Shaman = best raid healer now?

[DoubleA]

Seriously, if you are a bad healer, you need to have a class that's easy and a job that's easy.
FoL-Spam, CH-Spam, CoH-Spam, LB-Spam

[Ogemaniac]

Priests and shamans dominate in end-game. The reason is that they scale far better than druids and paladins.

By the time druids and paladins finish Kara and fill up the gaps on badge purples, they pretty much have all the mana they will every need to use whatever spell they want, whenever they want. From that point on, THEY NO LONGER BENEFIT FROM MORE MANA (mp5, spirit, static mana from int, pally's mana savings from crit, etc). When a pally or druid gets a new peice of gear, all that really matters is the bigger +heal.

On the other hand, shamans and priests have big, costly, effective spells that they can continue to dump even more and more mana into all the way to endgame. Hence, when a shaman or priest gets a new peice of gear, they not only benefit from the +heal, but also all of the mana-generating stats as well. Hence, they gain more from equivalent upgrades.

So not only do shamans have the best scaling from healing gear, they also have the BEST BUFFS. This is completely wrong on Blizzard's part. When it comes to dps classes, there is a sensible balance between class/specs with good buffs (say, a shadow priest) and classes with good dps (eg, a rogue). For the most part, hybrids have good buffs but weaker dps, "pure" classes have the best dps but fewer buffs. When it comes to healing classes, things are totally out of whack. Shamans have the BEST heals and the BEST buffs. Hence, everyone stacks them.

[greenmasheen]

this is true to an extent... when i played/healed on wow in raids w/ a druid, i would help out on the tanks and those taking dmg by spamming regrowth *usually lower ranks* but i would also spam with the highest rank. i took a lot of healing threat because i would be chain casting it on top of all my HoT spells... rarely did i ever have threat issues though.

i would hope that druid healers use regrowth even more now that the healing efficiency on it has been increased... the fact that it crits so often and has an additional HoT effect makes it a nice spell to use when not spamming rejuv and lifebloom.

[lothos]

I play a resto shammy and I personally dont think shamans are the best raid healers. I prefer the druids since they really dont need to stop and cast. A good resto shaman can keep constant heals on MT's while also healing up the raid w/ other hots. However, all healers need to work together to increase the effectiveness of everyone. Each has their role. My guild usual runs w/ 1 resto druid, 1 shaman, 2 pallies, 2 priest for heals. A 7th healer varies. The pallies usually watch tanks w/ the druid has he HoTs general raid in process. Shaman chain bounces CH around the entire raid. Priests watch everything, healing up tanks and bouncing mendings throughout DPS.

So i wouldn't say 1 is THE best. Depends on fight and their role.

[Diesel_rat]

Shaman can top meter because their heals are instant. With druid the heals take a few seconds to work but they are probably much more efficient then the shaman. The only healer that has ever outhealed me in a raid is a shaman, Im usualy about 4 times more healing than any other healer.

4 times....ye right . Say u got ~7 healers in ur 25. Then you wold do ~30-35% , shammy above u, ~35-40% and the rest~5-8% Healing done. Its fun how people sometimes just throw out numbers :. I could be wrong, early in the morning :-*

[musso]

Quote from: colonyafer on June 04, 2008, 02:56:30 PM
Shaman can top meter because their heals are instant. With druid the heals take a few seconds to work but they are probably much more efficient then the shaman. The only healer that has ever outhealed me in a raid is a shaman, Im usualy about 4 times more healing than any other healer.

Sorry to break the news to you but your healers must really suck if they're at the same pace as you are gear/raid-wise.

Get better healers.

As for shamans being the best raid healers, they deffinately do come up high on top. They were designed for that roll - being raid healing. They wouldn't be as efficient healing the MT as they would be at raid healing. I play a shaman, 2.3k bonus healing, and with the 5% increase on chain heal from the 4 set bonus from t6, raid healing is deffinately what you want the main roll of a shaman to be.

[Pointyfern]

Shamans are Raid Healers. Probably the best (Unless the Priests are good). Truthfully, all Shamans should only be casting Chain Heals, basically ever. Thats what their made for, like pallies are made for spamming Flash of Light.

So yes, either them or Priests. Circle of Healing can be very, very amazing. Especially since it works on the run. But yes, raid for them.

On my time as holy pally I've never ever been able to top the heal meters.

Exactly - As a Pally, never look at the healing meters. It took me a while to learn it but our specialty is single target healing, and as long as our targets don't die you did your job. If you're topping the meters as a pally, the other healers are failing (For the most part).



Well ya, I could post a lot about how much some people don't understand healing - Especially the ones you can tell haven't healed a thing in their WoW career.

But I won't, so take care.

[Loliiten]

Yes, they are the best.

However, I`m a bit concerned about raid spots for shamans in WOTLK, with totems effecting the whole raid from now on.. On the other hand it will be insanely OP to have many of them, Mana Tides for the whole raid? o.0

Play prot warrior and elemental shaman myself, so don`t really care, but some thoughts on this would be nice

[Cyclonian]

whoops yeah...

holy nova: lots of mana, short range, no aggro, low damage and low healing .... was fun on vael fights tho.

I take u are a priest since u clearly whine about priest alot!
A good priest can easliy Out heal a resto shamy on the healing meter and so can a druid. If you know what your doing and have the gear for it you should top the healing. And chain heals are useful in most of boss fights on some boss fight chain heals is pretty useless cause u stand too much spread out and it only effects 1-2 targets. So no shamy arent "The best" but they are among the best Its still druid , priest and then shaman.

[Macalister]

Shamans are by far the best raid healing class, the priest can do well but are not nearly as efficient as the shaman is nor do they give as huge a buff to the raid and thats all there is to it.
Paladins havent been a very great healer since the patch after the illumination nerf as thats when they buffed the other healing classes.
Dont get me wrong they can still dish out alot of healing but they should not be even remotely close to topping any healing meters past Black Temple.

And as far as totems affecting the whole raid will go, it will not pass, thats just not going to happen unless they change how they work currently.

PS. Any paladin still spamming FoL today thinking its effective and great, you should just throw in the towel and quit because its been shit for sooo long now.

[gingilica]

ofc it all comes down to class knowledge and skills but .... on equal geared toons the priest will have no problem outhealing any class ... i have been playing holy priest for almost 3yrs now [not even a second i have been shadow, tho i am sometimes discipline] and have competed against all classes

it is indeed very fight dependant also but it all comes down to the player behind ... watching meters and looking at overheals [ppl think overheal is overrated as long as u have mana but ....overheal means ur heal landed on a target when it wasn`t needed being either too late or too early... so it`s not a mana problem, it`s an efficiency one]

in my book it goes like 20%-40% OH for priests/druids..30%-50% OH for pallies and 40%-60% OH for shammies there for i can set out something like :

priest 10.0
druid 9.7
shammy 9.2
paly 8.5

coming to raid healing a CoH priest will always outheal a shammy [if he doesn`t has other task such as MT/s]... he has an instant cast spell delayed only by GCD which also allows him to move freely as he keeps healing ..he can pull out alot of raid healing in a very short time [just look at illidan P2 and u`ll see what a CoH spamming priest means] ... and if u think spamming CoH means oom in less than 60s means the priest stiill needs to learn about his class

healing the MT is without a doubt the priests favorite choice and the situation he excels at .. having at his disposal all the healing types available [instant, HoTs, fast heals, heavy heals] and the PW:S makes the priest the best choice for tank healing [ofc always assisted by other healers ...can`t run at brutallus with just 2 priests healing MTs] ... as i have said skill and experience makes a healer [for that matter any class] not the gear ... knowing what precasting means [i think i`m right when i say 75% of the healers still have to learn how that works], knowing how/when to downrank heals, having a heal "on the pipe" 95% of the time, but most important is intuition, being able to predict upcoming dmg and react accordingly ... and this is a skill u can`t learn from any forum or any guide. .. it comes with time and practice

... and yeah i also run a resto shammy and a resto druid ...no pally yet :P

[BadTime]

the bigest mistake ya makin now, is judging classes by metters. look at em like at tools. then compare it.

[haZmlokmagerogue]

I think i remember seeing an article about the first kill of a boss... composition revealed 4 shamans all resto in t6. Yeah they are up there, mana tide totem ftw.

[bbr]

Chain heal is quite powerful yes.
We go with at least 5 shamans whenever we can.

[Salkara]

1) It's fight dependent
2) It's Play style dependent
3) It's skill dependent

Bunch of terribles in this thread aren't getting this guy's point. Your raid role can be broken down into either multiple-target or single-target, whether you dps, heal, or tank. T6 glaive rogues have amazing single-target dps, but you wouldn't set one up in an aoe dps role (if you would, then you wouldn't have t6 or glaives). The same goes for healers. A shaman will *never* be a better single-target (read: tank) healer than an equally geared healing class (assuming we're dealing with competent, non-retarded people here). That said, a smart paladin or druid will never be a better aoe (read: raid) healer than an equally geared shaman or coh priest. Now, let's go over these points people are ignoring:

1) It's fight dependent - If a fight involves massive raid-wide damage, you sure can bet that the shaman and priests will be topping the healing charts. Don't tell me that "healing charts aren't what healing is about." Of course they aren't, but while they aren't proof of skill or class superiority, they do tell you how a player or class is performing on a fight. If you've got a tank healer on top of the healing charts for a fight with lots of raid damage (i.e. Brutallus, Bloodboil, etc), you might want to go over your WWS and make sure that the healer was focusing on the tanks and not the raid. Also, you need to take into account your strategy for the fight. For example, on Kalecgos my guild has players stack in the middle of the dragon realm after leaving the demon realm and move out of the stack ~10s before the Spectral Exhaustion debuff fades. This is great for chain. Other guilds have players spread out dragon-side, and that is not great for chain heal. It's the same fight, but different strategies (both which work well) will have different healing classes at the top.

2) It's Play style dependent - This isn't totally right. Having your own play style is great, but in the end we're all trying to maximize our utility. A shaman whose play style involves lots of lesser healing waves should get gkick'ed by any guild that's even semi-serious about progression (they should probably also reroll as a holydin). It's called 'min-maxing.' You minimize your weaknesses and maximize your strengths. Shaman are weak single-target healers and amazing raid healers.

3) It's skill dependent - Can't emphasize this one enough. MLK had a dream that we were all created equal, but he was wrong. Try getting the 22-year-old kid still in high school sped classes to do open heart surgery, and you'll know what I mean. This game isn't all about twitch skill though. Knowledge of classes, abilities, and other game mechanics make a large portion of WoW "skill."

As to the Shaman vs. Priest debate, it's another on of those 'it depends' cases. If the raid spreads out, it's better for the CoH priest. If the raid bunches up, it's better for the shaman. If strategy is taken out of the picture, I have to give a nod to whoever gets a shadow priest in their group. In high-end content, being grouped with a spriest generally means you can focus on healing and not worry about your mana bar, and you can also stack spell haste. If you have the effective regen for it, spell haste increases your healing output amazingly fast.

So, the point of all this? No one healer is the "best" healer. We all have our roles and uses, and it's not your class which decides if you'll be doing more healing than another class on a particular fight.

[Salkara] casts [Wall of Text]
[Wall of Text] hits [You] for 9000 (Critical)

[Ethanlien]

Topic: Shaman = best raid healer now?

I don't get this "now" bit. has there been some recent change? (dont play shaman)

[Esra]

Re: Shaman = best raid healer now?

yes

[xano880]

Actually I find that shamans healing isn't that much better then a Holy Priests at least, though they are far more efficient. The major advantage that Shamans enjoy over holy priests and for raiding is their buffs.

Holy priests (the ones with COH mind you) bring zero buffs that a shadow priest cannot also give, and with Vampiric Touch the shadow priest becomes more important to a raid than a holy priest (assuming of course your raid isnt hurting for healers).

Shamans get heroism/Bloodlust, totems (which you can tailor to your individual group to maximize effectiveness), and a self rez. Oh and a resto shaman has mana tide (which doesnt suck anymore like it used to back in the pre- TBC days) so he can not only keep his mana up, but his groups as well.

So, in conclusion, after looking at this, as far as Holy priest vs. Resto shaman, is there really even a choice? If a raid has enough resto shamans a holy priest isnt needed, and the shamans increase the raids dps as well as excellent healing.

Im a holy Priest BTW, I figure this is our pennance for being the best healers for raids (Horde side at least) before TBC came out. (Note good resto druids were also excellent healers before TBC came out, but on Horde side only one class could dispel magic at that time, hence Priests were taken in mass to raid dungeons)

by your logic, so do enh and ele shamans bring heroism/Bloodlust, totems and self rez ...tbh there aint such thing as a best healer,there is only a healer that is best suited for some situation more than other.

[Phoulmouth]

sooo.... do you pose a question here? the thread title lets me guess so.
or do you just state it?
shamen probably are the best raid healers thats right. but not bringing any of the other healing classes still would be madness.

Explain yourself?

I have done successful hyjal clears without resto druids so HoTs aren't exactly that important. Single target heals? Shamans got that covered with ancestral healing and healing way. Raid healing? There is no more mana efficient raid heal then chain heal. Plus the content in tier 6 seems to be more based on doing damage to the enitre raid then it is to individuals, thus making raid healing more important then ever. Every single party in your raid having there own totems, heroism, mana tide.....

I wish I had enough resto shamans in my guild I would actually love to try it TBH.

[Heliosuk]

i would say that shamans priests and druids are all on par on healing - but again each class is suited to there best role.

A priest can use CoH to heal everyone causing a shamans heal to over heal. this would then cause them to go OOM very quickly. A druid can Hot the same people depending on the amount of haste and what type of rotation they are using on keeping up tanks burn healers.