OK, dps have dps meters, tanks have threat generation and staying alive, but how do we healers improve using meters?
I plan to write a few of these over time, so will start with
Overheal meter
This is a very clear meter that everyone could argue about and if it has value or not.
The very simple answer is that if your targets are alive then it does not matter what your overhealing is. After all, you have achieved what your class is required to do in the raid.
Longer answer, which is one way to measure our performance is well... longer.
Firstly, and most importantly when using these meters you need to know what the fight was and what were the healing orders.
Some fights it is simply heal 100% of the time, don't worry about overheal, just ensure that your target is at max health as much as possible and to avoid that 1 damage spike that can wipe the raid.
The very rough and ready "rules of thumb" are generally viewed as
Less than 15% your Class Leader will probably be questioning why you are so low.
15% overheal is average
20% needs to be watched by yourself
Greater than 30% your Class Leader will probably be questioning why you are this high.
For a small overheal percentage, consider these reasons why:
I) Standing around time.
Not casting heals simply means cannot over heal. (Cor tough mathematics that formula)
Reasons for it:
1) Lazy healer not working in the raid / AFK
2) Died early in the fight, so did not cast many spells anyway
3) Too many healers brought to the raid
When on progression, generally too many healers are brought. A good example being Karazhan. At the start when you first all walk in there, generally 3 are taken, however once understood only 2 are actually required. Same with ZA, similar with SSC/TK etc. just different numbers.
We have done Leo in SSC for example with 6 healers, yet more are recommended for this fight.
When you are learning content, you need more healers than you do when that content hits farm status.
II) Heals that get used
If your spells are not overhealing someone, they are simply healing them.
This can be effected by your assignment.
a) MT healers generally have less overhealing
b) Raid healers generally have higher overhealing
Reasons for this:
MT healers are very clearly defined, and will be working as a team. The only outside intervention will be the occasional HOT thrown on them by the raid healers.
Raid healers are all fighting to heal the same people, so it's generally a case of who has the quickest spell has the lesser overheal.
Other reasons is that sometimes a raid healer will put a HOT on someone which would heal them up in good time, but then another raid healer also direct heals them, resulting in Overheal for the person who put a HOT on them.
As Ebaneezerbad has rightly pointed out, some clarification to HOT overheal is required. HOT's only tick if the person is missing health, therefore if they are 100% a HOT will not tick, therefore this causes no overheal. The only time a HOT causes overheal is when it ticks, but the full size of the tick is not required to heal that person to full health.
To use Ebaneezerbad's example a priest puts a renew on the target that ticks for 1000 per tick. When said target gets to only 500health missing till 100% this tick will heal for 500 and overheal for 500. The next tick "does not tick" as they are now 100%
For a large overheal percentage, consider these reasons why:
I) Standing around time.
a) This time, rather than not casting, you are throwing your biggest heals at everyone who moves when they take any damage at all
b) not downranking spells
II) Heals that are NOT getting Used
1) You are too slow to heal your target back up and someone else beats you to the hit
2) Lag, resulting in you appearing to heal a low health person, but actually they are not
3) Not cancelling a spell if someone else heals the target
4) Again excess healers in the raid
5) Incorrect assignments - similar to excess healers, but more broadly, imbalance of the healers in the raid.
6) Not following your assignment, or someone else, resulting in 2 healers doing the job of 1.
Summary
If I saw a low overheal rate, I’d investigate, but there are many factors to understand before I concluded the person was underperforming.
Likewise greatly overheal also has many factors to understand before concluding that I am inefficient.
Skill and coordination can decrease your overheal, aswell as understanding of the fight and
trust your fellow healers.
The only other real problem with overhealing is only an issue if you have mana problems.
One last point to consider is that it really depends on the event too. I know i've already stated this, but it's important and I don't want people to think that I must reduce my overheal.
On fights like Al'ar where the only healing is really tanks, with the occasional raid heal, then 10% is totally viable and achieveable, however now with BT being explored this changes.
Look up a fight like phase 1 illidan and any healer with only 10% should be shot by me personally as you have to constantly heal to keep the tank up and most of your heals will obviously land 0.00001 seconds after someone else.
Only
YOU can fully understand what is going on when you heal. Speaking with your class leader or healing assigner can help, but will not result in the definitive answer.
Original post basing my post on
