Light & Leafy

Miss Medicina, who happens to be my new daily fixture to read, created a wonderful meme questionnaire for healers to fill out. I don’t really have anyone to tag yet (I’m a noob when it comes to blogging), but I think it can always been fun for others to read, and maybe answer for themselves =)

Post this questionnaire, with your answers, on your blog. Pick the healing class you know most about (or is the focus of your blog) for the questionnaire, and then send it over to another healing blogger you know and love who heals with a DIFFERENT class. Include a link to the blogger who sent you the questionnaire, as well as a link to the blogger to whom you are sending it.

What is the name, class, and spec of your primary healer?
Edainne: She’s my priestess. Usually can be found floating above the rest of the raid as a pretty spirit, although she has been known to bubble EVERYONE. (i.e. holy with a pve discipline offspec)
Sairyn: Sairyn is my shaman. I like to pretend she’s elemental, but normally she’s running around tossing earthshields and  playing connect the dots … I mean, chain heal ftw?
Fluffikins:  Again, good intentions gone bad. I made her back in BC because I thought boomkins were adorable. My boyfriend taught me the joy of bouncing up and down while throwing my hots around like beaded necklaces at Mardi Gras.

What is your primary group healing environment? (i.e. raids, pvp, 5 mans)
Edainne: Being my main, Eda mostly sees progression raid, both of the 25 and 10 man variety.
Sairyn: Mostly 5 mans, but she’s beeng getting into a few good Naxx 25’s and Ulduar 10’s.
Fluffikins: A lot of 5 mans as well, but she does see more raiding than Sairyn does. She’s geared enough to be getting into Onyxia and the rare Trial of the Crusader when the other healers are good enough to bring a sapling.

What is your favorite healing spell for your class and why?
Edainne: Guardian Spirit. I have it glyphed, so more or less every minute someone has 40% increased healing. It makes other healers my friend. Also, I feel like a superhero when I can save a person from dying with a click of the button.
Sairyn: Is it pathetic to say chain heal? I’ve only really, REALLY started to enjoy shaman healing recently, and the glowy golden beams make me giggle.
Fluffikins:  Wildgrowth. Hotting an entire area of people? Yes please. #2 is Tranquility, but only because I like the name.

What healing spell do you use least for your class and why?
Edainne: Divine Hymn, mostly because of the long cooldown. I keep saving it for that moment when I “REALLY NEED IT”. I have yet to find that moment, and now because I have used it so infrequently, I forget that it’s there.
Sairyn: Tidal Force.  I took the talent, and I never EVER remember to use it, and I’m not exactly sure when it would be appropriate.
Fluffikins:  Tranquility. I get that it can be really useful in 5 mans, but since I’m usually in the group with healers during raids, it seems a bit wasted to use it very often. Also, I’m not usually in the predictiment where I would need to use it.

What do you feel is the biggest strength of your healing class and why?
Edainne: Versatility. Not only can she switch between two specs, but even just in her holy spec she can easily transition from raid to single target healing. Some people use “Jack-of-all-Trades” to describe priests, and I take that as a compliment.
Sairyn: Raid healing. Say what you will about cirlce of healing, or even prayer of healing now that it’s not restrictive to the priest’s party, I still feel as though chain heal is the ultimate (not-on-a-cooldown) AoE. Also, I discovered last week how much fun it is in 25 man raids and I might still be a little bit high off of the experience.
Fluffikins: Mitigation. Most classes have been balanced really well when it comes to making arguements for what types of healing is best suited for each class. Right now, though, Druids have the most tools to make the damage that’s being tossed around not seem so hairy for the other healers. They might not use their big bursts very often, but I love that I can roll HoT’s on a tank prior to a big smash of damage and make his healers a little stressed out.

What do you feel is the biggest weakness of your healing class and why?
Edainne: Survivablity. She’s the squishest character I’ve ever played. Even with her shield, and sometimes even with guardian spirit, it doesn’t take much to turn her from pretty draenei to sparkly floaty angel thingy. It’s insanely annoying to be killed by a snobold, and even more annoying when you did nothing to provoke the wrath of aforementioned snobold.
Sairyn: Mana regeneraton. Granted, Sairyn’s gear is NOT nearly close to being set up the way it should be. She’s not rocking all the pretty Mp5 gems I should be cutting for her, nor is her gear much above Naxx25 level. Still, compared to my spirit crazy druid and healer, her regen is pretty weak, and in the heat of battle forgetting my watershield just makes matters worse.
Fluffikins: Emergency (“oh shit”) Buttons. Sometimes I’m a negligent healer. Especially in five mans where the tank is sitting next to me on our couch and is purposely trying to make me explode in giggles. While I shouldn’t be getting to this point in the first place, my heartrate always goes up a bit when I see the tank below 25% health and I have nothing that instantly saves them. Sure, they’re nature’s swiftness, but I notice healing touch doesn’t always seem to hit for as much as I want it to so I can have time to reapply all my hot’s.

In a 25 man raiding environment, what do you feel, in general, is the best healing assignment for you?
Edainne: I usually love to party heal, mostly because we run with a lot of paladins. Plus renew/circle of healing/flash heal make party healing easy peasy lemon squeezy.
Sairyn: Raid healing, again. Chain heal is too fun not to use. Give me melee or smushed together ranged dps and I’m a happy spacegoat.
Fluffikins: I actually prefer tank healing on her. Or, rather, keeping hot’s rolling on the 2-3-4 tanks being used for an encounter. It’s nice to make other healers lessed stressed out =) And let’s face it, while it’s not as mana friendly as it used to be, lifebloom is still helluva lotta fun to play with. Actually, rolling hots, period, adds a fun dimension to healing.

What healing class do you enjoy healing with most and why?
I love healing with my priest. I think because I’ve played her the longest, and because I’ve played her exclusively as a healer (thanks to the warrior/dk/bear in my life), it’s just second nature for me to heal on her. I know all her spells, and I don’t have to think anymore about which keybindings I’m using. Also, she has SO many healing spells (including Gift of the Naaru, Lightwell, and Guardian Spirit which I use all of regularly) that everything else feels a little more like whack-a-mole. Honestly, I love healing. It’s far and away my favorite role to play and I’m always excited to learn more about each type of healer.
*In case my first answer did not actually answer the intended question: I like having a druid along with me because I love the stability they bring with their numerous hot’s. It’s like they spray a magical sap over the entire raid that makes everyone just a little happier. Oh, and dancing with a tree is totally where it’s at.*

What healing class do you enjoy healing with least and why?
Before I started leveling Nesme, I really thought I would hate healing with a paladin because there’s so little by way of actual healing spells. That’s how I felt about Sairyn as well until I caved in and spec’d her resto though. Once Nesme’s at 80, I think I’ll be able to explore all the other awesome things Paladins bring to the table and really appreciate them more than the “whack-a-mole” healers I assume them to be.
*In case I made the same mistake as the previous question: Paladins because I’m envious of beacon and it always has ticked me off that overhealing really doesn’t mean much to them.*

What is your worst habit as a healer?
I think I have 2 that are equally bad. The first is, and this is especially true in dungeons, I have a tendency to get chatty with other people. Sometimes this escalates to the point where I’m either not paying attention to what’s going on around me, or all my keybinds will end up in a string of unintelligible letters typed in either a whisper or raid chat. The second is, and this has gotten better with time, sometimes I forfeit myself for another player. I used to be the healer trying to weave through the slime patches in Grobb’s room to get to the player who decided it would be smart to run to the other side to dispose of their injections. I think my worse habit as a heal lead is probably giving myself the job I want to be doing most and to try to keep an eye on everything (meaning sometimes I forget my priority and not trust my teammates to do their job).

What is your biggest pet peeve in a group environment while healing?
I really, REALLY don’t like being told, mid-fight, that a dps either needs heals or died because of lack of healing. No, you died because you were standing in the fire and we refused to heal you. Alternative answer: you are not as important as the tank who is getting his faced smashed in by the giant scary demon dog he just taunted off of you.  Also, anyone who is not a raid leader and speaks on vent only to say “tanks will need healing” should be smacked. Twice.

Do you feel that your class/spec is well balanced with other healers for PvE healing?
From what I’ve played of the healing classes, I can honestly say I can see really clear balance. I haven’t played a paladin, and they’re the only ones who strike me as a little be supercharged, but I still haven’t gotten over the fact that overhealing doesn’t matter as much in Wrath and that beacon was the deciding factor in my 10 man’s team taking down the Northrend Beasts in Trial of the Grand Crusader. I’m sure when I actually play my paladin I’ll be better able to say whether or not I think the classes are balanced. I do know that I believe it completely lies within the player’s hands to make their healer stand toe-to-toe with any other great healer out there. Did I mention I’m not really a number cruncher?

What tools do you use to evaluate your own performance as a healer?
I’m not a big fan of healing meters, as I feel they only take into consideration part of the story. If I am looking at them, I’m looking at them collectively and not using them to compare myself to other healers.  I have recount, and I’ll usually bring up my own statistics to see how much of each spell I use is actually effective healing, and if I’m discipline I have the guessed absorbs turned on to see that as well. At the end of the day, though, if the raid is alive and I’m not out of mana, it’s all good.

What do you feel is the most difficult thing for new healers of your class to learn?
For priests, I think binding heal and guardian spirit are equally difficult to learn. I think a lot of healers forget about themselves when they’re healing, and by the time they remember they’re looking for a quick fix, rather than looking to see if anyone else is damage. Guardian spirit is another toughy, especially for those who don’t have it glyphed, because it either requires quick reflexes or figuring out a good time to use 3 minute cooldown that could potentially be used to save a life.
For shamans, I think remembering to use shields can be a big thing. Maybe to some people it’s second nature, but until I set my grid/power auras up, I really forgot 90% of the time to refresh these things (or, in ES’s case, I was refreshing too often and wasting mana).
For druids, I think it’s definitely hard to learn the patience required when dealing with hot’s. You want to see the green bar get fulled up right away, but with a druid it takes time and that can be kind of unsettling to watch when you’re getting used to it. Another thing I found hard coming from a priest and shaman was I was automatically casting heals without paying attention to what was already on the target. So I’d cast rejuv and then another 3 seconds later. It was a huge mana hog until I actually recognized what I was doing and why that was not a really pro way to play.

If someone were to try to evaluate your performance as a healer via recount, what sort of patterns would they see (i.e. lots of overhealing, low healing output, etc)?
I play all three pretty differently. Eda is usually pretty low on the overhealing with moderate healing out put and moderate guessed absorbs.  My greater heals/prayer of healing make up for the most of my overhealing. As of lately with the change to hot’s actually overhealing, Fluff has gotten pretty high on the overhealing, but her healing output is equally hight. Sairyn is usually high as well on the healing output and usually is somewhere in the middle for overhealing, though I think this is thanks to my training playing Edainne where my out of casting Mp5 was so ridiculous that I really would stop casting if I saw a heal wasn’t needed because of the additional regen.

Haste or Crit and why?
Edainne: I like surge of light. Free heals always make me feel good. As far as overhealing goes, my raid team usually plays it light when it comes to healers, so giant heals aren’t always a bad thing. But mostly those free heals are the motivation.
Sairyn: Again, I like crit  for her. I feel between totems and heroism, I have the haste pretty well covered. It’s the Tidal Wave Proc I’m using to get.
Fluffikins: Right now, I’m leaning towards a balance. I like the crits I get when I’m casting a bigger heal, but it’s also pretty glorious to have the GCD lowered when I’m just bouncing around giving out hots like I give out hugs (I’m a huggy person).
For any of my characters, an upgrade is an upgrade. I won’t pass on something for Eda simply because it has haste and not crit. It’s actually been a really long time since I’ve thought about this and I might start thinking about retooling my gems to get more out of these two stats. Mebbe a soft cap on both is really the best way to handle it =D

Which healing class do you feel you understand least?
Paladins. I’ve refused to play one for the longest time, and it always ticked me off to no end to see that they never run out of mana and how ridiculously powerful bacon of light is (no, that’s not a typo. Bacon is yummy. So is beacon) . And I’ve badmouthed them on numerous occassions. I love you. I’m sorry. That’s why I’m leveling up Nesme. Because I’m 80% sure that once I start playing her at endgame, I’ll love them as much as everyone else.

What add-ons or macros do you use, if any, to aid you in healing?
I have a mouse-over macro I use for dispelling, though I’m thinking about adjusting it so that all my healing spells are mouse-overs. I use Grid for frames because they’re clean and incredibly customizable. Prayer of Mending tracker is another I absolutely love (it keeps track of the charges, the time before it fades off, and the player it’s currently on). And this one doesn’t really *aid* me per say, but I use Redeemer (with edited quotes) to add cute sayings to my resurrections.

Do you strive primarily for balance between your healing stats, or do you stack some much higher than others, and why?
I like balance, and I strive to always meet my socket bonus. Edainne is a little spirit happy, but her regeneration and spell power love her for it (i.e. she normally will not take gear with no spirit on it unless it’s either a weapon (because there are no high ilevel weapons with spirit =*( ) or others really don’t want it). Fluff likes her spirit as well, but I’m a little less picky with her and Sairyn about stacking stats. I like my healers to be well rounded and be able to be mana efficient without sacrificing raw healing power.

Thank’s Ms. Medicina for a great opportunity to really take a in-depth look at my healers /hug

*EDIT: I think I misread 2 questions the first time around…*