Why are healers more populated than tanks?

[Elamys]

Have to pick your brains about this. Hyperbole aside ( I mean, even in LFR the DPS in your would have to be dead for you to be at the top as a Holy Priest - unless you literally just mean a few trash DPS aoe spikes?).

What were the spells back then... top of my head - you would have had Halo (with a damage component - either it had it or it was glyphed in?) Smite (single target) Chastise (single target - long cool down) Holy Fire (single target - long cool down) Holy Nova (?)... - what am I missing? I was Shadow during Siege so you'll have to remind me

No, I mean literally all the time Trying to work from memory here - while my mythic gear certainly helped a lot, as did the fact that my actual chart-topping was in LFR, even without it on my other priest alt, my damage was significant, beating a number of DPS, and it's on my non-mythic alt that I did my Brawler's run. The damage itself was Holy Fire, Smite, and Chastise, and the level 90 talent I picked would be Divine Star if I wanted to contribute a bit more to healing, or Halo (both had a damage component baked in). I can't remember if Holy had Shadow Word: Pain still or not. For AoE you would use Mind Sear - due to horrendously bad scaling, Mind Sear did more damage for Holy priests than shadow! Sit in Chastise chakra, which increased your damage overall, and blast away.

Pick up Power Infusion as a DPS CD, Glyph of Holy Fire (made it instant) and Glyph of Smite (increased Smite damage on targets with Holy Fire). You'd also get Glyph of the Inquisitor which increased your damage further in exchange for having some dealt back to you. Once they changed how old raids were scaling partway through Mists, I very handily killed myself with this glyph in Icecrown Citadel.

If you wanted to make it sillier, you could reforge and gem and enchant for all Crit and Haste, no Mastery. I was also a shadow main in my actual raids, but that expansion made me really like Holy.

[Zarkovitch]

It pending what content tbh
if you re talking on savage level of play they have to put trust on healers/doing there duties as tanks & work with the team to maximize stuff.
On 4 man dungeons its ez you can play turtle no one cares.
on ultimate same as savage with more cordination.
on extreme primal it it below savage with less teamwork tbh.
I didn't apply learning curve because it pending on what fight.

[Ilyrian]

No, I mean literally all the time .

Forgot about Holy having Mind Sear. Was it removed and locked to Shadow in Legion? I've been away too long it seems.
Anyway, that does sound fun;(without wanting to derail more) it does make me miss that kind of customization.