Should healers now be allowed to play how they choose to play?

[Lambdafish]

For me and my FC, the viability of healer that does not do DPS starts literally at zero on the patch day, and increases as ilvl of people rises. At this point in patch cycle, I don't care if healer does DPS, as long as he can keep us alive during weekly reclears.

I agree that viability rises, however you do also have to factor in the fact that tank ilvl also increases, meaning that healers have an easier job in general. Healers come in all shapes and sizes and some may need this cushion, however there does come a point on a lot of fights where tank ilvls are high enough to allow solo healing, at which point, if the other healer isn't DPSing, they are useless (this is more a phase by phase thing, rather than a fight by fight, as not many fights allow solo healing throughout, however almost every fight has phases which can be solo healed).

Raid healing is also a lot different from Dungeon healing in that the two healers co-ordinate their heals and often split themselves into main healer and offhealer, and if you aren't DPSing as an off healer then you should probably be the main healer.