DownrankingFollow

Can someone point me to some good information on the how's and why's of downranking? It's an interesting concept, but strikes me as something that can very easily be screwed up. I'm most interested in healing spells, but any input on the concept in general would be appreciated.

My main questions, I guess, would be -

Is downranking necessary or can I excel without it?

Does/should downranking be applied to all (healing) spells or just some? Which ones?

How do I determine how far to downrank? Is it solely to gain cast time (like with healing touch 4) or is there a benchmark heal amount I need to maintain (i.e. the downranked spell needs to heal for the same amount as the top level)?

Thanks

I often use a lower rank of healing touch because sometimes I don't need that much healing. Other than that, not much use indeed. The very low ranks won't use your +healing bonus, so you can't cast a fast spell for a very low mana cost that will heal for 100 + 2000 bonus ;)

And going back in ranks for healing touch, to a point where it takes less time to cast, it will be so weak that it would be worthless.

Wowwiki has some good info on the formula's behind downranking post patch 2.0. follow link:

http://www.wowwiki.com/Formulas:Downranking

(sorry you will have to copy it into your browser as the clicky link keeps failing me)

the point of downranking is not to save casting time, it is to save mana while keeping the same amount (or most of it) of +healing applied. As you can read on the wowwiki page, downranking does affect the amount of +healing applied (the further you downrank, the more penaly on the +healing is applied).

Example: You are lev 70. you want to downrank HT. HT rank 13 learned at lev 69, rank 12 at lev 62 and rank 11 at lev 60, rank 10 at lev 56. As the penalty does not apply to downranking to spells learned within 11 level of your current level, downranking to rank 11 does not give a penalty.

Downranking to level 10 would give a penalty of:
(56 (level learned) + 11 / 70 (current level) = 67 / 70 as penalty multiplier on the +healing. Hardly a penalty. Mana cost savings of 215.

Taking healingtouch rank 5 as downranked spell. Learned at level 26, the penalty would be (26+11 /70) = 37/70, being close to 50% on your +healing. Difference in mana between rank 5 and rank 13 around 650 mana, but the penalty to the +healing will be too severe, especially once you start hitting >+1500 healing figures.

What it comes down too is that you must weigh the benefits of downranking (are you running low on mana in a fight so downranking becomes a emergency necessity)) and find balance in the mana savings versus the penalty. In my experience it means you can only downrank only a few ranks before the penalty hurts too much. But that small downranking might just save you that couple of hundred mana needed for those extra rejuv/ regrowth etc.

Hope this helps you on your way?