Resto Shaman stats guide 4.3 priority/help?

[Deleted]

As a little preamble, I'm speaking from a very casual perspective, so please mind what I say.

I've tried stacking all three stats, and I've found some interesting results that might be worthwhile to share:

stacking haste is the best for when reaction time actually matter more than anything, and is the best for when an increase of throughput is needed all the time, ie you have a constant aura that won't let players get too low on HPs, as if there are many healers putting out substantial amounts or AoE heals, and if you need to look good on the meters, it's the better stat for sure, as you reduce the risk of others sniping you.

Mastery on the other hand, is very nice for doing HPS that actually matters, as you will heal a player more the more he/she's injured, and it's also the mana neutral stat in the equation here, as it's an increase of throughput that will not affect your mana pool but for the fact that you will need to cast less to top a player off. I'm not experienced enough to say if it's best for heavy AoE settings, but my gut feel is that it's best for spiky damage, as the TC+GHW mechanic really favors us there.

Crit as you probably know it's both an increase in throughput as it is for regeneration, but since it's really RNG dependant by its very nature, it can lead to mixed results, especially if the extra healing (it's 200% + 60% on another target from AA) goes wasted, which is a real possiblity. But if it doesn't, it's a pretty linear throughput increase. I'd like to point out one thing though, stacking crit is unreliable, but if you get enough, it starts to smooth out. I'm not geared enough to test this, but I'd really like to know if at high levels of gear, it's possible to get to a level where stacking crit is actually worthwhile.

When comparing the three, and especially mastery and crit, you also need to keep in mind that crit requires lots of rating per 1% increase, which is why mastery stacking is usually favored in raiding environment (for what i know at least).

[whyabadi]

Crit is excellent for TC despite the 150% multiplier, simply because the mana cost of the spell is fixed. So crit returns more mana, while haste both returns more mana and drains more mana. Mathematicaly, think M = X(Y*A - B); if you want to maximize mana gained, it's more beneficial to increase Y than to increase X.

Every 200 LBs, 180 rating of haste would allow you to cast 3 additional LBs while 180 rating of crit would make 2 spells crit for 1.5x.
Haste: additional mana = 3 (LB*0.4 - 1440) = 1.2 LB - 4320 = LB - 3600
Crit: additional mana = (0.5 LB + 0.5 LB)*0.4 = 0.4LB
If you do 9000 damage per bolt then 180 haste rating adds 4482 mana every 200 LB while 180 rating of crit adds 3600.
I take into account the miss chance for haste only because it doesn't affect the value of crit. Also, this assumes the haste gain is enough for the encounter to allow you to cast an additional LB.
I would love it if someone could confirm that the math is correct.

[Alltat]

180 crit rating should be 1% crit. 180 haste rating should be 1.4% haste. So on 200 LBs, it's two crits versus 2.8 LBs.

So something like:
Haste
2.8*0.83*(9000*0.4) - 2.8*1406 = 4430 mana
Crit
2*0.5*(9000*0.4) = 3600 mana

So 23% better returns from TC per point. Not really enough to outweigh that crit is better than haste for both HPS (+1% crit always gives more than +1% HPS, while +1% haste always gives less than +1% HPS) and HPM (Resurgence).

[whyabadi]

180 crit rating should be 1% crit. 180 haste rating should be 1.4% haste. So on 200 LBs, it's two crits versus 2.8 LBs.

So something like:
Haste
2.8*0.83*(9000*0.4) - 2.8*1406 = 4430 mana
Crit
2*0.5*(9000*0.4) = 3600 mana

So 23% better returns from TC per point. Not really enough to outweigh that crit is better than haste for both HPS (+1% crit always gives more than +1% HPS, while +1% haste always gives less than +1% HPS) and HPM (Resurgence).

I had wrong rating conversion for haste there. The question wasn't if crit is a better stat overall, but rather it was whether haste provides higher mana returns with TC than crit and it does contrary to what you claimed.
I am changing my mind about haste though. I am even considering going for the first ticks of Healing Rain and EL only and ignoring Riptide's.

[Shammyhealz]

If we're discussing Crit v Mastery, you cannot possibly say that the crit will overheal. In order for Mastery to become effective the target must be missing a substantial amount of health, and so in discussing crit v mastery, the discussion is centered around at lower health levels, when it is unlikely that anything will overheal. If crit were to overheal, the target is obviously at a high enough health level that you will get very little out of Mastery to begin with.

As for the RNG of Crit, if you are assigned to raid heals, it is usually not imperative that you get out a massive heal very quickly, so the RNG of it works just fine. If you are a tank healer, I can agree that crit is a suboptimal throughput stat, but can be very nice for regen.

As for pure throughput, in most situations Haste will be the best if you can reach the next breakpoint. Just look at your healing charts, Healing Rain, ELW and Chain Heal are often the top heals due to the large amount of stacking this patch. Lets say that Healing Rain is 30% of your healing done on a fight, there are roughly 10 ticks to Healing Rain. If you hit that next breakpoint, thats another tick, a 10% increase to Healing Rain, which is a 3% increase to total healing done. Thats a pretty substantial increase, and that is not counting ELW ticks you may have gained, Riptide ticks you may have gained, or the increased cast speed that you have gained. I love Haste, but it takes a much greater amount of raid awareness and mana conservation to fully utilize than Mastery or Crit, you have to know when damage is going out, and when you can take a break and TC. That said, it is just awful for some fights. Spine is a bitch with Haste, not a huge amount of downtime, I usually have to pop a pot and Berserking on the second tendon to get back up to enough mana to continue, and the plateaus that you reach are less significant, as you have to heal single targets (you can use HR and such, but it's almost a waste to use it to heal 3 people in 10m). I suppose the same applies for Mastery though, as the target has a 200k health deficiency, but is registered as being at 100% health. I guess Crit would be by far the best stat on that fight, so you are right in some ways OP.

[Alltat]

The question wasn't if crit is a better stat overall, but rather it was whether haste provides higher mana returns with TC than crit and it does contrary to what you claimed.

And you were spot on about it: haste is better than crit for TC regen, though not by a whole lot. I foolishly trusted unsourced forum posts about it rather than doing the math myself, or at least asking for a proper source for the claim. I should know better than to trust any claims of theorycrafting that don't include full numbers.

Nice job clearing things up. The haste figure may have been a bit off, but your conclusions were correct.

If we're discussing Crit v Mastery, you cannot possibly say that the crit will overheal. [...] As for the RNG of Crit, if you are assigned to raid heals, it is usually not imperative that you get out a massive heal very quickly, so the RNG of it works just fine.

Agreed and agreed. Concerns about overhealing and randomness may have been valid in previous tiers, but in the current tier of heavy raid damage and fairly humble tank damage (with a few notable exceptions), crit is neither random nor likely to overheal.

As for pure throughput, in most situations Haste will be the best if you can reach the next breakpoint. Just look at your healing charts, Healing Rain, ELW and Chain Heal are often the top heals due to the large amount of stacking this patch.

For HR and EL, yes, as an extra tick adds quite a lot of extra healing on short duration HoTs (916 boosts EL healing by 25%, for example). Less so for Riptide, as it has a much longer duration, and the 2005 tick only increases its healing by ~13%. HR has six ticks baseline, EL has four and RT (glyphed) has seven, for the record. Unless the late hour has me confused. Also keep in mind that outside of breakpoints, haste is the worst throughput stat (out of int/mastery/crit/haste) point for point (source & numbers).

[TenDance]

Heavy mastery builds work just as well in ten mans, especially if you two-heal fights, as you'll perform better the more strain is put on you. Peaking at 60k+ HPS in a ten man is quite useful.

I want to point out that you shouldn't look at the number of people you're with, but at the importance of your spells. In 25s, depending on your setup/role, HR and CH are easily your most important spells. To buff these, mastery works pretty well. But haste STILL does buff CH significantly.
If your Raidlead can't discern snipehealing from real healing and is unable to see on the log your throughputspikes when it really matters... well, get more haste, or ditch this "not that smart"-person.

In 10s, GHW becomes much more important in nearly every situation. And haste does next to nothing for GHW. Or, in other words: under the usage of tidal waves, GHW is fast enough.
Mastery is only beaten by more mastery.

And remember that you'll get a lot of haste for bursthealing with your 4pc.

[Chort]

Tried to reforge everything to mastery - and it works very well! I almost beat our druid. And yeah, GHW under tidal waves needs no more haste! So 916 is perfectly fine.

[Miga]

I tried reforing to mastery and after trying it in this weeks Ds hc, i personally experienced it to be SOOOO slow. i Think i will stick with my original idea of stacking haste to 2005 (1865 or whatever for goblin) then stack mastery after that, its worked out very well for me and in our setup.

[Revelations]

I tried reforing to mastery and after trying it in this weeks Ds hc, i personally experienced it to be SOOOO slow. i Think i will stick with my original idea of stacking haste to 2005 (1865 or whatever for goblin) then stack mastery after that, its worked out very well for me and in our setup.

Your heals won't be superfast with 2005 haste either. What is it, 0.2 sec off?

[Miga]

Then as im sure your aware that those 0.2 seconds usually makes the difference between being able to solo heal morchok (1 side), or failing misserably, those .2 secs makes a huge difference over time in a longer fight.

[Revelations]

Then as im sure your aware that those 0.2 seconds usually makes the difference between being able to solo heal morchok (1 side), or failing misserably, those .2 secs makes a huge difference over time in a longer fight.

So does +Healing when target is dying. Aka mastery.

[Miga]

mastery wont save you if u dont have time to heal the target before the next dmg spikes comes. As i stated before im not saying mastery is bad, just that i prefer haste to second cap before i stack mastery. As i also stated in my first post, this is my personal preference, i wasent telling him that this is the way to go, as i can clearly tell your very passionate about ut 916 haste - crit / mastery build and if it works for you thats great, but its pointless to start an argument when both players are speaking from personal preference.

[TenDance]

If haste would equal mastery in terms of HPS (or better: lifesavingpower [lsp]) - and it does not - you would still need more spirit or more time spent LB-ing to hold your mana in check.

Which, all in all, diminishes your lps.

CH is a smart heal, so to be at least to 90% effective, it doesn't matter that much where you're throwing it. Therefore, precasting it is perfectly viable. You don't need to cast things like that reactive, but are able to do so preemptive. What everyone should do, because waiting for damage to occur means wasting time you could've spent healing. Therefore, thoughts about "saving lifes with more haste" don't apply to shaman healing. CH can always be cast preemptive and whoever thinks GHW isn't fast enough (or gets boosted by haste) should try things out - the game itself will prove him wrong. Therefore, haste aside from breakpoints isn't an option. And even with breakpoints taken into account, it's still more or less a tool for snipehealing.
I have to admit, having more haste feels better. But you'll notice that more ooomph for your heals holds a higher value.
It isn't that dificult to predict incoming damage, the time where you looked at bossanimations is long gone.

[Miga]

Also if you look at DS hc gear you wont be able to sustain your 916 haste even with a total reforge out of it, essentially your "wasting" 300-400 haste so going for the second threshhold becomes alot more viable. Maintainging 2k(1860 as goblin) haste and roughly 2.5-3k mastery (in full DS hc gear) seems more realistic and a more viable option.

[TenDance]

That might be true - but "full DS HC" is more of a theoretical state. Because... for which encounter should anyone finetune that gear? Leveling on Pandaria?

End of expansion -> showcasegear.

Up to that, there is an ample amount of time to gear up. And in this space "between now and full DS HC", what Revelations and I stated is what we believe holds true.

[Revelations]

if it works for you thats great, but its pointless to start an argument when both players are speaking from personal preference.

Let's drop personal preference and look at facts/math then?

Mastery > Additional to 916 haste

[Alltat]

Then as im sure your aware that those 0.2 seconds usually makes the difference between being able to solo heal morchok (1 side), or failing misserably, those .2 secs makes a huge difference over time in a longer fight.

Nonsense. I'm doing just fine with 916 haste when two-healing Morchok hc (though I'm up to 1100 now, ironically from getting the Morchok hc neck). I think you overestimate the difference those 0.2 seconds make, or how often they matter. Soloing a side on Morchok is about cooldown timing and anticipating damage, not about stacking haste. If anything, Morchok hc is a great showcase of how awesome mastery is, as people will be very low a lot.

mastery wont save you if u dont have time to heal the target before the next dmg spikes comes.

There's no content currently in the game where big hits happen so frequently that haste is in any way necessary to get heals off in between them. There's also no content currently in the current expansion where a mastery stacking build does not outperform a haste stacking build.

Also if you look at DS hc gear you wont be able to sustain your 916 haste even with a total reforge out of it, essentially your "wasting" 300-400 haste...

I think you grossly overrate the value of the 2005 breakpoint. It's a fairly minor amount of extra healing done. So if being at 1200 haste is 300 haste rating wasted, then being at 2005 is 1100 haste rating wasted. The solution to "I can't avoid wasting some of my stats" is not "I should waste even more".

[Jinto]

Haste is generally only good when you want to snipe unpredictable damage. In terms of HPS it is a 40% gain over Crit. However that is not taking into account breakpoints. For a typical encounter this tier roughly half the healing done would be from HR, EL etc. Yes, they are effected by haste (HR cast time, EL proc from more casts etc) but the value of haste is hugely diminished. 2005 gets you an extra RT tick. Look through the logs to see how much RT is actually doing for you. Anyway a conservative estimate would be crit being the same HPS as haste and obviously better HPM.

p.s. I am trying to figure out at what point does Mastery overtake Crit in HPM.

[Radux]

p.s. I am trying to figure out at what point does Mastery overtake Crit in HPM.

You'd have to create two formulas with several variables:
Mastery:
- Target health
- Mastery value
- [Insert Spell] Heal Total
- Mana Cost for [Insert Spell]

HPM = [Heal Value * (Health % * Total Mastery Contribution)] / Mana
- Obviously use base values for the heal and mana (talents still included)
- Health % would be done like... .43 for 43% health
- Mastery Contribution would be in addition to the spell, so 40% more healing would be 1.40
- Insert values and profit

Crit:
- Critical %
- Resurgence Value based on [Insert Spell]
- [Insert Spell] Heal Total
- Mana Cost for [Insert Spell]

HPM = [Heal Value * (1 + (Crit % * 2))] / [Mana Cost + (Crit % * Resurgence Value)]
- Crit % will be dealt with like Mastery was (eg. 43% = .43)
- Resurgence's value will change pending on the spell you're calculating for
- Insert values for whatever spell and other info and it should be easy.

Obviously HR and CH would require much more in depth calculations based on number of targets and such. But essentially it should just be a plug and play kind of thing with a little bit of comparison.

The only problem I see with this would be that Mastery increases Crit's value for HPS, which in turn, would probably increase its value for HPM. However, I'd want some more concrete numbers to claim my statement as fact.