Hello there cuties! (〃＾▽＾〃) Some of you probably know me after my Heal Pip clips which featured on Inuki's TOP 5 Plays of the Week (Episodes 100 and 101) and/or TOP 10 Plays of 2020 (2nd place), some other by my tiny all-about-Pip YouTube channel. Whatever the sauce, I'm just a guy who played healer Pip since early Paladins days. Just on last split, after my (finally) first ranked session, I've got all the way to Master mainly playing supports - mostly Pip on Combat Medic - and reached good peaks of 80% win rate (when in Party/Duo).

Sooo, I noticed that there are plenty of Heal Pip guides on Paladins Guru, and it's really well-done stuff! That's why I'm gonna make something on the advanced side here: the build and tips I'm about to show you are useful information for players who are already confident enough with Combat Medic or Megapotion Pip.

Edit: added Chronos values to Potions CDR equations and simulations.

Update: updated to Patch 3.4 buffs (Healing Potion Cooldown 8s → 7s | Weapon Healing 700HP → 750HP).

Update (April 2021): updated to Patch 4.3 Octavia's CDR passive skill values; added some tips about using Smithereens instead of Gift Giver when you'll feel ready to; updated to new Megapotion values after buffs (Healing Potion healing on allies is increased by 100% → 115%).

Let's get started!

- PIP HEAL: COOLDOWN REDUCTION LOADOUT BUILD -

As you know, Pip's burst healing output still remains the highest on the game. Analyzing the healing talents:

► Playing Combat Medic, you can shoot a 750 HPs burst and throw two 1.000 HPs Healing Potions in about 2 seconds. That means you can blast up to 2.750 HPs within the duration of an average champ reload time.

► Playing Megapotion, you can throw two 2.150 HPs Healing Potions in about 1.5 seconds. You can blast up to 4.300 HPs in one and a half second and that's just OP.

To balance this high (and immediate) healing, we get to suffer on waiting an hellish 7 seconds cooldown for each Healing Potion outside of Realod's bonuses (e.g. using two potions before the 5 seconds Reload's bonus cooldown vanish).

That's why the loadout build which I show here is focused on cutting down Healing Potions' cooldown. Being sure to control our potion availability through a specific action (in our case, enemies shooting) is the core key to get out from any hard situation or to keep up with intense heal & damage-dealing multitasking (and this is pretty charateristic of a good healer Pip).

Let's begin from higher level cards to the bottom fillers.

► Medicinal Excellence (Lv. 5) + Reload (Lv. 4) = extreme Group Healing

One of the best things about Pip is his Group Healing potentials. This combo just bring it to the extreme side: extending the healing range, you'll be able to heal on really wide areas and even through thick walls (e.g. stone walls on Jaguar Falls near Point).

Moreover, Medicinal Excellence will enhance Reload's bonus triggerability (2.4s of Potion's cooldown for each ally healed): on a wider area you can heal more people at once, and healing 3 or more people will immediately bring to zero the w h o l e timer, and then you can throw another potion right away.

The biggest problem here is Reload's internal cooldown: you gotta wait 5 seconds before getting card's benefits again; and so, the third Potion will come 7 seconds later. But...

► Acrobat's Trick (Lv. 4) + Deft Hands (II) = extreme Potion Spamming

...that's basically the solution: each enemy hit with Potion Launcher will give you a 0.40s of Potion's cooldown reduction. If you shoot (and hit) 2 or 3 enemies with just one shot, you're then getting 0.80s or 1.20s of cut, and so on. This will help you regenerate Potion's availability faster while waiting the big 7-secs-full-cooldown.

The real thing is Acrobat's Trick helps to manage Potions cooldown by a controllable variable: hitting enemies (watch out: Luna won't be able to trigger Acrobat's Trick benefits), which is much more reliable than - for example - a lv. 4 Shrewd Move; what if you won't be able to get that elimination or kill? XwX

Since when playing Combat Medic you need your Potion Launcher to heal first, you should buy Deft Hands as first item, even before Chronos. Be careful on balancing the shots and be sure to never miss your targets (e.g, I use a variable DPI mouse to quickly change settings on fast & slow aim; also, be sure to train on faster videogames - like racing stuff - to shorten your cognitive cycles and reaction times).

► Don't overstimate Gift Giver (Lv. 1)

Self-sustain is sure an important issue, but after properly mastering positioning through Weightless and Flask/Self-knockback jumps you can downgrade your Gift Giver card to level up cooldown reduction related cards. Be sure to learn escape jumps spots on each map; Serpent Beach, Slipstone Quarry and Brightmarsh allow you awesome traveling distances with a single Wightless and Flask.

If you're low of HPs, you can reach for the closest (needy) ally and explode a potion near it, so you'll benefit of Reload's bonuses too.

When you'll feel self-confident enough, you can even avoid using Gift Giver to give some space to Smithereens (Lv. 1): it will be so convenient when you get into countering extremely high enemy damage into allies' heals and to deal some more damage while cutting Potion's cooldown. You can start by un-using the self-sustain card in small maps, like Brightmarsh, where is highly probable that you're inside your own potion AoE most of the times.

► The filler boi (Lv. 1)

As I stated on this guide introduction, this deck focuses on cutting Healing Potion's cooldown. That's why I think Shrewd Move will surely help with that extra 0.64s.

Before concluding, let's get into the numbers.

- PIP HEAL: COOLDOWN REDUCTION LOADOUT BUILD. THE MATHEMATICS -

► Total (potential) cooldown reduction

So, given the bonuses from the cards:

• Reload [Lv. 4] = 2.40 seconds per healed ally (HA)

• Shrewd Move [Lv. 1] = 0.64 seconds per kill or elimination (ELI)

• Acrobat's Trick [Lv. 4] = 0.40 seconds per enemy hits (HIT)

...and from the item:

• Chronos [III] = 2.10 seconds

You can totalize a Healing Potion cooldown reduction of:

→ (2.40 * HA) + (0.64 * ELI) + (0.40 * HIT) + (2.10) = Total (Potential) Cooldown Reduction [value is expressed in SECONDS]

E.G. for 4 healed allies - 4 eliminations or kills - 4 enemies hits - chronos III

• (2.40 * HA) + (0.64 * ELI) + (0.40 * HIT) + (2.10) =

• (2.40 * 4) + (0.64 * 4) + (0.40 * 4) + (2.10) =

→ 9.6 + 2.56 + 1.6 + 2.1 = 15.86 seconds

Real-life example for 2 healed allies - 1 elimination or kill - 3 enemies hits - chronos III

• (2.40 * HA) + (0.64 * ELI) + (0.40 * HIT) + (2.10) =

• (2.40 * 2) + (0.64 * 1) + (0.40 * 3) + (2.10) =

→ 4.8 + 0.64 + 1.2 + 2.1= 8.74 seconds

► Partial (potential) cooldown reduction (can't trigger Reload's bonuses)

This time, given the bonuses from:

• Reload [Lv. 4] = 2.40 seconds per healed ally (HA) (5s gap untill bonus re-triggerability)

• Shrewd Move [Lv. 1] = 0.64 seconds per kill or elimination (ELI)

• Acrobat's Trick [Lv. 4] = 0.40 seconds per enemy hits (HIT)

...and from the item:

• Chronos [III] = 2.10 seconds

You can totalize a Healing Potion cooldown reduction of:

→ (2.40 * HA) + (0.64 * ELI) + (0.40 * HIT) + (2.10) = Partial (Potential) Cooldown Reduction while waiting the full 7 sec cooldown [value is expressed in SECONDS]

E.G. for 4 healed allies - 4 eliminations or kills - 4 enemies hits - chronos III - you are waiting the full 7 seconds cooldown

• (2.40 * HA) + (0.64 * ELI) + (0.40 * HIT) + (2.10) =

• (2.40 * 4) + (0.64 * 4) + (0.40 * 4) + (2.10) =

→ 0 + 2.56 + 1.6 + 2.1 = 6.26 seconds

Real-life example for 2 healed allies - 2 elimination or kill* - 5 enemies hits* - chronos III - you are waiting the full 7 seconds cooldown

• (2.40 * HA) + (0.64 * ELI) + (0.40 * HIT) + (2.10) =

• (2.40 * 2) + (0.64 * 2) + (0.40 * 5) + (2.10) =

→ 0 + 1.28 + 2 + 2.1 = 5.38 seconds

*whithin the full 7 seconds cooldown you can do much more stuff (▔∀▔)╯

► Octavia's Cooldown Reduction

If there's any Octavia in your team, and she selects the Cooldown Reduction passive skill, you can add 0.70 seconds to the total and partial CDR equations results we already discussed.

► CONCLUSIONS

And here we are! As I mentioned before, Acrobat's Trick is probably the most controllable variable on Healing Potion's cooldown: you need one? Give enemies some safe shots and you get it. Gotta wait the full 7 seconds cooldown after you throwed 2nd Potion already? Then just do the same!

I sincerely hope this card will get some buff in the near future, like a boost from 0.1s to 0.2s base bonus. That would be just awesome. Hi-Rez team decided to lower Potion main cooldown by 1 second, (before Patch 3.4 we had to wait 8 seconds) and that helped quite a lot already!

Hope this guide helps you! Take care :)