Balancing threat, with mana conservation, with keeping people alive is what the healing game is all about.
"I dunnae get it, Padre. Ev'rytime ya do a group heal, all tha monsters on tha map jump on ya and try to kill ya." - Flintlocke, to his Priest
Threat is the primary game mechanic for determining which player a particular mob will attack. Oversimplified: the player who has done the most damage. Healing a player will generate threat to all the mobs in combat with the heal's recipient as if you had damaged each of them. Only the hitpoints you actually restore count, even if you use a bigger heal than necessary.
There are many special abilities, talents, and even some items that manipulate threat. The value in understanding threat is that you will understand why a mob turned to attack and kill a certain player, and how to keep mobs attacking the right players in the future. I highly recommend studying:
Kenco's "A Guide to Threat" http://evilempireguild.org/guides/kenco2.php
If all the monsters on the map do jump on you, first make sure as many as possible are either being tanked or crowd controlled (e.g. Polymorphed). If not, your party needs to get its act together and it's not your fault. It is your responsibility, however, to be careful right at the start of a fight to give tanks time to build initial threat. Some tactics:
* Don't heal immediately, when possible. If a tank can be beat on for eight seconds without dying, there's no need to start a heal for the first couple seconds.
* Renew. Renew generates a small amount of threat on each tick, which makes it unlikely to spike healing threat past what the tank is doing. A low rank direct heal after a few seconds works similarly.
* Shield. Very important to understand how Shield works. It immediately generates threat equivalent to half as many hitpoints healed. So a 1000 point Shield is like healing 500 hitpoints. Cast it on a tank before combat starts and mobs won't even know about it. (However it does slightly slow threat generation. See the Frequently Asked Questions section in this guide.)
* Fade. Fade removes a certain amount of your threat toward all mobs, then dumps that threat back on you when Fade expires. Fade is best used reactively: hit it when mobs turn toward you then lay off healing as long as you can. For extremely touchy encounters when even a second of a raid boss' attention can cause a wipe, consider "pre-Fading." You go in to what behaves like negative threat, allowing one small to medium heal at very low risk. Just remember to stop casting after doing so, otherwise the return of Fade's threat may spike you right over the tank.
* Use Prayer of Mending. Prayer of Mending generates threat toward the player healed. Especially helpful on tricky pulls to give the tank an initial boost.
* Use Binding Heal. Binding Heal generates unusually low threat for the amount of hitpoints healed.
* Use multiple healers. Splitting healing aggro among more than one healer can keep all of you at low threat.
Mana Conservation
A beginner's healing style often consists of frantically chain-casting Flash Heal on hurt allies until running out of mana. This works fine in very short fights. Flash Heal is a fine tool for quickly getting a medium-sized heal where needed, but the amount of healing per mana spent is low. How to get the most out of your blue bar:
* Greater Heal. Cast time is longer but both hitpoints per second (HPS) and hitpoints per mana (HPM) are higher than Flash Heal. If you can land one, do so.
* Renew. Renew has high HPM and heals for a ton. It just does so slowly. For anyone taking constant damage, tossing a Renew is like tossing an instant cast Greater Heal.
* Prayer of Mending. If you can get it to bounce a few times, Prayer of Mending can reach very high HPM levels, especially with one or both of the cost reduction talents.
* Learn Burst-and-Break style. Try to maximize your time outside the Five Second Rule to pick up as many big mana regen ticks as possible. For instance, cast a Renew right as a Greater Heal lands then wait until the next Greater Heal is needed. It is better to patch up everyone then take a longer break than to cast a spell every three or four seconds.
* Downrank Heals. Experiment or use a healing calculator to find which lower ranks give a higher hitpoints per mana ratio. Usually one or two ranks down will be more efficient with smaller gain beyond that.
* Cancel heals. Watch your target's health while casting heals. If someone else heals your target to full, interrupt your own cast. Not only do you save the cost of the spell but starting a spell doesn't trigger (or maintain) the Five Second Rule. Some like to hit ESC, some like to move, some like to jump. Find what works best for you.
* Rotate with a partner. One healer is responsible for the tank while the other one stops casting to regenerate. The healer in waiting can be on the lookout for a damage spike and intervene when needed. Set up a macro or two for quick coordination.
* Gear switching. Weapons (including offhands) and wands can be swapped out during combat. Many Priests like to start with a high-int set and swap after the first couple of casts, or at least swap to a high-spirit set when resting in a partner rotation.
Safety
Threat management is about keeping yourself safe. Mana conservation is about keeping yourself useful. Safety is about doing whatever it takes -- even going against the first two aspects of healing -- to keep group members alive.
* Shield. Our instant "heal" is mana inefficient but well worth the cost. Nothing like throwing out a Shield to give the other healers that last second to land a big heal. Learn what Mortal Strike looks like and immediately Shield any tank hit by one; it still takes full effect unlike actual heals. Shield also acts like a Sta buff when a tank is already at full. Shield when you know massive burst damage is about to land, then start your next heal.
* Prayer of Mending. If your target can survive one more hit, Prayer of Mending also functions like an instant heal.
* Flash Heal. When you suddenly realize a heal needs to go right there Flash Heal delivers. It's bad to use Flash Heal all the time, but smart to use it at the right time.
* Binding Heal. Any time you're uncomfortable with your own low health but can't let the healing slack on a tank, Binding Heal is the best tool for the job.
* Use the Force. At least, it will seem like you can sense the immediate future when you start Greater Heals when they're not needed and repeatedly interrupt before it lands. Then, when a tank gets hit hard in the middle of your cast just let it complete. This synergizes well with other healers stabilizing tank health with Steady style direct heals.
* Stack HoTs. More stabilization. Every tank should have every available HoT active at all times. Multiple Priests can even maintain their own Renew on the same tank. Many small heals going off constantly give direct heals time to land and thus save tanks from sudden death.
* Casting Bar. Now a standard UI option. It can pay to target enemies to know ahead of time what hell they're about to loose upon your party.
* Target's target. Now a standard UI option. This allows you to select an enemy and keep track of which ally it is currently attacking. Great for making sure you're healing the correct tank of the moment.
* Learn to run. Too many healers pay little to no attention to their environment. If a tank goes out of Line of Sight are you going to stop healing and complain? Far better to keep track of your tank's location and take responsibility for positioning yourself within LoS. It's even possible to kite mobs who target you, preferably towards a tank who can pick them up. PvP is a good way to train yourself to heal and pay attention to the 3d world behind the health bars.
