WHM Best in Slot Discussion PVE

[Naunet]

I don't see healing as HPS. Anything that isn't OH S&#! isn't hard to handle, and a good majority of that OH S&#! is from spike damage on a topped off tank followed up by an auto attack. Its those situations that you need that heal, and you generally need that heal before the next auto whacks your tank. A 25hp bigger cure isn't going to be a difference if it's a hair too slow. A cure that comes in even only marginally faster to beat that next auto can save a fight.

That's why you watch boss cast bars and pre-cast.

I'm pretty solidly in the DET camp myself. The majority of healing that isn't just general, no-pressure maintenance can be predicted and thus pre-casted for, which means that itsy bitsy fraction of a second SS shaves off doesn't help at all, but the little bit of extra oomph in the heal sure could.

[Thunderz]

I dunno I'm not a huge fan of SS for the simple fact that most boss encounters are scripted. Basically after memorizing a boss fight I already pre-cast most of my cures b4 the big hits will be coming out and if I need a double heal (if one wasn't enuff) and can use swiftcast to close the gap.

With that being said SS is pretty useless for me.

[DreamWeaver]

Imagine the below situations :
1) Tank is left with 1k hp, you cast Cure 2!! You see your cast bar finishes, casting animation complete!! But....tank still died. If only I cast abit sooner/my casting speed is slightly faster..... (SS wins in this situation)

2) Tank is left with 1k hp, you cast Cure 2!! Cure 2 heals tank for 1500 hp!! But Boss crits tank for 2515 hp, tank died. If only I have more DET so I can heal slightly more!! (DET wins in this situation)

3) I am the bestest healer of all time and eternity, I can anticipate every hit from bosses and my tanks never die on me, their hp is always above 50% (It does not matter if you're going SS or DET, since you already bestest anyway)

Personally for me, I find Situation 1 happen to me the most (excluding Situation 3 of course :P), and that is why I choose SS over DET .

[Aedra]

The problem is, HPS is a stupid metric

^ This

Seriously... most people still thinking that healers can stand there and spam heal like no tomorrow so they love to talk about this stupid HPS and such, while healers should already know that in reality, healing is all about situation.

For me, I'm in favored with SS. For example ~490-500, you can cure I,II with speed of 1.85 sec and approximate gcd of 2.35 sec, which help tremendously as you have to move around.

The debate over SS / Det / Crit for secondary stats is pretty ridiculous.
If I really have to choose, I'd say SS till I reach the speed I need then all to the PIE for MP regen.

[WLotus]

This seems pretty accurate to me except i'd go with Allagan earrings

[Rona]

Bumping this thread since it's a good discussion. I've been running DET for a while, almost full BiS for DET gear (STUPID GLOVES Y U NO DROP), but have been considering going SS for Turn 5. I function as the off-tank/raid healer for the majority of the fight, so getting out quick heals for the dps and offtank seem like a better payoff than healing for more. Thoughts?

[Eriane]

Its been stated to death, almost any build can clear content.

That being said I prefer det. Having cures that do 1100 without healing buffs seems more effective for me than a slightly reduced gcd. In terms of effectiveness unless you are dodging something, which is completely possible without ss (ie titan ex), the cast time reduction is irrelevant when using most of your heals like cure. You still have a gcd. So you are really working with the GCD reduction which is even smaller.

You need to be constantly casting to get the full benefit of ss while det is a constant boost to any heal and increases your mana efficiency, however slight. As healers are not dps, more than likely you will never be chain casting for very long.

The simple truth is, if you were late on a heal, ss won't save the tank. If you were late casting a heal before you need to dodge, ss won't save you. I would rather take the raw potency.

Bumping this thread since it's a good discussion. I've been running DET for a while, almost full BiS for DET gear (STUPID GLOVES Y U NO DROP), but have been considering going SS for Turn 5. I function as the off-tank/raid healer for the majority of the fight, so getting out quick heals for the dps and offtank seem like a better payoff than healing for more. Thoughts?

Quick heals... its more about timing and understanding the hidden timers on enemy cds in the fight. You will be able to predict death sentence, fireball etc. to make sure a dps has a ss, or time a heal to land as fireball lands. Death sentence you can watch for with your focus target and you will NEED to precast heals anyway.

[Rona]

That's what I figured, which is why I started stacking DET from the beginning. Appreciate the feedback.

[Viviza]

Outside weapon damage and mind, I tend to go with:

PIE > DET = CRIT = SS.

Piety means more MP and more passive regen. The faster I recover, the more often I can throw down expensive heals when I need them. In my opinion, the flexibility to cast what we want, when we want, is the greatest utility a healer can have.

Determination is, I think, useful but overrated. Bigger heals across the boards is GOOD, but the benefit is small per point and tends not to resolve 'dangerous situations' so well, when a BIG FAST heal would be the perfect thing. Spell speed improves reaction time, which can save lives, and helps overall output when chaining several spells. But it does not help our hots and drains MP faster. Crit will consistently improve our hots (for the same reason summoners prefer crit), saves mana with cure crits, and can reverse a bad situation when the tank gets slammed. But crit is unpredictable, sometimes useless, and even dangerous.

All that said, I don't think there is such a thing as WHM best in slot list, outside getting to ilvl 90 items and tweaking secondary stats how you like them. A DPS can try different combinations and come out to a better performance, a healer isn't measured so much by output as a more binary pass/fail check.