You must not have played the same EQ that I've played then. :p
Inner Fire was infamous for the "ghetto healing" since it was a better mana to HP ratio healer than casting the actual Minor Healing spell. Shamans and especially beastlords didn't get a new healing spell soon enough, so we would spam Inner Fire over and over to heal up. This is how it's always been since the beginning ever since I played from Beta3. Unless they've changed it in the past few years then you must be either thinking of EQII or some other spell.
You can check on
Lucy's if you don't believe me. AFAIK, the spell is working fine.
About the mobs going underground - everyone knows this. It's a Z axis/spawn bug and it's nothing new. It's been discussed to death already.