An easy to play healer class for my GF

[Tsuna]

shaman is simple, lots of passive healing through totems and a big fat aoe circle heal that takes out a lot of the thinking.

[Krommm]

Discipline. It can dps and heal, has the least binds and a well rounded toolset.

edit: for someone new shamans is a very close second, can do fine without utilizing all it's abilities.

[Louis CK]

Just for the sake of clarity: I'm not forcing her into playing WoW; I know it's against the 'stereotype' but it was actually her who saw an ad of WoW and pandas and wanted to try it out with me, saying that she wants to watch my back as a healer so no angry monster would hurt me . Believe it or not . And yea, we probably won't be doing any raids or anything, just playing casually - just wanted to find out an easy class so she doesn't get confused too much

@ Kezotar: People do different things for fun, so do we. Trust me, after playing together a game for 30 to max 60mins you still have got plenty of time left for other activities. We've played some very casual, not mmorpg games before and we have both enjoyed it immensely. I guess it's no different than watching a movie with your gf - only that it is somewhat more engaging. Don't you watch movies with your gf? Anyways, everyone does what pleases them

Just reading between the lines here, but chances are she's doing it to spend time with you. That's not a bad thing of course, but keep it in mind. As someone else noted, pretty much any healer will be easy depending on what level of play you're looking for, and they can all be complicated depending on the level of play. Have her pick what she feels looks cool, and she'll probably have the most fun with it. It's not like they're starting her out with a full spellbook or anything, she'll develop just fine if she's really wanting to heal.

Best of luck to you, and whatever you do, don't pressure her. Be aware, things that don't seem like pressure to you, can seem like pressure to her. Even things like "no, let's do this quest first because it's on the way" can wear her down when what she really wants is to follow that other quest because the "guy looks mean".

It's a lot of fun and enjoyment to have your girlfriend play with you, don't fuck it up

[tru]

create toons on the ptr and tell her to test em out. Easy to me might not be easy to someone else. but imo here it is

Holy priests have good toolkits aoe and single target (my fav healing spec for many years) Their output (hps) is pretty low compared to others but still viable.
Shammys are good but my biggest beef with them is location based AoE heal and one of their cd totems you rely on ppl stacking up
Monk is fun to an extent until you realize all the aoe you have you have to pre stage it. Spreading a hot over the raid members then using a spell that will direct heal them(only the ones with that HoT on them)This makes me feel like you need to know and be prepared for raidwide mechanics be4 they happened more so than other healers.
Pally is good single target a little more tedious to AoE heal with.
Druid is fun with strong cds simple enough single target healing and aoe i enjoy the playstyle the game just favors absorbs way to much but some of the best healers ive ever seen were druids

not sure what the cap is on ptr for making toons these days but imo if it were me
-priest
-pally
-druid
-shammy

[Deleted]

I'd say holy paladin, very few 'mechanical' healing as most of it is instant. Very few HoT spells and from experience I never needed any keybindings aside from the usual, and when she gets better she'll have other tools to help in various situations.

[Louis CK]

create toons on the ptr and tell her to test em out. Easy to me might not be easy to someone else. but imo here it is

Holy priests have good toolkits aoe and single target (my fav healing spec for many years) Their output (hps) is pretty low compared to others but still viable.
Shammys are good but my biggest beef with them is location based AoE heal and one of their cd totems you rely on ppl stacking up
Monk is fun to an extent until you realize all the aoe you have you have to pre stage it. Spreading a hot over the raid members then using a spell that will direct heal them(only the ones with that HoT on them)This makes me feel like you need to know and be prepared for raidwide mechanics be4 they happened more so than other healers.
Pally is good single target a little more tedious to AoE heal with.
Druid is fun with strong cds simple enough single target healing and aoe i enjoy the playstyle the game just favors absorbs way to much but some of the best healers ive ever seen were druids

not sure what the cap is on ptr for making toons these days but imo if it were me
-priest
-pally
-druid
-shammy

For someone who's brand new to the game and mmo's in general, that's probably the second worst thing you could do apart from throwing her midraid on your main and telling her to keep every one alive lol.

The tookit of a max level character won't be anything to a new player besides a lot of complicated buttons that may or may not scare her off. If you want her to see what the classes look like at max level, it'd be best to just let her see how the spells and gear LOOK rather than trying to explain every ability in a given toolkit.

I know before my girlfriend started playing, I hinted at it one day and showed her my DK. When she looked at my screen, her response was "I could never play a game like that, it's way too complicated." A few days later, I suggested she make a character and just run around for a bit and see how she likes it. She started a mage on my account a little reluctantly, but after a few quests, she realized it wasn't as complicated as she thought and found it enjoyable. The last thing she was concerned with was how she'll perform in a raid (or what a raid even is), and was more concerned with getting those lynx collars. The next day, after I went to bed she made her own account without my help lol.

Again, just going off personal experience. I've tried to convince a gf to play before, pushed her a little too hard to "be good" and it failed miserably. Now, just letting my gf enjoy herself and following her around as she does it is proving a lot more effective. She'll grow into her role.

[ringpriest]

I'll second those who've suggested letting her poke around the character creation screen, read the little descriptions of each class and race, and pick a class/race combo she finds interesting. That said, here's a few thoughts in more direct answer to your question:

Priests are easy, and do have the option to go shadow.
Pallys are a little more complicated, far more survivable, and have few complicated decisions to make about how they heal.
Druids are the one class I wish I'd rolled earlier in the game - they're massively flexible, and a blast to play.

[Argent Champion]

Let her pick whatever heal class she thinks sounds cool and don't overthink it and worry about babying her. Girls aren't retarded.

[Louis CK]

Let her pick whatever heal class she thinks sounds cool and don't overthink it and worry about babying her. Girls aren't retarded.

This guy brings up a good point to. Just because she's new doesn't mean she's retarded. As I noted before, she'll grow into her role whatever it may be. And if you treat her as if she needs the easiest class possible, it may make her feel like you think she's stupid.

The game starts you out with few abilities for a reason. Let her pick what she thinks is the coolest and go with it.

[Benomatic]

disc priest.

[Deleted]

Disc priest. You can basically do all content up to Flex with pure atonement.

[Deleted]

I will go with Shaman or paladin. going by what you said, Druid is a no go. Priest's have almost like a milion different spells for no matter the situation.

[Willfox]

Definitely a druid.

-Not many key binds (shape shifting is pretty irrelevant for a healer, you might only use cat form for a speed boost)
-Very simple concept (keep up lifebloom on the tank, only a couple buttons to ever choose from unlike priests who have more abilities than you can reasonably put on a skill bar)
-Almost entirely instant casts (wild growth, rejuv, lifebloom, swiftmend, then with the addition of tree form, regrowth. That is 90% of what you will ever cast and it's all instant)


Seriously, druids are the simplest. Priests have a TON of abilities, paladins have a ton of CDs(fairly easy otherwise), shaman feel wonky. (havent played a monk so it could be easier but i'd doubt it)

PS: With effloresence on a mushroom + keeping lifebloom up on a tank, its about 40% of all the healing done at later levels.

[Kezotar]

Just for the sake of clarity: I'm not forcing her into playing WoW; I know it's against the 'stereotype' but it was actually her who saw an ad of WoW and pandas and wanted to try it out with me, saying that she wants to watch my back as a healer so no angry monster would hurt me . Believe it or not . And yea, we probably won't be doing any raids or anything, just playing casually - just wanted to find out an easy class so she doesn't get confused too much

@ Kezotar: People do different things for fun, so do we. Trust me, after playing together a game for 30 to max 60mins you still have got plenty of time left for other activities. We've played some very casual, not mmorpg games before and we have both enjoyed it immensely. I guess it's no different than watching a movie with your gf - only that it is somewhat more engaging. Don't you watch movies with your gf? Anyways, everyone does what pleases them

Again, I wasn't trying to be rude. I was just trying to explain that "Gaming" in general in a relationship isn't the top choices. That is in general, like saying in most relationships, if you can make it work sure.. My GF plays Diablo 3. This was long before I met her. Yet she hasn't touched her account since she met me. Logged in at my place to play for a 2-3 minutes before we get bored and realise, oh.. There's alot of better things to do. Take friday for example. We were watching a movie, but we realised.. Good weather outside, let's go do that. It ended up with us going to a park, going to the city, grilling and having alot of pleasure that way. Compared to watching a movie and later on having.. Yeah. This was much better of an option. But hey, my two cents didn't look too good for you, so I'll leave it. I'm not going or even trying to force you. It was just a tip. But hey, it's going ot ..

[MuskiER]

Gotta go with Resto Shaman.

Monks are pretty easy also, but they're also incredibly difficult when you need to emergency heal.

I played all 5, and this ^^^ i agree with. Then again havent tested Holy paladin since the resource change to holy power.

[Wayne25uk]

I'd say druid,its piss easy to heal and if she gets bored she can always go dps or melee or tank. That way she has 1 of everything and can be a jack of all trades and a master of fuck all,cos thats women right?

[MuskiER]

Also forgot to add for those who keep saying priest, priest have the diversity healing spell choices of any healer. A heal for every scenarios kind of event. Which is conflicting with one thing the op was asking for, fewest keybind.

[Itisamuh]

I don't know how monk plays really, but I'd say paladin and priest are much easier to learn than shaman or druid. I'd recommend priest, cause if she ever wants to do something besides heal, chances are she'll enjoy a caster over a melee. At least, that seems to be the pattern with every girl I've talked to that plays these types of games.

[Blayzee]

Everyone knows girls always tend to choose priests, i mean atleast 80% of priests i've met are girls!

[Frolk]

Resto shaman got a very gentle learning curve