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Wouldn't a Disc build generally be better for a leveling healer?
Yes, disc > holy for a leveling healer.
I've found that holy really turned into a heroic/raiding spec as it is now. You get stuck with tons of nice new abilities and talents you basically don't need in normal 5-mans. Guardian Spirit is really nice, but you don't really
need it pre-heroic. Same goes for Surge of Light, Lightwell, Circle of Healing, Serenidipity, (imp) Holy Concentration and Divine Providence. None of these talents really see play in ordinary 5-mans or solo questing.
Whereas speccing disc-healer gives you Imp Power Word: Shield, Mental Agility, Mental Strength, (Imp) Divine Spirit, possibly Focused Power, Power Infusion, Reflective Shield, Rapture, Borrowed Time ánd Penance. ALL those talents significantly impact your solo play and thoroughly improve your healing in 5-mans as well. And I haven't even mentioned Pain Supression, Grace and Divine Aegis.
Basically... Shadow = more pewpew, Disc = more mana+shield, and Holy = more healing. Logically, that makes Disc a better levelling spec than Holy since you don't need that much healing when soloing.. It used to be this way pre-patch, but the effect between disc and holy wasn't really noticable enough. As a little add though, holy is more effective than disc (and probably shadow as well) for AOE grinding. Yes, you read that right. I was killing groups of 6 level 71 mobs with ease at 70; Just DOT them all up and spam Holy Nova.
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Same goes for Surge of Light ... None of these talents really see play in ordinary 5-mans or solo questing.
Alright, after carefully re-reading my post I feel I have to mention that's not entirely true. Surge of Light does see use in solo questing. Doubtless though, almost anything you can get in it's place in the disc tree is better.
Edited, Nov 28th 2008 4:27pm by Mozared