Holy in 5.4, still 0.6%

[Deleted]

I would take Holy on Norushen over disc any day of the week, feels much safer with healing on demand rather than having to rely on inconsistent absorbs and a tough time getting the group back up.

Yeah Holy has been above and beyond every other spec on fights with constant aoe damage this whole expansion: I used to run as holy on Garalon, Tsulong and Garajal aswell, topping the meters without any effort.
But the number of fights where holy>disc is so low and the stat priority is so different that you will hardly see a priest switching from one to the other spec based on the fight.... Unless you're a finnish guy running for a world first :V

[laplacedemon]

So what your saying is a lot of people get out of raid and respec Disc or shadow before they log out?

What ever, holy is fine, shaman is fine, druid is fine, we are all fine. Keep on trucking and never want for anything. Got it!

You never 'want' anything though. You just complain about everything.

And no, what I'm saying is; a lot of the healer priests play both specs. Yet if I logout after a disc fight, I'm suddenly a disc priest... That's not accurate anyway.

You can't just look at the numbers and go "Only 4.21% of the healers on 10m heroics are playing holy, that means it's bad". They don't mean much. If you look at 25hcs on raidbots you can see holy paladins are the second most common healers after shamans. Do you think holy paladins are better than druids, disc/holy priests and monks? Yet they are more popular.

People -who aren't in top guilds or are really concerned for their performance, don't change their habits too easily. Some people haven't played holy in years even, because except for a few fights either it was worse or the difference was negligible. Why would they suddenly switch to holy? If you can kill the boss with the spec you've been playing for years, you might as well play that one instead of the more useful one (and first 8 heroics don't exactly require perfect game play anyway). You won't see a sudden increase in holy numbers during an expansion, it's only possible after a big overhaul.

And like I said, 10s don't even have much room for healers. You usually have 3 healers in your roster (some fights are even 2 healed) and some healer alts. Besides things like if you need extra dps, damage patterns, raid cooldowns and what not, what the other healer/healers are becomes a bigger issue. It doesn't matter if you have the best toolkit ever if you can't use it all, because you're 3 healing and some of the tools you have are overlapping with others'. I wouldn't want to go holy with a druid and a resto shaman for example...

That's why I don't think who plays what percentages aren't as important as you think. People talking about what they think holy is lacking on this thread is much more valuable than your "Numbers are in, sky is falling!"...

[nobodysbaby]

For every new raid the % of priest that goes holy is high. But then, as you hit heroic progression, gear scaling and mby just realizing disc is simply more valuable, the numbers go back to favor disc heavily. This pattern makes me pretty sure many disc would like to play holy more, wich is why the devs should not ignore the issue time and time again.

[Noradin]

They go back to disc because when you already 'overgear' you can play disc lazy and snipe in the meters when it doesn't matter anymore anyway.

[Kildragon]

The only reason disc is so strong is that absorbs > every heal. If disc did not exist or was just the absolute worst spec due to some massive nerfs, I can guarantee you that holy would not only be fine, it would excel. The healing througput is obviously there and the utility is as well.

Discs are simply the best complementary healers since they essentially increase your hp. Which really just means that the problem lies with disc, not holy. It also means that holy is more than viable as jhaz has proven.

- - - Updated - - -

Also, as people have been saying the whole time, why do you guys focus on over healing so much? If you're overhealing a lot, you either don't need the extra healing in which case it doesn't matter what spec you play, or you're just getting sniped. If you're getting sniped the whole time you still don't need the extra heals. If you're getting sniped during low damage phases, who gives a fuck as long as you can keep the raid alive during heavy healing.

Oh and also nice logic reversal in this thread. Usually it's if you're not in a progression guild who cares what you play. Now that people are using jhaz as an example it's suddenly the progression guilds that don't matter, it's all about your average guild. If jhaz can heal as holy for 9/14 fights then an average guild being unable to kill bosses due to lack of healing from the holy priest means the priest just isn't good. Not to mention that holy excels during fights where lack of healing is the issue due to all of that overhealing being useful.

[Music]

I've played Holy for 11/14 H so far, and I don't feel that I've held back or hindered the raid in any way. We have a disc priest in raid as well, which is actually what caused me to go holy originally last tier (rapture was a bitch).

Sure there are fights where I'm low, but there are fights like that for every healing spec. Most of the time I can keep up with the other healers, though. I don't really see why there's so much complaining going on in this thread.

Also, on the topic of the .6% thing, just because a spec is "underplayed" (I don't really trust the statistics from that site) doesn't mean it's a bad spec. If you'll notice arms warriors are .3%, but they can pull extremely competitive numbers. Just noticed I'm not even listed on that site, so I'm almost positive the numbers will be inaccurate; who knows how many other people aren't showing up.

[willemh]

If you're overhealing a lot, you either don't need the extra healing in which case it doesn't matter what spec you play, or you're just getting sniped. If you're getting sniped the whole time you still don't need the extra heals. If you're getting sniped during low damage phases, who gives a fuck as long as you can keep the raid alive during heavy healing.

This is so true. It doesnt matter if you overheal allot, because as soon as the damage gets dangerous that overhealing will stop being overhealing and save lives. It doesnt matter if you get sniped allot, because as soon as the damage gets dangerous that sniped healing will stop being sniped and save lives. People just really have a hard time understanding that healing meters say absolutely nothing. 'Sniping' and 'overhealing' are both completely irrelevant on fights that are hard enough to push healers to their limits. If the fights arnt hard enough or you take too many healers to push healers to their limits, then who cares who tops the healing meter at the end of the fight? Its completely, 100%, irrelevant.

A smart raid leader doesn't just look at meters, he doesnt congratulate his warlocks for doing sick dps on sha of pride when all they did was aoe reflections like mad. He doesnt congratulate his disc priest for sick healing when all that priest did was snipe the heals from other healers. He doesnt blame an arcane mage for doing lower dps then the warlocks on sha of pride because the mage only focussed on the boss itself and big adds and ignored the reflections. He doesnt blame the holy priest because he knows that if the shit hitted the fan that holy priest would have been there to save the day. That is the reason he choose to take an extra healer in the first place, to keep the healing steady, even if something doesnt go exactly like planned.

[Dierdre]

If you're overhealing a lot, you either don't need the extra healing in which case it doesn't matter what spec you play, or you're just getting sniped. If you're getting sniped the whole time you still don't need the extra heals. If you're getting sniped during low damage phases, who gives a fuck as long as you can keep the raid alive during heavy healing.

Requesting sticky.

[Deleted]

Actually getting sniped _can_ be - in the end - less healing. Imagine a disc pre-empting incoming damage in a challenging fight. During this time, the disc is using mana, AND regenning it. Meanwhile a holy priest might be waiting for the damage with full mana bar, which is the absolute worst situation. To do the most amount of healing possible you need to be constantly healing AND regenerating mana from the earliest point possible.

You can't win by starting the healing game after your super-awesome Disc priest is low on mana and cries for mana cooldowns. Thats just bad planning. This is the situation where sniping and hauling all the healing (or bubbling to be more specific) is actually harmful to the overall healing performance.

Good luck telling the disc priest to "ignore healing done meters and save mana". I understand that this isn't blizzards design fault, but the players. I just wanted to point this out.

[Arayaa]

And what are the variables scewing up the top 100 Holy logs then? Cause I dont hink many of them are with a Disc in the raid "scewing things up" for them?

Not to say that you are wrong in saying disc is better, but holy performs worse on "top 100" logs because no one is playing the spec. On some fights, there are up to 3x as many disc logs as holy logs, so it is easier to reach the top 100 as a holy priest, which in return lowers their rankings here. That said though, priests aren't idiots. They are playing disc because it's better. The gap may not be so large as it appears on a "top 100" raidbots ranking though.

[nobodysbaby]

I want to ask you; Just how fun is it in the long run to get sniped, look "worse than you are" on meters (except the overhealing done ofc), even if you can shine when underhealing content...? And how many get to seriously underheal content and make full use of a Holy Priest abilitys and enjoy that?

Don't pretend RL/others don't judge by the meters and understand all of this, cause healers do very much get judged by effective healing done, and not "potential" healing.

[Kalmah]

Good luck telling the disc priest to "ignore healing done meters and save mana". I understand that this isn't blizzards design fault, but the players. I just wanted to point this out.

That should be standard regardless of spec, oom healers are worthless healers. Going all out at the start when it doesn't matter only to end up oom before the end of the fight is stupid. I don't see how Blizzard's design comes into this.

[nobodysbaby]

Not to say that you are wrong in saying disc is better, but holy performs worse on "top 100" logs because no one is playing the spec. On some fights, there are up to 3x as many disc logs as holy logs, so it is easier to reach the top 100 as a holy priest, which in return lowers their rankings here. That said though, priests aren't idiots. They are playing disc because it's better. The gap may not be so large as it appears on a "top 100" raidbots ranking though.

You have a strong point and I am aware of this. But saying those 100 top Holy are worse than the top 100 Disc... hm.. Idk if I will buy that tho. Not on many fights atleast, only those who are VERY underrepresented by Holy and that's surprisingly not that many compared to t15.

[Dierdre]

Actually getting sniped _can_ be - in the end - less healing. Imagine a disc pre-empting incoming damage in a challenging fight. During this time, the disc is using mana, AND regenning it. Meanwhile a holy priest might be waiting for the damage with full mana bar, which is the absolute worst situation. To do the most amount of healing possible you need to be constantly healing AND regenerating mana from the earliest point possible.

You can't win by starting the healing game after your super-awesome Disc priest is low on mana and cries for mana cooldowns. Thats just bad planning. This is the situation where sniping and hauling all the healing (or bubbling to be more specific) is actually harmful to the overall healing performance.

Good luck telling the disc priest to "ignore healing done meters and save mana". I understand that this isn't blizzards design fault, but the players. I just wanted to point this out.

LOL @ ""Disc priest is low on mana". Weakest argument ever. If the disc priest, for whatever most unlikely reason, went OOM, it would be utter badness on his gameplay, not that holy is "weaker". Face it, the only healing meter that matters is 0 Deaths, and holy is a very strong spec on that meter. If you're in it for the big numbers, go DPS; healing just doesn't work that way.

[Keikenbe1201]

Sad to see, miss the ICC days of Holy.

[Dierdre]

Don't pretend RL/others don't judge by the meters and understand all of this, cause healers do very much get judged by effective healing done, and not "potential" healing.

That's why healers should be educated, so they can explain RLs that healing just doesn't work that way. It's as stupid as judging a healer's performance by using mana regen or debuff uptime meters.

If your RL doesn't understand the interactions between absorb and raw output healers, then your problem isn't your spec, it's your RL.

E.g. We usually run holy pally / disc priest / resto druid, not because disc is "better", but because if our priest went holy the raw output from her and our rdruid would most likely result in overhealing and boredom. Whenever I have to sub as disc because our resto druid can't make it, our other priest goes holy, because the interaction between 3 absorb-based healing specs just isn't as strong.

[Deleted]

If the disc priest, for whatever most unlikely reason, went OOM, it would be utter badness on his gameplay, not that holy is "weaker".

If disc cannot go oom then he has too much mana regen. Duh.

[Charo]

The way I see it, if I am healing with my raid, which uses a resto shaman and resto druid and a monk heal/dps 3rd healer, if I have to fill in on my priest with any combination of those, yeah, sometimes I'll have the weakest numbers, especially if there isn't a lot of raid damage going out, but I'm still keeping renews on people, using my AoE heals when needed, sniping heals with Flash Heal (FDCL procs!), and doing as much as I can, all the while keeping a full mana bar, so if shit hits the fan, guess who can handle it when the other two healers are OOM or dead? We're fine.

[nobodysbaby]

That's why healers should be educated, so they can explain RLs that healing just doesn't work that way. It's as stupid as judging a healer's performance by using mana regen or debuff uptime meters.

Or, healing/absorbs should be redesigned so that absorbs wont always "come first" in healing done, making others look "worse than they are" etc. Or maybe we need to cut back on absorbs? Do you really think we should educate every raider about how healing and absorbs works? And tell them "Holy (and others ofc) DO have powers, but it mostly goes to overhealing, so they are good even if it doesn't look that way"...?

Would like you to answer my first sentence to: "I want to ask you; Just how fun is it in the long run to get sniped, look "worse than you are" on meters (except the overhealing done ofc), even if you can shine when underhealing content...? And how many get to seriously underheal content and make full use of a Holy Priest abilitys and enjoy that?" (besides Jahzrun..) I don't think it's fun to heal a LFR beside a Disc either, so difficulty don't really matter here.

Perhaps it's not very fair to "go first" with absorbs, with low overhealing, while Holy get sniped, doing very high overhealing?

I'm talking from a 25m hc perspective, perhaps Holy is doing better in 10's (or "look better on the meters").

My RL understands healing very well. Our Disc is doing amazing and is pretty much 20-30%+ ahead of everybody on pretty much every heroic fight, so another issue could also be; Would you ever bench a Disc with a normal healing setup this raid looking good on the meters (and doing damage, and have absorbs wich IS an advantage in many cases)? Probably not, no. Would you look at Overhealing done and think "wow, this Hpriest got potential, let's go with less healers next time"?

And maybe we're doing it wrong healing heroics with 6 healers, but boy, I understand it feels a lot safer than going with 4 or 5 many times. Idk. I do feel it's wrong and healing needs adjustment imo, especially absorbs and smartheals did go nuts lately. IMO.

[laplacedemon]

Or, healing/absorbs should be redesigned so that absorbs wont always "come first" in healing done, making others look "worse than they are" etc.

If they did that, we'll be just looking at things like ground effects and instant smart heals and say "Maybe they should have some drawbacks", because whatever casted heals we have will get sniped too. If you think about it, HoTs aren't exactly innocent either; they are prone to being sniped and overheal, yet they continue ticking so they do snipe too. I don't think one button wonders like HTT, D-Hymn and Tranq are the best way of promoting good play either.

What's left after that isn't much though. You can't really have a balanced hps and no sniping in this current healing model, what we have can't be improved too much without really big changes. I mean, we're at a point where Blizzard had to change how abilities work because there were so many heals going on at the same time, they were causing input lag. How can you not get sniped...