Which do you prefer?

[Bourne_Endeavor]

Depends on my mood. I generally prefer having to heal over DPS only because I main primarily DPS/Tank jobs. So it really feels tedious spamming only a few abilities whenever I do play Healer. On the other hand, Holy spamming is quite fun.

[Ninster]

WHY would I ever prefer a badly-geared tank? The way you worded your post makes it seem as if the only difference between the two scenarios is the tank's gear. Obviously, the most efficient option is to have a higher ilvl tank so you can burn everything to the ground as fast as possible, specially if you a team that knows when to aoe. Choosing a lower ilvl tank for seemingly no reason but "to heal more" doesn't seem very logical to me, but I might have misunderstood your post, I suppose.

Considering I made the post in the early morning, yeah, I had to re-read myself. Hopefully I can clarify more:

First "a bit under geared" and "badly-geared" are not the same thing IMO. We're talking the difference between, in this scenario, item level 50 AF set + level 40ish tank chest piece + Brayflox belt + lvl 41 weapon (accessories were tank accessories with the two rings being Brand-new Ring and a copper ring) in a level 44-46 dungeon that was fairly capable of controlling hate and had enough HP to not drop in an instant, compared to say, the same setup showing up Dusk Vigil or Sohm Al. Granted my threshold for this may be skewed by having dealt with WORSE tanks than this in the times I've rolled healer.

Second, if we take away the specifics my question could be better set up as:

On a scale of 1 - 10, with 10 being the positive end of the scale, how much do you like to heal as a healer? How much do you like to dps as a healer?
If you end up in Duty Finder with tank A, how enjoyable is your experience? If you end up with tank B, how enjoyable is your experience?

If I've overcomplicated things, my apologies.

[Shougun]

On a scale of 1 - 10, with 10 being the positive end of the scale, how much do you like to heal as a healer? How much do you like to dps as a healer?
If you end up in Duty Finder with tank A, how enjoyable is your experience? If you end up with tank B, how enjoyable is your experience?

I don't main healer, and really only have experience in PotD with it but I find it interesting that they can be fairly capable DD - like out DD the DD if they're geared better lol. I'm concerned that some people play it for fast queues but still play it like a DD vs a healer, like because they're so good at it that you get players who actually don't like playing as a healer but do so as they can DD.

Perhaps this lowers the quality of healers, specifically the healers that generally leave me going "OOOH MY THAL!!!" are usually high end healers who just want to get stuff done, and the new healers are actually healing the kupo nut out of me lol.

But then again I imagine so many healers sleeping at the keyboard if they didn't have any other option. Or just not wanting to be healer.

Not being a real end game healer when doing PotD and being main as a tank I like to keep people above 50% health (tanks at least, DD lower hp is more concerning to die fast), it makes me uncomfortable when healers let me drop to 15%.. "you do know I can be oneshot soon right.. like.. am I going to die?" lol. Letting me get low seems to be popular, either because they didn't switch out of cleric or are still dealing damage, although I don't die that often. To add though.. letting me get low and then an accident happens else where means the healer has to choose who to heal first, while I don't die that often I do see DD die quite a bit because the healer just switched for me and couldn't also help the DD. Sometimes clemency can save the DD and the healer can do the rest, but I only have one cure spell and it is on a casting timer lol.

I personally like to DD more than heal but that's why healer is A. not my main and B. I only level in PotD where I also try my best not to let people die because imo "Healing" is your first priority as healer. Although people might argue priority and order, speed, all that fun stuff, I'm just talking as a perspective on what a role means.. I don't think SE should be purposely designing healers at least where they imagine their first priority is damage. I feel like some really nice buffing mechanics to healers could encourage more healing/support/but not slow down the team gameplay.. but again I don't main the job and I get if all you were doing is healing you'd be bored cause.. JUST healing is usually really slow (minus certain fights).

So as for your scale, I'd like to see most healers going "I like to heal people an 8 or more out of 10!!" but I imagine many are, and personally, more like "I like to heal 5 or less" - only my tank experience commits me from not wanting to see people's health get too low even if I know I can heal out of it (like the instant big cure spells).

[loreleidiangelo]

Most people seem to feel the opposite of me (or are nitpicking on the idea of whether or not a lower-geared tank for content is "undergeared" for said content), but I'll throw out there that yes, I actually like being forced to use my healing abilities and cooldowns in quick reaction scenarios to save struggling parties rather than Cleric Stance snoozefest through everything like most of this game is. There's a reason I ran Weeping City long after I needed any gear from it, and why I continue to queue a metric butt-ton of Dun Scaiths a week. It's also why I vastly prefer healing in PVP rather than healing in PVE.

I get that the devs want to shy away from constant scenarios like that, because even given the responses in this thread, most people don't want to constantly be pressured or challenged by the game they're playing, but I do wish at least endgame content was handled like this. I like pulling groups back from the brink with lightning-fast usage of cooldowns and still managing my MP despite all the heal spam. I just rarely get to do it because pretty much everything outside of raids is faceroll.

[Fevelle]

As long as no one picks on me for DPSing a little less in the first option, I'd be ok with any situation the DF throws at me.

In cases of boring things like weekly Void Ark and Weeping City, I prefer the second.

As a WHM I have more fun when the tank can't play than when he CAN play but is undergeared. WHM is an AOE HPS powerhouse, and I can rarely put my toolkit to the test (except on day-one release of 24-man raids).

[Fernosaur]

If I'm doing Levelling roulette, I don't mind if people are undergeared or still learning their jobs and fucking up. I tend to offer advice to the best of my ability because my mind-set is already prepared for learning players.

If I queue for lvl 60 or Expert roulettes, even if the tank is undergeared they have no excuses to not allow full healer DPS uptime (for Scholar, at least). The only way to force a Scholar to drop Cleric at this level is if the tank is literally not cycling any CDs at all and pulling everything, which is awful practice. Aetherochemical Facility is the only lvl 60 dungeon in which an undergeared tank can mean 100% healing uptime because of the big gap between the min IL which is 143, I think, and even then that is only on the first couple of pulls.

TL;DR it depends on what I'm queueing for. I don't really want "challenges" on the single roulette that forces me to repeat the same two dungeons I've been repeating for three months, I just want it to be over with :P.

[Reinha]

I prefer an overgeared tank mass pulling or a less geared tank pulling smaller groups. If I lag, I don't have to worry about wiping on trash because my cast is suddenly interrupted for no reason, and if I'm not lagging I can go nuts on the mobs.

[Gemina]

Most tanks learn quickly not to mass pull in DD. It's not a 50+ dungeon. Synced groups lack the 50+ skills that facilitate mass pulling, and even an over geared tank will eat dust before you can say it if he pulls one pack too many. However, you have provided a great example of how the SCH fairy can't always do it on their own, and if the combined healing efforts from SCH and Fairy can't keep the tank alive, it is obviously time to ease it up.

That said, I don't prefer either option. I can tell you that I absolutely despise being in cleric 90% of the time, and will call for mass pulls if this is the case. However, I don't like the stress of having to constantly heal either. Ideal is an even 50/50 split, but a 30/70 either way is totally acceptable. I like to think of myself as an adaptable healer, and I put a lot on the tank to determine how the run is going to go in terms of pace, incoming damage, partial or full clears and so forth. My preference is a tank who will sync with me to help smooth out the run regardless of how much, or how little he pulls.

[matteoxyz]

I like to be challenged, for sure! I like utter chaos with death and resurrection all over.

[RLofOBFL]

50 or 60 dungeons I enjoy mass pulls. 2 pulls is always really easy but 3 & 4 is where it gets fun & I actually have to use my CDs. But if no CDs or largely undergeared I am hesitant. Because I know I'll probably eat the blame if we wipe even if I am doing the best I can.