Healer DPS Rotation Guide?

Hi,

For some context of who I am and where I am at:
I started this game a little more than a month ago and I have hit Level 70 on my SCH/SUM and WHM. My main job focus is SCH and I have WHM as a backup (and currently leveling AST).
I started running with a static for savage content two weeks ago. So far we have cleared OS1 and OS2, we started testing out the waters for OS3 this past weekend and things are not looking too bad. Something that came up after we cleared OS2 for the first time was that both the other healer and I have very low DPS.
To save myself some face lets just say that I had very, very low dps and call it a day.

On to my question or request!
Can someone provide or link me a guide on the proper DPS rotation for all three healers (because I would like to keep all three healer jobs an option for the time being) I want to be able to contribute more to our progress and me doing more DPS is something I can do personally for the group.

There's no solid rotations for healers. The key is always be casting (ABC).

Always have your DoT's up, then spam your stone/broil/malefic. Use your oGCD damagers like Assize on cooldown.

For WHM I like opening with Aero 3>Aero 2> PoM> Stone 4>Stone 4> Assize> Stone 4 spam. Reapply DoT's as needed. Lucid Dreaming at 75% mp, then on cooldown the rest of the fight.

I'm sure you have either a WHM or a Diurnal AST, so let those regens do as much healing as possible. It will become obvious when people need to be topped up right away, and when you can let the regen AOE's do their thing. So dps away while everyone's health is being slowly topped up.

There's no set rotation for Healer's per say but there are optimal ways to spend GCDs during burst windows where the party as a whole is bringing out their biggest guns to optimize their damage that also helps increase the damage of party members as well, so you want to try to do your best things in that period.

In terms of maintaining good DPS, as a player you have to understand how each fight unfolds so you know at which moments you will need to heal and thus also understand which places also give you the best opportunities to DPS. There is also a level of trust you have to have with your party and especially your co-healer partner. If your party members are taking avoidable damage, that's less GCDs you have to spend on DPS.

Once the group has hashed out the mechanical details of the fight, the next step is to communicate with your healer. If both healers are responding to the same damage with healing that results in overheal, that is lost opportunities for DPS from either of you. Likewise, both healers should be communicating so you both know which one of you is going to be using your potent abilities to heal through certain periods of pain, or if both of you have to get involved to maximum effect. This communication will enable you to determine when you can DPS and when you should be focusing on heals. In some cases you'll both need to be firing healing from all cylinders and there's nothing wrong with that.

Once you, your co-healer, and your raid have worked out the mechanic kinks and healing responsibilities, your general DPS thoughts will work on a two point priority system:

1. Apply / Reapply DoTs (unless boss is about to go invuln - then just keep nuking)
2. Use your direct damage spells

The end goal for highly optimal DPS for the healers is to reduce any healing GCDs and rely on your oGCD and abilities to help carry the healing and then maximize DPS GCDs. Mileage may very depending on your comfort level and how bleeding edge you and your group want to push the risk factor but this should at least get you started.

Each group may do healing differently too so find a strategy that works well for your group. For example in my group, my AST partner wants to do the main bulk of the healing and this allows me to invest heavily into DPSing as a WHM. You may not have that luxury but you won't know until you communicate with your co-healer.

You also may hear about the "main healer" and "off healer" strategy. This is non-optimal from a pure-healer-DPS standpoint but it's easy to communicate as well so it might be something to employ. Similar to my example above, essentially one healer takes the bulk of the healing with the other providing heavy DPS and some mitigation / healing during periods of heavy raid damage.

If you want any help planning out the fight, there is a bunch of neat time stamp pictures that can found in this imgur album.

Healer DPS rotations tend to be pretty simple, although openers are a bit more complex if you're shooting for fully optimal play. I don't play much SCH, but this is what I use (timer listed is the remaining seconds on the pull timer):

(Start with Selene) > 11s Summon (Eos) > 7s Fey Wind > 5s Infusion of Mind > 3s Cleric Stance > 2s Miasma (Pull happens as Miasma hits) > Bio 2 [Energy Drain + Swiftcast] > Miasma 2 [Shadow Flare + Energy Drain] > Broil 2 [Chain Strategem+ Energy Drain] > Broil 2 [Aetherflow + X] - X being an action up to you. You may use another ED or a healing spell, it's really encounter dependant.

WHM:
5s Infusion of Mind > 3s Cleric Stance > 2s Aero 3 (pull happens as Aero 3 hits) > Aero 2 [Presence of Mind] > Stone 4 > Stone 4 > Stone 4 > Stone 4 [Assize]

AST:
5s Infusion of Mind > 3s Cleric Stance > 2s Malefic 3 (pull happens as Malefic 3 hits) > Combust 2 [Expanded Card] > Malefic 3 > Malefic 3 > Malefic 3 > Malefic 3 [Lord of Crowns] > Malefic 3 [Sleeve Draw] > Malefic 3 [Lord of Crowns if you have it]

This is by no means set in stone, because raid buff timing can change on your opener you want to use as many ogcds/gcds as you can during those windows. For example, I always wait for a full set of buffs (specially Trick Attack) before I use Assize - they share the same cooldown and waiting a few extra GCDs at the beginning to sync it will very rarely, if ever, cause you to miss a use in the fight. It also tends to be beneficial to clip your dots before all the raid buffs go down due to how snapshotting works.

I personally can't say I recommend the full on MH/OH strategy as it ends up gimping one of the healers and can cause you to get bad habits. By default you have two healers with powerful kits at their disposal, and both should be making efficient use of the full extent of their kit to open up DPS opportunities.

Just one thing of note: Using an instant gives you enough time for 2 oGCDs. So, for example, if you have aero III and II hit as the pull happens, you can them pop both assize and presence of mind, instead of needing to wait till later and GCD clip a stone 4, or pop a Lord of Crowns even with an expanded card also going out.

As a general rule, clipping your dots is worst than letting them fall off and reapplying them (provided you don't wait more than a couple gcds). Obviously uptime is equally important but really comes second.

PS: just to be clear, a lot of factors come into play here. Some dots might be worth clipping but as a general rule it is best not to.

Also FFlogs is your friend. Take an encounter you're working on and look at how the high percentile (dps) healers are doing. You'll often get clues as to how you can optimally heal in order to free up gcds for dps. Those clues sometimes have nothing to do with the healers: a well placed addle, tank stance switch or skill, etc..

Good recommendations here, overall. I would also add that your group as a whole has responsibility here as eamett mentioned. Because even dd can reduce the incoming dmg and therefore increase the raid dmg, since both healers can dps more and heal less. You should talk with them when to use skills like shake it off, feint, passage, dismantle or addle for example. Also plan out the best tank cd for tank busters (holmgang, livind dead and hallowed ground). You could go even further, but that should be more than enough to clear content (v1-v4).

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Odd

There's no solid rotations for healers. The key is always be casting (ABC).
Always have your DoT's up, then spam your stone/broil/malefic. Use your oGCD damagers like Assize on cooldown.

---

ABC is key here as you said, but i don't agree with using azzise on cooldown, because azzise is one of the good ogcd aoe heals and sometimes it is better to wait a few seconds to heal aoe dmg with it. Additionally azzise could be saved for situations with more adds aswell. V3 ninja phase comes to mind. Perfect spot to utilise the skill, since you will hit many adds with it and heal the aoe spam of the boss. As an scholar you shouldn't use ED all the time to weave since sometimes you should save an stack to use skills like indom, for example. This is an very strong aoe heal and can save gcd for both healers. Which is ultimately the second goal after ABC. Using as much Fairy or oGCD skills as possible to increase the gcd spend on dmg skills for both healers.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Estelle9lives

I personally can't say I recommend the full on MH/OH strategy as it ends up gimping one of the healers and can cause you to get bad habits. By default you have two healers with powerful kits at their disposal, and both should be making efficient use of the full extent of their kit to open up DPS opportunities.

---

You said it very well and having both healers trying to heal and deal dmg will always be better than doing MH/OH. This just requires class understanding of all healers (+tanks) and communication. You don't have to go all out either and plan every aoe dmg out for the start. Just use simple rules. For instance, when the scholar uses rouse+WD and it is enough to heal the group up high enough, then there is no need for other aoe healing. Priority should be Fairy healing/ofgd > gcd healing. The latter can be used with swiftcast. Althought i wouldnt recommend this during progress, because people will die, unless people would die if you don't use swift for healing asap.

PS: I'd also recommend this guide for scholar -> https://www.mooglemedia.com/sch-class-guide/