Uhm, healers do heal and tanks do tank. It's just not ALL they do. It would be awfully boring as a healer if the ONLY thing you could do was heal, especially in some of the zones where the healing load is light. Having classes able to do multiple things makes the group dynamics much more interesting and means there is always something you can do. As a healer I'd be bored if the ONLY thing I could do was heal.
I think it's mostly player mentality that changed that. I was DPSing as a healer when I started raiding in 2006, but seeing healers DPSing used to actually worry groups that they were about to die. Now, everyone is willing to take that risk for the sake of higher DPS and finishing faster. Maybe the death penalty is too low now (repair bots and persistent instances, ect), but I think it's mainly just that people are more competitive/aware about parses and in more of a rush. EDIT: And priest DPS was actually much higher in T7 relative to DPS classes than it has been since.
I'm not suggesting dps to the detriment of healing, but at the very least dps between healing.. and when the healing load is super light. And there are still priests who let their group die because they're too focused on dps... as well as those at the other end of the spectrum who seem to be allergic to doing any dps at all, even if there is little or no healing to do. EVERYBODY'S dps has gone up by leaps and bounds. I'm not sure if priest dps is so much more compared to T1 dps.. just that T1 dps is doing 500k-1 mill dps and healers are 150k-300k. Still a huge gap.
t1 dps should be doing way more than 500-1mil..that's more like support classes dps mixed in with inqs/wardens
well of course it depends on the gear, but when you talk about dps one would assume you mean top end when comparing, not dps for the less average geared
I am just going by what is posted above the little pictures above, However I do not agree and would not spec this for pvp over the survivability and dps lines
Yeah, I was saying that Priest DPS was a much greater percentage of T1 DPS back in Kingdom of Sky and Echoes of Faydwer than it is now. Priests could do around 50-60% of T1 DPS back then, but now it's only about half that. And yet, players were generally much less concerned with Priests DPSing back then than they are now.
Your both correct...the solo line does have aspects beneficial to a pvp spec but since soe has never put in aa's specifically aimed at pvp technically bodiddle is right....still doesn't change the fact that 3 of the 5 abilities in the line are useful in some aspect for solo or pvp although the final hope ability does seem to be illogical at best (solo line ability that does aoe damage and heals the group but not the healer when the healer hits the hp threshold...not much of a solo ability tbh).
I play a raid mystic. I can do almost everything these AAs address fine already. On some encounters what I can't do is keep up on cures when solo healing a group, and these new AAs don't help me there at all. Disappointing. I'll probably end up taking the DPS line, except for that last ability which is just not very good at all (no healer is going to give up healing entirely for any significant length of time). Compared to previous AA/prestige lines, these abilities seem pretty uninspired. There are few meaningful choices to be made, few AAs that really intrigue. Hopefully these are improved before they go live. I think they could be a lot more compelling/imaginative.
Yeah wouldn't it be nice if you could use your single target cure once in a while as a group cure. Now that would be an aa to be excited about as a mystic.
Okay, I'm assuming that some of the new Dragon Abilities in our tree will be slightly adjusted or changed from the pre-beta teaser to the actual beta release (least thats what I am hoping) so here's my take on the new aa tree: Solo Line: Focused Mind: When taking damage , the priest has a chance to become immune to interupts for a brief time. (1% chance for 5 second immunity with 1 point so 10% chance with 10 points for 5 seconds) Leaving aside the issue that clerics already have an ability to prevent interupts in the KoS tree (that they must not move for it to remain active) this is a nice (not great)ability choice for the other priest classes that don't have an anti-inturupt ability choice in their aa already and a nice added bonus immunity for clerics as this immunity does not drop if they move. Wuoshi's Barrier: When casting heals, the priest has a chance to become immune to taunts and grants a damage shield. (Triggers .2 times per minute for 10 second duration for 1039-1270 divine damage on target with 1 point so 2 times per minute with 10 points spent) Trigger chance seems appropriate and not overpowered as 2 times per minute is the current standard trigger chance on procs with 10 points spent. As I am unsure if the damage amount increases as well the more points spent in this line, is the damage shield affected by personal stats such as crit bonus/potency? Again not another overpowered ability but nice one for the soloing priest. Mental Retaliation: When taking damage, the priest's attacker will have their dps/attack speed debuffed. (When damaged with amelee weapon this will cast Metal Retailiation on targets attacker, lasts 10 seconds debuffing dps/attackspeed by 1 with one point spent and debuffs 10 dps/attack speed for 10 points spent). There currently is no proc chance per minute listed for this passive ability, is that intentional. The amount debuffed even with 10 points spent (of which no one would that I can see) 10 dps/attack speed is not even a blip on the debuff radar. Suggest doubling or trippling the amount debuffed to be of any real benefit...even than the amount debuffed is so under the radar to be barely noticable. Final Hope: When the priest falls to an extremely low health, all enemies will take divine damage and their group will be healed. (When target falls below 2% health, will cast Final Hope on target inflicts 4155 -5079 divine damage on targets in area of effect, heals no priest group members for 604-738 with one point spent.) Not clear if one spends 10 points in this ability if either the damage threshold of 2% increases to 20% or only the damage shield/group heal increase in effectiveness. For a solo line ability, damage threshold of 2% per point for a max of 20% (if modifiable via more aa) seems awefully low...would suggest incresing the threshold to 30% - 40% as current is too low of any serious use by the soloing priest. Please explain the thinking on adding this ability to the solo line but making the group heal not affect healers? Kinda defeats the purpose of it being in the solo line to begin with. Wuoshi's Recovery: Clears most of the priests reuses. (Clears the reuse of most of the priest's abilites in their spell book, not usable in combat, recast is 5 minutes). Pretty pointless in my opinion as the ability is not usable in combat, doubt many if any will actually spec into this. Change this ability to be able to be used in combat and people may actually spec into this otherwise this is a useless ability. Solo Line Conclusion: Aside from looking like this line was put together with the intention of being more of a generic pvp spec than a pve solo spec I don't see much viability in its current form. Survivability Line: Dauntless Spirit: Increases maximum health of the priest. (.8% max health with one point for 8% max health with 10) Pretty clear and straight forward ability choice, extra health. Would suggest making this ability 1% per point instead of the .8% per point. Dauntless Drive: When the priest is damaged highly, they will reduce incoming damage for a short duration. (When the target drops below 25% health, they will reduce incoming damage by 10% for 3 seconds, can trigger once ever 90 seconds with one point). Again without knowing how this ability changes with more aa can't really give a solid feedback. If this ability's damage threshold is increased with more aa this could be nice ability. If the threshold was increased with max aa to say 40% - 50% be pretty solid ability considering it can only trigger one every 90 seconds. If the damage threshold is not increased via aa but the damage reduction is than a decent increase in the abilities max DR or the duration of the spell is in order say minimum of 20 DR or duration of 5 - 10 seconds. Considering any damage that brought the healer down to 25% HP will more than likely finish the job with the next barrage of aoe's. Sturdy Scales: Increases the physical mitigation of the priest. (Increases the effectiveness of worn armor by 2% per point). Extra mitigation is alright not breathtaking but alright. Reprieve: Passively applies a regenerating ward to the priest. (Wards target for 188 points of all damage, regenerates 33% of the ward every 3 seconds with 1 point, at 10 points looking at 1880 ward amount). This ability is meh in my opinion to be honest. A personal ward is ok however as has been stated in the feedback earlier some mobs bypass wards completely making them pointless. If the ward amount is not modifable then its a waste to sink anything more in this ability than what is needed to get to the endline. 1880 for a ward amount is extremely low considering the amount of damage current scripts do. Undaunted: The priest is able to prevent their own death. (An until canceled death save on the priest that heals for 100% and does not trigger is a priests death save or Equilibrium is active.) Hmm so basically priests now have the option of getting an until canceled death save on themselves. This one I like. Useful for the memwipe/memshuffle fights that healers love so well as well as scripts that require the mob to be moved alot and as such the healers to move as well to keep the group and/or tank alive. Survivability Line Conclusion: If the Dragon Tree Lines go in as they are with no adjustments, quite frankly the survivability line is still the best overall choice as a whole line even without some slight tweaks.
Heal Line: Concentrated Restoration: The priests healing stance will improve the potency of their heals. (The priests healing stance will improve the potency of their heals by 1.5% with 1 point, 15% with 10). 15% potency when maxed for heals when in heal stance I have to agree with others is meh in my opinion. As others have pointed out here and in other threads many if not all priests in today's game do not run in heal stance as such this initial ability does next to nothing for the majority of healers out there. With current scripts calling for an ever increasing raid wide dps requirement (raid/group) the marginal boost to potency in heal stance does not outweigh the dps we can add to the encounter. Suggest removing the heal stance and/or the potency for heals only aspect of this ability to better address current game mechanics and script requirements thus giving the priests a flat 15% that could be applied to either heals or damage that would be more desirable to all healers not just the select few who still run in heal stance only. Majestic Casting: Improves the cast time of the priests special group heal. (Improves the cast time of the priests special group heal by 1.5% per point for a max of 15% with 10). Completely lackluster and totally negligable amount even with max aa sunk into this.The mere fact that cast speeds on these abilities even with soso legenday gear would be a max or near max that any benefit one would get from sinking points into it would be totally negligable as well. Saving Grace: Improves the heal, ward and special effects of the priest class death prevention ability. The final rank will add a second trigger to the priests primary death prevention. (Increases the triggered effects of the priests class death prevention ability by 10% with 1 point and 100% (estimate) with 10 points spent). Another meh and outdated ability. While boosting the triggered effects is an okay buff the addition of the second trigger is near pointless when one considers how many red text jousts the need to move out of ae range as many scipts have the red text death hit aoe keep triggering unless target moves out of effect range thus making the second trigger near pointless. Suggest instead of the addition of the second trigger this be changed to a reduction of the primary death prevention spells base reuse and/or the ability to finally use them out of group. Considering how many scripts have death touch mechanics in them and that their reuse especially in a raid situation is on a 45 second timer (some names that come with reuse speed debuffs as well just for fun) this would keep up with current mechanics for the foreseeable future. Ancient Alacrity: Increases the base reuse speed of the priests large direct heal. (Reduces the base casting time of the priest's large direct heal by 3.33% for 1 point, 33.3% for 10 points (estimate). Extremely small change to the most unused line of heals for all priests. As has been stated before here and in other threads the large direct heal is hardly ever used especially at the high levels. Clerics (not sure of the other heals classes) got a replacement large direct heal with 2 decently sized reactive triggers attached via a prestige choice and it has become largely unused for those that spec into this ability. The problems and issues expressed here were brought up numerous times during the Skyshrine Beta regarding that ability only to be ignore...I sense the same issue here. Suggest changing this ability to be a further enhancement of the priests primary death save ability as was started with the Saving Grace ability and as was suggested there, enhance its base reuse speed instead. Draconic Reinforcement: The priest increases the health of the target of their single target direct heals. (Casting the basic single target heal will increase target's health by 10%). Leaving out the non-stacking issue of this abilities mechanics, on paper this is another hamstrung ability. Does this stack with numerous other priest abilites that already boost the max hp amount? What is the duration of this ability is it a low duration amount say 6 second or does it stay on longer? If you intend to stay with this ability then I'd suggest allowing some form of stacking from this endline as quite frankly allowing both healers in a raid group say main tank group to be able to proc this slight boost would be more beneficial and would not be quite as overpowered as one might think. Heal Line Conclusion: Poorly thought out and unless some major issues are addressed not even worth a cursory glance. DPS Line: Intent Smiting: The priests offensive line will enhance their ability damage and auto attack damage further. (The priests offensive stance will increase damage per second, spell weapon damage per second and the potency of all damage abilities by 1.5% with 1 point, 15 % with 10.) 15% potency boost to our spells while in offensive stance is ok not great but ok especially considering the number of priests who run offensive stance over healing stance. The bump of 15% boost to dps and spell weapon dps (btw isnt spell weapon dps being removed as are other spell weapon stats to be replaced by only spell weapon damage damage bonus?) is ok as well but again not that great. As I suggested with Concentraited Restoration, suggest allowing this ability to not be tied down only to the offensive stance and allow the buffs to be passive regardless of stance. Litany of Destruction: Improves the effects of Litany of combat. (Improves the weapon damage bonus of Battle Prowess by .5, the doublecast chance of Casting Expertise by .5 and crit bonus and Stamina of Sacred Follower by 1% with 1 point spent, and 5 weapon damage bonus and doublecast and 10% crit bonus/Stamina with 10 points spent). Modest bump on this line of spells for the better. Uncontrollable Wrath: A replacement spell for Wrath. This version can be cast on the move and deals damage appropriate to the priest that casts the spell. (Assuming that the more points spent in this ability increases it's damage.) Enhancing this spell with a cast on the move replacement is meh in my opinion. Not sure the situation in which being able to cast this spell on the move will be make or break as any scripts (group or raid) that require numerous and fast repositioning also require all priests to bring dps while moving. TBH I feel this ability is lacking overall. If your intent is to keep this ability in the line then I would also suggest also adding perhaps 1% crit bonus or potency per point for this ability. There is already precedent for adding crit bonus into priest spell enhancements already in game so this is warranted already (Wrath was added few years ago and was not part of any aa line enhancement so this change would be consistant with current priest spell enhancements. Quickening: Hastens the duration of class damage over time abilities. (Shortens the duration of class damage over time abilities by 2% with 1 point, 20% with 10). Another modest bump to priest damage. Not bad but not great. Unyielding Retribution: Grants the priest additional crit bonus. This spell will terminate when the priest casts a heal. (Increases the priests crit bonus by 15% and will terminate when the priest casts a heal.) This endline is so appaulingly bad it is not even funny. First the mechanics of this ability directly parallels the old templar aa ability Smite Wrath before the recent (in SOE terms) character revamp. Any mechanic that disables its passive ability on heals is so outdated its not even funny. After the 10 year odyssey that templars went through to get that aa ability changed from the old mechanic to the new one that does not disable on benefical abilities/spells to offer what is in essence a new version of the old Smite Wrath to every healer as a dps line endline is really a slap in the face its no where near funny. Remove the disabled on heals/beneficial mechanic period, no ifs, ands or buts. DPS Line Conclusion: Endline being a complete and unmitigated disaster by design makes this whole line lacking. Buffs to Litany make that ability more desirable than further down the line or even the endline is completely sad...major rethink warranted.
If dauntless drive is like the Mage one, with ten points it's 100% DR for 3 seconds. This actually works. Focused mind, like so many other abilities that prevent interrupts, does nothing against knockbacks. WTB knockbacks immunity! Offering 10 AA
Agreed....anti-interrupt abilities like steadfast and focused mind do not provide any benefit against knockbacks...however unlike steadfast focused mind does not require the caster to stay still for the immunity buff to be up...granted still have to deal with knockbacks but in theory one could still have his/her interrupt immunity intact (which tbh is making me consider that they may throw interrupt raid names at us again...oh joy).
Considering the ever increasing raid requirement for more and more dps for fights especially in raid settings...it does seem bit off that healer dps is in steady decline relative to other dps classes currently....
Well the devs are starting to cater to the casual player like yourself who wants to do everything. Personally, if I want to dps or tank or do something else I make a class that does that. Because, you know, that's what the various classes are for. Also, you mention times when the healing is light and you might get bored. IMO, that's your fault for not doing something challenging. I always tell tanks to pull as many mobs as they can hold agro on and I refuse to group with other healers. There is no way this game can get boring as a healer unless you coast through chump zones pulling 1 or 2 encounters at a time IMO.
personally I never liked healers so I can't say for sure, but back during SS (92) I did have a warden I was fairly good with and almost even enjoyed playing, and I was solo healing mass pulling the SS zones with ease, and time to dps. And although I don't play a healer at the moment, I know it's only gotten easier, as most, more and more stats are being capped with less effort and no new stats are being put in. honestly I can't see how anyone can Only heal nowadays, it's almost impossible I would think, unless you want to go afk during fights.
TBH this is less a case of healers wanting to do everything and everything about the ever increasing need for healers to contribute more and more dps/debuffs/etc. to the general group or raid setup, blame rests with devs. As was mentioned earlier, back way in KoS or EoF days, healer dps was 40-50% of a good T1 dps class....and now its near 20-25%...but the need for more and more dps as a whole from everyone has not diminished but on a fast track to keep increasing non-stop. If this keeps up I expect the devs to throw a raid mob at us someday soon in which only a healer can tank it or dps it....its completely illogical but it seems that illogical rules the day a lot of times with dev thinking currently.
