Hi,

I'd like opinions on the new tier of gear in relation to healing sages, as it stands my full-augmented wh gear has served me well. However, look through the new vendor there seems to be yet again an abundance of stat combinations that do not seem appealing.

I've been trying to minimize my alacrity, but it seems to be on every piece now :/

What gear will you been grinding for over the next few weeks?

I am a 22/17/2 sage hybrid. I am close to min/maxing on my gear atm, and basically, I follow this stat preference:

Primary stats:

WP > Endurance >= Expertise

Depending on your situational awareness, feel out your survivability. If you have issues with healing while being a focus target, increase expertise. Drop it as low as you can go if you feel OK. I sit at 1208 expertise atm, and do fine. A few healers in the guild have dropped as low as 900-1160 expertise & do alright, but are super squishy. I like a little more than that.

Secondary stats priority:

- Surge: ~75%

- Crit: ~33-35% (buffed)

- Alacrity: ~4-5%

Once those numbers are hit, the priority is to stack power.

Augments:

Resolve (+18 wp / +12 endurance) = all pieces

Basically, the full EWH bonus is really bad if you take it at face value. The best approach is to get your WH min/maxed with WH items (using this stat guide), then cherry pick out mods/enhancements from the EWH pieces to make upgrades where appropriate, emphasis upon +power upgrades.

Set bonuses:

I have 2 campaign armorings (healing trance CD decreased by 1.5 seconds) & the bubble shield lockout CD set bonus.

To finish min/maxing, I need to upgrade my armorings (because the stats flip flopped between where they were, I need to look at set bonus upgrade priorities), then upgrade the belt/bracers, too.

Otherwise, I'm pretty much done.

Example performance:

Tonight, there was a group with a few guildies against a heavy DPS team (3 dangerous smash juggs/maras, a PT and a DPS sorc) and another smug healer and I were working mid with our guild's tank. I dropped off 677k healing, the smug dropped 550k+, and we both died 3-5 times, taking well over 300k damage per player.

The most healing I've done in a full length VS map with this setup is just shy off 900k healing (it was ~880k).

Very effective gearing approach. I've tried a few DPS builds (love FIB hybrid spec), and the stat priority is relatively similar, but you need to be closer to 1300 expertise.

I hope this helps.

Hi,

 

I'd like opinions on the new tier of gear in relation to healing sages, as it stands my full-augmented wh gear has served me well. However, look through the new vendor there seems to be yet again an abundance of stat combinations that do not seem appealing.

 

I've been trying to minimize my alacrity, but it seems to be on every piece now :/

 

What gear will you been grinding for over the next few weeks?

I started PvPing late, so I just completed my WH set, and am grinding to my EWH MH and OH currently. IMO, those are the most valuable pieces for sage healers, since they add Force Power which is equivalent to power.

After that, my plan is to acquire WH from cheapest to most expensive. The problem with the gear is really that in each piece, you only want the armoring and the mod, or the armoring and the enhancement, for a min/maxed set. So I'll be keeping the good 61 mods/enhancements from my WH gear to move around for min/maxing as I go.

Generally though, I think it is a mistake to try to "minimize" alacrity. I aim for equal parts alacrity and surge to minimize the effect of diminishing returns overall. For PvP, there is also an argument to be made to favor alacrity over surge. I wouldn't take it to the extreme that Ycoga does in another thread, but I wouldn't want to go much below where I am now (~10% speedup). (EDIT: just checked, actually 8.36%)

I'm at ~5% activation speed and it takes 2.4 seconds to cast deliverance.

A guildie of mine has 11% alacrity, and it takes her 2.3 seconds to cast deliverance.

Alacrity is junk. Give me power & surge with enough crit to fill the gaps. I've had 7100 deliverance crit heals in a WZ (very few, most are between 6500-6900).

A matter of opinion, but the math doesn't work to minimize a chance to boost critted heal power versus quicker bursts because, 1/10th of a second would require roughly 200+ casts until you'd see an extra deliverance on me. Meh.

I'm at ~5% activation speed and it takes 2.4 seconds to cast deliverance.

 

A guildie of mine has 11% alacrity, and it takes her 2.3 seconds to cast deliverance.

 

Alacrity is junk. Give me power & surge with enough crit to fill the gaps. I've had 7100 deliverance crit heals in a WZ (very few, most are between 6500-6900).

 

A matter of opinion, but the math doesn't work to minimize a chance to boost critted heal power versus quicker bursts because, 1/10th of a second would require roughly 200+ casts until you'd see an extra deliverance on me. Meh.

I think you don't understand how the gear works. You *cannot* trade alacrity for power or crit. You can trade power with crit, or you can trade alacrity with surge. So saying you stack power or crit at the expense of alacrity is false.

EDIT: misread, apologies. Still, a 4% faster cast time is 4% more HPS and less chance of being interrupted, for a very small reduction in crit multiplier. The DR on both is very severe.

1480 power

1314 expertise

0 crit rating

75% surge

23/17/1 bubble stun

Ownage

I think you don't understand how the gear works. You *cannot* trade alacrity for power or crit. You can trade power with crit, or you can trade alacrity with surge. So saying you stack power or crit at the expense of alacrity is false.

 

EDIT: misread, apologies. Still, a 4% faster cast time is 4% more HPS and less chance of being interrupted, for a very small reduction in crit multiplier. The DR on both is very severe.

Allow me to clarify.

If a piece (mod/enhancement) has a +power / + alacrity, you can replace it with a +power/+surge, or a +crit/+surge.

I very much know what I'm talking about. Just last night, I pushed a piece out of my gear with this approach that was power/alacrity (+54 alacrity), and replaced it with +power/+surge. I am above the DR on multiplier/surge, but I still went from 77.9 to 78.8 with a +54 surge replacement.

My deliverance still takes 2.4s to cast (as it did before), my healing trance is still 2.8s to channel it fully.

After that, I hit a 7.1k crit deliverance heal in a WZ. And my healing trance ticks on crit for +50/tick (x2-3 crits/channel, which equates to ~150-200 more healing per channel).

So, you can question my understanding all you want, but this is the proof you need to make decisions. Alacrity is essentially a wasted stat -- unless, and who would do this -- you go with it in a major way, looking at +15-20% activation speed.

Herein lies the problem with alacrity, though -- if you use it as a primary stat focus, you'll be depleted of the resources to really do any effective healing anyways.

I'm always one of the most damaged, least killed, and almost never out healed in any WZ with this setup. I suggest you try it. If not? Suit yourself, it works amazingly well in my hands, and may not for others with differing preferences or play styles.