Incoming Healer Changes

Since the release of patch 4.0.6, we’ve been keeping an eye on healers and how they are performing and are currently in the process of making some additional adjustments.

Priests

The cost of Power Word: Shield is being increased by 33%. While we wanted Discipline priests to be able to utilize this spell more often and with better results, we also did not want it to be the main spell (and often the only spell) used while in groups. We don’t find this to be a particularly compelling playstyle and have found that it encourages players to avoid using other spells such as Penance. We believe that using a shield in a tight moment is totally appropriate, but we don’t want it to be incredibly efficient to do so with more frequency than that.

We realize that by making Power Word: Shield slightly more expensive for Discipline priests to cast that it might cause Holy priests to avoid using it. To that end, we are adding mana savings into the Body and Soul talent. The tooltip will not reflect this change until a future patch, however. Ideally, Holy priests should not notice much of a change to the Power Word: Shield costs.

Shaman

We are also applying a hotfix for Purification for the Restoration shaman passive from 10% to 25%. We think that shaman healing per second is not as competitive with other healers and while we hoped to bring down Holy priest and Holy paladins (in particular) in 4.0.6, which we did, shaman still appear to be behind. In this case, it is simply easier to buff Restoration shaman rather than nerf everyone else or rebalance the encounters.

In Addition- Restoration Druids and Restoration Shaman

We agree with the sentiment among some players that Restoration druids and Restoration shaman are lacking in the healing cooldown department. The shaman buff and Power Word: Shield adjustment above should bring all healers reasonably close in terms of throughput. The decision on who to bring then might end up being dictated by the strong cooldowns offered by paladins or priests. This isn’t the kind of thing we can address via a hotfix, but it is something we are looking at for the next major content patch.

As always, we appreciate your continued constructive feedback and will do our best to keep you informed of ongoing developments.

02/16/2011 10:07 AMPosted by Elam

Any ETA on these hotfixes coming in? I'm pretty pumped.

We anticipate having these in relatively soon (possibly as soon as sometime today). We'll do our best to let you know once they're in and we'll be updating the notes on the Hotfix thread as well.

Neth, are these Shaman/Druid Healing CD's going to be coming next tier (a.k.a. 4.1) or is this something you might do with a major patch (like 4.0.6)?

I ask because our team has a resto shammy and druid, so that would be awesome. :)

I can't answer that for you just yet (as far as a specific patch), thus why we tend to stick with "a future content patch". ;) Sorry!

02/16/2011 10:32 AMPosted by Lazerpewpew

@Nethaera: iWhat about shadowpriests using PW:S? are they going to get the increase as well or will they also get some sort of talent buff to keep the mana costs are they are now.

I probably don’t have the answers you’re looking for in regard to PvP, but Shadow priests already put out significant damage in PvP, and we’re ok if they’re a little bit more vulnerable as a result of this change. Discipline priests while not putting out as much damage, were still healing well and were likewise difficult to kill in PvP. As always, we’ll keep an eye out on these changes to see how they play out on the PvP end.

Generally speaking (and more to the PvE end), the Discipline tree has talents that play off of Penance, Flash Heal, Greater Heal and Prayer of Healing. It wouldn’t be strange for these priests to leverage Power Word:Barrier to help mitigate damage either should the occasion present itself. There's a solid variety of available spells to be used, and we want you to use them. Moreover we think healing as a priest will be more fun if you have to think about which spell to use rather than robotically answering each damage event with PW: Shield. Overall, we’re not reducing the power of Power Word: Shield at all, just increasing its cost and making the more efficient heals more attractive to use.

Power Word: Shield will still have its time and place and as always. We want it to be used often, we just don't want it used to the exclusion of all other abilities. We'll keep an eye on how things play out once the change is applied too.

*Someone earlier in the thread asked if this was an increase from base mana, and it is from the base mana cost.

As an aside: For those sharing constructive feedback, as always, we thank you. For those who are utilizing this thread as a means to simply complain, we hear you, but overstatements of upset aren't going to help us address your concerns.

02/16/2011 2:51 PMPosted by Illundreal

Moreover we think healing as a priest will be more fun if you have to think about which spell to use rather than robotically answering each damage event with PW: Shield. Overall, we’re not reducing the power of Power Word: Shield at all, just increasing its cost and making the more efficient heals more attractive to use.

Have their been waves of complaints about disc priests saying PW:S wasn't fun???

EVERY disc priest i have ever talked to said they prefer the spec because they prevent damage.

Stop making these stupid pvp nerfs and blanketing them with this generic "fun" excuse.

If the community isn't complaining then don't change it. (see cookies tenderizer)

Since you asked, yes, I've seen/read some Discipline priests comment on this. Let's not get into "I haven't seen" or "I've seen" arguments. These are not constructive or productive to conversation.

We don't want Discipline priests completely reliant on a single spell or ability for everything- (as in), Shield should not be the only spell you feel worth casting. Discipline priests are still very powerful at damage mitigation and we're not trying to take away using PW:Shield on a regular basis or its value. There should still be some worth in choosing which spells to cast and when.

It seems this change has just gone live, because I was in a 47 minute arena match where both healers were living off of no mana. It told me I have enough mana for shield when I really don't. I think an emergency patch should be issued to fix this, as it is affecting gameplay when a spell is not grayed out but yet prevents me from casting the spell due to "not enough mana"

We'll take a look at this to see if there is a new issue that's been introduced. Thanks for letting us know.

02/16/2011 4:50 PMPosted by Nyumetsu

We believe that using a shield in a tight moment is totally appropriate, but we don’t want it to be incredibly efficient to do so with more frequency than that.

So then half of our talent tree has to do with nothing more than "tight spots" instead of just general healing. I honestly don't get the design plan for discipline here. Make it weaker and let me cast it more often again, if this is where better shields lead to, so that I can still benefit from the 50% of my talents that are shield-related.

I would highly suggest reading the rest of my responses first before commenting just so you aren't taking this statement out of context.

We want people using Power Word: Shield. As others have pointed out, it's something Discipline priests do well (Damage Mitigation) and it took awhile before more people began to believe that (remember those days?). Damage Mitigation will still happen and is still important even with this change, it's just not going to be the ONLY thing that the Discipline spec is going to be using to keep their groups and Raids up. There will be heals as well. Also, in Raids, there will be more than a Discipline priest supporting the raid. So knowing the best use of your abilities in that situation is key and playing off of the strengths of other healers will be as essential as it has always been.

Again, we're continuing to watch constructive feedback even if we may not be responding to all of the questions and thoughts that have been brought up in this thread. We are definitely reading.