Part 2 - Talent Tree Issues
Talent Tree Issues
Issue #1 - Too Many Prayer of Mending Talents
Holy currently has 8 talents dedicated to 1 ability - Prayer of Mending. Now let me start off with: I don’t dislike Prayer of Mending at all. It fits the Holy playstyle quite well. What I dislike is that I have to spend a total of 8-10 points in the Holy Tree for one ability.
Many of those points are entirely just filler. Divine Service, Focused Mending, Say Your Prayers, Epiphany, etc. could be entirely removed, and all that would need to be done is to apply a healing increase to PoM and/or more charges.
Holy Tree PoM Talents: Benediction, Divine Service, Prayers of the Virtuous, Say Your Prayers, Epiphany, Answered Prayers
General Tree Pom Talents: Prayer of Mending, Focused Mending
Issue #2 - Only Two Viable Endtree Talents
Holy currently only has two viable end-tree talents: Miracle Worker and Divine Image for all forms of content. These talents together outperform everything else because more Holy Words = more heals on demand = higher Divine Image uptime = stronger heals.
I’ll address the issues with the other end-tree talents.
Lightweaver - The main issue with this talent is its only impacts Heal, and you can only have 1 charge up at a time. If it were 1 Flash Heal = 2-3 charges of Lightweaver and also made Heal a lot stronger than 40%, it would be much better. Overall, Divine Image outperforms this talent because it functionally does the same thing: your Naaru’s make your Flash Heals stronger… and all your heals and damage abilities.
Lightwell - This talent has a number of issues. First is its healing is limited to people <50% hp, you can’t move it after it’s placed, and it’s more or less competing against better talents. If this talent were higher up in the tree, it would be a good talent to take.
Divine Word - This talent overall just isn’t up to snuff compared to Divine Image. Every 1 minute you get a 15s boost to only one type of ability, but with Divine Image, it buffs all your abilities, and you can keep a 60-80% uptime on it during boss fights. If this talent were higher up in the tree, it would be a good talent to take.
Restitution - This isn’t a bad talent, but just gimmicky because it relies on the premise that you have to die to make any use of it, and if you’re doing prog on bosses you’re wasting it every pull. Put this higher up in the tree
Issue #3 - Bottom Tree Bloat and only 3 End Tree Talent options
Holy Priests only have 3 End Tree talent nodes while a lot of specs in-game have 4-6 options to pick from. This really limits your build options because there’s simply a lack of choice and more cookie-cutter building.
The entire bottom of the Holy Priest tree is full of 2 point sinks that simply exist to eat up all your available points.
It would be nice to have 4-5 options and more 1 point nodes at the bottom of the tree like most classes in-game.
Issue #4 - Forced/Wasted Talents
When you’re pathing down the Holy Tree you’re forced to take talents that just exist as filler.
- Prayer of Healing - You’re forced to take this to get Circle of Healing even though you may never cast it.
- Cosmic Ripple - You’re forced to take this to get Trail of Light.
- Everlasting Light - You’re forced to take this even though you don’t use Heal so you can get Crisis Management.
- Enlightenment - Why do we need to waste 1 point to get our baseline mana regen? Holy is balanced around this talent.
If I want to do a single-target build I’m wasting 2 points in Cosmic Ripple and Everlasting Light that I could otherwise put elsewhere.
Issue #5 - Too Many Single Target Healing Talents
I play both Disc and Holy, and on Disc, I don’t need to invest a single point into any talents to make my Penance/Flash Heal stronger. On Holy, I need to invest steeply into these talents.
- Cosmic Ripple - Need to get this to get Trail of Light.
- Trail of Light - 2 points to make Flash Heal replicate 25% of its healing.
- Everlasting Light - 1 point that is completely wasted if I’m not using Heal.
- Crisis Management - 2 points to give Flash Heal a +15% increased crit chance.
- Light of the Naaru/Harmonious - Both are 2 point talents that make Holy Word Serenity reset faster.
- Pontifex - 1 point to make your next Holy Word up to 40% stronger.
- Resonant Words/Desperate Times - Both are 2 points if you want to go into Lightweaver.
- Lightweaver or Divine Image - 1 point to make your single-target heals stronger.
- Binding Heals - 20% replicated Flash Heal to yourself in the Priest General Tree.
At minimum, Holy needs to invest 8-10 talents to make Flash Heal/Heal viable. And 2-3 of those points are wasted on talents you have to pick in order to progress down the tree. I’m not counting Apotheosis or Prismatic Echoes here though since they have their usefulness.
Many Priests end up opting out of taking Circle of Healing for M+ because they’re simply tied up on points.
Issue #6 - Inconsistencies with Filler Spell Talents
As noted in #5… Holy has to invest 8-10 talents at minimum to make Flash Heal Stronger, but you can put 1 point into Empowered Renew or Rapid Recovery, and get an instant +30-40% boost to Renew.
If you want to buff up Prayer of Healing you just need to invest a total of 2 points into Revitalizing Prayers and Prayer Circle.
So I don’t get why for 1-2 points I can buff up 2 abilities (Renew/Prayer of Healing) just as strong as investing 8-10 talents into Flash Heal.
Issue #7 - Dead Talent Nodes
These talent nodes are effectively deadzo.
- Gale Winds - 2 points for a stronger Divine Hymn that’ll overheal more. Putting 2 points into Prismatic Echoes accomplishes the same thing.
- Powerful Litany - This provides a very minor boost to Prayer of Healing.
- Resonant Words - This talent is better off being a 1 point talent option with Pontfiex. Desperate Times is so much better.
How I would Fix These Issues?
Now that I’ve compiled a list of issues. How would I fix this?
Firstly, I would completely crunch down on the Prayer of Mending talents. Remove Divine Service, Say your Prayers, Epiphany, and Focused Mending. In return, you can just buff up the baseline healing of Prayer of Mending and/or add extra charges to it so that no healing is lost.
Secondly, I would trim down the talent nodes for the single-target heals, add more options to avoid filler spells you don’t want.
Third, I would address the mandatory Divine Image/Miracle Worker problem by making Miracle Worker baseline or up higher in the tree so you can’t always get it.
Fourth, I would expand the bottom of the tree with 5 options to pick from. Apotheosis/Holy Word Salvation can be moved to the bottom as well as one of those choice nodes. I would crunch down a lot of the 2 point sinks into 1 point. It should be designed in a way that if I want to get Divine Word, Lightweaver, and/or Lightwell, I should be able too on-top of Miracle Worker + Divine Image. More choices = more fun.
Fifth, I would greatly expand the talent tree with more thematically stuff that involves buffing up different abilities like Holy Words, Renew, etc. Holy Priests should be able to pick completely different playstyles to adapt to different boss fights.
Part #3 will address Playstyle issues in M+ and raid.