Healer Setup in 3.1

[Elix]

Hey guys,

It's been overwhelming to catch up on the numerous changes in 3.1 and major grats on beating the new encounters so far.

I'm really interested in how the healer setup is being handled with the new content. We for one run with 5 to 7 healers in most current content (which isn't a benchmark really) but it's an indication of how we build our raid teams for us at least.

Is there any signs of this changing? Maybe setups that require 8 to 9 healers? or a DPS/Healer hybrid for special situations? I know it's a little early given that there's a lot more content on the way, but any feedback would be highly appreciated!

Cheers,
Elix

[sparkygg]

I think blizzards intentions were to not make a new 4H, with the need of one class, but who knows!

[Ruk]

I think Blizzard is moving towards less healers compared to TBC. It's the most elegant solution at least when you need to bring in a new class in the raid and you certainly don't want to kick out that last rogue/mage/insert whatever. It's better to go from seven to five healers to free up those extra needed spots for DKs, moonkins, lolret.

What healer setup you run will heavily depend on the DPS of your guild and the competence of your healers (and tanks to some extent). Also having some really skilled paladins go a long way as they provide the raw HPS so your priests and druids can shine in their roles.

Method's standard setups are like this:

Seven healers: 2*paladins, 2*priests, 2*druids, 1*shaman
Six healers: 2*paladins, 2*priests, 1*druid, 1*shaman
Five healers: 2*paladins, 1*priest, 1*druid, 1*shaman
Four healers: 2*paladins, priest/druid/shaman*2

I think we're gonna run more "four healer setups" than "seven healer setup" in Ulduar. After Thorim and Freya I'm even more convinced about that.

[Excelle]

So far we havn't seen any special encounter where you need a special amount of healers. We did both encounters with 6 healers which was quite an overkill since we had 1 healer gone on both kills for huge parts of the fight. I was talking with Protec yesterday and we agreed that Thorim at his current state could be done with 2 healers only (assuming that there is no heavy lag as on the PTR) but you have to keep in mind that so far it is only the first version of the bosses. They might be harder later on thus require more healers.

Feel free to ask later when we know more. ;)

- Excelle the Mortal

[Fleuria]

Well if Druids stay in the current state they are then it will come down to the question do we keep the paladins for the blessings or take 2 druids for better mt healing but thats just my opinion based on healer stress test

[Protec]

The 2 healer thing on thorim is only for the 3 min achivement you should go with 5 on live firstkill coz we dont know how he gets changed etc. Remember nothing is final

[Elix]

Awesome. Thanks for the response guys. It's quite exciting to see such a shift which is compensated through Dual Specs to allow people to go back and forth. This will prove invaluable especially during progression raids where you might realize you have too little DPS or too much heal/overheals.

I think it's time to tell everyone to learn how to play offspecs to the max. It doesn't seem like there's a current indication of which healer is going to shine through this new content, so I might play it safe and make the raid healers all prepare for war. :)

You guys tried out discipline much? We're using one in all raids now and saw one on the Hodir Kill video. They seem to be doing quite well.

Cheers!

[Protec]

Well if Druids stay in the current state they are then it will come down to the question do we keep the paladins for the blessings or take 2 druids for better mt healing but thats just my opinion based on healer stress test

The healer stress test cant be taken as a test. We had 6 people spamming 1 person so Patchwerk decides who will heal the most in terms of mana effic. i dont know about russa but i just wanted to know how long i can keep spamming HL.

Ive read myself into this Nourish a bit and see that it crits without the 20% for like 7k thats less than a fol. With the 20% more healing done it will be around 8.5k(+~850 living seed) which is only a bit more than a flash. A Paladin flash will have more crit even with your +25% of the PTR and every 6seconds you have a 60% chance that the next fol will be instant + active ss(+50% crit = 98-100%) and the shock healingdone isnt added to this example. And we have way more haste on our fol, if you compare the mana costs for it and remember that even with hl spam a paladin wont realy go oom then a druid is defi. loosing in these terms. But i dont use a fol spammer in my rooster.

[sparkygg]

Real men faceroll Holy Light

[Taurec]

yea I also wouldnt say that you can draw any conclusions from spamming one person.. saying anything else is just plain retarded

[Fleuria]

Well if Druids stay in the current state they are then it will come down to the question do we keep the paladins for the blessings or take 2 druids for better mt healing but thats just my opinion based on healer stress test

The healer stress test cant be taken as a test. We had 6 people spamming 1 person so Patchwerk decides who will heal the most in terms of mana effic. i dont know about russa but i just wanted to know how long i can keep spamming HL.

Ive read myself into this Nourish a bit and see that it crits without the 20% for like 7k thats less than a fol. With the 20% more healing done it will be around 8.5k(+~850 living seed) which is only a bit more than a flash. A Paladin flash will have more crit even with your +25% of the PTR and every 6seconds you have a 60% chance that the next fol will be instant + active ss(+50% crit = 98-100%) and the shock healingdone isnt added to this example. And we have way more haste on our fol, if you compare the mana costs for it and remember that even with hl spam a paladin wont realy go oom then a druid is defi. loosing in these terms. But i dont use a fol spammer in my rooster.

Well yes true with out the multipliers Nourish seems pretty weak compared to FoL but with the multipliers in place in can compete with Holy Light spam (approx 50% Nourish Crit on ptr at the moment), ok i go oom compared to a paladin but thats due to the fact they changed spirit on the ptr and i gemmed spell power for max lifebloom healing, I dont gain anywhere near as much as i do on live if i regem int and spirit/mp5 i could probrably get away with spamming nourish on mt for a whole fight and due to my hots ticking aswell i'm sure druid would be as efficient as a paladin and with the nerf to lifebloom incomming i don't really see a point in gemming spell power anymore as you will not be able to efficiently roll them out on the tanks and others. It would free it up to maximize nourish and if this keeps up i see druid challenging a paladin on the effectiveness of mt healing but these are just my 2 cents at the moment and i guess we've still got alot of changes to come till 3.1 goes live. I mean heck they could change us to raid healers in the time 3.1 goes live :D

Yeah you can't draw anything out of mashing buttons on 1 person but i do what im doing now on live realm and at the moment on ptr it seems like they've increased the output by 50-60% of the current healing rotation i use on tank healing over the 2 tests of freya / thorim and the patchwerk dps test we he was hateful striking.

[Elix]

Well yes true with out the multipliers Nourish seems pretty weak compared to FoL but with the multipliers in place in can compete with Holy Light spam (approx 50% Nourish Crit on ptr at the moment), ok i go oom compared to a paladin but thats due to the fact they changed spirit on the ptr and i gemmed spell power for max lifebloom healing, I dont gain anywhere near as much as i do on live if i regem int and spirit/mp5 i could probrably get away with spamming nourish on mt for a whole fight and due to my hots ticking aswell i'm sure druid would be as efficient as a paladin and with the nerf to lifebloom incomming i don't really see a point in gemming spell power anymore as you will not be able to efficiently roll them out on the tanks and others. It would free it up to maximize nourish and if this keeps up i see druid challenging a paladin on the effectiveness of mt healing but these are just my 2 cents at the moment and i guess we've still got alot of changes to come till 3.1 goes live. I mean heck they could change us to raid healers in the time 3.1 goes live :D

Are you referring to the increase in Lifebloom cost? How much of a hit is that to the trees? From what I've been able to read over at the PTR forums, most people are saying it's quite manageable so far. Also with the change to intensity going up to 50%, I would have imagined that mana regeneration would be better. Please do correct me if I'm yapping.

Also, if you do regem int/mp5, does it look like there's a milestone you can reach that would give you back the same regeneration before the mechanics were changed?

[Protec]

Well yes true with out the multipliers Nourish seems pretty weak compared to FoL but with the multipliers in place in can compete with Holy Light spam (approx 50% Nourish Crit on ptr at the moment), ok i go oom compared to a paladin but thats due to the fact they changed spirit on the ptr and i gemmed spell power for max lifebloom healing, I dont gain anywhere near as much as i do on live if i regem int and spirit/mp5 i could probrably get away with spamming nourish on mt for a whole fight and due to my hots ticking aswell i'm sure druid would be as efficient as a paladin and with the nerf to lifebloom incomming i don't really see a point in gemming spell power anymore as you will not be able to efficiently roll them out on the tanks and others. It would free it up to maximize nourish and if this keeps up i see druid challenging a paladin on the effectiveness of mt healing but these are just my 2 cents at the moment and i guess we've still got alot of changes to come till 3.1 goes live. I mean heck they could change us to raid healers in the time 3.1 goes live :D

Yeah you can't draw anything out of mashing buttons on 1 person but i do what im doing now on live realm and at the moment on ptr it seems like they've increased the output by 50-60% of the current healing rotation i use on tank healing over the 2 tests of freya / thorim and the patchwerk dps test we he was hateful striking.

To cast an effective nourish youll need at least 1 Hot (1 GCD) to prepare for x(depending on the duration of the Hot) Nourish (+20%).

Tree
~719 Mana Regrowth (Hot 26 Seconds) -> 25/~1.4 = ~17x Nourish
~391 (PTR ~780) LifeBloom (9 Seconds) -> 8/~1.4 = ~5x Nourish
~446 Rejuvination (18 Seconds) -> 17 / ~1.4 = ~12x Nourish

To create a powerfull Nourish with the effect of the new Glyph (+6% per Hot) youll need 3 GCD to get the hots up + cast time of your Nourish. And even with all these Buffs it will never heal as much as a HL + youll need the hots + your rotation will be a problem since all the hots have way different durations.

A flash doesnt need any preparation to cast, you could only nourish spam if you abuse another Druids hots. (You can add the preparation mana needed to the mana costs of Nourish)

Regarding the gemming, if you realy wanna change your gemming and remove the SP you get from them to gain some healing endurance then your Nourish will get less effective too.
(calculation for you current gems)
7x 19sp = 133sp
3x 32sp = 96sp
1x 25sp = 25sp
= 254sp
(i wont expand the math of this sp loss into the +% of the glyph and other +% effects)



Rolling Lifeblooms on 2-3 tanks is just hands down one of the most -- probably the most -- efficient heals in the game. We didn't want to nerf the amount Lifebloom heals, but we were concerned druids would jump to the top of the healer stack pretty quickly with the recent mana changes.

Someone asked whether we were intending to change the Resto druid's role. We aren't. All of these changes fall, in our minds at least, into the realms of balance or polish.


To counter the high mana costs you gained an extra 20%+ regen.

[Fleuria]

well lets just see

i never said Nourish would beat holy light i just said it might rival it or be a good back up.

[sparkygg]

Noway nourish spamming druid can outdo HL spam from a paladin.. >_<


Effective healing is useless meter with to many healers, so yea you might be the same there, but please, stop being foolish....

[Fleuria]

Noway nourish spamming druid can outdo HL spam from a paladin.. >_<


Effective healing is useless meter with to many healers, so yea you might be the same there, but please, stop being foolish....

i didnt say nourish + hots beats holy light i said it might rival it / be a very good backup.

but its pointless to discuss this any further untill 3.1 is on live realm.