Healer population all time low?

[shammypie]

Hi,
Coming back from Hiatus one of the things i noticed was that healers seem to be in super high demand. As someone who mained a healer for a long time I'm familiar with how hard it is to find one normally. However I'm not sure it it's legion artifart system or what and wanted to know what you guys think. I'm highly tempted to go back to my old main but I want to try to focus on PvP this expansion and pvp healing sucks balls to do. My thread doesn't just pertain to PvP as I was slightly more curious about the PvE aspect.

[MrExcelion]

From my experience from pugging, yes, it does seem to be the case. Could be really difficult trying to pug healers for higher level mythic+

[kaloryth]

After the pre patch changes with no artifacts yet, healing is a little more difficult. Most geared healers won't be doing pug content, so you only get the swath of newer healers. I suspect many are taking a break until Legion hits.

[Alopex Major]

Personally I can't even remember the last time I pugged anything, so that's probably true. I'm also leveling as a DPS spec because Blizzard's promise of healers being able to level efficiently didn't hold water, at least for my class.

[Lightslinger]

People are prepping for Legion. Most will be leveling as a DPS spec so they are all getting used to the spec and a lot of people are still unaware of the role specialization switching for PvE. Also from the looks of it healing in PvP on any class in the pre patch is kind of difficult and stressful simply because we do not have our honor talents. Healing honor talents play a huge role in survivability and the overall performance of the spec. Not to mention the game is now structured around each class having an artifact ability to fill gaps within the class rotation. A lot of the healers have "Oh shit button" artifact abilities they are missing.

[Termak]

Demonhunters cant heal, everyone is playing them atm

[FuxieDK]

People have been crying about the lack of healers, since late WotLK..
Before that, it was tanks, that was in short supply..

[Mlz]

Demonhunters cant heal, everyone is playing them atm

This. Everyone and their family rolled a DH (just check the groups for mythic dungeons - almost each of them has a tank which was a rather rare case pre pre-patch).

[XDurionX]

I don't know whether it's an "all time low", but healers have been in high demand all the time. I think the main reason is that noone will level as a healer, since dungeon xp can't compete with questing. The population will "normalize" after the initial weeks of leveling, but healers will still be sought after.

[Al Gorefiend]

I can never play something that isn't a healer anymore... It's like whenever I want a break from healing to hop on my DK or warrior nobody else steps up to the plate in my absence..

[Jewsco]

Aren't healers wasting artifact power if they level in dps spec? This is why for my guild we have assigned dps or tanks to level with the healers so they can stay heals while leveling and not lose artifact power.

[Deja Thoris]

Aren't healers wasting artifact power if they level in dps spec? This is why for my guild we have assigned dps or tanks to level with the healers so they can stay heals while leveling and not lose artifact power.

A healer throwing 12 or so points into their offspec weapon is no biggie at all. After about 2/3 weeks (in other words before raids open) you'll be able to grind that cost back in an hour.
At that point those 12 points in their os weapon will be worth about 10% of their next point in their main spec.

So "technically" its wasted since you are now 1/10th of a point behind where you could of theoretically have been. On the flip side. Maybe if you threw those points into the dps spec you'd have leveled faster ^_^

[Overdispersion]

Aren't healers wasting artifact power if they level in dps spec? This is why for my guild we have assigned dps or tanks to level with the healers so they can stay heals while leveling and not lose artifact power.

No, we save the AP items and use them when bags are full and we're in correct spec.

[Jewsco]

A healer throwing 12 or so points into their offspec weapon is no biggie at all. After about 2/3 weeks (in other words before raids open) you'll be able to grind that cost back in an hour.
At that point those 12 points in their os weapon will be worth about 10% of their next point in their main spec.

So "technically" its wasted since you are now 1/10th of a point behind where you could of theoretically have been. On the flip side. Maybe if you threw those points into the dps spec you'd have leveled faster ^_^

Ok but the grinding needing to be done to raise it none the less has to be done in healing spec right? So all the dailies and stuff need to be done in healing spec might as well do it with someone else let them tank/dps and you heal because won't that make it quicker?
Unless the healer uses his/her dps spec while rAiding why waste any artifact power on it?

[Deleted]

Aren't healers wasting artifact power if they level in dps spec? This is why for my guild we have assigned dps or tanks to level with the healers so they can stay heals while leveling and not lose artifact power.

No... You gain AP while questing in DPS spec. You can respec to healer and then spend your AP and respec back and continue questing.

[Echo of Soul]

According to this post I made in another thread there's some validity to this.

[Meagree]

Healers have finally gotten a buff to their damage to where it always should have been, but the rotations for every single healer is boring as hell (barring Disc, but that's the obvious exception) which needs to be adressed to increase people who want to have a healer spec as their main spec.

[Deleted]

They changed healing quite a bit, its not as fun anymore for most classes.

[Deja Thoris]

Ok but the grinding needing to be done to raise it none the less has to be done in healing spec right? So all the dailies and stuff need to be done in healing spec might as well do it with someone else let them tank/dps and you heal because won't that make it quicker?
Unless the healer uses his/her dps spec while rAiding why waste any artifact power on it?

Artifact power is a token that goes in your bag. You right click to "consume" it and its consumed in the spec you are currently in. So you can level as dps and when your bags are full respec to healer and use the tokens.

As to your last question. I'd assume the healer at some point will be solo (world quests or whatever). At that time he'll be thinking "gee, I wish I'd put at least a couple of points into my dps spec to make this more efficient"

[Deleted]

Personally I can't even remember the last time I pugged anything, so that's probably true. I'm also leveling as a DPS spec because Blizzard's promise of healers being able to level efficiently didn't hold water, at least for my class.

What class are you? If your avatar is an indication Id guess priest? In which case Disc is by far the most efficient, shadow is bollocks for leveling in comparison.