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Lolwell: Why so negative?
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Post by
oddbrown
I shall have to set the scene first, so prepare for a small bed time story...
I ran ZA for the first time tonight.
It was fun, was mainly guildies but we pugged a DPS spot from a serious raiding guild and all went ok. We wiped on the eagle boss as I was noob in the instance and didnt hear the screams of "get in there's a storm coming" until it was too late.
So we lost the opportunity for a timed run and took the opportunity for me to learn the place (as the only raid member who'd never been there before).
All went well generally, healers did well, DPS was a bit slow, tanks were solid.
Almost all bosses were downed when one of the healers declared that he needed to leave. So we replaced him with another member of the previously mentioned raiding guild. Another priest to be precise.
This guy runs BT/MH/SWP and is well geared and knows his stuff.
We were now facing hex lord, and things began to go wrong.
As some of you may know, I am a little low on stam (and aware of it). But I was not the first to die. I was in fact having to use PoH to keep my group up, once after every spirit bolt batch.
The new priest was CoH and we juggled things around a bit, but still it wasn't working, so in the end called it.
After the raid the other priest whispered me and offered me "some advice".
He pointed out my lack of stam, which I told him I knew of.
He then proceeded to disect my
lightwell spec
.
He was persistently negative about my use of this spec, having seen me on one bossfight in one raid.
I explained that I found it situationally useful and he critisized it again.
After a while I gave up trying to explain my perspective to him and left the conversation.
I guess my query is, why is lightwell so flamed by people who have never even bothered to try it?
I have found it situationally brilliant. As I am an IDS priest I feel that I can add another utility for tank healers who are grouped together. We can pop a mana free HoT on ourselves and just keep on healing the tank without having to switch targets or alt-heal ourselves. At 770hp per tick I can get over 3500hp back in 5 sec, 5 times in a 3 minute period for a one off cost of 445 mana.
It worked perfectly on Morogrim earlier this week. We were even able to spare a HoT for a lifetapping lock and a mage who had taken a few too many hits from murlocs.
So why do people dismiss it as a waste of a talent point and suggest I take things like
Holy Reach
instead (not exactly useful for an IDS priest in my experience)?
Thoughts please people.
Post by
182246
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
GenXCub
When you get down to it, it's a great use of a single talent point. There are a lot of people who see having 4/5 of a talent as the same as 1/5 or 0/5 and they don't see the big picture of "relative talent point values."
Like, do I see the lightwell point being more useful than finishing up your Holy Specialization talent? Definitely. 1% of crit vs. a lightwell, a lightwell will do more for your group, and it's more likely to be a fight-saver than 1% of healing crit (which non-paladins don't count on anyway in their "usefulness" thought process).
Now, there are priests who have learned to work fine without it, and it doesn't enter into their rhythm. I get that too (my rogue almost never uses premeditation, even though she really should), but they shouldn't turn around and say OMG NOOB! THAT ONE TALENT POINT IN X TALENT WOULD HAVE SAVED THE HEX LORD FIGHT!
Now I have seen people with seriously gimped healing builds on druids and shamans (my healing expertise), and I give evidence as to why I feel certain talents are better than others, or more about relative values of talent points, but when it comes down to it, if they can finish a boss or an instance, I'm in no position to be critical.
Post by
oddbrown
As it stands, I have an instructional macro and I have bitchslapped my guild into shape on lightwell use. They know they will get in trouble for abusing it.
It is not really aimed at the dps (who should be getting heals, using pots, bandages) but more for us healers who need to focus on keeping other people alive and don't really want to take the time/mana to heal ourselves while the tanks/raid are taking AoE or a pounding.
At the moment you cannot reclick on the lightwell while the HoT is on you, so it minimises the spam (providing the locks don't keep lifetapping).
I am aware it will be buffed in WotLK. It is one of the reasons I have specced into it now. Partly to get used to using it, partly to get my raid used to using it.
I have also encountered/heard of some bossfights/situations where it is very handy.
If i can save a healer a HoT that could go to a tank, or a chain heal that could go to DPS instead, then it's worth 1 talent point in my eyes.
The only other place that talent point would be going is 3/5
Empowered Healing
instead of 2/5. A 4% difference on a 5k heal (200hp) won't stop a tank from dying in a raid.
Post by
murakaz
Most fights require you to focus on more then just your DPS, like kicking, sheeping, watching aggro, moving, etc. that the content itself makes it useless in later fights.
In Hyjal and BT you are stacking spirit, and thus have plenty of regen to make up for whatever mana you're saving having them heal themselves.
In Sunwell however, raid-wide damage is so commonplace that keeping the HoT up for the full duration is a feat in itself. Kalec has his arcane AoE and the bouncing curse, Brutallus has Slash and Burn, Felmyst has the nature AoE, and the Twins have nothing but AoE damage.
Couple these problems with the bad design of the spell itself (few charges, long cooldown) and hopefully you can see why it's not loved amongst raiders.
For the longest time I wanted to like Lightwell, even with all its flaws, but I just found it more fun to do the healing myself then have other people click a box of bandages to do my job for me.
Post by
oddbrown
As I am miles away from Sunwell (there is a debate in my guild about whether we are ready for MH yet) I don't see that being a huge problem.
Like I have said, this is an experimental spec, and lightwell is getting buffed in WotLK to be more servicable to raids/groups.
I'm not saying it will save me a ton of mana, but being able to right click on a well and Hot myself while still being able to focus my healing elsewhere appeals to me. The other healers who have used it have also found it useful (especially the holy palas).
I have received mixed reviews from my guild on it, some love it and think it is a good idea, others question it's validity. It is a try out rather than a definitive spec for me. After all, how do you know if it is good/bad for your playstyle unless you try it?
I do agree that the lack of charges and long CD suck but, if used wisely, the last charge can be used and there is only 3mins left before you can use it again. Thats the same CD as Inner Focus.
On some of the longer bossfights it has proved very handy, and the fact that I can HoT while silenced has been greatly appreciated at times.
I guess I just dislike people dismissing it without considering it's applications (something I was guilty of a while ago). If it proves utterly useless and has no applications then I will spec out of it again.
Post by
5200
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
32828
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
Aylia
For what it's worth, in my opinion, there's nothing wrong with your spec. Having that single point in lightwell as opposed to empowered healing (that's where I'd put it otherwise, anyway) isn't going to make a difference. If you find having it useful, more power to you.
Most of the hate comes from the fact that, like FaaR mentioned, people still associate it with older, crappier versions. Combine that with the fact that people either don't use it, or don't use it properly without instruction, and there you go.
As far as healing Hex Lord without CoH, you have my sympathies. It's not fun, I'm sure. The best thing you can do is to use PoM a couple seconds before the spirit bolts so that the cooldown will be up again during, and keep renews on as many people as you can.
Post by
oddbrown
As far as healing Hex Lord without CoH, you have my sympathies. It's not fun, I'm sure. The best thing you can do is to use PoM a couple seconds before the spirit bolts so that the cooldown will be up again during, and keep renews on as many people as you can.
Well we had a CoH priest and resto shammy with us to help, but it was still impossible, even when i was just tank/self healing. Actually popping lightwell at the start of the fight and using it with a renew after each spirit bolt phase brought my HP back up to a reasonable amount quite quickly.
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