The Care and Feeding of Healadins

Anyone coming into this blog for the first time is going to think that I hate healing, when in fact the opposite is true; I love being a Holy Paladin. I have been healing in raids since ASTIG first started running Zul'Gurub and Molten Core; I have healed in 5-man instances and battlegrounds and every raid instance ASTIG has attempted. If I sound unhappy or, worse yet, ungrateful, please excuse me because that was not my intention.

Healing as a Holy Paladin is a joy. I don't have as much +heal as a priest, nor do I want it, especially if it will reduce my +spellcrit. My highest-ranked Holy Light averages 6500 on a critical heal, which happens once every three or four heals. Trust me when I say this is just above average and that there are plenty of other paladins who heal for more on a crit.

Paladin heals are remarkably focused. We usually only have two kinds of heals - Flash of Light, which we cast in 1.5 seconds, and Holy Light, which takes all of 2.5 seconds to cast - an eternity that is blessedly cut short by the Light's Grace talent, which all healing pallies should have. We don't have instant heals - except for Holy Shock, which is really more of a panic button than anything else. We don't have heals over time. We simply have to choose between a short casting time and a long one.

So when it comes to raid healing, you'll find a paladin healer on the main tank and no one else. We'll leave topping up the raid to the shamans and the druids. Putting a paladin in the same group as a shadow priest or an OOMkin druid is the best way to keep your paladin healer happy - critical heals return mana, but only 60% of the base cost of the spell, which means we guzzle down a lot of potions to remain viable throughout the fight.

I suppose the best way to give back to the community is to write a bit more about that, so expect more posts on being a healadin.