As a vivid supporter of Dota ROC (the very first dota game) i am a bit disappointed not to se any dedicated support healer in the game. Other arena games like Guildwars and WoW seems to have incorporated healing classes that can actually keep your team alive to a reasonable extend, casting an number of different damage mitigating spells and direct healing spells on allies.

specifically i think the idea of Holy light / vs deathcoil (warcraft 3) fits very nice into this theme. its a direct heal spell combined with a nuke, that heals 200/400/600, and damage for the half amount 100/200/300 on enemy targets.
I dont know what the balance should be for LOL, but IMO, there is a need for a healing spell with more healing power than an equivalent nuke.

This will add an additional layer to teamfights, and you will be forced to penetrate enemy lines or divide the enemy team in order to take down the healer, to efficiently stop a push.

@noth

I only played soraka, taric and alistar, and out of those, id say soraka only vaguely qualifies for the healer role.

alistars heal is a soft heal, you can compare it to juggernauts healing ward.
tarics heal is a joke, like omniknight, only it does not do damage.

As i understand it, the best way to ensure survival of your team, is to stack mass HP and armor on your tank, and hope you destroy the enemy team in the team fight before you collapse.

I just want a skill that can "save" a champion that is getting focused down in these fights. with the current balance, 300(+1) health just dont cut it.

Something like protective spirit, healing hands or spirit bond (guildwars) would be a welcomed addition.
- A skill that caps the amount of damage you can take per second for a short period of time (fx, you can only take 5% of your max health in damage each second for 5 seconds.)
- for the next 10 seconds, whenever a source deals damage to target, target get healed for XX.
- for the next 10 seconds, whenever target take more than 100 damage from a single source, target is healed for 150.

wait...WHAT!? No, it is not, it's freaking 270+.9 ap (**** good!) that heals his target, and ALSO heals him for 100% of what his target gets. If he heals himself it gets a beefy +40% boost so heals himself for, at base AP, 378 health for 130 mana (I admit, the mana should be lowered a bit).

It can be done every 12s with CD down, and every time he attacks it takes another 2s off of it. Even with modest AP you could see him very easily doing a +500 to an ally and himself every 10s. That is a GREAT heal!

Edit: Also, your idea - Riot has stated quite emphatically they do NOT like the idea AT ALL of abilities that will turn damage into healing or vice versa.

Edit 2: On a side note, any idea how much ap/mana it would take for Soraka to do that sweet ass +1000 heal? >.>

160 mana per cast, 9s CD, so assume she'll have that at 5s. Needs 33 less AP than Taric due to her +30 heal. She will thus do +500 every 5s, but needs to cast twice to do it so will take 10s to heal two targets for 500 each, cost 60 more mana, but will give an armor buff...But by this time Taric can cast again for +1000 while Soraka is on 5s CD...

-blinks- Wow, Taric may be able to out-heal Soraka...

-confused- Wait...For the same AP Taric can heal nearly 2x what Soraka can in a single 'burst' of healing from default heal spells.

If we throw in the ult then, yes, Soraka becomes the better healer for burst but Taric's ult has such a sickening additional effect (the +damage) that the nice rapid heal aura included is more a perk.

Still, no, Soraka's burst healing does not really do much to out-gun Taric's, it is simply more versatile - a smaller heal on a shorter CD. In the vast majority of cases Wish will not see a truly effective use, being used to 'save' someone that Astral Blessing just isn't enough for and only giving a very modest heal to the others in the team who are not being focus fired. While with Wish Soraka does out-burst heal Taric the amount is not at all what one could call overwhelmingly in her favor and when ult is on CD -Taric- will do the better burst heal (+540 every cast (270+270) or +378 (himself), every 12s vs +300 every cast, every 5s with only -40% CDs and Taric using no auto-attacks).