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Holy Priest Healing Easy Mode in Battle for Azeroth (BfA) 8.0.1

Last updated on Sep 25, 2018 at 09:22 by Niphyr 30 comments

Table of Contents

About Our Author

This guide has been written by Niphyr, a generally knowledgeable, long-time healing Priest and theorycrafter. You can follow him on Twitter.

1. Foreword

This page is intended for players who are new to the game or class, have no intentions of raiding Mythic difficulty, or simply want a more straightforward way to play their specialisation without being overwhelmed by the numerous subtleties and active abilities that need to be taken into consideration for optimal play.

2. The Basics of Holy Priests

Holy Priests are better suited to AoE/raid healing, where they are able to provide relatively smooth output. That said, they are also capable single target healers. Most of the stronger Holy Priest spells require standing still to cast, which requires some forward thinking to play optimally, meaning periods of heavy movement can sometimes be punishing and should be planned ahead.

3. Talent Choice for Holy Priests

These are currently the easiest talent choices to perform well as a Holy Priest. Note that some of the suggestions sacrifice a bit of performance for ease of use, but overall the difference is not great. Consult the detailed talents page for the complete picture.

4. Stat Choice for Holy Priests

Currently, you will want to prioritise secondary stats as follows for raid content:

  1. Mastery = Critical Strike
  2. Versatility
  3. Haste

For dungeon content, the priority is:

  1. Critical Strike
  2. Haste
  3. Versatility
  4. Mastery

While we provide stat preference lists, swapping gear to higher item level items — and their higher Intellect/total stats — should, usually, provide a larger upgrade than using lower item level items with better stats. The exception to this rule are items with important tertiary stats, Leech and Avoidance, which should still be used ahead of other items without them, unless the difference in item level is around 10 or above.

5. Basic Playstyle for Holy Priests

Regardless of the content you are tackling you should be aware of a few basic abilities:

  • Purify Icon Purify is used in most content as many enemies will place magical or disease debuffs on your allies which can be removed by casting Purify on the affected ally. It is commonly referred to as dispel.
  • Power Word: Fortitude Icon Power Word: Fortitude is a group wide buff that lasts for 60 minutes or until death and provides an additional 10% Stamina. Apply this before getting started on a dungeon or boss.
  • Desperate Prayer Icon Desperate Prayer is an active ability with a 90-second cooldown. It heals you for 30% of your maximum health and also increases your maximum health by 30% and should be used when your own life is in danger.

5.1. Dungeon Healing

Dungeon healing is primarily focused around single target healing, as outlined below. A lot of your decision making will be based on incoming damage and the cooldowns you have available. It is better to use your cooldowns early and often, than it is to save them for unknown future situations.

Below is the basic priority you should follow in dungeons. You should not cast a spell that will mostly overheal, so keep this in mind as working through the priority list and skip an item if there is likely to be significant overheal.

  1. Holy Word: Serenity Icon Holy Word: Serenity on an injured ally.
  2. Holy Word: Sanctify Icon Holy Word: Sanctify when most of your group is injured.
  3. Flash Heal Icon Flash Heal for both emergency and regular healing.
  4. Divine Star Icon Divine Star when most of your group is injured.
  5. Prayer of Mending Icon Prayer of Mending when little healing is required.
  6. Renew Icon Renew while moving and healing is required.
  7. Smite Icon Smite an enemy when no healing is required.

For heavy single target damage, use Apotheosis Icon Apotheosis with Flash Heal Icon Flash Heal and Holy Word: Serenity Icon Holy Word: Serenity as it comes off cooldown. If this is still not enough, you also have access to Guardian Spirit Icon Guardian Spirit.

For heavy aoe damage, use Apotheosis Icon Apotheosis with Prayer of Healing Icon Prayer of Healing and Holy Word: Sanctify Icon Holy Word: Sanctify to keep your group alive. If this is still not enough, you also have access to Divine Hymn Icon Divine Hymn.

Dealing damage while in dungeons is often overlooked by healers. While any additional damage is beneficial to your group, it should not come at the cost of keeping your group alive, which is your main priority. Smite Icon Smite is your main damage dealing ability and it costs no Mana. In situations where Mana is not a concern you can also cast Holy Word: Chastise Icon Holy Word: Chastise and Holy Fire Icon Holy Fire on cooldown.

5.2. Raid Healing

Raid healing is primarily focused around aoe group healing, as outlined below. A lot of your decision making will be based on incoming damage and the cooldowns you have available. It is better to use your cooldowns early and often, than it is to save them for unknown future situations.

Below is the basic priority you should follow in raids. You should not cast a spell that will mostly overheal, so keep this in mind as working through the priority list and skip an item if there is likely to be significant overheal.

  1. Holy Word: Sanctify Icon Holy Word: Sanctify when a cluster of your raid is injured.
  2. Holy Word: Serenity Icon Holy Word: Serenity on an injured ally.
  3. Prayer of Mending Icon Prayer of Mending on cooldown.
  4. Halo Icon Halo when most of your raid is injured.
  5. Flash Heal Icon Flash Heal for emergency triage on an ally near death.
  6. Binding Heal Icon Binding Heal for general purpose healing.
  7. Renew Icon Renew while moving and emergency healing is required.
  8. Smite Icon Smite an enemy when no healing is required.

Holy Word: Salvation Icon Holy Word: Salvation should be used during a period of heavy raid wide damage. Keep in mind, however, that your raid leader may instruct you to use it a very specific time.

Be mindful when using Halo Icon Halo as this spell not only heals your allies, but also damages enemies it hits. On some encounters you may have dangerous enemies that are being crowd-controlled and the damage from Halo may break this crowd-control.

6. Cooldown Usage for Holy Priests

As a Holy Priest, you have three baseline cooldowns. Here is how you should use them:

  • Divine Hymn Icon Divine Hymn should be used during periods of very intense raid damage. Keep in mind, however, that your raid leader may instruct you to use it a very specific time.
  • Symbol of Hope Icon Symbol of Hope should be used towards the end of a raid encounter to give the highest potential Mana back to all healers in your group. A good guide is either when you are at 20% Mana, or the boss is at 20% health remaining.
  • Guardian Spirit Icon Guardian Spirit should be used depending on many factors, including on your raid leader's instructions. If you do not have to save Guardian Spirit for a specific event, then just use it as a "life-saver" on the tank or another raid member who needs it.
⋘Introduction
Spell Summary⋙

7. Changelog

  • 25 Sep. 2018: Updated talent choice and playstyle.
  • 03 Sep. 2018: Updated stat priority after higher gear-level modelling.
  • 13 Aug. 2018: Updated for Battle for Azeroth launch.
  • 19 Jul. 2018: Clarified introduction wording regarding movement.
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