Losing the faith.Follow

I'm a longtime priest and a devotee of the healbot school. I enjoy healing. For the first two years that I played this game I didn't have a character that WASN"T a healer.

But my priest was my baby. I specced Discipline primarily for the versatility and had a good time with it. I learned how to kill things slowly but safely and without ever pausing. I learned how to heal with terrific endurance, precisely calibrating my guages of who needs heals and when.

I raided. I occasionally did battlegrounds. I had a blast.

I did particularly well in raids, where my power heals and combination of deep mana pool and high regen (and a liberal supply of mana potions) allowed me to top the healing meters time and time again.

I didn't fare so well in battlegrounds. My dependency on other players to inflict damage was fine; I was used to that. But what really bothered me was how little other players could do to protect me and, more importantly, how little I could do to protect myself.

This was back in the day of the Arcanite Reaper. Even then, Mortal Strike was king of PvP; if a warrior singled me out I was pretty much toast. Conversely, if I could keep a warrior healed he could inflict hideous damage. Even as far back as then, however, I knew things were amiss.

I played Alterac Valley more than the other battlegrounds. I thought at the time that the reason was because it had the best rewards, but in hindsight, the primary reason was that I could hide in the mass of bodies and not be immediately singled out as a target.

Priests are a very high-value target due to the fact that their healing capacity is strong while their survivability is low. Thus, killing the priest is an impeccable tactical decision-- maximum gain for minimum effort.

I did what I could. I abused geometry, hiding behind hills and the like. I specced Pain Suppression when it became available (only to discover that my 41 point talent can be countered instantly by a spell shaman learn at level 12). I even used Anathema in BGs instead of Benediction, for the extra stamina and because it's not so freaking conspicuous.

But there were problems. My priestly friends and I tried to smoothe them over with jokes. "Why Spirit of Redemption? I do some of my best healing when I'm dead!" said one. Mine was: "Being a priest in PvP is using Psychic Scream and watching a warrior pop Berserker, an undead pop WotF, a third person trinket out and a fourth break on a SW: Pain tick."

So the expansion came out, and I did well. Leveling wasn't so bad, instancing was great fun and world PvP rarer than I was used to from my first leveling experience. But things were starting to go wrong, somehow.

Our new spells were a mixed bag. SW: Death and Prayer of Mending were nice, if a bit situational; Shadowfiend was wonderful when it wasn't bugging out or breaking shackles; Binding Heal and Mass Dispel were both not worth the training costs.

But here was wake-up number one: After a few battleground and world PvP experiences, I knew better than to ever try to Arena or seriously PvP.

It really came together when I was PvPing with my warrior (craftable epic weapons, HO!). In the arena, I had no fear or respect for priests. I could kill them directly with relative impunity, or just blast the heck out of the DPS, counting on MS to mitigate the healing the priest could attempt. My partner could do mild CC on the priest as needed or just keep himself alive while I did my thing.

In short, I desired to face priests, because it meant easier matches.

And experience at level 60 tells me that things are worse, not better, in larger groups, because it's that much more CC and interruption directed at the priest.

The fact is, I could do arena as a priest, but I would have to invest massively in stamina and resilience gear to even have a prayer. An arena priest's major function is to be a massive target-- due to the THREAT of mana burn, healing, and offensive dispelling, the priest is still a priority for the enemy... thus guaranteeing that the priest will be unable to actually DO any of those things, since he spends the whole BG trying his darndest not to die. And failing.

I rolled a priest because I well and truly enjoy healing. I do. But if I went to the arena, I wouldn't be able to heal.

At that point, I was pretty much out of quests, BG gear was unappetizing, and my warrior had reached the point where it farmed faster than my priest. So I specced into impotence, going to a fully healbot talent build. Unfortunately, something had happened along the way.

When I started healing in Karazahn, I noticed that I was interrupting my own heals a lot. Why? Because the targets had already been healed to full. Well, gosh, why is that? Use of my healmeter confirmed something... paladins and resto druids were generating crazy amounts of overhealing. But they were also generating crazy amounts of actual healing.... and the overhealing they were doing was irrelevant.

I know my priest. I know my limitations. One of the biggest aspects of our class is our reliance on stopping our casts when we can afford to so as to stay outside the five-second rule and regen. I knew that if I just HoTed everything and/or spammed Flash Heal, I would be able to do so only briefly.

The result was that I was getting substantially outhealed.

In my interests to avoid overhealing (and thus sustain my mana pool) I was casting reactively to damage, as I'd always done. I'd start a heal, then interrupt if the target hadn't taken damage (or been healed of its damage). I usually started my casts in anticipation of hits; even so, I was canceling all over the place.

HoTs and spammed Flashes of Light took care of things before I got there.

A few nights ago I decided to try harder. I healed harder, even when I knew I'd get overhealing. I spammed when necessary. I decided to forego efficiency. Consequently, I ended even the harder trash packs with a good chunk of my mana pool missing.

I came in second in healing done. Behind a paladin. And not only did the paladin beat me, she beat me a LOT, with a mana pool that was fuller than mine for practically the whole duration. Don't get me wrong, this paladin is a terrific healer by my own estimation and had been a terrific healer at level 60. But it was not my personal assessment that she was better than me. Certainly not that much better.

My gear is good, almost as good as it could be outside of Kara itself. There are only a few pieces that could be improved with craftables and stuff. But frankly, I don't know how much of a difference it would make. I'm just not the healer I was at 60.


I feel like so much of our class is just so futile. Healing scaled linearly, damage scaled exponentially. Inner Fire and Shield have smaller effects, percentage-wise, than at any time in my priestly career. In heroics and Kara, Inner Fire is the difference between a mob one-shotting me for 12k and a mob one-shotting me for 15k, but I keep it up anyway because I've got nothing better. Shield used to be something you pop on the tank to buy you time to get off a real heal. Now, Shield is something you pop off in the desperate hope that the warrior will parry the next attack while you wind up a real heal. Fear is getting nerfed because of warlocks, but we're caught in the blast from that; what was already the game's weakest escape mechanism just got weaker. Finally, there's a great deal of insecurity where previously there was none. Why? The one thing I could always count on was a raid slot due to my healing. But "just healing" isn't enough any more. In the smaller raids of Burning Crusade, group composition becomes vitally important. If you add a second paladin to a raid, the entire raid gets an extra blessing, a group gets an extra aura, and you get extra healing. If you add a second druid, you get a second aura, another of battle rez, and extra healing. If you add a second shaman, you get another self-rez, another cluster of totems, and extra healing. If you add a second (healing) priest, you get... extra healing. And that's it. And if another class gives you these other benefits while healing just as well.... why on earth would you take a priest instead?

My guild would probably say I merit a raid spot due to my tactical acumen, my sharp eye for spotting problems, and my long-standing friendships with guildies. But that doesn't change the fact that I'd feel guilt. I'd be unable to shake the feeling that I'd be more useful to that guild if I'd rolled something else. And that's a heavy weight to bear for me.


What frustrates me the most about all of this is that some of the biggest weaknesses of the priest class have been known for a long time. PvP survivability has been an issue for years. So has Inner Fire (attack power? charges?), Shield scaling, useless high-level Holy talents (we shouldn't have to say "In this particular fight, I'd use it" about a 41 point talent!).... none of these are new issues. What's new is that they've become larger sore spots while other classes have become competitive with or surpassed the only thing I wanted out of my priest: potent healing.

I'm losing it, guys. I really am. I'm losing my faith in the priest.

These are pretty much exactly my thoughts about my priest atm, which is why I quit her. I started WoW like 3 months ago, I rolled a priest because I like healing. I didn't know too much about WoW so I was sure a priest is going to be the best healer, cause it's a priest!... Wrong.

It's a shame imho, but that's blizz.

I certainly don't mind other classes healing as well as us. I'd far prefer 4 healing classes each with their own strengths and weaknesses than a single class that makes the others obsolete.

The problem is that priests offer little other than healing. Druids can combat rez, HoT stack, Innervate. Pallies have the best buffs and single-target healing in the game, plus wipe prevention. Shammies have totems, good healing, and excellent group healing. Priests have... healing with none of the weaknesses and none of the strengths of the others. Between HoT stacking from druids, efficient chain healing from shammies, and insanely efficient flash heals from pallies, priests simply can't compete, which leaves priests as the kings of 5-mans and heroics but severely lacking in raids. Priests need buffed to be competitive with the other healers, not buffed to the point where they are superior to the others.

I agree. Especially in regards to arena. I joined an arena team to find out I'm almost insignificant. Even with my +stam set on I'm dead within the first few seconds of the fight. Spirit of Redemption lets me pop off some renews etc to help my teammate out but they still can't win a 2v1 most the time.

Same goes for BGs but its not quite as bad, the larger scale of combat allows you to blend in a bit more. New outland equipment is often for priests and mages so its not quite as easy to tell who we are. However, once the enemy figures out that you're healing you're toast. I agree with what your friend half jokingly said "I do some of my best healing when I'm dead." Once the enemy team discovers that I'm healing I change my tactics from hiding in the back to charging into the fray. My goal is to get in the middle of the action and die as soon as possible so I can start healing as a spirit. Pathetic, but its fairly effective.

I agree with almost all your sentiments and I can honestly say if I knew what I know now before I rolled my toon I'd have picked another class. I play my priest because he's a 70 but I have to confess to starting a pally with the intention of taking him over to Holy at 70 and then putting my priest back in shadow. I think shadow is really the only way we become useful in endgame.

Not only are we boned in the sense of game schematics, but really no one pays attention to us in instances or raids either. Usually in a group if there's a bad pull the warrior will say something like "Phew, I busted sheild wall for you guys, did you see that?" and everyone will thank him or congratulate him for saving the day, meanwhile I might say something like "Yeah well I popped a potion worth three gold, successfully used touch of weakness and silence, and kept you all alive despite running out of mana three times when really the pull was your fault to begin with." and get a half hearted "Thanks dude..."

And I can't blame them, because when I'm playing my warrior or druid I never notice the priest either. I just notice that "Hey, I'm alive. *pew pew pew*". It really is a thankless job, even though we sacrifice the most for others well being. From 10-60 was holy and then discipline/holy in the later levels, and it was soooooo slow leveling. I thought "Well if I just instance a lot and group up I should be fine", but even then it was like leveling through mud. So when BC came out I promptly switched to Shadow/Holy and quested by my stoney lonesome ever since.

The real kicker now is that even after all this time being ignored in groups, and despite the fact that even in my current build I can keep people alive despite slightly-above-mediocre gear and my new build, they still play 20 Questins with me about my spec before letting me into the group.

Don't get me wrong, despite all of my beefs I still love my class, I love my first toon, but Blizz needs to shape up while they're fixing classes.

I dunno about thankless, there's some great moments. One was when a guildmate invited me to a pickup group, and I get there and 10 minutes in I get a tell from her "They said you're a great healer, and I said that's what you get when you group with <our guild>" Best part was, I was mostly watching TV. No wipes, we owned the place (Botanica).

Problem I have is, the best groups are the ones where you don't need to panic. The groups where you're actually doing your best healing, the PUGs with overeager mages, undergeared tanks, rogues who lost the vanish and feint buttons (Can't feint, it interrupts my DPS), people who throw a sting on the sheep 0.2 seconds into the fight, those are the groups which I need to heal my best in, and where they never appreciate WHY their dumb asses are alive.

Edited, May 2nd 2007 4:28pm by Sharajat