Healing

Healing is the restoration of Health to a damaged character. Healing a character will increase their Health by the stated amount, up to but not beyond their current maximum Health.

Healing effects or Restore Health effects are effects which restore Health. These may be Hero Powers, spells or abilities such as Battlecries or Deathrattles. Most healing effects affect a single character (these effects can be targetable or select the target automatically or at random), while some others have an area of effect.

Healing is distinct from granting a minion increased Health, which increases both the current and maximum Health for the target. Increasing a minion's Health is usually achieved through enchantments (or removing them through Silences), while healing is usually achieved through effects.

Healing is available to all classes through neutral cards, but is most strongly associated with the priest class, and to a lesser extent paladins, shamans, druids and demon hunters.

Notes

• Although healing effects (including targetable ones) can target undamaged characters, attempting to restore Health to a character already at their current maximum Health will have no effect and will not count as healing for game purposes (for example, on-heal triggers such as Lightwarden will not trigger).
• Healing effects with an area of effect (such as Circle of Healing) heal all affected targets before any on-heal triggered effect (such as Shadowboxer) triggers.
• Auchenai Soulpriest, Auchenai Phantasm, and Embrace the Shadow make your healing effects deal damage instead (for additional details see the Advanced rules section below).
• Prophet Velen doubles the healing of your healing spells and Hero Powers (for additional details see the Advanced rules section below). Note that Prophet Velen will NOT double the healing recieved by minions with Lifesteal.
• Healing a character to full Health will remove its damaged status and thus any Enrage effect currently active, which can be very useful for denying enemy minions' Enrage effects.

Strategy

Healing can be very useful for sustaining friendly minions, allowing them to survive another round, or trade favourably with enemy minions. It can also be used to restore Health to the hero, preventing defeat and moving the hero out of lethal range. Healing is often used as a counter to aggro decks, which focus on quickly reducing an opponent's Health before they have time to counter.

Healing works best in control-based strategies, especially hero healing, which can allow the player to outlast their opponent. Reno Jackson is an especially powerful neutral healing option, single-handedly forming the basis of many control deck types. Minion healing can allow for superior trades and card efficiency, but works best with synergy cards like Northshire Cleric. Priests have the widest range of healing options in general, as well as almost exclusive access to healing synergy cards. Lesser Heal works especially well to heal either themselves or their minions, while AoE heals like Circle of Healing and Holy Nova allow for powerful combos with cards like Northshire Cleric.

A few priest cards (Auchenai Soulpriest, Embrace the Shadow) and ((Auchenai Phantasm)) have the effect of converting healing into damage, allowing for some very efficient plays especially when combined with cheap healing cards like Flash Heal and Circle of Healing.

Advanced rules

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Healing Events

Healing effects work by creating and resolving Healing Events:

• Healing effects that affect a single target create one Healing Event, and then immediately resolve it;
• Healing effects that affect "multiple targets" (Binding Heal) creates and resolves the Healing Event of each target before moving to the next one;
• Healing effects with an area of effect first create all Healing Events (one for each affected character, in play order), and then resolve all Healing Events (queuing and resolving triggers) in play order.

Spells and effects with two steps (like Light of the Naaru, Moonglade Portal and Lay on Hands) resolve the Healing Event before they query the target's condition (e.g., if the target of Light of the Naaru is damaged) or move to their next step.

Creating a Healing Event

Each Healing Event has its own source (usually, the healing effect that created the Event; notice that, in the case of Power Word: Glory, the source of the Healing Event is the enchantment created by the spell, not the spell itself), target and proposed healing:

• Most healing effects have as proposed healing a fixed number explicitly stated in their text (for example, Lesser Heal simply reads "Restore 2 Health");
• Some healing effects have a variable proposed healing which may depend on the damage dealt by a source (Queen of Pain, Hallazeal the Ascended, Wickerflame Burnbristle), on the cost of a card (Ivory Knight), on available mana (Forbidden Healing) or on the number of enemy minions (Cult Apothecary);
• Stoneskin Gargoyle's proposed healing is equal to the difference between its maximum Helth and its current Health;
• All other effects that restore a character to full Health (like Ancestral Healing, Reno Jackson, Tree of Life and Hozen Healer) have a proposed healing equal to that character's maximum Health.

Then, if the controller of the source of the Healing Event also controlled an unsilenced Auchenai Soulpriest since the last Aura Update (Other) Step or controls the enchantment created by Embrace the Shadow, the Healing Event is prevented and replaced with a Damage Event: this Damage Event has the same source and target of the Healing Event and has a proposed damage equal to its proposed healing (for additional details, see Damage#Advanced rules).

• Example: If a player with an Auchenai Soulpriest active casts Tree of Life all characters will suffer damage equal to their maximum Health, usually causing them all to die.
• Example: In combination with Auchenai Soulpriest, Queen of Pain will instead deal damage to the controlling player; however, since that damage is counted as damage dealt by the Queen of Pain herself, her effect will trigger again and again until the controlling hero is destroyed.

Then, if the the source of the Healing Event is a Hero Power or a spell (notice that this does not include the enchantment created by Power Word: Glory) and its controller also controlled an unsilenced Prophet Velen since the last Aura Update (Other) Step, double the proposed healing of the Healing Event. Multiple Prophet Velens stack, each one doubling the proposed healing.

Finally, the character's current Health is increased by the Healing Event's proposed healing, up to but not beyond its current maximum Health.

Resolving a Healing Event

If the Healing Event was prevented or if it did not change the character's current Health, it will not run any triggers.

Otherwise, Triggered effect#Healing (listed in the following table) queue and resolve in play order.

Cards with healing effects

For Wild format listings, see Healing/Wild format

Related cards

For Wild format listings, see Healing/Wild format

See also

• Damage