This is a guest post by our friend Matticus from World of Matticus. He’s that crazy Disc priest Lilith has mentioned before that likes to heal the raid and stacks way too much intellect. But we love him anyway. (/pat wee dwarf priestie)

“Let’s bring the Paladin in. We could use another set of blessings.”

“But what about that Priest? She’s done these fights before and her experience will be invaluable.”

These are one of the many internal conversations that raid leaders have with themselves mentally or their officers. Deciding which healer gets to come to raid and which healer gets to sit isn’t an attractive activity for most people. No one likes being the guy that has to tell a person that they’re taking the night off.

But first, you need to get to that point.

I’ve handled healing assignments for various different guilds and I can tell you that there is a system that is used. There are certain criteria that make different healers desirable over others. In this post, I’ll walk you through what goes on during my head when I’m selecting my healing roster.

Before we do that, let’s look at the activities of the night as it will play an impact on what healers we bring in.

Are we:
• Going back to farm older raids?
• Doing 10 or 25s?
• Pushing the progression content stuff?

Heading back into older raids means I have much more flexibility with my roster. I can give veteran healers the night off if they so choose. I won’t have to worry about specific buffs as much. Pushing into progression content or hard modes means I have to be increasingly picky with who I want to bring in.

The Factors

Availability

My guild employs a strict signout policy. All raiders are expected to be present and ready to jump in any time. But there are occasions where players have things happen in life and I understand that. If they know in advance that they can’t show up (exams, important dinners, family functions, and so forth), they’ll post in the forums. Even though I have a large stock of healers to select from, they might not be there that day.

Raid composition

• Do we have Priest buffs?
• Do we have enough blessings to go around or the totems to cover it?
• Do we even have a Heroism?

I try to make sure that we have all the healing buffs necessary for what we’re working on. I don’t want to stack it too far in one class direction either. That doesn’t mean I won’t do it if I have to (like the time I ran 4 Priests and 2 Paladins). It just sort of kills me if a piece of healing plate drops and there’s no Paladin on hand to grab it.

Experience

This is the not-so-tangible aspect of players that I look at. Stuff like tenure and raid experience plays an impact on which person I bring in. I’m not going to take in a fairly “green” healer who just joined the guild into a progression raid. The players invited tend to be the ones who have healed together long enough that they know what other players will do. They’re comfortable in their surroundings and they’re relaxed with the other healers around them. If they’re new, I might simply swap them in at the last notice on a difficult raid to see how they hold up and how they perform.

Gear Needs

Are there any significant upgrades for a player that drop in this instance? That’s another question I will look to answer. If one of the varsity healers don’t need anything but one of the newer players do, I’ll ask them if they’re willing to sit. If they’re reasonable, they’ll understand and gently sidestep out. After farming Trial of the Crusader 25 for multiple months, some players jump when I ask for volunteers to take the night off.

Those are just some of the significant factors that are looked at when selecting the healers for a raid. Other officers might handle things based on merit (IE, this healer did a great job the night before filling in and I want to see if they can repeat that effort). It’s never easy to choose a healing roster with a large number of players to select from. Sometimes, things take a turn for the worst and there are not enough healers on at all. You’re hard pressed and have to consider things like off specs or alts.

The ultimate concern for me is to ensure that the raid be stabilized as much as possible using whatever healers necessary.

Tagged as choices, healing, leadership, raiding, raids + Categorized as General