. Your only mana return in this scenario is MB. While it has a shorter CD than SF and lasts longer, it returns less mana per hit. You also won’t have access to PW:Solace and its 1% mana return. In fact, in not taking PW:Solace you’re left with HF. Unlike its improved counterpart, HF costs 1.8% of your base mana. However, like PW:Solace you should be casting it on CD to keep rolling stacks of Evangelism and for the smart heal. This means PW:Solace and HF have to be factored into any subsequent mana calculations, although for opposite reasons. PW:Solace will yield positive mana returns, while HF is a mana-negative drain.

To drive this point home, it’s time for more math! At 90, your mana pool is 300k. SF and MB both attack every 1.5sec, and while this is affected by haste, you’ll recall per our discussion of stat priority that you should have none. SF lasts 12sec with a 3min CD and returns 3% mana per hit to MB’s 15sec duration, 1min CD, and 1.75% mana per hit. If you have SF, you should also have PW:Solace which restores 1% mana every 10sec, assuming you’re casting it on CD. Conversely, if you have MB you should be casting HF every 10sec which costs 1.8% mana every 10sec. Lastly, we’ll assume one use of SF for a sample duration of 3min. Now, the math!

[SF + PW:Solace]: (12/1.5)(300,000 x .03) + 3(300,000 x .01 x 6) = 126,000
[MB - HF]: 3[(15/1.5)(300,000 x .0175)] - 3(300,000 x .018 x 6) = 60,300

While on the surface the argument for MB seems to have merit, it doesn’t. MB has less synergy with our spells as disc, it nets less mana, and you use more GCD’s to keep it up. It should be noted that these conclusions are based on logic and math that assume perfect scenarios (you’re using PW:Solace/HF and SF/MB on CD to their greatest effect). However, the quality of life improvement and the mana-positive yield that PW:Solace gives are benefits too insurmountable for MB to make sense.

TL;DR - Use PW:Solace because the arguments for MB don’t hold water, even with perfect circumstances and especially in imperfect ones.

Shocking, I ran out of room!

Archangel - This should be used on CD***, especially if you have the T16 2-piece set bonus. Per stack of Evangelism (up to 5), AA will increase your healing by 5%. With 5 stacks, that’s a 25% increase that also affects certain absorbs like Power Word: Shield. With the set bonus, AA will also give 2% crit chance per stack of Evangelism for up to 10% additional crit chance. With an 18sec uptime and only a 30sec CD, this is the boon, the linchpin, and the crux of our throughput as disc.

***There are more nuances to AA than I can begin to count. For example, there is debate whether AA should be used on CD, if at all. Those who advocate forgoing AA claim that the stacks of Evangelism are too important to shed for the return AA gives. After all, each stack of Evangelism will give an additional 4% damage to Smite and PW:Solace/HF, and reduces the mana cost of those spells by 6% per stack. At 5 stacks, this yields a 20% increase in damage to those spells and a 30% reduction in mana. For atonement-focused disc priests, these are tantalizing numbers. However, if you’re exclusively an atonement disc priest, you’re doing it wrong.

Atonement exists as a filler and should be treated as such. It’s our go-to healing method designed to yield strong throughput but not be the answer to all scenarios. Prayer of Healing, our T6 talent (e.g. Divine Star), Prayer of Mending, and our other direct heals all have their place in our rotation and all benefit from AA. Learning how to generate 5 stacks of Evangelism to keep AA up is as integral to disc as Chakra is to holy. We have to work harder for our throughput, but are rewarded in added versatility.

However, to add subtlety to nuance, there are places and times when stacking Evangelism has some merit. Challenge Modes are a good example, where time is of the essence and damage is key. Also if the boss has 1-5% life left and the stability of your team is in rapid decline, I could get behind forgoing AA to spam your atonement rotation.

TL;DR - Keep AA up, focusing on offensive Penance and PW:Solace as your Evangelism generators, weaving in the occasional Smite as needed. However, if damage is needed and time isn’t on your side, forgoing AA may be a good, if not better, option.

That’s all for now everyone! When we continue this discussion, we’ll be talking holy spells and rotations. Until then, happy healing all!

This is simply divine, Agis.

Thank you Khromie, what a kind thing to say! And Happy Weekend everyone, and a belated Valentine’s Day! I’ve been on vacation, so I apologize for letting this thread fall by the way side. With that said, I’d like to continue today’s discussion with a look at some talents. I’ll cover most of our options, but will emphasize my personal choices and explain why I’ve chosen them.* This will be an ongoing discussion, one we’ll likely finish before switching to a new topic. As always, feel free to ask questions or add your thoughts!

*The biggest mistake players make, both new and veteran, is assuming that they can take one combination of talents and wash their hands clean of the whole process. This isn’t true. Good players, especially the best, are constantly swapping and changing their talents. Fight mechanics, niche roles, and personal preference all play into our talent selections. While I have my preferences, I’m often forced to stray from them as the situation evolves and demands. Keep this in mind when selecting your talents, and always ask what the situation warrants and what it needs.

Talents, Disc

Tier 1 - Crowd Control
This is our crowd control tier which includes Void Tendrils, Psyfiend, and Dominate Mind. I don’t personally find great utility in this tier, given the nature of these CCs. Void Tendrils will root up to 5 enemies within 8yds of you, but in a group or raid, why is an enemy that close? It’s important to keep in mind, as well, that because the tendrils themselves are attackable units they run the risk of being one shot by any raid or group enemy. Nevertheless, because they’ll neither send enemies running nor shift your control to another unit, Void Tendrils is our go-to talent for this tier.**

**As you might be expecting, there are caveats to this. For example, Psyfiend is awesome for PvP and pealing other players or even enemies off yourself or others. It does have limited functionality in a group or raid, although it’s recommended you stay away from this talent. If it fears an enemy, the likelihood of that baddie running into other baddies is high. Moreover, the fear itself is easily breakable, which further lessens the talents usefulness.

Dominate Mind is an interesting talent, and I would say is used more to grief (i.e. to purposefully troll or infuriate people) than for legitimate functionality. As a healer, shifting control from yourself to another unit is highly inadvisable unless there’s a reason to do so (e.g. Razuvious in Naxxramas). In general, this will be your last choice and is virtually useless except in the above examples.

Tier 2 - Movement
This is our movement tier which will add speed to us or our team, as well as shed any movement impairing affects all together. Our abilities here include Body and Soul, Angelic Feather, and Phantasm. Body and Soul is our go-to talent, and is great if you’re new to disc and don’t want one more spell to remember (e.g. Angelic Feather). While B+S doesn’t have the same movement bonus or duration as AF, it comes with certainty. AF can be hard to place if you’re new to it, and it’s one more spell entirely to keep in mind. However, the trade off is substantial, and I ultimately recommend AF. Get used to splitting up your shield and movement speed buffs, you’ll appreciate it in the long run!***

***I’ll mention Phantasm because it’s here, but I’ll also add that I’ve never used it. I don’t often PvP, and that’s where this talent really shines. Additionally, it’s attached to Fade, which is of limited use in PvE if your tanks are worth their salt. Not to mention the mana cost of Fade is nothing to discount, especially if you’re trying to optimize your regen-to-throughput stats. Phantasm does have PvE functionality, especially on any fight where your movement speed is impaired and there are adds that the tanks will be straining to pick up (e.g. H Malkork). It’s just usually the case that B+S or AF are better options and offer more versatility and utility.

Just a quick review of our first couple talent tiers, we’ll pick this discussion back up soon! Until then, happy healing to one and all!