I just have a few questions about the rotation for Restoration Druids. I have notice that there is always a great difference in my HPS when I do Heroics and when I do Raids. My HPS is always higher when I do Heroics (about 11K) and when I do Raids my HPS is average (about 8K). I was just wondering if I should be using different healing rotations for eachof these specific situations. I also was told that addons help your hps which I know istrue bc i use VuhDo but are there other addons that would help increase my HPS? Thank you.
<Earthgoddess---Windrunner---Level 85 restoration Druid>
Earthgoddess: 80 Resto Druid: Windrunner
www.eggsncrits.guildlaunch.com
Probably has something to do with healing heroics alone and sharing healing duties with another healer in raids. Your HPS will only increase with the amount of damage available to be healed. Don't worry about your HPS so much. Concentrate more on if people are kept alive.
Kathy, I said, "I'm lost" though I knew she was sleeping
I'm empty and aching and I don't know why
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Your HPS in a 5 man are going to be higher, you are the only healer in the group responsible for healing all 5 of you. In a raid you will have 1-2 other healers (for a 10 man) backing you up. As for a difference in healing rotations, I cannot help you there since I am a disc priest.
Thank you boh for telling menow if I can only find a rotation that will work...
We discussed this in your thread from yesterday, there's not going to be a "rotation" that you do as a healer, you're not a rogue. There's never going to be a, "Do A->B->C->D->A" system that you follow to be an effective healer.
The idea is to familiarize yourself with all your tools and then familiarize yourself with each fight that you're tackling and determine where your tools are the most effective given the challenges. This is mostly a matter of experience really, which is why I'm not a huge fan of generalized "Healing Guides". There's some basic things I can tell you, but no one is going to be able to give you that, "Do A, then B, then C." rotation stuff that DPSers do. Or rather, someone could do that, but it won't make you an effective healer.
In reply to your questions about addons, Grid/VuhDo are great. Especially when used in combination with mouse-over macro's.
very simple example (remove Healing Touch by whatever you want to use):
#showtooltip
/cast [target=mouseover] Lifebloom
Well I dont really use mous over macros because i am very unfamiliar with em i just use the clicking on the boxes to cast a spell that vuhdo offers ways XD but i was just wondering if i need any other addons to aid me in being able to do my personalbest in heroics and raids. thanks
Earthgoddess: 80 Resto Druid: Windrunner
www.eggsncrits.guildlaunch.com
Click casting (such as VuhDo, Healbot, or Clique with any frames) whether you realize it or not is using mouseover macro like functionality. The mouseovers are simply being bound to your mouse clicks instead of action bar buttons. So instead of hovering over the target and clicking the "1" button, you are hovering over the target and clicking "MouseButton1". They both resolve what your mouse is pointing at for its target.
"In anything, if you want to go from just a beginner to a pro, you need a montage." /w TankSpot WTB Montage for Raiders.
I know VuhDo has a section under "Spells" called "Key Binds: Local" or something similar that lets you set up mouseovers like this, without needing to use up a bunch of macro slots.Originally Posted by Moonr
Didn't know this, using Grid. Do you use that much macro's that you are running out of macroslots?
No, I was just being silly.
Hmmmm....Okay thank you Sebadoh I will make sure to check ths out.
Earthgoddess: 80 Resto Druid: Windrunner
www.eggsncrits.guildlaunch.com
Mouseover macro's make healing awesome. For my holy priest I have all my heals (heal, greater heal, PoH, Flash, etc) macro'd, and I just hover over grid and hit my keybinds, occassionally selecting a target if I want to see their status in more detail. I use Clique to mousebind Shift+LeftMouse and Shift+RightMouse for dispel/cure. It's far superior to selecting a target and then healing you'll be amazed!
One thing though, Prayer of Mending no longer works as a mouseover for me, I have to select the target. Anyone else have this issue? It started in Cataclysm and I can't fix it! >.>
The biggest HPS increase is from Quartz, or any other cast bar replacement that takes your latency into account. It's like gaining a haste buff compared to relying on the default cast bar.
Most addons don't directly give you better HPS. The value in them is the information they make visible, which allows you to make better decisions. High HPS is good, and you should aim to have high HPS; however, it's more important to heal intelligently.
I guess you're not up to speed on the spell queuing system. While latency does still perform some part, it is no longer the key factor because you can queue your next cast before your current one completes.
Quartz is a great addon. And yes, it does tell you about latency in your casts. However if you understand how casting mechanics have changed in the past year that information is significantly less important that it used to be.
Part of Hamlet's EJ guide for Balance druids explaining the spell queuing system. While this information comes from a balance druid guide, the principles are universal for all caster types (including healers).
So long as your queuing window is larger than your latency, latency should not be a variable in your throughput.
Last edited by Quinafoi; 04-19-2011 at 11:29 AM.
"In anything, if you want to go from just a beginner to a pro, you need a montage." /w TankSpot WTB Montage for Raiders.
Thanks Quinafoi, I wasn't aware of those changes. They must have come out when I was on a WoW hiatus before Cata. I'll have to play around with them to see how much I like it. Reminds me of when they took out the need for stopcasting macros. Just like back then, I still see value in Quartz for showing the "real" end-time of each spell. I'm a big fan of visual indicators.
HPS not equal to skill.
To do more HPS play worse, don't heal the person who needs it but the person who next needs it etc...the list could go on but it's not worth it.
Having more HPS doesn't make you a better healer, doesn't make you cool and doesn't make you not wipe.
There are a bunch of things that make a better player like:
- Playing PvP
- Refining your interface so everything is easily accessible
- Making sure you never hit an out of mana situation by monitoring your spell useage
- Checking logs to see the other healers tendancies and your overheal% so you can see where you overcompensated
- Understanding that sometimes raidleaders accidently bring too many healers
- Understanding that every fight is different for every class and every healing role varies in terms of 'meters' and 'HPS'.
- Investigating constant ways to improve your gameplay (covers much of the above but extends to peripherals etc.)
Note: You do not need to do most of this to be a good player and you definately don't get huge improvements by spending tons of money. However you may find that a gaming mouse will be the best thing you ever buy unless you really hate sensitve mice.
Point is have fun, don't worry about meaningless numbers.
Healing is perhaps more selfless as tanking, you won't be congratulated until it's a really tough healing fight that is known to be a tough healing fight and when you hit that wall you will get all the complaints and the fact the DPS failed at interrupting 3 nights ago goes completely out the window. However the feeling of success when you know that because of good teamwork between your fellow healers a boss died it is a good feeling.
Tanking and healing are the 2 most rewarding roles but there isn't a true measure for how good anyone is at either role.
If you are bored then feel free to mess around to get to the top of the afk meter but don't let that become the goal. The goal is to makesure the raid runs smoothly not to see how bad you can play also communicate with the other healers about the subject. You will find varying views and many will infact think meters are the goal (which i'm blaming wrath for sorry).
I assume you are refering to clipping your casts resulting in them still finishing because of latency.
Actually, the latency of the prior cast is projected over the latency of the current. So it doesn't tell you what your "real" end time based on latency. It can never actually do that. It's an approximation based on the prior value. You can never tell if I stop casting now, will the cast actually finish or not. It's likely because of latency should be relatively consistent, however never guarenteed.
Again don't get me wrong. I use Quartz myself, it's a great addon. But your arguments about latency as it pretains to casting mechanics are a bit incorrect.
For example, if I had a half second latency, say there was a lovely spike for some reason, and I begin my next cast and it puts a half second latency marker on my cast bar as a result. Once I reach this estimated latency point I could in theory stop my cast and it will still finish because of latency the server won't get my request to stop the cast until after it has completed. However that half second spike which applied to my current cast may not apply to the next, and as a result my new request to the server to for example move my character may actually result in stoping the cast if my new request's latency reaches the server in less time.
There is no such thing as "real" latency. When you push a button, it is never possible for you to know ahead of time how long that request will take to reach the server. It is only an approximation based on the time it took for the prior request.
"In anything, if you want to go from just a beginner to a pro, you need a montage." /w TankSpot WTB Montage for Raiders.
@Quinafoi: Yes, I know it's an approximation of the latency, although I also understand there is an adjustable buffer involved to deal with spikes. A high buffer isn't ideal though, as you essentially lose fractions of a second depending on how high you set it. Finding an optimal setup depends on the speed/stability your connection. Luckily, I have good Internets.
From my perspective, I'd rather have a useful visual approximation like Quartz rather than the alternative. It helps me get into a rhythm. This spell queueing looks promising though, and I may need to rework my rhythm a bit
The way I look at it, being able to crank out high HPS is a skill, but being a good healer requires many skills. The value of high HPS is that it shows your throughput can keep up with healing intensive phases. Past that, it's just a number.
The one case I think HPS can be a meaningful gauge of performance is for healers who are struggling to keep up. Many people have a difficult time managing their healing at the same time as managing the fight mechanics, and they just can't cast as many spells as a top healer in those situations. HPS will reflect that, and training your fingers to play better will lead to higher HPS. It's a gauge to show that you are capable of pushing buttons well.
Unfortuntely, it's not a gauge of whether you are making good decisions. For any healer looking to improve, the healing meter should not be the first place you look for feedback. First you have to ask questions like, "Did I fail at any fight mechanics? Were there any avoidable deaths? Did I fail at managing my mana?" If, and only if, you've done a satisfactory job at managing your other skills, then you can look at your HPS and gauge how you can improve it.
You can snipe heal in this game quite easily during the lull phases which will give you a higher 'hps' it doesn't happen much anymore though. You also don't really have a useful value at all.@Quinafoi: Yes, I know it's an approximation of the latency, although I also understand there is an adjustable buffer involved to deal with spikes. A high buffer isn't ideal though, as you essentially lose fractions of a second depending on how high you set it. Finding an optimal setup depends on the speed/stability your connection. Luckily, I have good Internets.
From my perspective, I'd rather have a useful visual approximation like Quartz rather than the alternative. It helps me get into a rhythm. This spell queueing looks promising though, and I may need to rework my rhythm a bit
The way I look at it, being able to crank out high HPS is a skill, but being a good healer requires many skills. The value of high HPS is that it shows your throughput can keep up with healing intensive phases. Past that, it's just a number.
The one case I think HPS can be a meaningful gauge of performance is for healers who are struggling to keep up. Many people have a difficult time managing their healing at the same time as managing the fight mechanics, and they just can't cast as many spells as a top healer in those situations. HPS will reflect that, and training your fingers to play better will lead to higher HPS. It's a gauge to show that you are capable of pushing buttons well.
Unfortuntely, it's not a gauge of whether you are making good decisions. For any healer looking to improve, the healing meter should not be the first place you look for feedback. First you have to ask questions like, "Did I fail at any fight mechanics? Were there any avoidable deaths? Did I fail at managing my mana?" If, and only if, you've done a satisfactory job at managing your other skills, then you can look at your HPS and gauge how you can improve it.
You can't compare it to your other healers because they probably have different assignments, you can't compare it to other classes because they have different mechanics and you can't even compare it to any other fight because the fight length will most likely be different and you can't say a fight will ever go the exact same way.
So if you can't compare it, it isn't valuable as something to analyze. The best healing stat to analyze is how many unnecessary heals you were casting and how many of those could be switched into more effective heals.
Sure the argument that its a measure of how much throughput you can do holds up but as you said that throughput is useless without having the fight undercontrol. This is where communication comes in, it is very important to speak to other healers about where they feel you could chip in more or less finding a good balance is essential to beating challenging fights, finding the highest hps player in the world is essential for that one persons ego and it's fine as long as he stays out of the fire...
I reckon 'HPS' comes when you understand where you need to heal more and less and this comes from experience and gear as a by product. It still isn't something that is the be all and end all of healing but obviously healing a huge ammount less then other healers should tip any healer off that they need to refine their gameplay or understand the situations that result in this outcome.
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