It was raid invite time for Naxx – I was in shadow – excited to be going to a raid as DPS – I had missed out on an invite yesterday, so I was happy I was approved for tonite.
I was prepared to DPS.
At the 11th hour I get asked to respec to holy. So I ended up having to fly to Dalaran for a port to a city to repec – fix up my tool bars so they were healer friendly, swap over into more spirit gear
I know I’m harping on this, I’d like to think I’m a reasonable person, somewhat flexible – I’ll gripe in blog, but I’ve rarely said no to anything reasonable asked – its the whole ” Be a team player” thing echoing through me head. These guys are the ones that I left when my raiding guild blew up – and I was happy to be back with them when some reformed.
I’m adamant about being Shadow because I had to work at being a good shadow priest – I never needed to be good in the guild I started Kara with – but once I realised that there were ways to improve, I started taking it more seriously, this blog is one of those things that happened along the way. I understand hit caps now, I can argue with someone else as to if a piece is an upgrade for me, but I’m still learning. I want to use my knowledge, find out what works on bosses. Learn to DPS in the Naxx fights.
I never learned to heal in a raid – and If its as easy as spamming one button then tell me your secret. I have mana issues, my Dps/healing gear is Hybrid gear, its worse now especially now that there is potion sickness – I need to worry about the 5 sec rule, what heal is more mana efficient/time efficient – how to work out how much damage the tank is taking so I can have time to cast a greater heal rather then topping him up with flash. My Glyphs are wrong for healing. Its been a crash course on raid healing this last week – now three Naxx nights as a healer.
Someone asked in raid ” So are you going to stay holy?” I replied “I hope not” the RL reply was” only untill more healers level.”
I’m not acting pugnacious – so I say nothing.
That they need a second rate healer to heal, means they are desperate.
Have I made it clear to my guild I do not want to heal? – my reluctance should be obvious – my eagerness to get back to shadow asap is certainly apparent. I haven’t said a final no – because if I did, me being online when they need a healer would probably cause resentment / annoyance – start begging / pleading and I would feel guilty
I tried offering help to the non 80 healers to level – no one wants it. I guess they want to play their own game too – and thats more then fair.
and I know your advice.. Get out. Get out now. I know I should.
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Pugnacious Priest's Warcraft Blog 
You should be more pugnacious about it 😛
Just a few quick tips for healing:
#1 Dealing with the 5sr, it doesn’t activate until you actually spend the mana, so you can always do “stop casting”. Imagine if you will (and I know you will): your tank takes maybe about 10% health hit. So you start casting greater heal, however, about halfway through, your renew (you do have renew on him, right?) ticks and you see he’s going to be ok without a major heal, so simply jump or inch forward or backward, whatever, just cancel the spell. Since you didn’t spend mana, you’re still out of the 5sr.
#2 Always try to predict when you’re gong to need a heal. Try to start casting before the tank actually needs a heal so that as soon as he gets to a point where he needs needs one, you’re already halfway through the spell. This goes hand in hand with stopcasting.
#3 Use shadowfiend at about halfway through the mana bar. If you’re going through a boss fight this is especially needed. Always a good idea to pop this before it’s actually necessary but also when you’re going to get maximum return on it.
#4 Use renew and shield liberally and at the same time if you can. This will allow you to hug the 5sr, you might want to combine inner focus with this (if you spec it, which you should if you’re a healer) later on and use it on the first spell you need after you do shield/renew combo because, as I said, you’re out of the 5sr as long as you don’t spend mana, so doing this lets you stay out of it that much longer.
Anyways, those are just 4 very basic tips for healing and mana effeciency. Although like I said, I hope you won’t have to use them for very long. Good luck!
So there are no druids in your guild? No shamans? No paladins? No other hybrid class that could heal instead of you? I would propose a compromise — you’ll heal for this round of Naxx 10, provided that they understand that your main spec is still shadow and that that’s the gear you’ll be rolling (or spending DKP points, or whatever) for. But NEXT round of Naxx 10 (or some other raid) where they need a healer? Say no — it’s the shaman’s turn, or the druid’s turn. You are probably not the only choice for respeccing to heal — so what if whatever enhancement shaman out-DPS’s you, or there are mages in your guild that would prefer a boomkin’s buff over your mana regen? You did not roll a priest to be healery, and you don’t play the game to be a healer. You should not be the only one that has to sacrifice some of your love of the game for the good of the guild.
I agree with Captain — be pugnacious! 😀
@Dueg – Cheers for the tips..
@D yes there are some hybrids just not enough of what we need when we need but they are fine on Dps classes so they don’t need me as Dps – and I have been pugnacious – I’m dreading logging back in to see the reply to my 3 page gquit mail…