The Usefullness of Greater Heal in the Holy Priest's Arsenal

[Curana]

So I recently got in a fight with my druid guild leader as to the usefulness of Greater Heal as a tool. I have always read that it should only be used in emergencies but my GL thinks otherwise. I would personally use PoH instead of GH but I may very well be wrong. I read these forums pretty religiously and there are some posters (such as Harky) who really make a lot of sense to me and I respect. I was wondering if you guys could explain to me whether GH is a worthwhile spell (say more worthwhile than flash heal) or if its worth using more and why. Thanks a lot I do appreciate it.

[Vordie]

Personally, I never EVER use GH. I tend to use PoH, Flash, Mending, Circle and Renew. The only place where I've used Greater is Dreamwalker, 3 flashes + 1 greater, 3 flashes + 1 greater etc etc.

[fabian]

Only place to use a GH is in dreamwalker and taking portals(which you should leave to the other healers first) and when you can substitute a FH with a slightly longer cast time but the GH will be used to a great extent. The latter is almost non-existent since FH has been replaced by renew as the filler and is almost only used with SoL and only when needed.

[Kootz]

back in the older days of wow priest healing you would be doing something known as "precasting"

This means you would cast a greater heal before the tank even needed it.. and by the time the cast is finished he will either need the heal.. you you will cancel the cast.. this would allow for some serious clutch heals from priests..

Now with all the snap healing that is present in the game. the holy priest has degraded into a simple coh or poh machine.

at least that is how i see it.

[Larancy]

back in the older days of wow priest healing you would be doing something known as "precasting"

This means you would cast a greater heal before the tank even needed it.. and by the time the cast is finished he will either need the heal.. you you will cancel the cast.. this would allow for some serious clutch heals from priests..

Pally healers.. That is all

[Maxpowr]

The only place where I've used Greater is Dreamwalker, 3 flashes + 1 greater, 3 flashes + 1 greater etc etc.

That's bad. Unless you're specc'd into full GH (generally speaking, you shouldn't be), you should be assigned to raid heal on Dreamwalker as holy. FYI, it is much more effective to continually spam GH and not build serendipity stacks due to wasting GCDs.

The problem with GH is that if a player besides a tank ever takes that amount of damage that you would even consider using GH, it is the player's fault. There is only 1 instance in ICC when a single non-tank player takes an obscene amount of damage purposely and that is harvest soul on normal LK. Even then, your instinct should tell you to GS them and spam flash heal.

[Samurai]

For GH to work properly on Dreamwalker you need a completely different spec to the standard holy builds. There is a thread somewhere on a discussion on this, i think it was a thread originally about disc priests healing her, but it got jacked

[Calendra12345]

That's bad. Unless you're specc'd into full GH (generally speaking, you shouldn't be), you should be assigned to raid heal on Dreamwalker as holy. FYI, it is much more effective to continually spam GH and not build serendipity stacks due to wasting GCDs.

The problem with GH is that if a player besides a tank ever takes that amount of damage that you would even consider using GH, it is the player's fault. There is only 1 instance in ICC when a single non-tank player takes an obscene amount of damage purposely and that is harvest soul on normal LK. Even then, your instinct should tell you to GS them and spam flash heal.

The way to heal the most effective way is to keep renew up, and go Binding Heal/flash heal x3 > Greater heal.

Source: http://worldoflogs.com/rankings/play...H/Holy_Priest/

[Danner]

As others have mentioned, the primary usecase for me is as a renew
+ 3xFheal + Gheal combo on Valthira. As long as you have Serendipity, this will offer the maximal HPS, regardless of specc. Naturally a specc tailored to increase single target HPS would improve it dramatically, but that's somewhat beyond the point. I spam this for the first minute or so until I blow half my manabar. It doesn't really heal the boss up, but it does prevent her from dropping too much while the real healers are in the portal.

Beyond Valthira, it doesn't see a lot of use. I randomly use a GHeal on tanks if I have 3 stacks of serendipity, and that does actually make a difference. But, it's usually not worth spending a full 2.5 seconds on a GHeal, any paladin out there will have landed at least one big honkin' HL in that timeframe. As such, I'm much more likely to just stick to a fheal, shield, or better - Prayer of Mending. As holy, my job isn't tank healing anyway; my default specc sucks at it badly. My job is to prevent people - tanks included - from dying. Sometimes, that means helping the paladins out.

[chupatwo]

yeah as a raid healer, i dont see any reason for using greater heal. you wont find many priests even discussing this spell anymore. i mean if you got a 3stack up and someone is real low on health (like 20% or below) i can see a greater heal (fully hasted) as the most effective means of saving them, but in a 25m raid enviroment a PoM in conjunction with druid hots or hopefully a pretty chain heal should do the trick.

in a 10m enviroment where you are the only raid healer, then yeah i guess its situationaly useful.
really of our 11 heals, is pretty low on the list as far as how much it is used.

in the end, as a holy priest i suppose every heal your going to throw all night is going to be situational, so to effectivly "rank" your 11 heals is pretty pointless. although, PoM's healing done per mana spent is godly... just godly.

[Powerlamer]

Well if your raid leader/guild leader, doesnt know that GH has 0 use these days, tell him to pass the leader so someone else. A raid leader/guild leader should know anything about any class in Wow, if he wanna do a good job by leading them.

Second, if you are entering the portal as a priest, at Valithia = fail. This is not your job, and you are the WORST healer to do this job. Let the Paladin/Shaman/Druid (yes Druid) do it.

Cheers

[Calendra12345]

Well if your raid leader/guild leader, doesnt know that GH has 0 use these days, tell him to pass the leader so someone else. A raid leader/guild leader should know anything about any class in Wow, if he wanna do a good job by leading them.

Second, if you are entering the portal as a priest, at Valithia = fail. This is not your job, and you are the WORST healer to do this job. Let the Paladin/Shaman/Druid (yes Druid) do it.

Cheers

Actually the difference between a holy priest and a druid is minimal (3k hps less). You only really need one healer outside anyone, and that is the disc priest.

[Powerlamer]

Actually the difference between a holy priest and a druid is minimal (3k hps less). You only really need one healer outside anyone, and that is the disc priest.

If you wanna go inside the portals as holy, you need 2 things; Serendipity and Empowered Healing, BUT if you are a raiding holy priest renew specced, you dont have both talents, so again, you'd better stay out of the portals.

For a quick job inside the portal, we use 2 holy paladins (beacon on valithia, and holy light themself near her to clip the holy light gliph) and 2 shaman (Ancestral Awakening FTW). Outside, the holy priest cast Guardian Spirit when possible and gg.

At least that is what we do in our guild.

Cheers

[Evolixe]

GH is a joke theise days... tell your GL that its got no use. Your not a tankhealer either, only do raidhealing unless your dramatically overgearing an instance (then still.. no GH).

Ofcourse you don't ignore tanks.. flash them when needed and PoM on CD.
And personally i always keep up a renew on the MT. (Sometimes OT depending per fight)

[Tycho]

It's a bit irritating having someone tell you how to play your own class when they don't play it. It would be one thing if they've had experience with the class, but all to often these know-it-alls just see one snippit of information - out of context, probably - and suddenly start ranting and raving about stuff they know little about.

[Strykie]

Gheal is useless, Your hpaladins are retarded if you have to use it even once.

[ZeroKasutoa]

In the extreme case that you are assigned to tank heals, greater heal is good.

That case would usually only exist if you were the best-geared holy priest in a raid group where all the other healers were lesser-geared holy priests.

Most raid leaders would cancel the raid before assigning a holy priest to a tank though.

[SobeBauxite]

I stopped raiding on my disc priest when ToC hard modes were the latest content, and she'd been holy since the beginning of wrath. Offspec holy through Ulduar. I have one question for you all.

What's greater heal?

Your raid leader is probably retarded, and you should probably go find a new guild if he wants to lecture you about things he knows nothing about.

[Zoros]

I'm raiding the 10 player mode and I still use Greater Heal often. We are only 2 healers, so 3 Serendipity Greater Heal is really good. I use it far less than Burning Crusade, but from my point of view the guilty is the current healing situation, not the spell. When I did some 25 player bosses I noticed that there's no reason to cast longer direct heals than Flash Heal. Mana is endless, everybody is at 100% and the targets receinving damage need fast heals or they just die.

I really miss old healing days, when healer gameplay was about choosing the correct spell and the correct target, and mana was something to care about. Now healer gameplay is absurd, all bosses are identic to heal. I'm bored of damage spikes that only test how fast players push their buttons, and only add more random factors to an already too random fights.

I know that to be nostalgic in this forums is pointless, but I really miss Buring Crusade and vainilla healing gameplay.

[Malpractise]

It is really sad to see how many priest dismiss half there abilities, if you want to be a three button healer reroll paladin. If you want a set in stone rotation to prevent any circumstances in which you may have to make a decision about what ability to use reroll dps. Priest have a myriad of abilities all suited to different situations, and while dismissing half of them and saying just keep these 3 spells on cooldown may work in perfect conditions, how ofter are conditions perfect?

Healing is about situational awareness and team work, and if anyone ever said to me "sorry the tank died but i read on MMO greater heal is useless" i would kick you to the curb and never invite you back. That kind of narrow mindedness will only ever hold you back.

Situational != useless.