I absolutely despise the new crit mechanic for disc priests

[Deleted]

It just feels so wrong. So extremely wrong. Crit heals were something I was happy about every single time because I could top the group with some burst healing. Hell, every crit, be it as a dps or a healer is something you should be happy about. The new mechanic feels so extremely unrewarding that I'm considering just switching to holy. I hate the new disc.
There is literally no way to top a group now quickly without relying on other healers in the raid. Nearly every time my PoH crits the shield just vanishes into thin air after 15 seconds. I cast PoH when the damage is already there since it doesn't guarantee DA anymore. But after that there is no raiddamage anymore that could be prevented with the new crit mechanic. You'll just want to top the group. But that just isn't possible quickly enough because there are no crits anymore and the new crits just fade away without ever being absorbed.

I really can't play like this. It feels so incredibly wrong and just plain stupid. When people started saying "discs can't crit anymore" I thought that... well, they shifted the heal to absorbs. Might work just fine. But it doesn't. It feels weird. You'll want crits when the group has already taken damage and it felt f*cking good to top it with Inner Focus. Nope, can't do that anymore. But here, have some additional shields for the next incoming damage that's non-existent.
Thank you for changing disc into something that just feels awkward to me at best. I didn't have any problems with the nerfs until this crit change came in. And now I'll never play disc again until I can properly crit again. It just doesn't feel good. That's all.

[Silverblade Paladin]

I thoroughly enjoy it.

Now when I top people up, My crits instead of being wasted as overheal are now an Absorb for things to come

[Deleted]

The problem is that those things never come.

[Kuniku]

I've not tried it out yet, but in theory its a clever idea, crits often over heal, so turning the extra into a shield will be more useful no?

[Spike`]

theory yes, reality no

if Cri goes to tank, no change and less overheal, to Raid only if in the next 15s a player is hit by something or its wasted

for huge damage phase, for ex council on sandstorm or Megaera, you POH to heart and the players simply dont go up, Try it to play with a Druid and enjoy your wipes for not being able to bring people fast enough

on 25 probably works ok, on 10man its alot of comp dependent and you will burn more mana to archive the same thing plus the nerf to Rapture... you get the picture

[vanityking]

I also miss seeing big numbers, and when someone is about to die, using Inner Focus + Greater Heal/Flash Heal doesn't feel as rewarding as it did but in practice it is better.

[Meaks]

The inability to heal large amounts of missing HP sucks too much. IF needs to give bonus % heal or something, its too weak now, I barely notice using it.

[Kuniku]

yeh I suppose the problem with more shields is the difficulty in topping up afterwards =/

[Shahad]

While I absolutely hated the mechanic when it was announced, after running around in ToT as Disc the past week, here are my observations:
PoH actually heals a decent amount now. I don't feel the need to press IF to top people off(even though it doesn't now, but I mean my reflex to hit it isn't being activated) so it feels much nicer than before, reminds me of when I play Holy. Overall healing is more reliable since I always know how much PoH will heal, with DA being a very nice bonus.
I tried a crit-heavy build along with a mastery-heavy one and I liked both for different reasons. The crit-build was really fun for Atonement healing and the mastery one made PoH stronger which also feels very rewarding. Right now I keep a balance of both and I think I'll keep it that way for the rest of the expansion.

My only gripe is IF. Sometimes, I still need that really big burst of healing and it's just not there anymore. Maybe make it reduce the DA bubble, but increase the direct healing.

Another thing that I don't like is that they seem to want to make us use PW:S on raid healing duties, and that's just not something I will do ever again, not after Wrath's shield spam. I don't care if I lose potential healing, I'm just not doing it.

Overall, I like 5.2 Disc. But I just think it needs some more tweaking since it was tested only very shortly due to it's inception late in the PTR cycle.

[Kuniku]

yeh from the sounds of it IF needs to do its normal job but remove/tone down the bubble from DA so it actually increases the healing

[Shahad]

yeh from the sounds of it IF needs to do its normal job but remove/tone down the bubble from DA so it actually increases the healing

I'm not even sure about that, since the DA bubble would just cap anyway at a percentage of your health. So it's not even that strong a bubble.

[Dorfie]

I'd just like it if casting PoH took 5 seconds off inner focus like greater heal does. Inner focus is pretty crucial now for guaranteeing those DAs when you really need them.

[Shahad]

I don't feel that need at all. IF's CD is just fine as it is, it just needs to do the big healing burst we're accustomed to.

[Chimaera]

In regards to Inner Focus:
If somebody is not going to take damage in the next 15s they do not require a burst of healing. Crits have been dampened for disc. The notion of a guaranteed crit to turn the tide of a bad situation has not.

If a player has a health deficit and is going to take damage in the next 15s, an absorb is no different from a heal. The player has the same effective health either way.

Not having crit heals provide a double heal is certainly something the brain has to adapt to when you have been playing a long time(and continue to play other healing specs). That being said, if we take a step back and push from our minds how crits worked prior to 5.2, it is not all that conceptually different from other healing specs. The duplicate heal coming in the form of an absorb does have advantages where it is less likely to be overheal, at least in the situations we actually care about healing. It also leaves room for other healers to heal on top of it. The downside being you lose the hpm boost of the crit if the person takes no further damage within 15s.

Moral of the story is that the new mechanic feels weak simply because for a long time prior to now discipline had giant crits. Now they have simply been brought back down to the size of other healing specs(before mastery scaling).

[Shahad]

In regards to Inner Focus:
If somebody is not going to take damage in the next 15s they do not require a burst of healing. Crits have been dampened for disc. The notion of a guaranteed crit to turn the tide of a bad situation has not.

If a player has a health deficit and is going to take damage in the next 15s, an absorb is no different from a heal. The player has the same effective health either way.

Not having crit heals provide a double heal is certainly something the brain has to adapt to when you have been playing a long time(and continue to play other healing specs). That being said, if we take a step back and push from our minds how crits worked prior to 5.2, it is not all that conceptually different from other healing specs. The duplicate heal coming in the form of an absorb does have advantages where it is less likely to be overheal, at least in the situations we actually care about healing. It also leaves room for other healers to heal on top of it. The downside being you lose the hpm boost of the crit if the person takes no further damage within 15s.

Moral of the story is that the new mechanic feels weak simply because for a long time prior to now discipline had giant crits. Now they have simply been brought back down to the size of other healing specs(before mastery scaling).

You need to consider that sometimes the big burst of healing is more valuable than the regular heal+bubble. One example that comes to mind is PvP, where even with the same effective health, being under 35% means you're open to Execute abilities which deal enough damage to pop the bubble rather quickly. An actual crit heal is better in that situation that a bubble. So having IF be actual healing rather than a heal and bubble would be a good thing.

[Chimaera]

Executes in pvp is the one glaring downside to the change and IF specifically. However, all of the pvp changes suggest to me that the idea is to be more proactive rather than reactive and keep our teammates from ever reaching the dangerous execute range. And if they do you better still have peels available to shut down the damage. It is something we just have to adapt to. That being said I would not mind a glyph implemented that makes your heal from IF a double heal but removes aegis for those that prefer that.

[Shahad]

Executes in pvp is the one glaring downside to the change and IF specifically. However, all of the pvp changes suggest to me that the idea is to be more proactive rather than reactive and keep our teammates from ever reaching the dangerous execute range. And if they do you better still have peels available to shut down the damage. It is something we just have to adapt to. That being said I would not mind a glyph implemented that makes your heal from IF a double heal but removes aegis for those that prefer that.

PvP isn't predictable damage though, so being proactive is difficult. I'd just like to have the option of having my big crit heal depending on the fight/if I PvP.

[KidCanuck]

In regards to Inner Focus:
If somebody is not going to take damage in the next 15s they do not require a burst of healing. Crits have been dampened for disc. The notion of a guaranteed crit to turn the tide of a bad situation has not.

If a player has a health deficit and is going to take damage in the next 15s, an absorb is no different from a heal. The player has the same effective health either way.

Agreed.

In PvE, absorbs are >= heals in almost all cases (specific mechanics like Chimaeron aside). If you don't like absorb effects, disc probably isn't the right spec for you. Do you hate Spirit Shell too because is just disappears after 15 sec without being used?

[Valium104]

To me, they should make disc all about absorbs, and holy all about heals.

[Hand Banana]

You need to consider that sometimes the big burst of healing is more valuable than the regular heal+bubble. One example that comes to mind is PvP, where even with the same effective health, being under 35% means you're open to Execute abilities which deal enough damage to pop the bubble rather quickly. An actual crit heal is better in that situation that a bubble. So having IF be actual healing rather than a heal and bubble would be a good thing.

With how incredibly (bugged) strong prayer of mending is right now you dont need crits to get out of execute range. With just 3 stacks of grace the lowest PoM I will see on the first tick is 100k. God Forbid I get a(bugged like I said) crit of 180k that DAs a 220k shield.