Holy priest Love?

[Kexmeister]

Wall of Text hits Ferrion for 1 [9999 overkil] (Critical)

You suck.

[nikkita]

I have been raiding on ptr 10m's and 25m's with my guild, as holy and as discipline (since some holy talents didn't work i had some fun with bubbles). I have enjoyed reading this thread by miles, i can't even explain.

I've been playing a holy priest for almost 4 years now, i have never had a bread and butter spell (not Gheal rank 1/2 in tbc, not flash heal). I must agree that the strengh of a holy priest isn't the ability to spam. You can't even compare my flash heal to a paladins flash of light, healing amount and mana (ofc serendipity sort-of gave a impression you can spam flash but i really don't see it as a good, strong or even needed gamestyle of healing, this adds to the non-stop spaming of coh that was finnaly nerfed although the not justified over qq that it caused).

So on Ptr i traded my clearcasting (not reliable) procs from crit Gheal, flash and binding (which i must say were very cool) to 50% increased mana regen. Tbh i am happy with it (no i don't stack spirit), and if i'll be honest it changed nothing about the way i played since i never though i was a paladin and spamed flash heal. I traded the serendipity mana return for a reliable haste/weaving, my true sorrow is that Prom and renew aren't combind in serendipity (prom isn't combined with HC also). Since this MAKES me use flash heal. Most my flash heals on PTR were either SoL procs, or me weaving for the hastened greaterheal (that went to the tank or a very un-healthy raid member). I can't say these 2 talents are great (the new Holy conc. and the new serendipity), i wish they added more spells, to justify my use of ALL my arsenal of spells and not mainly flash heal.

The problem i think happened with flash heal being to good (mana wise) to spam, leaving many (casual) holy priests spam it and get threw with it. The thing is, its cool to play like that if you play casual, but when you go to a end game encounter or want to continue a harder contest flash heal will not cut it (spaming it). A holy priest general shouldn't spam one button. But use a veraity of spells and abilities in order to support all the healers in the raid. Danner you have a very negative way of showing things or seeing things, but you almost sound as if 3 greater heals and i'm oom. I have been playing on the ptr, mana is not easy at all, yet i did not run out of mana (i did finish pretty low though meaning excess play of spam flash heal will probably cause you to go oom). When it came to healing meters, i was (and usually am) highest - especially when it comes to effective healing. This is by nature of me being the holy priests that drops the Gheal on tanks when needed and able to equally assist the shaman to keep the raid up (i will not say top off since i'm not a top off healer). I will shine only when things become problematic, hectic, i will shine when you need healing now and a big amount, i will not shine by spaming flash or any other spell. But iam sure i am capable of sorting myself a rotation of steady healing flow (meaning yes i did go patchey 25m with 3 healers, 1 discipline and 2 holy priests, and all went pretty smoothe).

If i will take example from the ptr: on one encounter the raid damage was very difficult to heal, since it was a burst AoE raid damage, so i stood and did nothing but renew and prom once in a while, use GS etc (has 1 min CD now if you use it to make healing easier), and when the raid damage came i blew 30% of my mana on it in like 5-8 secs. Most of this time i was "standing doing nothing", yet remove me and who will heal that burst? another example i have was a encounter that only tanks take damage (just like Patchwerk), the tank damage was steady except every Xx secs something Horrible would happen, so yes i wasn't spaming MT, i was keeping my renew up, proming, flash healing here and there for inspiration, just geting ready for that special ability to drop my 24k crit greater heal (yes i have test of faith) in 1.5 sec casting time (new serendipity) which would land just on time. And hell i can do that over and over again (since i had time to regen between).

Holy priests are a great healers for raid, and are amazing healers by themselves. Though we did get much love, i still feel "where's the love?" i still feel 'gimped' 'weak' 'holy priest step out for a dps' kind of healer. Maybe its the fact that my only new healing spell has a 10 min CD, my new mana regen tool doesn't even assure i get the mana. Maybe its the fact that spirit is buffed to others and i'm left 'losing' my spirit gear to others, maybe its the fact that tree's and paladins are so awesome. I really don't know. After this while on PTR i can definetly say: i'm not thrilled having a tree and plate nabadin just be generally better FOR raid's as healers, and in addition have it VERY easy mana wise. Yes you might 'think' that druids got it harder then us - you are wrong, 2 tree's on PTR spaming rejub/regrowth like mad (lame) not runing low on mana, preforming extremely high healing compared to any class, the only thing that got nerfed was their innervate on them selves (yes you might say i play with good players and they know how not to run oom, they are still using same ability and just spaming it and they are pro - not that hard to be pro apperantly. Ofc for once they shuted about raid healing and finnaly gave that role to holy priest, returning back to hoting tanks and assisting raid only if needed).

Tbh i would be excited to get Divine hymm as a AoE heal with 1 min CD or 30 min CD (style riptide just aoe), i would like to get SHORT cd's for PvE spells (since no one will 8 sec channel a holy spell in any pvp situation - unless no CS/pummel/mindfreaze/kick/shock ETC). Hymm of Hope - I don't mind channeling mana, the graphic is cool - and to what i saw and tested you have time to channel, but for myself. Hell i'm a selfish priest, holy priests are selfish - all our talents invovle me healing for more and not around me giving more to the raid, i don't have little totems near me, i don't increase all your stats (just stamina and spirit), and the best raid spell i have of 'i casted it, its there so benifit from it' is lightwell. And i am still waiting for lightwell to become a heal pet!!! (or atleast become something that doesn't require others to click).

Basically what i'm saying: Holy priests got alot of love, but still feel like their neglected due to many things: not being satisfied from own spells and CD's, feeling out-healed easily by other classes in area's we should be strong enough to compete, having some core and new abilities that have no usefullness to us or/and a very long CD.

[Danner]

Nikkita, that was a fantastic post.

I think I maybe am a bit overly pessimistic; as you say, our mana will be sufficient for most content, as long as you don't cut down on healers and allow us to play to our strength. But I also believe that blizzard failed in their "make mana a concern for all healers". Neither druids nor paladins will have to even think about their blue bar.

Maybe I can get my guild to try sartharion 3d next week on the PTR; I'd really like to see how my mana is holding up on heavy spam content... Patchwerk/10 with 2 healers could probably be a good benchmark too.

[[-Spiritus-]]

Nikkita, that was a fantastic post.

I think I maybe am a bit overly pessimistic; as you say, our mana will be sufficient for most content, as long as you don't cut down on healers and allow us to play to our strength. But I also believe that blizzard failed in their "make mana a concern for all healers". Neither druids nor paladins will have to even think about their blue bar.

Maybe I can get my guild to try sartharion 3d next week on the PTR; I'd really like to see how my mana is holding up on heavy spam content... Patchwerk/10 with 2 healers could probably be a good benchmark too.

I just ran a 8man Patchwerk/10 with 2 healers on live. I had a resto shaman, Imp Kings, regular BoW, Arc Int, Focus Magic, and Replenishment. I put on my DC:BD and Spirit World Glass. We took over 4min to clear. I never dropped below 80% mana while spamming Gheal on the hateful tank and throwing the free SoL procs in between. Considering that I never entered a OFSR state... doest this help your concern? (PS-- I have re-gemmed already for 3.1)

[Danner]

It's good data for live servers, SpiritusVex. But I'm really interested in hearing how the same deal holds up on the PTR.

On live I can chain-spam gheal (+SoL) for just below 6 minutes by using my own cooldowns only. That means: shadowfiend, trinket, 2xarcane torrent and a mana potion if needed. Usually it's not needed, but it's good to have a safety net in case i'm unlucky with procs.

On the PTR... self-spamming GHeal lasts me for 92-95 seconds with very little variance. Rudimentary theorycrafting states me I can make this last for a little more than 3 minutes given raidbuffs, up to 4 if I'm lucky. That might be sufficient for patchwerk, but I really need real data to be sure. If you can do the same feat on the PTR server as you just did on live, then I'll shut up and smile.

[[-Spiritus-]]

It's good data for live servers, SpiritusVex. But I'm really interested in hearing how the same deal holds up on the PTR.

On live I can chain-spam gheal (+SoL) for just below 6 minutes by using my own cooldowns only. That means: shadowfiend, trinket, 2xarcane torrent and a mana potion if needed. Usually it's not needed, but it's good to have a safety net in case i'm unlucky with procs.

On the PTR... self-spamming GHeal lasts me for 92-95 seconds with very little variance. Rudimentary theorycrafting states me I can make this last for a little more than 3 minutes given raidbuffs, up to 4 if I'm lucky. That might be sufficient for patchwerk, but I really need real data to be sure. If you can do the same feat on the PTR server as you just did on live, then I'll shut up and smile.

Honestly, I can't. I got into the PTR, but my guild wasn't as froggy about the idea of running pre-tests (which is a whole 'nother story). All I can say is, if live & 3.1 IFSR is the same (which has been certainly proven so), then I *should* see the same result from my example. Maybe with a little less efficiency due to the shaman/pally regen homogenization. I would assume that the new Holy Concentration in 3.1 would average out to similar regen to the live Imp-HC over a long fight. I actually uninstalled the PTR because of the whole guild thing, but if everyone would like another pair of eyes on this... I will reinstall for the benefit of all.

BTW, its fun to have folks talking about stuff w/o flames. Maybe we should have a sticky about regen/efficiency theorycrafing? Venara? Halp!

[Danner]

Got the exact same problem. It's easy enough to find guildies online for Sartharion 3D on the live server, but not on the PTR. It's just not a fight you PUG, and noone want to do the effort required to raid unless it's Ulduar. And by that time, the server usually crash

The IFSR regen is not the same, I'm afraid. The number on your charsheet is the same, but this is only a small part of the story.
On live you will also get cheaper heals thanks to serendipity. GHeals now effectively costs twice the mana.
You get free heals thanks to clearcasting. Every 6th heal is no longer free.
The combined package of SoL + clearcasting will eventually get your some accidental OOFSR time. This is a lot of mana lost over time
Plus, you can no longer add the manatide totem to your income. And this is another 100 MP5 out the window.

On the upside, shadowfiend now heals for 20% more (~25 MP5), and the new Holy Concentration, while worse than the old one, isn't completely hopeless. I still haven't seen any good uptime numbers on this one though. 100% is unrealistic, but 50% might be very doable... it will depend on style though.

[[-Spiritus-]]

Yeah, your right. When I did some self spam on ptr, I did notice a significant reduction in efficiency. Also, the uptime on the new HC, if I remember, was leaning more towards the 50% mark than 100%... though that was self-spam in a non-raid setting where I'm usually between 30-35% crit. Plus on my Patchwerk test I had my DC:BD/SpiWG equipped... and both are getting a colossal nerf 3.1.

Curious what one's crit and cast frequency has to be to get a theoretical 100% uptime on HC?

Given a cast every 1.6sec, and the 8sec duration, you will have 5 chances to refresh HC. Therefore, if the RNG was perfect, a 20% crit chance would keep a 100% uptime. Of course, RNG is never perfect. My math skills aren't up to the EJ standards, but is there a formula to calc the optimal crit% to maintain as near a 100% HC uptime as possible? At some point, too much crit would have extreme diminishing returns on HC uptime... so I'm curious what the "magic" number is.

I guess its just number crunches and speculations until we can drag our guilds into satisfying our lust for moar regenz. ;D

[Danner]

Following maths for the new holy concentration, done assuming some assumptions:

A Holy Concentration proc while under the holy concentration buff means the buff will refresh.
Holy Concentration lasts 8 seconds and increase spirit by 50% as far as regen is concerned.
Every crit will trigger Holy Concentration.
Our single target heals can trigger Holy Concentration (fheal, gheal, renew)
Binding heal give a double chance of triggering Holy Concentration. I'll disregard that in the calculations below.

I'll assume four different priests, casting a heal every 1.2 seconds, 2.5 seconds and 4 seconds. That should give us some different numbers for everything from high spammers to conservative priests.
I'll also consider 20%, 25%, 30% and 35% chance to crit.

--

For the calculation, one basically need to figure out the chance of not proccing the ability for X casts. 100% minus that chance is the chance of "at least one proc in X casts". The interesting X is the number of casts you can squeeze into the 8 seconds cast time, basically X = 8 / heals per second. Buff uptime will then be equal to the chance calculated. ... i think :P

20% / 1.2 sec: => 77.41% uptime
25% / 1.2 sec: => 83.31% uptime
30% / 1.2 sec: => 90.72% uptime
35% / 1.2 sec: => 94.34% uptime

20% / 2.5 sec: => 51.04% uptime
25% / 2.5 sec: => 60.17% uptime
30% / 2.5 sec: => 68.06% uptime
35% / 2.5 sec: => 74.80% uptime

20% / 4.0 sec: => 36.00% uptime
25% / 4.0 sec: => 43.75% uptime
30% / 4.0 sec: => 51.00% uptime
35% / 4.0 sec: => 57.75% uptime

--

Assuming I didn't do any stupid mistake, the uptime is somewhere around 66% of the time for average play. Crit and cast frequency both have a lot of impact on the uptime; you really need a bit of both to make this good. In order to have good uptime, you will need to spam a lot of heals. Which unfortunately is counterproductive in terms of gaining mana.

When it is up, the buff is worth between 150-250 MP5 depending on how much spirit you stacked. 66% of that is 100-165 MP5. It's a decent value given that it only costs 2 talent points, but considering it's the only manaregen in town, it's not really enough alone. By comparison, if you cast one gheal every 2.5 seconds, you will spend 2100 MP5. The old clearcasting alone basically gave you every 3-6th heal for free; which cut 350-700 MP5 off that manacost.

As such, I'm concluding that the new Holy Concentration is way worse than the old one, and in addition no longer gives you free OOFSR regen time.

[Kelesti]

Nice follow-through again, as usual Danner. However, I would like to make one point in rebuttal:

Stopcasting can still net you 3 seconds of supercharged Holy Concentration O5SR regen, so sure you might make "more use" of it by spamming, but that doesn't mean that's the most effective :P

[Healbot411]

I'll assume four different priests, casting a heal every 1.2 seconds, 2.5 seconds and 4 seconds. That should give us some different numbers for everything from high spammers to conservative priests.
I'll also consider 20%, 25%, 30% and 35% chance to crit.

Correct me if im wrong please.
Under these assumptions your assuming that the player is casting ONLY f-heal, g-heal or renew every 1.2, 2.5 and 4 seconds. Players casting any other spell in between would lower the % uptime considerably.

That seems retarded imo, since we excel at multi-target healing. As a personal preference I would choose renew over f-heal if HPS and HPM were roughly equal, but im still gonna use CoH, PoM and maybe PoH (now that its targetable). With all the other regen nerfs I don't think its OP to have any crit proc HC. At 100% uptime its as u said 150-250 mp5, not that OP considering its the only regen talent we have in Holy atm.

[dascia]

In my case 1 CoH gives me 88,24% chance for 1 crit (I have 30% crit raid buffed and the glyph for CoH), since I can use that every 6 sec I could cast 1 CoH with 88% crit and in between I use enough PoM's/ Flash heals etc. to up that chance to almost 100% for a proc. That alone will give me a lot more uptime then you currently calculated, while still casting conservative.

Then when you get the buff and you're low on mana just wait for 8 seconds till it's gone and then use another CoH, less then 12% chance you won't get the buff again. :P

The loss of mana saving from the old HC and serendipity will hurt, but I think it'll work out okay in the end.

Just don't (try to) overheal anymore and occasionally, when the situation makes it possible, just wait out the full duration of the buff, possible combine it with HoH if you're really low on mana and you should be fine after that.

[Danner]

Don't theorycraft at 3 am. :

I kinda forgot that the old Holy Concentration only had a 45% chance to proc off crits, it doesn't proc off all crits. Old holy concentration yielding 350-700 MP5 is thus wrong; it's only 45% of that: 135-350 Mp5. The new holy concentration is still subpar, but not "way worse"(tm). Just worse. Of course, I still haven't calculated in the accidental OOFSR time into the equation, which may just tilt it back into "way worse" territory :P

Kelesti:
You are quite right; but the OOFSR regen isn't all that anymore. Considering OOFSR regen was nerfed to 60%, the "supercharged" 1.5x regen will be basically 90% of what you are seeing right now on live. Priests don't usually get a lot og OOFSR time these days i'm afraid; our best way of getting it was removed when clearcasting went to play with Titanic. On the other hand, we might be forced to take OOFSR breaks these days...

Blitond:
Aye, another forgotten point. Gonna have to blame the 3am part on that screwup. Even if you cast a spell every 2.5 seconds, you will likely prioritize ProM and CoH (which is now quite nice on the PTR), not fheal/gheal. As such, the number of proccable casts within the 8 second window will be significantly reduced; let's pick a conservative number like 2. This will lower the average uptime by a whole lot. An average of 66% seems unlikely just now; will do some maths on this when I get home, but a quick estimation says around 50% uptime...

Dascia:
PoH, CoH and ProM can unfortunately not proc Holy Concentration. It sucks.

[nikkita]

I would like to say, i didn't like the old holy concentration, the new one is not better or more fun/cool, but it is more reliable.

Blizz stated (if no one recalls this i will search the blue's again to look for it) that they were not happy with chain procs of free casting. The truth is when going raid buffed i sit atm at around 35% - 40% crit, i reach a OS 3d's 25m, with 3 replenishers in raid, boomkin or ele shaman, kings (ofc), arcane int. No spirit buff atm (we don't have a discipline priest unless i feel like bubbling). standing on above 70% mana while healing a MT alone (we went 4 healers, i was on MT, the pala was on OT the shaman was on raid, the druid was on spam mode hots) - ofc i wasn't going greater heal / stop but using all my spells: prom, renew, sheild only before a breath, and abit of over healing there with flash and greater heal when the chuny is needed. And yet the Holy Concentration procs alot with a high crit rating (especially noticed if you ditched all haste and took mainly spirit/crit). This situation was not happening with lower level gear, the holy conc proc really did give you a few ooc regen. For me, atm on live, most of my greater heals, binding heals and flahs heals are free, most of the time i don't drop under 70-50% mana just cause of chaining holy conc. with sol. giving most of my mana being spent on Prom. I can understand that a proc of a clear casting that will allow you to 'use smartly' the proc and regen mana, but at the same time, in a 25m raid - with all the buffs i am almost on 40% crit acording to the log, allowing almost every greaterheal/flash heal to be a free mana. In addition another thing: gaining holy conc proc and casting binding heal will almost assure another holy conc. proc with 40% crit.

Yes the fsr dance with procs has changed on the ptr, you will no longer gain any free spell. You won't get a return from mana if you over heal. But again, it is far from "way worse" (danner chear up man). For one, holy conc on ptr, with the same gear had almost 100% uptime. Its not even hard to get it to proc (though i would like to see prom as part of it, or a longer uptime of the buff like 15 secs instead of 8 secs). I think your calculations are not exactly correct, yet i never do calculations i /combat log, then phrase it and analize. But making a 'calculation' of how much will the uptime of this talent will be is missing the idea of the talent and missing its real flavor.

The new holy conc is not about procs, clearcasting and whats the chance i'll get it. I would look at it as a buff i will have 80% of the time up - considering i cast 80% of the encounters time. What i noticed about holy conc - i get to 1058 OOC regen when it procs - and even more with regen trinkets based on spirit (yes the mp5s in the fsr is around 100-200 max depending on spirit, but it will scale as you get more spirit), why am i saying this: no one has a high OOC regen - it was 'nerfed'. But we still have it threw a talent. a druid siting on 500-600 ooc regen without a way to increase it, when we still have a high OOC regen. Ofc again you can say 'stand and do nothing', but as i said a few posts above you don't need to chain cast. Even when solo MT healing (patchey 25m), i did not run oom. The huge benifit of holy conc is the ability to give us back the insane OOC regen we had, meaning now without a free cast we will have to wait here and there 5 secs to gain our OOC regen. Almost like in vanila. What i'm trying to say is: this talent look dull on paper, hell this talent is dull and boring ingame. But it gives you a huge benifit that druids for example don't have. Our OOC regen is highest atm due to this talent, and what i extremely like about this talent is its flexability: meaning if i decide to continue healing with the holy conc - my mp5s will still be increased - i don't have to wait here and there to 'see' or 'feel' the difference mana wise. Meaning: on short encounters you will be able to chain cast without a problem, your mp5 is increased in addition to the fact that almost every class brings replenishment. On the longer encounter, mana managment will step in, where you will take short breaks with the buffs.

Just like many i guess, i clicked on suggestions on holy conc. and asked to have Prom being added to it (i also asked renew to be added to serenditpiy) in the excuse of: prom and renew are core abilities and should have same synergy as flash heal (atm the spell with best synergy, yet its still not the one i use the most or want to use the most - makes me go ???), and ofc i was also dissapointed from the holy conc, under estimating how much it benifits me, only after a while i got a nice QQ from the druid whispering "wtf? whats your OOC regen" to find out he has 500-600 and i still have above 1k (yes i did smile irl when he went 'how they nerfed ooc regen'), this made me notice the fact that OOC regen was 'nerfed' which was the first reason why holy conc was changed - cause of chain procs, yet i was still runing around ptr procing all the time holy conc and having the same OOC regen i have on live, just a higher mp5s then live.

Yes holy conc on ptr is boring and no fun. But it has different benifits. This will be our 'mana regen' talent, that will allow us to last longer by being smarter.

To dascia: CoH doesn't not proc holy conc, but surge of light (a free flash heal), criting with coh won't give you much except a free flash heal, same goes to prom. The spells that can proc Holy conc atm on ptr are: Renew, Greater Heal, Binding heal and flash heal. I think you got something wrong: you said you lose mana from losing the old holy conc. but the old holy conc didn't effect directly your mana regen and also didn't proc from CoH. The old holy conc allowed you to cast with no mana cost (and hasten yourself), it proced from Greater heal, flash and binding heal. It did not increase you mana regen, but allowed you to stay OOC regen for X secs in order to regen. The new Holy conc directly increases you mana regen by 50% - this effects both your OOC regen and your mp5s.

I still think Prom should be added to Holy conc. and renew should be added to serendipity (made these suggestions on the ptr).

[Danner]

Maybe I am in need of a little cheering up.

But I do want to pull my share. For the hard fights, I need to pull my share or I will simply be sidelined for the hard fights. And wanding for 50% of the raidtime is not it.

Having 1k OOFSR regen is not really useful when you're not OOFSR while that happens, and the cost of our heals eating up the benefit entirely. Kelesti talked about the supercharged regen, but that's reduced to 3 seconds worth in the best case. Sure, you may go get that and it will add up to a lot of regen over time, but it comes at the cost of not healing. And a healer not healing is just as useless as a DPSer not DPSing. You can get away with it on farm content, but what about hard modes?

--

Also, your numbers are not possible unless you spam nothing but flash heal.

If you want 80% HC uptime, you will still need on average a proc every 10 seconds. You can get off 6.66 GCDs in that timeslot.
1.43 of these GCDs will be used for ProM under optimal uptime, because ProM is still your top priority heal and you should cast it at every possibility.
2 of these GCDs will be CoH under maximal usage (and face it, CoH on the PTR is kinda neat. You want to use that one).
You will likely get at least 1 SoL proc from these two spells, which will cost you another GCD.
That leaves 2.24 GCDs in the 10 second window.
If you use these for FHeal, you will spend (critrate=40%) of these as SoL procs, which will be subtracted from your remaining GCDs.
This leaves you with 1.34 GCDs capable of actually proccing holy concentration.

And at a 40% critrate, you will only have a 49.5% chance of actually proccing Holy Concentration (on average) in these GCDs.
If you want to maintain a 80% uptime, you simply need to drop something else from your schedule so that you get at least 3.2 GCDs available. Not casting CoH ever will do this for you, but do you really want to drop one of your best heals? Adding ProM to the talent will also achieve your goal, so here's to that happening! :

Of course, that was highly idealized numbers. In reality, you will also do some time waiting for things to be hurt, spend time re-targetting, throw in the odd mana regen cooldown, shield, PoH etc. There will be downtime, skewing the numbers further.

--

That said... I do appreciate your sentiment. I agree that a steady income is better than the RNG slavery we are stuck with now. I just wish I had some slightly better reliability than what I fear I will have come 3.1.

[dascia]

Dascia:
PoH, CoH and ProM can unfortunately not proc Holy Concentration. It sucks.

Crap.. I was confused with Surge of Light which does allow crits from all spells... Guess I shouldn't post either late at night. :-X

[rellex]

in response to some of the earlier posts about set bonuses...

because 5% mana off Gheal is soooo amazing for Disc :/

they make benefits that both specs CAN benefit off of, but inevitably, some will be better for certain specs than others :/


What they should have done (or could have), is make it something that benefits gheal and Penance since most priests use one or the other, but rarely both

[[-Spiritus-]]

@ Danner: Yup. that was what I was looking for. I guess instead of a "mechanic," we should just look at HC3.1 as another regen trinket. Maybe then it'll seem sexier...

@ Kelesti: Yeah, you can get the 3sec supercharge...at the expense of not healing for a minimum of 4.9sec (clipped non-hasted PoH) up to a maximum of 8sec (instant cast). Good to know that window is there, and I will be looking for it when I can, but it would seem cumbersome to obtain. But if you *can* pull it off... its like having a 11sec HC squeezed into 8sec.

@ Rellex: We Disco & Holy priests need to share the love!!! Mainly... because a lot of us will become both anyway here soon! Also... there are tons of things that can be done that would benefit both healing specs well:

Tier1: (.8.) Set: Each spell you cast can trigger an Epiphany, increasing your mana regeneration by 24 for 30 sec.
Tier2: (.3.) Set: -0.1 sec to the casting time of your Flash Heal spell.
Tier4: (.4.) Set: Each time you cast Flash Heal, your next Greater Heal cast within 15 sec has its casting time reduced by 0.1, stacking up to 5 times.

And thats just from the past. You are right...certainly their are other, more creative solutions out their. For instance... look at the mage tier:

(2) Set: Your Arcane Blast, Frostbolt, Frostfire Bolt, and Fireball spells have a chance to grant you 350 spell power for 15 sec.
(4) Set: You have a chance for the effects of your Missile Barrage, Hot Streak, or Brain Freeze talent not to be consumed when you cast the spells which benefit.

*POOF*

(2) Set: Your Penance, Flash Heal. and Greater Heal spells have a chance to grant you INSERT REGEN MECHANIC HERE for 15sec.
(4) Set: You have a chance for Circle of Healing & Penance to not enter a cooldown state after casting.
OR
(4) Set: You have a chance after casting Circle of Healing & Penance to enter a state of Holy Badassery(tm) where the cost of your healing spells are reduced by 5% for 6sec.

or the warlock set for something more vanilla:

(2) Set: Increases the damage done by your Unstable Affliction and Immolate spells by 20%.
(4) Set: Increases the critical strike chance of your Shadow Bolt and Incinerate spells by 5%.

*POOF*

(2) Set: Increases the healing done by your Renew, Flash Heal, and Prayer of Mending spells by XXXX%.
(4) Set: Increases the critical strike chance of your Circle of Healing, Prayer of Healing, and Penance spells by XXXX%.

Blizzard already balances multiple trees within one set. The bonuses on the Tier 8 set scream a lack of creativity or caring.

[Selerious]

Part of the problem I think. Is that the changes to spells and talents in 3.1 ended up making Holy priests extremely powerful healers. So to limit that they at the moment have left our our mana regen low to try to balance how powerful our healing can be until they come up with a solution (maybe?).

However all of our spells are costly and so this hurts the Holy spec overall unless we are very conservative with our mana usage. I'm hoping they find a way to fix this, but at the moment they would have to change how our healing spells can be used if they gave us more mana regen to keep from making us overpowered as we are already the most versatile of the healing classes.

Such a pain.. but they give us no info so we can only speculate what their plans for the Holy/Disc specs are. They say they don't want to lock them into MT/Raid healers. Though so far that is exactly what they have done in 3.1

[Kelesti]

@ Kelesti: Yeah, you can get the 3sec supercharge...at the expense of not healing for a minimum of 4.9sec (clipped non-hasted PoH) up to a maximum of 8sec (instant cast). Good to know that window is there, and I will be looking for it when I can, but it would seem cumbersome to obtain. But if you *can* pull it off... its like having a 11sec HC squeezed into 8sec.

Inner Focus still costs no mana and so does its' spell, letting you stretch it even farther when you really really need to. :O

Also, those tier sets are kinda nice <3