The lightwell (still affectionately known as “lolwell” from the days when it used to suck) is a powerful tool. It costs little mana and it can be used when casting is interrupted. Yet it is incredibly frustrating because it depends on the actions of others.
When your raiders use it, that’s a lot of healing. On the last raid, almost 10% of my healing was from lightwell clicks. That’s pretty significant.
So how do you maximize the use of lolwell when it’s not really up to you at all?
1. Practice
When you’re out and about with your guildies in a non-raid situation, remember to place the lightwell even if it’s not strictly necessary in a heroic. Remind them that it exists and teach them about its use when you’re in a more relaxed setting. That way, remembering it and clicking it becomes more ingrained. (I can also dominate vent and nag and remind in a heroic. In a raid, Alas will break my fingers.)
2. Placement
For this, you really need to know the encounter. Once you do, you’ll know exactly where to place it to maximize the clicking. I recommend somewhere that nobody is going to be standing, so that it is easier to click. If you have a free raid marker, you can put it above the lightwell.
3. Replacement
I can’t even tell you how many times I forget to replace lightwell when it expires. I’m looking into a good addon for this for next week’s raid. Preferably one that puts up big letters in the middle of the screen “REPLACE THE LIGHTWELL, MORON.” They can’t click it if it’s not there.
4. Announce the placement
You can announce the placement via addon (I use Raeli’s Spell Announcer), with a macro, or in vent. This depends on the learning style of your raiders and your raid leader’s vent preferences.
5. Reminders
Blanket “remember to use the lolwell” are good, but it helps when you pick a specific time when clicking the lightwell will benefit you. After a big aoe damage spike, say “ok everyone, click the lightwell.” This starts the group getting healed up at a crucial time when YOU need it.
6. Tracking
I use Raeli’s Spell Announcer to tell me about clicks during the battle. I also use world of logs afterward to see how lightwells were used. I was awesomely proud of my raid last week when I looked for the lightwell and found that it was gone, but still on cooldown – meaning the raiders had used up all the charges. If anyone knows of a good lightwell tracking addon, I’d love to hear about it.
Anyone else have tips on maximizing that tricksy lightwell?
One tip I have found works well is asking the DPS where they want the lightwell to be placed. This works not simply by improving placement, but also by giving them a somewhat personal stake in the lightwell if that makes sense. How can they not click it after they told you to place it just so.
Another aspect we have been working on is making sure both holy priests are on the same page with their lightwells, either staggering when they are dropped or where. This is especially clutch on something like Nef phase 2, where putting a lightwell on your pillar makes healing easy mode, but two would be overkill. Clearly this only applies if you raid with another holy priest.
Another great post, Zel!
I think another lesson that I had to learn and still struggle with is not only “where” to place the Lightwell, but “when.” There are some situations where you can place it at the start of the encounter and it will immediately see use and everything is great. Then there are times where you really want it for certain phases (like the pillars on Nefarian) and you need to know when to save it.
P.S. Placing the Lightwell on top of the lava on Nefarian is pure win.
I don’t have any great tips, but I just wanted to say that I’ve been impressed by how much I’ve warmed up to the spell. If you get a chance to place it before the encounter so you can regenerate the used mana before the pull, you really have nothing to lose by putting it down. Unfortunately mine still expires from simply timing out more often than not. The one notable exception to this is Halfus Wyrmbreaker, where everyone will quickly use it up whenever the boss does his roar – because even the laziest dps agrees that if you’re stunned for several seconds anyway, you might as well click on something in the meantime!
It warmed my heart the other night when the raid asked “hey, where’s the lightwell?” I responded “uh guys, I’m in disc spec.”
Love it! As I’ve always been disc with my priest, I’ve never really dabbled with holy or lightwell, but I’ll share your post with our raid team! love it
I was having trouble remembering to place the LW mid fight too, so I set up a Power Aura that plays a sound and pops the icon onto my screen when it’s off cooldown. Other than that I haven’t seen any addon specifically designed for lightwell.
Where is your post on the hatewell?
Would you like to GUEST POST on the hatewell? Because, ya know, it’s a big topic.
I noticed the placement thing in last night’s raid especially. I think it’s good to place the Lightwell a bit off to the side if your group is gathering up somewhere.
On Chimaeron last night our Holy Priest placed the Lightwell on the spot where we all gather up. Which seemed fine, until we all gathered up and I couldn’t find the damn thing among the 10 people all stacking in one place on top of it.
I’m guessing placing it slightly to the left or right (but within clicking distance) would be the best option. I do like to click it when I can (more Life Taps for me!), but it needs to be somewhere I can see it.
Also, if you find an addon to remember to place it – let me know, I will probably use it on my alt as well as link it to our raid Priest hehe (cause what do I know.. maybe the lightwell wasn’t as much obscured by 10 bodies as it was actually despawned!)
Guys I found and love a lw addon called lghtwell geespot it announces when dropped when clicked and when used up/ expires it’s alll configurable. It also has the option to announce in /w to the player or in chat when a player uses it wrongly ie full hp wasting it check it out I get a few complaints in random hc bout it but the raids like it and feel it’s a great help to them.
When I last checked, Lightwell Geespot didn’t have a config menu, but apparently that has been resolved. I will definitely check it out.
I just tried this add-on this morning and could not get it to work. Apparently, I’m not the only one. Based on the notes @ Curse, there was about a 50/50 split of those who could get it to work and those who couldn’t. I tried everything, too. Whispers, party chat, raid chat, different combinations and still nothing.
If I could get it to work, it seems like it would have some potential and I would be up for writing a post about it. Unless Zel beats me to the punch, that is.
I did indeed test it over the weekend, and it worked for me, but I only used the self-report feature.
I had the issue at first u say above I solved it by resetting the localisation at the top of the config to eu/us and this forces a ui reload which solved my problem maybe that would work for u too