Haste vs Mastery for disc

[Mongoose19]

Ok I know this is very popular topic but still I wasn't able to find answer that would satisfy me (or rather reasoning behind it). People are divided into two camps, one say mastery is best, other haste. But I really see no reason to ever go mastery for disc. At best reforging all your haste into mastery will give you extra 2-3k absorp on PW:S and its even worse for Divine Aegis. So why people love mastery so much? I really wanna know answer to that question...

[Shathïr]

I believe mastery is really helpful if you're tank-healing, and not as much helpful while raid-healing. I play holy on my priest tho, and I recently dinged, so disc isn't my play-field =)

[Dathorize]

Most Disc Priests prefer Mastery, it's more effective than haste in most simulations (Differs for different gear).

[Blada]

I just go with spirit>mastery>=haste>>crit for the most part, and by that I reforge all crit I can to mastery, and don't reforge out of haste unless its for spirit

[Deleted]

If you had read all those popular topics (and previous threads talking about the same) you'd find out that it depends on your playstyle and there's no "right answer". But the short answer and the conclusion I made after all is that if you're not a BB (bubble bot xD) you should stack haste. And that's what I do because I think haste is better even if you are a BB.

[Deleted]

How good Mastery is as a stat for you is directly linked with how often you cast PW:S.

You are right that Mastery has a much smaller effect on the size of DA so it shouldn't be stacked for the sole benefit of increasing the shield from something like Prayer of Healing.

In 10-man especially, haste is a far better stat than mastery as it puts you in a good position to tank or raid heal at the drop of a hat, and throwing masses of shields around just isn't sustainable with less outside regen.

I would say though not to stack haste above all else. Get your self 'enough' haste to have comfortably faster GHeals and ProH while still having some crit and mastery. At the moment I'm trying to keep crit and mastery fairly even ratings wise after getting around 1500 haste rating.
More haste means more casts which is more potential crits and crits mean more DAs.

All stats tie together for us, but which stat is more effective for you is all about playstyle.
If you're using your Shield just for rapture and emergencies, then stacking mastery above haste and crit wouldn't be the best idea.

[mookspal]

I recently posted a similar question as you did but with the reverse thought. I completely reforged everything into mastery. This past weekend I reforged all my mastery into haste just to see how it compared. On the first fight (shannox) I noticed almost no difference and ended the fight at my normal 12.5-13K with no mana issues. I did noticed a large difference on Beth in terms of lose in HPS. I went from doing about 17K to 15.5K on that fight with minor mana issues (before I had no mana issues at all). This could be because the raid took less damage, but overall it felt "wrong." The rest of the fights I continued to noticed a decrease as well in HPS (except on Bal). The Bal fight clearly favored haste in terms of HPS because it is all direct healing. Many people on here will tell you something like "haste is by far the best stat for 10man's. You are stupid if you stack mastery or crit or whatever." My advise to you would be to try both styles and see what better suits your playing style. Right now, if you look at the top healing priest on the WOL they are mostly stacking mastery. Does this mean it is the best for you? No. I remember watching one of LORE's tankspot clips and him talking about how so many people get caught in a tunnel vision of I HAVE TO DO THIS. He talked about how he asked a warlock in his guild to change spec's and play styles because at the time "the other spec" was considered "better." In the end they realized that his play style suited the "so called" lessor spec and as soon as he went back his dps came back up. I think this story strongly pertains to healing style and stat values. My advise to you would be to mess around with both ways and see what suits you and your raid the best. Either way you are going to put out similar numbers. Just my thoughts.

[Aleysia]

Mastery is the way to go if you're essentially a 25m bubble bot.

For anything else, I would stack haste. PWS is a serious mana drain although it has its uses. For constant raid damage, PoH is roughly the same HPS and far, far more mana efficient. A quick shield can save someone from death of course. For tank healing, GH is more mana efficient given the increased chance to crit from talents + crits now do 200%, although again shields can be an excellent buffer. In most circumstances though, PWS will not make up the majority of your healing because of its mana cost.

Keep in mind that the way mastery works on crits/PoH is relative to Divine Aegis, not an absolute amount. By this I mean, okay so Divine Aegis does 30% in absorbs as a base amount... Now even if you stack mastery to give yourself 40% more absorbs on your tooltip, you do not get Divine Aegis procs equal to 30%+40%=70% of the heal. You get a 30%*1.4 = 42% shield.

This is why mastery is terrible unless you're mostly using PWS. The effect on Divine Aegis is very, very small, making haste the superior throughput stat.

Furthermore, if you do 10 mans where healer assignments are not as strict, you'll probably be PoHing to help with raid heals, and haste > mastery for PoH.

[Apostolic]

Mastery is the way to go if you're essentially a 25m bubble bot.

This is why mastery is terrible unless you're mostly using PWS. The effect on Divine Aegis is very, very small, making haste the superior throughput stat.

Furthermore, if you do 10 mans where healer assignments are not as strict, you'll probably be PoHing to help with raid heals, and haste > mastery for PoH.

Correct. Mastery is inefficient for 10 man when you are playing a multi-role healer (tank and raid), and when you can not stop bubble spamming to regen mana.

I do recall there were some calculations done that in something like tier 14 you can potentially have Mastery out scaling Int for Bubble Bot Spam, but then again your back to Ice Crown, single ability spam.

[zakaluka]

even asking a respected non-blizzard forum like this you will get every answer you can posibly imagine. And most people won't qualify their answers.

If you're trying to raise your HPS you have to decide WHY your HPS is low, first. Which of your spells are overhealing? Who is sniping your healing and how do THEIR healing mechanics work? Then you have to really understand what the three different secondary stats get you.

It comes down to this: haste/mastery/crit are all viable choices. Which combination you choose depends entirely on what spells you're casting most.

Mastery: very good for shield. very bad for gheal/penance unless you have extremely high crit. Weighs into PoH the same no matter how much crit you have, but still not as good for PoH as haste is.
Crit: Very bad for pw:s, extremely good for gheal/penance. Also makes what mastery you do have far more valuable for gheal/penance.
Haste: Good for everything, and almost always has a higher return on throughput per point, but at the expense of sustainability. haste is also amazing for triage. I didn't really believe that .2 seconds would make a huge difference, but it DOES. Try it - 2 second gheals are amazing.

Typical answers? To the wind. You have to understand your class to make sense of it. If you just follow community advice you won't come anywhere near living up to your potential.