Is SS better than Power Infusion?

[Taliasha 1]

Hello folks.  I am new to the forums and I just signed up today.  I have been playing a Disc Priest / Shadow dual spec for a couple of months now.  However I am still trying to understand how better to heal in raids and challenge modes.  It seems my single target healing is far better atm as a disc priest and it feels as though I can cast more quickly in this spec vs the Holy spec.  With that said, I have done several challenge mods and ran into issues the other day on the Sky Reach Challenge mode with my guildies.  On the Araknath boss I just could not keep up my tank through some of the blasts and had a hard time keeping up some of my guildies when they were in the beams.  I was told that I should be using Spirit Shell and not Power Word Solace, and that I should put Surge of Light as a talent point and not Power Infusion.  My talent points are as follows currently: Desperate Prayer, Angelic Feather, Power Word: Solace, Void Tendrils, Power Infusion, Halo, Words of Mending.

 

I have been reading on some of these forums that Spirit Shell isn't worth utilizing as a whole as it isn't as good as it once was in MoP.  I would be giving up increased haste and mana reduction if I give up Power Infusion for Spirit Shell.  Right now I am struggling to keep mana so I just didn't want to give one up for the other.  Surge of Light also takes away my ability to gain mana if I put it in place of Power Word: Solace which is what I use as an instant cast to gain 2% mana back as needed in fights.

 

I would really love to hear your thoughts and constructive Criticism and advice on these talent points.  My toon is Taliasha in WoD.  If you want to look her up on World of Warcraft to see how I am geared at the moment.  Anyway thanks for you time and look to hearing back from some of you.

 

Tal

[Kulia 39]

If your struggling with mana, stick with power infusion and power word: solace. If they work for you thats great!

It does seem that spirit shell is a lot weaker than it was in MoP, it would seem to have better use in 5-mans then in raids (to me at least). Overall, just go with what works for you. The only talent I would NEVER take would probably be divine star, since it's a lot weaker than prayer of healing.

[Brewmonksta 157]

The thing i would note is the different styles of damage on the CM fights vs Raiding vs Heroics.

 

Talents in their current form are easy to switch between and should be switched depending on the needs of the boss/CM.

 

You could have all the mana in the world with solace, burst with PI but it could be the well timed AA Buffed spirit shell that gives your team enough effective health to last through the laser beams while you blanket PW:S and then Stack up a nice CoW.

 

Adapt to your fight/group needs. This can be the difference between a good healer and a bad healer. Disc is very much about preempting damage and knowing what is going to happen next.

[Gwenymph 414]

I personally recommend Power Infusion for all Highmaul fights and PoH mana cost during SS does play a part in that.  I ran all CMs with PI and SS and slightly favored PI but in Normal and Heroic Highmaul PI has really fit better into the encounters with my playstyle and the niche Disc is falling back into with PWS

[Taliasha 1]

I personally recommend Power Infusion for all Highmaul fights and PoH mana cost during SS does play a part in that.  I ran all CMs with PI and SS and slightly favored PI but in Normal and Heroic Highmaul PI has really fit better into the encounters with my playstyle and the niche Disc is falling back into with PWS

Thanks for the advice.  It looks like PI is the right choice then.  =)

Edited December 8, 2014 by Taliasha

[Gwenymph 414]

Thanks for the advice.  It looks like PI is the right choice then.  =)

 

and Welcome to forums!

[Nuadria 20]

As Gwenymph said, I, myself, would also recommend Power infusion. SS would be VERY situational now, and the reduced mana cost/haste of power infusion will outdo SS in general.

[Ichigaki 13]

I may have to have a play around with spirit shell myself. I can see how it could be applicable to Skyreach Heroic.

[Espiee 161]

PI is an incredibly useful on-demand throughput cooldown. SS is made clunky by being associated with expensive spells(SS+Heal is worse than CoW so that choice would make no sense).

 

That tier is essentially a choice between ToF and PI until you get the mana to sustain SS.

[Ichigaki 13]

PI is an incredibly useful on-demand throughput cooldown. SS is made clunky by being associated with expensive spells(SS+Heal is worse than CoW so that choice would make no sense).

 

That tier is essentially a choice between ToF and PI until you get the mana to sustain SS.

Havn't had a chance to play around with this yet, will likely do so tonight. I was thinking more along the lines of consistent raid damage as disc, PW:S - SS - PoH, however how would this scale compared to Divine Aegis I wonder? I dont think SS is intended as single target FH spammer, but maybe a handy utility for group damage phases.

[fateswarm 3]

It's basically simple. Spirit Shell is only useful (and totally useless otherwise) if PoH (or other) will not heal. Since in like 90%+ of the time on most fights that you don't severely overgear and in their current setup and design most people will not be 100% HP for prolonged periods of time waiting for a burst damage, it's practically pointless.

 

 

The existence of CoW made it evern worse since in the case of single target healing it takes that old spirit shell role almost entirely.

Edited December 11, 2014 by fateswarm

[Brewmonksta 157]

 

It's basically simple. Spirit Shell is only useful (and totally useless otherwise) if PoH (or other) will not heal. Since in like 90%+ of the time on most fights that you don't severely overgear and in their current setup and design most people will not be 100% HP for prolonged periods of time waiting for a burst damage, it's practically pointless.

On paper in a vacuum SS is worse. But punching out max HPS is IMO not what the current healing game is all about. It is about using the tools you have available to progress in an encounter.

 

I found SS to be handy on Brackenspore with the infinite mana and haste buff. I may not have given me the best throughput over the whole fight but at those periods it provided a great buffer.

 

There is times where the SS will be of greater benefit than PI will to the healing toolkit.

[fateswarm 3]

On paper in a vacuum SS is worse. But punching out max HPS is IMO not what the current healing game is all about. It is about using the tools you have available to progress in an encounter.

 

I found SS to be handy on Brackenspore with the infinite mana and haste buff. I may not have given me the best throughput over the whole fight but at those periods it provided a great buffer.

 

There is times where the SS will be of greater benefit than PI will to the healing toolkit.

 

 

Well yes, it needs those little niches, but very strictly. It's no longer a very universal way to "buffer" and transfer healing for later. Right now most fights do not have the luxury to heal up everything to 100% just like that on demand.

[Brewmonksta 157]

You dont need people at 100% HP for SS to be effective.

 

Imperator Heroic when force nova is pumping you in the face 3 times or right before a Kor'agh orb explosion after the dps decided to kill adds outside of the void zones.

 

I dont disagree that SS has worse throughput but i just wanted to add my input to a thread titled "Which is better".

 

My answer is define "better".

[Ichigaki 13]

I tried spiritshell on Brackenspore last night, I find it terrible, for times in stress the 20% casting speed and mana reduction provided by PI just seems so much more useful. The output from SS doesnt seem as strong as CoW especcialy with PI up. Would make more sense to take a portion of the healing and add it on top of the heal as a flat absorb. I found myself wanting to turn it off after a couple of seconds.

[Espiee 161]

Brackenspore is the only fight you can afford to use SS because of the rejuvenating mushroom, but that doesn't mean it's worth it.

 

When Brackenspore casts Infesting Spores, you have Living Mushroom to keep you alive. Using SS is just padding and completely needless.

 

The only place you could argue to use SS on brackenspore would be on the tanks for necrotic breath since the debuff doesn't affect absorbs. But a PWS and a fully decked CoW is more than plenty to cover that.

[Taliasha 1]

Last night I raided with my guild and between boss fights would switch back and forth from the talent points SS and PI and found that even though it states on Spirit Shield that if members are within 30m of you SS is applied, this isn't necessarily so.  What I noticed is some members getting SS on them and others did not.  In addition as I was using healing spells to apply SS the 15 seconds seemed to be cut short by big bursts of damage taking the shield off the tank and other members.  That left me with less mana and less haste once SS was off members to quickly apply much needed heals.  I think I was doing better with managing healing and shielding people with PWS (applied as needed) and using PI when mana reduction and haste were needed during periods of big damage.  This is just my opinion having gone back and forth using both talent points.  I now have some better gear but I am still having mana issues on some of the HM raid fights.  So haste and mana reduction I believe at this point are priority.  If you give up PI for SS then you lose that.

[fateswarm 3]

Prayer of Healing doesn't work between you and 30 yards. Read the tooltip.

 

 

 

edit: Come to think of it, it is vague, but in practice it's based on target.

Edited December 11, 2014 by fateswarm

[Nuadria 20]

Last night I raided with my guild and between boss fights would switch back and forth from the talent points SS and PI and found that even though it states on Spirit Shield that if members are within 30m of you SS is applied, this isn't necessarily so.  What I noticed is some members getting SS on them and others did not.  In addition as I was using healing spells to apply SS the 15 seconds seemed to be cut short by big bursts of damage taking the shield off the tank and other members.  That left me with less mana and less haste once SS was off members to quickly apply much needed heals.  I think I was doing better with managing healing and shielding people with PWS (applied as needed) and using PI when mana reduction and haste were needed during periods of big damage.  This is just my opinion having gone back and forth using both talent points.  I now have some better gear but I am still having mana issues on some of the HM raid fights.  So haste and mana reduction I believe at this point are priority.  If you give up PI for SS then you lose that.

In my opinion, it would take a rare situation to be able to use SS effectively; It's overall better to use Power Infusion, because of the haste increase, and the reduced mana for spells.

[BigMcLargeHuge 6]

Power Infusion, forever and always.  Spirit Shell is terrible, especially at the cost of a talent tier.

[Bobbyjensen6000 17]

Looking at this from a holy perspective how do you feel about Twist of Fate vs Power Infusion? I used Power Infusion for the longest time, but yesterday I tried Twist of Fate and on some bosses I noticed I could keep the buff up a lot(Brackenspore if Green mushroom was down especially and if infesting spores hit), Kor'Gath, and in the later stage of Mar'Gok the buff would be up a lot.

 

But I also missed increased haste/reduced mana sometimes.

[Espiee 161]

ToF is better whenever you can get a decent uptime. 15% increased healing is incredibly nice. PI is however better if you can't, or you need the on-demand throughput.

[Hummingbird 9]

Maybe a dumb question, but does those 15% increased healing also increase our PWS/CoW?

[Espiee 161]

You can check that fairly easy by removing and reattaching your equipment bringing you below 35% health, heal yourself and then use PWS to see if it heals for more.

 

The answer is unfortunately no.

[Hummingbird 9]

OK, then ToF cant really be better then PI at this point when we throw so much PWS i guess, even with a high uptime. Thanks for the clarification!

(At work, so cant test myself - thanks for explaining!)