Healers that don't want to DPS are like DPSes who refuse to move out of AoEs.

[Taika]

Can someone link me to where he said Healers focus on healing? Thanks.

In PAX East QA Yoshi said that healers need to remember they're still healers and their first priority is keeping their party members alive ("Don't get wrapped up in cleric stance so that all your party members end up dead" or something). It's from this video from around 28 mins: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/127955803.

Basically he said the same thing everyone else has been saying: keep your party members alive, then you can DPS.

[Hirmu]

People really need to relax and remember this is just a game!

I'll just come clean and admit that when healing I've wiped the party many times. Usually I mess up a mechanic, don't heal prey target in time or someone is in low health and I don't top them up before aoe and they die. In dungeons I've been stuck in cleric stance and the tank has died. This happens sometimes. And when on tank, I've died because not using cooldowns right, messing up tank swaps or just plain standing in stupid when there's too much going on. On DPS I die mostly to messed up mechanics. So the point is, I've died and messed up in almost every imaginable way in this game. And yes, one of those is being stuck in cleric stance.

So what? Out of all the thousands of deaths, healer doing dps is probably the cause in less than 1 % of the cases. Wipes happen, then you return and start over, it's not that big of a deal! I'd much rather spend an hour in expert wiping and helping a healer learn how to dps and heal than get through in 20 minutes and watching the healer do nothing most of the time. You're not supposed to sit idle for 70% of the time just because there's a tiny chance you might make a mistake and cause a wipe.

And you know the types of people who in case of a wipe would be the ones who start rambling and raging on how healers (or tanks) aren't doing their job right? Don't be those people.

[KokonoeAiyoko]

In PAX East QA Yoshi said that healers need to remember they're still healers and their first priority is keeping their party members alive ("Don't get wrapped up in cleric stance so that all your party members end up dead" or something). It's from this video from around 28 mins: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/127955803.

Basically he said the same thing everyone else has been saying: keep your party members alive, then you can DPS.

Hmm... I notice he also states "So you will still have to focus on healing, and take care of that, but if you still want to help your party members with the DPS, then you may help them".

The usage of "may" is similar to the one utilized in the Hall of the Novice.

[aleph_null]

I might be thinking of a suggestion from 3 years ago or something but would it help anything to allow overhealing to provide buffs?

Such as if someone gets a heal when at full health the healed teammate gets a small haste effect that lasts a varying amount of time that depends on how much excess health they got.

Then someone who hates to stance dance or dps can still provide something and not be standing about.

That'd stupidly raise the amount of aggro tanks need to deal with, so either make overheals generate no aggro, or make the buff worth the extra aggro combo (or tank stance uptime) the tank has to do.

[Taika]

Hmm... I notice he also states "So you will still have to focus on healing, and take care of that, but if you still want to help your party members with the DPS, then you may help them".

The usage of "may" is similar to the one utilized in the Hall of the Novice.

Well yes, he couldn't just go there and say "and after that you're absolutely forced to cast your damage spells", now could he?

In any case, what Yoshi P says is not relevant to the argument in any way. How the jobs should be played is defined by the game design: how the abilities and fights actually work.

[KokonoeAiyoko]

Well yes, he couldn't just go there and say "and after that you're absolutely forced to cast your damage spells", now could he?

He doesn't say people "should" be DPSing ever is the main point.

In any case, what Yoshi P says is not relevant to the argument in any way. How the jobs should be played is defined by the game design: how the abilities and fights actually work.

It's honestly not even an argument. Healers heal, the DPS side of it is an optional optimal way they can help due to the potency of it. It will never be mandatory or "bad healing" to not DPS as healer. Maybe inferior healer DPS, but not inferior healing.

[Taika]

He doesn't say people "should" be DPSing ever is the main point.

Exactly, what I said was he can't tell the players they're supposed to play in a certain way.

It's honestly not even an argument. Healers heal, the DPS side of it is an optional optimal way they can help due to the potency of it. It will never be mandatory or "bad healing" to not DPS as healer. Maybe inferior healer DPS, but not inferior healing.

It's an inferior way to play a healer job if you wish to go into splitting hairs.

[Kitfox]

It's honestly not even an argument. Healers heal, the DPS side of it is an optional optimal way they can help due to the potency of it. It will never be mandatory or "bad healing" to not DPS as healer. Maybe inferior healer DPS, but not inferior healing.

Your argument is even worse:
"It's not bad tanking, just inferior CD usage!" - Tank that doesn't want to use CDs.
"It's not bad MNK DPS, just inferior positionals!" - MNK that doesn't want to use positionals.
"It's not bad DRG DPS, just inferior combos!" - DRG that doesn't want to use Blood of the Dragon.
"It's not bad SMN DPS, just inferior DoTs!" - SMN that doesn't want to use DoTs.
"It's not bad BLM DPS, just inferior use of fire magic!" - Ice mage.
"It's not bad support, just inferior TP/MP regeneration!" - BRD/MCH that doesn't use songs/turret.

But hey, it's all optional optimization, right?

[aleph_null]

He doesn't say people "should" be DPSing ever is the main point.

The way I see it is that if it benefits your group, why shouldn't you do it? It's like saying smn should use virus, blm should use apoc, mnk should use mantra, those are all not a part of their "job" (the way some people here insist dps isn't a healer's "job") since they're dps, but those separate the better players from the rest. I'd go as far as say that healers should also know when to use their dps utilities like balance/arrow and fey wind, and time them according to when the dps players do their burst rotations with cds up, but that's playing at a much higher level than simply healing and dpsing.

I don't like to draw hard lines on what is or isn't my "job", I just look at them based on how they benefit my group and whether they're feasible given the situation (no one should prioritize dps over keeping people alive).

[Taika]

I don't like to draw hard lines on what is or isn't my "job", I just look at them based on how they benefit my group and whether they're feasible given the situation (no one should prioritize dps over keeping people alive).

Exactly, and this is the logical and most effective way of playing any job in this game. Look at the situation, look at the abilities you have, and use what's best for your group in that situation. This applies to every single job in the game.

It makes absolutely no sense whatsoever to start drawing artificial lines to which abilities should be used and which should not - especially when it's only based on what your job's role is named as.