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Priests, are they still the best healer overall?
Khrymson
Member UncommonPosts: 3,090
So I've been having second thoughts about the Tauren Shaman I started a few days back. I've visited Thunderbluff and Ogrimmar many times now and even running around questing. It appears that for every 1 Priest I see, there are 30 or more Shaman or Paladins and usually in their healing tree!
I'm curious then; are Priests still the top healer and as rare as ever or are they just not as wanted anymore. I just don't see very many and I'm very interested in finding out more about why this is, and possibly playing that instead if they are still the top{rare} healer!
Comments
I'm pretty sure paladins and shamans took over most of the PvP healing with WotLK. I could be wrong though, I havn't played since it came out.
You say PvP healing...thats ok cause I wasn't planning on much PvP right away. I'm more interested in getting into instances and raids and being called upon as a healer the most for that. I'd rather do that and be on the rare side and wanted for runs instead of competing with tons of other shaman/paladins for the healer spot.
From my limited understanding of the healing metagame, priests still rock the HoT world, but the cows are better at burst heals. Take that as you will....
Evil will always win, because Good is dumb.
Well in that case, if there's a ton of shamans/paladins on your server, go a priest. The buffs are always handy if you're planning on raiding a lot, I'd say.
Priests have both HoTs and decent burst heals. Not as high as the other burst healers (shaman/paladin) but, you get the picture.
Aren't Druids the ones with all the HoTs...
Aren't Druids the ones with all the HoTs...
I may have gotten it backwards. Ignore me, I don't heal or get heals; I play a rogue.
Evil will always win, because Good is dumb.
Doesn't matter what server I'm on, as that could still change...not completely sold on Moon Guard yet since I can't talk with anyone except in say. Trying to find out more about Priests usefulness overall.
Doesn't matter what server I'm on, as that could still change...not completely sold on Moon Guard yet since I can't talk with anyone except in say. Trying to find out more about Priests usefulness overall.
Well like I said above, priests have decent burst capability along with HoTs. They can't burst heal as much as a paladin/shaman, but their HoTs make up for that. Along with their buffs, and undead crowd control (not sure if that's still useful, like I said I havn't played since BC :P)
I'd say any healer you go is pretty useful, though. It's just up to you on what you wanna play.
Paladins have good burst heals and bubbles, buffs. Shamans have good burst heals, totems and earth shield. Priests have HoTs, burst heals, good buffs. Druids have HoTs and some decent heals, and a few buffs too.
there has definitely been an increase in the number of shaman healers, and most priests I see on my server are shadow. priests I find strike a good balance between single target heals, HoTs, and aoe heals. druids have all the HoTs but not many powerful aoe or single target heals. pallys have loads of single target heals but only 1 HoT (and that comes from a glyph). shaman have the best aoe heals but again, not many HoTs. priests on the other hand have renew (very powerful HoT), prayer of healing (very powerful party only aoe heal), circle of healing (raid aoe heal, although it got nurfed to a 6 second recharge), flash heal and greater heal (single targets). 1 thing I have found is that priests seem to go oom far quicker than other classes but that really depends on your play style.
priests are the worst pvp healers because of their squishyness, and paladins do best single target pve healing because of flash of light(1.5 sec cast, almost no mana) working very well with high spell power to get good healing at little cost. At the same time, holy light and holy shock make them awesome for burst healing, so pallys are set.
Every healer can fill certain roles better than another healer. Paladins are very good single target healers from what Ive seen but are highly limited when having to heal multiple players. Priests and druids can kick ass with hots and aoe heals for group heals. Not as familar with shamans but I've had no complaints with the ones I raid with.
Things are balanced enough that it would be hard to pick one class and label them as best healers. There are certain situations where one class might excel over another, but all classes seem to have their strengths in various situations.
Holy Priests are still really good healers and can tackle all healing situations (though they have encounters where they have a harder time than other classes, and vice versa), but the most important thing is that they are really fun to play. We get some really good insta-cast spells, which for twitch players like myself who love FPS games and competitive RTS games is a real bonus.
Desperate prayer: Instant
Renew: Instant
Prayer of Mending: Instant
Circle of Healing: Instant
Guardian Spirit: Instant
Power Word: Shield: Instant
Flash heal: often available instant cast if specced correctly, otherwise very fast to cast with decent haste %
Which means we can do a lot of stuff on the move, great for encounters such as the last boss in the nexus where standing still for too long freezes you, or for when you are dodging flame wall in Sarth etc.
Our non-instant spells might take longer to cast but they pack a big punch, and benefit from crits from the other spells - so we might get a free or instant cast flash heal if our talent abilities proc, which adds some v ariety to fights and means it's not efficient to just repeatedly spam the same spells all the time.
I play a raiding Holy Priest at the moment and I would say we have a great selection of spells. Our 3 minute cooldown is incredibly useful : Guardian Spirit : Prevents death of tank for 10 seconds and increases healing by 40% during this time. For Sarth 3D guardian spirit is almost essential for that stage of the fight where the breath can deal upwards of 40k damage on the tank.
I suppose the best part of a Priest is that our heals require some tactical thinking and forethought, and applying these to a situation can make you appear to be a really good healer. Prayer of Mending is incredibly satisfying to use, especially when it pings between two targets such as a tank and offtank.
Circle of Healing is a nice tactical spell on raids because it heals targets around your target, instead of around yourself - so if you see a rain of fire on raid members you can target a guy in the middle and do some decent healing instantly - and probably get your next heal instant cast too depending on your crit %.
The biggest challenge of a holy priest - imo - is being mana efficient. There are many situations where it's tempting to use prayer of mending / circle of healing / flash heal because they're so fast, but in longer fights that will be problematic for mana unless you're overgeared for the encounter.
Playing smart will usually keep you going, and even in encounters when you are overpowered, not having to stop all the time to drink because you're playing intelligently will look good to the rest of the party who often tell me "don't you ever run out of mana?".
Great class. Resto druids can beat me on the raid healing numbers but I'm still a bit undergeared compared to them, I'm sure I'll match them in time.
Still waiting for your Holy Grail MMORPG? Interesting...