Protection Paladin: Selfless Healer or Sacred Shield?
Which talent is better for a Protection Paladin: Selfless Healer or Sacred Shield?
I am ... confused on how Sacred Shield is chosen over the Selfless healer talent for protection spec.
The choice between Selfless Healer or Sacred Shield comes down to a few variables, but most importantly the amount of damage mitigated or healed by the two abilities and how much impact they have on your rotation. We can begin by calculating the likely healing/mitigation of the two talents.
The following calculations assume 50000 Attack Power. This is a reasonable estimate for T14 content when buffed by Vengeance. Thanks to Guarded by the Light, 50000 Attack Power yields 25000 spell power.
Selfless Healer
Flash of Light = 11882 to 13331 (+ 112% of SpellPower)
(11882 + 13331)/2 + (1.12 * 25000)
(12607) + (28000) = 40607 healing
The 35% healing buff is not applied if you use Selfless Healer for a self-heal.
Sacred Shield
(30 + 1.17 * holy spell power) damage every 6 sec for 30 sec
Based on these number alone, Sacred Shield has a major lead over Selfless Healer in terms of raw healing/mitigation. But, how often can you use these two abilities? Does that change the outcome?
Sacred Shield can be maintained with 100% uptime and lasts for 30 sec. In 1 minute, Sacred Shield will provide 146400 * 2 = 292800 absorption. To match this amount of damage mitigation, you would need to use Selfless Healer 7.21 times (292800 / 40607 = 7.21). Each Selfless Healer requires 3 Judgments to activate, or 7.21 x 3 = 21.6 Judgment per minute. At a base cooldown of 6 sec, 21 Judgments would require 126 sec (less with Sanctity of Battle). There is simply no way to use enough Judgment to make Selfless Healer pull ahead of Sacred Shield.
In addition to the disparity between the amount of healing/mitigation provided by the two talents, Selfless Healer requires you to use a heal which means you've already taken some amount of damage. This heal is now competing with all the other heals you receive and will likely result in overhealing. However, Sacred Shield absorbs damage resulting in extremely efficient damage mitigation. In other words, damage prevented is always better than damage healed.
Check out Noxxic's Protection Paladin Guide for more information on the best talents, stats, and rotations for your character.
