Rant on healers acting as a dps role

[Alistaire]

You not being aware of what SE's said doesn't change anything.

And as far as me dealing with it I do. When I'm playing a healer I dps whenever possible.

When I tank if a healer doesn't I drop tank stance.

And quite a few times I've politely asked a healer to start. In the worst of responses I've had them kicked. Seems pretty well dealt with to me.

[DarkmoonVael]

Out of curiosity, where did you hear that from? Last I heard Healer DPS was still not required for on-par-ilvl Savage Raid.

I too would like to know the source from this. Been trying to find any i fo on it but to no avail. I was sure they were still sticking to their "no healer dps factored in" policy on raids. Will be interesting to see if they have changed their mind.

[Alistaire]

It was around the start of heavensward, that's all I remember.

Besides, several people here have referenced hearing that. Calling 1 person a liar is one thing, but this is a pretty well-known quote, and I'm sorry I don't keep record of the references where these quotes were from.

Also even if it wasn't true it still wouldn't matter. Everyone should be doing what they can do, not just the bare minimums.

Someone else here said it best, this game is far above others in terms of healing done per action (or some words to that effect). It's like this game was designed for healers to contribute to dps. And then of course from that, it allows the playerbase to more easily distinguish between good healers and bad ones.

[Supersun]

I can't find the source (read it sometime this last week), but Y-P recently talked about how people were using healer and tank DPS to clear Alexander content below the expected gear level which...pretty much implies that when at the expected gear threshold that tank and healer DPS shouldn't be required to clear, but if you are below that threshold then healer and tank DPS will be required.

Edit: Found the source
https://www.reddit.com/r/ffxiv/comme...w_with_yoship/

[DarkmoonVael]

I can't find the source (read it sometime this last week), but Y-P recently talked about how people were using healer and tank DPS to clear Alexander content below the expected gear level which...pretty much implies that when at the expected gear threshold that tank and healer DPS shouldn't be required to clear, but if you are below that threshold then healer and tank DPS will be required.

Edit: Found the source
https://www.reddit.com/r/ffxiv/comme...w_with_yoship/

Cool thanks for sharing that. Havent been keeping up with the info they have been putting out about calculating raid dps as of late .

[Ghishlain]

Here's the post I made half a year ago where Yoshi-P stated that healer DPS wasn't included for raids.

Specifically, from the BG translation, there are two quotes I pulled out regarding healer DPS from that translation:

Yoshida: Yes. Since all DPS jobs will be increasing up through level 60, it makes sense to have the white mage's DPS extend by a proportional amount as well. For development, such as with Bahamut's Coils, the development team assumes what the item level should be for general equipment on players when they clear a raid. They sum up the basic DPS for four DPS and tanks at that assumed item level and cut that by about 10-15% for the minimum clear DPS. Healer DPS is not taken into account when this is set.

Certainly for people who are at world's first level, their goal is to clear it at as low an item level as possible, lower than the one assumed during development. So if you look at the fight and figure out that if it's not numerically possible to clear with four DPS and tanks, you'll need to make up the gap with DPS from healers. Then when those publish clear videos and other people see the healers DPSing, they might think that healers need to be DPSing even though its a situation that only arose because their clear would have otherwise been impossible. While we could take this into account, and assume a different item level in the next update which would then make it impossible to clear even with the healer DPS, we'd eliminate this type of play for highly skilled players who use communication, items, and a high level of understanding to come up with those last second clears. That would be a tough decision to make, so I still think it should be up to each party's own plans.

This is also one of the reasons we decided to implement both a normal and savage version of Alexander. Once again, healer DPS was not included in the development team's calculation as it was for other jobs, so you should just think of healer DPS as a last way to get your overall party's DPS up to where it needs to be.

and

They sum up the basic DPS for four DPS and tanks at that assumed item level and cut that by about 10-15% for the minimum clear DPS. Healer DPS is not taken into account when this is set.

I would like to see where people have heard otherwise since that half year ago if possible. Thank you

[EDIT]

Also even if it wasn't true it still wouldn't matter. Everyone should be doing what they can do, not just the bare minimums.

Of course everyone should be doing their best and all players should strive to do better. With that being said, there's a very large difference between being encouraged and assisted a healer to play at a higher caliber than forcing a healer to play at a higher level to suit one's own whims and desires.

[Sidra]

This whole argument about how SE creates the fights in terms of if healer DPS is needed or not is 100% irrelevant because it's the wrong question to ask in terms of if healers should be dpsing or not. I mean, who wants to do the bare minimum required. No matter what job I am playing, I want to be the best teammate I can be. And that's how I hope my party members feel. The important questions are:

1.) Can I do it?
2.) Will it help?

Since number 2 is almost always yes due to cutting off phases or just speeding things up, it really comes down to if you are able to. My frustration with hardcore "healers shouldn't dps" forum crowd or in game players is they don't actually ask themselves the first question or even try because they don't think they should be doing any dps in the first place. They aren't trying to be the best teammate they can be because doing it their way is more important to them than team performance. It's just not the mindset of people I prefer to be in a group with.

[TatoRazzino]

This whole argument about how SE creates the fights in terms of if healer DPS is needed or not is 100% irrelevant because it's the wrong question to ask in terms of if healers should be dpsing or not. I mean, who wants to do the bare minimum required. No matter what job I am playing, I want to be the best teammate I can be. And that's how I hope my party members feel. The important questions are:

1.) Can I do it?
2.) Will it help?

Since number 2 is almost always yes due to cutting off phases or just speeding things up, it really comes down to if you are able to. My frustration with hardcore "healers shouldn't dps" forum crowd or in game players is they don't actually ask themselves the first question or even try because they don't think they should be doing any dps in the first place. They aren't trying to be the best teammate they can be because doing it their why is more important to them than team performance. It's just not the mindset of people I prefer to be in a group with.

The problem with this statement is that healers are being blamed for teams not meeting DPS checks. Even now, when parties are above the ilvl requirement and healers don't need to DPS. Monks who don't pop mantra or second wind are complaining about healer DPS when they're not doing the best they can as well. If DPS is a group effort in FF XIV, then everything else should also be considered a group effort, including healing or mitigating damage. DPS roles have tools to deal with this kind of stuff, but they're not always happy to use them; no one complains about that and I don't see threads in the forum saying that DPS players should use their complete toolkit more often. The question for me is not "should I do it or not?" or "will it help if I do it?"; it's actually "why am I being blamed for DPS checks when my team mates are not being blamed for other things they can do but are not?". For crying out loud, there's a whole thread about AST's Aspected Helios range as if it was the end of the world to ask a party member to stay close; people act as if healers were a liability to the party, a job that's there to lower the DPS output with silly heals and support.

[Sidra]

In FFXIV, DPS is everyone's responsibility. If a team is failing, I'd tend to look at what individual is underperforming. Let's just say that it's Thordan ex and you are enraging. You got 4 dps at 900ish and a SCH and WHM both at 0. In that case, I actually would look at the SCH. There is no reason to have 0 dps in that fight as an off healer. And that SCH going from 0 to 300 is far easier an improvement to make than 4 dps going from 900 to 975. Incremental improvement gets increasingly difficult so sadly a healer, especially an off healer at 0 usually is the easiest place to add dps. On the other hand, if you are getting a reasonable amount of DPS from your healing team, but you have a dps pulling 700 - well then that person would be the first place to start.

With that being said, "blame" should be for the sake of team improvement. Unfortunately, to properly analyze a situation and look where the best/easiest places to makes up gaps would not be strength common to the average FFXIV player. So while I agree with a lot of what you said it's a moot point, because so many players are clueless. All jobs should use all their abilities, so dps jobs with mitigation and healing buffs should be counted on to use them, as you said. But the issue you're describing is just a problem with people's perception, knowledge, and reactions. It really has nothing to do with the issue of if healers should be dpsing.

The whole me vs them thing is pointless. Do your best regardless of what everyone is doing or who they are blaming. Too many dumb people out there to worry about them or make gameplay decisions based on them.

[TatoRazzino]

I agree that's easier for a SCH to add 300 DPS than for the DPS to go from 900 to 975, but that's not the point I was trying to make. At this point in the game, where you can get to i208 without setting foot on Thordan or anything above A2S, neither of the two healers have to DPS to meet checks. I'm not saying it's easy, I'm saying it's possible which are two different things. There's a difference between helpful and needed. Healer DPS is helpful, but it's not needed.

The thing is, being helpful alone is reason enough to advocate for Healer DPS. Even before the ilvl boost from the twines I got from hunts or Void Ark I could easily solo heal the first phase of A3S as AST while adding two sets of DoTs (one at the very start and another one when the boss was setting Sluice). Now, it's piece of cake. If my co-healer was adding any heals, that would be insane. However, as insane as it is, it's not needed, and this has to be stressed because a lot of what has been said here is "if you're not DPSing you're not performing to your fullest". That's true, but it leads to people saying that if the party is not clearing, it's on the healer. Now that is not true. If the DPS check is not being met, everyone is underperforming. In a context where everyone is underperforming, there's no placing blame, since I'm under no obligation to pick up the slack by myself. If said DPS players are reaching 900, they should be pushed to hit 975 regardless of healer DPS. I don't care how easier it is to add that by making two players (the healers) get better, it's not something I will accept as my fault. I say this because I have been in that position, I have been forced to play a job I didn't want to play because of DPS players underperforming (using 2.x food to go into Savage week 1 and not clearing Faust) and it's not cool at all. This expansion has seen a pressure on healer DPS that it was neither needed nor called for, and it's no wonder that threads like this one are being created.