Healer & Tank DPS (WoW vs FFXIV)

[Teranuh]

First, encounters are all designed to be downed without healers DPSing. It just really, really helps because DPS can't always play optimally due to AOEs, etc (I'm being really polite here....Some just aren't good).

Generally speaking, there is downtime in almost every fight for healers to DPS. As for tanks, they're always DPSing to tank anyways and simply stance dance when not actively tanking to do a bit more. It's all about efficiency - If a healer is casting nothing, there is no major damage incoming, and the healer isn't out of mana, why wouldn't they deal some damage? As a healer myself, I kind of find it annoying because it adds one more thing I have to keep track of on top of mechanics and keeping everyone alive but at the same time, this is how encounters are designed. There's no real reason I can't DPS, for example, at the start of Susano EX or right after Susy's transition - nothing's really happening at those moments to keep me from doing so.

[zipzo]

If a healer is casting nothing, there is no major damage incoming, and the healer isn't out of mana, why wouldn't they deal some damage?

So, my first instinctual healer-based reflex response to this question I think is a rather obvious one...but what if things don't go perfectly smoothly and you need that extra mana later to fix a catastrophic healing demand?

That's mana you expended for damage earlier that you could have had in the chamber in order to execute your actual role to fix a tight situation. So wouldn't this logic only accurately apply in a world where the healer has infinite mana?

[Teranuh]

...

Kind of. As I said in another part of my post, I'm a healer myself and I don't necessarily like DPSing almost precisely for this reason. That being said, there are some parts of fights where someone has to drastically screw up to make that mana spent DPSing matter. Between built-in mana refreshes each healer has and a second healer, they should be able to cast something at all times. As long as you don't have to expend droves of mana rezzing a lot of people, that is. A lot of it has to do with adjusting to the situation - if the group you have is taking more damage than necessary, you might save more of your GCDs and add some downtime to prevent deaths. Healing is easily the most social role in that a lot of the job is down to knowing how people will react and reacting accordingly yourself.

If you know your DPS are good at not taking damage but lacking dps, your first reaction should be to supplement their damage with yours where possible. If you know your DPS have good DPS but screw up mechanics and take extra damage, you should dedicate your mana/time to keeping them alive. It all boils down to what effectively increases raid DPS. Dead DPS = bad for raid DPS. Stationary healer with mana to spare = bad for raid DPS.

[SaitoHikari]

So, my first instinctual healer-based reflex response to this question I think is a rather obvious one...but what if things don't go perfectly smoothly and you need that extra mana later to fix a catastrophic healing demand?

That's mana you expended for damage earlier that you could have had in the chamber in order to execute your actual role to fix a tight situation. So wouldn't this logic only accurately apply in a world where the healer has infinite mana?

Wipes in this game tend to be rather explosive and unsalvageable. The situation you describe (lack of MP being the primary reason you wipe rather than a mechanic being failed/lack of recovery time afterwards) won't happen period unless the tank isn't holding aggro and both DPS end up dying before the tank does (or conversely, the tank dies with enough mobs still alive to chew through everyone else before you can get them back up on their feet). Plus you have Lucid Dreaming to fall back on, and even failing that, a ranged/caster DPS worth their salt will have Refresh/Mana Shift for you.

The main reason why DPSing healers are a thing is because powerful oGCD heals exist, and this is especially why it has become so prevalent for level 60+. Many healers have the mentality to save them as emergency heals, but the top tier healers will use them to blow open windows for them to DPS afterwards. That's pretty much the difference between a standard healer and one that knows how to abuse everything to the fullest.

People aren't expecting healers to balls to the wall DPS 24/7, but to exercise judgment and contribute a little extra instead of standing around with massive amounts of downtime. That said, I am in agreement that it is really on the DPS to push out as much damage as they can rather than forcing a healer to DPS, but as long as an official parser isn't a thing, DPS players will never be held accountable to that. And I find that any healer arguing that DPS players should just get better while simultaneously arguing against the existence of basically anything that outright tells them that they aren't performing up to par is quite frankly contradictory.

(And also as someone that has been openly parsing for close to a year now - healer DPS seems to matter less in SB compared to the situation in HW. It was fairly common for me to see healers push out 1.3k+ DPS in HW when most tanks pushed out 800+ and actual competent DPS pushed out 1.8k+, in terms of expert roulette. But these days, I don't see even DPSing healers doing much higher than they did during HW, while competent DPS can easily break 3k+ now, and I see tanks average out at 1.7k+.)