Healer Micromanagement - The Beacon of Light Question

When you are in charge of passing out healing assignments, you will find that everyone does it slightly differently. Some people use addons, and I'm sure these can be very handy. I have a dual monitor setup, and figure out who the tanks are going to be for each boss, who all my healers are, and make a spreadsheet assigning targets or healing duties.

For my single target healers, I sometimes have full conversations with them, via whisper. I do it privately, so that if they are having trouble keeping up a target, they can let me know instead of the whole raid - or if they find they are needing to help someone else keep up a target more than they ought to.

I Know My Class and Assume You Know Yours

I play a priest, and I know my class very well, so I can hand out a few tips. I play a Pally, and I know enough about pally healing to know what questions to ask. With Shammies and Druids, I have a general idea of their role in the raid, but the specifics, not so much. That having been said, I depend on each of the healers to know their class better than I do. Shocking, right? They're smart folks, they don't need me telling them crap they already know.

I actually do not want to make everyone's decisions for them. I don't want to control everything - I just want everything to work properly. The vast majority of the time, I don't need to tell my healers HOW to heal - they do it their own way, let me know if there are problems, and as long as the boss goes down and the raiders stay up, I'm happy enough.

I'll organize the roles so that everyone is coordinated, but all the other healers are just as good at their job as I am - so who am I to tell them how to do their job? Is that what being a leader really means? If that's the case, I don't want to lead - I want to coordinate.

Main Tank and Beacon of Light

In 25 man raids, there should usually be two healers on the Main Tank. Part of the criticism I received revolved around the fact that I did not assign this. I don't think 2 separate healers are necessary when half of your healers are Pallies since Beacon of Light allows two healing targets. Inevitably, at least one of those three Pallies will assign the MT as their BoL in addition to the assigned healer. That right there equals two healers, at least.

I guess if I'm not micromanaging the Pallies, and telling them where to put their BoL, there is the chance that there won't be a BoL on the MT. In retrospect, I think all I really need to do is ask that amongst the three pally healers in the raid, one or two of the non-MT healers put their BoL on the MT. There ya go, problem solved, with minimal micromanaging.

Instead, I decided to assign BoLs via whisper, and then realized that I was right in the first place, and didn't need to - every assignment I gave was what the Pallies were already doing. This is why I rarely feelthe need to step in and tell healers how to do their jobs - they're good healers. There is organization, and there is execution. Identifying where the source of the problem lies is the tricky part.

The point is, as the healing lead, I approach it with an eye for learning from my healers - not for forcing my lessons and orders upon them. I don't take kindly to people trying to tell me how to play my class, and so I assume that other healers won't like it either.

Yet now, I'm shrouded in indecision, stumbling around doubting my own abilities at organizing healing assignments due to problems we had on our last raid night, and the criticism I received (which is partially why I reacted so poorly). If assigning heals means that I need to be directly involved in telling every healer exactly what spells they should use when, and telling them how to play their class, then I am not the person for the job. Not only do I not have the knowledge, the patience, or the wherewithal, but I don't have the stomach for it - I am not good at just ordering people around, I am good at leading a group, together, with every voice guiding me.

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8 Responses
  1. Fuubaar Says:

    Question regarding Disc's in a raiding environment.

    How do you assign "bubbles"? If you only have 1 in your party & it's a 25man raid, do you just tell that priest to go to town?

    Just curious.


  2. Fuubaar Says:

    PS: There is a good post that I think you should read. Very good stuff:

    http://penancepriest.blogspot.com/2009/09/graduate-level-review-of-disciplinary.html

    Sorry, I'm excited about my Disc priest :P


  3. @Fuu

    Re: Disc Priests in raid - it depends on what I have the Disc priest assigned to. Since Disc is better at single-target, I always assign them something specific, but it is rarely the tank, because we always have tons of Pallies. Usually I put them on wonky mechanics - i.e. Slagpot, Light Bombs, Kologarn's Fist, that sort of thing, and just raid shielding and heals when not busy.

    Since we also usually have multiple priests, if there is a Disc priest in the raid, I just tell all the other priests not to shield Disc's target. Aside from that, I ask that Holy Priests be "conservative" with their shields, but use when necessary, and the Disc priest is permitted to go all out - as long as the Disc priest is able to monopolize Weakened Soul on their specifically assigned target, I don't think it's a problem.

    I depend a lot on Iraetsarran to give me feedback on whether or not this is working well. One of the other Holy priests is specced for Body and Soul, which gives a short massive running speed boost after shielding, and it sucks that when there's a Disc priest in the raid, he doesn't really get to use it much, but so be it. That's why I'm not specced into it - if I want uber fun powerful shields, I'll spec Disc.


  4. @Fuu

    Jeez, i can't even shut up in comments.

    A lot of that post intimidates me and is a bit over my head. Sigh, I wish I were more confident with my disc abilities! I think I'm going to try running disc more often.

    And now I'm looking at all my stats, trying to figure out what to regem. I have way too much intellect - I NEVER run out of mana as holy, but constantly as Disc - this is totally ass backwards, and I'm trying to figure out the problem.


  5. Fuu Says:

    What we should do is when my Abi hits 80 & is ready to get into Naxx 10, I would like to Dual heal it with you. Then I can learn a little bit about raid healing & not feel like an idiot if you're there you telling me what to do :D


  6. @Fuu

    zomg... if that's the case I better learn my shit fast!

    ::runs off to test Disc spec so as to not be failpriest::


  7. Fuubaar Says:

    No pressure ;)


  8. Fido Says:

    "Sigh, I wish...out the problem."
    Jess,
    If you need some tips or advice on gemming or whatever I suggest you to create a post or read one of the gemming posts in the Gear forum of Discpriest.com
    A lot of people will be able to help you there.

    Just make sure you´re in discipline gear when you create the post or make a list with your gear, gems, and enchants. (current stats are welcomed too, saves math :P)

    Besides that, gogo play discipline more! ^^ Some things just need to go on autopilot sometimes so you can focus on the rest. Playing a Class and spec combination is one of those things. Play it a lot and your fingers will find the buttons by themselves.

    Good luck.


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