As a healer, is it my job to DPS? A new perspective.

Oh huh, I never knew Gravity and Demi were the same spell. Maybe it could do 25% except on certain immune targets? With an adequate cooldown, it couldn't be TOO OP.....maybe?

Nono, I don't want a cooldown on Gravity. Ast already has worse AoE damage than White Mage because of several factors. Having a one time hit of 25% health would be more of a nerf than anything else, if the cooldown was more than 10 seconds.

I'm probably thinking of 4 mans too much, but from my perspective AST already has 0 AoE. When my tank has 24 mobs on him, the last thing I can afford to do is channel a 3 second damage spell, even with all non-hallowed ground cooldowns up. Holy stun is obvious, and fishing for critloquiums with a buffed faerie can give me some room. It's especially comforting to know that I have 3 lustrates or benediction to fall back on, but AST doesn't really have those things. Not to mention they lack eye for an eye, so I just don't really feel like I can AoE.

Hmm, usually I get away with 2 or 3 Gravities before using my Regen on the tank, and Essential Dignity does enough to keep them alive through the rest of the pull if they're rotating cooldowns properly. I also use the Lumi+CO combo to mimic white mages' holy spam and outlast them.

Unfortunately CO's 2 minute cooldown means you can't really do that every pull, and since you need to walk up and stun, it pretty much nullifies the only advantage Gravity has, which is range. At that point, it kinda feels like I'm playing a worse WHM. While the healer's single target playstyles are pretty the same, they DO have their own unique advantages. WHM burst, SCH mana, and ASTs less reliant on accuracy. When it comes to AoE WHM and SCH have similar niches, but AST doesn't have any of its own. Would you propose a different sort of change, or are you happy with the way things are?

Honestly I have no clue, they placed too much emphasis on the cards (4 job quest skills dedicated to the cards, 5 and a half if you're in Nocstance) so we have far less consistent contribution on AoE than the other healers.

Hum sch advantage is the fairy not the mana, because ast got a very strong regen now
And I think that in aoe whm still has a upper hand because SCH and ast need the center target while both all 3 aoe of the whm are self cast

Yep, gravity and demi are the same. Thing is even a 25% damage would be waaay overboard in duties. Imagine that you can bring down any boss to 75%. As a healer. And if bosses get immunity, well your job won't be invitet to parties.

I mean you normally aren't AoEing bosses....I think? I haven't really kept up with raiding lately, but I don't recall that being major point before.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by basketofseals

I mean you normally aren't AoEing bosses....I think? I haven't really kept up with raiding lately, but I don't recall that being major point before.

---

You sure as heck would if that AoE took away 25% of the bosses health lol

Well obviously they would be immune, but I didn't see how that restriction would make them unwelcome in groups.

inb4 500 potency Gravity with 2 seconds cast/recast

Worst thing you can do in a videogame is affect its gameplay negatively for bs lore purposes. Asking gravity to do 25% of a target is like being content with having longer PVP frontline queues because lol GC companies. Might as well ask for a "Death" spell that actually instakills stuff because that's what the Death spell is supposed to do.

The problem isn't whether healers 'should' DPS, because there's too many things to take into account when making that statement: healer's skill, how well tanks manage their cooldowns, size of the pulls, difficulty of the content (DF versus something like Midas Savage), connection speed, gear quality, etc.

Can they DPS? Absolutely. The problem is how people try to convey this point, because I see so many people on forums and in-game stating it as if healers must do damage or they're playing incorrectly, and that's as ignorant as it gets. Is it less than optimal? Sure. But it's not a requirement. If it were you'd think SCH and AST would have been given their own DPS stance instead of leaving it as an optional cross-class ability, or they'd make healer spells scale to MND instead of INT.

A healer that doesn't DPS isn't playing wrong, they're just not playing the way you want them to.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Ariyon

A healer that doesn't DPS isn't playing wrong, they're just not playing the way you want them to.

---

Yes, because a Scholar auto-following a tank in Satasha while going AFK and letting his fairy do all the healing is an acceptable form of playing and I'm such a horrible person for expecting the bare minimum of ABC and not overhealing.

If you are ABCing and not overhealing and you aren't ever casting DPS spells...your tank sucks.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Supersun

Yes, because a Scholar auto-following a tank in Satasha while going AFK and letting his fairy do all the healing is an acceptable form of playing and I'm such a horrible person for expecting the bare minimum of ABC and not overhealing.

If you are ABCing and not overhealing and you aren't ever casting DPS spells...your tank sucks.

---

Ignoring the fact that a SCH who does that is susceptible to the inactivity penalty and getting automatically removed, any party who willingly allows that to happen is just as much to blame as the healer who did it in the first place. We have the option to vote players out for a reason. While the healer in your example is obviously lazy, I'd say the problem there lies with people who allow SCH to get away with that kind of nonsense in the first place. But we're talking healers in general. Can they DPS? Sure. Is it useful? I think that goes without saying. Is it a requirement that they DPS? Not at all.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Ariyon

Ignoring the fact that a SCH who does that is susceptible to the inactivity penalty and getting automatically removed, any party who willingly allows that to happen is just as much to blame as the healer who did it in the first place. We have the option to vote players out for a reason. While the healer in your example is obviously lazy, I'd say the problem there lies with people who allow SCH to get away with that kind of nonsense in the first place. But we're talking healers in general. Can they DPS? Sure. Is it useful? I think that goes without saying. Is it a requirement that they DPS? Not at all.

---

You're a little late to the party. We've already gone over, with evidence brought forward in the game text and debunking the healer double standard (why are they the only class where it's acceptable to literally do nothing for most of a run), and how if a Healer does zero DPS they're a bad Healer.
I go one step farther and say if they cannot even follow that bare minimum, they should play another class or another game.

http://img2.finalfantasyxiv.com/acci...d837712233.jpg

I've added a screenshot of the attribute window for Alexys Kitty in Healer role at Lv60. With these stats, with Cleric Stance activated, she does approximately 500 damage points with Aero III which ticks three seconds for 24 seconds which multiplies to a total of 4,000 less or more damage points within 24 seconds. The Stone III casts every 3 seconds at approximately 2,000 damage points with totals 16,000 damage points while Aero III is active. If Aero III is cast followed by eight back-to-back Stone III casts and 24 seconds have elapsed a WHM has done approximately 20,000 damage in 24 seconds of battle. This may not seem much in comparison to DPS roles. The Healer role is not DPS. This stance is simply a plus to the party's overall damage. DPS is a different role with different individual damage.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by FunkyBunch

You're a little late to the party. We've already gone over, with evidence brought forward in the game text and debunking the healer double standard (why are they the only class where it's acceptable to literally do nothing for most of a run), and how if a Healer does zero DPS they're a bad Healer.
I go one step farther and say if they cannot even follow that bare minimum, they should play another class or another game.

---

If you're not being lazy with the DPS and your rotations, you'll be too busy to care about whether or not the healer does DPS.

Is healer dps helpful? Yes.

Is it your business whether a healer dpses or not? Not really.

People do a lot of things for a lot of reasons. Don't jump to conclusions about people you never met.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by AlexysKitty

[IMG]...Aero III which ticks every second or two for 24 seconds...

---

Just to correct, all DoTs tick once every 3 seconds on a global timer. Aero III thus gets 8 ticks for the full duration.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Ariyon

The problem isn't whether healers 'should' DPS, because there's too many things to take into account when making that statement: healer's skill, how well tanks manage their cooldowns, size of the pulls, difficulty of the content (DF versus something like Midas Savage), connection speed, gear quality, etc.

Can they DPS? Absolutely. The problem is how people try to convey this point, because I see so many people on forums and in-game stating it as if healers must do damage or they're playing incorrectly, and that's as ignorant as it gets. Is it less than optimal? Sure. But it's not a requirement. If it were you'd think SCH and AST would have been given their own DPS stance instead of leaving it as an optional cross-class ability, or they'd make healer spells scale to MND instead of INT.

A healer that doesn't DPS isn't playing wrong, they're just not playing the way you want them to.

---

This is like saying DRK and WAR don't need provoke because it's an optional cross class or SCH and AST don't need to use protect. Some actions exist on the cross class to prevent them having to make the same skill for each individual class. Also by your logic WHM should dps as they were given Cleric Stance through CNJ.

If you was solo I'm sure you would use Cleric stance and why do you you do this? To make the fight go faster and save having to cure yourself more. Same thing in party's you DPS where possible to aim to push past mechanics making the fight go faster and smoother.

End of the day though you are right you don't have to dps as healer, but don't complain when another healer who can use every skill available to them gets chosen for content instead.

The way I see it, the idea of a healer only needing to heal is in the same mindset of a tank only needing to hold aggro. It's doing the absolute bare minimum and how this idea continues to be debated is mind-boggling. How would anyone feel if the tank just held aggro? I spammed flash or unleash enough to get an aggro lead and then stopped attacking. After that, only used enough skills to ensure I had an aggro lead over everyone else, only using the skills that gave me the largest aggro generation, because that's all I have to do as a tank. Hold aggro.

That's how ridiculous the healer only has to heal argument is to me. Nearly everyone would lose their minds at a tank that does that and yet we're debating whether the healer equivalent is an acceptable form of play?

I play as both WHM and SCH. SCH being my main. And I accept people who wishes to play a certain way. If healers don't want to DPS, they shouldn't have to. They shouldn't be kicked just because they don't DPS. Or be degraded upon. I qued for level 60 roulette and got ARF a few weeks ago. I didn't DPS, because the tank was taking WAY too much damage, and the DPS wasn't dodging. So, how am I to DPS if other people don't do their job right? Us healers get bitched at so many times, it's freaking disgusting. Even though tanks/dps are wrong as well. If a tank takes too much damage, and the DPS isn't dodging, it is not my responsibility to DPS when healing is obviously more important.

Don't get me wrong. I DPS like a sailor drinking his ale. I love to DPS on my healer jobs. But, people needs to understand, we can't do anything if other people don't know how to use CDs, dodge, etc.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by VraeliaValkyria

I play as both WHM and SCH. SCH being my main. And I accept people who wishes to play a certain way. If healers don't want to DPS, they shouldn't have to. They shouldn't be kicked just because they don't DPS. Or be degraded upon. I qued for level 60 roulette and got ARF a few weeks ago. I didn't DPS, because the tank was taking WAY too much damage, and the DPS wasn't dodging. So, how am I to DPS if other people don't do their job right? Us healers get bitched at so many times, it's freaking disgusting. Even though tanks/dps are wrong as well. If a tank takes too much damage, and the DPS isn't dodging, it is not my responsibility to DPS when healing is obviously more important.

Don't get me wrong. I DPS like a sailor drinking his ale. I love to DPS on my healer jobs. But, people needs to understand, we can't do anything if other people don't know how to use CDs, dodge, etc.

---

First of all, I think you read the title and not anyone's arguments. In the run where you didn't DPS you were busy healing, i.e. doing your job, you were actively engaging in the content and performing your role. This is not the argument, we all know that heals > dps on a healing job. The ISSUE comes when people idle and over-heal and do not engage in the content. If I'm playing WAR, I am expected to use my full rotation and keep maim and storms eye up as best I can, but I can't do that if there is a tonne of AOE and I need to overpower and flash lots (doing my job), which is completely different to spamming butchers block combo and not using berserk or any wrath stack at all (but im keeping aggro right?). Relevant healing > DPS > idling and over-healing is the argument people are making, and while I personally wouldn't kick anyone or even care about it, the mentality that it is acceptable is not ok.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by VraeliaValkyria

I play as both WHM and SCH. SCH being my main. And I accept people who wishes to play a certain way. If healers don't want to DPS, they shouldn't have to. They shouldn't be kicked just because they don't DPS. Or be degraded upon. I qued for level 60 roulette and got ARF a few weeks ago. I didn't DPS, because the tank was taking WAY too much damage, and the DPS wasn't dodging. So, how am I to DPS if other people don't do their job right? Us healers get bitched at so many times, it's freaking disgusting. Even though tanks/dps are wrong as well. If a tank takes too much damage, and the DPS isn't dodging, it is not my responsibility to DPS when healing is obviously more important.

Don't get me wrong. I DPS like a sailor drinking his ale. I love to DPS on my healer jobs. But, people needs to understand, we can't do anything if other people don't know how to use CDs, dodge, etc.

---

Being unable to DPS because you have to heal is not the same as choosing not to DPS when you don't have to heal. Your situation is completely different than what is typically debated. You had to heal because the other players were either undergeared or playing really poorly, resulting you in having to spend the majority of your time healing. It happens. Sometimes group DPS isn't up to par or the tank isn't doing enough to mitigate the damage. You performed your job admirably considering the circumstances, and you did what was needed.

But the issue arises to what happens when you don't need to heal at the moment. The frustration lies in the healers that once they are done healing, they sit there and do nothing until it is time to heal again. It's like a tank just grabbing aggro, and then do nothing until it is time to grab the aggro back. The idea of a tank doing such a thing is absurd and yet people make arguments in FAVOR of the healer doing the equivalent. As a healer, healing comes first, then DPS second. Like as a tank, aggro comes first, dps second. But it should never be healing only, just as it is never aggro only.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Lambdafish

Relevant healing > DPS > idling and over-healing is the argument people are making

---

My apologies. I was only adding my two cents. And yes, I agree. Healers who are sitting at full MP not doing anything, bothers me. If the party is safe, then Cleric Stance and DPS. Help speed things up. Don't just do nothing. It is why Yoshida/SE gave us DPS tools. To use. Not waste.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Kitfox

Just to correct, all DoTs tick once every 3 seconds on a global timer. Aero III thus gets 8 ticks for the full duration.

---

Thank you. I updated my post with more accurate damage point calculations.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Masekase_Hurricane

Snipity snap

---

1. Protect isn't REQUIRED, it's HIGHLY RECCOMENDED and people would think you're a scrub if you don't have it.

2. Provoke is REQUIRED because some content needs tanks to have it, last I checked there's no mechanic that requires the party to have protect on them. Yes, it mitigates ~5% damage on tanks, but it's not an essential cross-class skill.

3. A healer who doesn't dps will only make the run longer if everyone else does their jobs, yes, I know. It's bad to expect everyone to perform optimally while the healer is only doing the bare minimum, but people have to carry others all the time in DF. Make your own party if you don't like the fact that sometimes PF will match you up with someone who will just end up being dead weight you have to carry.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by VraeliaValkyria

My apologies. I was only adding my two cents. And yes, I agree. Healers who are sitting at full MP not doing anything, bothers me. If the party is safe, then Cleric Stance and DPS. Help speed things up. Don't just do nothing. It is why Yoshida/SE gave us DPS tools. To use. Not waste.

---

Just my personal experience, but I'm too busy trying to burn down mobs/the boss to really care about what the healer does aside from their main job of making sure nobody eats dirt. If the healer dpses, then great! If not, then w/e, I'll just spend a little longer doing the dungeon.

Now if we hit an enrage timer and I see the healer isn't dpsing, then I would encourage them dps to boost the party's overall damage, not force them. At the end of the day the fault of hitting the enrage timer lies with the dps, not the healer.

The only problem about this whole new mentality about healers DPSing is that it has created a bad trend of healers that mostly neglect their healing duties and just stand there spamming Stone III/Malefic II/Broil, which, in my book, is far worse than a healer that only heals but does it well.

Too many times I see myself debuffed, or very low in HP, or even dead, and I swear I see my healers' bars casting offensive spells over and over again.

Don't get me wrong, a healer that can both DPS and heal and does it correctly is far better than one that only heals, but assuming they can only do one thing at a time, they should focus on healing.

Too many times I see healers boasting about their DPS when the DPS rotation of a healer is 3 buttons for single target and 2 for AOE damage, some people should realize DPSing as a healer isn't hard, it's actually the easiest thing to do in the game, what requires some skill is stance dancing while keeping your party alive.

I swear I'd put all these scrub healers that only DPS in Sephirot EX playing as a BLM and I'd grab my popcorn while I count with all the fingers of both hands how many times they lose enochian and how many times they hit the floor before noticing that keeping Enochian or BotD is slightly harder than broiling a boss for the next 40 seconds.

I mean, it's only bad if you're dead. I will continue spamming my Holy while you are at 20% health because Benediction will do enough for you. I will continue Gravity spam for as long as possible so I can get the most mileage out of Essential Dignity.

I'd rather have a healer that DPSes more than they should and kills someone occasionally than a healer who's clearly on Netflix eating popcorn while petting their cat. It's even more disgusting when they talk down on the rest of the team as if they're contributing anything more than what's necessary.

I have a simple way of looking at it.
Did anyone die due to my healing?
No?
Then add up all their DPS and that it my contribution. Dead players contribute no DPS.

Though I do DPS with scholar, as it is most of the time, easy to do so.

If dps avoid aoe and perform all deadly mecanic perfectly and if tank have good mitigation rotation and timing
There is a minimal healing to do

And a maximum dps to provide

...

I got A8 NM on mentor yesterday
I gently ask or remind tanks that they have to swap on magic vulnerability
I got spat on my face because they don't have to bother doing that when i'm here to heal through damage

I didn't even try to smile when I watch them die and yell in agony
It was so good
They don't want me to dps, i won't heal either, it's a package 8D

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Rennies

I mean, it's only bad if you're dead.

---

It's bad if you are dead, debuffed (that slow debuff that makes your GCD twice as long, I swear I get cleansed from stuff like that 1 out of 10 times by random Broil/Stone III/Malefic II spammers) or in the verge of dying in for example a dangerous phase of a boss.
A good healer isn't the one that heals through everything when everybody handles mechanics properly, a good healer only shows up when things don't go as planned and everybody starts taking extra damage. If they can DPS on top of it, then they are flawless, but if they DPS and somebody that could've been saved reasonably dies along the way (reasonably as in somebody taking extra damage, knowing unavoidable AOE damage is coming within 3-4 seconds and not topping them off), then it's a fail in my book.

Let me put you an example: Weeping City of Mhach, Add phase 2nd boss. Lots of stuff seem to go wrong there every time, people not dodging doom, adds positioned poorly and people taking chunks of unnecessary damage, on top of that unavoidable poison from that other add. A good healer knows this and anticipates it. I go with my SCH and unless raid wipes I tryhard like mad cleansing dooms, poisons and topping everyone. I go with a DPS class and my party becomes an almost guaranteed sea of corpses within seconds with at least one of the healers on cleric.

A good player in general will make up for the faults of others. A healer has the greatest ability to carry like this.

If a DPS dies and I'm 5 seconds from a Swiftcast popping back up, I'm going to continue to dps and swiftcast instead of hard casting.

Good healers will anticipate debuffs. Bad players will create unnecessary and unplanned debuffs. As a healer, it is at my discretion as to what is worth cleansing. If you're mildly poisoned, but HP healthy I'm not going to go outside of a fey caress to cleanse you, since you don't need it. Slow is easily Fey Caressed as well. If you need it cleansed more than once a minute, someone is probably failing a mechanic: see Ravana EX.

Well most of the time the healer job is knowing which attack is coming if this is avoidable or not and the amount of damage on the party/player to pre-cast the adéquat spell and lose the least dps

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Gallus

Snip

---

Yeah, I just picked up ninja and hit level 46 and BOOM, instantly 4 or 5 new skills from 45-46.

I have a 60 summoner but I forgot how much of a struggle adapting to new rotations is.

Honestly, it's a good thing that healer rotations aren't complicated because it's so easy to get tunnel vision when you don't know your rotation too well.

Though at the end of the day, when you get your rotations on lockdown, dpsing isn't that hard.

Dungeons get really boring if you just wait for the hp to get low.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Dogempire

Just my personal experience, but I'm too busy trying to burn down mobs/the boss to really care about what the healer does aside from their main job of making sure nobody eats dirt. If the healer dpses, then great! If not, then w/e, I'll just spend a little longer doing the dungeon.

---

It's pretty darn obvious to me when the Healer is doing jack all. I'm running out of TP or a 7 minute fight is taking 10 minutes.
I watch what everyone is doing, so I can help them. I'm not actually a jackhole in game.

I routinely teach new tanks how to tank more effectively. I'm frustrated with how Healers are in game, so I complain here. I also solved my own personal problem by being the Healer in DF content for the most part.

It's not just a "little longer" it's a significant amount of time (20-30% longer depending on party make-up) because Healers have some of the best AoE in the game.

You're also completely ignoring the fact, that Healers not DPSing will literally cause wipes in many instances. Same as if tanks aren't using cooldowns.
You can't do the full pull in Fractal or Neverreap for example if the Healer doesn't DOT or Gravity or Holy a few times because you will literally die.
Healers are holding back far more parties than any other class, because it's the only class that thinks that doing nothing is fine.

Please note, not a single person is advocating for DPSing if someone legitimately needs healing. Like you have an undergeared tank pulling too large. You may not be able to DPS much. You guys keep mixing in things that are not what we are asking for or even talking about.

All I want is literally for you to not be standing around doing nothing and doing a bit of DPS if it's possible. I'm not asking you to top the DPS charts. I'm not asking you to maximize your rotations and keep everyone at the minimum health level. I'm just asking you to not stand around and stop arguing that not DPSing is good. It's worse than the in-game text tells you to be. End of story.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Rawrz

A good player in general will make up for the faults of others. A healer has the greatest ability to carry like this.

If a DPS dies and I'm 5 seconds from a Swiftcast popping back up, I'm going to continue to dps and swiftcast instead of hard casting.

Good healers will anticipate debuffs. Bad players will create unnecessary and unplanned debuffs. As a healer, it is at my discretion as to what is worth cleansing. If you're mildly poisoned, but HP healthy I'm not going to go outside of a fey caress to cleanse you, since you don't need it. Slow is easily Fey Caressed as well. If you need it cleansed more than once a minute, someone is probably failing a mechanic: see Ravana EX.

---

Exactly, if a DPS is derping hard and doing worse than me, they're not a high priority on a raise as Swiftcast is usually used on ShadowFlare for me to cope with large pulls.
I won't purposely let anyone die, but I'll make a judgement call on whether you're worth a swiftcast raise every time.