Rant on healers acting as a dps role

[FoxyAreku]

If you're a white mage or a Diurnal AST, you should be able to solo heal most phases in fights. Any phase that you need extra help, the scholar should lend assistance, however Scholar AoE heals are mediocre without cooldowns, so they're only really used to DPS and to keep tanks shielded unless an emergency arises.

[Nerael]

As a SCH I'm in Cleric stance 50-75% of the time. I often let my co-healer do most of the healing work.
I use Eos for this exact reason and micromanage her to crazy extent.

I only drop cleric stance when Healing is required (Tankbusters, AOE damage, etc)
I am often paired with a WHM which is more suited to topping off health than I am (being mitigation Healer and all that).
Together with Eos they often do completely fine and when they don't? I don't DPS.

Please note that I am first and foremost a healer, me DPSing is secondary. If I need to drop cleric stance to keep the party alive during the encounter; that is my job
Healer DPS is an extra, the more seasoned you become as a healer, the more you are comfortable with stance dancing and playing with peoples' health pools.
Sure you'll stuff up in the beginning, but later it becomes completely natural to do.

Do note that even while DPSing as a healer, it is still possibly to mitigate damage as certain classes. Sacred soil and things like that are not tied to cleric stance

[Immut]

Where are you getting this "second healer never heals" thing from? Eos doesn't even know cleric stance.

[ruskie]

I wonder how that healer would feel if the BRD/MCH told them they were on their own for mana management.

Considering that some threads mentioned heal priority with basically:
me > tanks > good dps > bard/mch > bad dps

It's obvious most don't care much for external mana mangement.

[SpookyGhost]

Agreed. WHM is really the better choice in some circumstances but the ARR attitude is so ingrained...

WHM is fantastic for burst DPS - with RoD up during a burst phase, a WHM is a much better choice to be in Cleric. However, this is an exception to a rule, not the rule itself. It's something that as a WHM you should be aware of, but it's not your primary responsibility on a given fight due to the amount of spells SCH has that won't miss. But I do agree that a good amount of SCHs/WHMs are stuck in the mindset that their primary job is their only job, regardless of the phase they're in and what tools they have available for it.

[technole]

If you're a white mage or a Diurnal AST, you should be able to solo heal most phases in fights. Any phase that you need extra help, the scholar should lend assistance, however Scholar AoE heals are mediocre without cooldowns, so they're only really used to DPS and to keep tanks shielded unless an emergency arises.

Yep, that is pretty much the reason why it hasn't shifted. Some people think "Oh Scholar has HW skills that has access to non-shield AoEs, so they can do the role just fine". But they require using resources: Long cooldowns and Aetherflow. Which are better spent on shields and DPS.

This isn't always black and white, as you can argue having Scholar taking damage down in A3S and solo healing for hands since it's mainly tank damage, and having White Mage burst DPS the hand(s).

[AzureFlare]

Honestly this all just sounds like having bad/random co-healers.

I trust my WHM partner to do most of the healing seeing she absolutely despises doing damage and otherwise I'm just sitting there doing nothing but unnecessary overhealing or spending my mana on heals where abilities could've been used instead while spending the mana on DPS/less Mage's/Promotion. Meanwhile I smoothen out the critical points where I know she's going to be in trouble or will be having a rough time, and likewise she respects me and doesn't overheal for crazy amounts while my heals are coming through.

Meanwhile in DF/PF I can have healers completely ignore Embrace/Whispering Dawn/Aspected Benefic/Wheel of Fortune(CU Regen)/Aspected Helios and spend 2-3k mana on healing that wasn't needed. Well.. why am I even there then if you intend to soloheal everything anyway? Might as well AFK Malefic 2/Broil/Stone 3. You don't have to Cleric but you don't have to get syndrome of 'oh my Twelve they aren't 100% they might die!' either.
A good healer knows the limits and the margins and sometimes, those can be pretty close to 20% and sometimes they are as early as 90%.

But I do agree that a good amount of SCHs/WHMs are stuck in the mindset that their primary job is their only job, regardless of the phase they're in and what tools they have available for it.

Meanwhile in AST land.. we're just kind of doing our own thing.

[Judge_Xero]

If you're a white mage or a Diurnal AST, you should be able to solo heal most phases in fights. Any phase that you need extra help, the scholar should lend assistance, however Scholar AoE heals are mediocre without cooldowns, so they're only really used to DPS and to keep tanks shielded unless an emergency arises.

But those CD's are so good, why not use them? Like Thordon during the knights (bad example I know since it's not really a hard part for any healer), the Main Healer can DPS so much more if SCH uses Aldo/Deployement prior to Divebombs and then Indom for Holy. (Trading 1 Aetherflow and 1 GCD so Main heal can keep up stronger ST damage)

I guess that does take some level of communication and it'd be easier if Main Heals just took over everything.

[technole]

But those CD's are so good, why not use them? Like Thordon during the knights (bad example I know since it's not really a hard part for any healer), the Main Healer can DPS so much more if SCH uses Aldo/Deployement prior to Divebombs and then Indom for Holy. (Trading 1 Aetherflow and 1 GCD so Main heal can keep up stronger ST damage)

I guess that does take some level of communication and it'd be easier if Main Heals just took over everything.

I usually swift a shadowflare on one of the knights when they come out, DoT up as much as you can before they take an oath. As it snapshots the full damage regardless.

Deployment Tactics is usually saved for Ultimate End, depending on party DPS that cooldown might not always be back up for it. A succor is good enough for holy until then. Indom is better used for the tether/ice knockback to meteors.

[Sleigh]

I usually swift a shadowflare on one of the knights when they come out, DoT up as much as you can before they take an oath. As it snapshots the full damage regardless.

Deployment Tactics is usually saved for Ultimate End, depending on party DPS that cooldown might not always be back up for it. A succor is good enough for holy until then. Indom is better used for the tether/ice knockback to meteors.

YMMV. If your group normally doesn't eat ice ticks or go into the wall, then Swiftcast Succor as you're running up is more than enough for the job. If they do then yeah you wanna Indom there.

Personally my group has it so SCH DPSes almost all of knight phase, main healer DPSes about 70% of it. With Regen up on both tanks right after as the knights appear, and the sword knight's tank buster getting Holm/HG/LD invulned, you can DPS and only heal with Bene/Essential basically until a few seconds before the meteor smash things. If you one cycle the knight (you should in a good, 8 man group), that's basically all she wrote for healing. Thordan is one of my favorite examples of FFXIV's ridiculously easy healing requirements, my group does it 7 man with both tanks permanently out of tank stance and both healers DPSing between 70-90% of the fight each, and it's never even scary or hard.