The Egotistical Priest
An irreverent and opinionated discussion of the many classes
in the World of Warcraft gaming universe.
Trinkets
by Vonya
Everybody loves trinkets, right? Even Talon King Ikiss loves his pretty trinkets, and is willing to kill you for looking at them.
You can carry two trinkets, and there are a LOT of them available for you to choose from. THIS discussion is aimed at the trinkets available to healy priests from various instances through Karazhan, and why I hate them. I want to take the designers who developed them outside, strip them naked, and make them run through a field of irritable emus.
Because despite the wealth of healy trinkets out there, we really don’t have very much of any use to choose from.
First, let’s discuss the ways that various classes heal, shall we?
Everyone is special and unique and different, just like everybody else.
Paladins - Spam healing is frequent, continually casting flash of light, flash of light, flash of light…
Druids - Spam healing is frequent, tossing HoTs out on whoever needs them, keeping everyone topped off…
Shaman - Do not rely on spirit for their mana regen and have a flexible heal structure which sometimes has them spam healing…
PRIESTS - Big heal, followed by a hot, followed by an earnest attempt to stay outside the five second rule. Rinse and repeat.
Before you bow up and get all defensive, I KNOW that these are simplifications. But I think that in general, this is a decent description of how each healer spends most of their time when healing.
Now, let’s take a look at the type of trinkets generally available for healers.
If you take the square root of the hypotenuse and multiply it by the integral of the…
MOST healing trinkets are along the same lines as most damage trinkets.
They have some sort of Equip: effect which ups something, be it damage or healing, and then they also have a Use: effect which you have to activate to see. This also means there’s usually a cooldown - generally a minute or three or five, depending on the trinket.
The average trinket Use says : Increases X by Y for Z.
Where X is damage or healing, and Y is the amount that it’s increased (often in the 200 range) and Z is the length of time that it’s affected, usually 15-20 seconds.
So, for a healer, your +heal is increased by…say 250 for 20 seconds after you use the trinket.
Let’s say our paladin healer has this trinket and uses it. Their normal healing involves spam heals, and let’s say they get the full benefit of this puppy. They cast Flash of Light repeatedly until the 20 seconds is up. FoL has a 1.5 second cast time. We’ll say that they get the healing bonus on something like their next ten heals. On average. Mostly because I like round numbers. You math-people feel free to do the real numbers, this is all for the sake of argument.
Druids, because they also do a version of spam-healing, get a good number of heals that are benefitted by the trinket.
Priests, on the other hand, really don’t spam heals. My philosophy on priest healing is that we top everyone off and then we STOP and wait for more damage. When I’ve used these trinkets, I’ve gotten maybe two, three uses out of it before the effect is gone. My greater heal has a massive (comparatively) cast time, and on top of that, I don’t spam heals!
So I pop the trinket, get off a gHeal and a hot…then I sit there. If I’m lucky, I need to cast another gHeal towards the end of the trinket use life, and I probably take so long casting it that the use is done by the time the heal goes off.
These things are USELESS to me. Utter garbage, trash. For a paladin, they’re GOLD. I’ll bet most druids love them too. But for a priest, in my not-so-humble opinion, they’re the gum that sticks to the bottom of a good man’s loafers.
And that’s not even taking into account a few other little details.
The comments to this post made me aware of something which somewhat changes my stance on the XYZ trinkets.
# showtooltip Flash Heal
/use 13
/use 14
/cast Flash Heal
If you use this macro in place of your Flash Heal spell, that means that your trinkets will have the opportunity to be triggered just before you cast Flash Heal. And since Flash Heal is one of our “CrapCrapCrapHOLYCRAP” spells…that’s not a bad tradeoff. It means that if your trinkets are up, your Flash Heal gets a boost. And if you use your Flash Heal for panic situations, that boost is probably not only helpful, but can save the day.
If you, like me, have a Use on your trinket that you never trigger, using that macro will at least ensure that the trinket isn’t WASTED.
Despite this, it does not change my opinion that the trinket situation is in dire need of a rethink. It simply provides a way for the trinket to be used when it otherwise is not being used.
How can you LIVE at that speed?!
I’m a priest, and when someone needs a heal, any cooldown can KILL them. I hate use trinkets. Generally if I’m in a situation where I need to use the trinket, I don’t have time to click the button. People need heals NOW. I’m watching the health of up to ten people. I’m trying to keep an eye on the battle so I can tell if something’s going to go very wrong. I may need to be shackling, and I need to keep an eye on my threat meters. Oh, and I should make sure I know what the mob is casting too, and how far down its health is so I can either ramp up or step down my healing as needed.
Guns don’t kill people. Cooldowns kill people.
So if I don’t have time to click a trinket with a questionable value to begin with, you’ll have to excuse me. If I click a button in that situation, I have very carefully calculated an extra two seconds into their survivability. I believe that although most trinkets do not activate a Global Cooldown, ALL of them require me to shift my eyes away from everything else going on, find the trinket button, move my mouse there, and click it. Add a cooldown on top of that and I’d better be getting some deus ex machina right there, or I’m just wasting time. And I’m almost certain that I’ve got some kind of lag thing going on which keeps me from being able to immediately follow that click with a cast.
And I am one of those blessed people who can go to click on the GIANT COLORFUL BUTTON and STILL land on that tiny half-a-pixel-wide line between two buttons.
It’s a gift, what can I say?
So yes, clicking a button takes extra time for me. My Nostromo is like a third hand for me, and anything not programmed on it doesn’t get used much. You can argue with me all you want, but clicking a button takes extra time. Yes it does, so don’t bother sending that hateful email. I’m not even going to open it.
ALSO, above and beyond all of that, damage dealers pop their trinkets whenever they want.
Me, I’m a healer. I have to decide whether I want to pop a trinket now, or wait until the boss fight, when it may become necessary. I have three mana-back panic buttons, and I want to make sure I have them when I need them. Same goes for trinkets. So I don’t use my trinkets and abilities every time they’re cooldown is up, because I may need it later.
So I don’t even get to use my trinkets as often as a damage trinket. If I don’t need that extra boost, I’ll save it till I do. Sure, that means I’m not quite as efficient overall, but it also means that my beloved [Talasite Owl] is always ready when I need him. And that’s got a whole lot more meaning for me than my overall efficiency. Averages can bite me.
The Menu
So let’s take a look at some of the more popular healery trinkets on the market, shall we? Please note that I don’t have trinkets on here that I don’t have access to. Yes, there are upgrades past Karazhan and at least one in a Heroic I haven’t done yet. But since I’ve not tried them, I can’t argue for or against them.
[ Ribbon of Sacrifice]
[Lower City Prayerbook]
[Bangle of Endless Blessings]
[Essence of the Martyr]
[Heavenly Inspiration]
[Talasite Owl]
-added after comments-
[Scarab of the Infinite Cycle]
[Rejuvenating Gem]
The Talasite Owl is one of my all-time favorite trinkets, and I’m prone to burst into song randomly, much like a cartoon princess, simply to declare my love for it.
Most people are not jewelcrafters, however, and thus cannot get the Owl to use it. So we move on.
Essence of the Martyr takes 41 Heroic Badges to buy, and it’s probably worth it….for a paladin. He’s a prime example of my “Increases X for Y over Z” formula above. For anyone that spam-heals, this guy will reward you a millionfold.
For everyone else, it’s just an expensive perfume bottle.
Heavenly Inspiration also follows that rule, but has an Equip value that is MP5 instead of straight +heal. Very nice, but that Use doesn’t help me any. Another very nice trinket for a spam-healer.
MOST trinkets fall into these categories. The next few that I’m going to talk about are the exceptions.
The Ribbon of Sacrifice drops during the Opera event in Karazhan. I snagged it and squeed to myself about the unique Use Effect is has. Applies Fecundity to your target, up to five stacks of a buff that increases all healing by 30 for 20 seconds.
Umm…someone do the math on that for me. At best, it does 150 +heal for 20 seconds? Sure, that affects all incoming heals, and not just your own…but…hello? Beuller?
That’s just a cleverly disguised XYZ rule again. Unless you spam heals, they won’t get the benefit from it, and as a priest…I don’t spam heals.
Also, Fecundity doesn’t stack from two different healers. So your healers have to coordinate when they use the ribbon so that one isn’t wasted.
AND…I don’t see much improvement in my healing, I gotta be honest. A fight that uses the ribbon isn’t any easier than a fight where it’s not used.
Again, maybe a Pally or Druid trinket, but she’s not for me.
I’m not going to throw it away or sell it, but it’s gathering dust in the bank, and I’m crying that I ever spent points on it. Not worth it. Not worth it at all.
Lower City Prayerbook is the mainstay of many healers. The Use effect is interesting - it lowers the mana cost of healing spells for the next 15 seconds.
…by a set amount. By 22. And that alone is odd to me…why 22? What wizened and sun-browned old mystic did they travel to the top of what mountain to ask the perfect number by which to reduce the cost of a heal? And what was he smoking to give the answer “22″?
Did he even speak English?
But I digress. Again we have the problem with 15 seconds being a time period during which I just honestly can’t cast many heals. Also, most of the heals I use, 22 mana is a drop in the bucket. It’s nothing. That’s like what…2 int? Give me a break. They don’t stack, and they share the same cooldown, on top of that.
Maybe for some healers, but not for the way that I priest.
So here we stand, and I’ve already scornfully tossed aside 99% of the trinkets available for healers.
I have another more on my list, and it’s one that I’ve disenchanted twice, and am now crying fat disney tears at my own stupidity. Warp Splinter in Botanica drops the Bangle of Endless Blessings.
This guy doesn’t come close to matching the format of the other trinkets. The Equip says that your spellcasts have a chance to allow a percentage of your mana to regen WHILE CASTING.
That’s inside the Five Second Rule, folks. And if you picked up the Meditation talent from the Discipline tree (you did, right? Of course you did) then that means that you’ll sometimes be regenning something around 30% of your non-FSR regen during casting.
THAT I can handle. THAT is something that I’ll be happy whether it procs in the middle of a casting series, or whether it procs on the last spell I cast before I try for the FSR. That guy will make me happy every time he procs.
Then we look at the Use effect, and most of you will go “UGH. Spirit. You told me spirit was useless!”
Yes, well, I said that itemization and encounter design in BC negates most of spirit’s usefulness.
But if you can get ENOUGH spirit, and you spec for it, then it’s a very nice stat to have. When I get the bangle, I’ll probably respec to get the spirit buff and get more benefit towards +heal based on my spirit stat. I’ve also got the [Masquerade Gown] from Kara, and that thing procs all the time.
I think that with all three - the spec, the bangle, the dress, I’m looking at getting a lot more benefit from spirit.
Two trinkets were added after Egotistical Reader commentary.
One is the Scarab of the Infinite Cycle, which drops during Black Morass runs. When it procs, it gives you a boost to your spell HASTE for six seconds. The spell haste that it gives is about 30%, according to mathheads and theorycrafters more number savvy than myself.
A lot of people mentioned that I had forgotten this particular trinket. Obviously they didn’t check my Armory Profile, because I actually have this puppy equipped.
Druids should never touch this trinket. You already have either instant-cast or quick-cast heal spells. The extra haste rating is going to be as useful to you as an elephant in a jumping competition.
Paladins probably love this guy.
For me, and the way that I heal…I’d say I get the benefit from it about three out of every ten times it procs. It procs fairly often, don’t get me wrong. It’s just that it procs AFTER I HEAL.
After I heal, I generally don’t heal again in the next six seconds. Sometimes I do, sure, but if I’m casting Renew, then it doesn’t have a cast time anyway.
It’s only when it manages to magically proc on the first of two gHeals that I’m tossing on the tank that I get the benefit. Which is not really often enough for me to be happy with the trinket.
The trinket DOES have a lovely graphic that surrounds my character when it goes off, so I don’t have to worry much about missing the proc. But the haste isn’t hugely perceptible when I watch my casting bar. So…of the few times that I actually get the benefit, I don’t even know that it was all that important of a proc for me. Since I just gHealed, the extra haste in getting my spell off isn’t needed to keep the tank alive. So it really has almost no effect at all on my healing.
Most BC trinkets have a hidden cooldown - even though they may have a universal 15% chance to proc, they will not proc ever during that cooldown. Generally the cooldown is about three times the duration of the effect. Since this one is six seconds, we’ll say that as soon as it procs, you are guaranteed that it won’t proc again for 18 seconds.
And past that point, you’ve got the 15% chance to proc.
I am unimpressed.
There are rumblings that the haste percentage from the trinket has been nerfed even further, and that it won’t proc off of certain druid spells. I obviously can’t confirm this, nor do I care to.
I’d say this is a glorious paladin trinket, a mediocre priest one, and a laughable druid one. Shaman might like it too, as I think it can proc off of each chain heal jump, but that’s unconfirmed. Also unconfirmed is a rumor that it can proc off of every renew tick. I personally have not seen it randomly proc when I didn’t JUST cast a spell, so I would tentatively say that’s a load of bullhonkey.
And last, but not least, is the trinket that I will never have, but wish heartily I could get my grubby little paws on. The Rejuvenating Gem.
This guy has no Use effects, and the combined Equip effects make it my dream trinket. Unfortunately, it comes from the dragons in Blackwing Lair.
Your brain can fight that all you want, it’s never going to change. What I consider to be the best priest trinket available comes not from Burning Crusade. Not from Naxx or AQ20, but from BLACKWING LAIR. It’s not even an Onyxia drop, for cripe’s sake.
However, I will never see this trinket, because nobody’s raiding BWL anymore. If your guild loves you, have them run BWL for you till you get the trinket. It has a chance to drop off of the three named not-endboss dragons, and it’s better than anything you can find in Outland.
And that, my friends, is a very very sad statement to have to make.
Summary
For a healy priests, trinkets truly suck the big one in BC. At best, you can stack the Equip effects that make you happy, but the Use effects will probably leave you cold.
Developers, please actually think about the classes that you are designing trinkets for, neh? Not all of us are spam-healers, and priest are made so they shouldn’t HAVE to spam-heal.
Give us trinkets to fit our play style. Trinkets we can use. Trinkets we can love.
And mother of monkeys, make Warp Splinter drop the gorram trinket for me again. I’ve already apologized for the disenchanting! What more do you want from me?!
P.S. Our warlock still wants the Eye of Quagmirran, if you could let that drop too, kthxbye.
P.P.S. Extra love for anyone who catches all of the various movie quotes I tossed in there.
August 16th, 2007
Yeah the LC prayer books - by 22 mana. Why? But not just that, there’s a lot of weird figures in WoW if you look. Like +81 heal to a weapon. 81? 81? 80, ok, but 81?
August 16th, 2007
Ahhh Trinkets…
I too hate “use” trinkets. I always think to myself when the hell do I need them? And usually being a Paladin and only getting half of the bonus to begin with it’s not going to add up to much for me.
3 Trinkets make me go oooooh I need it now.
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=32496 - Memento of Tyrande – From Illidan dang skippy I should want it…
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=30619 - Fel Reaver’s Piston – From Void Reaver also appropriate that I want it.
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=19395 - Rejuvenating Gem – From THE DRAKES IN BLACKWING LAIR… I mean if you were to separate the equips I wouldn’t touch it with a ten foot poll, but together? ZOMG… /drool.
I’d rather use the Memento and Rejuvenating Gem for healing at all times. And honestly I shouldn’t want the Rejuvenating Gem still… its not even from Naxx or AQ for that matter.
It’s like Blizzard forgot people actually like passive trinkets. I mean they are there but normally its an always there effect then a random effect at random due to spell casting, attacking or god forbid getting hit, and then to top it off they make it so it cant proc more then once a minute in most occasions…
Hopefully Blizz will take a look back and go wow we went in the wrong direction there… We should go back and make some new trinkets…
And isn’t it clear that Blizz loves the random number generator, its like they roll for stats every time they don’t have set guidelines, and think set bonuses are worth way to freaking much. Its sad that most Paladins refuse to use Teir 4, I mean its good for the other people but I prefer most of my Kara loot over all Teir 4 pieces… its just silly.
Ahh I’m done now
August 16th, 2007
The Talasite Owl and the Essence of the Martyr are probably the best in the list. However it depends on how much mana regen you have. The Bangle sounds like it procs Meditation (similar)when you cast. Hard to balance procs vs straight up bonus to heal. Balance Balance Balance.
Your rant against items that gives X by Y for Z isn’t entirely justified. Yes, you have fewer casts but you will get the full +200 healing, while a Paladin with his 1.5s heal will only get +86.
August 16th, 2007
Ego, try this macro. I’ve found it pretty useful for triggering my trinkets. Of course you can use a different spell to hook into–Frisbee, maybe? (Note to self: Give that a try!)
# showtooltip Flash Heal
/use 13
/use 14
/cast Flash Heal
August 16th, 2007
Lower City prayerbook is quite useful for a druid. 22 less mana means a lifebloom is only about 150 mana in tree form. And if I pop a +healing trinket Before i cast lifebloom, AND do not let it bloom, that +healing will still apply to the spell, even when the trinkets use is over.
August 16th, 2007
I love your blog. And as a new priest who came from being a mage I like to see the info about healing. Also your writing style makes me laugh and since I read this from work I really need that.
I see your point with the trinkets. As a mage my trinkets were used to the best of their abilities. But Stupid mage was right that you’ll get a little more than what you implied you would get….but since you’re not spamming greater heal for the Z duration you still loose some.
And at least lower city prayer book isn’t unique like every mage trinket. (I know its not much but its a little nicety).
22…..22…..22…we all know the answer to everything is 42. Oh wait, this is Blizz, maybe it is 22.
August 16th, 2007
@Mage
Very true on the balancing procs vs straight heal. It would definitely only be a good tradeoff for someone who was already swimming in +heal. AND also only for someone with a high spirit on top of that. *nod*
Actually, I don’t get the full +200 healing - GHeal no longer gets 100% of plus heal.
I think my HoT does, but don’t quote me on that.
Still, a single (maybe two) heals with +200 on them aren’t going to make or break a fight, nor are they going to significantly up my healability.
And though a paladin will get a lower percentage (of that I have no doubt) they get to use it more often, so it probably balances out in the pally’s favor.
If I hit it just before I chain cast gheal and hot then I’d get more out of it, but those situations generally involve a whole lot of naughty words and not a lot of extra time to click a trinket.
Not saying EVERYONE would agree with me, but I really don’t think it helps priest healing much. IMNSHO
@Kestrel
That may actually work…*ponder* I could replace the trinket button with a macro, and that would also fix the lag thing. Would I need to put a stopcasting in there? And how do I know which slot is my trinket slot?
Looked up the # showtooltip and that’s just fabulous. <3
@Mera
Aha! I knew it had a good use. Also, I spent like twenty minutes this morning trying to find the cast time of FoL…I realize I’m no genius, but my google fu isn’t THAT weak.
Are people trying to keep this a secret?!
But yeah, that’s definitely why I didn’t do more spell research on druids and whatnot. It was ignorance or smashing my computer screen in with a stiletto heel. I chose the lesser of two evils.
THANK YOU very very much for posting this from a druid’s perspective. 100% always welcome and grateful. =]
August 16th, 2007
@Necro
Thanks!
As a warlock, my husband also uses his trinkets to their utmost.
And it doesn’t do much good to have two LCPrayerbooks - they don’t stack and they share a cooldown. *grump*
August 16th, 2007
I highly recommend you get an addon like TrinketMenu that lets you bind some keys to activate whatever trinkets you have equipped, or use a macro for it as suggested earlier and bind that to a key. Clicking on heal buttons and trinkets = slow healer!
August 16th, 2007
I only use one LCPB, the other is a heavenly inspiration, for its imba mana regen, and the on use +heal, which is extremly useful for a druid.
August 16th, 2007
Slots 13 and 14 are your two trinkets, top and bottom respectivley, and yes a stop casting in there would be nice so the macro dosen’t stop if one of them is on cooldown. Go see Preistly Endeavors for today, that macro is in there.
August 16th, 2007
Just input from the shadow priest who has only raid healed twice (respeccing for an alt Kara run). When I pick out healy trinkets, I don’t even bother looking at the Use:, I just look at the Equip: and if the Equip: is something I like, that’s what I take. Since I’m not a jewelcrafter, and I only really heal in non-heroic 5-mans, I mostly look at gear to bump up my +healing, which is why I have the Lower City Prayerbook and the Essence of the Martyr.
Like Galadria said, 13 is your top trinket slot, and 14 is your bottom trinket slot, and to be honest, a trinket macro is the best bet, because while you’ll then get spammed with “That item is not ready” when you’re clicking on your Gheal/Flash heal/Renew when your trinket cooldown is up, you’ll at least be using the trinkets for some heals. Inefficient? Probably, but at least you’re using it. =)
August 16th, 2007
@Zasp
Sorry your comment got caught in my filter!
I am -so- with you on that Rejuv Gem. I wonder if we could five-man that….
@Mel
I don’t click on my heal buttons, I have them bound so I can use my GLORIOUS Nostromo. Which I need to post on, but that’s another critter.
I definitely agree. Clicking on trinkets = slow. Even if you’ve got them on your panic row, which is blown up to hugesize for easy clickage.
@Mera
*nod* Heavenly Inspiration is definitely good stuff. One of the best XYZ trinkets, I think.
@Galadria
Gahar, thank you. I saw that! I don’t know if Kirk read my mind or what!
@Lauchis
I think that’s what most priests do - I much prefer a good Equip than a good Use.
lol, I like your logic there in the last paragraph. I’d probably get a lot more use off it that way.
August 16th, 2007
Rejuv gem?
August 16th, 2007
blue dragon baby
probably a bit tricky to get now though
August 16th, 2007
Ego,
It takes a bit of planning, and I don’t know all the trinkets well enough to advise by specific names, but I can give you some generic advice that helps - not solves, but helps.
Many trinkets of similar use effect (specifically spellpower type) will not stack with each other, meaning you can’t have the effects ongoing at the same time. BUT, they aren’t locked into the full cooldown either. Which means you can pop one that’s got, say, a 1 minute cooldown with a 20 second duration, and at the 20th second pop a second that’s got a 1 minute cooldown with a 20 second duration… Which means if you’ve set up the double-trinket macro (above, or my post) you wind up with at most (and “only”) 20 seconds without the spellpower/healing bonus.
The second hard thing (picking the trinkets that maximize “some” power being first) is deciding which healing to spells to attach this macro to. On the one hand, attaching it to the “oh crap” spells like Flash Heal means those get a boost (of about 2/3 the listed damage). On the other hand, attaching it to your always used spells means you’re going to maximize boosted time. If in doubt you can always attach the basic macro to everything.
August 17th, 2007
@Mel
Rejuvinating Gem
Zing
Hmmm, I’ll have to look into that. Since there’s no way I’m parting from my owl, it may not help right away, but upgrades do happen and it’s something to look into.
Attaching it to a macro would definitely make sure it gets used though. *nod*
August 17th, 2007
Another point to consider…
I’ve run across several priests who say that for heroic and beyond, they usually use the method you mentioned still for small trash. But when it comes to bosses and large pulls it’s a constant cast as well:
Renew-Frisbee-FH-GH-Renew-BH-GH… What gets cast may change (gads, we’re flexible) but the 5SR and spirit regen is being heavily supplanted by constant-cast and MP5 gear.
And if that’s how the developers expect us to play - to get away from the 5 second waltz - then it explains the trinkets.
August 17th, 2007
@Zing
Ah, but if that’s true, then devs really only want trees and paladins to be healing?
Because priests are flexible and very good healers, but we don’t have the in-FSR mana regen tools that both of those other healing classes do.
If the devs want us to play constantly inside the FSR, then they’re saying they don’t want priests to be viable raid healers. We’d never make it to the end of boss fights.
There is, as far as I can immediately thing, nothing that gives priests any kind of mana help other than the Meditation talent, which is a low cap percentage. We crit and the tank gets armor. Pally crits and they get mana back. And I’ve seen tree of life druids spend hours without even hitting half mana. Sure, it doesn’t mean both of them are infallible, but if the devs want us to be casters for 10 minute fights inside the FSR, they need to give us the tools to make that viable.
Whups! /rant
August 17th, 2007
The fact that I still use my Rejuv Gem (and that you’re drooling over it) really shows how few decent healer trinkets there are. My other trinket is the Prayer Book (Aldor rep) and I never, ever use its use function. I keep it around for the equip effect.
I’d like to get the Ribbon of Sacrifice to use for specific bossfights when I’m spamming Circle of Healing a lot, otherwise, I wouldn’t wear it. And I’ll be getting the trinket from Bot now that you mention it, I don’t know why I never noticed it. I’m very fond of spirit. I’d trade half my int for spi if it was possible. And I should get around to making the owl for long fights…
August 17th, 2007
@Malva
You…what situation could ever call for CoH spammage?! *flails* That sounds dire indeed!
But definitely invest in the owl. VERY worth it, even for shorter fights.
August 17th, 2007
Ego
Just wanted to let you know I linked to your post on WoW Insider - so beware of incoming traffic!
August 17th, 2007
Healing Stream Totem….Lesser Heal….Heal….Chain Heal
August 17th, 2007
don’t forget about Scarab of the Infinite Cycle being a great healing trinking (especially for pallies and shaman) where spam healing is necessary.
Couple things of note. The “Increases X by Y for Z” trinkets are absolutely amazing for both druids and shaman for two instances. You can pop two trinkets at once and add a few hundred +heal. So for shaman, you can drop wrath of air totem and pop your trinkets and Earth Shield will use your entire +healing including the result of trinkets. The same goes for a druid’s lifebloom. As long as you don’t let the lifebloom actually bloom, the HoT will continue to use the +heal from the trinket(s) popped.
You can also pop both your trinkets at once and use nature’s swiftness with a single macro (although, I sometimes have to use macro twice for the heal to actually cast).
Now going back to the bangle. There is a good reason to have the bangle as a healer, as long as you have an innervate avaialable to you sometime in the raid. Time it correctly and pop your bangle before receiving an innervate and your mana regen will be much better than without it.
August 17th, 2007
For a resto shammy, heals break down as follows.
Chain Heal, which heals up to three people and jumps from target to target, lesser healing wave and healing wave, which are just our faster and slower heals. No HoT’s or AoE heals of any kind. So we’re kind of a spam healer, but one who can spam a heal that can heal up to three targets at once. We could also drop a healing wave totem, but unless there’s another shammy in the group dropping mana spring, we usually won’t.
August 17th, 2007
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=19288
with
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=30665
August 17th, 2007
as the top priest and gm of my guild, there are only a couple trinkets I would ever touch. As of yesterday, my two trinkets were lcpb x2 simply because of the plus healing. Yesterday, after we downed gruul, the eye of gruul dropped.
That’s a sexy trinket. I already have clearcast in my spec, but adding 2% to get a heal cost 450 less mana is just way toooooo sexy for me. On top of that, I already downrank my GH to rank 3, so its mana cost after the proc is 13 mana. Yummmm.
The only other trinket ive been trying to get is the scarab of infinite blessings. I think it procs off renew ticks, and spell haste is godly as a priest. Imagine quick GH….
It dropped for me once, and an elemental shammy ninja’d it from me… /cry
Also, get the primal mooncloth set. Your mana regen will fly through the roof.
August 17th, 2007
I’d also like to recommend [Eye of Gruul], which has two equip abilities and no unnecessary equips. It has procced a couple times for me so far, and has really helped, especially making -450 mana on say, a renew, which = free!
August 17th, 2007
I’m surprised you didn’t mention http://www.thottbot.com/i28190
“Scarab of the Infinite Cycle”
Equip - Equip Healing by 70
Equip - Chance to increase spell haste by 360 for 6 secs.
I use this with a lower city prayerbook.
The expansion seems to make it almost impossible to stay out of the 5 sec rule, and this gives a nice quik cast pretty often.
August 17th, 2007
fights in which CoH spam can make a *HUGE* diff:
hydrosss, void reaver, morogrim and in some situations, vashj. oh, and sometimes curator and prince, but i hardly count kara bosses.
i know a lot of priests like to poo-poo CoH but if you got a lot of regen and/or are willing to pot religiously, it can truly save a raid from a wipe on fights where AoE effects threaten to destroy your melee.
i’ve also seen priests put up some pretty eye-popping numbers mainly because they busted out the CoH spam and went nuts with it. it’s not an ‘use it all the time’ heal and can be fairly situational, but it does have some occaisional-use virtues.
August 17th, 2007
I use Darkmoon Card: Blue Dragon and when it procs I use Bangle of Endless Blessings for spirit bonus. I’m not sure if blizz changed the % based on level as it does with BC items, I don’t know how much it regens on an average boss in a raid but while nobody does the math I’ll use them (I’m too lazy to do the math myself). For PvP I use Scarab of Infinite Blessings (BGs) or Timelapse Shard (arena) and PvP trinket.
The trinket I want now is Pendant of the Violet Eye. Passive +40intellect and increased mana regen on activation is good for PvE and PvP.
August 17th, 2007
Earring of Soulful Meditation
Binds when picked up
Unique
Trinket
Classes: Priest
Requires Level 70
Equip: Increases healing done by spells and effects by up to 66.
Use: Increases your Spirit by +300 for 20 sec.
This is the upgrade from Bangle, which sadly is Priest only (I would kill for it as a Druid), Depending on your spirit the Bangle proc is around 7-15 MP5 passive.
Blizzard however is annoying me that there is no upgrade from Rejuv Gem (which I dont have, and want) untill Illidan, and I do not like clicky trinkets unless I am MT healing.
Let us hope that with their logical loot system, ZA will have a caster boss who uses heals, and is covered with trinkets all over his body.
August 17th, 2007
The problem with Earring of Soulful Meditation is that SSC is not accessible to everyone. But yeah.. it’s a nice trinket to use when the druid innervates you. =P
August 17th, 2007
Odd, I must be one of the few priests who still spams low rank (5th) flash heals on tanks every now and then.
August 17th, 2007
[...] by at Egotistical Priest has a nice write-up regarding the various healing trinkets available to players these [...]
August 18th, 2007
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=27828
Warp-Scarab Brooch from heroic Mana Tombs. Still got an on-use effect but the mp5 is pretty nice. A clear upgrade over Heavenly Inspiration at least. Haven’t actually got it to compare to the Bangle of Endless Blessings, and there’s no sums on wowhead comparing the two’s regen but I guess it would depend on how much you are casting to get the Bangle procs.
One nice thing about the bangle is that it doesn’t share a cooldown with other on use heal trinkets so you can get the healing bonus from both of them at once. Only +40 or so from the spirit bonus, but it’s all good.
August 18th, 2007
I am one of the main priests of our raid and we progressed pretty well having Gruul, Magtheridon down and 4 bosses in Serpents Shrine Cavern.
I can say that as a priest on those boss fights you wont have a chance to stay outside the 5 second rule. So you must optimize your mp5 for those instances. There are serveral trinkets which habe 10mp5 or more which are very good. With some bosses you need to use thr trinkets to increase your heal as the boss does too much damage on the tank (10k hits common).
Another trinket I can recomend is the one form Black Morast: http://www.thottbot.com/i28190. It speeds up your heals quite well and procs farily often.
To add mana efficiency on top of mp5 and down ranking you need all your procs you can get. My talent Holy Concentration for example adds free casts. MY set T4 bonus will speed up greater heals for every flash heal I cast. All those talents, procs (meta gems as well) and trinkets add well to make you an efficient healer.
If you have problems activating your trinket you can assign keys to them. As they dont stat a global cool down you can press the key and heal at the same time.
By the way, my two trinkets dont share thew same cool down and I can activate both of them, adding 400 heal easily. This is nice on enraged bosses or when its getting a close call.
Believe me, as soon as you enter those 25 man instances you have to adapt your heal style.
August 18th, 2007
Just binding the trinkets together with whichever spell you usually only use in emergency situations (flash heal anyone?) works pretty well for me.
Example macro would be:
#showtooltip Flash Heal
/script UIErrorsFrame:Hide()
/use 13
/stopcasting
/use 14
/stopcasting
/script UIErrorsFrame:Clear()
/script UIErrorsFrame:Show()
/cast Flash Heal
The UIErrorsFrame parts are not exactly necessary, but they’ll prevent those ugly “That item is not ready yet!” messages spamming your screen in case you’re in cd mode.
August 18th, 2007
My only healing character is a 70 shaman alt, but with things like earth shield and lifebloom stacking where you can stack a heap of +heal, try the ZG trinket and another that doesn’t share the cooldown such as the Oshu’gun Relic.
That’s +621 healing on your next spell with less for every after.
ZG Hero Charm: http://www.wowhead.com/?item=19950
Oshu’gun Relic: http://www.wowhead.com/?item=25634
August 19th, 2007
For the trinklets, I use the same macros as above but with Prayer of Mending. Only because I’m a shadow priest doing emergency heals now and again. Usually a moment when I can’t even get a heal up or remember to use Flash Heals (shameful, I know) so it’s usually on PoM.
Anyway, have you tried it yet though? Just curious to know the outcome. >.>
August 20th, 2007
@Chris
Meep. Holy COW, that was a huge visit spike. I went from a comfortable average of about 300 to 2,000. TWO. THOUSAND. *flails*
Too bad I was gone and couldn’t heed your warning ahead of time! *fluffs pillows on the couch* They showed up and I didn’t even have time to sweep the dust under the rug!
@Obmulap
Does that mean spam casting or were the ellipses indication that there’s pausing for the FSR?
@Dereg
I’m actually using the Scarab at the moment, I need to add an addendum about that trinket to it.
That’s a pretty snazzy trick - so a lifebloom cast during the +heal time will continue to tick for that amount so long as it doesn’t bloom? VERY handy, especially if keeping blooms up is part of your normal healing rotation.
And you’re right - innervate is based on your mana regen, so loading up on spirit first is genius. GREAT point.
@Shammy
That sounds very intriguing, and like there’s as much sizing up the situation as a priest has when healing. Do you know of any great shammy blogs?
August 20th, 2007
What I do with the Bangle of Endless Blessings:
When I get the regen proc, I’ll use the bangle for the spirit increase. The increase in spirit will also increase the amount regened during the proc.
August 20th, 2007
@Exit
Both very good trinkets, but not ones I’ve had personal experience with. You can bet I’ll be looking for the Serpentshrine Cavern one when the time comes though!!
@Venop
I can’t swap my profession to tailoring - both my enchanting and my jewelcrafting is too useful to too many people. I am very irked at Blizz for making those robes not only BoP but also require a specialty tailoring to wear. Very very lame.
I’ll review the Eye when I have a chance to get it. =]
Also, I think we should be allowed to choose based on more than just the Equip: effect on trinkets. IMHO. lcpb is a good trinket, but I think priests should have a wider selection.
@Vor
As soon as I can try it for myself, you can bet I’ll add it to the list. =]
August 20th, 2007
My two trinkets: The Bangle of Endless Blessings and Rejuvenating Gem.
The Bangle’s proc is VERY reliable: Once per minute. It procs on almost anything, if that hidden cooldown is over. “You gain Swift Brown Ram” “You gain Meditation”
In longer fights, I do try to keep an eye on when I gain the Meditation effect, and use the Bangle for +spirit at that time.
August 20th, 2007
@Zdubs
That’s one I forgot to mention, and I’ve actually got it equipped right now. I’ll add a comment on it.
@Argent
Potting religiously would require a source of mana pots, which I do not currently have. Also, you’re talking about bosses I’ve not fought yet. You may hardly count Kara bosses, but that’s where I am, so I do count them.
My biggest beef with CoH is less with whether or not it’s useful and more with the spikes in threat that it causes. But that’s a topic for another day.
@Aelwen
I need to find out where that Blue Dragon trinket cards come from. I hate the thought of collecting them, but it may be worth it.
August 20th, 2007
@Maifax
You can say that again. I hate that I still want the Rejuv Gem too, and I don’t really have much hope of getting it. Stupid stupid stupid.
And I want that earring. Patience, precious, patience….
@Matt
I still need to do some personal tests on downranking to determine whether it’s useful to me or not. At the moment, I’m not downranking anything.
@Torgan
I think that guy was on my wishlist - hate that instance in heroic though. Blech.
Very good point though!!
@Teut
Since I haven’t gone that far, I can’t comment. I will say that I am keeping a variety of gear in my bank for when my strategy will have to change for new bosses.
The trinket you’ve linked is one that I have currently equipped, I need to add a note about that one to the entry.
I plan on adapting my heal style, no worries. I’m not so naiive that I think there is one and only one way to heal.
Also, a lot of people have added some very helpful stuff on linking a trinket’s use to a spellcast - I’ll definitely be trying those out.
August 20th, 2007
@Glacia
Points for the most complete macro yet. VERY nice.
@New Guy
How lame is it that so many people are pining for old world trinkets still? I’m cool with them still being useful up to Kara, but c’mon. I’m a drae, when exactly was I supposed to be in on all these ZG and blue dragon runs? Bad form, Blizzard. Bad form.
@Myremi
Haven’t used it yet, but I’m going to give it a shot. I think that with that macro it’d be worthwhile. It depends on how it was used. On Flash Heal I can definitely see it being useful, or on bubble perhaps (which is my first panic heal…flash heal I’ll use regularly when I’m assigned to the raid, but bubbles only come out when I’m afraid someone’s going to die).
I think it’ll be a VERY nice addition there. *nod*
August 20th, 2007
@Versatile
That…that’s GENIOUS. I’m so stealing that and adding it as a suggestion in the article. *picks you up and twirls you around*
@Riprap
Oooh, that’s very good to know!
August 31st, 2007
Comments have been Assimilated
September 4th, 2007
[...] on trinkets I’ve been pondering trinkets for a while since reading Ego’s interesting post on the subject. Because my philosophy is similar but not identical, other trinkets are beginning to [...]
September 6th, 2007
Do you know if the Mark of Defiance from Zangar PVP works when you cast heals?
It gives +32 damage/healing and has a chance to give 128-172 mana on spell hit. I know it procs fairly often for me but I’m a stupid Mage and only cast damage spells.
September 7th, 2007
@Stupid Mage
I would say that it probably does.
The Blade of Eternal Darkness from Maraudon does not, but it specifically says “damaging” spells. “Chance on landing a damaging spell to deal 100 Shadow damage and restore 100 mana to you.”
Inconclusive, unfortunately, especially since heals aren’t generally considered to “hit” their target. But my rough guess is that it would work on heals as well. Its usefulness would depend on how often it procs. =]
September 18th, 2007
Any of the ‘fade-a-like’ trinkets, imo are solid as well. One heal or shield or fade itself needed else where, such as on myself, will negate any benefit from a +heal trinket.
September 22nd, 2007
i like the alchemist stone of all the trinkets +15 to all stats and 40% more on potion use, you cant beat it.
October 12th, 2007
Readin your post you’ll probably like the often forgotted Auslese’s Light Channeler (http://www.wowhead.com/?item=24390) from blood furnace.
This is one trinket i liked to have ona macro because i knew i would always get the full benefit of it.
December 19th, 2007
Ribbon of Sacrifice with 5xCoH spams is a truely wonderful thing to behold.
January 16th, 2008
I still use this at 70.
Blessed Prayer Beads: http://thottbot.com/i19990
January 28th, 2008
Hey - this is a bit of a late reply on this topic, but I just stumbled across your posts recently. I really enjoy them since they are straight forward and also fun
I’ve been playing wow since it came out, but priest has just become my main over my mage since BC came out, so there’s still stuff to learn. I also tend to play without many addons as it usually just ends up slowing down my comp too much, so it’s nice to see what you think is useful as far as that (and I love the shackle macro, thanks!).
As for trinkets, I really hated Use trinkets too, since I usually forgot about them completely, but someone pointed me to a fairly simple way around the click and cast (which does seem to take waaay to much time). Right now I’m using Scarab of Infinite Cycle and Ribbon of Sacrifice. I still love to use Heal (Rank 4) - it’s at a 2.5 sec cast, so yes it’s not practical for every type of fight, especially the ones where people take great damage at a really fast rate, but depending on your gear, it can heal for basically equivalent to Flash Heal (rank 9) for almost half the mana. So since you say you usually fill the “raid” role of healer, which often is what I find myself doing, it’s great to use while your PoM is on cooldown, to top off a tank, or when you think someone might heal up a dps class you would otherwise put a renew on. Since I end up using this spell fairly often, I have my Heal 4 set as a very simple macro:
/use Ribbon of Sacrifice
/cast Heal(Rank 4)
That way every time I cast Heal the trinket casts, and while sometimes it’s completely unneccessary, others it at least procs the trinket and then I can commence with my Greater Heals and what not, which continue to benefit from the trinket effects. You will get a message that says Spell is not ready yet (while the trinket is on cooldown and you use the Heal), but it’s actually quite easy to ignore since you’re basically staring at hp bars the whole fight (to some it may sound boring, but for me its like tetris on drugs). There is probably a much more sophisticated macro out there, but this works just fine for me.
Anyways, take it or leave it, its just something I have found really useful since I could not for the life of me remember to use a trinket while I’m busy actually healing people!
January 28th, 2008
I see on reading the posts below there is a macro to get rid of those error messages… great!
March 8th, 2008
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March 10th, 2008
and one more - http://thottbot.com/i24390 - ausilee’s light channeler. Not too bad for something pre BC. My 70 epic’d priest still uses it….
March 10th, 2008
and a royal seal of…. http://thottbot.com/i18469 (this is the pre BC one I still use, not the light channeler mentioned above). D’oh
April 8th, 2008
The new alchemist stone is very nice but you have to be an alchemist :
Redeemer’s Alchemist Stone
Requires Alchemy (350)
Equip: Increases healing done by up to 119 and damage done by up to 40 for all magical spells and effects.
Equip: Increases the effect that healing and mana potions have on the wearer by 40%. This effect does not stack.
http://www.wowhead.com/?item=35750