Is DPS'ing as a Healer Vote Kickable?

[DaikiKiyoshi]

It's a question of parity.
Would you accept other roles only pressing buttons for less than 20% of the duration of the instance?

It's actually false equivalency. Other roles are not healer roles. Tanks are almost forced to do damage in most cases in order to fulfill their "primary" role. DDs are forced to do dps for rather self evident reasons. It's what those classes are built around. Pumping out more damage than any other class should be capable of. In both these instances dealing damage is either required or somewhat required to fulfill the classes main role. The healers main role however is to keep the party alive and to revive fallen party members. Dealing damage is in no way required for them to fulfill this primary role and this is why you have the "Healers are not required to dps" argument. If you want to blame anyone blame SE for tuning every instance to the lowest denominator and allowing us to so massively overgear content. If anything this healers must dps during downtime mindset only serves to show SE that their current balancing of the system is perfectly acceptable and they don't need to change anything. Mindlessly spamming stone III because there's nothing else for you to do does not indicate good game design!!!

[Greedalox]

It's actually false equivalency.

I'd argue that's only a half truth. In the literal sense, yes Healers are Healers. But FF14's Holy Trinity+1 doesn't exist beyond arbitrary titles due to all the classes having DPS/Support/Heals outside of their "role".

I'd be more apt to fully agree with you if healers didn't have access to damaging abilities and support tools. You would kick Black Mages in an instant if they refused to use Apocatastasis in order for a tank to survive a tankbuster, or BRD/MCH who refuse to support with their toolkit. Maybe your summoner doesn't like using their battle Rez cause he's a DPS- not a healer?

You use the tools in your kit to help your team, not fit yourself in a Medica 2 AFK box over something as silly as a checkbox in LFG.

[Nixxe]

I'd argue that's only a half truth. In the literal sense, yes Healers are Healers. But FF14's Holy Trinity+1 doesn't exist beyond arbitrary titles due to all the classes having DPS/Support/Heals outside of their "role".

I'd be more apt to fully agree with you if healers didn't have access to damaging abilities and support tools. You would kick Black Mages in an instant if they refused to use Apocatastasis in order for a tank to survive a tankbuster, or BRD/MCH who refuse to support with their toolkit. Maybe your summoner doesn't like using their battle Rez cause he's a DPS- not a healer?

You use the tools in your kit to help your team, not fit yourself in a Medica 2 AFK box over something as silly as a checkbox in LFG.

If you need the BLM cooldown to complete the encounter, then that is akin to when you need healer DPS to do so as well. Would you even think of kicking the BLM for not using Apocatastasis to help the healer when it's not a question of the life or death for the tank and it's merely a slight convenience for the healer and/or tank? Probably not.

[Greedalox]

If you need the BLM cooldown to complete the encounter, then that is akin to when you need healer DPS to do so as well. Would you even think of kicking the BLM for not using Apocatastasis to help the healer when it's not a question of the life or death for the tank and it's merely a slight convenience for the healer and/or tank? Probably not.

The point purely stands that no 2 classes are the same so you'll never have a true equivalence of what a class can offer a team. It just so happens that something all 3 healers have in common is great capacity to assist a team beyond Regen/Fairy/Helios- powerful DPS tools. And yes, there have been fights in this game where the healers HAVE to help (And that's in healing situations that would make most Non-Dps Healers head spin).

Ignoring some of the most powerful tools in your kit out of laze when you're well within the capacity to do so (Talkin' about you /mdancers and 80% no casts) is at best terrible, and at worst disrespectful. The comparisons I made with Apo/Mantra/MP Songs/BRez is that they're all tools that don't traditionally fill the role they belong to, but they're still powerful tools anyhow that are used and expected to be used. It's not a question of NEED to be used at this point, we're long past that argument on page 2 of this thread. It's about using the tools within your kit to the best of your ability to help your team to down the content. When I meet a healer with near 0% overhealing and 0 mana remaining at the end of an encounter without DPSing then there may be merit to ZDPS Healers. Until SE ups the healing conditions for dungeon content/raids, expect people to be off put by Regen+afk for the next 20 seconds.

[Nixxe]

The point purely stands that no 2 classes are the same so you'll never have a true equivalence of what a class can offer a team. It just so happens that something all 3 healers have in common is great capacity to assist a team beyond Regen/Fairy/Helios- powerful DPS tools. And yes, there have been fights in this game where the healers HAVE to help (And that's in healing situations that would make most Non-Dps Healers head spin).

Ignoring some of the most powerful tools in your kit out of laze when you're well within the capacity to do so (Talkin' about you /mdancers and 80% no casts) is at best terrible, and at worst disrespectful. The comparisons I made with Apo/Mantra/MP Songs/BRez is that they're all tools that don't traditionally fill the role they belong to, but they're still powerful tools anyhow that are used and expected to be used. It's not a question of NEED to be used at this point, we're long past that argument on page 2 of this thread. It's about using the tools within your kit to the best of your ability to help your team to down the content. When I meet a healer with near 0% overhealing and 0 mana remaining at the end of an encounter without DPSing then there may be merit to ZDPS Healers. Until SE ups the healing conditions for dungeon content/raids, expect people to be off put by Regen+afk for the next 20 seconds.

If someone wants to spend their free time doing the Manderville, more power to them. They aren't getting my com, but I have better things to do than get stressed out because randoms aren't doing whatever I want them to if they aren't actually stopping me from doing what I want.

[Greedalox]

If someone wants to spend their free time doing the Manderville, more power to them. They aren't getting my com, but I have better things to do than get stressed out because randoms aren't doing whatever I want them to if they aren't actually stopping me from doing what I want.

You do you. I believe most players are like water and follow the path of least resistance which in turn breeds terrible players which perpetuates the problem. There's nothing wrong with having reasonable expectations beyond flat out bad for your fellow player. SE can't mold a community quite like a community itself- your apathy is sure to raise zero critical self thought on improving those who may need it. But at least they didn't get your com.

[Saito_S]

If you need the BLM cooldown to complete the encounter, then that is akin to when you need healer DPS to do so as well. Would you even think of kicking the BLM for not using Apocatastasis to help the healer when it's not a question of the life or death for the tank and it's merely a slight convenience for the healer and/or tank? Probably not.

No I wouldn't, but then I also wouldn't kick a healer who isn't DPS'ing, at least, not without asking them about it and seeing what (if anything) they said in reply. If they were healing well, and weren't an arse, I might just let the lack of DPS slide. It'd take more than that for me to want to kick someone - at least, more than JUST the fact that they aren't DPS'ing. Especially if we're in an easy dungeon. That's just me - I tend to view kicking as something that should only be done in specific circumstances. That doesn't change my stance on healer DPS'ing in general. By the same token, kicking someone because they are doing DPS as a healer - if they are successfully balancing DPS and keeping the party healthy, using whatever buffs are needed, etc. - in other words kicking them SOLELY because they are DPS'ing and you don't think healers should DPS, makes you a grade-A douchebag.

It's actually false equivalency. Other roles are not healer roles.

That's ridiculous. "Other roles are not healer roles" is a true statement of fact, sure, but it doesn't change anything.

A healer gets to slack off, stand around waiting for incoming damage or a need for Esuna/other buffs, etc, simply... because they are a healer? "You picked the GREEN role - congratulations! Sit on your ass and watch Netflix while your party fights the boss!"

It's not a false equivalency at all. It's basic fairness: there is NO GOOD REASON why we should all just be perfectly okay with the idea that 3 classes in this game get to spend 3/4s of their time during easy-to-middling difficulty content standing around doing the Moogle Dance while the rest of their party must be constantly performing skills and paying attention to the fight.

If you want to blame anyone blame SE for tuning every instance to the lowest denominator and allowing us to so massively overgear content. If anything this healers must dps during downtime mindset only serves to show SE that their current balancing of the system is perfectly acceptable and they don't need to change anything. Mindlessly spamming stone III because there's nothing else for you to do does not indicate good game design!!!

Sure, this is valid - to a degree. Blame SE if you don't like the way healers work. I don't really mind it (granted, I haven't played healer myself much in ages; my stance on the basic design could change if I start playing a healer in current content), but I don't think I would mind if things were tuned so that actual healing itself was much more demanding, leaving little-to-no time for DPS'ing, either.

But this is the game we have. SE's design choices don't entitle you to sit around while your party does all the work. The simple fact of the matter is: healers in this game have a fully loaded freight train's worth of DOWNTIME during a lot of the content in this game. Not all content - no one is saying that. And DPS isn't MORE important than keeping your party alive - no one is saying that either. Nor that you have to DPS in ALL situations - obviously if you've got a super squishy tank who barely qualifies for the ilvl req and loses half their HP when the monsters sneeze, then of course you're not going to be able to DPS much, if at all, even if normally, you would. I'm putting these in bold because I'm tired of people trotting those things out, as if ANYONE here is advocating letting your party die, or saying "you should be constantly DPS'ing as a healer in synched EX Primal fights or Savage raids or you're a bad healer!"

But outside of those situations, healers have got that downtime. It's there. This is not up for debate.

If you REALLY think that watching Netflix, doing the Moogle Dance, standing around, sitting on the ground, or just overhealing the shit out of your party is a good way to play... If you think it's okay to demand WAY more than that from tanks and DPS classes, even in relatively easy content, but just say "healers can sit on their ass, because they're healers"... then I don't know what to tell you.

[Nixxe]

You do you. I believe most players are like water and follow the path of least resistance which in turn breeds terrible players which perpetuates the problem. There's nothing wrong with having reasonable expectations beyond flat out bad for your fellow player. SE can't mold a community quite like a community itself- your apathy is sure to raise zero critical self thought on improving those who may need it. But at least they didn't get your com.

Nobody ever told me to DPS. I just do it because I can and I don't really like being in whatever dungeon longer than I have to after I've done it a few times. All of my MMO experience suggests the majority of people are like me and are sufficiently self-interested to contribute what they feel they can, even if they don't really want to do it per se, simply to not spend more time than necessary in content they've done a dozen times. It seems extraordinarily unlikely that we need people actively trying to police randoms and generally injecting negativity and stress because they feel they need to be the boss and micromanage everyone else in the dungeon. Part of random groups is accepting that you don't control everything and you can't be sure what you'll get. You just need to roll with the punches and do what you can to contribute to the success of the group on an individual level.

No I wouldn't, but then I also wouldn't kick a healer who isn't DPS'ing, at least, not without asking them about it and seeing what (if anything) they said in reply. If they were healing well, and weren't an arse, I might just let the lack of DPS slide. It'd take more than that for me to want to kick someone - at least, more than JUST the fact that they aren't DPS'ing. Especially if we're in an easy dungeon. That's just me - I tend to view kicking as something that should only be done in specific circumstances. That doesn't change my stance on healer DPS'ing in general. By the same token, kicking someone because they are doing DPS as a healer - if they are successfully balancing DPS and keeping the party healthy, using whatever buffs are needed, etc. - in other words kicking them SOLELY because they are DPS'ing and you don't think healers should DPS, makes you a grade-A douchebag.

Yeah, I mean I look for any excuse not to kick someone, unless they're being a jerk. In general I just don't concern myself with what other people are doing. I actually do agree that healers should DPS if they can find time to safely do so and everyone should generally do what they can to contribute, even if it isn't in line with the strictest interpretation of their role title. Where I seem to disagree with a lot of people in this thread is that I'm just not the least bit interested in trying to punish them if they don't play the way I want them too. I know personally there are times I don't DPS as a healer because I'm just too tired to care and I'm sure other people are the same way or simply aren't comfortable doing it or whatever. I let it slide and just hope for that courtesy in return if I need it later down the road.

[Greedalox]

Nobody ever told me to DPS.

This may come across as sarcastic, but just because you got the memo doesn't mean everyone else did.

For what it's worth, I've never kicked a ZDPS healer. What you call policing and bossy micromanaging may be a tad more grand in your head than an actual situation that takes place. Random party doesn't mean that you're playing with people who can never have a clue. People don't get better when nobody tells them they have somewhere to improve and they've never paid mind to alternatives.

Part of being a part of an MMO means you're part of a community whether you like to admit it or not, which means you are actively shaping it along with everyone else. Unlike you, I believe in the potential of the playerbase- I believe it to be higher than bare minimum of Regen, stand in everything and live anyways and single target DPSing on a pack of 8 mobs. If actively hoping to raise the bar is Bossy Policing then sure, call it what you will, but your "bads will be bads will be bads and don't bother trying to help" mentality might tickle your Free Country bone, but it certainly isn't helping the games community in the long run.

Besides, at the end of the day all I can offer is advice and reasoning. I can't be policing nothin' if they don't want to get better so no skin off their back anyways.

[Aylis]

FF14's Holy Trinity+1 doesn't exist beyond arbitrary titles due to all the classes having DPS/Support/Heals outside of their "role".

I'd be more apt to fully agree with you if healers didn't have access to damaging abilities and support tools.

You use the tools in your kit to help your team, not fit yourself in a Medica 2 AFK box over something as silly as a checkbox in LFG.

This is all why I'm convinced FFXIV exists in some kinda bubble universe, away from normal MMO practices in terms of healers. The druid days and the druid in me is screaming at these arguments. Where during parties it was globally expected of me to heal the party, keep up a steady flow of DOT's, root/snare/kite adds and be the puller if needed. In raids add in all the above plus spot healing the Main Tank party and timing my mass SDB's on the raid. Every trinity game I've played healers were always meant to go above and beyond the call of duty. It's why i love the healer role...we get to stay the most busy and rely on split second choices. It's a stressful role but we love every minute of it.