Flash of Light vs. Holy Light
Ferraro made a great post today (as usual for her posts) on the difference between a Flash of Light and a Holy Light build. I recommend all of you to go read it now, then come back and read my comments on her article below. After reading through her article I think I’ve realized I’m probably more of a hybrid healer than I thought. I do spam Flash of Light a lot, but I don’t exclusively spam it (although I have found the farther into the expansion we get the less I’m using Holy Light). I think I probably use Holy Shock a lot more than she does. Because of that, there’s some differences I have with her recommendations which I’ll go over below.
Flash of Light Meta-gem
Ferraro recommends to use the Ember Skyflare Diamond for a Flash of Light build. In my opinion, you should still stick with the Insightful Earthsiege Diamond, even when you’re stacking Spell Power. I don’t think the +25 spell power from the ESD is worth the mana return you lose from the IED. A Flash of Light spammer is still not solely spamming flash of light and having a little more freedom with your mana is never a bad thing. It lets you use Holy Shock more, use Divine Plea less, or even use Holy Light more (as she says, at the end of the fight when you switch to HL spam). Although, if you really want the +25 boost and you never have mana problems, then I guess, go for it.
Flash of Light Spec
I found her spec recommendations refreshing. Most people recommend speccing into mid-prot for a FoL spec, which doesn’t really makes sense to me. I think Ferraro made it clear which specs we should be using for each build.
I do have one area to discuss though. She makes a good point about using 5/5 Divinity for a Flash of Light build, but I think she underestimates the value of that extra 3% crit from Sanctity of Battle. I don’t think you notice crit less as you near or go above 50%. 1% crit is the same regardless if it is below or above 50%. You always crit 1% more of the time. Because of Infusion of Light, crit can be a very good stat for a FoL build. Generous use of Holy Shock ties in very well with a FoL build. When its off cooldown, you can do as much or more healing in the same amount of time as you would with Holy Light. Because it is instant cast, you’ll have less overhealing with Holy Shock than you will with Flash of Light, even at high levels of spell power. Ferraro doesn’t mention a third glyph for the FoL build, but I think the Glyph of Holy Shock is a good choice (I still use the Glyph of Holy Light, but I might switch soon). Of course, if you’re using Holy Shock every 5 seconds, you’ll need more mana than if you’re just spamming Flash of Light, which is the reason for some of my other recommendations here.
In my opinion, the 3% extra healing and the 3% extra crit are both very close in value and I wouldn’t fault anyone for choosing 5/5 Divinity. However, the reason I choose the crit is because of the mana return it gives from Illumination and the extra instant Flash of Lights it gives from Infusion of Light. The little bit of extra mana will allow you to use Holy Shock more often and support the additional Flash of Lights you’ll be casting. And remember, 3% crit does improve the amount of healing you do, just not as reliably as Divinity.
One thing to note is that if you are going over 50% crit with Flash of Light, and Sacred Shield procs, you will actually be over 100% crit with Flash of Light, meaning anything over that is wasted. However, its common for you to miss the Sacred Shield proc since its only present while the shield is up between tank damage every 6 seconds, so you might only see this proc every 12 seconds or more. Besides that, crit is always very useful for Holy Shock, so I’m going to stick with the 3% crit.
Glyph of Seal of Light vs. Glyph of Seal of Wisdom
Ferraro recommends using the Glyph of Seal of Light with a Flash of Light build, which isn’t a bad idea at all. However, my build is probably a little more mana intensive than hers which is why I still use the Glyph of Seal of Wisdom. Again, I wouldn’t fault anyone for using the Glyph of Seal of Light, but I like Seal of Wisdom especially because of the extra mana returns it gives when you whack a mob. The mana you can get back is pretty substantial. You don’t get any benefit when hitting someone with Seal of Light, so I’m going to stick with wisdom for now. Again, if you don’t have any mana problems, feel free to go with Seal of Light.
Lower Level Viability
Ferraro mentions that the Flash of Light build is only viable at the upper levels of gear. I disagree that a FoL build is not viable at lower levels. The main thing you gain at higher raiding tiers that helps a FoL build is the higher levels of crit, which helps your Flash of Lights and Holy Shocks a lot. Your spell power is lower at lower levels and your heals are weaker, but so is the damage your raid takes and your raid’s health levels so it generally evens out. Your haste is lower, but again, damage output and amounts are lower as well, so it evens out, and haste isn’t that important for a FoL build anyway. Because FoL is so mana-efficient, you can still spam it pretty easily at the lower tiers of raiding without running out of mana at all. In fact, a FoL build should be easier at lower levels to sustain throughout a fight because you don’t have the large levels of Intellect, Mp5, and haste yet that support a Holy Light build (although with items like the Libram of Renewal and epic gems, the HL build is definitely viable at lower tiers too). I’m just saying that there’s no reason you shouldn’t be able to use a FoL build at lower levels of gear and raiding. I’ve used it successfully through each tier. A FoL build does become even more viable as you gain higher levels of crit, but its definitely not completely unviable at the lower levels.
However, despite saying that, I will say that a Flash of Light build is more difficult to pull off, at any level. That doesn’t mean its less viable, just that it requires more skill/coordination. Generally a Holy Paladin has one job, to keep up the tanks, and a Holy Light build will do that very, very well at any level. A FoL build requires more raid healing, more healer coordination, more assistance from other healers on the tanks, and faster reaction times and more button pushing. However, it also provides more consistent, stable, and reliable healing to both the tanks and the raid. You can put out more effective healing to the points in your raid that need it the most, with less overhealing and wasted heals. So, if you’re a newer healer, you might want to start with the Holy Light build just because it is easier to pull off if your job in the raid is just to keep up the tanks. But if you have a skilled healing team, there’s no reason a flash of light build isn’t viable, powerful, and effective at the lower levels as well.
Summary
Besides those few things, I strongly agree with everything else in her article. I especially liked the last paragraph about fitting your healing style in with your healing team, it is spot on. I probably have less mana burning to do at the end of the fight than she does. I try to use up all my mana with a lot of Holy Shocks and even some Holy Lights throughout a fight unless there’s a specific reason to save it for the end. I may also use Divine Plea less (although I do use Divine Plea frequently when its smart to do so). But using Flash of Light more instead of Holy Light definitely allows you to get away with a smaller mana pool while having more reliable, quicker, and stronger heals with less overhealing. Its refreshing to see someone else recognizing the power of a Flash of Light build. If you haven’t read it yet, make sure you do.
Excellent! And I totally agree the FoL style works at lower levels. My gear’s far from being all 245 (only 2 rings and a belt) and I’ve been healing like this since I 80′ed. It’s been working great though I also agree you need to make sure you can be very reactive. Great post overall! It’s good to see I’m not alone in the world^^
Thank you for the kind words! =)
The main reason why I mention that the FoL build is better suited for high-level gear is because of it’s large lack of flexibility when compared to the HL build. When you’re in blues and such, the amount of sockets you have are minimal, so you can’t get much of a “bang” out of your FoLs. Plus, Intellect has a much wider, broader range of benefits for Holy Paladins, so it’s easier to not only play, but you’re better equipped for emergency situations with a bigger mana pool and Divine Sacrifice/Guardian.
It’s like, you know how when you play Mario Kart or Mario Tennis, Mario and Luigi are always the well-rounded, average characters? Not super fast or strong, but not slow or weak either? But you can pick Bowser or Toad if you want to specialize in brute power of speed, accordingly, right? Well, I think of these builds as the same thing. HL is more of the well-rounded Mario spec, and FoL is more of the “advanced” Bowser/Toad spec.
Silly analogy, I know, but it makes sense to me. =)
I’m curious as to why a FoL build needs to go into Ret as opposed to the Prot tree. With Sacred Shield being so much stronger from the SP most FoL spammers use, wouldn’t it be smart to make it even better and last even longer?
Here’s my take on glyphs and librams for FoL build…
Glyph for beacon. We generally have a smaller mana pool, so hitting this mana drainer less is always good, as well as less use of a GCD.
Glyph for Seal of Wisdom. I understand the logic on making my FoLs larger, but as it is, they’re fine. I tried going with SoL glyph once, and the difference was noticeable. Maybe taking this glyph would make me want to spec into Ret, but I think the imp SS is worth it. And as stated in the above post, it’s helpful if I get a chance to hit something.
Glyph for Holy Light. It may sound strange because I don’t focus on using HL, but if I do use it, I want it to be as good as it can be, so if can heal a few extra people, that’s great.
Libramof Renewal. Again, I understand that my primary heal is going to be FoL. But if I’m in a clutch, I want to rely on the hammer Blizz gave me, and not kill my mana pool when I use it. I’ve got the ilvl 213 PvP libram, and gave it a couple uses, but I find it’s limits me and my toolbox, so it stays in the bag.
I choose to eat crit food instead of the wimpy 46 SP from a feast. It gives me the same stamina buff, and it’s not like I’ll miss the AP. Raid buffed I normally sit on 37% crit.
I’m not doing hardmodes yet, but it looks likes we’ll start soon. Currently I have the Hard mode Holy/Prot build and have had no problems topping most meters in healing (and JoL is not in the top 3 of heals). I love that my SS is taking a bit of the load off of me and the tank, and I love that I have imp LoH, Aura Mastery and Divine Sacrfice as “Oh Sh!t” buttons. The only thing I plan on changing soon, is that I’m still gemmed for Int. I’ve got the badge 245 trinket, so I’m going to slowly wean myself onto SP gems.
Never use glyph of wisdom. If you need to melee for mana, hit seal of wisdom mid-fight. You need to heal as much as possible.
Wouldn’t the Revitalizing Skyflare Diamond (http://www.wowhead.com/?item=41376) be the best throughput meta for FoL builds? Seems like it would scale better/faster than the Ember Skyflare Diamond. I also thought grabbing Divine Guardian (and possibly Imp DA) were considered standard for the FoL build. Is the boost to SS + the longer uptime on the 50% crit buff not very substantial?
I don’t find problems renewing Sacred Shield and the mana you save from the longer SS duration certainly isn’t large, so that part I don’t think is worth it. The stronger Sacred Shield is nice but Sacred Shield is only on the tank. Unless you’re having problems keeping up the tank with Beacon, then I find the crit to be more useful overall.
That actually sounds like a really good tip, Rexxus. You could glyph for Seal of Light and switch to Wisdom temporarily if you need to whack some mobs. I might have to try that.
Do you think picking up a yellow and blue gem to fulfill the meta gem requirements for IED is worth the loss in SP from not socketing red gems?
It definitely is, jrock. Crit, Int, and Mp5 are all useful stats too, and the socket bonuses are just free stats. The activation of the IED on top of that definitely makes it worth it. I always use mixed gems: Spellpower/Crit, Spellpower/Mp5 for those slots.
For a Holy Light caster, ignoring socket bonuses for Int gems makes sense because Int gems really are OP. You get a lot more for +20 Int than you do from any other single gem, even with the socket bonus, assuming you’re actually going to use all that mana. But if you don’t use the mana, the Int gem is mostly wasted.
Hmm I have read Ferraro’s guide as well as part of this guide and I haven’t seen anybody mention another advantage of using seal of wisdom/judgement of wisdom. Whenever judging I have a chance to get mana return from long range judgement which really helps in the long run. Just wanted to mention it. =)
At this point, I’m confused about a lot of things. I guess I have been out of the loop of it for a while about researching on Holy Paladins, but it would seem as of late it’s either you’re a holy light spamming pally or a FoL paladin.
My question is, where is the hybrid factor in this and if there’s not really a hybrid build… which is the one that would suit my playstyle better?
I really use any of my heals at the disposal (which being a holy paladin… isn’t a lot) but, I do use FoL more then Holy Light. But, I also use Holy Shock more the Holy Light I think. So, I’m not sure which one of these specs or builds would really be more ideal for me.
I guess my gear is also the same type of problem where I have some intellect gems and some SP/MP5 gems. Is it possible to still do this type of hybrid thing and be able to keep up with other raiders?
I’m in a MOSTLY normal raiding guild. We have just gotten the first 4 bosses in ICC down with all previous raiding content down in the game, but I am the only holy paladin in my guild.
Helps?
what i found as FoL healer is how to socket them
I got 14 sockets on gear, and 8 socket bonuses what i think it’s worth to do, the total of 49 spell and 4 intellect isn’t much but as a FoL healer you need a lot of spellpower (and crit chance ofc)
Helm of the Restless Watch +9 spell (blue)
Pendant of Binding Elements +4 intellect (yellow)
Lightsworn Spaulders +5 spell (red)
Liadrin’s Tunic of Triumph +7 spell (red, blue)
Belt of the Lonely Noble +7 spell (yellow, blue, prismatic)
Corrupted Silverplate Leggings +9 spell (yellow, red, blue)
Sabatons of the Courageous +7 spell (red, blue)
Liadrin’s Gloves of Triumph +5 spell (yellow)
Socketing the red and yellow sockets with the following gems will max it instead of 1 Runed Cardinal Ruby +23 spell (red) and 1 Smooth King’s Amber +20 crit (yellow) or Brilliant King’s Amber +20 intellect (yellow) I take 1 Luminous Ametrine +12 spell and 10 intellect (orange) and 1 Potent Ametrine +12 spell and 10 crit (orange) with a benefit of 1 spellpower more.
And the blue once with Sundered Eye of Zul +10 crit and 5mp5 (green) or Royal Dreadstone +12 spell and 5mp5 (purple)
The Dragon’s Eye I not sure yet but I think I will take 2 Smooth Dragon’s Eye +32 crit (Yellow) and 1 Runed Dragon’s Eye +39 spell (red). Depends on how much crit I already have with socketing without the Dragon’s Eye
I am so glad that there r ppl that preffer FoL build. Pretty much every holy paladin on my server thinks I am an idiot because I gem for SP.