Healing Heroics: Not that scary anymore.

Recently I've been healing more and more of the heroics that Cataclysm has to offer, and my experience in them is getting less painful each time. From my first heroic in Deadmines, to my most recent in Shadowfang Keep, and everything in between I haven't felt the same stress when healing heroics now. What is accounting for these pleasant heroic runs?

Granted I have better gear now, the groups I've gotten have been pretty good, I've been able to learn fights with guildies, and healing as a paladin has been really fun. Why does healing as a paladin feel so awesome?

Being able to heal through AoE raid damage is why. Holy Radiance and Light of Dawn are really fun to use. Beacon of Light is stong, don't get me wrong, but HR and LoD are the game changers. Holy Radiance, while at a hefty mana cost, shines when everyone is taking huge chunks of damage at the same time. While it won't heal everyone to full, it while help keep people from dying while you finish them off. This makes AoE heavy fights much more manageable. Popping this at the right time (and not being afraid to use it) can make healing easy and I dare say overpowered.

Light of Dawn plays a similar role in making the healing game easier. It has been nerfed, and it doesn't seem to be powerful numbers wise, but it is in a sneaky way. You can essentially shoot 5 Holy Shocks at your group at the same time with not mana cost to you. So that's nice. On top of that the health buffer, if you're able to hit everyone in the group with LoD you'll be able to transfer a significant amount of healing toward you tank at no cost.

Both spells are situational, and require some thoughtful positioning, but when the stars align the green bars shine (see what I did there). If you're a paladin, and struggling with keeping everyone alive start incorporating this into your arsenal. You'll be delighted at how much smoother keeping people alive becomes.   

What a Catacalysm!

It has been a while since my last post, but, as I stare at this computer wasting time that could be spent doing homework, I think to myself that wasting a few more minutes couldn't hurt. So Cataclysm is out! As a breif overview, I am very happy with the game so far. My time spent healing has been limited, and I have yet to begin leveling my priest. With that said, though, I definitely think that most of the discussion that I touched on with 4.0.1, proved to be right.

The game of healing has changed dramatically. Everyone has around 100k health, and our heals are not much stronger now than they were at 80. Through the few heroics I have had the chance of healing, I can say that the changes aren't as overwhelming as I thought they would be. The game is more about keeping people from dying rather than keeping everyone topped off, and I like that. The mana game is very interesting (and frustrating at times), and there are very few times when I am not actively saving lives :)

As my guild slowly gets our feet wet in more of the content, I will try to post more regularly about it. I'm not quite sure how many of regular readers I have, but to anyone reading this, I hope that you find this blog to, at the very least, help you waste time that you could could have otherwise spent studying.