Any tips on dungeon healing for a fledgling Scholar?

Hey everyone! I've recently decided to try my hand with a healing class. Long story short....it was a disaster! Why? :)

1. The action in some dungeons was so fast that I kept pressing the wrong key combos as if in a panic

2. Some groups were.......very unpleasant to say the least (some even accused me of stealing accounts from somebody else but I digress)

3. I am confused as to which classes I am supposed to heal.

4. Have I essentially doomed myself by choosing SCH? :)

If you'd be so kind as to provide me with some helpful tips that would keep me from getting overwhelmed in a dungeon I'd appreciate that very much!

PS. Don't be fooled by my class info here. It says I am a 28 ACN but in fact I am a 40 SMN/SCH :)

First of, as scholar, do remember to summon your pet. If you don't summon her, it can indeed be seen as not knowing anything of your class. As long as you stay reasonably close to your tank (or in essence, your pet stays. But it follows you unless you use manual placement) the fairy heals a good deal on its own. Remember the fairy has shorter range for this than the range of your heals so don't stand too far. Apart from that, in dungeons about up to 40 that alone can be most of the needed heals leaving you time to learn the rest of the toolkit in a bit more relaxed situation.also, if you really have hard time healing in your level dungeons, just take few "refresher courses" by queuing to the lower level places. There you'll have less skills to tackle and can learn solid work with them before gradually upping their amount.

As for the fairies, if you use Eos (the blue garbuncle skill icon) remember to put her on Obay. It's a yellow red button in the pet skill bar. If she is left on full auto (SIC) she cast all her heavy duty aoe heals right when the battle starts which at that point is either unnecessary or even counter productive in most normal dungeon pulls. If you use Selene (the yellow garbuncle skill icon) you can leave her on SIC for the time being. It is good to learn to manually handle her skills as well later on but her being full auto is not that bad and some scholars even prefer it that way.

As for which classes to heal, in general you should heal everyone. But for your question, the tank(s) of the group always has blue class icon background in the party list, while damage classes are red and healers are green. If the run is going smoothly it's pretty much only the tank taking damage, so expect you heal them the most.

1: Ok, first things first: Learn to tune out all unnecessary distractions. Focus on if there are any AoEs you need to move out of, and the party HP bar. When in doubt, spam physick on the tank. Once you're confident with healing you can try DPSing, but until then focus on keeping the tank upright.

2: Some people are just plain mean. That said... if you hopped right into level 30 content trying to heal, no wonder you're having trouble. I highly recommend giving Conjurer a try (You'll likely want Cleric's Stance and Protect as cross-class skills anyway) or at the very least queuing for lower level dungeons on your SCH. Lower level dungeons tend to have a lot more leeway, and everyone having a smaller toolset to work with means there's a lot less to focus on.

3: The tank, the guy in blue on the party list. If any of the folks in red get hurt, it's usually their own damn fault. Toss them a cure if they're injured and the tank doesn't need healing, (Hey, everyone makes mistakes some times and there's also unavoidable AoE attacks here and there), but if it falls down between keeping the tank healed and keeping a DPS healed, pick the tank.

4: Nope! Personally I find that once you get the hang of healing, it is one of the easiest roles to do in the game. Most boss mechanics will even ignore you, making most fights a simple matter of dodging AoE and tossing cures at folks who need them.

If you're in a free company, see if people will run a few dungeons with you. If you've only got dungeon finder, explain that you're new - most folks are decent about it and will give you some tips about any special mechanics in the dungeon to look out for.

Mostly - don't panic! :) Someone suggested healing on your conjurer at first to get the hang of healing generally, and that could be helpful, as there's no pet to manage.

I would definitely go with the suggested Conjurer class first. Not only do you obtain the experience needed to successfully heal, you can obtain skills that you can criss-cross such as Cleric Stance and protect. To be perfectly honest, SCH is probably one of the classes you don't want to start out with if you're completely new to healing as it's a very complex class and only gets more complex to handle as you level up (a lot of things are happening not to mention trying to control a pet). Try conjurer/white mage as it's less complex and offers a less strenuous healing experience and then once you get the fundamentals of healing, go back to SCH. Like Pencardiel said, explain if you're new and you may get people who will help you out a bunch. If people leave, so be it, you'd rather run a dungeon with understanding people who can teach you than rude people who will leave a bitter taste in your mouth.

I actually would advice against seeking the WHM experience first. Reason is, up to level 35 or so they have pretty much the same tools at hand, with the exception of SCH having the fairy which they should learn to remember to have at that point. It's also good time to learn how much, and which way the fairy helps. Afterwards when they start to get diversity job skills, learning the WHM healing style doesn't really help with scholar much if at all. Apart from the very basics of healing (which can be learned in both classes alike) their way to tackle it are after all rather different. While it's true that SCH might have slightly more complex skills, at that point they should have good understanding how much their fairy can help them.

I'm not saying trying different healers is a bad thing. And if you find WHM style works you better go for it. Also it's not a bad idea to learn other healer classes to better you working with the one you main, but that should be after you have solid understanding of your main. Learning to play WHM to be a SCH is a bit futile approach.

Thanks everyone who replied! As far as practicing healing goes, my FC buddies said the same thing! Try a low level dungeon first :)

I have been practicing yesterday and have made some interesting observations:

1. On lower level dungeons (Sastasha etc) it is perfectly safe to just focus on the tank. The rest of the group can take care of themselves AND they are healed by Eos or Selene

2. It's become second nature to me fast to first cast Protect on the tank and then summon the fairy (if it's not summoned already)

3. Some tanks can't keep enough aggro but that's ok because we're all learning :)

4. I had a very nice dungeon run at Stone Vigil (the hardest dungeon I've done so far). Had to try it 3 times. Good thing is that I don't have to wait long in queues :)

We have finished the dungeon and I was commended (got the Leaving a Good Impression achievement)

Add people to your friends list as you group with them, shoot them tells when you log in asking if they want to do a run. DPS especially would appreciate a healer taking the initiative as your queue times would be a fraction of theirs. Then at least you will have one other person on your side if things go south in a group.

Wish you were on my server, I would tank for ya!

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Originally Posted by Darcorn

1. On lower level dungeons (Sastasha etc) it is perfectly safe to just focus on the tank. The rest of the group can take care of themselves AND they are healed by Eos or Selene

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Actually the faerie alone can be enough up through Haukke Manor, possibly even Brayflox Longstop if the tank is good. You do have to be aware of her range (less than you'd think) and timing (probably slower than you'd like).

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3. Some tanks can't keep enough aggro but that's ok because we're all learning :)

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Tanks don't get their threat stance until level 30 (WAR/DRK) or even level 40 (PLD). Even if you know what you are doing it can be a pain to keep aggro before then. If a tank level syncs below that, guess what, no threat stance.

Edvardelis is right about the fairy. I laugh when I get the daily on those lower dungeons as I can read a book while Eos does all the work.

Crit is your friend for Adloquium. I use Sacred Soil in cooldown though I don't see many others.

It's good to hear you got the basics down :) the next thing to learn is when not to heal. In general, during normal pulls if your heal would top the tank of and possibly even overheal, you want to wait them to loose a bit more health so even with you heal they come right to 100% or a bit less. This is for both, to save resources (mana and time) and to avoid you attracting more enemy attention that you need to. While both, the amount you actually heal, and the amount you overheal generate the same amount of enmity, the overheal one is totally needles. Soon you'll notice that if you actual let even the tank to drop somewhere around 75%, the fairy heals them too quite enough well up into about level 38 content.

Boss fights can be different of course, in those you generally might want to keep the tank topped most of the time in case of some bigger hits coming in.

Leaving most of the basic pull healing for the fairy who can do rather decent job about it, you'll soon find out you have quite a lot of time at your hands. In those situations, don't be afraid to pop a debuff for an enemy. In a way it's preventive healing. I'm not saying you should do your utmost for the damage (some healers do, I like to go boom on WHM too) , healing is your first priority and you should be comfortable with it first. But more damage to the enemies when you have nothing else to do never hurts anyone (except the enemies, obviously :p ). If you do damage, popping on Cleric Stance, a cross class skill from white mage makes it even more effective, just need to remember to turn it off for heals. But that too is something you can try when you feel like you handle other stuff well :) .

Congrats on your successful run of the Stone Vigil! That dungeon can be tricky if you have multiple people unfamiliar with the mechanics.

I didn't read all the responses so sorry if any of this overlaps:

- First, by the time you hit 30, you will have 3 cross skill slots available, these slots should be filled with Cleric Stance (CNJ level 6), Protect (CNJ level 8), and Swiftcast (TMG level 26). These three abilities are the staple of your healing role. Not having CS in particular will outright gimp your DPS output, which even if you are not comfortable doing now, you will need to acquire the skill of stance dancing in order to optimize your role.

- Prioritization of heals is important as well. YOU ARE priority #1. ALWAYS. The healer must heal thyself if in danger as you can't keep anyone alive if you are dead. The tank gets priority #2. The other members of the group get heals only if you or the tank don't need them.

- Galvanize (Adloquim and Succor) are your bread n butter. These abilities restore hit points, but their true strength lies in their shield effect. Pay attention to mob behaviour. Knowing when and how they attack will put SCH at an extreme advantage if they are proactive with their shields. You want to cast these abilities when you want to mitigate incoming damage. You have physick and your fairy right now in your tool kit to repair damage after it happens. You will later acquire more means to do so (Lustrate, Indomitability).

- When all else fails, heal. Simple as that. You are a healer. Not a tank. Not a DPS. Most mechanics for healer simply involve dodging red zones and tossing needed heals while doing it. When this becomes easy, it's time to mitigate damage and DPS. :)