Dear Healers who don't DPS

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Originally Posted by Taika

All healers have MP-free heals, WHM has Lucid, Assize and Thin Air, SCH has Lucid, Aetherflow and Energy Drain, AST has Lucid and Ewer (yeah not as good as it relies on RNG but anyways).

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And I'm not running out of mp - only - healing. I run out of mp if I dps with BAD tanks because on hairy situations I won't have much mp left to keep them from dying when I need to blow everything because they pulled more than they can handle. And everything you listed there has a cooldown. And don't worry, I did my homework as a healer, but you can only do so much when the tank is clueless and hopes to be carried by heals.

I'll just simply note that there will be a chance for you to DPS, and it's for you to decide when to DPS.
If a stranger sues your playstyle, don't care about it and stick with what works for you. No matter what.

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Originally Posted by Maeka

*enters dungeon*
*Tank mashes sprint button and grabs 3 packs of mobs*
*I catch up to the almost dead tank and give him Benediction*
*I get locked into chain-casting Cure2, not having enough time or MP to do anything else*

How again was I supposed to DPS?

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The DPS meta is a bit misleading. The general rule people follow is to Always. Be. Casting; your ABCs if you will. :D

If I do the mega pull in Shisui or Ala Mhigo, I don't expect any DPS from you otherwise, I'll die within seconds. If you're able to plan ahead and set up Swiftcast -> Holy -> Aero III while I have Hallowed or Living up, I'll love you for it, but I certainly don't expect it from DF. That's a bit more of a raider mentality. It's the people who stand around while at near full MP that annoy others. And that ire isn't reserved for healers. It drives me up the wall whenever I see a DPS who won't aoe during mass pulls, especially those bigger ones because I know the healer and I simply won't have the CDs to survive if things aren't dying. Had that exact scenario happen in The Vault just the other day. Neither DPS focused those gaints down and one never aoe'd, which eventually killed the healer since she couldn't stop healing me to spam aoe heals. DPS's response? "Samurai does more damage on single targets."

Yeah...

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Originally Posted by Maeka

I will second this, or at least the flipside: I only do a minimum amount of DPS, but I keep the tank above 50% most of the dungeon, I don't wait until he's 30% or less to start casting, and I only throw some stones during the last 2 or so mobs and only an Aero III near the beginning (I usually Benison the tank to give me enough time to safely land Aero III before the Cure spam starts) and I routinely walk away with 3/3 or 2/3 comms (unless the tank is exceptional, that is).

People in random DF groups seem to enjoy a healer who pays more attention to HP meters than their personal DPS parses. Now, granted, I don't do absolutely zero damage at all, I try to get at least a little in, but I'm not trying to maximize or any of that crap. I'm just keeping people alive and helping out wherever I deem it is safe to which is, you know, my job?

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Just a coincidence, really. People generally default to healers or tanks for their comms. I routinely get 2-3 and I'm a very aggressive healer. I've let tanks drop to three digits because I'm timing Benediction, though that isn't usually intention. 10-20% though? Yep. I won't even look at a tank before they drop below 50% other then to toss Regen on them.

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Originally Posted by Elamys

If your DPS are this terrible, it's not the not-DPSing healer's fault for the run taking so long.

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You can blame Donald J Trump for all it matters, it makes little difference who's at fault or whatnot in my eyes. My energy is better spent melting those trash packs than pointing the finger at the rest of the group.

Even in a very decent ~17 minute run, my DPS will have saved around 5 minutes.

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Originally Posted by Bourne_Endeavor

Just a coincidence, really. People generally default to healers or tanks for their comms. I routinely get 2-3 and I'm a very aggressive healer. I've let tanks drop to three digits because I'm timing Benediction, though that isn't usually intention. 10-20% though? Yep. I won't even look at a tank before they drop below 50% other then to toss Regen on them.

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Agreed, I'm pretty consistent with DPS in dungeons and see the same as you, I'll frequently get 2 or 3 commendations, sometimes I get none. Not everyone can be bothered dishing them out.

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Originally Posted by Cynfael

I covered this in my comments.

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Yes. I read the one line write off of this. I realize that I should've made myself clearer: you know the difference and I know the difference but John Q. Public (who've never healed) don't know the difference and this is where 95% of the healer flack comes from. They take your one sentence write off of 'A non-DPSing healer is almost always an idle/inactive healer.' and apply it willy nilly. If they're going to slap a label on someone, they're too lazy to do the dirty work of understanding the situation. 80% of the time, you can't count on DPS to rez you if you die (if they have rez), much less understand the nitty gritty situation, the tank, and all that goes into a healers consideration whether to DPS or not to DPS. And don't get me started on tanks... They just see a healer not DPSing and have read that someone said 'A non-DPSing healer is almost always an idle/inactive healer' and apply it to you.

I play Ast and Whm, you wont see me dps a lot on Ast because I dont want to waste a Ewer on myself when I could give a RR Balance/Spear/Arrow instead. I will cast Combust on every target I can tho. On whm tho, I dps in every possible cooldown I have because they have so many MP reduction tool that you cant really go OOM. (And when I play dps (Blm) And I see a tank(A good tank) mass pull and the whm just stand there and dont cast holy/aero 3 I just get sad...

I wanted to resist posting, but I couldn't. I'm probably going to repeat a lot of things I've already written in past threads.

Some of you bring up examples of situations where you cannot dps because you have to constantly heal. For example, a tank pulling a huge group of mobs and taking a ton of damage, or dps players not dodging aoes and getting hit by mechanics.

In these types of cases, it is perfectly understandable to drop dpsing and focus on healing. And it would be unfair if someone pressured you to dps during these kinds of situations. However, nobody is suggesting that you're a bad healer if you only focus on healing during this type of situation, nor is anyone suggesting that healers dps during this type of situation.

I play white mage and I dps whenever I can. But I'll return to healing if it's needed. And sometimes it's needed for the entire duration of a pull.

Sometimes I get great groups in roulette: damage dealers that follow mechanics and avoid aoes, and a tank that uses cooldowns, and this allows me to dps more often.

Sometimes I get groups that are not so great: damage dealers don't do mechanics, are constantly getting hit, tank pulls huge groups of mobs but doesn't use cooldowns, and I have to spam cure. Is it my fault that I wasn't able to dps? No. Does this mean I'm going to decide to never dps as a healer ever again? Of course not.

We have to adapt to every situation we're in. Sometimes we'll find ourselves with more opportunities to dps, and sometimes we won't.

When criticism is directed at inactive/idle healers, we're talking about healers who decide to stay idle when dpsing would be safe and efficient. Nobody is saying healers should be dpsing 100% of the time. That's unrealistic. But when it is safe (damage dealers are fine, tank is taking little damage and has regen up), dpsing would be efficient.

Because if things are going well, most likely you (as a healer) will just stand there idle. That's where the criticism is being directed at.

Healers have a lot of downtime in this game when things are going well. It's enough downtime that we can contribute a fair amount of dps. And that dps can make a difference.

MP isn't much of an issue. Healers in this game have tools that allow us to regenerate or save MP.

Some of you might be getting caught up with the idea, "damage dealers need to do their job so I wouldn't have to pick up their slack".

It doesn't matter if the damage dealers are dealing minimal or maximum amounts of dps. As long as things are going well (nobody's taking constant, unnecessary damage, failing mechanics, etc), and healing isn't required, it is efficient to dps.

If a damage dealer is messing up their rotation and deals minimal damage, that's something they need to work on. But that doesn't mean we as healers can't try to contribute to dps.

This is not about pointing fingers at damage dealers and saying, "you guys need to do your job right so I wouldn't have to dps." Because whether they're dealing minimal or maximum damage, our dps is still going to be helpful.

This is about saying, "I have all these tools that allow me to dps and heal efficiently, and I'm going to try to take advantage of them."

It's about pushing yourself to become a stronger player who can offer more than just the bare minimum.

Dpsing as a healer is a balancing act. It requires a deeper understanding of your toolkit, and knowing how to take full advantage of it. It requires practice and effort, but it's worth it.

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Originally Posted by Maeka

*enters dungeon*
*Tank mashes sprint button and grabs 3 packs of mobs*
*I catch up to the almost dead tank and give him Benediction*
*I get locked into chain-casting Cure2, not having enough time or MP to do anything else*

How again was I supposed to DPS?

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This. All. The. Way.

If I'm not DPSing in a dungeon, it's because of these types of tanks.

However, I don't deny there are plenty of awful healers out there. I see them almost daily.

I don't really care if they DPS or not. What I do care about is when they get so engrossed in DPS that they forget their job and let me die... which was my experience in roulette today. I understand that this just happens on occasion by mistake and I've been guilty of it before too, but whenever it does happen I at least own up to it and apologize for the error. This other guy though, he just immediately bailed from the dungeon without a word. Real low class.

Also, from my own healer perspective, if you megapull so much that I literally have to spam Cure 2 on you just to barely keep you afloat, don't expect DPS out of me.

It's kind of good I've been on the flip side since I've been leveling Paladin solely through SB dungeons, and for the most part it's been a positive experience.


I've ran into a handful good healers that do their job well, and put up considerable dps, some even beating bad red dps. Now of course I've been pretty well geared for each dungeon, so that helps cause of the big DEF jump at 65+. Like I've done the big stretch pulls in Doma Castle with these healers, Hallowed Ground on that big opening pull, and it's back up for the double heavy one before the 2nd boss. It almost brings a tear to my eye to see Gravity/Holy spam for days.

For the record, I usually wear 1-2 STR accessories on the right side, and do much as I can in Sword Oats when possible if the mob count is low enough. Not one single healer complaint. The only time i have ever used Clemency during the leveling process was when a healer died during a boss and we got through it that way. Otherwise it's just Holy Sprit spam for days, because more damage, and getting more Sheltrons to block damage. Amazing how many bad PLDs I had to level with that just flat out don't use this skill but would rather heal themselves because they couldn't trust good healing.