Hiatus

As much as I LOVE to blog on this blog, I have a crazy Summer here at work. That means I get home - go straight to a raid, then sleep -- compounding that with vacations, weekends at the beach, I need to go on a formal hiatus on the blog.

That being said I WILL do a write up once the 3.2 patch notes are more final (we're still weeks away from launch since they are JUST starting testing the bosses now).

See you all soon! And feel free to reach out to me on Twitter or via my email here.

Cheers,
D


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3.2 PTR Part 1 - Prayer of Healing Changes

The PTR notes have been posted, and I am sure they will change at least once, twice, several times. So let's approach these changes with the perspective that, in all likelihood, we'll be seeing several changes in these notes before they actually go live.

With the flurry of posts, forum topics, and guild chat discussions about 3.2 I figured it was about time I put my 2 copper in on this topic. I'll be doing analysis over the next few days putting attention on each of the major changes. Today I want to focus on the changes made to Prayer of Healing.

Prayer of Healing: The percentage of spell power this spell gains in healing (per target) has been reduced from 80.7% to 52.6%.

The Prayer of Healing change screams nerf, and with no question, it is. First it is important to remember that this isn't a pure 30% cut. It is a cut in the Spellpower Coefficient, which means it will be a nerf to more to those with higher SP. To first understand the change we need to look at the numbers:

The formula for Prayer of Healing (assuming Spiritual healing for a 10% bonus) is:

[ProH Base Heal + (Spellpower * Coefficient)] * 1.10 = Per Target Heal

Let's plug in the Live/PTR Numbers using the average base heal for Prayer of Healing as the benchmark [(Min Heal 2091) + (Max Heal 2209)]/2 = 2150 Average Base Heal

As you can see the size of the nerf goes up as your Spellpower scales. (Which makes sense since this is a coefficient nerf). So all being said and done this shoudl be around a 17% nerf to ProH, and in turn the Glyph of Prayer of Healing as the heal itself is based upon the healing done by the base spell. Obviously, none of these numbers take critical heals into account which should represent a good number of our heals since most Holies run at 30-35% holy crit, then add in 2-piece T8

Looking back at my logs for even Hard Mode IC and Hodir fights, the nerf is at or below my average overheal for the night on ProH. While, of course, that overheal does include people who were at 90% health getting a 5k heal and someone at 30% health getting a 5k heal-- I think the overall nerf to the spell isn't going to hurt as bad as people assume it will. Yes 17% is substantial, of course, but I think at the end of the day the number of deaths caused by the learning curve from the nerf would be minimal. Now, if it was a mana cost increase... then I'd be screaming QQ. Let's see how this plays out in a raid setting, but I think we're going to find it to not be nearly as bad as people are assuming. We will still be using ProH as we've always used it -- for raid stabilization.

Up Next: Penance Change, and Inspiration Change...

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On Changing Guilds and an Update

First, apologies for the long hiatus on posts! I've been busy adjusting to my a new guild--- after over 3 years with my old guild. Its been a long, but good transition.

Switching guilds is not an easy task, especially when you have close personal ties with many people there. I won’t get into the details as to why I chose to leave my old guild – I left for a number of reasons and I take nothing but good friends and good memories from the experience.

I have been lucky and found a new home pretty easily and it is with a guild that has a number of people with whom I am already friends. However, that only represents a small percentage of a 25-Man raid. Being a new addition to a guild can be tough, you have new names, new personalities, new strategies, new everything. (Then add a bunch of new voices on vent that you have to learn to ID! Thank goodness for my Vent overlay on my keyboard)

Being the officer primarily responsible for recruits in my old guild, I tend to understand what is expected, desired, and hoped for from a new recruit. (Even outside of great raid performance) Here are a few tips I have put together from my last 3 weeks and my time as Recruitment Officer.

1. Be sure to read any posted strategies on your new guild’s website BEFORE your first raid. Coming into a raid prepared should be an assumption, but worth repeating. If you joined the guild already tied to an instance ID, log into vent and listen to the raid. Get a sense of how the raid leader pushes the raid and what you can expect from your future raids.
   
   
2. Ask questions. Nothing can cause a wipe faster than a new raider who is unfamiliar with how a guild does something – if you are unsure: ask. Your new guildmates won’t mock you, they would rather you be 100% sure than have you run headlong into Iron Council Hard Mode and not know what taunt you are supposed to be using your cooldown for.
   
   
3. Talk to your other healers. Get to know them. After all you will be spending upwards of 20 hours with them a week. This accomplishes a few things, first and foremost it allows you to be friendly with them and thus have more fun during a raid, and two you get a chance to know their healing style.
   
   
4. If your new guild has ‘class leaders’ introduce yourself to him/her. Ask what your class should be prepared to do in their guild, as well as be sure you are in your class specific channels and Ventrilo binds.
   
   
5. Above all else: spend time with the guild. Participate in guild chat-- be around. Many of the raiders in your new guild will likely have been playing with each other for a number of months/years. You’re the new guy. You need to be available; be friendly. This is as much of a trial period for them as it is for you. Be sure to know if this guild is the new home for you. Performing well in raids is one thing, but if its in a guild that you aren’t ENJOYING yourself in… what is that really worth?

How I have been managing? I’ve been enjoying my new home. We run 5 healers in our 25 mans and I have been lucky enough to be in most of the raids that I’ve been available for. I’ve participated in a number of first kill Heroic Hard Modes, including Iron Council, XT, Hodir, Thorim, and 3-Lights. The challenge this new home presents is fun, and I look forward to pushing forward with my new team. Here we go!!!



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Mt. Dew Game Fuel Pet Now Available

You can get the Battle Bot Pet Today! Visit http://www.mountaindewgamefuel.com/index.php register, and you can pick up your Battle Bot Pet, provided you have a merged Battle.net account.

They will fight provided you have Fuel for them, which from the sounds of it will likely be a future reward. (Tomorrow?)




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Because you asked...

Because a few of you asked for this (and it is a good idea to keep it maintained). Below you will find a screenshot of my UI in a raid with the visible mods labeled.




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UI Updated!! (With Video)

So, I spent a good deal of time redoing my UI the other day and decided to make a movie discussing how to access some of the mods' control panels, why I use certain mods, and generally show the UI off better than a screenshot could do.

This is my first movie where I've done a voice over as well, so forgive the "ums...".


To view this in the HD version click here, then click the HQ button for the "High Quality" version. It is much easier to see! (Provided that Youtube has completed processing the HD version)

My UI is always available for download here.


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3.1 Priest Specs - Redux

3.1 has been out for a while and now that we've all had a good feel for our specs its time to re-evaluate what we've been using.

In my previous post, I alluded to two different healing specs: One Holy and One Disc. I've found my Disc spec to be exactly what I expected it to be, and its what I use now as Disc, however my Holy spec in that post has notably changed. I have been raiding mainly as Holy lately, and have tweaked my Holy build considerably since 3.1 launch.

Derevka's Holy Spec 2.0 - 14/57/0
This spec has a lot of the standards that you would normally see in a PVE raiding spec (Spirit of Redemption, Spiritual Healing, Empowered Renew), but you probably noticed right off the bat that there are a few things that don't smack of a pre-3.1 spec.

Notice I didn't put a single point into Divine Fury. Most traditional holy specs have this spec with at least 3 points, if not capped off at 5/5. However, ask yourself: "When was the last time you reliably cast Greater Heal?" Perhaps every so often, but not all that often, why sink 5 points into a talent that you aren't going to benefit from with any regularity?

Spell Warding, wait, isn't that a PVP Talent? At first glance yes, yes it is. However remember that Ulduar has a lot of raidwide magic damage. (Hodir, Mimiron Phase 2, Auriaya). Survivability for the win.

Normally I would skip Healing Focus, however for fights that have a lot of raidwide damage that you don't want to get pushed back on its a life saver. (i.e. Phase 2 Mimiron when you're spamming Prayer of Healing).

Improved Healing has zero points in it. Remember that you aren't casting a lot of Gheals so you can move these points elsewhere as well. Yes you will take a hit to your Hymn, and even post 3.1.2 nerf (pending), 3 points for a 10% boost on a 10 minute cooldown spell is quite pricey!

Serendipity and Test of Faith are two talents I find myself at odds with. I kept moving points around going 2/3 in each, but ultimately gave Serendipity 1 point and ToF 3. First, Serendipity, now who doesn't like a hasted Prayer of Healing! I know I love it, but i found myself predicting damage and casting prayer pre-emptively (thus landing shortly after the aoe damage), wasting the Haste buff. 1 point here seems plenty and is just a nice little "bonus" after spamming flash heal.

Test of Faith is a very passive, but powerful talent. You don't notice this talent at work. It simply makes your heals hit harder when your target needs them most. I want to repeat that, it makes your heals heal for MORE, when your target is under 50% HP. What's not to love!?

Another option, mentioned to me by a friend on my server (/wave Ava), is to move some points into Body and Soul. (I'd suggest pulling 2 points out of Divine Providence, and getting 2/2 B&S). This talent can be very handy for fights where mobility is key. (Running out of range during Mimiron, or running a Guardian to Sara for P1 Yogg). A quick trigger finger on PW:S with this talent can be a life saver.

Now, lets move onto Glyphs...

Glyph of Flash Heal - Quite handy since it reduces mana cost of a spell that I cast quite often. (though I am still not having mana issues, so I might swap this out for another- renew maybe)

Glyph of Circle of Healing - a must have for a deep holy spec, it makes the spell that much tastier!

While, yes, I have been using Prayer of Healing a lot more lately, I didn't find the glyph all that handy and mainly Overhealed. One glyph that I have been using a lot lately, and it surprised me, was the Glyph of Guardian Spirit. The first couple of raids with the glyph I had to break myself out of the habit of 'saving' GS. With this glyph you can use the spell a lot more often, and use it for purely the healing bonus to the tank. If its not used up, great! You only have a 60 second cooldown. (Mimiron Phase 1, this has been quite helpful in keeping the tank alive, and still having it available for even an additional Plasma Blast or as a hail mary in Phase 2).

Related Posts
3.1 Priest Specs - What are You Doing?
XT-002 Deconstructor Healing Tips
Kologarn Healing Tips

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Kologarn Healing Tips

Much like my previous post on healing the XT-002 Deconstructor event, I think it is important to understand the basic components of the fight first.

Kologarn himself doesn’t do devastating damage he main tank (initially), most of his damage is done by his two killable arms and his eyebeams to the raid.

First your MT healers need to know that the tanks will be taunting back and forth off of each other once they get around 2 stacks of the armor debuff caused by Overhead Smash. If your tanks are taunting back and forth correctly, 2-3 healers should be plenty.

Now things get tricky...

His right arm will periodically grab 1 person on 10 man, and 3 people on 25 man, putting them in Stone Grip. The arm will drop the gripped people and release them after 480,000 damage is done to the arm. (On 10 man its 100,000). If you do not do enough damage to the arm when these people are gripped, they will soon suffer Squeezed Lifeless, killing them. DPS must free these gripped targets, otherwise your raid will slowly bleed out.

His left arm will periodically do Shockwave, which causes substantial raidwide damage. (Kologarn will yell "OBLIVION!!!" every time he does this ability.... and yes, it does get annoying) This damage needs to be healed up quickly as you do not want a raid member getting Stone Gripped when they have low HP. Healing this encounter as a Holy Priest, I have found that a quick snap of COH, followed by a ProH or two is highly effective.

Eyebeams – blanket statement: eyebeam damage shouldn’t happen. Ranged DPS and healers shouldn’t take damage from the eyebeam. If damage from the eyebeam is causing deaths, it is 100% the fault of the person who got hit by the eyebeam. Now that the speed of the eyebeam has been reduced via hotfix, there is minimal reason to be hit by it. (not to mention that the graphic for it is gigantic) The person who is targeted by the eyebeam should run out of the room as to not run the beam into other ranged players. Now everyone, let's say Healer Mantra #6 with me: “I can’t heal through stupid”.

As far as setup for the room, simply spread the healers out across the room, minimizing the number of healers forced to run (potentially out of range) at one time when avoiding an eyebeam.

Assign healers to the grips – We assign 3 healers to each of the 3 Grips, DBM will announce the 3 gripped people and place raid icons on them as well. We typically assign them as follows:

Grip Target 1 -> Healer 1
Grip Target 2 -> Healer 2
Grip Target 3 -> Healer 3

Ah ha, but what if one of these grip targets is actually an assigned healer. Then you should step up a contingency healer for each target. If a Grip Healer is targeted and gripped, they must call out on vent that they are gripped and their contingency healer should heal the target.

Grip Target 1 -> Healer 1 -> Contingency 1
Grip Target 2 -> Healer 2 -> Contingency 2
Grip Target 3 -> Healer 3 -> Contingency 3

Yes, you could see multiple healers and backup healers randomly gripped at the same time, which is why your healers when healing the assigned Grip Targets should be ready to use AOE healing as an option. Shaman can chain heal their assigned target to bounce to the other gripped raid members, Priests can COH or open with a Prayer of Mending to bounce around, Druids can WG and hit multiple targets.

If you are using the strategy that has you killing the right arm, eliminating the Stone Grip for 60 seconds, you also need to have a tank ready to grab the Rubble mobs that will spawn. (Earth Elemental mobs). One healer should be assigned to the tank who will be tanking the Earth Elementals that spawn when an arm is killed - this can be one of your dedicated 'grip healers' since no one will be gripped for 60 seconds. Once the tank who has the Elementals has sufficient aggro, ranged DPS should take them out.

Once you get the flow of keeping your gripped targets alive, dancing aroud the eyebeams completed, and topping off your raid after Shockwave, this boss will be yours.


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Healing, Prayers, & Ulduar

Ulduar is now in full swing. 3.1 has launched, and priests have decided on their new specs.

In my previous post, I suggested two specs: Holy and Disc. I have found that while I particularly enjoy Discipline more, the number of fights that I am able to use it is notably low. This is mainly due to the fact that Ulduar has a lot of AOE damage and a quick snap or two of a Glyphed Circle of Healing really is a life saver.

What really surprised me was how good Prayer of Healing actually turned out to be in Ulduar. In my previous post I indicated that I was expecting ProH to be much more powerful than it was in the past. Being able to cast a serendipitous ProH and then target specific groups really can make a major difference to raid healing.



Here you see a WWS screenshot from a Kologarn kill. The total effective healing done by Prayer of Healing was a large amount of my total healing done. Admittedly, other priests in my guild have been able to pull off bigger numbers using ProH more often than I. I simply need to train myself to look to that spell more often than COH.

A lot of the fights in Ulduar have massive raidwide damage, which need to be controlled by smart healing. I have found that Discipline, while able to spam PW: Shield, is vastly inferior to deep Holy in many boss encounters due to the shear amount of raid damage. This, of course, also is dependant on the number of Shaman, Wild Growth Druids, and COH priests you may already be running with. If your healing team can cover the raid damage without COH/ProH, then having a Disc priest focus on the MT is likely the best option.

Matticus wrote up a post that shows his two options for Discipline spec - one for aoe healing flexibility. (I can only assume he intends to use Borrowed Time for the haste on a ProH. Part of his argument is that Disc and Holy itemize differently. While that is true, I've found that my gear mixes well, though mainly due to the fact that I tend to run my Holy Spec crit heavy for Holy Concentration procs, which translates well to Aegis Procs as Disc.

Then there is Divine Hymn. I have to admit, I freaking love this bad boy! First you need to understand that while it is a channeled spell, it heals 3 people every 2 seconds for 8 seconds. That means 12 ticks, and every 2 second's it reapplies the tick-- smartly! Seeing this spell heal for 8500 average heal and 14,500 on crits is a a raid saver. Kologarn's Shockwave and you're an AOE healer down? Pop this and see the equivalent of Greater Heals fly everywhere. The 10 minute CD is worth it.

At the end of the day, Ulduar has major raidwide damage from nearly every boss. This requires fast, and intelligent choices in your spells. Deciding to tackle those as Disc or as Holy is ultimately up to you. Me? I tend to lean towards Holy for a vast majority of the boss encounters, and Disc for a special few.

Related Posts
3.1 Priest Specs - What are You Doing?
XT-002 Deconstructor Healing Tips
PTR Trinkets, Trinkets, and More Trinkets!!

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XT-002 Deconstructor Healing Tips

Well, with server instabilities and instance servers being full, I spent a good deal fighting with My Brute. (FYI rather amusing 1v1 flash game- challenge me!). However, once servers stabilized the fight into Ulduar continued!

Today, I want to focus on XT-002 Deconstructor. Deconstructor is a very fun fight. Aside from the rather funny voice the boss has, it can be quite the challenging fight. You are up against an enrage, as well as massive AOE damage. I want to discuss the strat that seemed to work best for my guild.

To start, you need to understand his abilities, and the phases of the fight. He essentially has two phases a tank and spank phase, and an add phase.

Phase 1- Tank and Spank
This phase is mainly tank and spank with some important abilities.

Light Bomb - If you get this debuff you will start to glow (very obviously) white and will do damage to anyone within ~10 yards of you as well as yourself. Turn your /range monitor on, and you'll be fine, but healers need to keep an eye on the targets of this debuff and nearby raid members. Melee should run out of the melee group if you run too many melee and they can't be spread out. (he has a HUGE hit box).

Gravity Bomb - Looks like the shadowbolt that Illidan casts, and when you have the debuff, it kind of looks like Vampiric Embrace. If you get this debuff, GTFO! "You are the bomb!". You'll eventually explode and pull people into you if you are too close. The range seems close to 20 yards, not "nearby" like the tooltip suggests.

Tympanic Tantrum - The real biatch of the fight. 120% of your HP as damage over 12 seconds. Keep your Prayer of Mending on cooldown, and if your groups are set up use COH/ProH. I found that Divine Hymn worked wonders here. Remember, it has a 10 min cooldown, so Hymn it up if you can. DPS should be ready to use Healthstones and Potions. He'll do this about every 60 seconds and shout, "No no no no NO!".

Phase 2 - Adds
This phase will occur every 25%. He will emote "Oh, so tired. I'll rest for just a moment. " and at that point his heart will expose itself. Everyone, including healers, should DPS the heart (don't kill it unless you want Hard Mode). Damage done to the heart will convert multiplicatively as damage done to Deconstructor when you head back to Phase 1. Additionally, during this phase the Scrap Heaps will spawn a series of adds: XM-024 Pummellers, XS-013 Scrapbots, and XE-321 Boombots. The Pummellers should be tanked towards the rear by a Misdirected-tank and an assigned healer should keep up this tank. We didn't kill the Pummellers and just had the tank control them.

After Deconstructor's brief rest, he will return to Phase 1, and the heart will become untargetable. Once this happens, we had the DPS shift from doing Heart Damage, and then move to taking out the Bomb and Scrapbot Adds. You do not want them reaching him as they will do damage to the MT (Bombs) and heal the boss (Scrapbots). The bombs will blow up, and do damage to both Player and NPC alike, so if you can, you can use these to help with adds. Healers during this part need to be ready to keep up the MT as well as heal the Light Bomb and Gravity Bomb damage.

Shortly after the adds are taken out, be ready for another AOE Tantrum.

Rinse an repeat.

I highly recommend setting up your healers around the room, as illustrated and tank the boss near the stairs. An example is shown below.



This will allow for adequate coverage during Tantrum as well as healing the Light and Gravity Bombs, and healer range on the Pummeller Tank. The Deconstructor's damage is slow, but pretty heavy hitting. Be ready for bigger heals if your tank gets debuffed by Light or Gravity Bomb.

General Notes -

1. Set up an arc around the room to adequately cover the people running away with the debuffs and to heal the tantrum damage.
2. Healers should also be DPSing the heart during the heart phase.
3. Holy Priests should be able to chain a COH at the start, ProHx2, OR if they have it off the 10 min CD, use Divine Hymn (which ROCKS) as Disc I was getting 11k crits. (heals 3 people every 2 seconds, for 8 seconds and is a SMART heal every tick - to heal up to 12 people/ticks within 40 yards)
4. If you DPS the 25% marks fast enough you can avoid Tantrum. Tantrum is supposed to be every 60 seconds. However too quickly, and you'll have multiple waves of robot adds at once.
   
5. On tantrum DPS needs to be ready to use a HS or a pot.
6. Groups should be spread out accordingly, to maximize group heals. (Tranquility, ProH)

Related Posts
3.1 Specs - What Are You Doing?
My Musings On Val'anyr
Val'anyr: Loot Assignment Woes
PTR Trinkets, Trinkets, and More Trinkets!!

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