Woo my first Holy Pally update Blog! I'm going to discuss the changes that hit us in 5.3 and what that means to how we play.

First just the notes

• Mastery: Illuminated Healing now places an absorb shield for 10% of the amount healed, down from 12%.
• Daybreak is now a stackable effect with a duration of 10 seconds, stacks up to 2 times, and causes the next Holy Shock to also heal other allies within 10 yards of the target for an amount equal to 75%/150% of the original healing done.
• Item Sets
  
  • Tier-14 Holy Paladin 4-piece set bonus now reduces the cooldown of Holy Shock by 1 second, down from 2 seconds.

So Mastery!

Sadly they decided (inc flame from Atar, Kauu, Sassyßrat and Luna) that Holy Pallies were just too OP with their bubbles. They brought the ammount of healing from our mastery down by 2% /whopty doo. I'm still in forums now (as this just went up) to see the real numbers from this change and the difference. But I'm guessing as long as you're getting gear and upgrades this wont effect you much. 

Numbers I'm seeing so far is putting haste out in front of stat priority only slightly as it "scales" better than mastery. As to say it takes less haste for each 1%.

The numbers are as follows so far

*OLD*

• 400 Mastery = 1% Illuminated Healing

*New*

• 480 Mastery = 1% Illuminated Healing

• Haste 425 = 1% Haste Rating

BUT DONT GIVE UP ON MASTERY! It will still be our top heal and Illuminated heailng effectively costs no mana. Where as more haste will still continue to drain your mana bar quicker.

Daybreak!

Let's talk Daybreak, It's a buff we get after a cast of Holy Radiance that turns our Holy Shock into an AOE spreading it over 10 people. Makes for some great AOE healing and keeps your finger off Holy Radiance as much

My 5.2 AOE healing rotation (when stacked) is

HR > LoD > HS > LoD --repeat that until it's over

So how they have it now is a bit of a nerf to that style. The first stack of Daybreak after a Holy Radiance is only 75% of the holy shock over 10 people (used to be a flat 100%) But at two stacks you get 150%! of your heal over 10 targets.

HR > LoD > HR > LoD > HS > LoD > HR > LoD > HR > LoD > HS > LoD  -- Repeat (please note you can save your LoD for 3 holy power in more control scenarios)

With our two piece T15 This will make Daybreak up to 225% (I believe) Making it one of our most POWERFUL AOE heals possibly (will have to see real numbers before I make that call)

R.I.P. T14 4P

We hardly knew you. To be fair we were going to hold onto you until heroic T15 4P. They could have simply buffed T15 bonuses a bit... but know they had to hurt you instead. You're my favorite set bonus of the whole game thus far. I can't think of another bonus that made such a huge impact on our healing, or my heart. You took my favorite heal in the game, and you made it oh so much better.

In seriousness now, Be ready to have T15 pieces laying around ready to swap out your T14 at any given time. In AOE centric fights (i.e. Megaera's Rampage) 2 pieces of both tiers will provide maximum healing. Where on tank centric fights (i.e. Ji Kun Main Platform) T15 4 piece will sadly be king.

Well that's my first installment of Holy Pally PTR changes.