Healing Watercooler Discussion

[Mazi]

So what are your guys' thoughts? Personally I feel like this is a huuuuge push in the right direction. I've been saying this entire expansion that healing is an utter mess & joke. It's just a spam fest. T14 was okay, but as we all know scaling just goes through the roof and it becomes way too easy.

I trust that by adding 1.5 sec cast time to 90 tals that they will balance out the rest of our heals.

It sounds like we're going back towards the style of healing in Cataclysm and I really welcome it. The only thing I'm not a fan of, or understand, is the cast time on POM, it was a pretty balanced heal as is. Maybe this is more to focus on PVP and also Divine Insight?

[Deleted]

Still digesting it fully but I see Discipline gets their own AoE heal.

Additionally, as gear improves, the scaling rates of health and healing will now be very similar, so the relative power of any given healing spell shouldn’t climb so much over the course of this expansion.

That is excellent news. One of the "problems" with Discipline is exactly related to that insidious and far too prevalent power creep.

Additionally, we're toning down the power of absorbs in general. When they get too strong, absorption effects are often used in place of direct healing instead of as a way to supplement it. We will, of course, take these changes into account when tuning specializations that rely heavily on absorbs, such as Discipline Priests.

Also a good change.

Smart heals will now randomly pick any injured target within range instead of always picking the most injured target.

Slightly concerned about this. I guess this is a wait and see kind of thing though.

more dynamic, engaging, non-punishing, and frankly a lot more fun

Oh dear. Any time Blizzard mentions making healing "less punishing" it typically becomes a thankless and painful job. I'm looking at you early Cataclysm. Paladins not included.

All of those 1.5 second cast times are concerning. I could see them having a place with Cascade and Halo but less so with Divine Star which is much more dependent on positioning at the point it is fired off. Of course, allowing casting while moving on Divine Star would resolve this problem.

Overall, cautiously optimistic.

[Affiniti]

Pretty excited to test it in raid testing. Please gief beta?

[owbu]

Seems like they are learning from their cata mistakes. They had a huge amount of great ideas on how to make WoW better back then. It was just too much for them apparently.
Since then I feel like Panda and WoD are the "fixing all the broken great ideas cata had" expansions.
Maybe 7.0 will have a new path of the titants

So I guess..yay great changes! Less spammy healing. More choices. Just better tuned, so that they dont get obsolete by the time the last patch hits.

[Nurasu]

Seems like overkill for Discipline. They will be nerfing absorbs, but they already did by re-implementing triage. If you're not at risk of dying at less than 100% health, Discipline provides far less benefit in my opinion. Plus with smart heals no longer being reliable...

Also, Cataclysm seemed like a failed experiment to me that directly punished healers until things normalized in DS. I fail to see how triage will ever be balanced (stacked towards DoT classes) or engaging (weak spells are sooo much fun...).

[Deleted]

Seems like they are learning from their cata mistakes.

Part of me thinks that, part of me feels that they are returning to the issues with Cataclysm. All this talk about needing to use more efficient heals and reducing manoeuvrability brings back bad memories of idiotic raid members taking unnecessary damage and then being at the end of a mouthful for not being able to pull them back up. Oh well. Hopefully they do it right this time. If we just get Cataclysm again I can't see things going down well.

Yeah, going back to triage and decreasing the intelligence of smart heals will probably knock discipline down a bit. These changes (at a very opaque perspective) seem to be favouring druids who will still have some movement benefits with rejuvenation, lifebloom, swiftmend and so on.

[Deleted]

Yay more shadow nerfs! It's not like halo was already hard to use optimally .... As far as disc is concerned that change isnt really punishing if divine aegis stays the way it is , since t90 talents are mostly used to blanket the raid with absorbs rather than for burst healing.

[Keiyra]

Part of me thinks that, part of me feels that they are returning to the issues with Cataclysm. All this talk about needing to use more efficient heals and reducing manoeuvrability brings back bad memories of idiotic raid members taking unnecessary damage and then being at the end of a mouthful for not being able to pull them back up. Oh well. Hopefully they do it right this time. If we just get Cataclysm again I can't see things going down well.

That was the best part of early cata, dps actually had to pay attention to the crap they stood in! And if you got mouthed off...shame on your raid leader for not knowing how heals worked and that it wasn't your fault. (Personally i loved the triage style of early cata (BWD tier), where target and spell selection mattered more, as did mana.

Yeah, going back to triage and decreasing the intelligence of smart heals will probably knock discipline down a bit. These changes (at a very opaque perspective) seem to be favouring druids who will still have some movement benefits with rejuvenation, lifebloom, swiftmend and so on.

Well most of the aoe's across classes got nerfed in terms of being cast and not instant; but as for druid mobility: 1) we haven't seen all the changes, don't jinx us yet, 2) Mobility has been their perk/niche since at least BC - don't be jelly :P

[Mazi]

That was the best part of early cata, dps actually had to pay attention to the crap they stood in! And if you got mouthed off...shame on your raid leader for not knowing how heals worked and that it wasn't your fault. (Personally i loved the triage style of early cata (BWD tier), where target and spell selection mattered more, as did mana.

Yeah I agree. I enjoyed healing in Cata (minus Firelands). I thought that BWD tier & Dragon Soul were a lot of fun to heal. I hated Firelands though, but probably because I had to play Disc.

[zorkuus]

An indirect nerf to shadow? Who would've guessed...

[Deleted]

That's normal for blizzard to balance things in a vacuum, same story as with pvp nerfs affecting pve.

[Ilir]

I like how for the paladin the cast time only affect the holy spec but not for shadow priest... hahaha that's just too funny.

Well, they better give us some strong dps buff/cd.

[Nurasu]

I like how for the paladin the cast time only affect the holy spec but not for shadow priest... hahaha that's just too funny.

Well, they better give us some strong dps buff/cd.

Lol! I didn't catch that on my first read-through. Not surprising, though I'm sure it's an oversight (like the rest of the spec)

[Sam the Wiser]

This is the biggest nerf to the priest class since I've started playing it. I thought start of Cata was bad. These changes just blow my mind. This is literally the death of disc priest in PvP if this goes live.

[Kellhound]

I have a better idea for Holy Paladins, get rid of Holy power and adjust mana regen. All I see is the pain of Cata, the last time they said they wanted people not at full health.....

[Deleted]

That was the best part of early cata, dps actually had to pay attention to the crap they stood in! And if you got mouthed off...shame on your raid leader for not knowing how heals worked and that it wasn't your fault. (Personally i loved the triage style of early cata (BWD tier), where target and spell selection mattered more, as did mana.

I utterly detested Cataclysm healing. It probably didn't help that my class at the time took a long fall hitting every branch of the nerf tree due to being perceived as too strong during WotLK. I ultimately quit playing for that expansion since healing, aside from the occasional five man, just wasn't fun. Admittedly it got better with a few extra pieces of gear and the 5.1 dungeons were a boat load of fun but I think there is some rose-tinted glasses when it comes to triage. Personally, I didn't find it in the least bit fun but that might be something to do with the classes I had access to being the worst performing.

On the flip side, Cataclysm also had the problem of the raid leader (myself at the time) having to yell at people to play better and not take damage. Never a fun thing to do.

Well most of the aoe's across classes got nerfed in terms of being cast and not instant; but as for druid mobility: 1) we haven't seen all the changes, don't jinx us yet, 2) Mobility has been their perk/niche since at least BC - don't be jelly :P

I'm not jelly - just pointing out how I feel the changes in their very rough state will play out. I played a druid as my main for two expansions and the mobility was a bucket load of enjoyable. Perhaps that is why I didn't find Cataclysm too much fun - nourish, nourish, nourish. Presumably Holy Nova will remain instant cast to allow discipline to actually get one off on a reasonable number of people!

Time to practice my Whack-a-Mole skills I guess.

[Lurkerqt]

Lmao, these are the most dumbest changes In WoD as of yet. Without smart heals some spells like Prayer of Mending plus It's cast time may as well be removed. And a cast time for wild growth? YOu gota be shitting us Blizz, It's pretty useless in arena 2's and 3's, So why even bother giving it a cast time. Oh and GG for Paladins, as if they didn't have a hard enough time healing on the move already. I can't wait to see healers QQing from Durumu styled fights in WoD. Well done Blizzard, you just went full retard.

[Danner]

Resilience is gone, player HPbars doubled
I like the idea. But it's been tried before.
Prediction: before we hit T18, [insert fotm spec here] will oneshot any player thanks to abusing [insert trinket/buff/effect combo here].
Before the end of WoD, Resilience is back at near 3 digits range to compensate.

I just have very minor faith that blizzard will manage to avoid falling for the temptation of letting that [insert fotm spec here] do 19 digit damage when the stars align... also known as every 2 minutes. They already kinda failed this twice. At least. Why is the third time the charm?

Likelyhood of success: very very small.

Heal is gone
About time. Four years too late, but better late than never!
You shall not be missed!
I welcome this change a lot!

Likelyhood of success: Major success. Already implemented. Kinda.

Smart-healing is now dumber.
I like this change. It's too much of it, and I would like to see less of it.
Discpriests should probably note what a major nerf to atonement this is though!

Likelyhood of success: Disc will require some major overhaul to not be dependent on atonement. Again. If happening, this change looks promising.

Healing is now weaker.
I wouldn't really have cared, because I really do agree that healing could use some power reduction.
Except for the fact that [insert fotm spec / first WoD raid boss here] will still oneshot others for 19 digit damage. Any healers not enjoying themselves in this scenario, prepare to be called "bad". Raidhealers who let other raiders stay < 100% hp for more than 5 sec will still be the cause of wipes. PVPhealers... yeah. As if.

I see what they are trying to do. I also think they have failed it so many times that they are starting to sound like ... the Gulf War Iraqi Information minister. For those who remember. Anyone believing this will work out as they have foretold it, I have a wow expansion featuring the dance studio to sell!

Likelyhood of success: very very small

Mana is more important, matter more.
Optimist interpretation:
All healing classes reach Holypriest/Monk levels of mana management. This is IMO a good thing.

Realist interpretation:
All healing classes reach Holypriest/Monk levels of mana management, except... Disc, because. Holypaladins, because of holy power and Druids, because only being able to hot up a player you know will take damage kinda makes the spec require psychic abilities to play well.
Holypriest and Monks get way way harder mana management as the only notable change.

Likelyhood of success: This didn't work out in cata. This didn't work out in MoP. No snowball's chance in hellfire peninsula. I'm already thinking damage mitigation.


Shields weaker
I think it is necessary. But I also think this will wreck disc further. They tried to do EXACTLY this in the beginning of MoP. And I seem to recall that the only spec more unpopular than a holypriest was the discpriest.

Likelyhood of success: Disc needs a second toolbox to make this work. That's a LOT of work!


Instants are now less instant
I do note they did not mention PWS, which I would sort of assume is the major instant cast culprit here. I guess it suffered already?

I do see the point, and to some degree I agree to this change.... for PVP!
But I strongly laugh at the notion that speccing a healer makes your heals WORSE than not speccing a healer. That's screwed up, man (see paladin).

For PVE, it's a 8 year step back. Why is PVP being allowed to neuter my enjoyment of PVE?

Likelyhood of success: The beatings WILL continue until morale improves.

--

Overall:
I see what they say, my faith in them getting close to this is very small.
I would very much like to be wrong.

Worst case outcome:
Cata heroics all over, where tanks are oneshot by trashmobs, my GHeal costs 1/8 of a manabar, and fills 1/8th of a healthbar.

[Deleted]

Cata heroics all over, where tanks are oneshot by trashmobs, my GHeal costs 1/8 of a manabar, and fills 1/8th of a healthbar.

If we get Cataclysm level healing again, we will see another considerable drop in subscription numbers as healers move away from a system that simply isn't fun and DPS get frustrated with long queue times and difficulty joining content.

Then again, the numbers of three to four healers for mythic raiding that I've heard muttered around quietly are beginning to make sense if Blizzard are expecting people to move away from the role.

I do note they did not mention PWS, which I would sort of assume is the major instant cast culprit here. I guess it suffered already?

Increased health pool and reduced absorbs would suggest this is the case.

Discpriests should probably note what a major nerf to atonement this is though!

Coupled with lower crit levels at the start of an expansion and absorbs being outright weaker this is going to hurt quite a bit. Then again at least we can spam Holy Nova. Which was suggested for discipline in the past and also didn't work out then. Interesting times ahead!

The decision to already start inflating player health pools and increase enemy damage seems really strange when doing so could entirely be circumvented by decreasing player damage. Long route for a short cut.

[Larynx]

Disc doesn't have the toolkit to be competitive over holy in a low constant damage triage environment like they're suggesting, especially after nerfing absorbs. It'll probably be shit for the first raid tier.

Fact is, Disc is only viable because it relies on the crutch of atonement and divine aegis. Divine aegis is getting a two-fold nerf, one with an absorb nerf and the other with a scaling nerf. Atonement is also being nerfed to not smart-heal, which will probably make Greater Heal/Penance triage the norm. Basically meaning we'll have a 2.5 second cast time spell to triage, and half that heal from critting won't actually be useful. PWS has too high a mana cost, especially after the rapture nerf, to be useful beyond oh shit moments.

It seems like they did add Holy Nova for Disc, so that may be the game changer here. I'm patiently pessimistic though. Maybe Disc will become a tank healer?