Healing vs. Mana per 5, Part 2

Last time I talked about how I determine what rank of Greater Heal that I use.

Now I'm going to talk about whether it's worth substituting more +healing for mana regen.

Obviously, if you're spamming Greater Heal, downranking is a good idea. If I use Rank 6 right now and start using Rank 5, I lose 178 +healing for 34 mana. If I'm casting every 2.5 seconds, that equates to 68 mana per 5! Of course it's a good idea!

However, say I am one of two healers on a boss fight, and I'm only casting Greater Heal on average every 7.5 seconds or so. That equates to only around 23 mana per 5. Not quite as good.

Considering Blizzard treats 9 +healing as equal to around 2 MP5, it depends on how often you cast GHeal as to what +healing and downranking is worth.

This is one reason that I am still considering grabbing the Whitemend Set. Losing my current headpiece and leggings, I'd lose around 24 stam, 25 int, and close to 60 spirit. However, I would gain close to 60 +healing and 25 MP5. This is amazing for fights when you need to spam lower rank heals (read Prince during phase 2). So, once I have my epic mount and my primal mights for my runed eternium rod, I may start saving up for the Whitemend Pants. We'll see how the cash flows.

Don't forget in the final analysis, that priests don't only use Greater Heal. Renew is big, and Prayer of Mending doesn't get terrible returns on +healing. Also it depends on your talents...I get an extra 12% of my +healing towards my Gheals. Makes it nice.