Breakfast Topic: Does BC need too many healers?
by Eliah Hecht 
Aug 12th 2007 at 8:00AM
This post at Blessing of Kings makes a simple argument: BC raids are too healer-intensive. The standard Karazhan composition is three healers, two tanks, and five DPS, which makes 30% healers. The typical 5-man, on the other hand, is one healer, one tank, and three DPS, or 20% healers. Basically that means healers are suddenly more in demand once raiding starts, and that's a problem, because there's always a healer shortage. BoK argues that this composition requirement -- 30% healers -- extends into larger BC raids, and that encounters should be made less healing-intensive because healers are hard to find. What do you think?As a side note, it's interesting to look at heroics with regard to group composition. I would argue that heroics, like raids, work best with 30% of the group being healers, which translates into one full-time healer and one off-healer (ideally a shaman, in my opinion). This agrees with my overall impression that heroics are more like five-man raids than anything else.
Filed under: Breakfast Topics, Features, Raiding
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
Masema Aug 12th 2007 8:12AM
It's not that healers are overly difficult to find, it's the good ones that are elusive.
Tridus Aug 12th 2007 8:13AM
A typical 40 man raid had 15 healers (or more on some fights), which is 37.5% of the raid. The requirements already have come down.
The problem with requiring fewer healers is that the only way to do it is to reduce the damage mobs do, which means if you bring more healers anyway, its that much easier to keep people up. To counter that, you need mobs with more HP and faster enrage timers to force you to bring more DPS... which makes them less forgiving if the DPS gets killed, which is more likely since you don't have any healers around to keep DPSers up.
I'm not seeing a big problem with the balance right now, really. Treat your healers well, and you'll usually have enough.
Melien Aug 12th 2007 10:30AM
Well 30% healers is a problem because as 1 of those 4 classes out of 9 which can heal but can also do other stuff, you usually get told shut up and heal. Prot/retri paladins and moonkins tanking the worst of it.
To make things harder even with less healing required you can also increse the numeber of tanks required, with 5 tanks around and an enrage timer every spot for healers is gonna hit you hard as a lot less dps.
It would be also nice to start seeing less tank/spank/heal and more hybrid roles switching from tanking to dps to healing in 1 fight. Maggy is an example of what I mean. All the hybrid classes would find a more fitting role.
bwest0526 Aug 12th 2007 8:34AM
I am not a healer, although I played one in EQ and my wife now plays one in WoW, to be honest, from my experiences of playing, most raids/instances should have the proper amount of healers (as #2 said) if you take out the DPS you are basically saying, here go ahead and solo this BOSS...com'mon peeps, that isn't what this game is about, look for healers, I mean you have Shammy's, Dr00ds, Priests and even Pallies, you don't need a healer for a Warlock so the only ones that basically can't heal are the rogues, mages, and warriors...what's the problem?!
Joseph Aug 12th 2007 8:53AM
Gief more tanks plix.
Melissa Della Aug 12th 2007 9:13AM
I have no problem finding healers at all. Its tanks I can't seem to find on my realm... there's a serious tank shortage.
Matt Clemson Aug 12th 2007 9:37AM
For heroics in general my preferred makeup is me (pally tank, which doesn't exactly count as an offhealer), holy priest (Resto druid would probably do too, but the holy priest is usually the first one to volunteer...) and 3xDPS; generally two mages and a warlock, although that gets mixed around a bit sometimes. That's got me through most heroics I've thrown at it, including the 55-minute Shattered Halls run.
So, one healer's my preferred heroic makeup, although it must be pointed out that everyone involved is in Kara gear, which is probably a major extra factor.
Tolrye Aug 12th 2007 10:04AM
"I have no problem finding healers at all. Its tanks I can't seem to find on my realm... there's a serious tank shortage."
QFT
Same on my realm. I am a holy priest and while in demand to some degree, it is tanks that are hardest to find, our LFG is almost exclusivly LF Tank.
WatcherZero Aug 12th 2007 10:30AM
Healer % has indeed come down a lot from 40 mans, but whereas in 40 mans we could take mana break rotations in 25 man we have to heal non-stop. However my main gripe is on enrage timer bosses where you have to pull out X dps to down the boss before enrage, this fundamentally means that th fewer healers you take the more dps.
Unfortunatley its fallen on the healers to take up the slack, raids ask for healers to compensate for having 1,2 or even sometimes 3 less than the optimum amount and to step up our healing to compensate. Its like they think we have infinite potential when its the DPS who should be steppping on the gas.
Heraclea Aug 12th 2007 10:33AM
Well, there's a tank shortage largely because healing is, if not "overpowered", at least over-needed. Armor and other survivability abilities are seriously underperforming.
A tank is basically a healer's pet whose abilities to perform on their own without someone to prop them up is extremely limited. Their additional armor doesn't make them easier to solo or compensate for their decreased DPS ability.
timmah Aug 13th 2007 4:24PM
The premise that Karazhan requires three healers is faulty. Arguably the most efficient way to learn the instance is to bring two healers, to help out in a pinch on later bosses.
Dipstick Aug 12th 2007 11:03AM
I used to be a healer, but no more. It's not that fun with bosses hitting as hard as they do now - as you'll be the one the raid group blames if you miss one heal by one second and the MT dies. Fun.
Druid dude Aug 12th 2007 11:31AM
We have been bringing 6-7 healers for most 25 player encounters. This was not be design, but because we were short on healers and didn't have 8 to bring. We were surprised that it actually worked, even more surprised that it worked really well. Now 6-7 is now the standard for us.
Baluki Aug 12th 2007 11:41AM
Pre-BC, we had 3 of 8 (37.5%) classes filling healing roles in raids. But now that both sides can have Pallies and Shammies, you'd think that having 4 of 9 (44%) would make getting a healer easier. But now that "off-specs" are actually viable, only 4 in 11 different heal-capable classes spec for healing (3 different viable trees for druids, shamans, and paladins, and priests are either shadow or "other"), which makes the total number of actual healers pretty low.
You'd think that having 3 mostly-viable tanking classes now would make it much easier to find a tank, but that's strangely not the case.
It's a good thing that Blizz will be adding a highly-desirable tanking class in WLK. Let's hope that the next hero class can heal, because we sure as hell don't need more straight-up DPSers.
Pook Aug 12th 2007 11:57AM
/2 WTB more tanks...
No problem with healers here either..
Melien Aug 12th 2007 11:59AM
right 3 higlhy viable tanking classes until you meet hydross, then it is back to 1 class.
Sans Nomina Sep 2nd 2007 3:55PM
Hmm. Is 3 healers for Kara really standard? We did a couple runs that way and found the trash to be too slow and that two healers could make it through the bosses, granted nightbane gets a little rough sometimes. Holy priest and a paladin makes a good duo.
Additionally, I don't know hardly any heroic teams (at least amongst my friends and acquaintances) that bring an 'off-healer'. We always bring me (the holy pally), a tank and 3 DPS. An off-healer really isnt necessary, though it would definitely be nice for a few fights.
hootch Aug 12th 2007 12:06PM
Alright, on my server it isn't that hard to find healers, as a matter of fact a lot of good healers are unemployed and in guilds that aren't up their lvl...
Besides that, I've done all heroics with just 1 healer, me.
Nelson Aug 12th 2007 12:39PM
Two healers is plenty for 90% of Karazhan. For the other 10% you can fill in with a hybrid who can switch between DPS and healing; balance druid, shadow priest, etc. Or if you're feeling clever, have your second tank be a feral druid or paladin.
Gurei Aug 12th 2007 12:57PM
also important to note is that also just 10% or 20% WANT to heal,and are there to do it.
So yeah,less healer intensive and more hp to mobs thus more dps intensive would be a key change...cuz dps are more there.