Healing classes comparison

[Raledon]

After a long raiding night with my guild, one of the members claimed that disco priests are currently the worst healer in the game. Disco priest being my main-alt, I rushed to its defense. In the ensuing argument, it was generally agreed upon by many of the guild members that this is the case.

I was wondering where, or according to what, who, why and whatever these claims has been made?
According to LFR (and it doesn't say much, I know) my priest is pretty competitive, and does some damage. On what base has it been thrown to the bottom of the list?

[dopefishz]

Raiding 10m with Disc/Paladin/Shaman as healers.
Disc is always #1 according to recount follwed by Paladin and Shaman.
He never complained about anything but he's a very skilled player also.

[Uvwaex]

http://www.raidbots.com/dpsbot/

If you go down to healer table, it says something very different. Maybe they're talking about lack of a hymn/tranq though? But spirit shield is great. And so is barrier.

[overclockedamd]

Worldoflogs.

[HDPriest]

If all you care about is raw HPS and/or you have a MW in the group, you may feel behind. We could use some small buffs (and Holy is getting a bit in 5.1, even if it does make the Chakra more penalizing to off-Chakra heals) but we are not weak. Derevka put it better than I could: http://talesofapriest.com/2012/11/16/keep-calm/

[Izenhart]

As of right now, good Disc priests shit on absolutely everything

[mtree21]

Disc is quite good right now. Ignore the naysayers.

[Isheria]

Not sure what people you're raiding with that make such claims but disc priests are currently the most overpowered healing spec pve wise at least.

[Heap]

Disc is amazing since the hotfix (buffed DA and rapture) tbh. It takes a lot more knowing the fight and the dmg patterns than on other classes to play it effectively though.

[emni]

I find that many people didn't really register just how much disc priests have been buffed in the recent hotfixes. They went pretty much overnight from one of the weakest speccs to pretty much the strongest one. It could be that your guild mates are simply out of date on their info.

I'd say that the weakest healer in raids right now is the druid. Their usefulness basically hinges on the fact that they have Tranquility and even then you are better off with a shaman who has both Healing Tide and Spirit Link.

[Kipling]

I've found that a mix of hotfixes and me learning some of the fights (only on LFR atm though) better thus applying better usage of Spirit Shell My healing has shot up, on one epicentre on feng yesterday I went from 3rd on the healing meters to first by a long shot =D

[CapM]

I can do 50-60k as Disc, which usually puts me in the top 3 on healing (LFR) but I still feel like I'm running out of mana before the other healers do.

[nobodysbaby]

Disc are second HPS wise after Monks atm (or beside them). If they nerf Monks Disc will be the absolute "best" healer, since they also have 1 mini raid CD + a raid CD, closely followed by shamans and paladins (who do have a clear weak spot - spread aoe healing).

I see it as Holy Priest and Druids are at the bottom atm both when it comes to healing wise and utility wise, atleast in hc raids, looking at logs and raidbots.

Perhaps the disc buff was a tad too overdone?

PS: That "Disc is so weak" was true though just a few weeks ago.

[Vashi]

Yea as others said. Discs are completely ok right now. Almost all the times outhealing other two healers in my team.

[Cattlehunter]

Disc are second HPS wise after Monks atm (or beside them).

Where are all these disc priests then, doing well in the place where we'd expect to see them doing well if this was true (ie. Garalon)? What I see is monk, monk, monk, monk, monk, monk, monk, monk, monk, monk, paladin, paladin, monk, monk, monk, monk... discs are great where there's predictable burst damage preceded by a lull; would be OP if these fights where this is the hardest part of the healing aren't so rare this tier.

Beyond those fights, it kinda sucks, and it certainly nowhere even close to near the power of a monk (or a paladin, or a shaman). It's easy to "win meters" as a disc on easy content where you're just shielding everyone and thus preventing the other healers from healing; this doesn't show real relative healing power though (unless preventing damage that way is very good for the particular encounter, anyway, which is only like ~3 fights this tier).

[flaggel]

As always druids are the worst healers, amazinggg\

[Zanthos]

Your disco priests clearly arent using spirit shell enough.

[Hanto]

I've heard disc priests are doing decent right now, but in PvP Disc/Holy priests are always a priority target because they're certainly the easiest to kill atm.

Also, when I was reading the OP I was really hoping someone was going to post a Photoshop of a priest discoing with a disco ball and such, hah.

[Dorfie]

Monk/Disc > Pally/Shaman > Druid > Holy Priest

[emni]

Where are all these disc priests then, doing well in the place where we'd expect to see them doing well if this was true (ie. Garalon)? What I see is monk, monk, monk, monk, monk, monk, monk, monk, monk, monk, paladin, paladin, monk, monk, monk, monk... discs are great where there's predictable burst damage preceded by a lull; would be OP if these fights where this is the hardest part of the healing aren't so rare this tier.

Beyond those fights, it kinda sucks, and it certainly nowhere even close to near the power of a monk (or a paladin, or a shaman). It's easy to "win meters" as a disc on easy content where you're just shielding everyone and thus preventing the other healers from healing; this doesn't show real relative healing power though (unless preventing damage that way is very good for the particular encounter, anyway, which is only like ~3 fights this tier).

Then you're not looking well enough. All heroic HoF logs are dominated by disc priests, both 10 and 25. Are you talking about normal modes? Then why the emphasis on "hard" fights? The definition of "hard" is "heroic". And disc priests are awesome there.

Normal mode Garalon logs are full of monks because a) monks are overtuned and b) not every class excels on every fight.