Raid Rx: Cataclysmic stat changes for healers
by Matt Low 
Aug 22nd 2009 at 11:00AM
Whew! What an exciting day at the convention for healers! This is just day one! Okay, let's break down all the major changes that will be affecting healers.
Removal of spellpower
In Burning Crusade, they unified healing and spell damage into a single stat: Spellpower. Now they're taking it a step further and completely nuking it altogether. The spellpower stat is being removed completely so that casters and healers won't have to worry about it.
Instead, to account for the increase of spellpower, the stat that controls this now is going to be intellect. As always, intellect will continue to account for the size of a player's mana pool.
Removal of MP5
Shamans and Paladins have been screaming to the heavens to get this useless stat out of the game. Your prayers have been answered. MP5 will be removed from the game. So how is mana regen going to be calculated?
We're going back to spirit on gear! Yes, you read correctly. Shamans and Paladins will be receiving gear that will contain spirit. This primarily controls the regen rate.
Meditation across the board
Not only that, just about all healing classes will be receiving a Meditation like ability in their talent tree. I suspect we healers are going to require speccing into this talent at some point in order to maintain optimum rates of regeneration.
So why not make it a baseline again? I guess it would be too overpowered for the other specs or such.
Tougher healers
Not exactly anything to do with our casting, but stamina is being universalized among all the classes. Supposedly, our health is going to increase even more and match the health levels of other armor wearers and classes. It might be possible for a healer to edge out a tank on health.
I do like this change. Sometimes a boss has an area of effect that does X damage. If a tank eats it, its no problem. If a clothie eats it, it can result in an instant death. At least this way, we still have some chance to survive a direct hit or two.
On the other hand, I understand that mitigation changes have entered play and are different than what they are right now. I don't think caster gear is going to have any type of mitigation levels on it which means we could still get one or two shot.
Haste increases resource regeneration
If I read this correctly, spirit affects the rate at which you regenerate mana per tick. I think haste accelerates the actual rate of ticks that go off. Without any numbers or anything, it's going to be difficult to tell if stacking haste or spirit is going to be the way to go for mana regen. Who knows? Maybe you need both.
Lastly, who knows what else the Archaeology and the Path of the Titans stuff is going to do us.
Be sure to check out the stat changes for the other roles!
Want some more advice for working with the healers in your guild? Raid Rx has you covered with all there is to know! Looking for less healer-centric raiding advice? Take a look at our raiding column Ready Check.Filed under: Druid, Paladin, Priest, Shaman, BlizzCon, Raid Rx (Raid Healing), Cataclysm
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 3)
Omicron Aug 22nd 2009 11:04AM
Errr, for haste, wasn't it:
- Mana users get increased cast rate as now
- Nonmana users (rage, energy, focus, runic power) will get increased resource accumulation
I thought I read that oin one of the live blogs. If it's true, nothing at all will change for healers.
Cliff Aug 22nd 2009 11:20AM
Omicron has it correct. At the panel, they said that Haste was only working the way they wanted for casters right now. They want to try to fix it for the other classes, thus the boost the resource regeneration for those classes.
Jimmy Aug 22nd 2009 11:19AM
Thats what I was thinking this whole time all over WoW.com... that panel only mentioned every energy source BUT mana, and stated that it did what it needed to for casters...
jnicho20 Aug 22nd 2009 11:28AM
The only problem with the new haste that I see is.... what about non casting paladins? I guess any inconsistency and balancing issue can be solved in talent trees if you are clever and patient enough.
jbodar Aug 22nd 2009 11:42AM
Ditto for Enh Shamans
Iwanttobeasleep Aug 22nd 2009 12:55PM
I heard that they're finding a way to make haste work for enh shamans and ret paladins.
I wonder how Bloodlust and Heroism are going to work with that change. It's not really an increase to haste but it might work interestingly with this.
kabshiel Aug 22nd 2009 1:01PM
They said they'd address Ret Paladins and Enh Shamans through talents.
Cthulu Aug 22nd 2009 11:05AM
The only thing I see as a problem is will the homogenize healers so much you can't tell one from the other? I do like a little bit of complexity to the game to decide which weapon/armor you should use but on the other hand, everyone goes for the same BiS gear anyway. So overall probably a good change, but still want to keep a little complexity in the game to separate smart from dumb players.
Levinoss Aug 22nd 2009 11:08AM
Problem is they don't want smart people and the noobs to be on different levels anymore. They want the noobs on the same level.
duffry Aug 22nd 2009 11:22AM
I had the feeling, listening to the panel, that they're looking for a little less normalisation between healers.
Particularly the comment about how resto shamen are supposed to be the main AE healers but priests and Druids have edged in on this recently.
I'm thinking it'll be more standard itemisation and more distinct talents. While this would be great for class individuality and specialisation it could be a nightmare for gear priorities. Sure there will be a bigger upgrade pool for everyone but there will be a smaller set of BiS items that more people will be after.
Levinoss Aug 22nd 2009 11:07AM
woot I guess
brownyboi Aug 22nd 2009 2:42PM
Looks like the noobs decided to vote your last comment down, Levinoss.
I guess the truth hurts...
duffry Aug 22nd 2009 11:07AM
I didn't get the impression that haste would improve the regen rates of mana. For casters it generally seemed that GC and co were happy with haste doing the right thing ("pressing more buttons") but this is not so for melee. hence the change was to have the non-caster regen improved by haste (energy, rage, runic power and focus).
Would be surprised if there were an option between haste or SPI for mana regen, it'll be SPI or nothing.
Avrador Aug 22nd 2009 11:15AM
I also interpreted it this way; the other way makes almost no sense. It would leave healers with no secondary stats but...crit.
eXlin Aug 23rd 2009 3:56AM
Think haste didn't affect mana-regen, only to rage, energy, runes and focus.
arilasWL Aug 22nd 2009 11:11AM
"Supposedly, our health is going to increase even more and match the health levels of other armor wearers and classes. It might be possible for a healer to edge out a tank on health."
Wrong. Stamina on gear is being normalized, not player health. Tanking items will still have inordinately large amounts of stamina compared to dps or healer pieces. Cloth wearers etc will be nowhere near a tank's hp.
Avrador Aug 22nd 2009 11:13AM
"It might be possible for a healer to edge out a tank on health."
I understood the change to mean that DPS who wear plate would stop having huge amounts more HP than other DPS and healers, not that anyone would start equalling tanks.
elimeny Aug 22nd 2009 11:46AM
I am really looking forward to the second Class, Items, and Professions panel. At this point, with what we know, I'm a bit concerned that in addition to stat streamlining, Reforging will allow items of the same armor class to be roughly equivalent and generic. Who cares if it has all this intellect on it when what I need, as a healer, is spirit? I can just remove half the intellect and turn it into spirit. I'm worried that some of the gear is going to appear more like an armor class template, and we can just change what we want on it.
Yay for mana regen being focused on one stat again though. I am lawling a bit about the recent buff to Mp5, when it's going to be removed within a year or two anyway, but I guess in WoW terms, thats a long time.
staffan.johansson Aug 22nd 2009 11:37AM
Yeah, at the moment haste is kinda pointless for, at least, Death Knights. Most of our damage comes from our special moves, not autoattacks. Sure, haste (and Unholy Presence) lets us perform our moves faster, but we're still limited by the cooldown on our runes. That's why Blood is usually a better presence for DPSing - it increases ALL our damage by 15% instead of giving 15% haste.
I imagine things are similar for, at least, rogues, whose energy limits them in a way similar to DK rune cooldown.
Angus Aug 22nd 2009 11:38AM
Haste increases casting speed. Casters will not see any difference in what it does from right now except maybe tweaks to the amount needed.
MELEE will have haste increase resource regen. Ret, Enhance, rogues, warriors, DKs, (and probably hunters) will simply be able to use abilities more often.
This might get weird for enhance shaman. Right now Maelstrom weapon is allowing them to be hybrid casters. Having their resource rate to regen faster might allow them to become a weird healer option.