Raid Rx: Tell your raid to stand in glowing circles
by Matt Low 
Oct 22nd 2010 at 11:00AM
Seriously. I've seen it happen several times now where priests drop Holy Word: Sanctuary or something and people just reflexively move out of it. Granted, that type of automated movement comes from years of standing out of Void Zones and other such nasty effects. Now we have to train the rest of the raid to recognize these new AoEs and stand on it to benefit.
To be honest, I don't know how else we can help other players "get it". I only have two ideas and they're just painfully obvious.In case you haven't seen them yet, scroll down to see what friendly circle is beneficial to you. Standing in them provides extended life! They're all virtually the same. What will vary from spell to spell is stuff like cast time or mana, but people standing in will get gradually healed up.
Holy Word: Sanctuary
It looks like a big glowing white disc. Very hard to miss Holy Word: Sanctuary. Available only to Holy Priests but they need to have the Prayer of Healing Chakra activated.
Power Word: Barrier
On one hand, any damage dealt to players that stands inside it will get absorbed. On the other hand, with the glyph, it increases the amount of healing done to players standing inside it. I wrote some thoughts about it wondering if it was better served for players to stand within it absorbing the impact of a spell or for the barrier to go up after a major attack buying time for healers to heal up.
Healing Rain
A majority of players will not have seen it yet. You can see a preview of it above. It's a giant blue circle! Healing Rain won't be available until shamans hit level 83. Unlike Holy Word: Sanctuary, it takes 2 seconds for it to cast with a 10 second cooldown.
Efflorescence
Efflorescence will only activate after Swiftmend is used. The issue with this is that the bed of flora will appear on the person who you placed Swiftmend on. It doesn't give you a lot of flexibility for spell placement (which is the only real knock I have against it).
What about paladins?
Although paladins do have AoE healing spells at their disposal, their spells aren't exactly something players can stand in.
Now, what can we do to help players stand in the good mojo?
Solution 1: Just cast it directly on players
It is the easiest solution! However, that means that most of the time, melee players will benefit the most. If you think about it, they're rarely going to move on typical encounters since they're at point blank range of the boss anyway. If the boss needs to get kited around or something, then that might not work so well.
The problem is with players at range. I've seen people who actively move out of them. They're not trying to dodge an incoming missile or spell either.
Solution 2: Repetition, repetition, repetition
I don't even know if this will work. Perhaps with repeated exposure, players will see it and realize that they're not taking damage from it. Maybe constantly telling them that they're allowed to stand in it will help. I don't know if encouragement will actually work but I can't think of anything better. If only we could put a little treasure chest in the middle of it.
I'm actually at a loss here. What can we do to train players to stand in glowing circles?
Need advice on working with the healers in your guild? Raid Rx has you covered. Send your questions about raid healing to matticus@wow.com. For less healer-centric raiding advice, visit Ready Check, and don't miss our strategy guides to Icecrown Citadel and Halion/the Ruby Sanctum.Filed under: Druid, Paladin, Priest, Shaman, Analysis / Opinion, Raid Rx (Raid Healing)
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 6)
Aaron Oct 22nd 2010 11:06AM
People hate my Efflorescence. But it's a great spell and so I need to use it. But they hate it. And I don't blame them. It's bad design by blizz. I hope it gets changed.
Ahoni Oct 22nd 2010 11:12AM
If people hate it, they are not paying attention. It is a great design by Blizz, in my opinion. The problem is we are used to using Swiftmend on a caster/ranged to save them. Effloresence is, I think, more designed around tank healing. If you Swiftmend the tank, the Effloresence will cover the melee/pets as well. This should provide a massive amount of healing for one GCD.
Nina Katarina Oct 22nd 2010 11:14AM
It's especially bad on Deathwhisper - it looks too much like that bad green thing I'm supposed to move out of.
Aaron Oct 22nd 2010 11:17AM
I don't mean the spell is bad. I mean the graphic is.
Titleist Oct 22nd 2010 11:22AM
Man, oh man.
First you yell at us to never stand in the colored circles on the floor - and call us noobs. Now you tell us to stand in the colored circles on the floor - and call us noobs.
I'M SO CONFUSED! MAKE UP YOUR MIND!
Meadow Oct 22nd 2010 11:27AM
The floating leaves help a little, though, I haven't seen any bad ground effects with them. But yeah, we probably should announce it.
I Am My Enemy Oct 22nd 2010 11:31AM
There is a simple solution: Debuffs. Moist bad voidzones give you a debuff that you can usually quickly recognize and can make the decision to stay or move IF its really that difficult to tell them apart.
bennet Oct 22nd 2010 11:44AM
Summary of Lady Deathwhisper on Monday:
"Stand in the green stuff! Stand in the green stuff!"
"No, not *that* green stuff!"
Royal Oct 22nd 2010 11:46AM
I agree the big green circle throws people off.
Typically bad void zones and the like consist of a solid color. Think of shadow traps on HLK for example. It would be nice to have a stronger visual cue to distinguish friendly from bad circles.
So I propose to have the friendly zone only have a visual marker of the border of the effect while leaving the inner circle transparent. The border serves the purpose of knowing where the effectis occuring and the transparency helps with not desensitizing reflexes. You know down the line someone is going to say "I thought that void zone was a heal".
So basically solid zone color = bad and bordered circle = good.
andoring Oct 22nd 2010 11:53AM
Is there a macro you could use when Efflorescence hits? Something like, "Green glow on floor good... stand in for extra life!"
Thatacus Oct 22nd 2010 11:53AM
@I Am My Enemy
I really hate those moist bad voidzones; that's why I always use Extra Strength Deodorants
Lissanna Oct 22nd 2010 11:54AM
One of the Cataclysm bosses uses the Efflorescence graphic as something bad that players need to move out of. That angered me greatly. "But I JUST" taught my beta guild how to stand IN that effect". *Shakes fist at blizzard*
Emile Oct 22nd 2010 12:19PM
Ofc you can macro that.
/cast Swiftmend
/ra Efflorescence!!
Xtofer Oct 22nd 2010 12:46PM
Personally, I've found that optimal use of efflorescence is in fights where a bunch of people have to clump together. Boss fights like Heroic Anub, Heroic Sindragosa, and the Lich King (phase 1 and 2) had my efflorescence as my third highest healing spell. I only had to tell people to get into the green circle once or twice and they caught on.
I think the only fight where there's a huge green circle on the ground that kills you is Deathwhisper (unlike the Plagueworks where the bosses have more distinct looking green things that kill you), and we had no issues with that. The runes on the ground look different despite the fact that both effects are both green. Plus, any boss mod will tell you that you're standing in death and decay, so this should be a non-issue for the most part.
I also love the graphic for efflorescence, and I for one hope they do not change it. :)
Hahahaha Oct 22nd 2010 1:23PM
How about a little less attention on recount and a little more on your surroundings?
I know some effects could be exactly similar to some effects, in that case move out of that color no matter what. The rest of the effects are still good to be used in that particular encounter.
BB Crisp Oct 22nd 2010 3:53PM
Red lights now mean "go". Have fun driving.
uncaringbear Oct 22nd 2010 4:50PM
Problem with Efflorescence is that more times than not, the ground graphic doesn't even appear on the terrain, and all I see are the floating leaves. Agree that the graphic needs look distinctively more 'healy' and less threatening.
Nobag Oct 22nd 2010 11:07AM
I haven't really had an issue with it. Perhaps it's the fact that my sanctuary glows nice and yellow.. which is usually what people associate with GOOD things unlike black, red, or orange circles that usually mean BAD.
Saeadame Oct 22nd 2010 12:30PM
True, but I think the one people are having the most trouble with is Efflorescence anyway. We've been semi-conditioned that green stuff on the ground = bad. So even though it's a nice pretty glowy green with leaves coming from it, it's still green stuff on the ground.
The worst part of that is that Efflorecence is probably the one you'll see the most. The Holy Word: Sanctuary/ Prayer of Healing Chakra is just too mana intensive to maintain for long, PW: Barrier has a long-ish cooldown and Healing Rain may or may not hold up to Chain heal depending on the situation. If you're in a 10m raid group, you probably will only have 3-5 people in melee range anyway, so Chain Heal would be better and do more than Healing Rain. And of course, the general wow player base won't see it until Cata actually drops anyway.
jbodar Oct 22nd 2010 2:24PM
I agree. Hmmm, things associated with Green - poison, acid, fel energy... Ok that's all I got for now, but those are all very ungood. I guess it's like Kermit always said, " pimpin' ain't easy" wait, no. "Boats and Ho's?" ;)