5 locks vs 4 locks plus healer vs 4 locks

[Owltoid]

Assume BGs are the focus, which team would you recommend? The team will not be used in PvE.

Is the survivability greatly increased by using a healer or is the lost damage/burst too big? Can one healer really hope to make a big enough difference to lose the extra damage?

If you choose having a healer, then which one? I would think the healer who has the best survivability would win, but that must be balanced with AoE healing (not terribly worried about losing one slave if the overall battle is victorious and have time to Rez).

Finally, are five locks that much better than four to take up a spot in the BG? In the past I've felt more comfortable with four toons as I don't feel like the entire battle rests on my shoulders. I suppose three locks and a healer is also possible, though the burst damage is really going to be reduced.

Typing on iPhone at work. Sorry for typos

[Shodokan]

Play 4 locks and have a friend heal you?

If not then there is no real info on what will be the best healer in MoP yet. Druids are much better than in cata, and shaman will still be good. I'd say no to priest because of fear DR. Paladin has decent throughput and some nice cooldowns.

Its really up to how you wanna play your healer.

[Owltoid]

Assume I will also be controlling the healer.

Are you suggesting 4+1 instead of 5 locks?

[Shodokan]

Assume I will also be controlling the healer.

Are you suggesting 4+1 instead of 5 locks?

Unless you plan on hiding in AV/IoC exclusively? Yes.

[Owltoid]

Cool, thanks to you both! At the moment considering switching from a priest healer to a pally. Since I plan on leading with my healer, and they're usually the ones focus fired, then something makes me feel better about having plate and a shield. However, I was really counting on easy AoE with the priest from spells like circle of healing.

[Shodokan]

Cool, thanks to you both! At the moment considering switching from a priest healer to a pally. Since I plan on leading with my healer, and they're usually the ones focus fired, then something makes me feel better about having plate and a shield. However, I was really counting on easy AoE with the priest from spells like circle of healing.

Your comfort doing this is all that matters. If you want to play priest... play priest =P

[traedoril]

Priest healers are better for multiple targets like that (binding heal is OP for boxers if used correctly). I wouldn't suggest going holy for bg's though. Holy is sustained healing where disc is burst healing, PVE is sustained damage while PvP is burst damage. just food for thought

[Mosg2]

I actually settled (after *much* debate) on Warlocks to go with my DKs for my 10-box setup. I run 2 healer/8 dps with the option of doing 1 healer/4 dps for the smaller bg's and other stuff.

Why Warlocks?

They have solid ranged dps, good burst depending on spec, they have a nice selection of abilities in their talent trees and aesthetically they're the most pleasing to me. Their Tier 4 (I think) ability will also be insane--Prevent all damage done to you for 10 seconds, then after it fades over 20 seconds you take half the prevented damage. This is going to be insanely OP while boxing.

I would recommend 1 healer/4 Warlocks. You're giving up 1/5 of your DPS to gain a stupid amount of healing. It's the same reason I went with 2 healer/8 dps for my 10 box--I lose 1/9 of my DPS to double my healing.

Personally I have a Paladin and a Shaman. I prefer the Shaman as they have more versatility in healing than the Paladin. They *are* a little more squishy, but eh.

[ebony]

Shaman offers a lot to the group and adding this to my setup. Yes locks are very fun in beta and can not wait to get them to level 90. the lowend gear ones i have on beta are one the strongest classess so far in demo tank mode . Olny prob atm is the pet bug. they olny got 40k hp so

we do need a healer i end up life tapping my salf to death. the olny prob is the cass feels better on its own without any over class and you have a nice toolbox off tools to play with.

[Noids]

I have messed around with a druid healer on MoP and think that it is probably the best suited to lock healing. Locks are fairly resilient to start with so the dot style of healing works quite nicely with lifebloom for any focussed toon. Druids are getting some really nice defensive tricks back again as well as the ability to switch stacks of lifeblooms to compensate for lack of burst healing when targets are switched. On top of this, the druid currently gives one lock the ability to cast rejuv which will allow for some greater healing flexibility...

I am liking the look of locks in MoP also, esp. demo. The ability to switch into a tank form and stay there permanently if required whilst still doing some reasonable dps is nice. On top of that, if you have the improved imp, you get one of the best defensive dispel mechanics in the game... aoe (up to 5 targets) dispel every 10 seconds. The tooltip even mentions it can remove stuns although I have not actually tested it yet.