I know we all get an alarming amount of amusement out of using Leap of Faith in those “for fun” situations. Read: Engineers using Rocket Boosts and a Parachute Cloak to make it from the BWD Elevator all the way to Atramedes’ room… YOINK get back here! For purposes of this discussion, let’s put those uses aside… for now. *cackle* Today, I’d like to get into a bit more of the social theory behind Leap of Faith and what happens (beyond just moving the player) when the spell is cast. The original idea of this post was through a casual conversation between myself and Dawn of WoWInsider and LearnToRaid.
There are some great and very strategic uses for Leap of Faith:
- Kiting during Atramedes
- Kiting Constructs in Phase 3 Nefarian
- Burning Cinders targets after their explosion in Heroic Nefarian’s Phase 2
- PVP Flag Carriers
These examples are often planned and expected uses of Leap of Faith. My guild, on Heroic Atramedes, has planned and specific positions and rotations for using Leap of Faith during the air/kite phase. Since everyone understands that Leap of Faith is part of the strategy, it is known that they will be used.. it is those other uses that can be very difficult and awkward.
Using Leap of Faith on someone is a jarring experience. It can leave the target with a “WTFOMGWHATJUSTHAPPENEDAMILAGGINGOUT?!” reaction- which can either hurt DPS or disorient them during an important phase of a fight. I feel it is prudent to either use a macro, announcing AddOn, or a Ventrilo call to alert the target that they have been Gripped. This will enable them to react appropriately and understand what happened.
More importantly, Leap of Faith is not the most subtle of spells. When it is used, your raid will see a golden/white line across the screen and a player with wings flying through the air— not very surreptitious. As such, it draws attention to itself– now if Grip is part of the raid strategy, no big deal– but if it isn’t part of the strategy and you are using it to save someone from their own mistake, are there implications from doing that? Are you, in a way, saying “You screwed up; and I am saving you from your own mistake!”? In a sense, yes– but in reality you aren’t you are merely preventing damage from occurring, which is ultimately your biggest job.
- Forgot to move out of Valiona’s breath? Grip them to safety.
- Did they clip a Squal Line and get picked up during Al’akir? Grip them to safety.
- Did they run clear across the room on Heroic Omnotron with Lightning Conductor when Nef has hit them with Shadow Infusion? Grip them into the group.
- Are they about to be hit by a Phase 3 Heroic: Maloriak Orb? Grip them to safety.
The biggest thing people who happen to be Gripped need to keep in mind is that it is not about you making a mistake. It is purely the priest attempting to do their job: keeping people alive. When we use Leap of Faith on a target, does it have implications? I know I sometimes feel guilty when I use it on a player(especially if it is a fellow Priest), since I do not want them to think that they were playing poorly, or that I didn’t trust them to move out of the way– that isn’t the case at all. It all boils back down to itbeing about the overall success of the raid. I sometimes will whisper the person I gripped just letting them know why I did it: “Sorry about that Grip… only was trying to mitigate the damage, hope it didn’t screw up your rotation!” — 9 times out of 10 it usually is greeted with a “Nah, it was good.” or a “Thanks, nice Grip!”.
Don’t get me wrong— there are times when using Leap of Faith is purely a “OH MY GOD STOP SUCKING! YOINK!!!” These situations Lifegip is purely a save their ass spell; just don’t forget to use it as a learning opportunity for the person who messed up. (I do not exclude myself from this– we all screw up! It is just a matter of whether or not you learned from the mistake.)
Now, this doesn’t mean/nor give priests free license to grip every. single. time. possible. A fair amount of raiding is to trust your raidmates to do their job, and to do it correctly. Using Lifegrip at every possibly opportunity is not only a waste of mana, but also a surefire way to irritate your guildmates that might be learning a new encounter or are aware of what is going on but are saving a class ability to move them instead. (Blink, Intercept, etc…) A bosskill isn’t one by a single player, it is a team effort: trust your friends, and they’ll trust you.
Have you run into strange implications when you use Leap of Faith? How have you gotten over these?
