1. #1

    Question Contemplating going Holy - tell me what I need to know!

    I've been playing disc religiously since partway through ICC, when our disc priest left our guild. I hated it initially but eventually it grew on me. I actually liked it so much that even during the brief time that disc's performance felt a little lackluster compared to holy, I stuck to my guns and waited it out.

    Now, ironically, I want to switch to holy at a time when disc is at it's peak! I think I'm mostly bored - it seems like disc is pretty easy to play well right now. I want a change, and a challenge (as much of a challenge as this game provides, anyway!)

    I think I understand the basics for holy, but I'm getting some conflicting information around haste, and very little around spirit.

    First, here is my armory (partially prepared for holy, but as I said I was disc so it's a mish-mash. Critique is appreciated.) http://us.battle.net/wow/en/characte...efina/advanced

    I am not sure what to do about haste. Some sources say to get 12% while others say you only need 4-5%. Secondly, spirit; as disc I ran with very little spirit, about 9k with the meta gem. How much do I need as holy? You can see by my armory that I've increased it and while I have yet to really push my mana, I am thinking I have too much? (A little over 12k)

    I currently raid in a 10 man, so that's probably important info. Basically, I want to be able to provide enough healing to make up for my lack of absorbs. I will be healing with a resto druid and sometimes a resto shaman.

    Advice?

    - - - Updated - - -

    I should also mention that I am considering changing my gems (which are mostly crit) but I'm waiting to find out from you good people if I need to? I see a lot of holy priests are also stacking crit?

  2. #2
    For gemming crit is probably the worst stat for holy. You want to aim for mastery int or int spirit depending on the socket bonus.
    For haste since you are running a in a 10 man guild you probably want 12% which will give you an extra tick on renew (in 10 mans for most fights you will be running cascade which refreshes your renew and with the extra tick its very nice continuous healing).
    Spirit is a much personal stat compared to the other 2. Honestly you just have to play around with holy for a bit to see how much mana regen you are comfortable with. It depends a lot on your other healers and how you handle healing certain fights but with your gear I dont think that should be a big problem if your druid and shaman are competent.
    Also just looking at your glyphs I would change out glyph of circle of healing for maybe glyph of prom or inner focus. The extra mana cost generally wont be that effective in 10 man especially with a druid. (but again thats just up to preference and how your other healer is doing)

  3. #3
    Stick with Disc, way more fun and useful to the raid group. Giving up 50-80K DPS is a huge hit, not to mention all your utility and mobility.

  4. #4
    Quote Originally Posted by schwank05 View Post
    Stick with Disc, way more fun and useful to the raid group. Giving up 50-80K DPS is a huge hit, not to mention all your utility and mobility.
    Um, what? Did you read my post? lol

    I'm bored with disc and want to try something else. My guild is fine with it, we're not that hardcore and I'm sure I'll still be valuable as holy.

    - - - Updated - - -

    Quote Originally Posted by Xraychicken View Post
    For gemming crit is probably the worst stat for holy. You want to aim for mastery int or int spirit depending on the socket bonus.
    For haste since you are running a in a 10 man guild you probably want 12% which will give you an extra tick on renew (in 10 mans for most fights you will be running cascade which refreshes your renew and with the extra tick its very nice continuous healing).
    Spirit is a much personal stat compared to the other 2. Honestly you just have to play around with holy for a bit to see how much mana regen you are comfortable with. It depends a lot on your other healers and how you handle healing certain fights but with your gear I dont think that should be a big problem if your druid and shaman are competent.
    Also just looking at your glyphs I would change out glyph of circle of healing for maybe glyph of prom or inner focus. The extra mana cost generally wont be that effective in 10 man especially with a druid. (but again thats just up to preference and how your other healer is doing)
    Thank you! I was confused about the crit - so many variations out there! I can re-gem.

    I appreciate the info about renew as well, I was wondering about that. Does that mean renew is better in 10s only? What are people doing in 25s?

    Both the other healers are very competent so I imagine I can probably drop some of my spirit for mastery.

    I will change that glyph as well. I think I just picked it because I was excited about using coh again It's been a very long time!

  5. #5
    Generally renew is only better in 10 mans. In 10 mans you are usually in Chakra: Serenity and cascade is better on almost every fight in siege 10 so you are able to abuse the fact that cascade refreshes renew plus blanket renewing is actually possible in a 10 man unlike 25. In 25 man you can run Halo and have it be extremely mana efficient and blanket renews are impossible so cascade becomes pretty worthless. Also you will be in Chakra: Sanctuary for basically any 25 man fight you are on so that makes renew even worse in 25s.
    If you ever do switch to 25s the 12% haste can still be usefull but if you really want to min/max I would just reforge it to mastery or spirit.

  6. #6
    Quote Originally Posted by Xraychicken View Post
    Generally renew is only better in 10 mans. In 10 mans you are usually in Chakra: Serenity and cascade is better on almost every fight in siege 10 so you are able to abuse the fact that cascade refreshes renew plus blanket renewing is actually possible in a 10 man unlike 25. In 25 man you can run Halo and have it be extremely mana efficient and blanket renews are impossible so cascade becomes pretty worthless. Also you will be in Chakra: Sanctuary for basically any 25 man fight you are on so that makes renew even worse in 25s.
    If you ever do switch to 25s the 12% haste can still be usefull but if you really want to min/max I would just reforge it to mastery or spirit.
    Thanks for the help

  7. #7
    You should check out my guide in my signature.

    Crit also is no longer the worst stat - if you have PPOP it's actually really good as holy alongside a bunch of mastery. I run 10k spirit and basically my same super crit gear that I have to use for disc as holy and it puts out really good numbers.
    Pixl Returned! Holy Priest

  8. #8
    Quote Originally Posted by Mazi View Post
    You should check out my guide in my signature.

    Crit also is no longer the worst stat - if you have PPOP it's actually really good as holy alongside a bunch of mastery. I run 10k spirit and basically my same super crit gear that I have to use for disc as holy and it puts out really good numbers.
    I like this - means I don't have to regem

  9. #9
    Quote Originally Posted by schwank05 View Post
    Stick with Disc, way more fun and useful to the raid group. Giving up 50-80K DPS is a huge hit, not to mention all your utility and mobility.
    More useful to the group? Deffo

    More fun? You had me laughing.

  10. #10
    Bloodsail Admiral nobodysbaby's Avatar
    15+ Year Old Account
    Join Date
    Feb 2009
    Location
    Sweden
    Posts
    1,055
    Quote Originally Posted by Mazi View Post
    You should check out my guide in my signature.

    Crit also is no longer the worst stat - if you have PPOP it's actually really good as holy alongside a bunch of mastery. I run 10k spirit and basically my same super crit gear that I have to use for disc as holy and it puts out really good numbers.
    I agree with Crit being a good stat for Holy, even tho I prefer Haste much for the fun of it I sometimes forget switching my Disc gear to Holy as I respecc and I got higher numbers with 9k spirit and 15k Crit (rest Mastery) on Malkorok 25hc for example. As a note I run with 13-14k spirit usually as Holy and Mastery/Haste balanced stats.

  11. #11
    I been messing around with crit with holy lately. I think balanced is the way to go. I like equal crit and mastery with about 14k spirit. If we run less healers I will go up to 19k spirit. I have solo healed 14m flex with this build on many bosses.

  12. #12
    The only thing I'm noticing is that I feel like there's a lot of downtime?

    What do you do when there's not a lot of healing to be done? (Spoken like a true disc priest who simply smites when there's downtime!)

  13. #13
    Quote Originally Posted by Fefina View Post
    The only thing I'm noticing is that I feel like there's a lot of downtime?

    What do you do when there's not a lot of healing to be done? (Spoken like a true disc priest who simply smites when there's downtime!)
    Yep, there is. And Holy's mana pool can't really afford to just keep spamming during these low/no damage times. Which is part of why Holy ranks a bit lower on meters in general - terrible sniping.
    Pixl Returned! Holy Priest

  14. #14
    Quote Originally Posted by Mazi View Post
    Yep, there is. And Holy's mana pool can't really afford to just keep spamming during these low/no damage times. Which is part of why Holy ranks a bit lower on meters in general - terrible sniping.
    Yea, I definitely noticed a difference in our raid last night. I expected to have lower numbers but they were much lower than before - that being said we didn't have any trouble.

    Thanks. I'll keep trying

  15. #15
    Deleted
    Holy is good fun, i would keep most crit reforges / gems from disc spec as holy.
    Im Crit oriented with my Holy (main) spec running with 4726 haste for the extra renew tick (glyphed)

    PLay with your spirit, you will notice you need it more than you do as disc.
    Im doing 10mans, and if i dont pay to much attention to what im doing i will oom very easily mid fight with 18k spirit.
    you need to keep an eye out on your manabar alot more than you used to as disc.

    I didnt regret going holy since MoP and i was a Disc Fanatic since WotLK.

    Use FDCL with 2 set and Divine Insight is peechy.

  16. #16
    Quote Originally Posted by DerrHans View Post
    Holy is good fun, i would keep most crit reforges / gems from disc spec as holy.
    Im Crit oriented with my Holy (main) spec running with 4726 haste for the extra renew tick (glyphed)

    PLay with your spirit, you will notice you need it more than you do as disc.
    Im doing 10mans, and if i dont pay to much attention to what im doing i will oom very easily mid fight with 18k spirit.
    you need to keep an eye out on your manabar alot more than you used to as disc.

    I didnt regret going holy since MoP and i was a Disc Fanatic since WotLK.

    Use FDCL with 2 set and Divine Insight is peechy.
    Yea I have to use mindbender on cd but I can get by with about 12k I think. Maybe less with practice. I was reading a thread (which Mazi was in actually) that mentioned that crit was actually pretty good for holy too - seems like I want a close-ish balance between mastery and crit with various levels of haste depending on whether it's 10 or 25 man.

    I was disc last night for our heroic immerseus attempts but I am hoping to switch to holy - just not really "feeling" disc anymore.

  17. #17
    Get the set - the bonus is amazing and SPIRIT SPIRIT SPIRIT

  18. #18
    Quote Originally Posted by YashaK View Post
    Get the set - the bonus is amazing and SPIRIT SPIRIT SPIRIT
    I have the set, and I am hoping not to rely too much on spirit - if I can get away with as little as I'm comfortable with, I'll be happy. Those points are better spent in mastery, haste and crit.

    The set is pretty huge though. And having the meta gem makes things so much easier.

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •