Underperforming Holy Priest

[Oblivionisdark 0]

I have been playing holy priest since start of Highmaul and I feel like I am underpeforming in all of the fights. I look at my hps and compare it to other holy priests at or even below my ilvl and they are outdoing me greatly. I know hps will be lower when mechanics are done correctly but I still feel inadequite when looking at the other healers in my raids hps. My character's name is Valaine.

Here are the logs for the raid last night.

https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports/ARhNpHT8rVy4DP1z#boss=-2

 

Here is a link to my armory.
http://us.battle.net/wow/en/character/thrall/Valaine/simple

If anyone could give me some tips on what to do better that would be great. I keep renew up on tanks and try to renew people when raid damage is coming. I use circle of healing when it will heal three or more people. I try to keep lightwell up all the time. I use PoH when lots of raid damage is out. Honestly the rest of it is just me trying to adapt to what is happening.

[Earithrandil 5]

There is a possibility you are getting sniped, as 5 healers in a 21 man group is quite overkill imo.

Holy priests have slow casts and no absorbs with a disc in the group, so that puts us at risk for this.

Our slow heals make us have to plan when to use our spells, so that they are out there as soon as the damage hits.

The deaths do not seem to occur due to lack of healing, so it is very possible you are getting sniped.

 

Having a quick looksie at the logs, one thing I see is the lack of Prayer of Mending. This spell can be cast on multiple targets, both via the talent and the spell itself. It has a 10 sec CD and during periods of little damage, there is no reason not to put this on targets expected to take damage. Especially since it has really low chance of overhealing, making it fairly effective in terms of healing/mana. You only used it about 4-6 times per fight, which is pretty low.

 

Another thing is switching Chakras. If there is no aoe damage there is no reason to be in the Sanctuary chakra. Never stay in the same Chakra for a whole fight. Even if you have set healers for raid and set healers for tanks I recommend this.

 

Binding Heal is also a good spell for during aoe damage should be used instead of flash heal if you also need healing.

 

Renew is only for targets who are about to take damage, which is important to note.

 

Cascade should be used in the same way as Sanctuary and Renew, pre cast before the raid is about to take damage. It does a lot of healing per mana, but is hard to time right.

 

Wrote this together pretty quick as I am leaving and I bet it's not very clear and contains mistakes, but it's something. Will revise it when I have time.

In conclusion, plan your spells, have Cascade out and be in the middle of a PoH cast before the damage hits! and use PoM more.

[Gwenymph 414]

PoH is a very mana intesive spell for the output it provides.  It is very high on your cast list for most fights, try replacing at least 75% of those casts with Blanket Renews.  Personally, I try and use PoH as little as possible, if at all.  Your mana could be better used on an initial overheal tick of Renew on two targets in the same time/output you'll get from that one PoH cast in more than half the cases.

[Gurpreet 2]

Just look at what spells contribute to the top priests overall healing. It's almost always renew and coh.

[TheRaidBoss 11]

PoH is a very mana intesive spell for the output it provides.  It is very high on your cast list for most fights, try replacing at least 75% of those casts with Blanket Renews.  Personally, I try and use PoH as little as possible, if at all.  Your mana could be better used on an initial overheal tick of Renew on two targets in the same time/output you'll get from that one PoH cast in more than half the cases.

 

I will only ever use PoH with either Power Infusion on, or 2 stacks of Serendipity (Preferably both). If I can manage it, I will binding heal to build up the stacks, or if I can justify Flash Heal I will use that. I've gotten to the point where I will use Flash Heal, Flash Heal, Heal - as I have configured Weak Auras to easily display my serendipity charges. 

 

Reading your logs, you have a 60% overheal, whether that's from CoH / PoH hitting people that don't need it or what.

 

How do you use your lightwell? I generally will pop power infusion, and berserking (troll racial) to give the hot more power when it activates. (When possible waiting until Bloodlust to get even more out of it) I almost never use glyph of Circle of Healing. 35% more mana cost to hit 6 people, when I use it, compared to 5 and being able to bind heal + slow heal (2 serendipity charges) my targets. 

 

As Earithrandil said, planning spells is really important. For example, on Kargath's chain hurl, when hes doing the knockback I'm already casting Cascade so it hits everyone, and I throw a serenity under him and then I only cast renew on people that aren't going up with me. As once we go up it's no problem to keep them alive (provided they dont lick the bombs in the stands) Also, don't be afraid to Holy Fire and Shadow Word Pain the boss. Every little bit helps. I almost always start the fights out with Chakra: Chastise just to add a little more damage when there isn't much hitting the raid. I flip back and forth from Sanctuary and Serenity depending on the different phases. If there's a lot of movement and a lot of raid damage I'll use Sanctuary and spam renew to get more CoH, stopping when people are taking a lot or when I can safely cascade. Otherwise I'll go to Serenity to toss out an instant heal and keep renew refreshed on people with ST heals.

 

Also, if you are looking to replace some items, I do suggest getting 2 pieces of PVP gear. They are itemized almost perfectly, (Haste Multistrike) (I noticed that Divine Hymn can multistrike ) The 2 piece set gives you and the target healed by Prayer of Mending you and the target gain 130 Versatility for 10 seconds, stacking up to 5, which puts me to 8% Versatility and with Words of Mending this goes out a bit ( in addition to me casing PoM.)

 

Otherwise, just be creative with your abilities, time things with your raid's cooldowns, and you should do just fine. Holy Priests aren't the flavor of the month, but we do alright.

 

https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports/NbK6kmG9Z3yB8tDW/#fight=9&type=summary

 

http://us.battle.net/wow/en/character/blackwater-raiders/Hlzulongtime/advanced

 

Is my healer information, and the logs from today's heroic run (among other things)

(Two raid groups/guilds - Hlzulongtime and TheRaidBoss are mine)

 

 

Also after looking at your logs even closer, (On Tectus) You only gained the serendipity buff 6 times and the only time it benefited PoH was the 3rd time.Otherwise it was Flash Heal, Flash Heal, Heal. Depending on your mana issues, (which it seems that when the fight got hard you were at 35-50% which can easily get spent in a matter of seconds of carelessness. Using procs is really going to make a big difference, as your fight was 6:49, compared to mine at 9:23. I stayed above the 50% threshold, only dipping to 50% one time when everyone lost their minds.

 

I suggest playing around healing in Ashran. Dont let yourself out of combat and just heal away like it's a raid. Challenge yourself to keeping your mana up while keeping your raid up. It really helped me learn mana efficiency and when I can burn mana for more HPS and to conserve it with minimal healing needed.

Edited January 3, 2015 by TheRaidBoss