Healing experiences in Patch 3.2
I’ve had a few days to play with the changes in Patch 3.2 on the Live servers and try out a few different raids. I have to say that I’m still very happy with the changes. If anything, my effective heals per second has gone up, despite using Holy Light much less and I’ve even found I have more mana as a consequence of using more mana efficient heals. Read on for my thoughts on the patch.
My Results
First, I should point out that I am better geared now after the patch. I’ve gotten two new pieces of gear since the patch came out and also upgraded all of my gems to their epic versions (I knew those stockpiles of Emblems of Heroism would come in handy someday). So, undoubtedly, that has helped.
So, after my upgrades and armed with the new Beacon changes, we decided to go into 10-man Ulduar with only 2 healers. We ended up doing better than we usually do with 3 healers. We even got a couple new achievements. My strategy at first was to keep Sacred Shield, Beacon, and the Flash of Light HoT all on the main tank. However, I didn’t like it. The tank was getting pelted by so many heals from my Beacon and the other healer’s heals that my Flash HoT was largely inconsequential. It seemed pointless to refresh the HoT, especially since it required me to directly heal the Beacon target, which I didn’t like.
After a short time, I changed it up and put Beacon on the main tank and Sacred Shield on the off-tank. This worked a lot better and the HoT got used a lot more. The main tank still stayed at full health nearly the entire time even without the shield and the HoT, while I spammed Flash of Light on the off-tank and the raid. Whenever I switched to raid healing, the HoT would tick like crazy on the Off-tank. It was pretty amazing. The HoT can tick for 650+ every second if I get a big crit and it keeps ticking the entire fight as long as I refresh it. It was definitely noticeable, especially when I put Judgement of Light on his target for what was effectively a 2nd, weaker, HoT.
So, I ended up spending most of my time raid healing with Flash of Light and some Holy Shocks while my HoT ticked on the off-tank and the main tank got pelted with all my Beacon heals. My other healer (a resto druid) helped out with both tanks, especially the off-tank, and did a little raid healing. It worked really well. I was averaging 6k+ heals per second while rarely using Holy Light at all. Of course, there were some fights where it worked better to put both Sacred Shield and Beacon on one tank simply because he took much more damage than the off-tank. It was nice to have that flexibility.
I found the new range on Beacon to be very helpful as well. There are points in some fights where I did end up running out of range of the main tank (usually not on purpose). With the increased range on Beacon, it didn’t matter at all. Where in Patch 3.1 that might cause a wipe, now I was able to just continue healing without even a thought about the range. It was very, very awesome.
Mana Issues?
Mana is one thing I’ve always been worried about with the new patch, but so far I haven’t found any problems. In fact, it seems to be better. Before the patch, whenever we ran with 2 healers, I’d use Holy Light a lot and on some fights I would need an Innervate to keep going. Our Resto druid, on the other hand, was usually the one who had limitless mana. From what I’ve experienced so far, this has reversed. I was able to 2-man heal using mainly Flash of Light and still keep my mana up. I did pop Divine Plea every chance I got (during opportune moments) and I definitely used Holy Light and even Holy Shock less. But, Flash of Light seemed to do the job most of the time (keep in mind that it crits a lot because of Sacred Shield). Seal of Wisdom helped a lot too on fights where I could get some whacks in. The Resto druid ended up calling for Innervates from our feral cat throughout the night instead of me calling for it. It was pretty nice.
My Gear
I run with a lot of Spell Power, Crit, and Haste. I put less focus on Intellect and Mp5. I make sure to get the socket bonus every time, since every stat is important. I decided to stick with SpellPower/Crit for my yellow slots instead of Spellpower/Intellect. Since I didn’t have mana problems, I’ll keep it this way, for awhile at least. I stack my red slots with Spell Power gems, my yellow with SpellPower/Crit, and my blue with SpellPower/Mp5. I did make sure to keep my Mp5 up with the new patch, I’m running with about 350 Mp5 right now. My spellpower can easily go over 2500 during a 10-man raid, especially once Illustration of the Dragon Soul is fully stacked (which it is the entire fight). Also, the Insightful Earthsiege Diamond is an important part of any Holy Paladin’s gear, whether PvE or PvP, its just that good.
Summary
All I can say is that the new patch is really fun. I know a lot of people threatened to abandon their Holy Paladin because of the new patch and re-roll another healer. Its true that we don’t just main tank heal anymore. But then, neither do the other healers (unless you re-rolled a discipline priest). If you’re raid healing anyway, why not come back and try raid healing on your Holy Paladin? I think you might be surprised how powerful it is. With Flash of Light critting very often and instant Flash of Lights with every Holy shock crit, you can pump out a ton of heals. I put together a little diagram to illustrate how much healing I was doing during an average 3-4 second period when everything crits (which it often does). Enjoy!
just wondering how much crit you actually have?
In my experience stacking int is just what we need, for normal modes SP/crit might feel better because mana isn’t going to be a problem, but if you are aiming for hardmodes i would suggest a 30k+ mana pool. Mine is currently ~34k, replenishment is still very good. My healing style has changed alot aswell, but i can still use Holy light alot.
I tend to always have lights grace up so i HL every 8-9 sec even if there’s no need for it.
Key to new paladin playsyle is just to time your mana/divine plea with the dps and the encounter and be more careful to not over burn yourself. Flash Hot helps with surprise attacks so you don’t run out of heals before channeling a HL.
Also i’ve forgot to mention, my healing has increased alot and my overheal is under 50% all the time. New holy style takes more skill to master.
My character sheet says almost 37% Holy crit. That doesn’t include the extra crit I get from talents like Sanctified Light, from Focus Magic (mage buff), from Sacred Shield procs, and other raid buffs.
NOT HAPPY WITH CAST TIME ON EXERCISM!!!!
somehow i suck in new mode- care to publish the macros you use? would be really helpful
You can see my entire UI including macros in the UI section of this site:
http://www.holypaladin.net/index.php/holy-paladin-macros
Did you forget the FoL hot ticks on the BoL target in http://www.holypaladin.net/wp-content/uploads/2009/08/32healing.gif or aren’t they transfered to the Beacon?
I didn’t have the time to test it myself - much work to do the last week and since i quit raiding 25 man, i only raid 10man on monday+tuesday.
Since i run with 51/20/0 + stacking spellpower for a few weeks now and was able to clear 6/10 hardmodes in ulduar 10 until now, i am very happy with the changes in 3.2 because i think my build is even stronger now. Yay!
actually have those - but wondering how you’re combining those with sacredshield+beacon combo. put sacredshield as a buff in healbot?
Unfortunately, FoL ticks don’t bet transfered to the Beacon target.
Sacred Shield and Beacon do both show up as icons with timers on the target in Healbot. I’m hoping that eventually the Flash HoT will show up there as well.
If I am the only pally or the only pally specced into Divine Sacrifice, I don’t like not having Sacred Shield on the tank taking the most damage. With 2500 raid buffed SP and 4 pc T8, an DS specced SS is absorbing 2850 dmg every 4 seconds. In any type of hard mode, I would rather put my SS where it absorbs the most damage rather than worrying about it soaking up too much of the FoL HOT’s value.
For gearing, I think you want to value INT>Mp5>Haste>SP>Crit. Crit has become such a poor regen stat that I avoid gear with crit on it. Haste/Mp5 gear is now our best allocation. However, unlike 3.1, I do not just gem INT in every socket and ignore all socket bonuses. Since we are using FoL a lot more, SP is no longer a weak stat, so for the T8 helm for example, you’re better off with a 10 INT, 5 mp5 gem for the socket bonus than a 20 INT gem.
Here is how I gem:
Yellow sockets/BS sockets/JC prismatics: 20 INT (34 INT JC gems)
Red sockets: 10 INT/12 SP
Blue sockets: 10 INT/5 Mp5
Oh my gosh, I’m actually REALLY excited to read your post on this. Before I quit, I was pretty much the same kind of healer that you are - focusing on Crit and SP (however, I put Int before Haste =P ) and relying on obnoxious mana regen from Illumination and huge heals from Crit/SP.
However, as me and my co-guild leader (who were Naxx-25 gear’d before all this new stuff came out) of a fairly small guild were gearing up our 80s in nothing but greens and quest blues, I was always the “save-everyone’s-ass” healer.. So I’d be doing MT/OT, and a good chunk of raid healing (when/if someone wasn’t doing their job or if they just plain weren’t good at it) in most of the fights and the WWS would be something obnoxious like me doing 65-75% of the healing (depending on the number of healers - we’d usually have two). When I read all of this stuff on the new Beacon and raep of Illumination, I cried on the inside.
However, I think I really relied more on Illumination than on Divine Plea. Truth be told, the only time I really remember using it was in Sapphy during Air Phase. Our Crit’s about the same (I sit on 36ish% unbuffed, and I’m the designated Focus Magic-ee during raids) but I imagine my SP to be a good deal lower since I quit a while back xD;
What I’m asking, really, is how can mana regen for Crit-stackers be the same when Illumination has been halved? Is it that we don’t need to use Holy Lights as much, relative to the last patch? Will I have to DP whenever the CD’s up (not a fan of this ;-;.. I was constantly healing as the only geared healer, so there wasn’t so much an “opportune moment” as an “if I don’t DP, I’m going to go OOM, so I’ll take the -50% over uselessness” xD;)? SHOULD we be focusing more on Int and… -shudder- MP/5? As a healer, I would say that the Crit/SP approach really fits me, so I’m not really looking forward to killing my beautiful Crit rating in order to get MP/5 (ew) and more Int. BUT JUST SAY THE WORD, MAN! PLZ TELL ME (AGAIN) THAT THE NEW PATCH WON’T KILL MY HEALING ;_;
And P.S. Sorry for wall-o-text <3
You more than likely should exchange some of your crit for Mp5. However, I don’t think its an extreme amount, just enough to balance it a little more. Its still worth it to switch to Holy Lights if you have to during Divine Plea, or just spam your heals more durning that time to make up for the healing reduction. You’re not going to use up 25% of the mana you’ve gained from the Divine Plea, you’ll still come out on top. Ideally you’ll use Divine Plea when there’s a short lull in the action (even if its not the full duration).
Using Holy Shock and Holy Light less will help your mana a lot. Personally, I’ve found healing to be a lot easier in Patch 3.2. Fights that used to be a challenge no longer are. Being able to keep up two tanks with only a little help from other healers is very powerful. Not everyone is seeing the same results, but I’m very happy with the changes. One thing I’m suprised about is how healing has actually become a little less fun, and actually requires less skill it seems. You can keep the tank up without even thinking. But, it is fun in an empowering kind of way.
Been reading your posts the last couple weeks and most of them are pretty informative and ive enjoyed reading them. Seems like you know the paladin class very well. Just curious what you toon’s name is and what server, just wanna check out the gear and gems you use and compared them with my paladin.
I’ve been rocking the heal charts in everything so I will share what I am doing.
1) Glyph Seal of Light (+5%)
once haste is around 510 stack crit and spellpower
2) Glyph Beacon (saves mana - good comfort factor also, as you will be busy spamming FOL) and Glyph Flash of Light
3) Get haste down to 1.1 Cast for FOL with gear/talents - anything more then this is too expensive
4) Get a greatness deck and time your DP appropriately you wont run out of mana
5) If you are stacking enough haste to do this you are going to get a bunch of Mp5 for free which is nice
6) Beacon whomever takes the most damage, research your tanks avoidance etc - visually check your beacon heals are hitting
7) Be sneaky on your beacon usage - heal pets, heal anything low, heal stuff with bonus, heal yourself for the +5
9) Use the PVP FoL librams
10) I use holy shock with the guaranteed crit to save peoples life
11) Spam FOL, use other spells where necassary
12) Make sure your beacon is always on!
What about talents? The talent build previously used (51/5/15) is still good?
Y, i wanted to know about talents too. I am using 51/2/18, but if crit is not so good now, mb i should use 51/20 or smth?
51/5/15 - its useful to pick up divinity
It seems like its time to think as crit as a nice bonus and not so much as everything depends upon it. These days I am getting up to 550 mana regen in 25 man and that is really pretty nice. So right now crit gives me some extra bonus HPS but otherwise i ignore it - rather save it till I have nothing left to improve. Mana per 5 is very nice actually - especially if you find lulls in fights to divine plea/greatness/not cast for a few seconds - like during the transformations of bosses. But a flash of light spec is not worth it unless you have the PVP librams - they give sucha nice bonus.
I also just want to ad that you must consider yourself a beacon healer, beacon is now THE tool - its not the sacred shield, let the shammies and priests shield the tank. Sacred shield is pretty useless in the scheme of things. Look for it only to give you the extra crit value on FLash of Light.
Concentrate on making the beacon your priority and not speccing deeply into protection. Also be sure you are monitoring everyone’s health in the raid at all times, you are now part raid healer - even though you are hitting the same old buttons.
And always check again to see your heals are visually hitting your beacon target, sometimes its glitchy othertimes I cannot believe I am healing something so far away.
I have to say I have enjoyed the patch so far it seems to have given us a bit more versatility, I reckon that the new range of the beacon is OP but who am I to complain
The game play IMO seems to go back to the BC days where our main heal was FOL and we had to maintain our MP5 levels for those long encounters. no longer can we get away with stacking Int only but we must get a nice balance of mp5 Crit SP and haste we are becoming alot more of a stat balanced class again.
I have found that my heals have taken a large jump in the meters since the patch.
I enjoyed the patch too.
Beacon change is very nice, but does not replace HL spam in 25-man hardmodes (actually HL spam is incentivated). I love this Beacon because it allows to easily bring more than one paladin healer. Because beacons stack on tank and all healing (effective+overheal) is transferred.
Mana issues: I was worried, but it’s quite easy to adapt.
Gear: INT is still main stat (also for gems), MP5 is now second stat.
What is haste soft cap for Holy pallies ?
Yes..but nobod answered about talents XD Now I have 51/5/15 which means to reach Conviction on the retri tree, but somebody told me that it’s better to put 17 points in the prot tree to get Divine Sacrifice and Divine Guardian. So what’s better?
Divine Sacrifice can be really useful in some portions of some fights, but since its not meant to absorb more than 150% of your health and has a long cooldown, its not really worth the loss of crit and the other benefits in the Ret tree. You should be able to heal through the damage without it since it won’t always be up and isn’t always reliable.
Also, I have another post detailing the haste cap for Holy Paladins:
http://www.holypaladin.net/index.php/holy-paladin-haste-cap