Comments on: Zero-Sum Mana

By: The Art of Abusing Healing Meters | Life in Group 5 - A Resto Shaman Blog

The Art of Abusing Healing Meters | Life in Group 5 - A Resto Shaman Blog — Tue, 15 May 2012 15:29:12 +0000

[...] and a topic that Derevka discussed from a more global perspective in a post back in February—Zero Sum Mana. For a conservative person like myself, it was difficult to cut into the mana buffer I had on most [...]

By: Spiritual Guidance: How to increase your HPS as a holy priest | Enlightenment through The Power Of The Spirit

Wed, 07 Mar 2012 18:40:45 +0000

[...] some additional reading for we this week, pleasantness of Derevka. He wrote adult a good post called Zero-Sum Mana over during Tales of a Priest, that ties in good with what we’ve discussed here today. While [...]

By: Ravenford

Ravenford — Tue, 06 Mar 2012 15:36:10 +0000

A very informative post, thanks.

You should post more!

By: Evlyxx

Evlyxx — Sun, 26 Feb 2012 14:47:58 +0000

Great post, been practising some of the preachings here already but only realised while reading it that Madness of Deathwing will allow 2 Hymn of Hope uses. Thanks

By: Zelmy

Zelmy — Tue, 21 Feb 2012 15:40:30 +0000

Felade, I thought your comment was really great. I might copy/paste some of it into raid chat later tonight, as I feel like all of the healers in my raid (3 of us in 10′s) could benefit from thinking this way.
Thanks for that!
Meters are an interesting topic that I won’t dwell on too long, but I think healers also don’t think about how their placement may change depending on assignment. When I go AA disc for fights, I pretty much bubble whoever is below 60% health and HF/Smite as we’re probably 3 healing something not too hard or progression. So there I’m low, but I might rock a Mor’chok fight because of stacking DA/shields for stomps…

By: Felade

Felade — Sun, 19 Feb 2012 12:23:38 +0000

I think healers, especially later in an expansion, need to think more like DPS, which is sort of what this amounts to.

Cooldowns, from a DPS perspective, is something you need to use as often as possible to do your job correctly. Holding onto cooldowns for very long is a real waste, and missing out on a potential chance to use a CD again in a fight is a big no-no.

When a DPS sees a spell come off CD, they start looking for opportunities to use it ASAP. Healers should be doing the same thing.

I see cooldown use as the big game-changer for healers; its the difference between the guy doing LFR and normal modes, and the guy who’s carrying his raid through HMs. Healers are as balanced around CDs just as much as DPS – and no self-respecting DPS would ever sit on a CD for long. Healers are perhaps even more balanced around CDs with the way Dragon Soul has been designed.

Another thing that has bothered me with healers and their love/hate relationship with meters, and it ties into this topic. On the one hand, a healer’s performance can be evaluated using meters, similar to how a DPS can be evaluated. True, using meters to evaluate and increase healer performance is very different than with DPS, but healers are still watching meters, no matter what anyone tells you. However, sometimes you hear healers tell you something to the effect of “well, meters don’t matter” or “well, you only won the meters because all your healing came from (insert cooldown here)”. Its like proper cooldown use is somehow like cheating. That attitude can be a problem – if the meters are showing you that you can improve you should embrace that. And if another player’s CD use is causing you to look bad on meters, perhaps you should improve your own cooldown use.

Using a CD for a healer should be just like using a CD for a DPS: you should use it as often as possible, or as often as it makes sense to during a fight, to do the best healing you are capable of. Because when you are healing hard modes, the developers are expecting you to play that way when they balance the content.

By: Derevka

Derevka — Fri, 17 Feb 2012 22:43:16 +0000

Great point made about mana conservation, Valandris. However, I would suggest that there is an important difference between mana /conservation/ and zero-sum mana.Zero Sum mana is regarding restorative talents and abilities.

That said, you are spot on with some of the theory… dispite my personal preference of not PIing healers and PIing caster DPS.

By: Valandris

Valandris — Fri, 17 Feb 2012 22:18:47 +0000

I think its important to add here that our secondary stats (outside of spirit) can be considered as passive regen and play an important role in our mana management. By making our heals more effective through mastery and crit we dont need to use them as much. And a mana cooldown Derevka failed to mention is Power Infusion. With your 2 set your spending 45% less mana per heal with 20% faster casting. I treat this as a mana cd (which I have macrod to use on myself only) and only wait to use it for situations (burning tentacles/ bolt landing/ lightning phases etc) where I’ll need the extra throughput.

By: Cel

Cel — Fri, 17 Feb 2012 19:58:34 +0000

Nice reminders! (I finally went and got Ora3 like I’ve been meaning to)

The only thing I can add, is I’ve tweaked your “low mana” Power Auras for my different healer classes, so I get a reminder to use Divine Plea (2 min) at perhaps 80%, while I have it set a good bit lower to remind me to use Priest cooldowns.

By: Divinity

Divinity — Fri, 17 Feb 2012 19:38:32 +0000

You have given me a phrase for the very thing I always strive for. For that, I thank you!

Furthermore you have opened my eyes to the necessity of managing overlap reduction on raidwide mana CD’s; my 25-man H DS group has only downed the earlier bosses and mana cd management has not even been considered (that I know of).

Looking ahead to later bosses, it sounds as though this will be nearly required. We have 2 resto shamans so I will absolutely keep MTT in mind from here on out. Thanks!

*Downloading DBM – Spelltimers immediately!*