Old Issue No. 4: Allow Healing focus to work on Hot's

[Brohg]

Healing foci are available to low level shm even more easily than to those already level 70+, since lower items are droppable.

[Jaraman]

One consideration not mentioned so far is how it could be said that an HOT focus, whether thru AAs or folded into current healing focusses, would disproportionately benefit the shaman class.

Paladins receive no HOT crit AAs. They have one HOT spell line, Sacred Cleansing being the TSS version healing 859/tic at rank one. Pallies would benefit in one (1) area.

Druids receive no HOT crit AAs. They have 2 HOT AA lines, Spirit of the Ancient Grove for 499/tic and Gathering of Spirits for 1500/tic with a 3k instant heal. Druids would benefit in two (2) areas.

Clerics get the Healing Boon AA. They have the strongest single target HOT, the strongest group HOT, and a group HOT AA. They would benefit from an HOT focus in three (3) areas.

Shamans get the Healing Boon AA. They also have the most HOT options:

single target HOT
group HOT
group HOT AA
single target HOT AA
Epic HOT
long-term self-HOT AA

Shaman would benefit from six (6!) areas. The shaman healing model derives much of its power and flexibility due to the efficient and distributable nature of HOTs. What's more, shaman HOTs would benefit by not only having a tic healing more (proposed focus), but also by it then being crittable (Healing Boon/Resonance). And yet on top of this, several of these HOTs are also stackable with others... While clerics should remain kings of healing, the potential overall healing per second gained from an HOT focus clearly benefits the shaman class much, much more than it would other classes.

If the Devs consider the current state of healing relatively balanced across classes, is the request for a HOT focus a fair and realistic request?

[jdthomas]

[Brohg]

[Jaraman]

Of course even tho I'm no authority on where and when those elements are balanced, and based on Dev comments I saw in beta, I would have to guess that the HOTs are balanced around both the level that you can get them and a few levels after that, and that this would be for the "average" geared player. The only HOT not upgraded for the latest expansion is our Epic. All other HOTs were upgraded, including the introduction of a new line for us (Union of Spirits). This would imply that the latest HOTs were designed to handle up to level 75 raiding content. Furthermore, shamans used less-powerful HOT tools in pre-TSS raids, and the newer HOT tools -- in their unfocussed glory -- are already themselves boons to raiding shamans. Given this backdrop of HOT activity, granting or grandfathering in an HOT focus onto either current/past healing focusses or as a separate AA line would immediately and disproportionately benefit many, many more shamans than any other class that would benefit from an HOT focus.

The somewhat deceptive line of logic that you are using by arguing about scaling is that there is a relatively small minority (turboraiding shamans) that are adversely affected by the lack of scalability of HOTs. Ignoring the masses that would disproportionately benefit from the proposed focus, we must still compare apples to apples. Direct heals do indeed scale much better; but this scaling applies equally to all classes who can heal. That turboraider having to heal his group from massive AEs could easily be a druid instead of a shaman, and would use the more advantageous direct group heal. But if it were a shaman, wouldn't it be best for the raid leader to make sure that the shaman's group were made of auxiliary healers as well, such as rangers, beastlords, and pallies, with their uber 65% direct healing focusses? The dilemma of a shaman main healing his group from raid AEs is a challenge not specific to only turboraiders lacking this hypothetical HOT focus.

Besides all that, if the focus were to go into effect, would 32.5% more Epic 2.0 (162/tic) stacked with Ghost of Renewal (205/tic) be really that much of a healing boon against 2500/tic AEs? Perhaps combined they could help significantly, perhaps not so much, but this edge-case scenario needs to be balanced against the more relevant scenarios of the masses. One compromise could be to make the HOT focus specific to certain items only attainable by the turboraider.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not totally against the idea of us getting an HOT focus. More power to us. I just thought it pertinent to bring up some other issues that might play into the Dev's minds when considering whether or not to implement the idea.

[Jaraman]

[Brohg]

[WaringMcMarrin]

[Jaraman]

[Jaraman]

Let X = infinity
Let Y = infinity
Then X = Y and also X = Y + 1

Define X to be all numbers defined by Y, including itself.
Define Y to be all numbers defined by X, including itself.
Then X = Y and also X = Y + 1

Today, let X = Y
Tomorrow, let X = Y + 1
Sometime in the distant future, both X = Y and X = Y + 1 will have been true.

Let X = all increasingly positive numbers
Let Y = all increasingly positive numbers
Therefore, X = Y and also X = Y + 1

Let X = any nonzero number
Let Y = any nonzero number
Then X = Y and also X = Y + 1

Let X be the flag for anything that is true.
Let Y be the flag for anything that is true.
Let any value increased by one indicate something that is true.
Then X = Y and also X = Y + 1

Let X = apples
Let Y = oranges
Let X = Y. Therefore X = Y + 1.

Or best yet:

Let X = Y.
Also let X = Y + 1.
Therefore, X = Y and also X = Y + 1.

[Jaraman]

[Jabobtha]

[Brohg]

[WaringMcMarrin]

[Kianor]

[Giac]

[Veril]

[Jaraman]

[Grokii]

[Unmei]

[Tarnnok]

[Brohg]

Actually, at level 75, I use Breath of Trushar a ton, because that's the one I can cast six of (sometimes up to 7 or 9 of ) in 6.2sec

[Kianor]

[Jaraman]

[Jaraman]

But you know what, worn focus doesn't apply to most of those HOTs; it would only apply to our spell HOTs, Halcyon and Ghost.

For the turboraiding shaman with max worn healing focus of 65% (degraded down to 58.5% for level 73 Halcyon rank III), he'd be able to heal about 1900 per tic versus 1472.*

For the rest of us with rank I and 10% average worn focus, we'd do 1512 versus 1375 a tic.**

In other words, this new Top 10 Request would gain the turboraiding shaman 428 per tic, versus the average shaman gaining 137 per tic.


* 1472 = 1288 + (1288/7), accounting for Healing Resonance
** 1375 = 1203 + (1203/7), accounting for Healing Resonance

[Ungkor]

[Jaraman]

[Ughbash]

[Unmei]

[Ughbash]

[Cronikk]

If this issue was looked at by the good folks at SOE, they'd probably just introduce a whole new focus for us, dealing exclusively with HoT increases. Because shaman like collecting focii.

[Brohg]

That's pretty baseless and negative speculation, Cronikk.

[Tarnnok]

[Brohg]

[Cronikk]

[Peaky]