As a healer, is it my job to DPS? A new perspective.

[Feyona]

Because, as I said, you do whatever you need to do to clear. Personal enjoyment isn't a factor. I personally hate Sword oath, its clunky to move in and out of, and its effect is bland, but I still use it, because I am a terrible tank if I don't.

we didnt need healer dps to clear though. And we didnt need it on a10s to clear either, well as for enjoyment factor .. Its a game? Well thats where Im coming from anyway. Furthermore You state that your a terrible tank if you dont dps is that because it increases aggro? Sorry for asking but I dont know exactly what a tank is supposed to do in savage if hes doing his job

[Tint]

we didnt need healer dps to clear though. And we didnt need it on a10s to clear either, well as for enjoyment factor .. Its a game? Well thats where Im coming from anyway. Furthermore You state that your a terrible tank if you dont dps is that because it increases aggro? Sorry for asking but I dont know exactly what a tank is supposed to do in savage if hes doing his job

a tank is supposed to hold enmity and survive every hit (especially tankbusters) plus 1 auto attack. everything else is over-mitigation, like a healer can overheal. when you can hold enmity and hit the mitigation requirement, all what is left is doing as much dps as possible.

of course it is a little bit more complicated than that. every mitigation is good mitigation, in wich regard you can't over-mitigate. however, sacrificing damage for mitigation wich you don't need (tank stance) is another thing than popping defensive cooldowns wich you don't need to survive, but have no drawbacks also.

[Lambdafish]

Furthermore You state that your a terrible tank if you dont dps is that because it increases aggro?

If I am in shield oath when I am off tanking I am generating unnecessary enmity and losing out on a huge chunk (around 20-25%) of DPS for basically no reason, that is why it is considered bad. Basically the same as cleric stance really.

Its a game?

A multiplayer game. Your enjoyment is no more valid than anyone else in the party. If the party says you don't have to DPS then that's fine, that is team coordination and the strategy being built around players strengths and weaknesses, but if you think your personal enjoyment is more important than 7 other people in a PUG party then you are mistaken.

I feel like I have said that before... hmm... deja vu

[Feyona]

a tank is supposed to hold enmity and survive every hit (especially tankbusters) plus 1 auto attack. everything else is over-mitigation, like a healer can overheal. when you can hold enmity and hit the mitigation requirement, all what is left is doing as much dps as possible.

Yep no argument, was just wondering if it was essential for the job. In which case Im not sure it can be viewed as terrible if your doing your job. I get its not optimal play not to overheal or over mitigate but my argument is if optimal play should be a force, pressure, or stressing factor of the game. Ofc theres always pressure to do your job no question . My argumeng is whether awkward mechanics should be forced on people. When its either not necessary or people are uncomfotable doing it

[Feyona]

If I am in shield oath when I am off tanking I am generating unnecessary enmity and losing out on a huge chunk (around 20-25%) of DPS for basically no reason, that is why it is considered bad. Basically the same as cleric stance really.



A multiplayer game. Your enjoyment is no more valid than anyone else in the party. If the party says you don't have to DPS then that's fine, that is team coordination and the strategy being built around players strengths and weaknesses, but if you think your personal enjoyment is more important than 7 other people in a PUG party then you are mistaken.

I feel like I have said that before... hmm... deja vu

I know my personal enjoyment is not more valid than anyone elses please dont twist this. I was talking about stress and pressure put on people to do stuff outside their role unessarily. Plus I will say that my original point was about you hating the mechanic of it as well as me hating mine. And pressure to do something you hate is not about individual enjoyment its about game design and community pressure. Says more about people wanting to enjoy the game not about making others not enjoy their's

[Lambdafish]

its about game design versus community pressure

The thing about that though is that the community pressure comes from the game design. Meta is formed by game mechanics, players only enforce it. You can play how you like in an isolated space, like a static with friends, but as soon as you go into the open world of party finder, then you are ruled by meta whether you like it or not. I would love to have a discussion about what can be done to shift the meta, but I will tell you that it would involve a radical shift in how a healer plays and it would likely add pressure in other ways.

I actually did my degree on this subject if you are interested (my early playtesters complained that they got bored with exclusively healing, which amuses me). I know exactly how complex role design can be, and I see many design decisions in this game which I maybe don't agree with, and the DPS meta is one of them. Like Yoshi P though, I know that outright removing cleric stance won't fix anything, and it would take a far more complicated design shift to fix that issue (which to some isn't an issue in the first place).

Edit: I should point out that despite disagreeing with design decisions, I still respect the intent of the content developers, that's why I defend the meta, because unless the developers see a clear problem, there's not much that can be done about it.

[bounddreamer]

I know my personal enjoyment is not more valid than anyone elses please dont twist this. I was talking about stress and pressure. Put on people to do stuff outside their role unessarily

You're talking about stress or pressure, but the topic that everyone keeps coming back to is savage content. So I want to address that specifically.

Savage content is really intended for those who want to "stress" about their performance and go up against a bigger challenge than the vanilla fare the rest of the game offers. It's not casual level content. It is for people who want to push themselves, especially if it's a trial or raid tier that's dropping before max gear is available.

Just the naming convention, "savage," "extreme," lets you know it's really there to push yourself as a player. So I think that going into that kind of content with the mindset that a person shouldn't be expecting pressure and is going for clears wanting to feel laid back and stress free is pretty unrealistic. Does that make sense?

This more challenging content is for people who want a bigger challenge, therefore for some people it's going to be greater stress. At least, until it's cleared and on farm.

[Feyona]

You're talking about stress or pressure, but the topic that everyone keeps coming back to is savage content. So I want to address that specifically.

While your points are valid and dong disagree Im stating that savage can be cleared in a casual way also. We dont need that optimal play in such a rigid way to do so. The content in itself has enough stress . I think you really can enjoy content without unnecessary stress put on people. If a mechanic is creating undue stress cos of the way its designed I would like sothing done about it though rather than just accept all people should always be able to do it, or be excuded. Content should be open to all approaches hard core or casual In my view anyway its not exclusive to hard core mentality

[Feyona]

The thing about that though is that the community pressure comes from the game design. Meta is formed by game mechanics, players only enforce it. You can play how you like in an isolated space.

my specialization is psychology if you havent guessed. As such Ive studied what things impact on people. Whether anyone agrees or not Exclusion is classed as abuse in RL situations, and although no one is interested here Im here to advocate for enjoyment for all people whether they are optimal, or super skilled or not. I understand the meta. Whether it should be forced is what we are discussing. Only the game designers can change stuff though. You dont think dps healing is an issue I respect your opinion, but I do think it is in numerous ways.

[bounddreamer]

Content should be open to all approaches hard core or casual In my view anyway its not exclusive to hard core mentality

But it is! Find a group of like minded people, and/or do it when gear is higher than minimum (or now with added Echo.) So those options already exist.

I'm just pointing out the fact that this is the absolute most difficult content in the game. So far it's still probably around 6% of the total player base who has cleared A12S? Last I looked, it was 5%.

The people who are putting themselves into this content to begin with ought to, by definition, have a higher bar for stress or a greater capacity for higher level play than most people.

And this is an MMO. You're playing it with 7 other people. Everyone ought to be relatively on the same page for how you want to tackle the content with your own group. My group cracks a lot of jokes and talks a lot unless we're super focused on fight progression. Other groups prefer to operate in silence except for callouts. Everyone has to find their own best fit.