Yeah, and what level are you? How's your AOE heal?

Okay, I swear this is the last time I'm going to make this point. Putting points into anything but the seer tree, until you are completely finished with the seer tree, is pointless. Here's what you get when you put 2 points into TK to get your extra 100 force: - You wait two more levels to get healing trance, our bread and butter cheap heal; - You wait two more levels to get the bonus from the crit effect of healing trance which allows you to use sacrifice to get FREE force. Getting to this point as quickly as possible is essential. Your extra 100 force isn't going to do you much good, really, especially at low levels when all the tools you have are the direct heals. Once you get noble sacrifice, use that and carry medpacs. I did that and had no problems. I still haven't put any points into TK, and I'm level 42 with the seer tree filled out to my liking. I have my AOE heal and all the other benefits of that tree, and I'm not waiting until level 43 (or for some people, even LATER, because they waste early points putting MORE into the TK tree). No point having more mana when you can't regen it efficiently (or even somewhat inefficiently before you get the "free" use of sacrifice). Go right up the seer tree and don't bother with anything else until you're done. I had no troubles healing heroics throughout all my levels so far. That 100 force is much touted by too many people as essential or extremely beneficial, and it's neither. Edit: it would be more reasonable, if you're going to insist on the waste of points early in the TK tree, to put them into inner strength (3 points there will reduce costs of all force abilities by 9%). Even so, it's a waste of points because you're putting of rejuvenation, conveyance, noble sacrifice, and resplendence. Sure, you'll eventually get all those great seer skills, but you'll be about 45 by the time you do (not to mention our AOE heal).

Yeah, that's an utter lie.

That's my opinion also. The benefits you gain by speccing early in the TK tree will cause you to have to wait for the much better benefits overall in the seer tree (i.e., healing trance, rejuvenation, conveyance, and you won't an area heal until anwyhere from 2 to 5 levels later than you normally would). I remember a couple levels of healing being a bit painful due to only having deliverance and benevolence, but within a couple levels after that, I had the nice seer skills that help with force management, casting time, etc. Dumping points early into TK is a complete waste IMO. Also, an extra 50 or 100 force is nothing if you have no abilities to regen your force during battle, and that comes for us in the skill noble sacrifice. At first, that will cost you health and diminish your force regen for 10 seconds (keep medpacs on you always!), but a few skills later, and you learn how to use this ability with no penalties. Those who put skills into the other trees before seer have their own opinions about that, and I would agree with them, but then we'd both be wrong.

If a DPS is taking damage (really, anyone other than the tank), my initial reaction is force shield + rejuv on that person, then use the +25% crit effect caused by rejuv on healing trance, and use healing trance on the tank (or whoever else is low). That allows an almost guaranteed use of free noble sacrifice, and you've just healed a bunch for very little force. (This is of course, post level 30 or so.) Then I just reassess and keep going. I use deliverance as little as possible, but it's necessary sometimes when a tank is getting pounded on. I almost always use rejuv before deliverance if the situation is grim and the tank needs fast heals. If a DPS/non-tank is breaking CC or "off-tanking" an elite and getting their *** beat, I usually pay attention to them last. I do not let people die as a "teaching tool" but I don't place a priority on saving people from their own reckless playing. Other basic tips are above in the other posts. Using the function keys is how I "grew up" in EQ, but I have encountered a bug where the function keys are not mapped to the proper party members. This has caused me much pain. For that reason, I'm inclined to use the mouse to click portraits as inefficient as that is compared to using the function keys. Not sure if that's what you were looking for, but those are just a few of the things I've learned so far.

Then you do not know how to properly leverage seer skills to make your sage effective. Also, "sage hots suck"? You really don't know what you're talking about. At level 39 even, my healing trance can heal anywhere from 2000 to 3000 depending on crits, and it only takes four seconds to channel. It only, at this level, costs 40 force, as opposed to higher costs of direct heals. Not to mention, if you have the proper skill setup, any healing trance crit gives you the opportunity to use sacrifice for *no cost whatsoever*. In other words, that's free force. I'm tired of these posts from people who don't know a thing about the class or how to play it, and claim that it "sucks." That'd be like me saying scoundrels suck at healing compared to sage, though I don't really know much about how scoundrel healing woks. If you're going to post something, at least know what you're talking about. If you don't prefer the sage playing style, that's one thing. To imply that sages are worse healers and run out of force too often is, put quite simply, wrong.

It makes no sense whatsoever to have 50 or 100 extra force points and wait 2 extra levels to get better seer abilities. Think of it this way: once you've used that 50 or 100 force, it's gone. Your weaker seer abilities (whether it's being limited to benevolence/deliverance, getting rejuvenate later, not having access to healing trance [a VERY cheap and efficient heal], not having the ability to gain free force every time healing trance crits) will never make up for having that extra force. Once you've used it, it's gone. If you have two pails of sand, and one holds slightly more sand, and you are force to pour sand out at the same rate, the bigger pail of sand will last a little bit longer. If the smaller pail is getting sand put back into it while at the same time being emptied, it will no doubt last longer. The only, and I mean the ONLY, argument that could be made to put points into anything other than the seer tree first would be inner force which reduces the cost of abilities. The extra 50/100 force is the last thing you should worry about. It's math. This argument has been going on since EQ was released in 1999, and having a bigger mana pool means nothing if your mana regen and mana use sucks. Period.

Whoever said it's the worst of the healers has no idea what they're talking about. I am level 37, don't have all the final cool abilities that seers get, and I easily, very easily, heal heroics with no problems whatsoever (not counting stupid players breaking CC, tanking all mobs separately, etc., which I generally don't run into as much at this level). I was surprised to be in a group with a commando recently, and agree to let him heal while I DPSed ... he was good. But I noticed he didn't have the ability to spike heal as well as I did, and I did jump in to help a couple times (may not have been necessary but I did it anyway). I believe they get an AOE much earlier than we do though. I think in the end it depends on your playing style. All the healers are viable. I personally really enjoy the sage/seer abilities and style.

Just a reminder: speccing into any other trees BEFORE putting points into whatever you want in the healing tree means that you will get the very nice goodies later than you should (imo). I will forgo 50 or 100 extra force in order to get my healing trance, free sacrifice when that crits, and AOE healing earlier than I would had I dumped points into any of the other trees. All an extra 50 or 100 force gives you is the ability to cast a couple heals more than you would have otherwise. The ability to regen your force for free somewhat consistently (given a good crit rate), the ability to use a very cheap channeled heal, etc., is FAR more worthwhile than a couple extra heals. You make up the 50/100 force by having better abilities, by far. I would say the same about the 3/6/9% cost reduction in abilities in one of the other trees, too. Put that off until you're done with seer. So my advice: finish the entire seer tree, then go nuts with your extra points. (I skipped stuff like egress which I don't find useful or don't really see the sense of.) At 41, I will be completely done with the seer tree.

Sages get an AOE heal in the seer tree.

Additional note: original poster is level 24 and may not have rejuvenate. Rejuvnate and its related skills (conveyance) make things a lot easier, and this is before you even get healing trance. Also, I would NOT recommend putting any points into the other trees just to get more force or reduce force costs, because you're gimping yourself in terms of getting the advanced seer abilities. I have solely climbed up the seer tree, and while I plan to put a few points into the useful abilities in the other trees (additional force, reduced cost of healing, and added willpower), those are going last for me. I'd rather get the higher level healing skills (resplendence and clarivoyance at a minimum) before dumping points into an extra 50 or 100 force. It's possible to manage your supply of force (especially with some of the upper level seer skills) without having to put off levels getting those higher level seer skills. I believe by level 41 (might be off the mark here, haven't used the calculator in a while) I will have all the abilties I want in the seer tree and can start playing with the other skills in the other two trees. That's my opinion. Other may disagree that the extra force is worthwhile, but I'm not having a problem healing heroics at this point without it. And I'll get to add those points in a few levels when I'm done with the seer tree. Edit: at level 34, healing trance is healing about 1600 hp, not including crits. Just another reason to use it over deliverance whenever possible.

I'm not sure if I understood the last poster correctly, but I disagree about the channeled heal. This is from memory, but at level 34 (my level atm), deliverance costs 55 force and heals around 1200. The channeled heal, healing trance, costs 35 force and heals a little bit more than deliverance. The math says that you should always use healing trance when possible in order to conserve your force. I use deliverance when I need a fast spike heal (used immediately after casting rejuvenate, usually, to reduce the casting time). The only other time I resort to deliverance is in two instances: (1) the **** is hitting the fan, and someone needs healing fast, and (2) someone really needs healing, and healing trance is still on cooldown. I've healed some very tough fights without resorting to deliverance very much, and my force was up enough that I rarely had to use sacrifice. Another advantage to using healing trance is a skill that you will eventually get (should get, imo) that allows you to use sacrifice with no penalties (i.e., no health loss) every time healing trance deals a crit. Healing trance is by no means an "oh ****" spell. It's a staple of the sage healing abilities.