[Priest / Holy] The value of Intellect

[Danner]

I've covered the gains frmo HoH. It's a very experimental number, but it's there, under gains from active cooldowns

[supa]

A great way to cover all stats would be runed in reds, reckless in yellows, and seer's in blues. You get every stat (sp, haste, int, and sp) while maintaining bonus', regen, and throughput. Intellect is nice, but from what I've seen getting too much of it leaves you with a lot of mana at the end of fight. It makes a huge difference too gemming for it (leaving you with even more mana). Yes it is the superior regen stat but too much of it actually just leaves you with mana to blow.

[harky]

What you're describing is along the lines of 'balanced stats' supporters. The problem is that only works as a general idea. It does not work with specific gear sets and it's certainly not a good overall gemming strategy. If you have optimal Holy pieces Haste loses a lot of priority. If you're stuck with a lot of Crit gear then that isn't true and haste can be a great idea. There are a lot of specific gearing concerns that people need to assess. The times when a gem set you're describing would be good are very rare. The reason is that any set of real gear will have its priorities shifted one way or the other.

That's why the current Core stat + Hybrid off gemming strategies work so well. You have a core stat that you want the most of, so you gem around that stat. If your top priority is haste then SP/Haste in red, Haste in yellow and Haste/Spirit in blue is going to be the best setup. If your top priority is regen then SP/Int, Int and Int/Spirit are used. The idea is to use the best gem in every socket. The cases where pure Haste is best in yellow are semi-common (but much rarer than Int). The same goes for SP in red. However, what you're suggesting is a situation where SP in Red and Haste in Yellow are both optimal simultaneously. That situation is neither common, or expected to actually occur within game.

Throughput-SP: SP, SP/Haste, SP/Spirit
Thoughput-Haste: SP/Haste, Haste, Haste/Spirit
Regen: SP/Int, Int, Int/Spirit

There are more strategies, but those are the best general purpose gemming setups.

[supa]

I would argue that there is a core stat to that set-up. It is sp. Seer's will give 2.5 sp, and the other say how much sp you would get directly on them. In a way I'd say that there is a core stat there, while you are balancing the other stats too. Although it does depend on your gear, I agree with that. Maybe you have haste you like and instead gem 12 sp 10 int instead of 12 sp 10 haste. Maybe you don't like the regen and want to gem 12 sp, 10 spirit or just overwrite it with 23 sp. Things change depending on your gear but that is the ideal balance set of gems focused mostly around sp.

[Karlusdavius]

If you have any kind of passive regen trinkets (Solace etc.) then your regen will be coming from them + Replenishment. Geming spirit is generally a bad idea. The only socket i would put a Sp/Spirit gem into is a helm. The only piece of gear that gives a +9 bonus to spell power. Putting the hybrid gem into that socket equates into +23 spell power and a way to active your meta (which should be IED).

Spirit got nerfed pretty hard, Holy concentration doesn't really make up for that loss. Spirit on gear is a great thing don't get me wrong. You want some spirit. But the marginal gains you get from using hybrid spirit gems just arn't worth it.

[Maxpowr]

The math behind mana regen is 'fuzzy' at best.

Sure there are general formulas of translating stats like Spirit and Int into MP5, but when you start throwing things like shadowfiend, HoH, meta gem, tailor embroidery and other procs into the equations; the math becomes too complex and you begin to overanalyze the situation.

My general advice, stack int until you feel comfortable with your mana regen aka you are not OOM before the end of the fight. If you finish a fight with more than 10% mana, your mana pool is too big or your regen is too high. You would be better off gemming for throughput (SP and/or Haste).

[harky]

As odd as it sounds it's quite possible that you are not gearing too heavily for regen if you're using Int as your primary regen stat and end fights at 50%+ mana. The reason is that while yes, you have 'wasted' mana, your mana is actually a part of your mana regeneration as well. It's quite possible to end a fight at 40% mana constantly, think you have too much Int and regem to have maybe 150 less mana, only to find yourself now going OOM. The reason? You were zeroing out mana regen before. Burts of high mana usage drove mana down steadily, but normal mana consumption slowly brought it back. By reducing Int you now were not regaining mana during normal usage. That then creates a constant deterioration and you become high risk for going OOM.

This is because while your starting mana pool is a part of your overall mana regen it is not the largest part. Instead your maximum mana is the largest part. That may sound contradictory, but it isn't. Paladins are the best example of this. They're not stacking Int to get a very high mana pool. They're getting a very high mana pool to increase their effective MP5. I've looked at parses in the past and calculated how much mana I spent on my Priest and found I was often spending 3-4 times as much mana as my maximum mana. When reducing my maximum mana that would then require much higher MP5 to produce, while also reducing my MP5 via a smaller maximum mana figure. It becomes a very dangerous thing to consider if you're not completely sure of what you're doing.

General rule of thumb: If you struggle to drive your mana down, you have too much regen, or too little haste.

[Danner]

Another case of "having too much mana" might simply be because of wrong spell usage. A holypriest spamming Flash Heal will have a very hard time running OOM. And at the same time, he will have a very low HPS, especially if he was spamming renew instead. But - sometimes (and particularly in ICC), fheal spam is very useful.

It's also very easy to overdo the fheal spamming, and that will hurt you.

I'm leaning in the direction that holypriests should use their big heals a lot. It's what separates us from FoL-spamming paladins when it comes down to it. Prayer of Healing is damned expensive, but it's also offering a damned lot of healing done. And it's not hard to find a usecase for the spell. If you hold back and primarily stick to fheal, sure, you won't need mana much. But if you are going for PoH as your goto heal, no amount of manaregen will suffice.

[Upayidance]

The value of int has diminished so much, you get enough spirit/int on gear purely if youre up in ICC gear, its much more important to go for haste. Haste will ofc reduce your cast time, but your GCD aswell, which is important as on most fights ive found it 100% more effective to do PoM CoH 4Renews and then repeating (Twin Valks or Blood Queen wich have a non increasing yet steady aoe damage). This will aswell keep your holy conc up atleast 80% of the time, giving your regen such a boost from your spirit.

I used to gem Int/Spirit in all my sockets possible back in ulduar, but as your gear improves you WILL see a much more profitable increase in regen from spirit than from intellect. Well, i guess it works two ways, since maximising your mana with Int will give you a boost from Fiend/Hymn/Repl./Tides etc, but with higher gear you will want to go for spellpower before either of those stats anyway.

To get back on topic, Bad gear = Int better. Better and better gear = Spirit better and better. (IMO)

To get off topic, i want to slice every single holypriest using Int trinkets! :P

[harky]

You should reread the OP. This isn't a throughput versus regen discussion, it's purely a regen discussion. Also, your opinion on Int vs Spirit is nice and all, but it's wrong. There is no point in attainable gear at which spirit gives higher regen than Int except for OO5S regen, which is by far the smallest portion of your overall regen model. Oh and Holy Conc's up-time is determined primarily by your crit rating. It's also very hard to model properly. And to think I sometimes wonder why new Priests get so confused.

[Svn]

In regards to the original topic of this forum, what if (and I'm just spit-balling here) you're in a ten man with no ret pally or shammy, is int still better?

[Danner]

I'm not really sure what the ret paladin does for you (Replenishment?). But without replenishment, the value of int is severely lessened. To the point where spirit is on top.

And I'm even less sure what the shaman is doing (blood lust?).

[Kelesti]

It may have something to do with Mana Tide, or even to a lesser scale whether Blessing of Wisdom/Mana Spring factor into buffs that would affect the priority of Intellect versus other regen stats (like a "minimum mp5 rating" or something?). I dunno, pulling at straws here.

[harky]

In regards to the original topic of this forum, what if (and I'm just spit-balling here) you're in a ten man with no ret pally or shammy, is int still better?

Most theory is done around well rounded groups, but yes with a very sub-optimal group that has no Replenishment, lots of missing blessings and specific healer setups then Spirit can be a decent regen stat. It will still lose to raw MP/5, but it will break even with Int as Holy. That said, in those cases you will also have more mana problems in general and will be forced into using your cooldowns more efficiently, which could very well make Int better anyway, especially if you're not using excessive healers (only a couple fights in ICC10 need three healers).

[Eletharin]

At 1293 intellect, sqrt(int) * 0.005575 = 1.

First, sqrt(1293) * 0.00575 = 0.20676

This, assuming you blow shadowfiend and HoH on the pull and on cooldown then adjusting with a set % factor, assuming shaman for mana tide, assuming other raid buffs, assuming 7.5 minute encounter ...

While the math is fuzzy, the ideas are rock solid. As a springboard for critical thinking this post is amazing, as a concrete analysis of the relative strengths of spirit and intellect it doesn't hold much water. The reason it doesn't work is not a fault of the poster, but rather just that there is no way to provide concrete analysis of spirit and intellect since everything is so inter-related and variable.

Again great work, and an excellent read for new and experience priests alike, just a disclaimer letting them know the from the hip assumptions you'll be making as you go along may not accurately reflect the truth of their particular circumstance would be nice.

[Danner]

Eletharin:

Humm.. Ah. Thanks for pointing that out. I forgot to multiply by 5 due to it being mana per 5 seconds, and lef the 5 hanging in the next few calculations - then seemingly silently removing it. That's a black mark. I'll fix it up so that it makes mathematical sense; but it's mostly just a writing error. It doesn't impact the end line.

In general, the math is admittedly very fuzzy. It's just impossible to do much without assuming things, so I've just taken some typical numbers (and tried to not skew them in my favour too much). When I claim int is this and that much better, with three significant decimals, the mathematician in me wants to smack myself silly, considering the shaky foundation the calculation is based on. Luckily, the mathematician in me is very small and can't hurt me too much. ^^

But - I'm pretty certain about the principle. Int is better than spirit for your average holypriest. And that point got through. As such I'm happy for now, and can only hope that cataclysm brings a somewhat simpler formula.

If that doesn't happen, I'm going to have to do what zusterke did, and make a calculator. Then again, his kinda does the job, even if it IMO doesn't quite make int as good as it should be.

[Upayidance]

I have still allways experianced a better regen from increasing my spirit rather than increasing my int, so for me its (personal)fact that spirit a better regen stat than int. However it would be intresting to se some graphs and stuff with regen values with a gear interval crossreferenced with different types of regen, speaking of HoH, Fiends, Tides. I wish i was good at that stuff.

[Danner]

That is an interesting observation, Upayidance, because I've seen the opposite. So I'd be very interested in knowing just which parameters you are working under:

- What are your int and spirit levels while raidbuffed?
- Uptime of holy concentration
- FSR time? Are you pausing often in your casting?
- Any missing raidbuffs? Replenishment, f.ex?
- What is your gearing strategy? Max Spellpower? Spirit/Haste? Spirit/Crit? Mix of everything?
- How often do you use shadowfiend? Every boss? Twice / boss?
- Are you in a manatide totem group?
- Blood elf Arcane Torrent available?
- Anything else special going on?

[tatienne]

- Blood elf Arcane Torrent available?

I'll have a hard time seeing this happening since it's a human holypriest according to the banner in her signature.

[Danner]

OKay, that was just unobservant of me :P