03-18-2008, 09:33 PM
Going over similar ground to other posts, but here's my two cents:
Gearing:
I look for +heal first. Then where possible I avoid items which have no stamina on them. A healthy life pool is nice to have. The current regen formula favours a blend of spirit and mp5 on gear. The 2.4 patch will push the equation heavily in favour of spirit. Spirit boosts priest's healing as well as their regen, so my advice now would be to avoid where possible any items without spirit on them (like Garments of Temperance or the Leggings of Eternity). Intellect tends to take care of itself.
Tank healing - cast-cancelling vs down ranking
This is mostly a matter of personal preference I think. Playing from New Zealand, lag is usually an issue for me, so I've adopted a safety first approach of chain-casting down ranked heals. Kaz'Rogal is an exception however. Greater Heal is the spell of choice for healing tanks - particularly since both the Avatar 2pc bonus and Absolution 4pc bonus favour greater heals. Keep up a renew on the tank, use PoM if the fight warrants it (PoM is a little bit of extra aggro for the tank so its always good to "prime" the MT with it on pulls).
Raid healing
Priests can pretty easily switch from tank healing to raid healing as the encounter demands. Your choice of spells will depend on both the encounter and whether you're speccced for CoH or not. Some examples: Gorefiend and Shahraz lend themselves to renews; on Illidari Council I use Flash Heal mostly when raid healing; on RoS and Bloodboil I use mostly Circle of Healing and Prayer of Mending.
UI
I'd reiterate all the comments about finding a UI that you're comfortable with. A good set of raid frames can make all the difference. Try to look for ones where you have a lot of control over what buffs/debuffs are shown and not shown. Black Temple is full of debuffs that can't be dispelled, but will affect your healing if you know who has them (fatal attraction, bloodboil, agonizing flames etc etc).
Consumables
Part of the learning curve for any healer is knowing what fights you'll need all the mana you can get, and which fights you can save money on. In other words, your mileage may vary on the need for flasks, elizirs, food buffs and weapon oils. But regardless of how much you buff up, I recommend carrying a large supply of mana pots and also Dark or Demonic Runes for emergencies (Dark Runes can usually be bought off the Auction House).
Chris
Gearing:
I look for +heal first. Then where possible I avoid items which have no stamina on them. A healthy life pool is nice to have. The current regen formula favours a blend of spirit and mp5 on gear. The 2.4 patch will push the equation heavily in favour of spirit. Spirit boosts priest's healing as well as their regen, so my advice now would be to avoid where possible any items without spirit on them (like Garments of Temperance or the Leggings of Eternity). Intellect tends to take care of itself.
Tank healing - cast-cancelling vs down ranking
This is mostly a matter of personal preference I think. Playing from New Zealand, lag is usually an issue for me, so I've adopted a safety first approach of chain-casting down ranked heals. Kaz'Rogal is an exception however. Greater Heal is the spell of choice for healing tanks - particularly since both the Avatar 2pc bonus and Absolution 4pc bonus favour greater heals. Keep up a renew on the tank, use PoM if the fight warrants it (PoM is a little bit of extra aggro for the tank so its always good to "prime" the MT with it on pulls).
Raid healing
Priests can pretty easily switch from tank healing to raid healing as the encounter demands. Your choice of spells will depend on both the encounter and whether you're speccced for CoH or not. Some examples: Gorefiend and Shahraz lend themselves to renews; on Illidari Council I use Flash Heal mostly when raid healing; on RoS and Bloodboil I use mostly Circle of Healing and Prayer of Mending.
UI
I'd reiterate all the comments about finding a UI that you're comfortable with. A good set of raid frames can make all the difference. Try to look for ones where you have a lot of control over what buffs/debuffs are shown and not shown. Black Temple is full of debuffs that can't be dispelled, but will affect your healing if you know who has them (fatal attraction, bloodboil, agonizing flames etc etc).
Consumables
Part of the learning curve for any healer is knowing what fights you'll need all the mana you can get, and which fights you can save money on. In other words, your mileage may vary on the need for flasks, elizirs, food buffs and weapon oils. But regardless of how much you buff up, I recommend carrying a large supply of mana pots and also Dark or Demonic Runes for emergencies (Dark Runes can usually be bought off the Auction House).
Chris