Originally Posted by
ChromWolf
Attempting to actually contribute rather than just quote someone and say the obligatory "^this/agree" response, the bolded section is just inescapably true.
@Luchiano - My apologies that this has sorta turned into a flamefest against you, it's kinda not cool with the big moderator post that just went up not that long ago >.> That said, saying "no one gems haste" is wholly generalistic, and plain incorrect.
daphoosa mentions "Any holy pally trying to be good can hit 700+ haste while only gemming int, it's not hard". I only make it into 10-mans thus far, and am supplementing my non T9 stuff with crafted gear, I'll admit. I'd like to be higher, but I pull off what I can with my schedule and playtime. That said, when I'm raid buffed, and especially when the guild shammy pops BL, I just stop using FoL altogether, if I'd been using it at all. When even *I* can cast HL on about the same CD as daphoosa, and I *am* supplementing my haste with gems.
I spend a fair amount of boss fights with a 50/50 mix of FoL and HL, throwing in HS when I need the instant. But when the schtuff hits the fan and the tank (or even the raid) needs it, I start spamming HL. With enough mana regen tools to make it something even I can pull off with my mana pool, why not?
Overhealing is something on a meter, the general concept of overhealing that people worry about doesn't matter. It *is* a determination of how mana efficient you are, and that's important, but mana efficiency is only as import as how not-dead your tank (or other healing target) got. Don't worry about over healing. If you use beacon like you should, you'll be loaded with it. Worry instead about mana pool--and break away from the view that your mana pool must always be 95% or higher. spend it, that's what it's there for.
What really clinches daphoosa's bolded statement above is when my guild tries an ICC run, and our only healers that sign up are pallies. Doing Festergut with three holy pallies (we're running with three healers for now as we learn the fights) means you have no room for FoL carrying you through--same for healing Saurfang if you're the raid healer. When you think about all the ways you can reduce your mana cost for HL, and how it's basically twice as powerful a heal for the mana expended, FoL just doesn't give you enough output.
I learned that lesson the very first night our guild did Marrowgar after release, I hope you have the chance and the wisdom to tweak your spec as well. Trust me, you'll really see a difference in your performance.
EDIT: @ OP, comparing the two, others have said what I would say; take the 245. If you are concerned about the 18 haste, get a Quick King's Amber to give you 20 haste. It may even be worth crunching the numbers to see if gemming that will kick your cast times down another tenth of a second.