The ultimate healing class in World of Warcraft is the Priest. This is not really disputable; the Priest's combination of huge heals, flash heals, group heals, heals over time, and the much-loved Shield make them a class well-suited to being a protector of a party (much less themselves). In solo play, this ability to heal makes a Priest incredibly hard to kill in a one-on-one fight with an NPC. In group play, it draws the appreciation of one's teammates for keeping them alive in a heated battle.
There are two main philosophies with Priest-class players. Either you play the class as a more balanced offensive and healing class by liberally applying Shadow tree talents (better for PvP and solo play) or you play the class as what is derogatorily referred to as a "healbot," by concentrating talent points in the Holy tree (better for group PvE play). Note that both philosophies will use Discipline talents to some degree, for there are some juicy talents in there that neither style can ignore. What's great is that you can switch philosophies at any time simply by respeccing your talents - you're never pigeonholed into one style by early talent distribution decisions.
With my personality, I knew that I wanted to play a Priest for one reason - to be the ultimate healer. When I want to nuke, I play one of my Mages. And since it's not true at all that "Holy Priests can't solo", it's not a hard decision for me to go with the "healbot" setup on my Priest. I kick butt solo and have little downtime, to boot.
If you find yourself thinking that you might reply to a comment that "you're just a healbot" with the line, "darn straight," then I hope you'll read on for my opinions on what makes a sweet healbot talent build.
Focus of a Healbot
Mana efficiency, mana efficiency, mana efficiency. Ok, and aggro management, but the primary focus of any healbot is mana efficiency. You're obsessed with it. You like to crunch math numbers and figure out that Renew (the heal-over-time) is the most efficient spell. You see how many Flash Heals you can get off with full mana before you run out - and how many seconds go by before you can cast another. Why all the fuss? When you run out of mana, people die. This is Bad.⢠Since your entire purpose in the game is to prevent that from happening, it is your job to figure out the best way to maximize your ability to heal before running out of mana. The time between having a full mana tank to running out can be considered the TTL (time to live) of your party. Mana potions notwithstanding, once you run out of mana, the Bleep hath Hitteth the Fan. More than anything, you want to get the most healing per mana point possible, which is accomplished via two means: getting the talents/equipment to increase your mana/mana regeneration, and strategical usage of all possible healing spells.
Obsession over mana efficiency is what separates Priests from the Mages and Warlocks in World of Warcraft. Mages care simply about killing their target as quickly as possible - they don't need to save mana for healing, because they can't! Reduction of downtime is somewhat of a concern, but dying is worse, so it's blast blast blast and drink when it's over. Warlocks can pull from their vast hit point reserves to build back their mana if they're in a bind. But when in combat, healbot Priests rely on their mana regeneration and spellcasting efficiency to keep them in action. The lives of their teammates and themselves depend on it.
TACTICS
Sometimes it's easier to get one's point across by detailing what NOT to do first, and filling in the blanks later. I'll go over some of the common mistakes healers make in group fights that seem innocent at first but can result in wipes later on.
1) If a party member doesn't NEED a heal right away, hold off. I'll explain: as an example, let's say a Rogue in your party started off a fight by sapping a mob, but was seen right afterwards by the group. As the Rogue retreats to the tank so aggro can be pulled off, the Rogue takes some hits and gets down to around 60% health. Being a good Priest, you know that healing him at this moment would be a mistake - you'd get aggro of the whole group and strike fear in the heart of your tank as they are forced to scramble to protect you. However, you also note that the tank has made its move and has obtained the aggro of the enemy group now. The Rogue is no longer being attacked and remains at 60% health.
It's awfully tempting to throw a Flash Heal over to the Rogue - the standard heal choice for use on non-tanks - to top its health off. The tank's got the aggro held and the battle's starting to flow properly. Why not get the Rogue back at 100% now before you have to start casting other heals on the tank? Well, the reason is because it's not very efficient to do so. Under easy fighting conditions when the group isn't threatened by anything it's engaging, you can go ahead and top off that Rogue. But under heavy battle conditions found in raids, boss fights, and instances where you're grappling with tough foes, you need every ounce of mana you can get. At best, cast a Renew - the Priest's most mana-efficient spell - on the Rogue, and get your attention back to something else.
2) Hold off on heals for as long as you feel you safely can at the start of each pull. Healing draws the aggro of every enemy once the target you are healing has engaged in combat. You need to give time for your party members to build up aggro on the targets. This isn't so that you can only think of yourself and not get hit - it's so that you don't become a liability in battle. Just as a Mage who can't learn to wait before nuking becomes a liability to the whole party as they struggle to keep the caster alive, you don't want your party to have to worry about you by your heal spam. Just as they should trust you to do your job keeping them alive, you should trust that they will do their best to draw the attention of *all* enemies you are facing, so that once the inevitable healing begins, you won't get pounded flat.
Once you've reached the point where you feel it's time to start healing, go for it with gusto, using the most efficient healing methods possible. Under ideal conditions, you should not get aggro very often. Of course, ideal conditions have a way of not happening.
I was running the Baron side of Stratholme this week and in my group was the prototypical Mage Without a Clueâ¢, the type that just doesn't understand the concept of aggro management at all. At the outset of fights, he'd begin nuking with gusto and rely on his Ice shields to keep him alive. He'd even go and pull large groups himself instead of waiting for proper pullers to do so. Well, when you pull a group of 4 casters as a Mage, what happens to you? You get creamed. So mere seconds into the fight, I'd be forced to heal this Mage. Instant aggro. After 2 occasions of laying on the floor dead after all the mobs decided to beat on me for healing the Mage (even after I informed him twice to stop being so aggressive), I decided not to be the whipping boy any more and let him bite it a few times, which he was quite happy to oblige me with on the next few fights. The tank in my group just laughed at the guy - he could see as well that the Mage was deserving the deaths. This is an example of how party members with no concept of aggro management spell doom for a healer. You want to avoid these kinds of players.
How long can you go before you need to start healing? This is pretty subjective, of course, depending greatly on the party makeup, what you're fighting, how quickly others get aggro, and your skill level. You'll get a very good feel for it with experience. This isn't to say that you'll watch the health bars and try to time it so the first heal comes just as a character is at 1% health - that's stupid - just that it's a mistake to start flinging heals when your tank still has 80% of its health left and it's still early in the fight.
3) Know when it's time to cut and run. As a Priest, you have the ability to recover your party from a wipe. If you witness a horrific pull that is clear will result in the wipe of your party and you have not yet entered combat, your instincts will be to help your teammates and start healing. In some circumstances, though, this is a mistake. Back off from the fray and be there to recover your party from the wipe. Note that unless you save this tactic only for the case when it's completely clear that a wipe is coming, your teammates are going to get pretty annoyed at you. :) If you have a soulstone on you such that you can recover from a total party wipe, then enter the fray with gusto anyway and help try to kill as many of the baddies as you can before you go down.
4) Avoid overkill. When I was a newbie Priest player back in beta, I was a frequent abuser of this tactical error. I'd heal too much. Someone got hit a little? Boom, heal. Lots of Shields everywhere; keep everyone safe and protected. I see newbie Priests do this all the time still, so I understand. Power Word: Shield is a heck of a spell, making someone basically invulnerable for 30 seconds or until the shield absorbs enough damage. Problem is, it's a Priest's least mana-efficient spell. Admittedly it's been nerfed about 10 times during beta, but I hardly ever use Shield anymore. It costs too much mana for too little effect, and it's far more mana-conservative to use Renews or heals.
There are three situations when you want to cast Shield on a party member (or yourself):
a) You are pre-buffing the tank before a particularly brutal fight, knowing that by the time you have to cast again you'll have regained that mana back anyway. This also applies to pre-buffing AoE casters because you know they'll get beat on soon by a lot of enemies at once.
B) A caster on your party is getting hit by a foe, and the Shield is a fantastic dual-purpose spell that provides defense (keeps the caster safe) along with offense (allows the caster to cast uninterrupted).
c) A party member is about to die, and you won't be able to get off a flash heal until it's too late.
Likewise, it's not good to cast flash heal on someone when they've taken 10% damage. Sure, you might be in a group where that doesn't matter much, but the idea is to start acquiring good habits when you're young so that you play better when you get older. It's easier to ignore mana-conservation tactics when you're younger because the ratio of your mana regeneration to your total mana pool is greater. Renew is your most mana-efficient spell, at at its highest level with talents will regen more than 1,000 health over time. That's plenty for a top-off of just about any teammate, and it costs peanuts mana-wise.
5) It's an easy fight! Nuke away! No. The most offense you should provide is a casting of Shadow Word: Pain, and that's about it. Cast with your wand or beat on foes with your staff/mace as something to do between heals. Why is this? After all, if you're just fighting one or two mobs and you can help kill something faster, why not do it?
Aggro issues aside, the problem with this is overall efficiency and speed. When clearing instances, the group can only move as fast as its healer's mana pool. I can't stress this enough. By spamming offensive spells, you may be killing something a little (emphasis on little) faster, but the cost is the downtime involved for moving to the next fight.
Elite groups, well-oiled machines that clear instances quickly and expertly, know this innately. The tank controls the flow of battle, picks the fights, and keeps the group *constantly* moving. Guess what the tank's watching as they move from fight to fight? YOUR mana. Not the Mage's mana, or the Warlock's mana (except for cases where AoE is needed), but yours. Since a Mage shouldn't be blasting away until the tank's got plenty of aggro anyway, they can drink during the start of a standard fight. But everything has to come to a screeching halt if the Priest is low on mana.
This is why I love Spirit so much and scoff at those who diss it. With a good regen rate, the standard clearing of high-end instances can go much faster. From group to group to group, go go go. While a high-spirit build isn't the best for PvP, it rocks in PvE instances. It's a subtle thing that's hard to quantify, but with efficient spell casting and strong spirit regeneration, expert groups can simply go from fight to fight to fight with *zero* downtime. At all. The only pauses involved are boss fights or particularly tricky pulls.
6) When push comes to shove, heal the right person. The most important members of any party are the primary tank and primary healer. When the feces impact the rotating blades, the other members of your party may have to take one for the team. If keeping a mage or rogue alive will mean losing 50% of your mana at the outset of a critical boss fight, you may be forced to make the tough decision of letting that player die so that the group can live. This is part of the pressure and stress of playing a healer. The primary tank and primary healer have the most stressful, pivotal roles in any party - if you want to play more relaxed, then don't pick such classes. :) The easy thing to do would be to heal away on the player and feel that you "did all you could" when the party wipes due to your exhausted mana supply, when in fact you could have saved the day simply by letting them die. Not pretty. But it's fact.
TACTICS SUMMARY
Use the best, most efficient healing spell for each situation. Renews are for almost constant use on tanks and to top off non-tanks who are not being immediately threatened. Flash Heals are for spamming on tanks when things are getting really dicey and the tanks' hit points are going down in huge chunks, along with situational heals on non-tanks when they're taking damage. Greater Heals are for tanks when they are taking damage at a comfortable rate, allowing for the huge time to cast. Shields are for pre-buffs, protecting casters, and saving someone who is dying faster than a Flash Heal could cast.
Always be thinking of mana efficiency - protect your valuable mana pool. If you think of your mana pool as the hit points of the party, it might help. Just as you don't want your hit points to reach zero, neither do you want your mana pool to reach zero, and you need to take every precaution to prevent that in each and every fight.
TALENTS
I could give a talent spec here, and say point-by-point what you should be allocating your talents into. But if you've been reading, you'll be able to tell what I'm going to recommend anyway.
Because of certain glaring, shall we say, silly design decisions in the Holy tree, you don't need to worry about dumping a whole lot of points into it. There are key spells you want, but once you have those, it's up to you how to proceed.
I'm keeping this vague for a reason because you need to make up your own mind on this. You want to go for talents that improve your mana efficiency and healing abilities, not your damage. Thus, the offensive spells in the Holy tree will be completely ignored (they tend to stink anyhow - if you want offense, isn't that what the Shadow tree is for?). In the Holy tree, Improved Renew is a must, as is the 10% increase in healing power and Subtlety to ensure that you get aggro a heck of a lot less often. Those three talents are the keys for the tree, and you can go on to spend points as you please to increase your efficiency as you like. Improving your Heal and Prayer of Healing mana cost are options, and getting Spirit of Redemption can be useful since it's just a one-pointer. I have not found that reducing the casting speed of Greater Heal by .5 seconds is worth the 5 talent points required to get it, but do try it out for yourself.
In the Discipline tree, mana efficiency is greatly improved by the three talents that reduce the cost of instant-cast spells by 10%, increase your total mana by 10%, and allow you to regenerate some mana while casting. First off, reducing the mana cost of instant-cast spells by 10% affects Shield, Renew, Shadow Word:Pain, the Fortitude buff, and some other utility spells like Psychic Scream. You are essentially adding to your mana pool, because you WILL be casting these spells fairly often in party play and quite a lot in solo play. That last talent, Meditation, is often ignored by Priest players, especially those in the "spirit is totally useless" crowd. Just like spirit has a subtle but noticeable effect over long periods of time, so does Meditation. The regeneration of mana while casting at 15% of the normal rate does not get you a lot of extra mana per 5-second-rule wait. However, string that along the course of time and it gets rather significant in that it reduces downtime and keeps you in fights longer. If you're a dedicated healbot, you want this talent. In PvP, it's not so hot, but healbots aren't built for PvP.
Divine Spirit is nice for the extra spirit points, but the problem is that it requires 30 talent points in the Discipline tree. As a healbot, there's not enough in the Discipline tree to get me to 30 talent points without having to dump points into "junk" talents. I consider it not worth it now, especially since the casting of the buff itself every 30 minutes costs a lot of mana and adds to downtime. I save those talent points for the Holy tree, but I encourage you to try things out yourself.
Inner Focus is a great "oh, crap" spell that can let you get off an expensive healing spell when you're out of mana, or even early in a fight when you want to cast a huge heal and know you'll need that mana later. With the 5 minute cooldown, you can only use it once per fight at best.
The general rule of thumb when picking talents from these trees is, "which choice will make me the more effective and efficient healer?" Then go with it.
For more info on general Priest spells and the mana efficiency of the various heals, I highly recommend reading Mongo's sticky thread about Priest group play that's posted up there on the forum at http://www.lurkerlounge.com/forums/index...topic=4801.
Now go take care of your party, healbots. :) Comments welcome, including the "this is stupid, my build is better" variety!
-Bolty
There are two main philosophies with Priest-class players. Either you play the class as a more balanced offensive and healing class by liberally applying Shadow tree talents (better for PvP and solo play) or you play the class as what is derogatorily referred to as a "healbot," by concentrating talent points in the Holy tree (better for group PvE play). Note that both philosophies will use Discipline talents to some degree, for there are some juicy talents in there that neither style can ignore. What's great is that you can switch philosophies at any time simply by respeccing your talents - you're never pigeonholed into one style by early talent distribution decisions.
With my personality, I knew that I wanted to play a Priest for one reason - to be the ultimate healer. When I want to nuke, I play one of my Mages. And since it's not true at all that "Holy Priests can't solo", it's not a hard decision for me to go with the "healbot" setup on my Priest. I kick butt solo and have little downtime, to boot.
If you find yourself thinking that you might reply to a comment that "you're just a healbot" with the line, "darn straight," then I hope you'll read on for my opinions on what makes a sweet healbot talent build.
Focus of a Healbot
Mana efficiency, mana efficiency, mana efficiency. Ok, and aggro management, but the primary focus of any healbot is mana efficiency. You're obsessed with it. You like to crunch math numbers and figure out that Renew (the heal-over-time) is the most efficient spell. You see how many Flash Heals you can get off with full mana before you run out - and how many seconds go by before you can cast another. Why all the fuss? When you run out of mana, people die. This is Bad.⢠Since your entire purpose in the game is to prevent that from happening, it is your job to figure out the best way to maximize your ability to heal before running out of mana. The time between having a full mana tank to running out can be considered the TTL (time to live) of your party. Mana potions notwithstanding, once you run out of mana, the Bleep hath Hitteth the Fan. More than anything, you want to get the most healing per mana point possible, which is accomplished via two means: getting the talents/equipment to increase your mana/mana regeneration, and strategical usage of all possible healing spells.
Obsession over mana efficiency is what separates Priests from the Mages and Warlocks in World of Warcraft. Mages care simply about killing their target as quickly as possible - they don't need to save mana for healing, because they can't! Reduction of downtime is somewhat of a concern, but dying is worse, so it's blast blast blast and drink when it's over. Warlocks can pull from their vast hit point reserves to build back their mana if they're in a bind. But when in combat, healbot Priests rely on their mana regeneration and spellcasting efficiency to keep them in action. The lives of their teammates and themselves depend on it.
TACTICS
Sometimes it's easier to get one's point across by detailing what NOT to do first, and filling in the blanks later. I'll go over some of the common mistakes healers make in group fights that seem innocent at first but can result in wipes later on.
1) If a party member doesn't NEED a heal right away, hold off. I'll explain: as an example, let's say a Rogue in your party started off a fight by sapping a mob, but was seen right afterwards by the group. As the Rogue retreats to the tank so aggro can be pulled off, the Rogue takes some hits and gets down to around 60% health. Being a good Priest, you know that healing him at this moment would be a mistake - you'd get aggro of the whole group and strike fear in the heart of your tank as they are forced to scramble to protect you. However, you also note that the tank has made its move and has obtained the aggro of the enemy group now. The Rogue is no longer being attacked and remains at 60% health.
It's awfully tempting to throw a Flash Heal over to the Rogue - the standard heal choice for use on non-tanks - to top its health off. The tank's got the aggro held and the battle's starting to flow properly. Why not get the Rogue back at 100% now before you have to start casting other heals on the tank? Well, the reason is because it's not very efficient to do so. Under easy fighting conditions when the group isn't threatened by anything it's engaging, you can go ahead and top off that Rogue. But under heavy battle conditions found in raids, boss fights, and instances where you're grappling with tough foes, you need every ounce of mana you can get. At best, cast a Renew - the Priest's most mana-efficient spell - on the Rogue, and get your attention back to something else.
2) Hold off on heals for as long as you feel you safely can at the start of each pull. Healing draws the aggro of every enemy once the target you are healing has engaged in combat. You need to give time for your party members to build up aggro on the targets. This isn't so that you can only think of yourself and not get hit - it's so that you don't become a liability in battle. Just as a Mage who can't learn to wait before nuking becomes a liability to the whole party as they struggle to keep the caster alive, you don't want your party to have to worry about you by your heal spam. Just as they should trust you to do your job keeping them alive, you should trust that they will do their best to draw the attention of *all* enemies you are facing, so that once the inevitable healing begins, you won't get pounded flat.
Once you've reached the point where you feel it's time to start healing, go for it with gusto, using the most efficient healing methods possible. Under ideal conditions, you should not get aggro very often. Of course, ideal conditions have a way of not happening.
I was running the Baron side of Stratholme this week and in my group was the prototypical Mage Without a Clueâ¢, the type that just doesn't understand the concept of aggro management at all. At the outset of fights, he'd begin nuking with gusto and rely on his Ice shields to keep him alive. He'd even go and pull large groups himself instead of waiting for proper pullers to do so. Well, when you pull a group of 4 casters as a Mage, what happens to you? You get creamed. So mere seconds into the fight, I'd be forced to heal this Mage. Instant aggro. After 2 occasions of laying on the floor dead after all the mobs decided to beat on me for healing the Mage (even after I informed him twice to stop being so aggressive), I decided not to be the whipping boy any more and let him bite it a few times, which he was quite happy to oblige me with on the next few fights. The tank in my group just laughed at the guy - he could see as well that the Mage was deserving the deaths. This is an example of how party members with no concept of aggro management spell doom for a healer. You want to avoid these kinds of players.
How long can you go before you need to start healing? This is pretty subjective, of course, depending greatly on the party makeup, what you're fighting, how quickly others get aggro, and your skill level. You'll get a very good feel for it with experience. This isn't to say that you'll watch the health bars and try to time it so the first heal comes just as a character is at 1% health - that's stupid - just that it's a mistake to start flinging heals when your tank still has 80% of its health left and it's still early in the fight.
3) Know when it's time to cut and run. As a Priest, you have the ability to recover your party from a wipe. If you witness a horrific pull that is clear will result in the wipe of your party and you have not yet entered combat, your instincts will be to help your teammates and start healing. In some circumstances, though, this is a mistake. Back off from the fray and be there to recover your party from the wipe. Note that unless you save this tactic only for the case when it's completely clear that a wipe is coming, your teammates are going to get pretty annoyed at you. :) If you have a soulstone on you such that you can recover from a total party wipe, then enter the fray with gusto anyway and help try to kill as many of the baddies as you can before you go down.
4) Avoid overkill. When I was a newbie Priest player back in beta, I was a frequent abuser of this tactical error. I'd heal too much. Someone got hit a little? Boom, heal. Lots of Shields everywhere; keep everyone safe and protected. I see newbie Priests do this all the time still, so I understand. Power Word: Shield is a heck of a spell, making someone basically invulnerable for 30 seconds or until the shield absorbs enough damage. Problem is, it's a Priest's least mana-efficient spell. Admittedly it's been nerfed about 10 times during beta, but I hardly ever use Shield anymore. It costs too much mana for too little effect, and it's far more mana-conservative to use Renews or heals.
There are three situations when you want to cast Shield on a party member (or yourself):
a) You are pre-buffing the tank before a particularly brutal fight, knowing that by the time you have to cast again you'll have regained that mana back anyway. This also applies to pre-buffing AoE casters because you know they'll get beat on soon by a lot of enemies at once.
B) A caster on your party is getting hit by a foe, and the Shield is a fantastic dual-purpose spell that provides defense (keeps the caster safe) along with offense (allows the caster to cast uninterrupted).
c) A party member is about to die, and you won't be able to get off a flash heal until it's too late.
Likewise, it's not good to cast flash heal on someone when they've taken 10% damage. Sure, you might be in a group where that doesn't matter much, but the idea is to start acquiring good habits when you're young so that you play better when you get older. It's easier to ignore mana-conservation tactics when you're younger because the ratio of your mana regeneration to your total mana pool is greater. Renew is your most mana-efficient spell, at at its highest level with talents will regen more than 1,000 health over time. That's plenty for a top-off of just about any teammate, and it costs peanuts mana-wise.
5) It's an easy fight! Nuke away! No. The most offense you should provide is a casting of Shadow Word: Pain, and that's about it. Cast with your wand or beat on foes with your staff/mace as something to do between heals. Why is this? After all, if you're just fighting one or two mobs and you can help kill something faster, why not do it?
Aggro issues aside, the problem with this is overall efficiency and speed. When clearing instances, the group can only move as fast as its healer's mana pool. I can't stress this enough. By spamming offensive spells, you may be killing something a little (emphasis on little) faster, but the cost is the downtime involved for moving to the next fight.
Elite groups, well-oiled machines that clear instances quickly and expertly, know this innately. The tank controls the flow of battle, picks the fights, and keeps the group *constantly* moving. Guess what the tank's watching as they move from fight to fight? YOUR mana. Not the Mage's mana, or the Warlock's mana (except for cases where AoE is needed), but yours. Since a Mage shouldn't be blasting away until the tank's got plenty of aggro anyway, they can drink during the start of a standard fight. But everything has to come to a screeching halt if the Priest is low on mana.
This is why I love Spirit so much and scoff at those who diss it. With a good regen rate, the standard clearing of high-end instances can go much faster. From group to group to group, go go go. While a high-spirit build isn't the best for PvP, it rocks in PvE instances. It's a subtle thing that's hard to quantify, but with efficient spell casting and strong spirit regeneration, expert groups can simply go from fight to fight to fight with *zero* downtime. At all. The only pauses involved are boss fights or particularly tricky pulls.
6) When push comes to shove, heal the right person. The most important members of any party are the primary tank and primary healer. When the feces impact the rotating blades, the other members of your party may have to take one for the team. If keeping a mage or rogue alive will mean losing 50% of your mana at the outset of a critical boss fight, you may be forced to make the tough decision of letting that player die so that the group can live. This is part of the pressure and stress of playing a healer. The primary tank and primary healer have the most stressful, pivotal roles in any party - if you want to play more relaxed, then don't pick such classes. :) The easy thing to do would be to heal away on the player and feel that you "did all you could" when the party wipes due to your exhausted mana supply, when in fact you could have saved the day simply by letting them die. Not pretty. But it's fact.
TACTICS SUMMARY
Use the best, most efficient healing spell for each situation. Renews are for almost constant use on tanks and to top off non-tanks who are not being immediately threatened. Flash Heals are for spamming on tanks when things are getting really dicey and the tanks' hit points are going down in huge chunks, along with situational heals on non-tanks when they're taking damage. Greater Heals are for tanks when they are taking damage at a comfortable rate, allowing for the huge time to cast. Shields are for pre-buffs, protecting casters, and saving someone who is dying faster than a Flash Heal could cast.
Always be thinking of mana efficiency - protect your valuable mana pool. If you think of your mana pool as the hit points of the party, it might help. Just as you don't want your hit points to reach zero, neither do you want your mana pool to reach zero, and you need to take every precaution to prevent that in each and every fight.
TALENTS
I could give a talent spec here, and say point-by-point what you should be allocating your talents into. But if you've been reading, you'll be able to tell what I'm going to recommend anyway.
Because of certain glaring, shall we say, silly design decisions in the Holy tree, you don't need to worry about dumping a whole lot of points into it. There are key spells you want, but once you have those, it's up to you how to proceed.
I'm keeping this vague for a reason because you need to make up your own mind on this. You want to go for talents that improve your mana efficiency and healing abilities, not your damage. Thus, the offensive spells in the Holy tree will be completely ignored (they tend to stink anyhow - if you want offense, isn't that what the Shadow tree is for?). In the Holy tree, Improved Renew is a must, as is the 10% increase in healing power and Subtlety to ensure that you get aggro a heck of a lot less often. Those three talents are the keys for the tree, and you can go on to spend points as you please to increase your efficiency as you like. Improving your Heal and Prayer of Healing mana cost are options, and getting Spirit of Redemption can be useful since it's just a one-pointer. I have not found that reducing the casting speed of Greater Heal by .5 seconds is worth the 5 talent points required to get it, but do try it out for yourself.
In the Discipline tree, mana efficiency is greatly improved by the three talents that reduce the cost of instant-cast spells by 10%, increase your total mana by 10%, and allow you to regenerate some mana while casting. First off, reducing the mana cost of instant-cast spells by 10% affects Shield, Renew, Shadow Word:Pain, the Fortitude buff, and some other utility spells like Psychic Scream. You are essentially adding to your mana pool, because you WILL be casting these spells fairly often in party play and quite a lot in solo play. That last talent, Meditation, is often ignored by Priest players, especially those in the "spirit is totally useless" crowd. Just like spirit has a subtle but noticeable effect over long periods of time, so does Meditation. The regeneration of mana while casting at 15% of the normal rate does not get you a lot of extra mana per 5-second-rule wait. However, string that along the course of time and it gets rather significant in that it reduces downtime and keeps you in fights longer. If you're a dedicated healbot, you want this talent. In PvP, it's not so hot, but healbots aren't built for PvP.
Divine Spirit is nice for the extra spirit points, but the problem is that it requires 30 talent points in the Discipline tree. As a healbot, there's not enough in the Discipline tree to get me to 30 talent points without having to dump points into "junk" talents. I consider it not worth it now, especially since the casting of the buff itself every 30 minutes costs a lot of mana and adds to downtime. I save those talent points for the Holy tree, but I encourage you to try things out yourself.
Inner Focus is a great "oh, crap" spell that can let you get off an expensive healing spell when you're out of mana, or even early in a fight when you want to cast a huge heal and know you'll need that mana later. With the 5 minute cooldown, you can only use it once per fight at best.
The general rule of thumb when picking talents from these trees is, "which choice will make me the more effective and efficient healer?" Then go with it.
For more info on general Priest spells and the mana efficiency of the various heals, I highly recommend reading Mongo's sticky thread about Priest group play that's posted up there on the forum at http://www.lurkerlounge.com/forums/index...topic=4801.
Now go take care of your party, healbots. :) Comments welcome, including the "this is stupid, my build is better" variety!
-Bolty
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