15 February, 2009
I want Holy Charge!
13 February, 2009
The Flow of Things
27 January, 2009
Pally Power!
14 January, 2009
Healing Tunnel Vision
Get Your Eyes Out of Your Addons
This post is in response to the "Don't Rely on Addons to Heal" post over at World of Matticus, found here. This is a subject I feel very strongly about. As I peruse the Elitist Jerks forums, I see many UIs posted in the UI threads that are just god-awfully hard to heal with.
"Addons not make one great."
I can't stand people who rely solely on addons because they feel they're a better healer because of it. Healbot, Clique, Grid, and what have you are not the key to being a good healer. I actually argue the opposite. I feel that addons, when used incorrectly, actually reduce the effectiveness of a healer.
One thing I absolute cannot tolerate is people who have fifteen million spell icons and over nine thousand action bars out on their screens. You don't need that many. I guarantee you, you don't need that many spells out on your screen. I for one (and keep in mind, this certainly does not and should not necessarily apply to everyone) don’t need to see my spells to know what I’m casting. I know F4 is Flash of Light, F3 is Holy Light, 5 is Holy Shock, and F1 is my “Ah crap, burst damage incoming” Trinket + Divine Favor + Holy Shock + Flash of Light button. I don’t need to see them to know what I’m casting.
It’s More Than a Feelin’
Heck, I don’t even need to see my cast bar. I may be alone on this as well, but I can cast through feeling. I know how long a Flash takes to cast, likewise with a Holy Light. I know when the spell is about to end and can preemptively hit my next heal at the same moment my current heal goes off. Honestly, in raids and instances, the only things I even care about enough to have on my screen is Grid with the raid health bars and my target’s health bar. I don’t need to see chat (that’s what Ventrilo is for), I don’t need to see my target’s target, I don’t need to see the boss’s health (some say this leads to healing tunnel vision, but that’s a different post entirely), and I certainly don’t need to see half a million tiny spell icons, most of which I’ll never cast during the fight anyway.
Tips for Improvement
Get your eyes off your addons. You’d be amazed at how much more effectively you can heal if you’re actively watching your raid members. You’ll not only see who is taking damage, but more importantly, WHY they’re taking damage. You’ll also see who’s going to be taking damage (that rogue with A.D.D standing in the fire?) and can react accordingly, preempting most of the damage they’ll end up taking: You can start a heal so that it lands just as they finish taking damage, reducing the total time they spend damaged. Your eyes should be centered in the middle 60% of your screen, not roaming the bottom of the screen staring at action bars.
Furthermore, having a plethora of bars and icons and miscellaneous crap on your screen interferes with seeing aforementioned fire. If you die because you couldn’t see your environment, you’re not doing your job. I can’t tell you how frustrating it is as a (former) raid leader when you have players dying not because of the game (Random Number Generator comes to mind) but rather their own lack of attentiveness. If you have a 5 by 5 grid setup that occupies the middle 4 square inches of your screen, you’re doing it wrong.
Look forward to a new post soon about how to reduce UI clutter and make more efficient use of space. For now, I hope I’ve left you thinking about what addons you use and ways you could make better use of them. I’m not telling you to scrap addons entirely, just to use them well, and scrap what you don’t need. When it comes down to it, you should be watching your raid members because you’re healing the player, not the health bar.
11 January, 2009
The Art of Healing: Cooldown Woes
I’m writing this post after conducting a discussion with a friend of mine who plays a CoH priest. He was griping about the CD addition to CoH and Wild Growth, saying that now shamans will occupy the top AOE healing spot. This is my refutation of that claim. I’m going to mostly talk about how the CoH nerf affects Chain Heal and vice versa, seeing as I have the most experience with these two spells.
“That ability isn’t ready yet.”
We all know about the cooldowns coming in patch 3.0.8. Ask any priest or druid; it’s on the top of their list of complaints. I was recently discussing this change with a friend from class that plays a dwarf priest, and he had nothing but bad things to say about the fact that Chain Heal was not getting a nerf as well. He argued that shamans will now be the best AOE healers in the game. I personally disagree.
Targeting issues
I still think priests are perfectly capable AOE healers, and I attribute this to the fact that CoH is still a smart heal. CoH prioritizes who it heals. Those raid members with the greatest deficit health will receive the heals. I think that makes CoH one of the best “fire and forget” healing spells in the game. If you see a bunch of raid members taking damage, you can launch off a CoH and be fairly certain that the raid members who need the healing the most will receive it. You don’t need to even switch from your current target if they’re near the incoming damage. You are only limited by the 15 yard range, which remains nothing to scoff at. CoH is extremely useful in this regard because if your raid members are alert and moving to avoid AOE damage, you can pop off a quick CoH to keep them topped off.
Pay Attention!
Some healers are under the assumption that a shaman can just spam Chain Heal and win, much like priests are doing now with CoH. With Chain Heal, you have to pay close attention to who your target is, as they will receive the most benefit from the heal, and who is standing nearby them to receive the jumps from the heal. The jumps from the Chain Heal are much harder to judge than the smart healing from CoH. You can’t guarantee that the more damaged raid member will receive the 2nd jump, and the less damaged raid member will receive the 3rd jump. It’s not something you can judge easily in combat while a dozen other things are happening around you. Chain Heal IS very powerful because of it’s spammability. If you have a tightly packed group taking damage, like melee dps or the like, it’s a very useful tool for keeping them all up as they move to avoid AOE damage or what have you. Chain Heal is much more suited (post-nerf) to dealing with sustained AOE damage, whereas CoH is now more of a burst damage AOE heal.
Additional Notes
There are a lot of priests who bind every key to CoH and faceroll and top charts doing so. (I’m not saying every priest does this, but there are more than enough that do.) The only thing the nerf will mean for priests is that now you will have to make more efficient use of your heals. PoM is very powerful, as is Renew. Those spells didn’t lose any functionality with the advent of CoH, but they arguably gain some functionality now that CoH has a cooldown. Additionally, CoH is still instant cast. Chain Heal has a cast time. CoH is much more reactive than Chain Heal will ever be. There’s nothing wrong with CoH and Chain Heal. They merely are suited for different situations now.
I’ve always been a fan of laser beam Penance healing, and no, I don’t spam Chain Heal. I’m a Lesser Healing Wave fan myself, although I do realize just how useful Chain Heal is in the right circumstances. I believe there is no “useless” heal. All heals have their place. It is finding a place for each of these heals that makes a healer good.