Renew vs POH -debate-

[Auraye]

@ Kryptiki

I wasn't the first to take it to that level. Go back to the Disc thread - this has been going on for a couple of weeks. I'm not saying it is OK that I have said a thing or two, but I don't spend half of a page insulting someone. I'll admit that it was very weak of me to let him get to me. So like I said yesterday, I'm making it a point to try to uninvolve myself. However, if he's going to write another insult post, it should at least be in response to something current, or better yet - find his happy place. I'm not going to be trolled anymore.

I would never deliberately avoid responding to things that anyone says to me. Considering that I'm nearly always doing something else at work at the same time, alt-tabbing screens frequently, having people come in my office, etc., before I can ever complete a paragraph, let alone entire post, yes, things will get missed, especially since I'm not using the quote function anymore since I was criticized for it. If there is anything in particular that anyone addresses with me in a respectful manner, I will do my best to respond. However since last evening, I decided that I will not waste my time dignifying a wall of text that is written to be demoralizing more than intellectually challenging, with a response. Is it giving in? No. I lost track of time and was late to raid yesterday because I was so compelled to defend myself. It's not worth it if it's negatively impacting my life.

Another factor in this decision is that there is only so much room on these forums before people will pass out from reading walls of text. I started condensing my responses (or have been trying to!) since that Disc thread, quite purposefully, since I was criticized for responding to every tidbit. Do you want to watch people argue for 10 pages? Probably not.

Exactly my point of survival - that's the biggest point of contention with what Harky says for the past couple of weeks that I started reading this priest forum. He acts like everything is black and white and purely HPS, no consideration for RNG, no consideration for the difference in damage and healing team makeups when making comparisons, with little regard for who lives, etc. That's what got under my skin in the first place, when someone acts like they know everything, tunneling on meters, and insulting other people that disagree.

You know what's funny? I had more base mana during TOC because I still used blended gems. I wasn't as practiced at some fight mechanics to maximize my Rapture returns then, so I still needed it. You'll have that much mana much sooner than you expect.

My wasteful and lazy gimmick/game is healing heroics using one spell the entire time, whether it's Holy Nova or PoH. XD

[Zeuq]

I've read this whole thread and I'm still have trouble trying to figure out exactly what the real issue is here. Sure, Renew spam filling works fine in most cases, but to say PoH isn't useful... I'm just not seeing the logic behind the arguments. I can find plenty of places where it makes sense to use PoH as a filler. Sure, you occassionally have random alignments where a 3-4 people in a group could use it, but let's even ignore those. For instance, after a spore on Festergut, I can usually get two PoHs off on each ranged group with minimal overheal, or on BQL, when two Pacts end up in melee (which seems to happen quite often, actually), or on Putricide after a Green Slime explodes. And all of those situations are without even considering the HPS gain from any Serendipity stacks. And, of course, besides all of those, it's still awesome for burst healing too.

Obviously, as others have mentioned, if you're running with lots of healers, it's hard to find places to use it because it'll likely get sniped before it lands. Then again, poor reaction time or low levels of Haste can also contribute to making it less useful.

[Kryptiki]

@ Kryptiki

I wasn't the first to take it to that level. Go back to the Disc thread - this has been going on for a couple of weeks. I'm not...

My wasteful and lazy gimmick/game is healing heroics using one spell the entire time, whether it's Holy Nova or PoH. XD

Just so I'm being clear, I've very much enjoyed the discussion on PoH vs. Renew, it's a fine point in healing, and the points that have been made are stimulating (and I don't see anyone being dumb, just VERY frustrated). I like to try to finesse my healing as much as possible, which is where Harky is coming from, and I agree with you, that, in the end with awesome gear, it's not necessary. You can, and I do mean you, Auraye, brute-force it MUCH more easily and much for longer than I will be able to, given my current mana levels. There's practically no reason for you to play as Harky would, which I think you've stated a few times. I like healing more than damage due to the HUGE gray area for efficiency, plus it's just fun.

[harky]

Kryptiki, you also need to take it with a grain of salt. He does have good Disc gear, yes, but look at his gear from the perspective of a Holy Priest and it's rather bad. PoH is very clumsy to use with that haste level. PoH is actually very easy to work in if you're well geared for Holy as you can see from comments from people like Zeuq, myself and others. If you're haste capped, which is what Holy goes for nowadays, PoH is only a 2 second cast. Compare to someone at only 550'ish haste which will have a 2.37s cast. That makes it much harder to use and that's why many people are stuck in the Ulduar/Naxx mindset where they believe PoH is useful only when there's a big predictable spike of damage, instead of how it should be used in ICC which is just as a strong filler spell.

[Auraye]

Krypt, you used the term brute-force. I'm intrigued. Are you a geek too?

Harky, whose gear are you referring to? I hope not me, because I'm a disc purist, and my haste level is quite good for PoH anyway. How could you forget that disc gets 25% additional haste from Borrowed Time, and that we have Power Infusion?

[harky]

This thread is in regard to Renew vs Prayer of Healing, which is not a concern as Discipline. Thus the grain of salt needed when trying to look at your stats and how they would be applied to a Holy playstyle question. IE; Renew vs PoH.

[Auraye]

Just because I'm not holy doesn't mean I don't know what I'm talking about. It's just math, and I used to play holy.

Besides, I'm pretty sure that he was talking about my gear with regard to the size of my mana pool, not how it would affect playing Renew spam vs. PoH as holy.

You know that disc uses Renew and PoH, too. I'm not excluded from discussion.

[Kryptiki]

I know Auraye is a disc-priest, which is why his gear made me drool. I had on the fringe of my thought process that PoH was a holy-centric spell, which caused me a little confusion when looking at the overall argument between the two of you. I play, currently, as a discipline priest, I leveled through battle grounds and instances, and I can count on one hand how many times I appropriately used PoH. That being said, the healing throughput required in lower level instances is a joke, unless the tank and DPS are all a pack of morons, so I was very interested to see how I could weave PoH into my healing routine (I will not say rotation, we don't really have one, as far as I can tell). Also, BG and arena healing are very much triage healing and I have no haste, so a nice big heal like PoH will probably not land in time to save anyone, and it seems clunky when there's a TON of people around. So, any advice anyone has to offer on that subject is interesting.

As disc in raids I basically keep PoM on cool down, shield people taking damage, renew people who are only slightly injured, keep an extra eye on the tank, throw big heals if someone is going down (penance, GHeal), flash heal folks who could use topping off, PI the coolest mage/ele shaman there, and, if possible, dot up the boss. This is shockingly similar to how I heal BG's, mostly because my gear is not up to snuff for tank healing at the moment.

Auraye: I am a huge geek. I have previously done work in CFD and can make ANY cluster crash, burn, weep, and beg to have a magnet put to its hard drives.

edit: Oh yeah, I'm also a ravenous dispel bot, both offensively and defensively.

[harky]

He was referring to your mana pool in regard to sustainability when spamming PoH. And if you're using Renew in the same way that Holy does you're not doing your job as Discipline. You would need to compare PW:S to PoH, not Renew to PoH. Renew as Disc should be reserved for tanks.

If you want to make it a math question, actually show some. You've done nothing but avoid the math thus far, so go for it. The math is very simple. You need roughly 4% less over-heal on a cast for PoH to beat Renew on HPS.

Again: Renew has half the execute time of Prayer and Prayer has just under double the healing per execute. Renew is back-loaded which makes its over-healing amount best looked at as an average, while Prayer is primarily front-loaded which makes its over-healing predictable. If the situation arises that you can cast Prayer for lower over-healing than the average over-healing of Renew in a specific fight then Prayer will exceed Renew's healing on that specific execute time. So while Prayer is situational it is still useful and should be used in many cases.

[Auraye]

Harky, even HE knows that I'm not renew spamming as disc. You know this too. Why are you talking to me like I'm an idiot for doing so as disc? Furthermore, why are you dragging disc into the Renew vs. PoH discussion now? This thread is about holy use of the two.

Like I said a million times, along with several other people on this forum, which you continue to ignore, your math is flawed because you ignore many variables, such as the amount of damage taken (i.e. were people standing in fire in one fight, and not the next). It is not a black or white matter because people and the game are unpredictable.

You still sound like a broken record, are following me around on the forum trying to troll me. Go do something else already. I'm trying to help other people, and you're following me around trying to get under my skin. Get over it, get over yourself...

Now where's the ignore feature for this troll?

Krypt:
I could only dream of being capable of such destruction. LOL

[harky]

First, read what you're replying to. It's a very important concept. You continue to post things in reply directly to me without actually showing any ability to read and understand what is posted. Thus I sound like a broken record because you still have yet to address what's being debated.

Second, you should be monitoring your over-healing on a fight by fight basis so that you know when to use PoH properly. You have control of 83% of PoH and 15% of Renew. It is very easy to predict how much over-healing a PoH cast will produce and compare that to how your Renew is faring in a particular fight.

Third, you have posted absolutely no math regarding anything in this entire post, yet claim that it supports your comments. The math is there, it has been there since page one. If you want to 'help people' then disprove that math. Good luck.

Finally? You need to stop being so defensive. This has nothing to do with you as a person and if you need to detach your ego from the debate because it has no place. It only serves to make your posts less useful because when you do make good points people may not believe them when your other posts are emotional.

[Zeuq]

Auraye, don't take it personally. I think harky can come across a little curt sometimes, as can many others on this forum (I'm sure myself included), but it's important to realize that this is a text-only medium and a lot of the subtlety of conversation is lost in that. Further, both of you are getting a little frustrated because I think you're talking past eachother because you're focusing on different aspects of the argument. Perhaps if we lay out some important points of the argument, we can agree or disagree on them individually and figure out where the disagreement is rather than just laying out a case and people getting frustrated because they don't agree, but don't know why.

For instance, one of the points that a Renew spammer might argue is that Renew is more pure HPS than PoH. I don't think anyone is disputing that. The dispute arises in arguing that higher HPS means that the spell is strictly superior. One of the points that harky has mentioned specifically is that eHPS is actually the important value, and that the eHPS of PoH is more easily manipulated than the eHPS of Renew is. The main point that the pro-PoH side is trying to make is that it can be an effective filler if the Holy Priest is conscious of the amount of overheal it will produce relative to the execute time (ie, how many Serendipity stacks he has) and make the appropriate decision based on that.

Further, the utility of each spell depends on other factors like damage patterns, and healing composition. For instance, I find that PoH is just less effective when raiding with a Resto Shaman, because there's more likely to be greater variance in the health levels within a given group and I'm just better off tossing a Renew on the people that need topping off; whereas Druids will tend to keep a whole group much closer in health, meaning I can easily judge how much overhealing PoH will result in.

And yes, you're aboslutely correct that it is very situational. I've had times where I adjusted my use of PoH and saw varying results in either direction. Sometimes I've found I'm using it too much, and others I've found better results when I used it a little more often. In either case, I think a Holy Priest that completely neglects it outside of burst healing situations can see an improvement in his throughput by learning the situations when PoH can be more effective and taking advantage of it. Similarly, a Priest that tries to weave it into his healing without understanding when it is and isn't effective can see a decrease in his effective healing.

[Kryptiki]

Zeuq, excellent post. So, for Disc, where, if ever, does PoH really shine? I like my priest for all of the tools available to me, but am at a loss on occasion on how to effectively use all of them. I can see an good use for everything except PoH. This is an open question, and is not just for Zeuq.

[Auraye]

It's not a debate when you insult people and talk to them like they're garbage, even when you're wrong, which you'd never admit to. Will it help for me to agree with you and say I'm an idiot who can't read, who has no grasp of simple english, mathematics, or priesting?

You're incapable of debate without making it personal, by insulting the other person. That is why I'm frustrated: you're a complete jerk and a troll to boot.

So you're a jerk, and I'm an idiot. Marry me?

[harky]

Zeuq, excellent post. So, for Disc, where, if ever, does PoH really shine? I like my priest for all of the tools available to me, but am at a loss on occasion on how to effectively use all of them. I can see an good use for everything except PoH. This is an open question, and is not just for Zeuq.

It's actually just as easy to work in PoH as Discipline as it is for Holy. Most don't because Discipline is typically used in setups with more healers overall. The PoH glyph is heavily recommended to Disc for that reason. The idea is simply to look out for people at low health and then toss a PoH into that group with BT's haste. Back in Ulduar there were even strategies revolving around using PW:S on low-health targets, then PoH and going back and forth in that manner. With a pretty normal level of haste you can be tossing out a 1.7-1.8s PoH.

And nice post Zeuq, though I take objection to the use of the word curt. I'd like to think I'm quite diffuse in my exposition... though I am pretty curt, aren't I. :'(

[Kryptiki]

The idea is simply to look out for people at low health and then toss a PoH into that group with BT's haste.

Ah, that makes sense. Low health group, not just a low health individual, nice. Guess I got to redo my unit/raid frames to make more sense.

[harky]

What I used to do is make all my raid frames a single color, then setup a 'low health' coloring that will draw your eye. I don't do it anymore because I'm just more used to using it now, but it certainly helps to have a visual cue beyond just full or half full bars. Your eyes tend to pick up color and patterns much better than just the size of the bars. But yeah, the key with PoH is always looking for multiple people in a group that all need healing. Even as Discipline glyphed PoH is very, very strong in ICC on a few fights. Namely Blood Queen, Festergut, Sindragosa, Putricide (P3) and LK (time with Infest). LK it's not as important because it's not a particularly healing intensive fight, so you may not use it nearly as much, but the other aura fights it certainly is. Fun note on Sindragosa; You can ignore LOS problems from tombs in P3 with PoH.

[Auraye]

Krypt, that's a very thought-provoking question. IMO, I can't say that PoH ever really "shines" for disc, because holy's PoH is stronger than ours in power, more mana efficient, and has a greater range. I don't can't think of a good answer, except I know one when it could eventually lead in a raid wipe: don't cast on Anub'Arak!

I usually use it as clean up after Putricide HM ooze explosion, or time the landing on an unshielded group for infest on LK.

[Bigslick]

IMO, I can't say that PoH ever really "shines" for disc, because holy's PoH is stronger than ours in power, more mana efficient, and has a greater range.

While it may not be as frequently used by disc, remember that difference in raw healing is generally made up for by a fairly sizable Divine Aegis which doesn't go to overheal in aura fights, and the mana efficiency isn't really an issue at ToC+ gear levels.

[harky]

Disc makes up for the lack of Healing Prayers by having stronger overall mana efficiency than Holy. So while all Holy Priest's will have cheaper PoH casts the Disc Priest will have a more stable mana pool in general and more mana to work with. There is a decent Disc build that drops Imp. FH in favor of going going for Holy Reach, but no it's not possible to get Healing Prayers as Discipline.