Will the real Holy Nova please stand up!

[Aliahna]

Does it bother anyone else that there are so many descriptions of this spell floating around? I mean how in the heck can we know whether a spell has been improved or is worthwhile or not when we don't really know how it functions or will function? Keep in mind the spellpower coefficient for Holy Nova is also small at .196.

Examples taken from this this site:

1) Description from the Skills list for the Priest link says this:

Holy Nova now costs 15% of base mana, down from 20% of base mana. Now causes 247.38 to 287.5 Holy damage (down from 398 to 462) and heal friendly targets within 10 yards for 1518.74 to 1765.02 (up from 713 to 827). Healing is divided among the number of targets healed

2) The tooltip when you scroll over the spell says this:

Holy Nova
15% of base mana
Instant cast
Requires Shadowform
Causes an explosion of holy light around the caster, causing 355 Holy damage to all enemy targets within 10 yards and healing up to 5 targets within 10 yards for 2182. Healing is divided among the number of targets healed. These effects cause no threat.

3) Under the complete skill list for Holy spells it says:

Holy Nova 62 Causes an explosion of holy light around the caster, causing 276.28 to 321.08 Holy damage to all enemy targets within 10 yards and healing friendly targets within 10 yards for 1696.14 to 1971.19. Healing is divided among the number of targets healed. These effects cause no threat.
15% of base mana, Instant cast


If it truly is going to heal for so little and have such a small range, and depreciates in value the more people in range of you, is this really worth even having except as a leveling AoE spell?

It's just gone through so many changes lately, can anyone confirm on Beta how it is functioning? I was under the impression this was going to be one of the disc priest's tools for helping with raid healing but now I'm not sure about that. Thanks.

[iLive]

1. Description is from beta fr level 85.

2. Mouseover what? Ingame or in MMOC, Wowhead etc.?

3. It doesn't say "Holy Nova 62", but other than that, it is the description for Holy Nova now in live.

[Aliahna]

2. Mouseover what? Ingame or in MMOC, Wowhead etc.?

That is the description if you mouse over the name of the spell in the priest skills list from number 1. All three again, are from this site. I tried to explain where they are found, sorry if that wasn't clear to you.

[Samic]

The numbers in the spellbook scales with your level, even abilities you can't use.
Like, I linked sacrifice to my level 80 druid friend, and the numbers were retarded on his screen.

[Aliahna]

I guess my issue is that depending on how it works (which version) this spell is completely worthless for PVE. I know, who goes around casting Nova, but frankly I am not sure where I got the impression from but I thought it might be a viable raid healing tool, at least for disc since we have so few.

But I am not sure any of those descriptions are accurate. So I'd like some help. When I look at the spell range let's take the higher amount of 1971. Assume I have 5000 spellpower. 5000 * .196 (the SPC)= 980. 1971 + 980= 2951. To that we add 6% for Twin Disciplines and you get 3,128. The way the spell is worded this amount is divided by the number of targets, up to a max of 5.

Here is a snippit from a raid the week before last on the HN spell:

[20:35:43.656] Aliahna Holy Nova Aliahna +1788
[20:35:44.062] Aliahna Holy Nova Recyclops +1147
[20:35:44.062] Aliahna Holy Nova Rivinvegen +*2602*
[20:35:44.062] Aliahna Holy Nova WolfBlitzer +1235 (O: 541)
[20:35:44.062] Aliahna Holy Nova Polaris +751 (O: 1158)

Total healing done 7523, with overheal 9222

Here's a few more casts (this is in the spider trash room leading to Sindy btw):

[20:52:59.906] Aliahna Holy Nova Aliahna +0 (O: 1446)
[20:52:59.968] Aliahna Holy Nova Kazecap +0 (O: 1437)
[20:52:59.968] Aliahna Holy Nova Blackstaffx +0 (O: 1719)
[20:52:59.968] Aliahna Holy Nova Ravensfall +0 (O: 1440)
[20:52:59.968] Aliahna Holy Nova WolfBlitzer +*0* (O: 2160)

[20:53:00.968] Aliahna Holy Nova Aliahna +*0* (O: 2227)
[20:53:01.234] Aliahna Holy Nova Osmand +*0* (O: 2221)
[20:53:01.234] Aliahna Holy Nova Sidrogue +0 (O: 1478)
[20:53:01.234] Aliahna Holy Nova Blackstaffx +*0* (O: 2682)
[20:53:01.234] Aliahna Holy Nova Cevan +*0* (O: 2226)

[20:53:02.250] Aliahna Holy Nova Aliahna +0 (O: 1439)
[20:53:02.437] Aliahna Holy Nova Osmand +0 (O: 1441)
[20:53:02.437] Aliahna Holy Nova Blackstaffx +*0* (O: 2597)
[20:53:02.437] Aliahna Holy Nova Fourdeath +*0* (O: 2142)
[20:53:02.437] Aliahna Holy Nova Kazecap +0 (O: 1443)


I can see that the total number of targets is being limited to 5, but for the life of me, I can't see how the spell numbers are calculated.

Edit: Removed the log link since it didn't save and link just the query.

Okay one thing I found is this wowwiki link: http://www.wowwiki.com/Spell_power_coefficient#Priest shows that the SPC of HN was changed to 30.35% during patch 3.2.0. EJ shows it at .196 http://elitistjerks.com/f77/t105330-...heorycrafting/. Even at 30.35 the numbers don't look right. So maybe some where along the way they changed it again?? It's almost like it would have to be a 100% or greater for any of the numbers to look right.

The only description of the three that limits HN to five targets is the tooltip #2. This stuff makes my head hurt.

---------- Post added 2010-11-03 at 02:50 PM ----------

Anyone have any ideas?

Here is a snippit from Vodka's Beta 11/1 run:

[17:53:09.229] Kyriltwo Holy Nova Kyriltwo +0 (O: 1603)
[17:53:09.501] Kyriltwo Holy Nova Achthul +0 (O: 1614)
[17:53:09.501] Kyriltwo Holy Nova Laythez +0 (O: 1597)
[17:53:09.501] Kyriltwo Holy Nova Coops +0 (O: 1597)
[17:53:09.501] Kyriltwo Holy Nova Lazyap +0 (O: 1603)

[17:53:10.157] Kyriltwo Holy Nova Kyriltwo +0 (O: 1608)
[17:53:10.281] Kyriltwo Holy Nova Achthul +0 (O: 1599)
[17:53:10.281] Kyriltwo Holy Nova Coops +*0* (O: 2394)
[17:53:10.281] Kyriltwo Holy Nova Laythez +*0* (O: 2416)
[17:53:10.281] Kyriltwo Holy Nova Lazyap +0 (O: 1600)

[17:53:11.377] Kyriltwo Holy Nova Kyriltwo +0 (O: 1575)
[17:53:11.560] Kyriltwo Holy Nova Lazyap +0 (O: 1588)
[17:53:11.560] Kyriltwo Holy Nova Laythez +0 (O: 1587)
[17:53:11.560] Kyriltwo Holy Nova Coops +0 (O: 1576)
[17:53:11.560] Kyriltwo Holy Nova Lazyap +0 (O: 1581)

Link here: http://www.worldoflogs.com/reports/k7dqd6xnd5d0stpx/#

It's interesting since the WoLs spell tooltip for HN is this one: http://www.wowhead.com/?spell=23455
But it clearly is still limiting the number of targets to 5.

[Owltoid]

I understand the nerf to holy nova output since it was changed to be raid wide. However, now that it's limited to 5 targets, why keep the output nerf? Is this a function of not wanting a strong aoe spell?