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Protecting the citizens of Azeroth is extremely important to us. Our new Battle.net Account Security Awareness page provides helpful advice on what you can do to safeguard your computer, how to spot scams, info on the adverse effects of buying gold, and tried-and-true methods to help prevent account compromises.

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The mare Brightmane gave birth to Invincible as a young Prince Arthas watched with rapt attention.
In the years following Invincible's birth, the horse and Arthas formed a bond that carried them across the warring nations of Azeroth, through the icy grip of death, and into the throes of battle.

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Good news, everyone! The Plagueworks, the next wing of Icecrown Citadel, is now open! Inside this palace of grotesquerie, the devious Professor Putricide taunts foolhardy raiders to face the Scourge's most twisted and abominable experiments. If you succeed, you'll strengthen your foothold in the Lich King’s domain. If you fail, just hope the professor deems you to be an unsuitable test subject. For more info on the Icecrown Citadel raid, check out our earlier preview.

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I see this sort of question a lot, and it's usually phrased in terms of how we love dps casters and make things easy for them and hate healers and want to make them suffer.

When you think about the actual experience though the difference comes down to more damage nearly always being better while healing has a target, beyond which more healing isn't necessary because everyone is at 100% of their health. Overhealing exists as a concept, whereas overdamage does not (except in a few isolated fights or when threat is an issue). In a very coarse sense, damage is about as going as fast as you can while healing is about hitting your target -- damage is a 50 yard dash, while healing is playing darts.

Furthermore, most healing rotations aren't terrible complicated because they can't afford to be. If you had to get up e.g. 3 periodic spells and self buffs before you could even do your job, then a lot of time players would be dead before you could ever get around to actually saving their lives. Having a long ramp up time would just kill healing.

So the healing game ultimately becomes more about using the right tool for the job. If someone takes a little damage but isn't likely to die, a hot is a great idea. If someone is about to die, you might need a very fast spell or even a cooldown. If a lot of players take damage at once, an AE looks attractive. If you know you won't be able to cast for awhile (maybe you're moving) then again something with a duration like a hot or shield is the ticket. And so on....

Mana efficiency is ideally part of this calculus. If mana doesn't matter, then either your highest healing-per-second spell or your fastest spell (depending on the situation) is always the best choice. Increasingly in LK, it's just the fastest spell that wins because of the nature of incoming damage. If mana doesn't matter, then you aren't trying to hit the bullseye I described above because missing the bullseye (overhealing) has no consequence. If you use the proverbial bazooka to kill cockroaches, then who cares?

Many long-term healers (and I'll include myself in that) enjoy healing because you feel smart when you do it right. Part of that "smartiness" is using the right tool for the job. It's a different approach to the game than say a mage or warlock uses however. To some degree it's hard for me to understand how you like healing if you don't like mana management.

Now, in much of the above, I'm describing an ideal situation. Mana generally matters a lot less in Lich King for healers than we'd like, so instead of challenging healers to hit the target we just challenge healers to keep as many darts in the air as possible. If you miss even a single GCD, then it's possible someone is going to die. That doesn't feel like smart playing to many players. That feels like whack-a-mole.

Now don't jump to the opposite extreme and assume what we intend for Cataclysm is for healers to stand around a lot and regen. What we'd rather see is that say a Holy priest uses Renew in some situations, Flash Heal in others, Greater Heal in others, CoH in others, and so on. Furthermore, we'd like to see more coordination among the healers (again because the risk of going OOM exists). That doesn't have to mean talking on Vent, though it could be that too. It could be as simple as assigning more targets or roles for your healers instead of just "You heal the tank, everyone else heal the raid."

In addition, once the group learns that healing mana matters, then individual survivability matters more too. Health stones, pots and even bandages do something. An avoid-damage ability like Barkskin or Dispersion is an interesting part of the dps toolbox instead of a PvP-only spell. Standing in fires is dangerous rather than just sloppy playing. Avoidance on tanks is more attractive because being the guy who requires tons of healing can be as much of a liability as the guy who dies from big boss hits.

Yes, the risk is that the game becomes so stressful for healers that it's not fun for them. But I think healing can definitely be stressful now, and in a physically exhausting way instead of a I-need-to-make-smart-decisions-quickly way.

(...)I've addressed the downranking issue enough that you can probably find a good explanation for why we nerfed it.

The big problem with downranking was it propped up coefficients at the expense of everything else. It wasn't just that the lower ranked heals were cheaper. It was that the higher ranked heals just didn't have much to offer because the coefficients so completely trumped the flat points of the spell. The part of downranking that was choosing the cheap, small spell over the big, expensive spell was compelling, I'll grant you. But the part of it that was ignoring new spells because high spell power (or + healing back in the day) gave the lower ranks such great legs was just problematic for many reasons.

I agree that we need to make sure every class feels like they have the choice between big and small heals, and that may mean adding new heals to Cataclysm. On the other hand, priests have say Flash Heal and Greater Heal now but don't necessarily use them equally.

(...)I don't think Lightwell means non-healers don't care about their health. Lightwell means they aren't willing to take a huge dps hit (including losing targeting) to get it. Most players will use Healthstones in my experience. They just don't feel like they offer that much currently because the healers will be able to cover them.

(...)I know Replenishment is a popular bogeyman, but we don't think Replenishment itself is the problem. It's just a generous source of regen at a time when there are many generous sources of regen. We'd more likely to nerf everything than just Replenishment, because we like having player power grow so much when you're in a group.

(...)I'm not sure Replenishment even makes sense in its current incarnation in Cataclysm. Once all healers like Spirit, then Replenishment could just boost Spirit-based regen. But this is something we haven't worked completely through yet.

(...)First, regen based on % of mana pool will probably change. It has to work the way it does now because half the healers want MP5 instead of Spirit and some of the casters don't want either.
Second, you can't necessarily gear for Cat Int the way you can currently. Currently, spellpower is on your gear in relatively fixed amounts. The same will be true of Int. Now you can always gem or enchant it.
Third, it's possible Int will provide less mana (though still some) in a world where it also provides throughput. The same is likely true of crit. Int should be desired mostly because it makes your heals bigger. If it also increases your longevity a ton, then it's just going to be way too good.

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Listed below are recent fixes we have applied to the game. Keep in mind that some of these changes may not be active until after the realm has been restarted.

To review previous in-game fixes, please visit: http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=20677858456&sid=1

12/16/09

•Ionar, in the Halls of Lightning, will now only disperse once during the course of the fight.

•Prophet Tharon’Ja of Drak'Tharon will now only steal your flesh one time during the encounter.

•Players with the quest “Wrath of the Lich King” will now properly receive quest credit.

•Muradin and Saurfang will no longer gain stacks of Battlefury from totems. Additionally, the duration of Battlefury has also been reduced.

•Lord Marrowgar is now tauntable.

•The Looking For Group item level requirement for Halls of Reflection has been raised to match the difficulty of the encounters.

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It's that time of the year again! All across Azeroth and Outland, festive decorations adorn towns and cities as the Horde and the Alliance begin their annual celebration of the Feast of Winter Veil. Join in the festivities and experience some brand-new Winter Veil content this year!

To learn more about this event, check out the updated Feast of Winter Veil game guide page. And to get into the holiday spirit, make sure to check out The Night Before Winter Veil, the Blizzard holiday skit.

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